Tag: NICE

JHISN Newsletter 05/24/2026

Posted on May 24, 2026 by - News, Newsletter

Dear friends,

Like the volatile Spring weather, the battle for NYC immigrants’ future runs hot and cold. We were glad last Monday when a federal judge ruled that ICE arrests at Manhattan immigration courts must be significantly curtailed. But that feeling of relief was soon tempered by learning that ICE detained a man at immigration court the very next day—and by awareness that ICE might respond to the ruling by increasing its presence on our streets. 

Today’s newsletter begins on a positive note by describing how NICE (New Immigrant Community Empowerment) has expanded its programs and physical presence in the neighborhood. Our second article dives into the little-known story of Omni Airlines, a billionaire-funded company noted for its particularly cruel ICE deportations. We share a revealing map that quickly shows the story of ICE activity in Corona, and conclude with information about an upcoming volunteer event—one where we hope you will join us.

Newsletter highlights:
  1. Going “beyond one-time assistance” for immigrants at NICE
  2. The airline you’ve never heard of that transports ICE deportees
  3. Mapping ICE activity in NYC

1. NICE: “From Surviving to Thriving”

Migration and displacement are overwhelming experiences. Community members must navigate complex U.S. systems—healthcare, employment, housing, and financial services—that are often unfamiliar and difficult to access. —NICE Fact Sheet

Since 1999, New Immigrant Community Empowerment (NICE) has been a crucial first point of contact in our neighborhood for thousands of recent Spanish-speaking immigrants seeking access to social services, legal advice, community, and basic survival assistance. NICE has long been known for its support for day laborers, its OSHA and ESL classes, and for political action in support of immigrant rights.

In recent years, NICE has expanded both its role and its facilities. Their current strategy gives priority to “holistic, culturally competent support that goes beyond one-time assistance.” A key feature of this strategy is the Pre-Apprenticeship Program for Life and Work (Pre-APLW). This apprenticeship program offers English-language, legal, and job-related training. But it also helps immigrants build other practical skills useful in navigating life in the US, including:

  • accessing health and mental health services
  • learning more about transportation systems
  • strengthening financial literacy
  • dealing with New York’s rental and real estate markets

Pre-APLW is organized around intensive workshops. These typically include 25 to 30 participants, who devote 30 to 40 hours a week for four weeks. NICE has contacts and partnerships with potential employers, allowing Pre-APLW Apprentices to obtain hands-on experience and job opportunities. Like all NICE programs, Pre-APLW aims to promote social and political leadership and build community among immigrants.

NICE has recently acquired and renovated additional spaces around Roosevelt and 72nd Street, becoming a small campus. This includes a community center, event and meeting areas, classrooms, and offices. The organization hopes to keep expanding to further meet the needs of their members and all recent immigrants. 

Funding for NICE’s work comes from a combination of government grants, philanthropic or corporate donors, and private contributions. Volunteers are encouraged to assist at the organization’s community events, such as their winter toy giveaway and their Thanksgiving distribution. NICE is currently campaigning to build community support by sponsoring runners in this year’s New York Marathon.

WHAT CAN WE DO?

2. Omni: ICE’s “Special” Airline

“To leave human beings warehoused on a tarmac for hours reveals a system that does not see them as people. This is not simply a logistical error; it is a feature of ICE’s inhumane mission.”—Jo Jordon of No ICE NH

Michael Dorrell, an immigrant from Australia, made billions as a financial investor in logistics companies like the Air Transport Services Group, ATSG, which owns Omni Airlines, a passenger airline that, through the broker Classic Air Charter, contracts with ICE to provide airline deportations. Omni is reportedly the sole provider of “special high-risk charter” (SHRC) deportation flights. Since other airlines refuse to provide that service, Omni charges ICE twice the standard rate for similar flight services, over $33,000 per hour. Comparing the ICE deportation machine to Amazon for people is more than a metaphor: between 2016 and 2024, Amazon acquired over 13 million shares in ATSG, and ATSG expanded the number of cargo planes leased to Amazon in an operating agreement that is good to 2029.

The Torture Abolition and Survivors Support Coalition demanded, in 2022, that Omni suspend cooperation with ICE due to the many human rights violations created by their deportation work. Omni did not stop. In fact, that year, the US government gave Omni $67 million in COVID bailout funds and awarded them a $78 million contract. The airline’s treatment of immigrants actually got worse: flights have become longer and crueler. In 2024, Omni had just six trips that took more than 24 hours to complete, using multi-destination hops. By the end of 2025, 31 flights took between 24 and 50 hours—some have taken 70 to 80 hours. Deportees are held in shackles for the entire duration–an ICE requirement–and deportees have sometimes gone 10 hours without food or water. 

ICE talked publicly last year about possibly purchasing its own fleet, but for now, it works with between 8 and 14 aircraft from about 10 contractors to oversee about 15,000 deportations every month. To reach Trump’s goal of 1 million annual deportations would require 83,300 removals every month, which would require more than 50 planes.

Thomas Cartwright offers a stark contrast with Dorrell.  He is a retired financial investor who, when working with Witness at the Border in 2019, learned about the dehumanizing deportation flights leaving small border airports. He used his skills to track deportation planes using flight-tracking apps. It was his work that revealed the details about the notorious CECOT flights last year. He trained others in his process and has transferred the bulk of the work to Human Rights First, which now publishes monthly reports. April’s report holds 32 pages of revealing details, including:

  • The number of flights for both internal transfers and removals.
  • The use of coast guard flights in the deportation machine.
  • The number of planes provided by each airline carrier.
  • The path of a 51-hour flight carrying deportees to 6 countries.
  • How many times each airport is used: Alexandria, in Louisiana, had the most usage at 2,439 flights.

The contrast of the work these two people have done reveals the difference in mindset between a person who is seeking to make money regardless of how people’s lives are horrifically impacted, and a person who is looking to help his community do well by other people instead of blaming and abusing them.

