By Miriam Raftery

Photo via American Friends Service Committee



December 13, 2018 (San Diego)—On Monday, 32 people, mostly faith-based leaders from across the nation, were arrested in a peaceful protest in support of migrants seeking asylum at the international border in San Diego.

While most were charged with not following officers' orders and quickly released, Matthew Leber from the American Friends Service Committee representing Quakers was arrested on suspicion of assaulting a Border Patrol agent and kept overnight. But he was released without charges after a video posted by the AFSC shows agents knocking down Leber and taking his backpack, countering officials’ version of what occurred.  View video:  https://www.facebook.com/CAIRNational/videos/338520756967150/

East County resident Jack Shu, president of Cleveland National Forest Foundation, witnessed the incident. “I was standing only 15 feet from Matt when he was arrested,” Shu told East County Magazine. “The media reported that he was arrested for assault when the truth is, it was the Border Patrol that escalated the situation and used physical force when it was not needed.”

By Briana Gomez

December 6, 2018 (El Cajon) -- The annual El Cajon Multicultural Festival and non-profit fair at Eje Elementary School in El Cajon last month hosted an array of organizations dedicated to welcoming new immigrants into the community. 

By Miriam Raftery

November 5, 2018 (San Diego) – President Donald Trump, in an interview with Axios, declared his intention to eliminate birthright citizenship by executive order – a move that reputable legal scholars on both the left and right agree would be unconstitutional.  Congressman Duncan D. Hunter (R-Alpine) has previously supported a bill in Congress to similarly end granting citizenship to most children of immigrants born here.

Trump stated,  "You can definitely do it with an Act of Congress. But now they're saying I can do it just with an executive order." 

But the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. is crystal clear that everyone born in the U.S. must be granted citizenship.  It states: "all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside." Moreover, the Supreme Court has upheld that the amendment does cover children of immigrants, regardless of their parents' legal status.

East County News Service

October 9, 2018 (La Mesa) – The Grossmont Healthcare District (GHD) is continuing its support of community organizations that assist specialized populations in the East Region, including homeless and refugee groups, with recent grants to Crisis House and Survivors of Torture International.

By Rebecca Jefferis Williamson

Photo: Yusef Miller, CAIR-California 

October 3, 2018 (El Cajon) – Members of CAIR , the Council on American-Islamic Relations, called on Cajon Valley Union School District members  at the September 25th board meeting to  fire former Greenfield Middle School’s principal, Gregory Calvert over his handling of the alleged bullying of a Syrian student.  Calvert has since taken a position as assistant principal at Chase Avenue Elementary in the same school district. 

East County News Service

September 13, 2018 (El Cajon) - Local nonprofit Hope for Iraqi Christians is hosting a gala fundraising dinner on Friday, September 28 at 6:30 p.m.  All proceeds will benefit refugees in Iraq and throughout the Middle East who have been driven out of their homes by conflict and genocide in the Middle East throughout the last several years. The event will be held at the University of San Diego Forums Hall, 5998 Alcala Park, San Diego.

By Briana Gomez

August 1, 2018 (El Cajon) – Houda Al Sidnawi arrived in the United States in 2016 with both of her parents and her two younger sisters, now 16 and 10. The family left Syria in 2012 at the brink of the civil war and immigrated to Egypt where they obtained appropriate documentation to enter the United States on refugee visas.  

Despite having committed no crime, some asylum seekers have been kept in windowless cells for over a year, never allowed outside even a single day

By Miriam Raftery

July 2, 2018 (Washington D.C.) – People who ask for asylum when they arrive at the U.S. border after fleeing violence and persecution have committed no crime, unlike people who cross the border illegally. Yet the Trump administration has been imprisoning asylum seekers for over a year, even after they passed background checks, were found likely to receive asylum, and in some cases, even after a court granted them asylum but the administration was appealing the cases.

By Miriam Raftery

June 27, 2018 (San Diego) – U.S. District Judge Dana Sabraw in San Diego issued a ruling Tuesday ordering the Trump administration to end separation of parents from children at the border and to reunite families already separated, except in limited circumstances.

By Miriam Raftery

June 21, 2018 (San Diego) – East County legislators and California’s state attorney general are taking action in response to President Donald Trump’s executive order to end separation of immigrant children and parents. Some argue that the directive does not go far enough to protect children and babies, since they could still be detained with parents and since it’s unclear how or when youngsters already taken from parents will be reunited.

Trump's reversal came after audiotape of terrified, crying children at a detention facility was released by ProPublica and after a judge sharply criticized the Trump administration upon learning that records were not kept when some children were taken from their anguished parents, who have been unable to get any information on their children's whereabouts 

"I can’t understand this," the exasperated judge reportedly told the attorney. "If someone at the jail takes your wallet, they give you a receipt. They take your kids, and you get nothing? Not even a slip of paper?”

By Miriam Raftery

Photo via Twitter

June 4, 2018 (San Diego) – Outrage is growing over revelations that the Trump administration has dramatically expanded the number of children being forcibly separated from their parents at the international border. On Friday, dozens o f protests were held in cities across the nation, NPR reports. The hashtag #familiesbelongtogether is trending on Twitter, showing thousands gathered at protests from Trump Towers to the nation’s capital.

By Miriam Raftery

Photo: Prayer vigil held in 2015 by Iraqi Christians outside the ICE prison in San Diego’s Otay Mesa, where their family members were detained for prolonged periods.

March 4, 2018 (Washington D.C.) – The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that immigrants and asylum seekers may be detained indefinitely without periodic bond hearings.  The ruling applies even to people with permanent legal status.

Hear our interview  on KNSJ ith Mandy Mattis, No One Left Behind, on the Shurish family, how you can help this local hero and other translators relocated here after risking their lives to help Amreican troops.

By Miriam Raftery

February 1, 2018 (El Cajon) – Targeted by the Taliban for helping the U.S. military as a translator in Afghanistan, Ahmed Shurish fled his homeland with his wife and children, leaving everything else behind.  They arrived here just seven months ago, building a new life in El Cajon.

But now his family has once against lost everything, this time in a fire in which Shurish heroically saved his neighbor’s baby from the flames. So the community is pulling together to help this hero and his family rebuild their lives yet again.

By Miriam Raftery

“This is a moment of truth, a moment to reflect on our values -- values of decency, respect, and compassion -- and call this president to account for his treatment of others.” – Andrea Guerrero, Alliance San Diego

January 13, 2018 (San Diego) – The Washington Post, citing multiple sources, reported  Friday that during a meeting with several Senators meant to hammer out bipartisan immigration legislation, President Donald Trump made a vulgar racial remark. “Why are we having all these people from shithole countries come here?” the President reportedly said of immigrants from Africa, Haiti, and El Salvador.

By Miriam Raftery

Pope's homily for Christmas Mass during the night: full text

December 25, 2017 (The Vatican) -- In his homily at Christmas Mass in St Peter’s Basilica during the night, Pope Francis drew parallels between Biblical refugees Joseph and Mary and the millions of refugees around the world today who are “driven from their lands” under desperate circumstances, often forced to leave family members behind.

“In many cases,  the Pope observed, “this departure is filled with hope, hope for the future; yet for many others this departure can only have one name: survival. Surviving the Herods of today, who, to impose their power and increase their wealth, see no problem in shedding innocent blood.”

He urged compassion and a welcoming attitude toward refugees, in stark contrast to the harsh policies imposed by the Trump administration, which has sought to restrict admission of refugees and increase deportations, tearing many families apart.