Rapid Response Network
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In response to widespread immigration raids,
a coalition of immigrant rights activists has announced the launching of a Rapid Response Network Hotline
that will give help to those confronted with the raids.
The RRN Hotline, sponsored by the NJ May 1 Coalition and the New Jersey Civil Rights Defense Committee
is a 24-hour toll free number
covering New York and New Jersey that will provide immediate, contact with Spanish-speaking volunteers.
In the event of a raid, the volunteers will calmly inform callers of their basic rights,
especially the right not to admit the ICE agents to their homes without a warrant signed by a judge
and the right to remain silent.
The hotline number, for emergencies only, is 1-800-308-0878.
March 14, 2008 Press Release announcing the RRN.
RRN posters in English:
White and black text on red background,
Red and black text on white background,
Black text on white background
RRN posters in Español:
White and black text on red background,
Red and black text on white background,
Black text on white background
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Rapid Response Hotline operational, needs volunteers!
On March 10, the Rapid Response Network hotline became operational in the New York-New Jersey region.
Immigrants faced with ICE raids now have a 24/7 toll free number that they can call in an emergency,
and get a Spanish-speaking volunteer who will be able to calmly tell them their rights and how they can avoid detention.
Such Rapid Response hotlines, now being set up in other cites,
have helped immigrants to fight back against the raids and break the terror that ICE is imposing on the immigrant community.
The Rapid Response Network has already had its first successful response to a raid.
A woman called the hotline from her home in Elizabeth, saying that ICE agents were outside, demanding to be let in.
The RRN phone volunteer reassured the woman that she had a right not to let the ICE agents in without a search warrant.
Although the agents were waving various papers around through the window, they did not show any such warrant..
After some 20 minutes, the ICE agents gave up. No was detained and the Hotline worked as intended.
But we need YOUR help to make the hotline work and be more effective. You can help in three ways:
1) If you are fluent in Spanish, we need more phone volunteers to cut down on the shifts.
Volunteers will receive training.
During an 8-hour per week shift, calls to the hotline will be directed to your cell-phone
and you will be able to help immigrants involved in raids to avoid detention and deportation.
Volunteers are confidential and status does not matter.
2) We need a lot of help in getting the word out to the Spanish-speaking immigrant community.
We have eye-catching posters in Spanish and English which we need to get to organizations and individuals
that can put them up in immigrant neighborhoods.
We need help in printing lots of the posters.
3) You can join Rapid Response Teams who, when called by hotline volunteers,
rapidly go as teams to the site of an ICE raid and act as witnesses.
RRT witnesses will also receive training.
As experience in LA and other cities has shown, the presence of such witnesses can deter ICE agents from rights violations
(like breaking down immigrants’ doors).
Rapid Response Team members do not need Spanish, but since they will be dealing with ICE agents,
they must be citizens, permanent residents or on a valid visa.
Observing and commenting on the actions of ICE agents or any other law-enforcement authorities is lawful activity
protected by the Bill of Rights and by Supreme Court decisions.
To volunteer, please contact us at info@njmay1.org
Documents for Volunteers and for Immigrants
Know Your Rights (English),
Know Your Rights (Spanish).
Categories of Callers (English),
Categories of Callers (Spanish).
Description of the RRN (English),
Description of the RRN (Spanish).
Guidelines for RRN phone volunteers (English),
Guidelines for RRN phone volunteers (Spanish).
Recruitment letter (English).
Guidelines of Rapid Response Team (witness) (English).
Right to oppose or challenge (English).
Referral numbers for social services.
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| May 1 demonstrations
Day-after
thoughts and questions on 2007 May 1 — a personal
assessment by Eric Lerner
First, thanks to all for the work and thought that has
gone into the NJ May 1 coalition so far. Thanks in particular to the
endorsing organizations :United Day Laborers of Freehold, Immigrants
Defense Committee (Newark), People’s Organization for Progress, New
Jersey Civil Rights Defense Committee, Philippine Forum, Hispanic
Alliance of Atlantic County, Quindanos Unidos por Colombia, and First
Friends, but also to the many volunteers from other groups who worked
so well and hard to build for May 1.
