Lobbyists with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee [AIPAC] are pressing Members of Congress to co-sponsor bills that attack the Iran nuclear agreement by imposing new sanctions on Iran [S.722 & H.R.1698] [1] and attack Palestinian self-determination by promoting Israeli settlements in the West Bank [S.720 & H.R.1697]. [2] S.722 would designate part of Iran's military as a terrorist organization, which would obstruct contact between the U.S. and Iranian militaries. U.S. military leaders have opposed this move on the grounds that it would undermine the U.S. fight against ISIS in Iraq. [3] S.720 & H.R.1697 would erase the distinction in U.S. law between Israel and Israeli settlements in the West Bank and make it illegal for U.S. companies to boycott or otherwise discriminate against Israeli settlements in the West Bank based on calls by the United Nations or the European Union. [4] Urge your Senators and Representative to oppose these bills by signing our petition. References: 1. https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/722; https://www.foreign.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Countering%20Iran%27s%20Destabilizing%20Activities%20Act%20of%202017.pdf https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/1698; https://foreignaffairs.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/HR-1698.pdf; https://www.niacaction.org/new-senate-sanctions-legislation-risks-killing-the-jcpoa/; https://www.fcnl.org/updates/new-iran-sanctions-risk-putting-u-s-on-war-path-with-iran-709 2. https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/720; https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/1697; https://peacenow.org/WP/wp-content/uploads/pending-BDS-Conflation-bills-in-Congress.pdf 3. https://www.fcnl.org/updates/new-iran-sanctions-risk-putting-u-s-on-war-path-with-iran-709 4. https://peacenow.org/WP/wp-content/uploads/pending-BDS-Conflation-bills-in-Congress.pdf

Every day we read about the effects of deportations and the threat of deportation faced by our immigrant neighbors: five-year olds too anxious to go to kindergarten; parents who must make "contingency" plans for their U.S. citizen children; crime victims and witnesses too frightened to call police; people afraid to go to the jobs they depend on to feed their families. We hear the stories and see the stress on the faces of the people we work with, who live on our block, the people we teach or go to school with, the families who worship alongside us. The California Values Act will ensure that state and local resources are not used to fuel mass deportations, separate families, or spread fear throughout our communities. Under the California Values Act, state and local law enforcement agencies and school police and security departments will not engage in immigration enforcement. No state or local resources will be used to investigate, detain, detect, report, or arrest persons for immigration enforcement purposes. And regardless of whether state or local resources are implicated, no state or local law enforcement agency will detain or transfer any person for deportation without a judicial warrant. Civic institutions that serve the public - like schools, health facilities, courthouses, and the Division of Labor Standards Enforcement- will remain safe and accessible to all California residents, regardless of immigration status. They will establish and publicize policies that limit assistance with immigration enforcement to the fullest extent possible consistent with federal and state law. Please sign this petition and ask your legislators and Gov. Brown to affirm California's values by enacting Senate Bill 54 into law.

To make our Livingston Counties communities more secure and more just. It is just to pull over and ticket bad drivers, but it does not make our community more secure, nor is it just, to deport them because of that.

Last week Mexican presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador filed a complaint with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights against President Donald Trump's planned border wall and his administration's treatment of immigrants. Lopez Obrador said he expects the commission to "speak out in accordance with the law to protect immigrants from the harassment they are suffering since Trump took office." We join the National Regeneration Movement (Moreno) in Mexico in its request for a hearing before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights to combat the two executive orders issued on January 25 by President Trump, called "Improving Public Security in the Interior of the United States" And "Improvements in Border Security and Immigration." The Mexican leaders believe these orders “violate the presumption of innocence, ignore the right to asylum, ignore due process, omit protections relating to migrant children, have a discriminatory content, encourage the collective expulsion of foreigners without attending to the particular conditions of each case. “In addition, such orders make foreigners "deportable strangers" without having to be accused of having committed a crime, that is to say, without there being any charges against them, since it is enough for an immigration officer to consider that in the past they could Have committed any unlawful conduct.”

