#immigration justice

[fiercynn]

oh my fucking god can people stop coopting the term "harm reduction". i know language can change but i refuse to let this term change into the literal opposite meaning just so people can justify their decision to vote for a genocidaire.

harm reduction is literally, meaningfully, about reducing existing risk of harm. a person who uses drugs is at risk of disease or illness because they only have access to dirty needles? provide them with a needle exchange program to make it safer for them. a teen who is sexually active is at risk of becoming pregnant or contracting a sexually transmitted infection? provide them with sex ed and protective devices like condoms or dental dams to allow them to have safe sex.

and yes, there is a part of harm reduction that is aimed at not moralizing about the behavior that you're trying to reduce harm from. but if you're a progressive - as most of the people lecturing us about "harm reduction" purport to be - you should already understand that these behaviors are not ethically bad in and of themselves. it is not inherently unethical to use drugs or be sexually active as a teen, so the fact that harm reduction efforts could "encourage" that behavior is also not unethical! if you think that it is, then you're actually a conservative!

and, importantly, the people who benefit from harm reduction were only at risk of harming themselves in the first place. so helping someone make those activities safer for themselves is not only reducing the risk of harm to that person, but, in doing so, it is not increasing the risk of harm to anyone else either.

voting is giving your active support to a candidate, and thus to that candidate's platform. so please tell me how giving your vote to a president who is actively driving a genocide, perpetuating a pandemic, funding cop cities and a border wall, and driving up deportations - none of which he has pledged to stop if reelected - is reducing existing risk of harm? because harm reduction also isn't "choosing an option that you believe is better than the hypothetical even worse alternative". and voting for biden is, in fact, increasing the existing risk of the harm that he is currently enacting on other people, and encouraging his despicable behavior!

if coopting the term "harm reduction" is the only thing making you feel okay about your decision to vote for biden despite all the people who are dead, disabled, deported, or destitute because of him, then honestly, that seems like a you problem. STOP COOPTING THE TERM.

(and if you feel the urge to respond with something along the lines of "but biden's just doing his best! i'm just telling people to vote for him because i'm scared of trump!" then please at least read this post as well before you say anything to me about it)

[solarpunkwitchcraft]

"When Hurricane Ida hit New York City on September 16, it dumped more than three inches of rain an hour. Sewers overflowed, streets turned into rivers, and thousands of homes and basements across the city’s five boroughs flooded. Assemblymember Jessica González-Rojas saw the devastation firsthand when she toured her constituent neighborhoods of Corona, East Elmhurst, Jackson Heights, and Woodside in Queens. Family after family, mostly low-income immigrants, told her they’d lost almost all of their possessions in the storm. But as González-Rojas encouraged residents to seek help from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, she learned that those who were undocumented were ineligible for aid."

[pegglefan69]

Lado Lodoka, founder of the Immigrant Housing Coalition in Portland, ME & member of Housing Justice Maine, passed away on Dec 2nd. I wanted to share this interview with Nyawal Lia, a housing organizer with Maine People's Alliance, who worked closely with him.

[anarkittyy]

HELP TRANS JAMAICAN ARTISTS GAIN FOOTING IN USA 🌹

[allthecanadianpolitics]

As Palestinians in Gaza seeking to escape the Israel-Hamas war begin applying to come here through a special immigration program, immigration lawyers say Ottawa is asking for an unprecedented level of personal information from prospective migrants. "It's strikingly different than what is ordinarily required for a visitor visa application," said immigration lawyer Pantea Jafari. "[The federal government] is asking for significantly more information than any of those applications, and even more than any permanent resident's application." This week, the federal government launched a new program to permit up to 1,000 Palestinians who are extended family members of Canadian citizens or permanent residents to apply to come to Canada and stay for three years if their families can support them financially.

Continue Reading

Tagging @politicsofcanada

[alwaysbewoke]

[troythecatfish]

This is one of the reasons why stopping the genocide in Palestine is so important. It is the empire's testing ground for human rights violations.

And if America can get away with supporting one genocide with zero repercussions, well then what is stopping them from starting another?

[bfpnola]

hey! as y’all know, Better Future Program is an entirely youth-run nonprofit and we provide over 3,000 FREE social justice, mental health, and academic resources. but because the majority of our volunteers are full-time students in middle school, high school, and college, we need YOUR help!

the screenshotted sections above have WAYYYY less resources than some of the others. do you think you could help us out? if you have leftist, anti-capitalist resources that align with these topics, please submit them here!

to reiterate, we are looking for leftist, anti-capitalist resources pertaining to: Jewish rights, Muslim rights, immigration, climate change, reproductive rights, classism, children’s rights, educational equity, and fat liberation

[thoughtportal]

eating cake while people are in crisis

[mossmanismoss]

Redesigned Callisto for the 8th time

[fiercynn]

okay, if you have ever made or reblogged a “hold your nose and vote for biden” post, this is for you.