Despite the small numbers of people participating, we
have made some very real advances in New Jersey. We have bought
together a functioning coalition with the active participation of a
couple of dozen activists. We have started; with the endorsement of
Peoples Organization for Progress, to work towards bringing African
Americans into the immigrant rights struggle and overcoming efforts to
split us up. The meeting in Elizabeth brought in many new people, 30 of
whom volunteered for the Rapid Response Network, a very good start for
the 60 or so volunteers we minimally need to get the hotline going. In
Morristown, the Rapid Response Network idea was greeted
enthusiastically by Wind of the Sprit and we were able to talk about it
at the rally there and distributed more sign-up forms. So
organizationally, we have advanced considerably since we started the
coalition a bit more than two months ago.
There is no doubt that the turnout, not only in New
Jersey, but all though out the East Coast, was very low. In New Jersey,
there were 80 in Elizabeth, maybe 50 in Jersey City, 150 in Atlantic
City and perhaps 250 in Morristown a state-wide total of only about
500, 1/30 the size of last years 15,000. In New York there were perhaps
5,000, 1/40 of last year’s 200,000, in Boston about 500.
But this was not the universal pattern. In Chicago an
absolutely huge march was estimated by organizers to be at least
300,000 and probably as large as the half-million of last year. This
was a day-time march—starting at noon, so the vast majority of these
demonstrators’ took off from work or school. (The coalition there used
the term “day of action”, not “boycott”, but the effect was the same.)
The turn-out in Chicago proves that those who said a repeat of last
year was impossible were wrong. It also proves that the immigrant
rights movement remains a hugely powerful force in this country. We can
not emphasize this too much in assessing May 1, 2007.
In the rest of the country there were some cites with
sizable turnout, if much smaller than last years: In LA a divided
movement with three marches turned out perhaps 35-50,000, about 1/10 of
last year and Denver had 10,000, perhaps 1/8 of last year. But in other
areas, turn out was as low as in the East. In Dallas there were maybe
5,000 marchers instead of last year’s quarter-to half-million and in
Houston only 100, compared with last year’s 10,000.
After talking to people in Chicago, and looking at our
situation, it seems to me that the key factor that determined the
turnout was the active participation of many Latino organizations. In
Chicago, all but one of the main Latino organizations (which in Chicago
are nearly all Mexican-American) that participated in last year’s
action, agreed to build for May 1 again this year.
In contrast, in New Jersey all but a small number of the
organizations that participated last year did not endorse any May 1
actions this year. This seems to be the case in many if not all of the
other areas where turn out was very low. The efforts of the dozen or so
organizations that built for one or another of the NJ actions on May 1
were simply not enough to build a sense in the community that something
big would happen. As a result, even the endorsing organizations were
not able to mobilize large turnouts of their own members and
supporters.
I am not sure why most NJ immigrant and particularly
Latino organizations failed to endorse May 1 this year. If the main
reason was fear that turnout would be small, that became a
self-fulfilling prophecy. But the example of Chicago proved that when
the immigrant organizations united, the fear of the raids could be
overcome and a huge turnout ensured.
We can not blame fear of the raids directly. In Chicago,
a week before the huge march, ICE agents staged an outrageous raid on a
mall in the center of the Latino district of Chicago, locking everyone
in and demanding identification. Yet many people at the march said that
they were motivated to come by outrage at the raid. When the immigrant
organizations were already united in building the march, the raid cased
more turnout instead of causing people to stay away in fear. It is a
safe bet that ICE will think many times before repeating such a raid in
Chicago.
In the coming months, we all must find ways to work
together to combat the raids and to continue to build for legalization
for all. I hope that many organizations will join in helping to build a
Rapid Response Network to respond to the raids and employers attacks.
Through these and other efforts we can build the unity that is
necessary for us here in New Jersey to have the strength that the
movement has shown in Chicago.
Eric Lerner
NJ Civil Rights Defense Committee,
NJ May 1 Coalition
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