Every time you replace, “I’m overwhelmed”, with, “I need to decide what matters most and go slow,” your brain stops firing alarm signals and starts organizing information again.
Shared by Traci Murphy
Visit the IHB website at: https://www.indivisible-IHB.org.
Dear {{ FirstName | default: 'Friend' }},
Key actions for the upcoming week include the following:
This is a limited email today because of the urgent weather! Look for more updates.
The IHB Leadership Team
IHB PUSH BACK (FORMERLY CALLED COURAGE COLLECTIVES)
!! SUMMARY: Courage Collectives is a new sub-team of the Advocacy Working Group (AWG). Moving forward, we will be known as IHB Push Back because that’s what we do – non-violent non-compliance. We aim to make it difficult for companies, institutions, and organized groups that are supporting the Trump Regime to continue to do so. Our goal is to make it embarrassing, uncomfortable, or financially disadvantageous for these companies/institutions to continue to support the Regime, by making the public, and especially their customers, aware of their actions.
If you are interested in what we are doing, join us. We meet every Thursday at 4:00 p.m. by Zoom. Contact Deb at dstravers@comcast.net to get the link.
IHB continues to support the following initiatives which are focused on the Business pillar:
NEW COURAGE COLLECTIVE ACTION!! We are partnering with the Indivisible Philadelphia Group on an exciting new campaign to target companies that use cheap prison labor (or use vendors who do so), which unfortunately is legal. These companies could easily cross the line and start using ICE detainee labor, which is illegal. We want assurances that they won’t. The Philadelphia group has done research on sixty companies, and the program has been rolled out. Check out how we plan to PUSH BACK in a new way against the Regime's cruel and corrupt immigration system.
COURAGE COLLECTIVE - ACTIONS
!! 1. New Courage Collective Campaign: “No Detention Camp Labor”! (NDCL)
We are launching this letter writing project developed by Indivisible Philadelphia, inspired by Professor Timothy Snyder.
Summary: We want companies to pledge not to use ICE detainee labor or use contractors that do. Letters will go out to the target companies each week (we have a little catching-up to do). A letter template will be provided, with a link to the pledge. The letters will be mailed to the companies.
Action:
Background: We have ICE detention camps springing up all over the country as a result of the BBB’s pile of ICE funding from the Trump regime. But there is a big difference between prison labor and the labor of immigration camp detainees. Prison labor is permitted under the 13th Amendment, which prohibits slavery "except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted . . ."
However, many of the immigrant detainees abducted from our communities have had no such due process, if any at all. These immigrant detainees do not fall within the slavery exception in the 13th Amendment. To be very clear, our project is not centered on prison labor. Changing the 13th Amendment is an entirely different matter. We want to prevent detainee labor now, to deter companies from getting any ideas about using it.
!! 3. Shame on Citizens Bank – Let’s take what we learned from our Avelo campaign and apply it to Citizens Bank!
Summary: We want to force Citizens Bank (CB) to quit funding CoreCivic and GEO, who build and run the for-profit prisons used to hold ICE detainees under deplorable conditions. Citizens Bank is resisting our efforts, so we are escalating.
Action: Social Media Campaign.
We continue to target the Citizens Bank Facebook page this week. I have officially been blocked from posting on their Facebook page, so I took my complaints to my personal page today. YOU probably haven’t been blocked, so continue to post on the CB page. Get to their Facebook page using this link: https://www.facebook.com/CitizensBank.MortgageLoans/mentions and feel free to leave them a comment yourself. We need to amplify this message.
The Rally Team has several multi-chapter protests in the works. (See details in the Rally section.).
For more details, please contact Deb Travers at (dstravers@comcast.net).
Save the contact information below on your computer and/or in your phone:
[If you have not tried it, please take a look at Democracy I/O. This tool will allow you to send an e-mail to all three of our MOCs with just a few clicks.].
As part of our on-going advocacy efforts, the following are actions for your attention and action this week:
!! 1. To: Senators Chris Coons and Lisa Blunt Rochester (contacts 1 and 2 above) and Representative Sarah McBride (contact 3 above). Extra credit for including Chuck Schumer in your email contacts (Home | Senator Chuck Schumer of New York).
Summary: Congress is negotiating a deal to fund Trump’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that is killing people in the streets, taking our children, and trampling our rights. The stopgap measure that funded DHS through February 13th has lapsed, but negotiations continue. We must keep up the pressure on Congress to protect our communities.
Take Action: Recommendation from National Indivisible: Email your Member of Congress by clicking HERE.
Background: The killings of Alex Pretti, Renee Good, and others are unacceptable. We cannot stand by and allow the violence, killing, and trampling of our rights to continue unchecked. Every member of Congress must insist on real limits and accountability before any funding is approved.
