ICE Can Be Stopped By Citizens Of Faith

ICE Can Be Stopped By Citizens Of Faith
This post was published on the now-closed HuffPost Contributor platform. Contributors control their own work and posted freely to our site. If you need to flag this entry as abusive, send us an email.

Catholic, Evangelical, Jewish, Islamic, and other faith groups support Sanctuary Cities. Citizens of these groups must unite to stop ICE, Trump’s deportation agenda.

Sofi Cruz meets Pope Francis in Washington, D.C.

Undocumented immigrants are sacred to me. When Pope Francis came to the Obama White House in 2015, he reminded crowd that America has largely been built by immigrant families.

“As the son of an immigrant family, I am happy to be a guest in this country, which was largely built by such families.” - Pope Francis at the White House, 9/23/2015

The crowd went nuts. Families...for a moment, that’s what immigration in America was as it has been for centuries about families. No sooner had the Pope left the U.S. that immigration pivoted back to the opposite of families, where it remains in 2017. Trump’s deportation agenda is the opposite of American families.

The Trump Administration’s deportation agenda is a nightmare for American families. Immigrant communities face increasing rigidity when it comes to ripping families apart through harsher interpretations of our badly broken immigration law.

At a high-level, the White House immigration maneuvers have set the initial political and policy battlefield over what are called ‘Sanctuary Cities’. General John Kelly, the new White House Chief of Staff, has advocated for congress to do right be Dreamers but otherwise is a soldier in the deportation agenda. Increasingly, Kelly seems to control the president’s schedule.

“People who knew him said he’s an adult who will stand up to Trump, he’s not a white nationalist, he’s a balanced guy who can impose some order,” said Frank Sharry, executive director of America’s Voice Education Fund. “But all we’ve seen him do is be a good foot soldier for mass deportation."

Down the chain of command it doesn’t get much better. Chief Strategist Steve Bannon, Attorney General Jeff Sessions, and ICE Director Thomas Homan are working seamlessly on a deportation apocalypse. What’s happening now is ugly, but it can get so much worse — especially as the the Trump deportation force targets immigrant communities in the interior of the United States.

As a pro-immigrant movement, we need to do a better job of reclaiming some core terminology, like ‘sanctuary’, to refocus on the values of our faith-based coalition of allies. Faith groups interpret ‘sanctuary’ differently than Attorney General Jeff Sessions and U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Faith groups are also chalk-full of something else, U.S. citizens.

With an administration so-openly hostile to immigrant families, citizen advocates need to step up, in particular. The risks undocumented marchers take are extraordinary, especially those without DACA, which hangs in the balance as hardliners surround President Trump. Debating Ned Ryun yesterday on Fox News, I noted that “sanctuary” is a very Christian thing. I also noted that Catholic, Evangelical, Jewish, Islamic, and other faith groups support Sanctuary Cities.

As a citizen, I can call out ICE without fear of retribution from the agency, which is infamous for ruthless and unapologetic retribution against our undocumented friends and neighbors who dare speak up. The same is not true for the undocumented who ICE targets every day with operational brute force, institutional intimidation, and lies. Pro-immigrant advocates know this, which is why this week on the anniversary of DACA, marcher organized in cities across the country. Where I live in Washington, D.C., many came out under a dreary August overcast of rain clouds and white supremacy. It was a large march that I’ll post no photos here because frankly I’m afraid for the undocumented marchers.

As an advocacy community, we’ve never faced an opponent as determined, organized, and nebulous as the Trump deportation agenda. Humbly, I don’t think this week’s marches were big enough. In DC, the route was through a ghost town, as congress is on recess and was POTUS was again visiting the place where he golfs in Bedminster, New Jersey. So national press coverage was coverage was limited. When the marches were over, the carnage against our community continued unabated. To me, this is incredibly worrisome. We need more people out there marching who are not undocumented immigrants. That starts by strengthening our alliances and coordination with faith based organizations, then scaling up our capabilities to mobilize accordingly.

Popular in the Community

Close

What's Hot