A Call to Freeze ICE

Suspend all ICE activities pending judicial review of their methods.

By: Antonia Scatton

Reframing America

Publisher: Reframing America

There are many, many demands we can make about ICE including reforming it, replacing it with something better, or at minimum, repealing the recent massive funding increases. But those take time. We need action now. We need to call for an immediate suspension of activities, an appropriately named “freeze,” to stop the harm right now. A temporary freeze is a good place to start. It is both drastic and reasonable.

WHAT: Our Demands

  • FREEZE OPERATIONS pending LEGAL AND CONSTITUTIONAL REVIEW: Immediately suspend ICE activities and have agents withdraw to their local base. All out-of-state agents conducting “surge” activities should be returned to their home states until further notice.
  • DETAINEE STATUS REPORT: No more “disappearing” people.
    • List and account for every person detained or arrested by ICE and where they are now (including whether those detained were/are U.S. Citizens, people following the legal immigration process, previous status as a humanitarian parolee, DREAMers, long term residents with no record of violent crime, etc.)
    • Every detained person must have the ability to contact their families and access legal representation and a fair and timely hearing.
    • Assess the conditions of all detention facilities and assure that all detainees are being held under humane and legal conditions.
  • INCIDENT REPORT: No more extrajudicial violence.
    • Immediate inventory of all incidents involving shootings, beatings, injury, death, use of chemical weapons, as well as confrontation, investigation and/or arrest of protesters, legal observers, or U.S. citizens.
    • Review the legality of above incidents and whether they violate constitutional rights, specifically the First, Fourth and Tenth Amendments of the Constitution.
    • All cases of illegal arrest and use of force and/or violation of Constitutional rights should be referred to appropriate jurisdictions for prosecution.
  • OPERATIONAL LIMITS:
    • ICE must only arrest specific persons using judicial warrants. No racial profiling. No arrests in schools, churches, or medical facilities. ICE must not enter private homes or businesses without search warrants.
    • ICE is not to conduct non-immigration-related law enforcement.
    • DHS/ICE must provide and commit to clear definitions as to who is eligible for arrest on immigration law violations and why, such as record of being convicted of a violent crime or having crossed the border outside legal border crossings and being ineligible for the asylum process. DHS/ICE must provide and commit to clear definition of who is not eligible for arrest.
    • DHS/ICE must agree to crystal clear terms of engagement and use of force: when agents are allowed to stop people, ask for identification, or draw and/or use weapons including vehicles, guns and chemical weapons.
    • All arrests must be carried out with respect for due process and the Constitutional rights of suspects.
    • Agents must not wear masks. Agents must identify themselves; with their name, department/division and badge number clearly visible. Vehicles must be clearly identified as ICE or DHS. Agents must use body cameras at all times.
  • ENFORCEMENT AND RIGHTS OF OBSERVERS:
    • DHS and ICE must agree to these terms before resuming operations. Concrete consequences of violating these terms must be laid out in advance and enforced.
    • Protesters and legal observers must be provided clear definitions of their rights and responsibilities. Constitutional rights to protest and observe must be respected. We need clear definitions of what does or does not constitute “interfering” with federal agents. Consequences of clearly unlawful interference should be clearly defined in advance and proportionate, not a free pass for extrajudicial violence or murder.
    • DHS/ICE must defer to and coordinate with state and local law enforcement. Agents should not operate without the approval of state leadership. Local law enforcement must be able to supervise activities and stop any violations. DHS and the FBI must share all evidence of incidents and work with state and local law enforcement on all investigations.

More Reframing America articles

Stop ICE Raids Alert Network

Nation-Wide Mobile Alert System

by Sherman Austin

The Stop ICE Raids Alert Network lets you send and receive mobile alerts about nearby ICE activity whenever and wherever it occurs.

No downloadable app required. StopICE works with technology already built into your phone. Send and receive mobile alerts via text message, or at stopice.net, from any mobile device with a tap of a button.

Adjust your notification settings at any time to receive alerts within a certain mile radius of your neighborhood.

Alerts are crowd-sourced by the public. This means alerts are sent directly by people from their communities.

Noncooperation & Targeting Pillars of Support

This handout describes some of the Pillars of Support.

Each time a pillar institution yields to or supports the regime, the regime grows stronger. In contrast, noncooperation — refusing to do what is expected, disrupting the normal course of events, and withdrawing support from unjust or illegal policies — weakens the regime and creates cracks in its foundation of power.

PDF Handout

One Million Rising

by Indivisible

Publisher: No Kings

Across the country, authoritarian forces are getting bolder and more dangerous. Trump and his allies are not hiding their agenda: mass deportations, rollbacks of civil rights, weaponized courts, and full-scale attacks on our democracy. We don’t have to wait until it’s too late. We can stop this. But it’ll take all of us—not just single days of mass action, but sustained organizing in our communities.

That’s why this summer, we’re launching One Million Rising—a national effort to train one million people in the strategic logic and practice of non-cooperation, as well as the basics of community organizing and campaign design. This is how we build people power that can’t be ignored. You’re invited to join us—and lead.

