The decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) plan is another terrifying way that Trump's white supremacist administration continues its assault on human rights. Immigration reform in the United States has always been a practice that is rooted in race-based violence, exclusion, and exploitation. DACA was never proclaimed to be the best solution, not even an adequate or just solution to the immigration problems created by the United States. However, repealing DACA itself is a swift blow to over 800,000 young people and will force them to take immediate precautions to avoid deportation. They are being told to 'go home', and yet, this is the only home they know. This action targets vulnerable individuals on the basis of race, class, and nationality, a continuing fulfillment of Trump's campaign promises to make American great again for white people.
The horrific acts of violence and white supremacy in Charlottesville this past summer occurred because of continuing white supremacy on all fronts-- from the grassroots, local level all the way to the White House. White folks failed to address white supremacy on an interpersonal level as well as an institutional level. The events of this summer did not occur in a vacuum, but rather were the result of the years and centuries-long history of white supremacy, an abhorrent philosophy that the Trump administration is intent on strengthening.
Repealing DACA is yet another instance that exposes the current administration's blatant racism, and its constant effort to marginalize and subjugate people of different colors, genders, and cultures in our country. They refuse to label neo-Nazis and white supremacists as domestic terrorists, even as they perpetrate the very definition of terrorism against people of color within our borders. They recently announced that they will end a data collection process on gender wage gap, passed by the previous administration, which works towards women receiving pay equal to their male counterparts. They pass laws to militarize local police forces across the country, which disproportionally target, incarcerate, and murder people of color. They seek to build a wall along the US border with Mexico, showing an ignorant isolationism and a refusal of people to come freely and be welcomed into this country. They work to refute the words engraved upon a plaque at the base of the Statue of Liberty: "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses, yearning to be free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore; Send these, the homeless, the tempest-tossed to me; I lift my lamp beside the golden door."
And Solidarity Cville lifts our proverbial lamps beside all of these doors, be them by land or by sea, regardless of who you are.
Solidarity Cville commits to supporting undocumented, migrant, and immigrant people at all levels-- institutionally and personally-- in the wake of this decision. Specifically, we applaud and commit to solidarity with the DREAMers student-lead organization at the University of Virginia. We call on all freedom fighters to take action in solidarity with these courageous students. On Wednesday at 12:30 pm, the DREAMers at UVa hosted a public demonstration on the steps of the amphitheater. We support these students in making visible that ending DACA is unacceptable in our community.
We support the DREAMers public statement calling on the University of Virginia to offer protection, to uphold student tuition and wages, and to keep students' residences private. We will answer their call for local communities to act now and continue to act in support of undocumented and immigrant people.
This act of violence against DACA recipients and immigrant communities is only the most recent iteration of Trump's white supremacist agenda, a decision delivered by real life Confederate devotee, Jeff Sessions. We must commit to eradicating white supremacy in all its forms. Protect undocumented people. Remove the statues. Act now.