Trump’s Internment Camp Scandal
Trump’s Internment Camp Scandal -Best Reason To Impeach
The truth is leaking out about Donald Trump’s scandalous internment camps for stolen children. This clear abuse of power and the deadly and trauma rises to the level of high crimes that are enough to justify impeachment.
Dear MoveOn member,
Most of the thousands of children being held at detention camps at the U.S.-Mexico border crossed the border with parents or other family members—only to be torn away from their families by U.S. government agents.1
Now, they are being held in the most inhumane conditions—in overcrowded cages that are so cold that they are referred to as “ice boxes,” forced to sleep on concrete floors, left hungry and without the most basic care, like soap or clean clothes.2
A pediatrician who visited the camps called them “torture facilities.”3
Sources:
1. “Inside a Texas Building Where the Government Is Holding Immigrant Children,” The New Yorker, June 22, 2019 https://act.moveon.org/go/67482?t=11&akid=238113%2E37212143%2Epe_ZOa
Tens of thousands of people like you—members of MoveOn, United We Dream, Families Belong Together, and American Friends Service Committee, along with more than 50 sponsor organizations—held over 175 protests in over 40 states. And more than 800 letters were hand-delivered to members of Congress, ensuring they received our demands and feel the pressure to act.
Our message was heard around the world—and in the home districts of our representatives and senators.
These Close the Camps protests have changed the way our entire country is talking about the atrocities being committed on our southern border. More than 1,500 local news clips broadcasted our demand to close the camps and to establish an immigration system that uplifts the human rights of all people. Together, we are ensuring that our message cannot be ignored.
We are powerful when we act together, and our work is just beginning.
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Hungry, alone, and terrified (children in cages at our border)
A year ago, when Donald Trump was separating migrant children from their families at the U.S.-Mexico border, we rose up and forced Trump to end the policy.1
But now, largely through lawyers at the border, we’ve learned that the Trump administration is again illegally separating children from their families and detaining them in the most inhumane conditions—putting them in cages, forcing them to sleep on concrete floors, and leaving them hungry, alone, and terrified, without even soap or toothbrushes.2
A 15-year-old girl told one of the lawyers that there’s nothing to do but cry.3
An eight-year old boy told a lawyer, “They took us away from our grandmother, and now we are all alone. They have not given us to our mother. We have been here for a long time. I have to take care of my little sister. She is very sad because she misses our mother and grandmother very much … We sleep on a cement bench. There are two mats in the room, but the big kids sleep on the mats, so we have to sleep on the cement bench.”4
And a 17-year old boy said, “At Ursula [detention center], we have not been able to shower. The toilet is out in the open in the cage; there is no door for any privacy. There is water but no soap to wash our hands. There are no paper towels to dry our hands. We have not been given a toothbrush or toothpaste to brush our teeth.”5
As photos, audio, and stories emerge from the camps, outrage has grown to a crescendo over the past week, and right now is our opportunity to create the tipping point that forces the Trump administration to stop separating children from their families—once and for all.
That’s why MoveOn’s team has sprung into action, along with our colleagues at the American Friends Service Committee, Families Belong Together, and United We Dream, to organize a wave of highly visible protests across the country this Tuesday, July 2.
Most of these children have family, including parents, in the United States. But the Trump administration is taking them away from family and classifying them as “unaccompanied minors.”6
One lawyer who is part of the teams interviewing children at the camps explained, “There were children at this facility who came across with parents and were separated from parents. There were other children at the facility who came across with other adult family members. We met almost no children who came across unaccompanied. The United States is taking children away from their family unit and reclassifying them as unaccompanied children.”7
A 16-year-old girl at one of the camps told a lawyer, “We are in a metal cage with 20 other teenagers, with babies and young children. We have one mat we need to share with each other. It is very cold. We each got a mylar blanket, but it is not enough to warm up. … The lights are [on] all of the time.”8
The U.S. government, our government, is tearing children away from their families and terrorizing them—and it’s on our watch. It’s up to each of us to speak out and fight back. Together, we can close the camps and reunite children with their families. We we truly can’t do it without you, James. Will you help out?
Thanks for all you do.
–Vicki, Bill, Gabby, Eric, and the rest of the team
Sources:
1. “Family Separation Protests Shift the Narrative,” The Atlantic, June 30, 2018
https://act.moveon.org/go/
2. “Inside a Texas Building Where the Government Is Holding Immigrant Children,” The New Yorker, June 22, 2019
https://act.moveon.org/go/
3, 4, 5. “Kids Describe In Their Own Words The Dire Conditions Inside A Border Detention Center,” BuzzFeed, June 27, 2019
https://act.moveon.org/go/
6, 7. “Inside a Texas Building Where the Government Is Holding Immigrant Children,” The New Yorker, June 22, 2019
https://act.moveon.org/go/
8. Kids Describe In Their Own Words The Dire Conditions Inside A Border Detention Center,” BuzzFeed, June 27, 2019
https://act.moveon.org/go/
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Calling Out Trump’s Internment Camp Scandal
Tens of thousands of MoveOn members and our allies took to the streets at more than 175 protests in more than 40 states to demand that Donald Trump’s child concentration camps, where immigrants seeking asylum are being detained, be closed immediately. The pressure is growing, and now multiple members of Congress have visited or have pledged visit the camps.
But it will take all of holding our government accountable to provide justice to those in detention.
This inhumane treatment of asylum seekers and immigrants is an atrocity, and we must ensure that every American knows about the brutality being perpetrated by our government in our name. That’s why MoveOn has just printed a big batch of “Close the Camps” stickers, designed by artist Pablo Stanley, and is giving them away for free, while supplies last.
Click here or on the image below to order your sticker now.
Last week, we learned that the Trump administration continues to separate children from their families, is refusing to provide soap or toothpaste to the migrant children in these camps, that the children are not allowed to take showers or change their clothes, that babies held there are denied diapers, and that the lights are being left on 24 hours a day to deny those who are detained there the right to sleep.1
And on Monday, journalists at ProPublica revealed the existence of a secret Facebook group with nearly 10,000 Border Patrol agents—about half of the total number of agents in the country—making cruel jokes about the children who have died in their care, using racist epithets, and posting disgusting, threatening memes of members of Congress who oppose the camps.2
When those same members of Congress visited the camps later that day, they were told by an imprisoned woman that when she asked if she could have some water, a Border Patrol agent told her to drink out of the toilet.3
It is clear that it is not just “a few bad apples” at the border committing these heinous acts. It is clear that this is not just one rogue camp not following the rules. This is the result of an intentional strategy by the Trump administration to terrorize immigrant communities and criminalize immigration.
That is why MoveOn members joined more than 50 partner organization to take to the streets and the halls of Congress this week to demand that all members of Congress use every tool available to them to end these inhumane conditions and close the camps right now, defund these out-of-control agencies, and hold Trump and his administration accountable.
Thanks for all you do.
–Emma, Iram, Schuyler, Reggie, and the rest of the team
Sources:
1. “The horrifying conditions facing kids in border detention, explained,” Vox, June 25, 2019
https://act.moveon.org/go/
2. “Inside the Secret Border Patrol Facebook Group Where Agents Joke About Migrant Deaths and Post Sexist Memes,” ProPublica, July 1, 2019
https://act.moveon.org/go/
3. “Ocasio-Cortez: Detained migrants being told to ‘drink out of toilets,'” NBC News, July 1, 2019
https://act.moveon.org/go/