You can visit the site to see the recorded videos and access the training materials.

https://www.nokings.org/rise

Outraged

Why We Fight About Morality and Politics and How to Find Common Ground

By Kurt Gray

Publisher: Pantheon

It’s easy to assume that liberals and conservatives have radically different moral foundations. In Outraged, Kurt Gray showcases the latest science to demonstrate that we all have the same moral mind—that everyone’s moral judgments stem from feeling threatened or vulnerable to harm.

We all care about protecting ourselves and the vulnerable. Conflict arises, however, when we have different perceptions of harm. We get outraged when we disagree about who the “real” victim is, whether we’re talking about political issues, fights with our in-laws, or arguments on the playground.

In this fascinating and insightful tour of our moral minds, Gray tackles popular myths that prevent us from understanding ourselves and those around us. While it is commonly believed that our ancestors were apex predators, Gray argues that for the majority of our evolutionary history, humans were more hunted than hunter. This explains why our minds are hard-wired to perceive threats, and provides surprising insights on the scientific origins of our values and beliefs. Though we might think ourselves driven by objective reasoning, Gray unveils new research that finds our moral judgments are based on gut feelings rather than rational thought, and presents a compelling reminder that we are more alike than we might think.

Drawing on groundbreaking research, Gray provides a captivating new explanation for our moral outrage, and unpacks how to best bridge divides. If you want to understand the morals of the “other side,” ask yourself a simple question—what harms do they see?

Corruptible

Who Gets Power and How It Changes Us

By: Brian Klaas

Publisher: Scribner

Recommended by: Bruce R.

Does power corrupt, or are corrupt people drawn to power? Are tyrants made or born? Are entrepreneurs who embezzle and cops who kill the result of poorly designed systems or are they just bad people? If you were suddenly thrust into a position of power, would you be able to resist the temptation to line your pockets or seek revenge against your enemies?

To answer these questions, Corruptible draws on over 500 interviews with some of the world’s top leaders—from the noblest to the dirtiest—including presidents and philanthropists as well as rebels, cultists, and dictators. Some of the fascinating insights include: how facial appearance determines who we pick as leaders, why narcissists make more money, why some people don’t want power at all and others are drawn to it out of a psychopathic impulse, and why being the “beta” (second in command) may actually be the optimal place for health and well-being.

Corruptible also features a wealth of counterintuitive examples from history and social science: you’ll meet the worst bioterrorist in American history, hit the slopes with a ski instructor who once ruled Iraq, and learn why the inability of chimpanzees to play baseball is central to the development of human hierarchies.

How to Citizen with Baratunde

By Baratunde Thurston

Recommended by: Bob

Here are some sources of ideas from a podcast by Baratunde Thurston, which began in 2020 and has four seasons of episodes. The overall theme is encouraging thinking about “citizen” as a verb. The four
pillars for doing this are:

  • To participate, not just vote, but to show up for each other and publicly participate by discussing concerns, debating policy choices, advocating, etc.
  • To invest in relationships, by deepening our interconnections with our community, family, neighbors, etc..
  • To understand power, by learning about the fluidity of power and the various ways we the people can use it for our collective benefit.
  • To value the collective, by working towards outcomes that benefit the many, not just the few.

The four seasons of episodes (ranging from 11 to 16 episodes each season) consist of interviews with folks who are thinking about and demonstrating democracy-building activities. It’s a wonderful resource for ideas. They include international, national, statewide, and local leaders.

Indivisible.org

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In America, we don’t do kings.

We’re a grassroots movement of thousands of local Indivisible groups with a mission to elect progressive leaders, rebuild our democracy, and defeat the Trump agenda.

Indivisible National Organization

How we win

Defeating a multi-decade right-wing takeover of American government ain’t easy. But we’re here to win, and we have a plan. Here’s how we’re doing it:

We Are Indivisible. Our opponents depend on a divide-and-conquer strategy, so we treat an attack on one like an attack on all. We show up for each other, and particularly for those facing the brunt of right-wing ideologues’ attacks – often immigrants, people of color, and low-income people. We share a vision: a real democracy, of, by, and for everyone.

Strong Leaders, Strong Groups, Strong Movement. We build and sustain our movement’s power by helping individuals take leadership. They grow and lead local Indivisible groups, take independent action, and coordinate with their fellow local leaders. As a movement, our power comes from coordinated national campaigns where we act together, indivisible.

Inside/Outside Strategy. We understand systems of power – like how Congress operates – and we work inside them to get results. That complements our outside strategy of locally-based constituent pressure to demand elected leaders, regardless of political party, work for our democracy.

A Virtuous Cycle of Advocacy and Elections. We show up to advocate for policy wins in off-years and get out the vote in election years. These efforts reinforce each other to ensure our democracy works for all of us and that the people in power do too – or we will replace them with electeds who will.

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  • Yesterday was a bad day for Elon Musk and Donald Trump and a good day for democracy. Even after Musk spent more than $20 MILLION to buy a seat on Wisconsin’s top court, Susan Crawford won — and the liberal majority on Wisconsin’s Supreme Court is safe!This isn’t just a loss for Trump, Musk, and their lapdog Brad Schimel; it’s a wholesale rejection of oligarchy. The people of this country don’t want their courts stacked with bought-and-paid-for judges who’ll do the bidding of Musk and his billionaire friends. The vote results convey that loud and clear.And this isn’t just a victory for Susan Crawford […]
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