A Message From the Immigrants Rights Frontlines

The results of the U.S. election have left many of us in shock and we want to take a minute to honor our outrage, our grief and our fears.  But as human rights defenders, we cannot afford to let the moment paralyze us. 
During the first Trump administration, we witnessed firsthand the horrific violence inflicted upon our communities:  the racial violence, the brutality of family separation, the  Muslim bans, and  attempts to decimate  asylum.  In this second term, we are expecting  the trauma and rights’ violations to escalate. 
The crisis we face is not new. A massive deportation machine has been built over years of racially discriminatory policing, designed to criminalize, scapegoat, and label migrants as a security threat. These securitization narratives provide the physical and ideological infrastructure for Trump to normalize the deportation of millions of people. The key elements include an expansive immigration police force, a heavily fortified border, and a rapidly expanding surveillance infrastructure that enables data-sharing and collaboration between local police forces and ICE. All of these factors, along with an expanding network of both private and public prisons, contribute to the detention of immigrants under inhumane and deplorable conditions. 
The dangerous normalization of this system means that we are facing not only unjust immigration policies, but an existential threat to human rights—one that we must fight with every ounce of courage and capacity that we have.
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