FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: February 14, 2019
CONTACT: Elliot Levy, [email protected], 202-800-7409

New York – Following votes in Congress to pass a bill providing new funding to the Department of Homeland Security for immigrant detention and deportation, and reports of President Trump’s plan to declare a national emergency to seek construction of his racist border wall, Ginna Green, Chief Strategy Officer of Bend the Arc: Jewish Action, released the following statement:

“We are profoundly disappointed that Congress just gave ICE and CBP more money to execute the Trump Administration’s horrific immigrant detention and deportation regime--and they did so without including any ability to hold these rogue agencies accountable. The policies Congress passed today are the direct result of Senate Republicans’ enduring commitment to enabling President Trump’s dangerous anti-immigrant, white nationalist agenda. Reports that President Trump will make an end run around Congress and declare a national emergency to get his racist border wall adds yet another layer of lawlessness and authoritarian cruelty to this administration’s immigration policy.

“We thank our progressive champions in Congress who took a stand against this bill and made clear that the moral atrocities committed by ICE and CBP must stop. We remain in solidarity with our immigrant family--with Dreamers, with TPS holders, with every person whose lives are threatened by this Administration, and Congress’s actions today. We see you, and with you we remember Jakelin and Felipe and Claudia and Roxsana, and we will not stop fighting to build the multiracial democracy we believe in, where all are safe, all are welcome. ”