NAKASEC, KRC, KRCC, NQAPIA, SAALT, and SEARAC Denounces ICE Raids

For Imme­di­ate Release
Jan­u­ary 8, 2016

Con­tact:
Jen­ny Seon of KRC in Cal­i­for­nia, jenny@krcla.org
Inhe Choi of KRCC in Illi­nois, inhe@chicagokrcc.org
Dae Joong Yoon of NAKASEC, djyoon@nakasec.org
Sasha W., NQAPIA, sasha@nqapia.org
Lak­sh­mi Sri­daran of SAALT, lakshmi@saalt.org
Kat­ri­na Dizon Mari­ategue of SEARAC, katrina@searac.org

NAKASEC, KRC, KRCC, NQAPIA, SAALT, and SEARAC Denounce ICE Raids

AAPIs Join the Fight to Demand an End to Depor­ta­tions Tar­get­ing Cen­tral Amer­i­can Families

#StopTheRaids #KnowYour­Pow­er

WASHINGTON DC— Nation­al Kore­an Amer­i­can Ser­vice and Edu­ca­tion Con­sor­tium (NAKASEC),  Kore­an Amer­i­can Resource & Cul­tur­al Cen­ter (KRCC), Kore­an Resource Cen­ter (KRC), Nation­al Queer Asian Pacif­ic Islander Alliance (NQAPIA), South Asian Amer­i­cans Lead­ing Togeth­er (SAALT), and the South­east Asia Resource Action Cen­ter (SEARAC)  join the call of refugee and immi­grant rights orga­ni­za­tions, fam­i­lies, and com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers across the coun­try in con­demn­ing raids by Immi­gra­tion and Cus­toms Enforce­ment (ICE) tar­get­ing Cen­tral Amer­i­can chil­dren and fam­i­lies who came seek­ing pro­tec­tion from life-threat­en­ing vio­lence in their home countries.

ICE’s deci­sion to tar­get asy­lum seek­ing chil­dren and fam­i­lies is an inhu­mane mis­take that only instills fear in ALL our com­mu­ni­ties. NAKASEC, KRC, KRCC, SAALT, and SEARAC  encour­age AAPI part­ners to show sup­port for these Cen­tral Amer­i­can fam­i­lies by sign­ing an AAPI Sol­i­dar­i­ty Sign On Letter condemning the unjust raids. Visit the following link to sign on to the letter:  LINK

NAKASEC Executive Director Dae Joong Yoon, KRCC Executive Director Inhe Choi, and KRC Interim Executive Director Jenny Seon released the fol­low­ing state­ment denounc­ing the ICE raids: “We are appalled that while over 5 mil­lion immi­grant stu­dents and par­ents fight for the imple­men­ta­tion of the DAPA and expand­ed DACA pro­grams, the Oba­ma admin­is­tra­tion decides to move for­ward on wide­ly con­demned raids tar­get­ing anoth­er group of vul­ner­a­ble chil­dren and fam­i­lies. Many com­mu­ni­ties are vic­tims of war and pover­ty, so pro­tect­ing refugees and asy­lum seek­ers is a key pri­or­i­ty for all of us includ­ing the Kore­an Amer­i­can com­mu­ni­ty and Asian Amer­i­can and Pacif­ic Islander (AAPI) com­mu­ni­ty. Look­ing at our shared his­to­ry, we are all refugees and immi­grants. These Cen­tral Amer­i­can chil­dren and par­ents are a part of our fam­i­ly. Amer­i­ca is and we are bet­ter than this.”

Sasha W., Organizing Director for NQAPIA: National Queer Asian Pacific Islander Alliance, added: Pres­i­dent Oba­ma has become the “deporter-in-chief,” deport­ing more immi­grants than his pre­de­ces­sors. Like the so-called “Secure Com­mu­ni­ties” pro­gram, and the new Pri­or­i­ty Enforce­ment Pro­gram, cre­at­ing a cul­ture of fear does not lead to safe­ty. As queer API immi­grants, these raids make us feel less safe and less Amer­i­can. Immi­grants and refugees are part of our homes, our fam­i­lies, and our dai­ly lives. We stand against rhetorics and poli­cies that crim­i­nal­ize Syr­i­an refugees, Cen­tral Amer­i­can refugees and all those migrat­ing to escape vio­lence. The only crime here is deport­ing Cen­tral Amer­i­can refugees over the hol­i­day week­end. Pres­i­dent Oba­ma needs to stop deport­ing immi­grants, fam­i­lies, and chil­dren, and focus instead on push­ing for DACA+ and DAPA in the courts and stop­ping pro­fil­ing in immi­gra­tion enforcement.

