Thread by @mattgaventa

Tweeting today from the Texas Impact “Courts and Ports” Advocacy Intensive — bunch of clergy getting organized at the Brownsville border crossing. (1/?)

Plan for the day is 1) briefing this morning with ACLU; 2) crossing the bridge this afternoon to see conditions among those awaiting asylum hearings; 3) public prayer alongside the US-side tent city where asylum “courts” are happening. (2/?)

About 100 Texas clergy gathered here: Methodists, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Quakers, Baptists. Some drove 10+ hours for this day of learning and witness. (3/?)

I am reminded this morning that organizing is often highly un-photogenic. Just folks in a church fellowship hall with coffee cups. More later as the day intensifies. (4/?)

How clergy get their juices flowing. #courtsandports

This is a humbling chart. @HopeBorder #courtsandports

I forgot my numbering. Let’s call this (7/?): A reading of “Home,” by Warsan Shire. “No one leaves home unless home is the mouth of a shark.”

Now we have got a panel of lawyers representing real asylum-seekers. No streaming or recording out of respect to the confidentiality and safety of real people. #courtsandports (8/?)

Immigration court appeals go to an administrative review board before they go to a federal court. At this moment, the Attorney General can step in and unilaterally set precedent... #courtsandports (9/?)

The problem this creates is that it may take 4-5-6 years for a case to organically make it through to the federal level to allow for the possibility of overturning precedent. In the meantime, people wait. #courtsandports (10/?)

Hearing from attorneys: asylum process designed to be effectively unnavigable without legal representation. Also, lawyers now having less and less in-person access to clients — and perhaps none at all. Hard for this to feel like due process. (11/?) #courtsandports

Learning in-depth about the real-world impacts of Migrant Protection Protocols. (12/?) #courtsandports texastribune.org/2019/07/26/mig…

Immigration attorneys: Applying for asylum is 100% legal. Crossing the border without papers is a felony — albeit the “felony equivalent of jaywalking.” The problem is that agencies can use felony charges as grounds to withhold other rights. (13/?) #courtsandports

Immigration attorney now talking about compassion fatigue, burnout, and secondary trauma among those working on the front lines here. One voicemail from a client across the border has gunshots in the background — “I couldn’t get it out to my head.” (14/?) #courtsandports

Question from the floor: the policies you are describing are matters of administrative execution — is it fair to say that new leadership in the executive branch would be critical for changing what this looks like on the ground?
Panelist, quickly: “YES!”
(15/?) #courtsandports

Bullet points from each panelist: 1) need for judicial process separate from oversight of attorney general, so that the process isn’t subject to whims of any given administration. (16/?) #courtsandports

2) attorney: “Migrant Protection Protocol” is meant to protect migrants by keeping them in their own countries, which exposes them to cartel violence. Most would gladly choose detention centers, whose populations are declining as MPP kicks in. (17/?) #courtsandports

Last bullet point 3): faith communities have opportunity to frame moral arguments in public discourse. Churches have opportunity and obligation to continue to provide theological grounding for this convo... (18/?) #courtsandports

Correction re: #17 above: MPP exposes folks to danger either in home countries or alternately just across US-Mex border. Cartels substantially preying on migrants just across the bridge, no matter their origin. (19/?) #courtsandports

The first time the #CourtsandPorts program sent folks in as immigration court observers, PD changed a client plea to “not guilty,” because the client couldn’t understand English. Why the change, observers ask? “Because you were here, witnessing.” (20/?)

Getting briefed now on what to expect when we head to the bridge. No photos of migrant faces. Too many criminal orgs and cartels watching social media looking for those who have fled. (21/?) #courtsandports

Back at it. To cross the bridge, apparently first you park at the Ross Dress For Less. (21/?) #courtsandports

Congregating by the bus station. (22/?) #courtsandports

We are back from across the border. Maybe 75-100 tents just outside the border entry, several hundred folks living in an oven. Truly heartbreaking. (23/?) #courtsandports

Everyone we spoke to had fled violence elsewhere: Mexico, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Panama. Some had lost children to cartel violence. Nobody felt safe going back. (24/?) #courtsandports

Most had been there for several months. Some had immigration appointments weeks or months from now. Everybody had run out of money. Only sanitation access is the river, which is also the sewer. (25/?) #courtsandports

Many of the children we saw had skin lesions and infections as a result of having to bathe in the river. None had access to medical care or medication save for whatever volunteers bring from across the border. (26/?) #courtsandports

All of them were aware of and had been terrorized by cartel members in operation on that side of the border. We were under instructions not to give anybody anything that would draw extra cartel attention. (27/?) #courtsandports

Some of them had attempted to cross the river, had been apprehended, and taken to “the freezer,” a temporary detention facility cold enough to cause fever and chill and lasting diseases. (28/?) #courtsandports

No photos with faces. The crowd is thick on the ground. (29/?) #courtsandports

Folks are washing clothes in the river water, but cartel members also snatch unwatched pieces. It feels like we are surrounded by predators. (30/?) #courtsandports

Pictured: to the left, bits of the tent city. To the right, the back end of the border facility. We saw deportees exiting through this fence line. (31/?) #courtsandports

When you come back across the border, there are CBP agents standing precisely on the boundary line. One line for folks with documents. Another, much much longer, for undocumented folks seeking asylum. Not heavily militarized, but riot gear lying around. (32/?) #courtsandports

Here we are doing a bit of public witness back on the US side. The words of Amos, which seems apropos. (33/?) #courtsandports

We are fed and back at the church. Briefing from ACLU. Detailing the thousands of calls this office gets every month from asylees seeking help. (34/?) #courtsandports

ACLU: Rio Grande Valley is like family. Interconnected families. Grandma who has dementia and overstays her visa — but when she gets deported, “like a nuclear bomb.” (35/?) #courtsandports

ACLU: locals call RGV “La Jaula,” “the cage,” formed by checkpoints further up the highway. No major hospital inside. (36/?) #courtsandports

Now hearing about the Angry Tias, grassroots org of women responding to human need, picking up folks from bus stations, bringing food to to#he tent city. volunteersotx.org/agency/detail/… (37/?) #courtsandports

ACLU: immigration much different in 2019. Family units wanting to go through legal process, wanting to surrender to CBP. Many fewer CBP apprehensions on open ground. Average officer picks up 1.5/month. (38/?) #courtsandports

ACLU rep doin some good preaching now. “For people of the book, this is a call to action. What then shall we do?” (39/?) #courtsandports

We’re going to go have worship now. I’m going to sign off. I’m tired, heartbroken, thankful, weary, angry, and cracked open. Also I wouldn’t say no to a margarita. The end. (40/40) #courtsandports