WHAT CAN WE DO?

3. Locally Mapping ICE 

There are data analysts, such as Danielle Harlow, who examine ICE records nationally to produce public data visualizations showing deportation flights and the locations from which people were taken.  NYC activists are also gathering data to tell the stories of local people kidnapped by ICE enforcers. Corona-based Queens Neighborhoods United (QNU) has been tracking neighborhood ICE raids and verifying the locations where they have kidnapped people. 

 

NYC Icebreaker has been tracking ICE actions throughout the city: their work has revealed that raids are most likely to take place between 7-8 am and 3-5 pm. Monday seems to be the most popular day of the week for ICE to stage their raids in Corona, Tuesday in Bushwick, and Thursday in Sunset Park.

Maps like these are helpful, but incomplete. At last weekend’s anti-casino town hall meeting, it was noted that hundreds of people per month are taken from NYC streets to endure the excruciating flights and inhumane detention centers. Neither maps nor figures can show the full extent or cruelty of the process. 

Like so much immigrant justice work, tracking and mapping ICE is the work of small, local, volunteer-led groups who need support from neighbors and progressive journalists to continue raising awareness and speaking out against the injustices of the deportation machinery.

WHAT CAN WE DO?
  • Join JHISN, Brave of Us, and others at the Community Volunteer Morning organized by Documented, the multilingual, immigrant-driven news outlet we have covered in this newsletter (and often use as a source):

    “Saturday, June 6, from 10:00 AM to 12:00 PM: Distribute newspapers and guides to community spaces (houses of worship, small businesses, community centers, and busy public areas). Engage with residents about their information needs and build community in real time, together— and over food and drink.” INFORMATION AND RSVP

 

In solidarity and with collective care,

Jackson Heights Immigrant Solidarity Network (JHISN)

Follow @JHSolidarity on Facebook and Twitter and share this newsletter with friends, families, neighbors, networks, and colleagues so they can subscribe and receive news from JHISN. 

 

 

JHISN Newsletter 10/25/2025

Posted on October 25, 2025 by - News, Newsletter

Dear friends,

Rarely do we start with a set of asks, but extreme times give our newsletter a sense of urgency. So first, please take a few minutes to fill out our JHISN reader survey, and share how you might imagine and participate in neighborhood defense if escalated ICE raids land in central Queens. Thanks to all of you who have already responded.

Next, please check out and circulate this new state government portal to report disturbing or violent actions you witness by ICE and other federal agents in NYC; photos and videos can be uploaded to the site. The public portal was created by the NYS Attorney General one day after the militarized ICE attack on immigrant street vendors—and New Yorkers who came to their defense—on Canal Street this week. 

Our newsletter below looks more closely at the role of citizen immigrants, our own Jackson Heights-based organization DRUM Beats, and immigrant politics more broadly in Zohran Mamdani’s historic campaign for NYC mayor. And we give an update on the precarious situation affecting members of our Nepali community in Queens who have had their Temporary Protective Status terminated by the Trump regime—part of a larger campaign to rip away the legal status of hundreds of thousands of TPS holders nationwide. 

Newsletter highlights: 
  1. Zohran Mamdani: immigrant organizing boosts support for an immigrant mayor
  2. Update on cancellation of TPS for Nepali residents

1. Mamdani’s Campaign Success: Grassroots Immigrant Organizing

“[Trump] just threatened to have me arrested, stripped of my citizenship, put in a detention camp and deported. Not because I have broken any law but because I will refuse to let ICE terrorize our city.”—Zohran Mamdani

Jackson Heights group DRUM Beats, the sibling organization of Desis Rising Up and Moving (DRUM), was featured by many news organizations this year for its political advocacy work. You may have seen them last weekend at Jackson Heights Farmer’s Market doing henna tattoos, canvassing for Zohran Mamdani, and providing voting registration assistance. They are a major contributing factor to the success of Mamdani’s campaign to become the next, and first Muslim and South Asian, mayor of New York City, and, as he says himself, the first immigrant mayor in generations. DRUM Beats was one of the first grassroots groups to endorse him. Along with CAAAV Voice, the political arm of the CAAAV: Organizing Asian Communities, South Asian residents were engaged across all five NYC boroughs in support of Mamdani’s campaign. Turnout for the primary saw a 40% increase in South Asian voters for the Democratic Socialist candidate. This came less than a year after many of those same populations appeared to swing right by supporting Trump for president. One reason for Mamdani’s success is his showing up in person in their districts.

30% of the election districts won by Trump in 2024 supported Mamdani in the June 2025 Democratic primary. Many of those districts are in majority Asian neighborhoods. Indeed, across all immigrant-majority neighborhoods, Mamdani won by 7 points. New York Communities for Change has announced that a coalition of organizations representing 50,000 working-class Black and immigrant New Yorkers endorsed Mamdani. Make The Road New York officially endorses him, as does Congressmember Adriano Espaillat, an influential Latino leader for upper Manhattan and the Bronx. He also secured support from the head of the NYPD Bangladeshi American Police Association at a time when 13 other law enforcement organizations had backed the incumbent and former policeman, Mayor Adams, before he dropped out of the race. Despite having higher financial earnings than the working-class immigrants campaigning for Mamdani, many young, well-paid, white collar workers in New York’s tech sector are also giving him their support; they also worry about the affordability of life in the city. 

Mamdani, who worked as a housing counselor with the local immigrant services and housing support organization Chhaya CDC, does not include an “immigration” section on his campaign website. He clearly is a strong supporter of our sanctuary city status, but his platform emphasizes affordability, housing and food security, health, and education as the critical issues facing working-class populations. His policy memo about Trump-Proofing New York is not just about standing up to the ICE invasion, but about protecting all vulnerable New Yorkers from the multiplicitous attacks by Trump. During the first Mayoral debate last week, the topic of immigration and our sanctuary city laws was raised—Mamdani distinguished himself from the others by being more personal and talking of the horrific and ongoing abduction activities conducted by ICE at 26 Federal Plaza.

