Where Does YOUR Compassion Lay its Head? in Day by Day

No, it’s definitely NOT ok.

🙌 🙌

This absolutely sickens me. I cannot even begin to imagine the terrible things they are enduring right now. And any person who can try and justify it, is just as terrible. Absolutely horrified at what we are doing in this country.

With you all the way.
I've given to ACLU, KIND (Kids In Need of Defense https://supportkind.org/), HIAS (they've got their lawyers helping refugees at the border, https://www.hias.org/), and the Crowdjustice that Michael Avenatti has set up https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/stop-separating-families/. In addition to Stephanie Clifford, he is now representing detained mothers and children and earlier tweeted, "We are now representing whistleblowers within ICE, outside contractors, etc. They have reached out to us to provide us with info as to what is really going on. We are going to blow this wide open and take the info to the American people so they can decide what happens next."

I've called all of my MoCs (members of Congress) on this. I thanked Nelson for being an early cosponsor of Feinstein's S.3036 - A bill to limit the separation of families at or near ports of entry (aka the Keep Families Together Act). All the Dems now cosponsor that bill, but Nelson was among the first five. I also encouraged him to cosponsor S.2937 - HELP Separated Children Act. I urged Rubio to cosponsor the bills as well. I urged my Rep. (Webster) to cosponsor H.R.5950 - the House version of the HELP Separated Children Act, HR 6135 - the House version of the Keep Families Together Act, and H.R.2508 - Child Citizen Protection Act, as well as H.Res.927 - Condemning the Trump administration's zero tolerance policy. I told Webster to oppose the immigration bills by Goodlatte (H.R. 4760 - Securing America’s Future Act) and Ryan (Border Security and Immigration Reform Act; I haven't found a number for it) because both bills would drastically cut legal immigration, eliminate green cards for family reunification, increase detention and deportation, reduce access to asylum, and put more children and asylum seekers in jail or return them to deadly situations. Furthermore they don't offer any workable path to citizenship for Dreamers. I called the DOJ comment line 202-353-1555 to voice my opposition to Jeff Sessions' ruling on the Matter of A-B, which means the US will no longer grant asylum to most victims of domestic abuse and gang violence. I made another call to the DOJ to inform Sessions that the "zero tolerance" policy is a policy, not a law, and could be reversed at any time and should be reversed immediately. Thanks to a tweet from @AltUSPressSec (https://twitter.com/AltUSPressSec/status/1008163375031947264) I also informed Sessions -- and my MoCs, and Rick Scott, and Pam Bondi -- that Article II of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide states in relevant part: genocide means any of the following acts... Subsection (e) reads, "Forcibly transferring children of a group to another group." By Article II definition, the Department of Justice is now engaging in genocide. I also told that, via phone and email, to Trailboss, which has been transporting the kids. I told that via email to Phoebe Novakovic, CEO of General Dynamics, which has been contracted to help build the concentration camps.

I also called Rubio's office to ask why he was not among the 13 GOP senators signing a letter to Jeff Sessions calling for an immediate end to family separation and an end to the "zero tolerance" policy. (Those senators were Orrin Hatch, John McCain, Pat Roberts, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Bob Corker, Lamar Alexander, John Boozman, Dean Heller, Cory Gardner, James Lankford, Bill Cassidy, and Rob Portman.) I added, "I'm surprised because Sen. Rubio's parents were poor immigrants and his community still gets de facto political asylum through the Cuban Adjustment Act. He and his family benefited from the kind of asylum now being denied to people who have a legal right to asylum according to the laws of this country."

Cont. (ran out of space in the last comment)

I called Rick Scott's office urging him to join the bipartisan governors of Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Virginia, to block Florida state resources from being used to separate immigrant children from their parents.

I called Pam Bondi's office asking why she didn't join the AGs from California, Connecticut, Delaware, DC, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia and Washington, who signed a letter to Jeff Sessions and Kirstjen Nielson calling for an immediate end to family separation and an end to the "zero tolerance" policy. (Those AGs are all Dems, but I pointed out the letter signed by the 13 GOP senators.)

I called HHS to complain when Nelson was turned away from inspecting the camp in Homestead after he and Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz had been given assurances by the contractor that they would be admitted. I quoted Nelson, who said, "I have a responsibility as oversight of your agency. We appropriate the monies that run your agency in that capacity we want to know that you're doing your job right. And at the same time we have concern for the welfare and the caring of these children and we want to see it."

I also signed numerous petitions, tweeted like crazy, and shared info on social media. I emailed 23andMe, adding my voice to those of other customers and Rep. Jackie Speier, who asked that the company use DNA testing to help reunite children with their families (https://www.buzzfeed.com/lissandravilla/a-congresswoman-is-asking-23andme-to-help-reunite-kids-and).

I'll be participating in an action on June 30, one of now more than 400 protests planned across the country: https://act.moveon.org/event/families-belong-together/search/?.

For anyone who wants to call their members of Congress, full contact info may be found at https://contactingcongress.org/
I don't have a smartphone, but there are these useful apps for those who do:
Resistbot turns your texts into faxes to your MoCs: https://resistbot.io/
Stance sends voicemails to your MoCs: http://www.takeastance.us/

This news story makes me sick to my stomach.