As the Flint Alliance for Immigrant Rights (FAIR) approaches the one-year anniversary of its formation last February, one vital constant has emerged as a theme across their work: the ability to pivot.
That ability to rapidly organize was on display on January 10, less than 48 hours after Minnesota resident Renee Good was shot and killed by Immigrations and Custom Enforcement (ICE) Agent Jonathan Ross as she tried to leave the site of an ICE raid in Minneapolis. FAIR planned, organized, and promoted a vigil honoring Good and Keith Porter, a California resident who was shot and killed by an off-duty ICE agent during a dispute on New Year’s Eve. Despite short notice and frigid temperatures, more than 160 people spent the evening listening to local activists speak at the ice rink on the University of Michigan-Flint’s campus.
“We were so moved,” said Lucine Jarrah, a FAIR coalition member who spoke at the vigil. “There’s a lot of moving pieces (to put the event together) and the organizers, just from a logistical side to get everything set up, and of course the weather was not in our favor, but to have well over 160 people in attendance was incredibly moving and inspiring. That showing of solidarity is really a testament to where we are in terms of our ability to mobilize people through FAIR, but also where we are on a national scale in terms of the kinds of ways that this is finally moving people to action and wanting to fight against these terrible forces.”
In addition to Jarrah, other speakers included FAIR coalition members Regina Laurie, Alysia Treviño, Amanda LaMielle, Elizabeth Jordan, and Robert White; and Nayyirah Sharrif, director of Flint Rising. A statement from Delma Jackson of the Sankofa Project for Social Justice was also read by Laurie.
The ability to shift quickly as the times demand it is really just a requirement of activism, especially in this political moment when the Trump Administration has chaotically and recklessly enforced immigration laws often resulting in detainments of either American citizens or people who had legal status, ignored court orders and rulings, and incited increasingly tense and violent interactions with people while occupying communities like Minneapolis, Charlotte, Chicago, Memphis, and Los Angeles.
“It’s very difficult (to keep up), but I think that’s the point,” Jarrah said. “They want it to be difficult. They want people to lose interest and to disengage because it’s so overwhelming. And so that’s something that we are up against as a coalition. We’re trying to take all of this information and put it together, whether it’s through our online campaigns, digitally when we’re putting out newsletters, or informing people via our different social media channels that these are the (latest) policy updates. We’re trying to break them down and help people understand what’s going on and why it’s so important that they stay informed. It does make it difficult because every single day there’s something new that’s happening, and something new for us to follow.”
Jarrah said this can be particularly stressful for organizations working directly with assisting immigrants and their families with things like applying for citizenship or a green card or other required documents. She said there have been changes in the applications themselves, in fee structures, and other minutiae that can result in changes in status without the person even being aware something is missing.
The Trump Administration is also more aggressively canceling temporary protected status (TPS), which is a designation that allows people from specific countries facing conflicts, disasters, or other dangers to live and work temporarily in the United States without facing deportation to an unsafe home country. TPS has recently been suspended for several countries, including Venezuela, Somalia, Haiti, Afghanistan, Cameroon, Honduras, Myanmar, Nepal, Nicaragua, Syria, South Sudan, and Ethiopia.
“There’s a lot of communities here in Flint that are directly impacted by that, who are only here on TPS,” Jarrah said. “So an individual who came to this country and was able to stay because they have TPS for Syria, for example, now has to know how to adjust their status, apply for asylum, or apply for something else and have a pending case. Otherwise, they’re made effectively undocumented. We’re staying updated and following these changes as carefully as we can to make sure we’re giving our immigrant community here the tools and the resources and the information that they need to decide on next steps for themselves and also make sure that we’re informing the broader community that this is so important and we need you to be activated on these issues so that we have the support and the power to continue to fight this.”
FAIR is a volunteer coalition that was established out of community meetings and dialogues around how to protect and support the Flint area’s immigrant community shortly after Trump’s inauguration. Although it was formed in response to a Republican administration, the long-term goal is to make actions they are taking sustainable and replicable, no matter what political party is in power in government. The coalition includes activist organizations like Indivisible GLOW, and individuals who work in wide roles across the community, including churches, educational institutions, nonprofit organizations, lawyers, and others who are passionate about protecting immigrant rights.
People interested in learning more about their work are encouraged to attend their next teach-in and strategy session at 6:30 p.m. on Saturday, January 17, at the Neighborhood Engagement Hub (3216 Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue in Flint). The group also regularly posts information on its Facebook and Instagram pages, and there is an interest and volunteer form for people who want to stay informed or get more involved with the coalition. They are also selling shirts as a fundraiser for the group.
“This is a fight that we are in for the long haul,” Jarrah said. “I think that that has been a big part of the messaging for FAIR. A lot of us have been organizing around immigrant rights and immigrant justice for a long time. We know that the immigration system has been broken for decades. We’ve been advocating for changes in policy, and have not been able to achieve any of the policy goals that we’ve had whether it was under this current administration or under a Democratic administration. So part of the education is to tell people that not only do we want to respond in moments of crisis and in moments of urgency, like now, with what we’re seeing and the ways in which ICE is kidnapping people and detaining people and as recently as last week, murdering people. So not only are we responding and reacting to that, but we are also doing the reflecting and the visioning and the strategic planning around what our priorities are going to be in the next five, 10 years. What are we building towards? What are we organizing towards? And showing people that we all have a say and we all have power in deciding how this immigration system should work and how it can be improved to actually ensure that immigrant individuals and families have the resources that they need to thrive and succeed in this country.”
Beyond advocating for neighbors in the Flint area, FAIR also offers something else vital in this particular political moment: community. Its events give people the chance to meet others who care and are passionate about justice in immigration, housing, public health, and other inequities.
“The despair and apathy, that’s what they’re (the government) banking on,” Jarrah said. “They want people to feel enough despair, enough grief, enough anger, that instead of mobilizing them to action, it gets them to step away and disengage. There are days where it’s harder, it’s so difficult to watch the news and to see the kinds of horrific things that we are seeing. So this is important and pivotal, for us to step up and say, no, this is wrong. This should not have happened. And really help people continue to stay hopeful and continue to understand what kind of power they have to fight for change.”
FAIR also has strong local evidence that shows that community action and organization works. Last year, FAIR helped organize opposition to a 287(g) task force agreement between a local police department, the Metro Police Authority of Genesee County (which serves Swartz Creek and Mundy Township areas), and ICE. The agreement, which came in July, allowed officers to enforce ICE warrants, which are administrative and not necessarily criminal, and detain people.
The agreement, the only one of its kind any Genesee County law enforcement agency had signed, was immediately controversial. FAIR helped organize and mobilize residents who attended public Metro Police Authority meetings, submitted public comments, and consistently protested the agreement. It was eventually rescinded after that persistent presence and action.
“There are so many ways that we can build power here at a local level,” Jarrah said.
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