In private, Trump has indicated he thinks Mamdani is unbeatable. Trump has threatened to withhold federal money from New York if Mamdani is elected Mayor and has already moved forward to cut federal counterterrorism and transit funds. The president has stated that he will arrest Mamdani if he tries to stop masked ICE agents from deporting our neighbors. Trump, along with Tennessee Representative Andy Ogles, also questioned Mamdani’s citizenship. Ogles has been called out for censure for his bigoted and racist speech, including his letter asking the Justice Department to denaturalize and deport Mamdani. (Vickie Paladino, a Queens Council member, who also called for Mamdani to be deported, was met with minimal criticism from city officials and the current mayor.) After Mamdani won the Democratic primary, Tom Homan, Trump’s so-called Border Czar, said that ICE would double up and triple up agents in New York (and this week we watched New Yorkers defend their street vendors from ICE on Canal Street). 

These are the actions of authoritarians who will use any means, even if illegal, to silence and punish the people opposing their anti-democracy political dogma, which is hidden behind a show-of-force facade of nationalism and patriotism. Meanwhile, Mamdani was interviewed on Fox News and stated he will lead this city by building partnerships with people, and that he would do so, “not only in Washington, D.C., but [with] anyone across this country.” He has already proven he can do that by building a multi-asian coalition of support, which has expanded further and made him the current leader in the election polls.

WHAT CAN WE DO?
  • Be inspired by The Queensborough restaurant and organize a fundraising event for your favorite local immigrant-led support organization. After the No Kings March, The Q raised over $600 in cash for NICE (New Immigrant Community Empowerment).
  • Help DRUM Beats continue their political advocacy by making a financial donation. 

2. Brief History of TPS for Nepal, and Its Termination

As of 2023, there were more than 200,000 Nepalis in the US, with almost 17,000 living in Jackson Heights, many with Temporary Protective Status (TPS). As of October 2025, more than 12,000 Nepalis residing in the US–some of them our neighbors here in Queens–have had their legal TPS status abruptly canceled by the Trump administration. 

TPS was created by the Immigration Act of 1990, and grants permission for people to stay in the US if conditions in their country are unsafe from a natural disaster, an armed conflict, or some other unusual and temporary situation making it unsafe for people to return. TPS protects people from deportation, and they can be authorized to work in the US. TPS is granted for 18 months, and at the end of that time it can be extended or revoked for another 6, 12, or 18 months. At least 60 days before the period ends, the Secretary of Homeland Security must review conditions in the target country and publish the decision in the Federal Register.

In April 2015, there was a 7.8 magnitude earthquake in Nepal, followed by several strong aftershocks. There was extensive damage throughout the country: 755,000 homes were damaged; 9,000 people died and 22,000 were injured. That is why TPS was granted for Nepalis residing in the US until June 2018. Then, in 2017, serious flooding and landslides impeded food production and reconstruction of the earthquake damage. As a result of two separate court cases (Bhattarai v. Nielsen and Ramos v. Nielsen), TPS for Nepal was extended three times until June 2024. 

However, in 2018, Trump revoked the TPS status for Nepal, which was quickly challenged in court. Then, in 2023, DHS under Biden rescinded that termination and extended TPS until June 2025. On June 6, 2025, DHS Secretary Noem terminated TPS for Nepal, effective August 5, 2025. She claimed “there are notable improvements in environmental disaster preparedness and response capacity, as well as substantial reconstruction from the earthquake’s destruction such that there is no longer a disruption of living conditions and Nepal is able to handle adequately the return of its nationals.”

In July 2025, the National TPS Alliance and individual plaintiffs with TPS status challenged Secretary Noem’s actions as arbitrary and capricious, failing to provide the required 60-day notice, and violating the equal protection portion of the Fifth Amendment because the motivation was partially racial animus. On July 31, US District Judge Trina Thompson granted the plaintiffs’ motion to postpone the cancellation. The court ordered that TPS remain in effect until at least November 18, 2025. But on August 20, 2025, the District court’s stay was overridden by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, allowing TPS cancellation for Nepal, Honduras, and Nicaragua to go forward. 

Meanwhile, in September 2025, there was a political crisis in Nepal when economic dysfunction and disillusioned youth led to widespread protests, government buildings burned, a national curfew, and finally the installation of a new president, Sushila Karki, the first woman president of Nepal.

It is not clear if that political crisis will have any bearing on the status of Nepalis in the US. With the removal of work authorization and the threat of deportation the Nepali community is in danger.

WHAT CAN WE DO?
  • Make a donation to our local immigrant-led organization Adhikaar which represents the Nepali-speaking community. 

 

In solidarity and with collective care,

Jackson Heights Immigrant Solidarity Network (JHISN)

Follow @JHSolidarity on Facebook and Twitter and share this newsletter with friends, families, neighbors, networks, and colleagues so they can subscribe and receive news from JHISN. 

 

 

JHISN Newsletter 08/23/2025

Posted on August 23, 2025 by - News, Newsletter

Dear friends,

When this week a six-year-old child attending P.S. 89 in Queens is deported to Ecuador; when this week a US Court of Appeals upholds the cancellation of Temporary Protective Status (TPS) for many of our Nepali neighbors; when this week a reported 40% of the arrests so far in the Trump regime’s hostile takeover of Washington, DC, are undocumented immigrants—it can feel like immigrant justice is an impossible dream. 

But. This week, we bring you stories of the organized resistance of everyday people in Los Angeles to ICE raids and federal government terrorizing of immigrants, with an eye towards the near future of resistance we might organize here in Queens. We also take a deeper dive into Documented, an ambitious, vibrant NYC digital media organization bringing community journalism (in multiple languages) to immigrant issues and audiences. 

