[Updated 1/24/18 with names of organizational and individual signers]

Download PDF of letter of letter here.

Kirstjen M. Nielsen                                                                          January 22, 2018
Secretary of Homeland Security
Washington, DC 20528

Dear Secretary Nielsen,

We are community organizations, immigrant rights groups, faith-based organizations, and immigrant rights lawyers, professors, and activists writing to condemn the Department of Homeland Security’s (“DHS”) recent targeting of leaders of the sanctuary and immigrant rights movement and to call for the immediate release of Ravi Ragbir and Eliseo Jurado, the return of Jean Montrevil, and a halt to the effort to deport Maru Mora-Villalpando.

Organizations involved in the sanctuary movement provide critical advocacy and services for immigrants. For example, the New Sanctuary Coalition of NYC, which Ravi leads and which Jean co-founded, is a network of faith groups that advocates for immigrants and works to reform detention and deportation practices in New York City and nationwide. The coalition has grown to include 150 places of worship and over 1,000 volunteers. The organization has been central in developing and advocating for policy reforms and providing critical services to our communities. Under Ravi’s leadership, the coalition launched a program to provide volunteers to accompany immigrants to their ICE check-ins and court appearances. We support the work of the New Sanctuary Coalition and organizations involved in the sanctuary movement nationwide to help keep families together.

In many instances, these groups are led by individuals who themselves have been impacted by the very system they are trying to reform. The New Sanctuary Coalition is no different. Ravi Ragbir, the Executive Director, was a green-card holder for twelve years before facing removal and being detained by immigration officials for nearly two years because of a non-violent criminal conviction. After his release from immigration detention a decade ago, Ravi became an outspoken critic of the flaws in the immigration system and a fearless advocate for immigrants. He has been pursuing legal challenges to his deportation order and is in the process of trying to get his conviction vacated. He is married to Amy Gottlieb, Associate Regional Director of the American Friends Service Committee’s northeast office, who has fought for immigrant rights for decades. Similarly, Jean Montrevil, co-founder of the New Sanctuary Coalition, has lived in the United States for decades, but was placed in deportation proceedings because of old and non-violent drug offenses. He too was released from immigration detention many years ago and became involved in the immigrant rights movement as he pursued legal challenges to his deportation order. Together, Jean and Ravi galvanized faith communities in New York City and across the country to support immigrant rights. Maru Mora-Villalpando leads Northwest Detention Center Resistance (NWDCR), a Tacoma organization that advocates for better treatment and conditions for detained immigrants and to stop the deportations that are tearing families apart. Eliseo Jurado is the husband of immigrant rights activist Ingrid Encalada Latorre, who has taken sanctuary in Colorado churches since December 2016. Ingrid has publicly fought her own deportation based on a non-violent criminal offense.

Both Ravi and Jean were detained by ICE this month and sent to Krome Detention Facility in Florida, and Jean has already been deported to Haiti. On the same day Ravi was detained by ICE, Eliseo was picked up by ICE on his way to a grocery store to purchase items for his and Ingrid’s children. Maru was recently served with paper initiating deportation proceedings against her.

DHS’s effort to silence political opposition through coercive government power sadly echoes some of the most shameful periods in our nation’s history. Our Constitution holds most dear the right of the people to come together and raise their voices in dissent. The viability of our democracy depends on the most robust protections for such dissent. However, the brutality of the Trump Administration’s deportation machine seems to know no bounds and its disregard for our most sacred constitutional norms poses an existential threat to our American way of life. The fact that ICE has begun using deportation and detention to silence faith leaders and activists marks a new low.

Imprisoning and expelling activist leaders is a tool of repression that is the hallmark of authoritarian regimes around the world and is incompatible with democracy. We, the undersigned individuals and organizations, call on DHS to immediately release Ravi Ragbir and Eliseo Jurado, to bring back Jean Montrevil, to end the effort to deport Maru Mora-Villalpando and to cease using detention and deportation as a tool to repress dissent.

Sincerely,

The following individuals have signed in their individual capacity. Organizations are listed for institutional affiliation purposes only.