It’s hard to an estimate official number on how many queer and gender-nonconforming people ICE is currently detaining, but Francisco is one of them. He has been detained at Dodge Detention Center since October of 2018, far from his friends and the community that is fighting for his release. In late March 2020, his attorneys filed a humanitarian parole request to the ICE field director asking for his release given the current COVID-19 pandemic. Unfortunately, despite the community support, this request was denied. Francisco remains detained by ICE although he has been granted relief twice by an immigration judge, he has now been detained for over a year and a half. In another attempt to gain his release, his attorneys have filed a habeas petition. We know Robert Guadian, ICE field office director, has the power to grant Francisco his release. We ask that you email the field office director and let him know that we support Francisco. We need Francisco released now!

Last fall, profit-driven detention company VisionQuest announced plans to detain 60 Central American youth within Philadelphia, a sanctuary city. In response to this announcement, the community mounted fierce opposition. Philadelphia denied VisionQuest’s permit application, affirming its status as a sanctuary city and protecting immigrant youth from a detention company with a decades-long track record of physical and emotional abuse -- and even death. But the fight is not over. VisionQuest, which stands to reap $5.3 million on this immigrant youth jail contract, has now filed a lawsuit against the city. The company is claiming “discrimination” because the city has said no to locking up Central American youth here. On June 13th the courts sided with VisionQuest stating that allowing them to open their detention center now will cause "no adverse impact on or jeopardy of health, safety, or welfare of the employees of VisionQuest or the children placed in the shelter." even after multiple employees have come out publicly stating that the North Philadelphia location “Is not safe for us right now….“How would it be safe for the kids?” We ask that you join us in demanding that Visionquest stop pursuing the opening of their child detention center! VisionQuest is a company with a shocking record of abuse going back decades. Between the company’s founding in 1973 and 1991, twelve children died while being held in VisionQuest’s “care.” In 2017, VisionQuest closed its previous youth jail in Philadelphia after staffers punched, choked, and demeaned children being held there. Philadelphia youth subjected to VisionQuest have also reported being held in restraints, having ribs broken, and being burned with an iron. Speaking up in defense of their undocumented peers, these youth leaders have declared VisionQuest unsafe for youth. Questioned about such abuses in a public meeting, the company dismissed them as past events and argued that the new immigrant youth jail would “revitalize” the neighborhood and “create jobs” for the community -- absurd justifications that community members rejected. These community members prevailed when city officials rejected a new detention-for-profit scheme in our city. Help us keep winning in this fight by signing this petition and sharing it with your networks. En la lucha Juntos

For the better part of a year, Jesús Lorenzo-Ávila suffered multiple instances of physical and retaliatory abuse at the hands of El Paso Service Processing Center detention facility staff. Verbal harassment and vindictive retaliation now continue at the Otero County Processing Center. For his safety, we demand the immediate release of Jesús from ICE custody. Last year at the El Paso Service Processing Center, Jesús was falsely accused of breaking facility rules and placed in prolonged solitary confinement on multiple occasions. At this detention facility, local advocacy groups have documented a recurring pattern of false accusations and retaliatory use of solitary. Targeted for his sexual orientation, and for his courage to assert his rights, Jesús suffered multiple instances of solitary confinement. In January of this year, the retaliation reached a crescendo when Jesús was beaten by a guard and taken to the hospital. Upon his return to the facility, staff falsely accused him of having assaulted the guard. Jesús was placed back into solitary, denied friend and legal visits, and on one occasion left in his cell in his underwear for not donning the red uniform indicative of high security individuals. Jesús refuses to be treated as a criminal by the very criminals who assault him, and covered it up. Now at the Otero County Processing Center, Jesús is again being targeted for retaliation. At Otero, he spent 30 days in solitary confinement, was released for a single day, again falsely accused by facility staff, and placed back into solitary for at least another 15 days. Right now he is in solitary confinement. Facility staff at both El Paso and Otero rely on fear and intimidation to keep people quietly compliant when their rights are violated. When someone like Jesús courageously stands up without fear to speak up for himself and those around him, the consequences are violent. Clearly Jesús is not safe in a detention facility. He has been discriminated against, violently beaten, and psychologically tortured in solitary confinement by privately contracted detention center staff. ICE is fully complicit with this treatment. For his own safety, Jesús must be released from detention. We also demand an investigation into the abuses at both the El Paso and Otero facilities, and for those who are responsible to be held accountable. ____________________________________________________________________ UNIVISION story covering Jesús “Esto es tortura”: Así hablan los inmigrantes que han sido aislados por tiempo prolongado en celdas de castigo | “Victims of torture?” Immigrants complain of lengthy punishment in solitary confinement cells". https://tinyurl.com/y428qkb2 Recent News about conditions impacting the safety of LGBTQ persons detained at Otero ACLU-NM. Letter of Complaint. “Detention Conditions Impacting the Safety and Well-Being of LGBTQ Immigrants in the Otero County Processing Center.” Letter of Complaint, March 25, 2019. https://www.aclu-nm.org/sites/default/files/field_documents/advance_copy_of_3.25.2019_las_americas_santa_fe_dreamers_project_aclu-nm_letter_to_dhs_re_otero.pdf Bixby, Scott. “Trans Migrant Women in ICE Detention Allegedly Told to Bathe With Men.” The Daily Beast, March 27, 2019, sec. politics. https://www.thedailybeast.com/trans-migrant-women-in-ice-detention-allegedly-told-to-bathe-with-men Moore, Robert. “Gay, Transgender Detainees Allege Abuse at ICE Facility in New Mexico.” Washington Post, March 25, 2019. https://www.washingtonpost.com/immigration/gay-transgender-detainees-allege-abuse-at-ice-facility-in-new-mexico/2019/03/25/e33ad6b6-4f10-11e9-a3f7-78b7525a8d5f_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.cd3ec8a69a9d