Newsletter highlights:
  1. Resisting ICE violence from LA to JH
  2. Documented: New York’s immigrant-focused digital news hub

1. Los Angeles, Manhattan…and Queens?

The Trump regime is following through on its promise to unleash ICE thugs on sanctuary cities and “the core of the Democrat Power Center.” But mass deportation is taking different forms in NYC and LA—and so is the resistance by immigrants and their supporters.

In NYC, ICE has concentrated its efforts on kidnapping immigrants—more than 2,600 people so far—when they show up for scheduled immigration hearings at the courthouses in Federal Plaza in Manhattan. Recent reports indicate that ICE no longer even bothers to check asylum-seekers’ legal status: people are being detained, separated from their families and held under horrifying conditions even when a judge has continued their case and assigned it a future hearing.

Immigrant justice activists in our city are pushing back on several fronts. Lawyers are filing for remote appearances (by video) instead of in person. Citizen residents are going to Federal Plaza to bear witness and to accompany immigrants. A recent legal victory by the ACLU, Make the Road NY, and other groups has succeeded in slowing down the arrests, at least temporarily. There are daily demonstrations in Federal Plaza, some of which include civil disobedience. Yet many immigrants are deciding not to show up for their scheduled hearings, even though that means they will definitely be subject to a deportation order.

3,000 miles away in Southern California, ICE has focused its attacks on immigrants at workplaces, and especially at day labor pickup sites. They’ve unleashed swarms of militarized agents without warrants who don’t even pretend to search for specific individuals. Instead they chase down and detain whole groups of workers who “look Latino”—racial profiling in its boldest form. These ugly raid spectacles have more public visibility than the indoor arrests at NYC’s Federal Plaza. Partly for that reason, they have caused widespread mass revulsion and political backlash in Southern California. Most state and local politicians have spoken out strongly against the raids; LA Mayor Karen Bass has called for ICE to end its “reign of terror” in the city. A lawsuit to stop warrantless arrests of Latinos in Los Angeles has had early success.

At street level, key leadership of the resistance in Southern California has come from the National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON), a 24-year-old worker center with extensive community and national presence. (New Immigrant Community Empowerment in Jackson Heights is a member of their national network.) In the LA area, NDLON often draws on Mexican cultural and political traditions to rally its members and supporters. It sponsors a band, Los Jornaleros del Norte, who play highly danceable protest songs denouncing ICE and promoting the dignity of Latino immigrant labor. In the wake of an ICE raid, NDLON’s large flatbed truck, with Los Jornaleros del Norte performing on board, may drive slowly down the street. Dozens or hundreds of residents come out of their houses and follow—marching, dancing, waving protest signs and Mexican flags—to demand an end to ICE brutality towards workers and the community.

Along with other groups such as Unión del Barrio, NDLON tracks ICE activities and shows up to try to disrupt ICE attacks. The group also participates in anti-ICE lawsuits, and raises money from the wider community to assist families of arrested immigrants as well as street vendors unable to work because of the threat of deportation. NDLON sponsors lively demonstrations, block parties and street festivals with anti-ICE themes, and organizes supporters to “adopt a day labor corner.” They regularly take to Instagram and other social media to uphold day laborers as pillars of the community and to denounce ICE’s racism, violence, and disrespect for all residents. NDLON seems to be growing in influence in Southern California, as they provide focus for the anger and resistance of ever wider parts of the population.

NDLON is central to a national campaign and series of boycotts against Home Depot, the giant chain of construction supply stores where many day laborers assemble to find work, and where many large-scale raids have taken place. Anti-Home Depot actions have been endorsed by some 50 progressive organizations, and are happening in multiple locations including New Jersey and Westchester. Demonstrators demand that the corporation keep ICE out of their parking lots unless they can show a judicial warrant, and they call on Home Depot to give financial restitution to workers who are detained in mass raids. 

The example of NDLON and other energetic resistance forces in Southern California provokes the question of how mass community street support can be mobilized here in Queens, which includes so many immigrants and their family members, friends and supporters. Circumstances are clearly different here. ICE’s current NYC arrests have a lower public profile, and have mostly been carried out in Manhattan, even when targeting Queens residents. There are many different immigrant nationalities in our neighborhood, each with specific urgent issues to address, speaking a variety of languages. We have no local umbrella organization of immigrants and supporters, nor, obviously, is there a single musical group that can help galvanize street protest.

But we’re pretty sure that it’s only a matter of time until ICE expands its attacks on our local streets. And we believe that there are thousands of local residents, including many of our readers, who oppose their fascist agenda. Is there a way for the diverse grassroots immigrant-led organizations here to unite, to support each other for mutual benefit, and to begin to rally the whole community behind them on the streets? Will we come out of our homes together to protest and confront ICE? Answers to those questions will prove crucial over the next months and years.

WHAT CAN WE DO?
  • Follow National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON) on social media to learn about the tactics, activities, media and arguments they employ in Southern California and nationally.
  • Donate to or volunteer with NICE, our local affiliate of the NDLON.

2. Documented’s Digital Media: NYC Community Journalism With, And For, Immigrants  

“I have long dreamed that New York immigrants should have such media. Finally, you young media people with talent, conscience, and sense of responsibility have done it.”  —message posted to Documented’s WeChat community (translated from Chinese)

We are excited to encourage readers to explore Documented, an award-winning, independent NYC-based digital media non-profit that generates immigration news daily. With a long-term vision of producing more and better coverage of immigrant issues, they have transformed how that news is produced. This summer, Documented joined with four other immigrant news organizations nationwide to found the Immigrant News Coalition, dedicated to news that reflects immigrants’ experiences and responds to their needs. Since 2020, over 150 ethnic media newsrooms have closed down, so the Coalition’s commitment to sustainable, skilled, well-funded “immigrant-centric” news media is especially critical. 

