TAKE ACTION FOR HUMAN RIGHTS

DEMAND BIDEN END RESTRICTIONS ON IMMIGRANTS & ASYLUM-SEEKERS

The Biden administration just announced that it will continue Title 42 — a cruel, xenophobic, and illegal relic from the Trump era that rejects asylum-seekers who are seeking safety at the U.S. border.

Title 42 uses COVID-19 as the reason to deny people the opportunity to apply for asylum. That’s despite countless public health experts validating that Title 42 is driven by politics, rather than public health.

In the face of powerful grassroots outcry, the Biden administration has changed course in the past... join us to urge the President to end Title 42 immediately.

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President

DO NOT USE Joe

DO NOT USE Biden

DHS Secretary

Alejandro

Mayorkas

DHS

Dear President Biden and Secretary Mayorkas:

I write with deep concern about policies endangering the safety and wellbeing of immigrants and people seeking protection in the United States. I urge you to deliver on your promise to build an immigration system based on humanity, compassion, fairness and respect. Such systemic reform to respect human rights means explicitly addressing the racism underlying the current system.

As initial steps, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) should: 
Immediately stop expelling individuals and families under Title 42;
Rescind the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) order and accompanying Health and Human Services final rule; 
End the use of arbitrary, mass detention. Incorporate a presumption of liberty in custody decisions, and allow asylum-seekers and immigrants to live in the community, supported by sponsors and community-based programs operated by non-profits to assist them in navigating the immigration process;
Release people in immigration detention through an affirmative file review with a presumption of liberty; 
Phase out Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) contracts with private prison companies and county jails; and
End family detention and close all three family detention centers.

There are now over 25,000 immigrants and asylum-seekers held in detention – an 82 percent spike since early February – when they should be freed. Your proposed budget for the next fiscal year funds detention spaces for 32,500 beds – a return to previous levels of detention, not progress. DHS should swifty establish an affirmative file review process, with a presumption of liberty, to release people from detention. This process should prioritize people who are most vulnerable to harm in custody, including individuals who face a heightened risk of serious illness or death from COVID-19, transgender people, pregnant people, HIV+ people, and parents and children.

Further, DHS should adopt formal guidance requiring individualized consideration of release for all people in ICE custody with a presumption of liberty for all people in the immigration system.. No one should be detained for seeking safety or solely because of their immigration status. Families should never be separated, and children should live in freedom with their families as they pursue their right to seek safety. Immigrants and asylum-seekers should be allowed to live in the community, supported by sponsors and community-based programs operated by non-profits to assist individuals in navigating the immigration process.

The policy of family detention should be ended immediately, and all three family detention facilities closed. DHS should also move to close detention facilities with the most egregious records of human rights abuses, and ensure that detained individuals are released, and not transferred to other detention facilities.

For-profit detention should be ended. DHS should develop and implement a plan to phase out ICE contracts with private prison companies, as well as contracts with state and local prisons and jails for immigration detention. Facilities with the worst records for negligent and abusive care and conditions and lack of accountability should be prioritized in phasing out contracts. DHS should end the use of state and local prisons and jails and other criminal incarceration facilities for immigration detention altogether. Human rights violations are linked to for-profit detention, which have a well documented record of harsh conditions and negligent care, and lack of accountability.

The COVID-19 pandemic has made detention facilities even more dangerous and deadly. Thousands of people have been affected by the illness in detention, and at least nine have tragically died after contracting it. As we see a spike in cases across the country, and the aggressive nature of the Delta variant, the risk of spread of COVID-19 in a congregate setting like ICE detention is more dangerous than ever before. The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in ICE custody has risen dramatically, a result of your administration’s expanded reliance on detention and reckless practice of transferring people between facilities.

While I am grateful that DHS terminated the disastrous Migrant Protection Protocols program, your administration has continued the Trump administration’s reckless policy of misusing the Title 42 public health authority to block and expel people at the border, endangering their lives. Hundreds of thousands of immigrants and asylum-seekers have been summarily expelled, and this misuse of Title 42 continues despite objections by CDC officials, public health experts, and even current administration officials.

Black and brown immigrants and asylum-seekers, who make up the overwhelming majority of people in detention and blocked or expelled at the border, again and again bear the brunt of harsh, punitive immigration policies and practices anchored in detention, deportation, and deterrence, and powered by private prison companies. Failure to address these harms undermine your commitment to racial equity and human rights.

Many people coming to the U.S. are fleeing from horrific violence, persecution, torture, and other grave human rights abuses in their home countries. They are simply seeking protection and must be allowed to pursue the right to seek asylum. Many have long-standing family, faith, and other community ties in the U.S.

I greatly appreciate the steps that you have taken to roll back policies harming immigrants and asylum-seekers and to restore respect for their human rights, but far more needs to be done and time is vital. I urge you to uphold your commitments to human rights and racial justice – and to prevent the further spread and devastation of COVID-19 – by immediately releasing people from ICE detention and implementing a fair and humane asylum process that provides a meaningful opportunity to ask for protection at the border.

This administration has had ample time to end the cruel and unjust components of our current immigration system. You have the opportunity to turn away from harsh practices that criminalize asylum-seekers and immigrants and perpetuate the harms of systemic racism, and immediately begin to build a more just, compassionate, and humane immigration system.

I urge you to act.

Sincerely,

{user_data~First Name} {user_data~Last Name}

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