SAALT Director of National Policy and Advocacy, Lakshmi Sridaran, said: “It is a dan­ger­ous and dis­turb­ing trend to deport and refuse refugees and asy­lum seek­ers who are flee­ing vio­lence.  Our immi­gra­tion pri­or­i­ties should be focused on imple­ment­ing the expand­ed DACA and DAPA pro­grams and pass­ing com­mon sense immi­gra­tion reform leg­is­la­tion, not on enforce­ment mea­sures that crim­i­nal­ize chil­dren and fam­i­lies. We know that the con­di­tions of the ICE fam­i­ly res­i­den­tial cen­ters where many of these fam­i­lies will be sent are often deplorable. All immi­grants deserve to be treat­ed with fair­ness and dig­ni­ty and raids over a hol­i­day week­end are unacceptable.”

SEARAC Executive Director Quyen Dinh said: “It is shame­ful to see America’s lega­cy as a lead­ing human­i­tar­i­an leader tar­nished by recent ICE raids tar­get­ing refugees and asy­lum seek­ers. Like many South­east Asian com­mu­ni­ties flee­ing war and vio­lence over 40 years ago, Cen­tral Amer­i­can fam­i­lies deserve com­pas­sion and pro­tec­tion. Crim­i­nal­iz­ing their very act of sur­vival under­mines our human­i­tar­i­an val­ues by re-trau­ma­tiz­ing vul­ner­a­ble com­mu­ni­ties. We urge the Oba­ma Admin­is­tra­tion to reex­am­ine their cur­rent enforce­ment poli­cies that have seen to the depor­ta­tion and sep­a­ra­tion of immi­grant and refugee fam­i­lies. As a nation, we must fix our bro­ken immi­gra­tion sys­tem by imple­ment­ing and expand­ing DACA and DAPA, inte­grat­ing and wel­com­ing immi­grant com­mu­ni­ties, expand­ing pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al dis­cre­tion and oth­er pro­tec­tions against unjust depor­ta­tions, and keep­ing fam­i­lies together.”

NAKASEC, KRC, and KRCC joined the efforts of faith, refugee, and immi­grant rights orga­ni­za­tions across the country:

  • On Jan­u­ary 5th,  KRC joined Los Ange­les part­ners con­demn­ing the raids on the one-year anniver­sary of the his­toric dri­ver’s license law in California.
  • On Jan­u­ary 5th, KRCC also strong­ly spoke out against the raids with Chica­go part­ners and edu­cat­ed immi­grants about their basic rights if immi­gra­tion enforce­ment comes to their home.
  • On Jan­u­ary 8th, NAKASEC’s Vir­ginia office joined part­ner orga­ni­za­tions for a press con­fer­ence denounc­ing the raids and announc­ing their upcom­ing Know Your Rights train­ing. For more infor­ma­tion about future train­ings and how to get involved, please con­tact NAKASEC at 703–256-2208 or dkim@nakasec.org

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The Nation­al Kore­an Amer­i­can Ser­vice & Edu­ca­tion Con­sor­tium (NAKASEC) was found­ed in 1994 by local com­mu­ni­ty cen­ters to project a pro­gres­sive voice and pro­mote the full par­tic­i­pa­tion of Kore­an Amer­i­cans on major social jus­tice issues. NAKASEC main­tains offices in Annan­dale, Vir­ginia and Los Ange­les, Cal­i­for­nia. NAKASEC has affil­i­ates in Chica­go (Kore­an Amer­i­can Resource & Cul­tur­al Cen­ter) and Los Ange­les and Orange Coun­ty (Kore­an Resource Center).