On March 23, a bipartisan group of ten Senators urged Secretary of State Tillerson to launch an urgent diplomatic effort to address obstacles in northeastern Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan, and Yemen preventing humanitarian aid from being delivered to people who desperately need it. [1] About Yemen, the ten Senators wrote: "In Yemen, the World Food Program estimates that 80% of the population is in urgent need of humanitarian assistance. In short, millions of innocent people will starve to death without concerted and urgent action in the coming weeks…In Yemen, we ask that the Department of State work urgently with stakeholders to persuade combatants to permit humanitarian groups increased access to Red Sea ports like Hodeida to deliver much-needed assistance to vulnerable communities." Former U.S. officials have said that failure to open Hodeida to food imports could tip Yemen into famine. [2] The Trump Administration is moving towards selling even more weapons to Saudi Arabia. [3] This arms deal could be blocked by Congress. [4] That gives Congress leverage over Saudi Arabia. Urge Congress to use its leverage to force the Saudis to open Hodeida to humanitarian aid to avert famine by signing our petition. References: 1. https://www.rubio.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ContentRecord_id=7D1BDC36-79DE-4AB2-A9F1-1A89B8B5111D 2. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-hodeidah-yemen-famine_us_58a88970e4b037d17d28610b 3. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-administration-looks-to-resume-saudi-arms-sale-criticized-as-endangering-civilians-in-yemen/2017/03/08/a259090a-040e-11e7-b1e9-a05d3c21f7cf_story.html 4. http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2017/03/congress-showdown-saudi-arms-sales-bombs-yemen.html

The threat of ending the DACA program will put 700,00-800,000 young people across the country at risk for deportation. Several threatened include students from our own student body at Aquinas College. Our school, with its Dominican traditions, should stand with our community and work to provide a safe space where all students can focus on their academics instead of worrying about their families and immigration status.

Earlier this month, the Trump administration began the process of looking for contractors to build the border wall. More than 500 companies have reportedly already shown interest in designing and building prototypes of the wall and the wall itself. Many of these companies also build projects in our cities and states. We must stop those who seek to profit from dividing families from getting our tax dollars at the local level. So far legislators in six states and four cities have taken steps to propose legislation to keep local funds from going to companies that support construction of the border wall. This legislation would ban companies that build the wall from winning local construction contracts with the city or state, withdraw public investments in these companies through state pension funds or both. Despite running on a promises to rebuild America's roads, bridges, airports and other infrastructure, the only project Donald Trump is actually trying to build to date is the border wall. We must stand against companies that seek to profit from dividing families and building walls. Add your signature above to ask local elected officials not to send your local dollars to support border wall companies.

• Ensure no state support for a Muslim registry - It prohibits access to information in state databases for use in any federal registry program based on national origin, religion or other protected characteristics. • Focus police on crime, not deportation - State, local and campus police will not participate in federal immigration enforcement activities, including inquiries, investigations, raids, arrests or detentions that are based solely on immigration status. When police act as ICE (immigration) agents, victims and witnesses of crime are afraid to call police, which makes us all less safe. • Guarantee basic due process rights - It requires notice to immigrant detainees of their legal rights – in a language they understand.

In the United States, it’s not about what you look like or where you come from that makes you American - we are all equal. But Donald Trump doesn’t agree and has declared war on immigrants and wants taxpayers to foot the bill. If you think Trump’s current immigration policies are already bad, just imagine what he will do if he gets billions more from Congress. Taxpayer money would be used to build his costly and unnecessary southern border wall. Another $1.2 billion would be spent on immigration enforcement agents and detention beds to detain and deport millions of hard-working immigrants As Americans, we cannot allow Donald Trump to replace our most cherished values with his xenophobic agenda. Republicans will need 60 votes to pass any funding bill - and there are only 42 Republicans in the Senate - so Democrats have the power to be the resistance to the Trump agenda. You can help keep immigrant families together and save American tax dollars by blocking Donald Trump’s border wall and deportation force -- but you have to act now. Congress can defund Trump’s mass deportation plan, but they're not going to do it without a strong public outcry from Americans like you. Take a stand now and sign this petition telling Congress to block funding for Trump’s deportation force.

We must take steps to support and protect the rights of our community.

Broken windows arrests have always disproportionately impacted poor communities of color, specifically Black people. But now under Trump, these prosecutions are having devastating consequences for our non-citizen community members. In fact, under the new Executive Order, just being accused of a crime could lead to deportation. The NYPD has stated its intention to cooperate with the federal government’s new enforcement regime and reiterated its continued commitment to broken windows policing. District Attorneys are the only people who have the power to halt these prosecutions by declining to prosecute these cases.

In recent weeks, the Trump administration has made it clear that any and all immigrants are subject to deportation. Trump has called on local jurisdictions to help carry out his plan and to do that he wants to reinstate the failed enforcement program known as 287(g), an agreement that gives local police some authority to enforce immigration law, and a similar program known as Secure Communities. The Maryland TRUST ACT would put an end to this. The MD TRUST ACT would prohibit law enforcement agencies from collaborating with ICE on civil immigration enforcement, and prohibit the contribution of state or local resources to a federal effort to register people on the basis of protected classes including religion and race.