For more details, please contact Beth Anne Gluck (bagluck@comcast.net).
!! 2. To: Senators Chris Coons and Lisa Blunt Rochester (contacts 1 and 2 above)
Summary: We need our Senators to oppose the SAVE America Act, which has been introduced in the Senate after the House approved a sweeping federal elections act promoted by Donald Trump. The bill requires Americans to provide proof of their U.S. citizenship (such as a passport or birth certificate) when registering to vote. Currently, new registrants must attest that they are a U.S. citizen. Millions of eligible voters do not have ready access to these documents. Voters would be required to show passport or birth certificate also when they cast a ballot. The Act requires states to turn over their voting rolls to Homeland Security. This would require an unreasonable intrusion of the federal government into state voter data.
Action: Write to Senators Chris Coons and Lisa Blunt Rochester to vote against this bill.
Sample Statement:
Background: Republicans have for years been intent on changing the way U.S. elections are run, building on their false assertions of widespread fraud. This bill would ban universal vote-by-mail. The provisions would only apply to federal elections, forcing states to choose between changing their state election laws to match and administering federal and state elections differently. Either way, the bill would likely create more work for election officials. Given how many states would have to change their voting procedures, the enactment of this bill would send officials scrambling to adapt to unfamiliar requirements.
For more details, please contact Bruce Dalleo at (bdalleo@aol.com).
!! 3. To: All IHB Members - Take Action Against For-Profit Prisons - Immigration
Summary: ICE is moving forward to purchase facilities across the country that can be converted into detention centers, most recently in Berks County, PA.
Take Action: Tell Delaware's Leaders to take action on HB151 which will prohibit for-profit prisons in Delaware. Email or call your State Senators and Representatives urging them to make this bill a priority as the Department of Homeland Security seems to be moving quickly, and out of the public eye, to buy-up facilities. If your legislators are a sponsor or signed on as co-sponsors, thank them!
Background: Read this article from The Inquirer. Note that Delaware does have warehouse spaces on the market for lease and/or purchase.
For more details, please contact Beth Anne Gluck (bagluck@comcast.net).
!! 4. To: All IHB Members - Phone Banking Opportunity!
Summary: We will educate voters about a couple of critical Constitutional Amendments regarding voting in this Legislative session (SB 2 and SB 3).
Action: Please put Wednesday, February 25, from 6:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m. on your calendar to phone bank with the ACLU and voters in Representative districts 9 and 22 in an effort to help expand voting in Delaware. Training will be included, so newcomers please join us! You will be able to do this phone banking from home!
If you have not done a phone bank with ACLU previously, please contact Branden Fletcher at bfletcher@aclu-de.org to fill out forms and make an account PRIOR to the phone bank.
Background: Expanding voting is a top tier issue for IHB and has been from the very beginning of our history! We need our members to commit to this important effort.
Click HERE to sign-up.
For more details, please contact Sally Barclay at (sallybar913@gmail.com).The Social Capital Work Group - We Build Community.
!! IHB Community Sing – Wednesday, February 25th. DATE CHANGE - (Due to the church’s calendar.). Join the fun, all voices welcome, even off-key.
!! Unless noted otherwise, all meetings start at 4:00 p.m. and take place at Wilmington Brew Works (WBW), 3129 Miller Road in Wilmington. Join us!
Reminders: Please come early (3:30 or 3:45 p.m.), to give yourself time to get your drink and socialize so that we may start promptly at 4:00 p.m. Because our membership is growing, do consider carpooling. And please don't forget to generously tip the wait staff at Wilmington Brew Works for making this great facility available to us! Members are encouraged to wear their IHB name tags.
Indivisible Highland and Beyond’s mission: Preserve and expand participation in our democracy by electing pro-democracy candidates and by promoting legislation and policies that advance an inclusive, representative democracy.
Find IHB on TikTok @ihbdelaware and Instagram @indivisiblehighlandsandbeyond.
Visit the IHB website at: https://www.indivisible-IHB.org. If you need help setting up your IHB account or have trouble logging in, contact IHB webmaster Sandy Dobbs at indivisiblebeyond1@gmail.com).
IHB Leaders:
| Electoral |
Lucy Comstock-Gay (lucy.comstockgay@gmail.com) |
| Legislative Advocacy: | Sheila Grant (sgrant62@gmail.com) |
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Legislative & Electoral Mailings: |
Sarah Baylin (sjbaylin66@gmail.com) |
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Courage Collective: |
Deb Travers (dstravers@comcast.net) |
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Operations: |
Nancy Hannigan (njhannigan@yahoo.com) |
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Social Capital: |
Jill Gaumer (jill.gaumer@gmail.com) Maxine Robbins (maxinerobbins@gmail.com) |
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Communications: | Gwen Jolley (gmjolley@bellsouth.net) |