Community journalism is at the heart of Documented’s commitment to respond to, as well as report on, immigrant concerns. Documented’s community correspondents are part of their communities of coverage. They conduct audience/reader research and design new digital media products that engage with community members (online and in-person), using that engagement to generate investigative stories and news insights. In 2022-23, community correspondents at Documented conducted audience research with NYC’s Chinese and Caribbean immigrant communities, then innovated two new digital platforms to serve those communities in their own languages. With a $2 million grant from the Knight Foundation, Documented is building curricula and training for other news media to develop “community-driven reporting” and expand audiences nationwide.

This week in Jackson Heights, Documented and New Immigrant Community Empowerment (NICE) co-organized an Education Resource Fair on 35th Ave. School supply giveaways, medical screenings, and activities for kids targeted both parents and students, aiming to support a successful start to the new school year. Live events like the Fair are an integral part of Documented’s community engagement; in 2024, they hosted in-person events involving 600 New Yorkers across three boroughs, building “trust with the people behind the news.”

Launched in 2018, Documented has altered the landscape and ecosystem of immigration news in New York City, offering a robust range of news stories and resources over multiple digital platforms, and in multiple languages (Spanish, English, French, Chinese, and Haitian Creole):

  • WhatsApp Documented Semanal—Their Spanish-language WhatsApp channel, started in 2019, serves weekly news to thousands of NYC immigrants, many undocumented. The channel is a two-way bridge as immigrant audiences can inform Documented’s journalism by asking questions, posting insights, and sharing information. Documented Semanal also hosts Q&A sessions where subscribers can text questions to ‘experts’ including immigration lawyers, diplomats, and professors.
  • WeChat community—Their Chinese-language WeChat community (named ‘New York Immigrant Chronicle’), started in 2023, serves NYC’s Chinese immigrants, most of whom receive their news via the WeChat platform.
  • Nextdoor newspage—Research indicated that over 30% of Caribbean residents actively use Nextdoor as their communication platform. So Documented created a Nextdoor presence to bring community-driven news to them. “[W]e are bringing onto this platform—where people usually talk about their lost cat…—serious news content sparking a new kind of conversation,” writes Documented’s Caribbean communities correspondent.
  • Documented.Info—Created in partnership with the International Rescue Committee (IRC), this web-based project offers trusted and regularly updated information about a rich range of “actionable resources” re: immigrant housing, education, legal support, deportation and ICE, jobs, health, and more. An extensive Service Map marks locations and gives descriptions of hundreds of NYC sites/resources.  

These innovative digital media projects are in addition to the in-depth reporting that regularly flows from Documented’s ambitious newsroom. In this month alone, they published stories on how Chinese-American voters in South Brooklyn view Zohran Mamdani’s mayoral campaign; Mayor Adams’ veto of a City Council bill that would decriminalize street vending and protect vendors from deportation based on a “criminal” record for selling without a permit; a federal judge’s Temporary Restraining Order in response to the ACLU’s class action lawsuit against inhumane conditions at 26 Federal Plaza where ICE is detaining immigrants; and rallies and resistance in Queens to the cancellation of Temporary Protective Status (TPS) for hundreds of thousands of US residents. Such a vital, vibrant news organization has earned our support, and the best support you can offer is to read and share Documented’s ongoing experiments in community journalism. 

WHAT CAN WE DO?

 

In solidarity and with collective care,

Jackson Heights Immigrant Solidarity Network (JHISN)

 

Follow @JHSolidarity on Facebook and Twitter and share this newsletter with friends, families, neighbors, networks, and colleagues so they can subscribe and receive news from JHISN. 

 

JHISN Newsletter 12/23/2023

Posted on December 23, 2023 by - News, Newsletter

Dear friends,

As 2023 comes to an end, immigrant justice struggles continue on so many fronts: national and global migration politics; racial and class inequalities; community empowerment; and the lived realities–and failures–of refuge, asylum, and sanctuary. We encourage those of you who can, to consider an end-of-year donation to one of the local immigrant groups JHISN follows most closely, listed below in our What Can We Do section.

For our last issue of the year, we update you on the return of some of the immigrant street vendors displaced by the city from Corona Plaza. Their victory is only partial; hopes for a more just outcome will require an ongoing fight.

1. Tug of War Over Street Vending Enters New Stage

“To allow only a handful of vendors to return part-time ‘Feels like a slap in the face,’ said Ana Maldonado, 40, who ran a tamales stand in the plaza….’There is a lot of anger’ among the vendors.”  —New York Times (11/28/23) 

“It’s a foundation. It’s not the end-all-be-all. It’s not the perfect agreement.”  —Carina Kaufman-Gutierrez, deputy director, Street Vendor Project

After months of arm-twisting and horse-trading, the Adams administration has agreed to allow a limited number of street vendors back to Corona Plaza. The deal includes stringent restrictions. A “Community Vending Area” has been established under the formal authority of the Queens Economic Development Corporation (QEDC), a non-profit that works with the city to promote small business development. Since the QEDC will now run the vending area as a private enterprise, taking responsibility for enforcing all city and state regulations, vendors who they sponsor avoid the requirement to get (unobtainable) individual licenses.

Fourteen standardized blue stalls have been deployed to be shared among the 80 members of the Corona Plaza Street Vendor Association (CPSVA). Craft items are for sale now; food sales will come soon. Once the market is in full operation, each eligible vendor will have access to a stall about once a week. The vending area will only be open from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m., effectively preventing the revival of the former, celebrated, night food market. As Gaston Cortez, president of the CPSVA says, “From 5:00, all the way to 11:00—that’s the best time for food vendors.” Cortez, who works with his wife to sell chilaquiles, tacos, and Mexican soups, says he will be forced to hustle odd jobs to help pay the family’s bills.

The CPSVA and their allies are pushing for more stalls and expanded hours. They’ve expressed hope that their partial victory at Corona Plaza will be a first step in decriminalizing street vending, and will help establish a pattern for legal street vending across the city. At a press conference on December 12, Deputy Mayor for Operations Meera Joshi seemed willing to consider opening other Community Vending Areas if the Corona Plaza “experiment” is successful. 

