Familia Trans Queer Liberation Movement, CA Immigrant Youth Justice Alliance (CIYJA), GetEQUAL, Juntos, Orange County Immigrant Youth United (OCIYU), Arizona-Queer Undocumented Immigrant Project (AZ-QUIP), Arcoiris Liberation Team, the Transgender Law Center (TLC), and the TransLatin@ Coalition have called for Immigration and Custom Enforcement (ICE) and the Department Of Homeland Security (DHS) immediately release all LGBTQ-identified individuals in detention centers, halt deportations of all LGBTQ-identified individuals, and immediately provide relief for the LGBTQ undocumented community.
The grassroots organizations have stated that they will continue to fight until all their demands are met and all of the migrant community is free. under the hashtag #Not1More LGBTQ Detention & Deportation Campaign the groups are commited to demanding full liberation without compromising basic human rights.
According to the groups, April 5, 2014 marked a record of two million deportations under the Obama Administration. Often, LGBTQ immigrants come to the U.S. seeking a safe haven from structural violence, criminalization, persecution and discrimination in their home countries. Others have grown up in the U.S. and live with ongoing fear of deportation and family separation as a result of our unresolved immigration status. Many do not qualify under the current deferred action programs (i.e., DACA, DAPA) due to the criminalization we experience as marginalized members of society pushed into survival work.
According to a statement released by the groups, “This violence, persecution and discrimination is not only happening in our everyday lives but also following many of our community members to the inside of ICE and DHS detention facilities. LGBTQ immigrants are often placed in detention facilities that misgender them, allow/foster physical and sexual abuse, and ignore verbal and physical harassment from both other detainees and detention guards.”
The “record” of 2 million deportations is a fraudulent one. The Obama Administration changed the way that “deportations” were calculated by funneling some border crossers (who used to be counted as “returns”) into the “removal” category (which is ostensibly the same as the broader term “deportations).
I don’t think that it’s allowed to post hyperlinks in the comments section here, so I’ll just have to cite my source the old fashioned way on my other comment…
Check out Brian Bennett’s story (Los Angeles Times) from April 2, 2014. Headline: High Deportation Figures Are Misleading