Puro Philadelphia #Not1More #DNCinPHL pic.twitter.com/iitidzR7T3
— Not1More (@Not1_More) July 25, 2016
On the first day of the DNC, 500 people marched to demand Democrats be the “anti-Trump” on immigration. That means the candidates calling for an immediate moratorium on deportations, DHS shutting down the Berks family detention center 60 miles west of Philadelphia, and the President dismantling the expansion of ICE to actively demonstrate their expressed commitment to immigrant rights and to stand in sharp contrast to the attacks launched by Clinton’s opponent during his acceptance speech.
Before it was an issue taken up by candidates, immigrant rights groups were already pushing the President to make immigration policy more humane. After the Supreme Court allowed the injunction on the deferred action deportation relief program to continue in US vs Texas, the national #Not1More campaign launched a petition that now has over 50,000 individual signatures calling on the President to act on immigration and issue a moratorium on deportations.
Members of the campaign and allies from Georgia, New Orleans, Chicago, Tennessee, and elsewhere will be marching to lift up that demand and presenting to various committees during the DNC to push for further executive action on immigration before he leaves office.
“The best way to remove the fear of deportation is to end the threat of it,” explains Erika Almirón, executive director of the local organization, Juntos. “Real champions don’t wait to act. A nursing mother in detention shouldn’t have to depend on the election results to know freedom in this country.”
As Marisa Franco of Mijente and Carlos Garcia of Puente Arizona write in a recent Nation opinion piece: “With the prospect of a Trump presidency overseeing future DHS activity, the most important decision the president has on immigration is yet to come. Will Obama dismantle the astronomical capacity to capture immigrants he created during his presidency, or risk handing over the reigns of a dragnet at-the-ready to the man who’s promised to surpass him in using it?”
#endalldetention. Because everyone deserves to be free. #not1more #DNCinPHL pic.twitter.com/YCBcTa9XDM
— Not1More (@Not1_More) July 25, 2016
Getting ready to March. @HillaryClinton, allies don't wait. #moratoriumnow #Not1More pic.twitter.com/xZ7uYkK2z6
— Not1More (@Not1_More) July 25, 2016