See above

Call ICE Director Henry Lucero at ICE headquarters at (602) 200-2215 to let her go home with her children. Sample Script: “I would like to leave a message to ICE Director Henry Lucero. I’m calling in support of Sandra Ramos, A# 078676226 she is a loving single mother of four children who are currently without a home right now. I’m aware that Ms. Ramos had a traffic violation but she has young children who need their mom home. Ms. Ramos’s case has garnered public attention and many are looking more closely into the case. I urge to use your prosecutorial discretion to keep Sandra home with her children. Thank you.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DeFLgGZwcIE&feature=youtu.be

Jose Montelongo is an immigrant from Arizona who just this January sued a local Sheriff for his 48hr detainer policy, that allows the re-arrest of undocumented people for up to 48-hours after they have been released on all state and local charges. ICE lifted the detainer on Jose after the jail commander informed their agency that Jose was likely to succeed on the merits of his emergency request for a Temporary Restraining Order on the Sheriff’s policy. Jose was successfully released on a $200.00 bond from the Coconino County Jail on February 14, 2019, and welcomed with open arms by his children, family, and community. Since his release, ICE has been surveilling the Flagstaff community. On April 18-19 agents targeted immigrant communities in the cities of Flagstaff and Sedona, searching for Jose. ICE detained and threatened loved ones of Jose, who were told that if they did not tell ICE agents Jose’s location, they would go after their family; ICE kept their promise. At least two who were detained were shown files on various members of the community full of information collected through heavy surveillance. Jose’s father was told, “The more attention this gets, the worse it will be for your family.” He refused to speak and is now in Eloy Detention Center awaiting a bond hearing. This is an egregious attack by ICE to chill undocumented people from exercising their civil rights and terrorize communities and organizers. https://youtu.be/eOsD9GO3xqU Jose has lived in Flagstaff since he was 9 years old, for close to 20 years. Last December he was booked into the Coconino County Jail after being pulled over for going 2 miles over the speed limit. He had a failure to appear warrant from 2016 that was unresolved due to a previous voluntary departure in 2016. Jose returned to the United States after his life was threatened and his children’s mother was having trouble caring for his two oldest children on her own. According to Jose, it was made clear to him by ICE agents that the raids and his detention were retaliation for his lawsuit, stating that he should not have let himself be convinced by others he could exercise his rights. After a heavily armed, warrantless and inhumane action led by ICE to capture Jose, agents pulled into a Home Depot parking lot in Cottonwood, Arizona, and thanked him for the raises they would receive, adding plainly that he had brought this upon himself for filing a lawsuit against the Coconino County Sheriff. As recently decided in a federal appeals court case, retaliatory actions towards undocumented activists and advocates are a violation of our first amendment rights.

Nicole Garcia Aguilar is a trans woman who fled Honduras after surviving a violent attack and death threats. Despite being granted asylum in the U.S., ICE detained her unlawfully and placed her in solitary confinement for months. Coverage by the Associated Press and the Guardian: https://apnews.com/04032e8265fe45789a581c2e7ada3823?fbclid=IwAR0tPJ5C-00AQiQ5kl7RK4k9rWbFJKuki5lo6HuhZOkUFptXjdP29Gj-XnI https://amp.theguardian.com/global-development/2019/apr/19/honduran-transgender-woman-nicole-garcia-aguilar-freed-us-detention?CMP=share_btn_tw&__twitter_impression=true