It’s not clear how much impact the Community Vending Area model might have for the 12,000 vendors—mostly immigrants—who are currently on the city’s waiting list for vendor licenses. Or the thousands more who aren’t even allowed to join that list, which is currently closed. Nor can the city be considered a trusted partner, having broken its promises to the vendors over and over.

Vendors are especially skeptical of the Adams administration’s intentions in light of the ongoing crackdown at Brooklyn’s Grand Army Plaza greenmarket. Parks Enforcement Patrol has been aggressively citing unlicensed vendors and forcing them to leave Prospect Park. Some vendors have moved to nearby traffic medians or in front of the Brooklyn Central Public Library. Cynthia Blade, a long-time craft and vintage jewelry vendor, told Gothamist, “They’re shutting us down at the height of the holiday season. I would say…80% to 90% of my annual income comes from the holiday season.” Not far away, another enforcement blitz—on the Brooklyn Bridge—has resulted in 240 citations by Sanitation Department cops. 

But street vendors are taking the offensive too. On Wednesday, December 6, hundreds of people chanting “Vendor Power!” rallied in support of a new city council initiative that would provide substantial relief. The four-part legislative package is being put forward by council members Pierina Sanchez (the daughter of street vendors from the Bronx), Amanda Farias, Jackson Heights council member Shekar Krishnan, Carmen De La Rosa, and public advocate Jumaane Williams. The first of the proposed laws would mandate that the city issue at least 3,000 vending licenses a year for five years, after which there would be no cap. The second would make unlicensed street vending a civil offense instead of a crime. The third would establish a Department of Small Business Service to assist vendors. The final piece of legislation would clarify rules about where vendors could operate. “We are one of the only cities in the United States of America that arbitrarily caps vending,” Sanchez argues. “The solution lies in business licensing. It lies in decriminalization.” 

WHAT CAN WE DO?

 

In solidarity and with collective care,

Jackson Heights Immigrant Solidarity Network (JHISN)

 

Follow @JHSolidarity on Facebook and Twitter and share this newsletter with friends, families, neighbors, networks, and colleagues so they can subscribe and receive news from JHISN. 

 

JHISN Newsletter 05/20/2023

Posted on May 20, 2023 by - News, Newsletter

Dear friends,

As corporate media headlines flare about Title 42’s termination, we try to offer some clarity about President Biden’s national immigration policies. Reckoning with the abdication—and the criminality—of this Democratic administration’s immigration politics is increasingly urgent. And as Memorial Day approaches, we report on a local act of remembrance led by Jackson Heights-based NICE (New Immigrant Community Empowerment), honoring immigrant workers who have died while performing their jobs.     

Newsletter highlights:
  1. What’s really going on? Update on national immigration policy
  2. NICE marks Dia del Trabajador Caido (Workers Memorial Day)

1. Biden’s New Immigration Policies Violate the Law

“The people are not the problem. Rather, the causes that drive families and individuals to cross borders and the short-sighted and unrealistic ways that politicians respond to them are the problem.” –Amnesty International 

After the horrors of World War II, the US played a major role in convincing the UN General Assembly to adopt the Universal Declaration of Human Rights as the centerpiece of international law. Article 14 states, “Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.” The US also promoted the humanitarian provisions of the Geneva Refugee Convention, which Congress made part of domestic law in the Refugee Act of 1980. But today the US is breaking its promises—and the international and domestic laws that protect asylum seekers and refugees. 

The US often announces itself as a nation of immigrants, but it is at the same time a hotbed of xenophobia. Deciding which immigrants from where and how many are “acceptable” is a constant seesaw battle, especially during periods of massive migration like our own. Currently, one thing everyone seems to agree on is that the immigration system is “broken.” But there is no unity in Congress on how to remedy the disgraceful mess.

In January 2021, President Biden sent a proposal for immigration reform to Congress incorporating his campaign promises to provide legal status to millions of immigrants, and reduce cruelty at the southern border. That bill went nowhere. Now Biden has pivoted to a new set of policies, mainly using executive orders. He is taking a “carrot and stick” approach: offering seemingly generous new ways to enter the country, paired with stiff enforcement to deter entry.

Human Rights First has documented eight separate ways that the new policies break international and US laws. The laws violated include Article 14 and Section 208 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, the Geneva Convention, the 1951 Refugee Convention, and Section 1158 of Title 8. Although there are current legal challenges from both the left and the right, the new policies nevertheless went into effect at midnight on May 11, the minute Title 42 ended.

Below are the specific policies, their real-life impacts, and how they violate established US and international laws:

The CBPOne app requires an asylum seeker located in Central and Northern Mexico to make an appointment at a US port of entry to present their claim. The app is intended to reduce wait time and crowding at the border. It assumes asylum seekers have a smartphone or access to the internet and can read one of five languages. The app is often inaccessible, has a limited number of appointments available, and uses facial recognition which often fails to identify non-white faces. The app raises privacy, discrimination, and surveillance concerns because data will be collected and stored even before a person enters the US. Mandatory use of the app violates the internationally accepted right to seek asylum—an unconditional principle also embedded in US law as noted above. 

Asylum seekers who enter without permission and who lack a legal basis to remain will be returned to their country of origin and will have a 5-year ban on reentry based on Title 8. Their only hope to avoid deportation is a “credible fear” interview while in CBP custody, held with limited access to legal counsel. International asylum law specifically requires that people not be returned to countries where they will be subjected to persecution (refoulement). “UNHCR [the UN refugee agency] is particularly concerned that … this [policy] would lead to cases of refoulement—the forced return of people to situations where their lives and safety would be at risk—which is prohibited under international law.” –UNHCR

Parole for Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, Haitians, and Cubans. Up to 30,000 people per month can come to the US for two years and receive work authorization—IF they have an eligible sponsor, pass vetting and background checks, and can afford a plane ticket. This limits entry to migrants with connections in the US and the means to secure visas and plane tickets. Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, Haitians, and Cubans who cross Panama, Mexico, or the US border are ineligible for parole and will be expelled to Mexico, which has agreed to receive up to 30,000 people per month. This policy is a blatant violation of the international right to seek asylum. It also endangers lives. There have been over 13,000 attacks against migrants and asylum seekers in Mexico.