here’s the fucking thing about these kinds of posts. i've been seeing them since i first returned to tumblr in, I think, late 2022? they've certainly increased in frequency since october 7, but they were there before too, ready to counter any kind of opposition to biden that has cropped up. many of them are not just trying to educate people about what positive things biden has done, which, like, at least I can understand the motivation behind those ones? but so many of them are directly in response to people criticizing biden, and their only real point is “sure you’re upset at this thing biden did, but have you considered the election?” starting YEARS before the next presidential election, mind you.

and october 7 only made that clearer. i don’t think it had been a week before i saw these posts cropping up. can you not see how fucking ghoulish that is? to look at the rightful pain and anger of those whose relatives and communities are being slaughtered with active american support, to respond to one of the few pieces of agency most americans have in influencing what their governments do – their vote – by saying “yes but trump would be worse.” as if the primary people you’re lecturing – palestinians, muslims, arabs, black people, indigenous people, disabled people, other marginalized people – don’t remember exactly how bad it was under trump!

and even if you think not voting is an empty gesture – something i, who studied political science at a mainstream american lib college, who has worked as a field organizer on a previous democratic presidential campaign and for several policy campaigns, who currently works in public policy in america, used to believe, but have absolutely changed my mind on – what is in no way an empty gesture is saying publicly that you will not vote for someone. the arguments people usually have about why simply not voting is bad are that you can’t tell why someone is not voting, so it is as likely to be apathy or disenfranchisement as it is a political statement. but saying publicly that you will not vote for someone, and why you will not vote for them, absolutely is a political statement, and potentially a powerful one! but you choose to negate and/or ignore that by trotting out the “lesser of two evils” bullshit.

and then there’s the whole “yes but people will DIE under trump”. PEOPLE ARE DYING NOW. even if you’re fucking racist and have decided that palestinian lives don’t count, have you forgotten biden’s ongoing covid minimalism and dismantling of the CDC’s covid research and prevention infrastructure? have you forgotten his increase in spending for law enforcement scant years after the murder of george floyd and his administration's surveillance of protesters, including cop city protesters? have you forgotten his recent ramp-up in deportations of undocumented immigrants, including the active continuation of many trump-era policies?

maybe you have forgotten all those things and do purport to care about palestinians, but you just think that biden is doing his best to influence netanyahu and is getting nowhere! but then you must have forgotten all of the things that biden and his administration themselves have done to further this fucking genocide, including:

continuing to send arms to israel

putting together a military task force within days of yemen’s red sea blockade and attacking yemeni ships

bombing yemen

bombing syria

bombing iraq

vetoing three ceasefire resolutions at the united nations

testifying to defend israel and its genocide and occupation at the international court of justice

refusing to rescue palestinian-americans stuck in gaza

halting funding to the united nations relief and works agency for palestinian refugees (UNRWA) based on israeli claims that 12 of UNRWA’s over 30,000 staff were hamas agents, even though u.s. intelligence has not been able to independently verify this

lying that he’s personally seen photos of babies beheaded by hamas when he hadn’t because they didn’t exist (and even when his own staff cautioned him that reports of beheaded babies may not be credible)

questioning the number of palestinian deaths reported by the gaza ministry of health (when even israel has not questioned them, since they are in fact proud of those numbers)

perpetuating lies about hamas having committed the attack on al-aqsa hospital

questioning united nations reports of adults and children raped by israeli soldiers while claiming to have proof (that no one else has seen) of hamas doing the same

honestly so many more things that i can’t remember them all but others feel free to add

or maybe you haven’t forgotten any of that, and think that you’re still justified in lecturing people about why they should vote for biden, because you genuinely believe trump would still be worse. if that is the case, you have still failed to see that by saying you will vote for biden no matter what, you are part of the problem of biden continuing to act like this. because biden is counting on fear of trump to win him this next election no matter what else he does. despite his appalling polling numbers, despite the knowledge that he is losing the palestinian-american vote, the arab-american vote, the muslim-american vote, the black american vote, the youth vote – despite all of that, he is secure in the idea that he will still win because he is better than trump. can you not see how that allows him to act without impunity? how it becomes increasingly impossible for his base to influence what he’s doing if he thinks that they will be with him no matter what? this is how you make yourself complicit to biden’s actions, by not affording anyone even the slightest power to hold him accountable for anything.

and in most cases, the “hold your nose and vote for biden” thing is the response of people who aren’t even being instructed by others not to vote for biden. it is their response to people saying they themselves are choosing not to vote for biden. fucking ghoulish.

[morning-and-good-night]

Reforming the human rights act

The UK is planning on reforming the human rights act.

If it wasn't shitty enough for them to try and go against BASIC human rights to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda, they're now planning on making it legal for it to happen.

This is going to affect immigrants, refugees, criminals, disabled people and asylum seekers.

If the human rights act does get reformed, this is going to make it easier to deport people and reduce the government's responsibility to uphold human rights.