Ali Marounfa (also known as Ali Tera), was born in Niger, West Africa and has lived in the United States for the past thirty years. Ali, 58, has two teenage daughters who are US citizens. A political activist with the Moden Fa Lumana part and the past president of the Niger Association in North Carolina who has publicly denounced corruption in the governing administration, he has been held in Stewart Detention Center in Georgia since June 2017, reportedly detained at the request of the government of President Mahamadou Issoufou, who currently hosts US military bases in Niger. He is not a criminal or a terrorist. Ali has been ordered deported by April 4, 2019. In addition to cruelly separating his family to pay back a Trump foreign policy ally, Ali's family fears his deportation would result in his imprisonment and torture. According to Amnesty International, other members of Moden Fa Lumana have received prison terms for criticizing the government on social media: https://www.amnesty.org/en/countries/africa/niger/report-niger/ Sen. Tillis has intervened to demand that ICE support other political activists like Liu Xia of China (https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/1587/cosponsors?q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22%5C%22section+245+of+the+Immigration+and+Nationality+Act%5C%22+and+%5C%22for+the+relief+of%5C%22%22%5D%7D&r=23). He should act now to stop this politically motivated family separation.

Chicago Mayoral Candidate Lori Lightfoot has said she is a progressive, pro-immigrant candidate, and has committed to moving forward some pro-immigrant reforms. However, the presence of two Aldermen from Chicago’s most conservative Aldermen at a recent Lori Lightfoot endorsement caused the immigrant community concern. Alderman Sposato recently condemned Chicago’s status as a sanctuary city, stating that elected officials should ignore the immigrant community and work closely with ICE to deport Chicago residents. Watch the video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tk0WsYfQLTo Alderman Napolitano is the only Republican in City Council and held a press conference the day after the city created IDs that were inclusive of Chicago’s immigrant residents. To show that she stands with the immigrant community Candidate Lori Lightfoot should denounce these anti-immigrant stances and reject any possible endorsements.

On December 27th, Sikh asylum seekers started a hunger strike to protest the discrimination, verbal abuse, lack of language access, and prolonged detention they have faced at the hands of ICE. The hunger strikers were joined shortly after by more Sikh and Cuban asylum seekers who have faced similar discrimination and lengthy detention. ICE has taken the extreme step of force-feeding nine hunger strikers through plastic nasal tubes, a painful and inhumane process. When asked if those being force-fed were being treated well by medical staff, one man simply responded: "they don't care". ICE has a history of cruelty and discrimination. This is only one of several hunger strikes happening across the country, which speaks to a pervasive problem with this government institution. While immediate relief for all hunger strikers is key, the only acceptable permanent solution is for the government to abolish the immigrant detention system, cease the criminalization of migrants, and provide safe and fair opportunities for immigration. Asylum-seekers should not have to endanger their own health and expose themselves to retaliation from ICE in order to make progress in their cases. We call on civil society to ask that ICE stop torturing asylum seekers and instead do the work of considering their claims in a legal hearing.

New research shows that Amazon is helping ICE track, detain, and deport immigrants -- in a big way. We've known that Amazon's servers host Palantir, the company that provides ICE with “mission-critical services,” such as its case management software, and we've been pressuring Amazon to drop Palantir. But it turns out Amazon's role in the deportation machine goes deeper than that. Through intense lobbying of policymakers and law enforcement officials, Amazon and Palantir have secured a role as the backbone for the federal government’s immigration and law enforcement dragnet, allowing them to pursue multi-billion dollar government contracts in various agencies at every single level of law enforcement. These systems are new, and dangerous in new ways. They are accumulating unprecedented amounts of data (everything from facial scans to social media content), and exchanging information among city, state, and regional law enforcement systems, as well as some foreign governments, for the purpose of finding, deporting, and detaining immigrants. DHS and many other law enforcement agencies are spending billions of taxpayer dollars on these tech systems -- and Amazon, Palantir and other tech companies are pushing them to go further. It's time to hold Amazon accountable for its outsized share in building the deportation machine, and demand that they stop. It won't be easy -- Amazon makes billions from these contracts. But the company also depends on consumers -- including millions of Latinx people -- and has to worry about protecting its brand. Recently, the company was forced to raise its minimum wage to $15/hour, which wouldn't have happened without a major campaign demanding it. We can force Amazon to stop helping DHS and ICE target immigrants, if enough of us call them out, stay engaged, and keep the pressure on.

For 17 years the Cardona/Dunoyer family have lived in the United States after fleeing from their home country due to threats from Columbian guerilla groups. As of March 2017, Consuelo Cardona, Roberto Dunoyer, along with their sons Pablo (age 19), and Camilo (age 16) became the beneficiaries of a private immigration bill, HR 1490. It remains pending as of today. The family has no criminal record. Camilo Dunoyer recently graduated high school and is attending community college in San Diego. Pablo Dunoyer is scheduled to graduate college with his Associate's Degree and has been accepted to the University of San Diego to continue his education. If they are deported they will lose everything that they have worked hard for and their lives will be at risk.