“U.S. policies returning asylum seekers to Mexico have resulted in unspeakable danger and harm, while the Mexican asylum system has consistently failed to protect people fleeing persecution.”  –Meg McCarthy, Executive Director of National Immigrant Justice Center

Creation of new processing centers.  In Colombia, Guatemala, and perhaps other countries, migrants will supposedly be able to apply for legal entry into the US before they make the difficult journey. These centers aren’t operational yet and require the use of the infamous CBPOne app. It’s unclear if people from Honduras and El Salvador will get access to a center.

Migrants passing through other countries en route to US who do not first claim asylum there will be ineligible to claim asylum at the US border. This violates the international right to seek asylum as well as Section 1158 of Title 8 of the United States Code. This section clearly states that people can apply for asylum no matter how they enter the US.

1500 active-duty US soldiers have been deployed to the border to relieve Border Protection officers of administrative duties. This is further militarization of the border. Their presence will undoubtedly frighten people. It treats migrants as a security threat.

It’s notable that other countries, including Colombia, Ecuador, Costa Rica, and Belize, have provided legal status to an increased number of migrants, basing their policies on the Los Angeles Declaration on Migration and Protection. Canada, Mexico, and Spain have also expanded refugee resettlement and temporary work opportunities. Mexico and Guatemala have ramped up their asylum systems, partly based on collaboration and funding agreements with the US. 

The new Biden Administration rules will be in effect for two years—May 11, 2023 to May 11, 2025. What happens then?

WHAT CAN WE DO?

2. Fallen Workers Day Organized by NICE

“We work to live, not to die.” –NICE Facebook (May 1, 2023)

 Holding a black banner printed with the names of the dead, members of New Immigrant Community Empowerment (NICE) gathered on April 28 to mourn and to mobilize. Dia del Trabajador Caido (‘Fallen Workers Day’ or ‘Workers Memorial Day’) is an annual public event honoring NYC workers who have died on the job, and calling for increased safety and protections, especially in the construction industry.

 NICE, based in Jackson Heights, supported the seven-year fight to pass Carlos’ Law, finally signed by Governor Hochul in December 2022. The legislation increases the criminal liability of employers whose workers are killed or seriously injured in the workplace. The law was named after Carlos Moncayo, a 22-year-old Ecuadorian immigrant living in Queens who was killed while doing construction work in 2015.   

 Worker safety and worker deaths are immigrant justice issues. The annual 2023 Deadly Skyline report produced by NYCOSH—the NY Committee for Occupational Safety and Health—reveals fatality statistics in NY’s construction industry: in New York City, 20 workers died at their jobs, a 54% increase from the previous year. And while an estimated 10% of construction workers in New York State are Latinx, over 25% of fatalities were among Latinx workers. Immigrant workers are disproportionately dying on construction sites—and non-union sites in particular, according to NYCOSH, accounted for 86% of worker deaths in 2018. Even getting an accurate count of worker deaths and injuries has been a political battle. Not until Queens State Senator Jessica Ramos successfully sponsored legislation in 2021 requiring a statewide death registry for construction workers, did the Department of Labor belatedly begin to gather fatality statistics in a public database.    

 To remember is to keep alive. We support the necessary political work that NICE, NYCOSH, the Manhattan Justice Workers Collaborative, and their allies are doing to keep alive the struggle for a safe and accountable workplace. And to honor the living memory of immigrant workers who have been sacrificed while doing their job.  

WHAT CAN WE DO?
  • Donate to NICE if you are able, and follow NICE social media @NICE4Workers.
  • Support the online Worker Hotline for reporting workplace crimes—including health & safety issues—against low-income workers, organized by the Manhattan Justice for Workers Collaborative.

 

In solidarity and with collective care,

Jackson Heights Immigrant Solidarity Network (JHISN)

 

Follow @JHSolidarity on Facebook and Twitter and share this newsletter with friends, families, neighbors, networks, and colleagues so they can subscribe and receive news from JHISN. 

 

 

JHISN Newsletter 01/14/2023

Posted on January 14, 2023 by - News, Newsletter

Dear friends,

As winter brings colder weather and our search for warmth, the realities of economic inequality and financial insecurity become all the more stark. Our newsletter looks at two local struggles to generate security and empowerment for immigrant workers often left out in the cold: day laborers, and those who are systematically excluded from the unemployment system. Our first article reports on the growing importance of Worker Centers in organizing immigrant day laborers, and the leading role of NICE (New Immigrant Community Empowerment), based here in Jackson Heights. Our second article announces a new movement launched by the Fund Excluded Workers Coalition to permanently expand unemployment compensation to cover many of the most vulnerable workers in New York state.  

Newsletter highlights:
  1. Day laborers and worker centers: NICE organizing
  2. Statewide campaign to secure unemployment insurance for all 

 

1. Jornaleros: Pushing Out of the Shadow Economy

On a recent afternoon in Woodside, more than fifty men wearing work clothes and backpacks have spread out along 69th Street, from Roosevelt Avenue to Broadway. Hanging out in small groups or alone, they scan the passing traffic intently, hoping that a van or car pulls over with an offer of work.

These workers are among an estimated 10,000 day laborers, gathered at about 70 sites around the city, who play an indispensable role in the NYC economy. Day laborers are hired for a variety of jobs, including domestic work. But the greatest demand for day labor comes from the city’s sprawling, $86 billion dollar a year construction industry. 69th Street has long been known as a stop—parada—where employers can find construction day laborers.