It's the government's way of cleaning their hands by pretending nothing has happened

Please please sign the petition so it will at least get debated in Parliament. Only UK residents and British citizens can sign it, but please please please reblog this to protect human rights

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/607712

[plutotimeslot]

Bodycam footage was released this week. It was from January 24th. It was the morning after a police officer hit a woman who walking across the crosswalk. He was going 74 miles per hour in a 25 mile per hour zone.

The 23 year old woman who was hit, Jaahnavi Kandula, was killed. In the footage, you can see the VP of the police union on a call with the president of the police union.

In the call, they go into graphic detail about her death. At one point in the video you can hear the VP laughing, saying, "Yeah, just write a check. $11,000. She was 26 anyway, she had limited value."

[fandomtrumpshate]

2024 Supported Org: Never Again Action

Anti-immigrant hatred, antisemitism, and other forms of bigotry uphold one another—and safety lies in the collective struggle against white nationalism and white supremacy. For many American Jews, honoring their heritage means standing with vulnerable people of all kinds in their struggle for justice and recognition. When they stand up for themselves as Jews, and for their allies in the immigrant community, they recognize that we are all in this together. Never again means never again for anyone —not in the United States, and not in Palestine.

Never Again Action is a Jewish-led mobilization against the persecution, detention, and deportation of immigrants in the United States, taking direct action to raise the alarm about the current system and disrupt its operation, and to catalyze a popular movement for permanent protection for all undocumented people. They work by empowering the public, not making compromises with the powerful. They don’t negotiate with candidates, politicians, or companies–but welcome them to move to the right side of history. They act to change the common sense among the American public, to create the political conditions that politicians will have no choice but to follow.

Continuing their work to fight antisemitism and anti-immigrant bigotry, for the past several months, NAA has also worked in cooperation with other organizations to mobilize in support of a ceasefire in Gaza, working to challenge the narrative conflating Jews and Israel, staging protests and demonstrations in support of Gaza and calling for a ceasefire. NAA and its partner organizations argue that the culture and values of Judaism require them to stand up against injustice and oppression everywhere.

They imagine a world where people of all races, identities, and origins come together to tear down the walls that have kept us apart from each other and build a new world.

You can support Never Again Action as a creator in the 2024 FTH auction (or as a bidder, when the time comes to donate for the auctions you’ve won.)

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

The Department of Justice on Monday sued the state of Texas and Gov. Greg Abbott over the installation of a barrier of buoys in the Rio Grande River intended to keep migrants from crossing into the U.S.

The DOJ based its lawsuit on allegations that in building the buoy barrier, Texas violated the Rivers and Harbors Act by obstructing navigable waters of the U.S.

Texas officials began constructing the barrier near the Camino Real International Bridge in Eagle Pass earlier this month, finishing last week, according to the DOJ lawsuit.

Federal officials are asking a Judge to order that Texas remove the existing buoys at their own expense and also that they be enjoined from constructing any further barriers in other waters near the U.S.-Mexico border.

Abbott and the state of Texas allegedly did not seek authorization from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers prior to installing the buoys, as required under law, and that because of that, "the Corps and other relevant federal agencies were deprived of the opportunity to evaluate risks the barrier poses to public safety and the environment, mitigate those risks as necessary through the permitting process, and otherwise evaluate whether the project is in the public interest," the DOJ lawsuit alleges.

The buoys are part of Operation Lone Star, Abbott's major border policy.

"This floating barrier poses threats to navigation and public safety and presents humanitarian concerns. Additionally, the presence of the floating barrier has prompted diplomatic protests by Mexico and risks damaging U.S. foreign policy," Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta said in a statement on Monday.

A Judge from the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas had not yet been assigned to the case as of Monday afternoon.

It was not immediately clear how soon until Texas has to answer the allegations in court. Abbott's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In a letter on Friday, the DOJ had warned the Governor that Texas' "actions violate federal law, raise humanitarian concerns, present serious risks to public safety and the environment, and may interfere with the federal government's ability to carry out its official duties."

On Monday, Abbott responded with a letter to President Joe Biden remaining defiant -- and indicating his state's defense will hinge on what he describes as Texas' "sovereign authority" to protect its borders.

"Texas will see you in court, Mr. President," Abbott wrote, hours before the DOJ announced its suit.

Abbott, a Republican, has long assailed what he calls the failure of the Biden administration's border and immigration policies. He's also been busing migrants out of Texas to Democratic-led states and cities -- a move that has stoked outcry from advocates.

On Friday, the Governor said in a statement that his administration, along with Texas' Department of Public Safety and the Texas National Guard, are "continuing to work together to secure the border; stop the smuggling of drugs, weapons, and people into Texas; and prevent, detect, and interdict transnational criminal behavior between ports of entry," citing statistics on hundreds of thousands of apprehensions and criminal arrests made under Operation Lone Star.

Responding to the DOJ lawsuit on Monday, White House spokesman Abdullah Hasan, said, in part: "Governor Abbott's dangerous and unlawful actions are undermining that effective plan, making it hard for the men and women of Border Patrol to do their jobs of securing the border, and putting migrants and border agents in danger."

[alwaysbewoke]