#Not1More Deportation

53+ LGBTQ Organizations Endorse #Not1more Campaign to End Deportations

As Obama Administration Nears Two Million Deportations, Groups Across Country Say “Not One More,” Urge White House Action

 Transgender Law Center and Southerners On New Ground, alongside a broad coalition of LGBTQ organizations, proudly endorse the #Not1more Deportation campaign and the protests and marches occurring on the April 4th and 5th National Days of Action across the country.

 

Among the two million immigrants deported by the Obama administration—1,100 people deported every day, and 34,000 people caged in immigration detention centers every single night—are countless LGBTQ individuals and their family, friends, and loved ones. Under the current system of detention and deportation, LGBTQ immigrants, especially transgender women of color, often experience horrific treatment within immigration detention centers, including violence, deprivation of necessary medical care, dehumanization and assaults on basic dignity, psychological torture in solitary confinement, and rape. A recent study demonstrated that transgender women survivors made up 20% of substantiated sexual assault claims in immigration detention.[1] Many detained LGBTQ immigrants simply give up and accept deportation rather than continue to fight for the asylum that they qualify for under existing law because their detention conditions are so unbearable. Too many of our deported community members then end up facing the violence and sometimes murder that they had originally come to the United States to flee. The current immigration detention and deportation crisis harms us deeply, and we call on President Obama to act within his powers to end the cruel and senseless tearing apart of LGBTQ people’s communities.

 

We also call on President Obama to end Secure Communities and other programs which funnel immigrants into the deportation machinery through local law enforcement, particularly those that experience biased policing based on race, sexual orientation, and/or gender identity. Too many of our community members end up in deportation proceedings because they are arrested after calling police for help in a domestic violence situation because the officer made assumptions about what intimate partner violence looks like. Too many transgender women of color are deported because of pretextual arrests for drug possession or sex work leading to criminal charges being immediately dropped and transfer to immigration detention. President Obama has the power to stop these programs so that our non-citizen community members do not live in fear that any minor interaction with police could lead to their deportation.

 

As those living and working in the intersections of LGBTQ and immigrant identities, we join immigrant activists across the country to say that two million deportations is two million too many and to call on President Obama to act immediately for Not One More Deportation!

 

Transgender Law Center

Southerners on New Ground

AIDS Legal Referral Panel

Association of Latina/os Motivating Action (ALMA)

BreakOUT!

Center for Gender & Refugee Studies

Colorado Anti-Violence Program

Community United Against Violence

Domestic Violence Project at the Urban Justice Center

El/La Para TransLatinas

Equality California

Equality New Mexico

Forward Together

GetEQUAL Action

Immigrant Youth Justice League

Invisible to Invincible: Asian Pacific Islander Pride of Chicago (i2i)

Latino Equality Alliance

Lavender Youth Recreation and Information Center (LYRIC)

LGBT Law and Immigration Projects at NYLAG

LGBT Rights Committee of the Hispanic Lawyers Association of Illinois

L.O.C.A.S.-Latinos Organizados por un Cambio Social (Greater Birmingham Ministries Latino LGTBQ initiative)

Media Literacy Project

National Center for Lesbian Rights

National Center for Transgender Equality

National Gay and Lesbian Task Force

National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health

National Queer Asian Pacific Islander Alliance

New Mexico GSA Network

One Colorado

Our Family Coalition

Out4Immigration

Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada

Queer Detainee Empowerment Project

Qulture

Red Circle Project

San Francisco Trans March

Santa Fe Mountain Center

Southern Arizona Gender Alliance

Southwest Women’s Law Center

Sylvia Rivera Law Project

Tennessee Transgender Political Coalition

Third Wave Fund

Transgender Resource Center of New Mexico

The TransLatin@ Coalition

TransOhio

United Latin@ Pride

Wingspan

 
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