‘If You're Like Me, You Can't Sit By. This Is America.'

With the help of legal counsel, immigrants facing deportation are more likely to win their cases and keep their families together. The New York Immigrant Family Unity Project is one of several organizations in New York that provides lawyers free of charge to detained immigrants. The program is also a part of the broader Safety and Fairness for Everyone (SAFE) network, which includes 18 cities that have set up legal defense funds for immigrants.

As the struggles of refugees and immigrants drudges on, a number of cities across the US are gathering funding for their legal defense. One strategy, a legal counsel program called New York Family Immigrant Unity Project, has proven so successful that it now has 19 other counties in states like Colorado and Georgia participating in their network. Beyond that, these public defense projects often comprise of both public and private dollars and are all working for the right (not guaranteed by the US Constitution) to have access to legal counsel during immigration proceedings.

Over 20 U.S. cities have passed municipal I.D. laws, which provide a form of identification to undocumented immigrants. “Municipal IDs are one of the most effective measures that cities can implement to protect and empower undocumented people.” Poughkeepsie, New York, is the latest city to pass such a law, and several others are in the process of doing so.

One way that any ordinary citizen can lend a hand to the plight of those caught in the American immigration system is by being a court observer: someone who sits in immigration court and takes notes by hand. Several organizations are working to develop a standardized way of evaluating judges' treatment of migrants to put it in a central database so that the data can be used to evaluate the human impact by the system as a whole. People who participate testify to the job alleviating despair over the situation as they can mitigate any unfair practices going unnoticed.

Iranian families are sidestepping the U.S. Muslim ban inside a library. The Haskell Free Library and Opera House is located in both Derby Line, Vermont, and Stanstead, Quebec. Dozens of Iranian families have briefly reunited in the library, which acts as unofficial political gray zone. “You don’t need your passport. You park on your side, I’ll park on my side, but we’re all going to walk in the same door.”

Grassroots organizers use mobile technology to spread information and resources to underserved immigrant communities. Groups like the Haitian Bridge Alliance and UndocuBlack mobilize legal and social resources for immigrants who belong to groups often characterized as “invisible” in the public discourse, because they represent such a small percentage of the migrant population. Mobile tech enables these nonprofits to publicize individual cases and quickly connect immigrants to appropriate social networks.

In the state of New Mexico, policy makers, activists, religious leaders, and the community are all working hand in hand to make the state a safe harbor for undocumented immigrants. The state is refusing to cooperate with ICE and aside from California is one of the most friendly to immigrants. A community organizer says, “We wanted to push back against this narrative that ICE just gets to come in our communities and kidnap people from their homes.”

In the 1980s the Mexican economy falls and a surge of undocumented immigrants begin crossing the Rio Grande river into El Paso, TX. Border Patrol agents begin stopping and questioning high school students near the border in Bowie High School. After one of the high school teachers finds out, the students began to organize, eventually suing border patrol for infringing on their constitutional rights. Ultimately, the high school students win a landmark civil rights case. “We couldn’t believe we took on the federal government and won.”

Volunteers, hotlines, community supporting families, these are the basic principles of rapid response networks. A rapid response network is a community led, volunteer response to immigration crackdowns that is being replicated in cities around the country. When people are getting detained, the rapid response networks are activated, volunteers receive a text that a neary neighbor is getting deported and they rush to the house. They take notes, and record with their cellphones. “I feel hopeful that there’s something I can do rather than sitting worried and angry, and I feel like I can be part of something that

As immigration policy fluctuates under the current administration and the future of thousands of undocumented migrants remains volatile, uncertain, and complex, many find themselves in a heightened state of stress and fear. But activists in Colorado are attempting to take positive steps and support the immigrant community, specifically through the creation of the Colorado Rapid Response Network and 24-hour hotline. The network helps ensure accurate information about ICE activity is shared and that trained volunteers are available to assist with legal, human, or civil rights concerns.