Immigrants make up 63% of the city’s construction workforce. Most are from Latin America. Their pay and conditions differ greatly depending on immigration status and union membership, with undocumented day laborers at the bottom of the construction labor hierarchy. Struggling just to get a one-day job, they tend to work for small, non-union contractors and landlords, some of whom are notorious for low pay, wage theft, and unsafe conditions. Now a new wave of migrants, many from Venezuela, is trying to establish a foothold in the industry, hustling jobs on city streets. Early morning crowds at 69th Street and other paradas have grown.

Day laborers—jornaleros and jornaleras in Spanish—have always engaged in an uphill struggle for dignity and fairness in the US. In recent decades, a nationwide network of “worker centers” has been at the heart of this struggle. In our own community, one of these worker centers is organized by New Immigrant Community Empowerment (NICE), whose offices on Roosevelt and 71st Street are buzzing with day laborer activity. NICE is part of a citywide day laborer coalition of worker centers fighting to “improve workplace conditions in unregulated industries, defend their civil rights, and to end wage theft.”

Although worker centers were once seen as unwanted competitors by the construction unions, in recent years it’s become clear that worker centers are organizing workers who the unions themselves can’t reach, and that they are helping lift up standards in the whole construction industry. Relations between worker centers and unions vary around the country. But today there is often cooperation, which sometimes includes the funding of worker centers by unions, and has even involved a few joint unionization efforts. In New York, Local 79 of the Laborers Union and other unions work closely with local worker centers on the #FundExcludedWorkers campaign, including the recent mobilization to expand unemployment insurance.

NICE and the other worker centers often protest and lobby for legislation needed by day laborers, such as Carlos’ Law, a major NY State workplace safety bill signed by Governor Hochul in December. Workers victimized by wage theft or who face unsafe conditions can count on NICE to use its collective strength to intervene—sometimes side by side with unionized workers. NICE runs a continuous series of Occupational Safety and Health classes, which are legally required for work on most construction sites. The waiting list for these classes has grown long, as the recently arrived wave of asylum seekers searches for work. NICE also teaches construction skills such as framing, plumbing, and painting, as well as “soft skills” like English and technology. Women are encouraged to investigate careers in construction. All of the classes and workshops are free.

NICE’s effort to build solidarity among jornaleros is exemplified by their day laborer hiring hall. Employers looking for dependable day labor contact the Center. (“Hire NICE Workers,” the Center’s website says.) Workers who are registered with NICE get dispatched without favoritism, with an agreed wage, and with a formal work order. This system protects workers from unscrupulous bosses and job agencies. The Center’s workers make decisions democratically about minimum pay and other aspects of dispatch. The Worker Center doesn’t have the number of jobs or the physical capacity that would allow them to dispatch the whole local day laborer workforce today. Most jornaleros are still looking for work on 69th Street at least part of the time. But the hiring hall model is known in labor history to be a potential kernel of powerful worker organizations. For instance, in the 1930s, the demand for a hiring hall was central to eliminating the competitive “shape-up” of day laborers that ruled the longshore industry at that time. Winning the demand for a fair hiring hall helped create longshore unions in the US, mobilizing a mostly-immigrant day labor workforce that had been considered unorganizable.

To amplify its day labor activism, NICE developed a cell phone app in 2016 that helps workers track their hours and pay, rates employers, and shares warnings and alerts. Omar Trinidad, a construction worker, was the lead organizer for the app, which was named, appropriately, Jornalero/a. The app has spread to day laborer stops and among delivery workers in the city and beyond.

WHAT CAN WE DO?
  • Sign the petition, by NYC’s Day Laborer Coalition, calling on the city council to fund the Day Laborer Workforce Initiative. 
  • Hire a NICE worker if you need construction, day labor, domestic work, or a dog walker.

 

2. #ExcludedNoMore Launches Campaign for Unemployment Compensation

Immigrant justice groups and the Fund for Excluded Workers (FEW) Coalition won a historic struggle here in New York in 2021: $2.1 billion in state funding for immigrant workers systematically excluded from federal pandemic relief programs such as unemployment insurance and stimulus payments. The NY Department of Labor (DOL) distributed the money to 130,000 eligible applicants, with most recipients receiving the maximum funding amount of $15,600. Last month, the NYDOL made final payments of another $30 million to an additional 1,900 New Yorkers.

But immigration activists and community organizers didn’t stop after this unprecedented victory. The pandemic revealed brutal inequities in government support for workers in precarious times:

“[T[here are hundreds of thousands of workers across New York who have no way to access financial support when a crisis hits, be it a pandemic or an economic recession. That’s because our unemployment insurance system shuts out many of our state’s most vulnerable workers, especially Black, Brown, and immigrant workers in precarious low-wage industries …. We need a permanent solution that will remedy the need for an Excluded Workers Fund in the future.” –Nisha Tabassum, FEW Coalition Manager

This week, #ExcludedNoMore launches a statewide Unemployment Bridge Program campaign to secure economic justice for all workers excluded from unemployment compensation due to their immigration status, or the kind of job they hold—including coverage for up to 750,000 domestic workers, day laborers, freelancers, and street vendors. “We need to do the structural work of matching our state’s unemployment system to the realities of the labor force,” said Queens-based State Senator Jessica Ramos, “The Unemployment Bridge Project is an update that aims to create a 21st-century safety net to match our 21st-century workforce.”

On January 11, the new campaign officially launched in NYC with a march and press conference near the Brooklyn Bridge. Rolling launch actions will take place this week in Westchester, Long Island, Upstate, and Albany. The struggle is just beginning!

 WHAT CAN WE DO?
  • Follow the Unemployment Bridge campaign on Fund Excluded Workers Coalition’s  Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, where future actions and rallies will be announced.

 

In solidarity and with collective care,

Jackson Heights Immigrant Solidarity Network (JHISN)

Follow @JHSolidarity on Facebook and Twitter and share this newsletter with friends, families, neighbors, networks, and colleagues so they can subscribe and receive news from JHISN.