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Elliot Levy
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New York – In response to the Justice Department’s decision to halt a program that provides basic legal information to detained immigrants, Stosh Cotler, CEO of Bend the Arc Jewish Action, released the following statement:
"The Trump Administration’s move to deprive immigrants of a crucial legal lifeline imperils their due process rights and is yet another of his attacks on fundamental American principles. Over the last two weeks, we’ve seen what happens when the rhetoric and promises of 2016’s Candidate Trump are backed up with the executive power of 2018’s President Trump. Since he failed to secure his border wall in the spending bill, he and his Administration have been aggressively escalating their attacks on immigrants. In the past two weeks, his Administration has added a citizenship status question to the 2020 Census, changed Obama-era rules so ICE can detain pregnant immigrant women and restrict their access to reproductive health care, and allowed Attorney General Sessions to further weaken our immigration courts. Along with his decision to endanger all Dreamers with deportation, the President is making his cruel disdain for immigrants unmistakably, dangerously clear.
American Jews are committed to vigorously opposing every attempt by the Administration and its allies to threaten the safety of immigrant communities. We will not allow the President to realize his vision of a nation where immigrants are marginalized and terrorized.”
Bend the Arc Jewish Action is a leader in the American Jewish community in demanding that Congress take action to protect immigrant youth. On January 17th, Bend the Arc Jewish Action organized a historic act of civil disobedience in Washington DC, in which 82 Jewish activists were arrested on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol while demanding a clean Dream Act. Since then, activists from Bend the Arc Jewish Action have organized local “Let My People Stay” actions and protests across the country inspired by this civil disobedience, including in New York, Illinois, California and Massachusetts.
