The U.S. government maintains the largest immigration detention system in the world.
Mandatory detention laws, quotas, a lack of compassion and outright hate drive the continuation and expansion of this country’s immigration detention facilities, funneling those in need of asylum into a sprawling system of unaccountable incarceration. As of today, more than half a million immigrants and refugees are captured and detained in inhumane conditions. With cruelty serving as the bedrock of America’s immigration policy, detainees are subject to standing room cells, food and water deprivation, abuse, sexual assault, and daily dehumanization solely for wanting safety and for wanting more for themselves and their families.
Yesterday, on the steps of Middle Collegiate Church, over 450 people gathered at a #CloseTheCamps protest organized by MoveOn and the New York Civil Liberties Union chapter of the ACLU, and led by Rev. Jacqui Lewis and the Resistance Revival Chorus. In an act of radical love, protestors called for the reunification of families, divestment from detention and deportation, and the closure of the U.S.'s hundreds of immigrant detention camps. In solidarity. #CloseTheCamps.
