Sophie Sonnenfeld Photo
Over 100 demonstrators flooded Elm Street outside U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro’s New Haven office Tuesday to protest the immigrant detention centers on the border.
The event was part of a larger #CloseTheCamps protest that occurred across the nation from Boston to San Francisco on Tuesday.
Moveon.org organized the nationwide protest to attract the attention of members of Congress home for the Fourth of July holiday. The website states the group’s demands for Congress are “1. Close the camps 2. Not one dollar for family detention 3. Bear witness and reunite families.”
The protests were held in response to the Trump administration’s attempts at border security through migrant detention centers. Recent reports have detailed the conditions children face when detained at these border camps. The reports revealed accounts of children being denied soap and toothbrushes, told to drink out of toilets for water, and exhibiting signs of severe trauma. So far, seven children have died in U.S. custody after being separated from their families.
The protesters outside DeLauro’s office held up signs and chanted their three demands: ‘Close the camps!’ ‘Not one dollar!’ and ‘Reunite families!’
Shelly Altman started to put the protest together on Sunday at 4 p.m.
Fellow organizer George Goodrich said when he contacted DeLauro’s office, staffers were “a little standoffish at first, so I assured them we were protesting the camps and not Rosa.”
Organizers held a moment of silence for the seven lives lost at the border and read aloud a letter for DeLauro. The letter states the three demands, and asks DeLauro to visit a camp this week and “bear witness.”
DeLauro staffer Lou Mangini read aloud a statement from DeLauro to the crowd.
“Given the Trump administration’s history of abuses, I could not in good conscience vote to give the Trump administration funding because I do not trust them to properly care for the children,” the statement read in part.
DeLauro has visited the border and recently voted against the border supplemental bill. DeLauro also fought for a House-passed bill ensuring every facility children stay in meet standards of care enshrined in the Flores settlement: Setting a 90-day limit on how long children can stay in an influx facility, requiring HHS to tell Congress if a child dies in their custody, and requiring HHS to allow Members of Congress to conduct oversight visits without advance notice.
“Shame on us for not doing more to hold this administration accountable. The kids in our care deserve so much better, and I am not going to give up this fight. As chair of the Appropriations Subcommittee responsible for funding HHS, I will be conducting oversight to hold this administration accountable for how they are treating children,” DeLauro’s statement read.
Goodrich was a paramedic and reporter in New Haven, and has now been a nurse for 10 years. “Something needs to be done to close the camps,” he said. He said his experience in medical care and reporting taught him “the importance of responding to things.”
“The best person to take care of a child is their parent not ICE” (Immigration and Customs Enforcement), Goodrich said. “Even if ICE or border security wanted to help these children, it is clear there is a good percentage of people who don’t care about the children.”
In May, Kristine Bourret went to the U.S.-Mexico border through a Border Immersion Program with Iglesia Luterana Cristo Rey (“Christ the King Lutheran Church”). Bourret met with undocumented immigrants, border patrol officers, and immigration attorneys. She said this visit has inspired her to “keep helping everyone suffering at the border.”
Kristine Bourret said she thinks DeLauro is “on our side,” but added that Congress could work to “expand the definition of asylum.” Bourret called the current definition of asylum “too narrow because it keeps people from receiving the help they need if they don’t fit all the requirements.”
Fellow demonstrator Mary Herron said she attended the protest because “if we do not speak out then we are complicit.” Herron said she believes staying silent regarding the migrant camps is “as bad as Germans who stayed silent in the 1940s.” Herron said the title of “concentration camp” is fitting for the border camps. “Though they’re not extermination camps, the concentration camps in Germany started as detention camps.”
There has been fierce debate sparked over the correct terminology for the migrant detention centers after U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez first referred to them as “concentration camps.” Regardless of the terminology, Herron said, “almost all religions teach that we should treat others the way we want to be treated. So really, Trump should be put in a cage too.”
Artist Julia Provey painted a poster of a mother and her child being separated. She said her oil painting took only about 20 minutes. “I just let the emotion pour out.”
She created the piece a few months ago after listening to news reports about the border camps. “I just felt so powerless,” she said. She said attending protests like the #CloseTheCamps event is important because “lots of people want to help, but they don’t know how.”