Month: August 2021

Any issue comes into focus when you ask what it will mean for children. Food insecurity, pesticide exposure, evictions, biases around gender identity, illnesses, racial inequity–all have particular impact on children, who have the fewest resources to cope. Even voting rights, which can only be exercised by those over 18, affect children, as those parents who brought their children to Saturday’s March on DC clearly knew. Those of you in California who must vote soon on the recall of Governor Newsom might want to read the New York Times voter guide through the lens of the consequences for children to see what the implications of replacing the governor could be. And remember our database of the many pieces of voting rights legislation that are going to become extremely important if the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, which the House passed last week, stalls in the Senate.

DOMESTIC NEWS

1. 1 in 7 children—10.7 million—go hungry. New funding may help.

Children in American have become more food-insecure since the pandemic. With schools closed, poor children did not get the breakfasts and lunches that they depended on, and food banks reported distributing 43 per cent more food, according to the AP. The Children’s Defense Fund reported in May that one of seven children lives in a food-insecure household, meaning that members of the household do not get enough to eat. The rate is double that for Black and Latino children. (See the chart on food insecurity state by state from FeedingAmerica.org, a network of food banks.)

Beginning in October, recipients of the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP, colloquially known as “food stamps”) will be receiving increased benefits based on a new assessment of basic nutritional needs and their costs. For example, previous food cost estimates for the program assumed recipients would be using cheaper dried beans, rather than canned, when in reality most families receiving food stamps don’t have the time to prepare dried beans. The new estimates assume the cost of beans to be the cost of canned beans. While all recipients will see some increase in benefits, these will vary by state. The New York Times reported that the average benefit of $121 a month will increase to $157—just shy of a 30% increase. The Times also includes United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) statistics that show most families have used up all food stamps by midway through the month—and 43% of food stamp benefits cover children, who are unlikely to be able to add to the family income. S-HP/RLS

Thank the USDA for this increase that more accurately acknowledges the needs of American families: Tom Vilsack, Secretary of Agriculture, Department of Agriculture, 1400 Independence SW, Washington DC 20250, (202) 720-2791. And donate to your local food bank.

2. The Supreme Court allows massive evictions. Children’s health will suffer.

Hundreds of thousands of people could be evicted–in a pandemic–as a result of the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn the Biden administration’s ban on evictions, the New York Times reports. While funds have been earmarked to keep people in their homes, only 11% have reached renters, due to various bureaucratic snafus, NPR reports. As Child Trends, a research institute on children’s issues points out, unstable housing is detrimental to children’s well-being. Housing Matters, a branch of the Urban Institute, points out that when families are late on rent, endure multiple moves, or become homeless, the health of children suffers. Their data precede the pandemic, so the consequences of families doubling up with other family members or living in shelters for the spread of COVID have not been calculated. The Court believes that Congress needs to pass an eviction moratorium for it to be legitimate. RLS

You can urge your members of Congress to address the issues of evictions immediately. Find your representative here and your senators here.

3. Pressley bill would put mental health staff, not police in schools

Having police in public schools does not make children safer, research shows. Instead, it tends to criminalize children of color and traumatize children who have already had negative contact with police, according to the Healthy Schools Campaign.

Representative Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) has introduced the Counselling Not Criminalization in Schools Act (H.R.4011), which would prohibit the use of federal funds to pay for law enforcement officers in public schools. Instead, schools would have access to a grant program to help replace law enforcement with personnel and services that are trauma-informed and designed to support mental health. When we talk about defunding police (this writer’s language, not the language of the legislation), we are talking about programs like these that reduce the burden on law enforcement and that put in place professionals in services like mental health. This legislation is currently with two House committees: Education and Labor and Judiciary. S-HP

If you want to get involved in this issue, you can thank Representative Pressley for introducing this legislation, urge swift, positive action by the committees currently considering it, check whether your Representative is a cosponsor and thank/nudge as appropriate [note: Representative Panetta is not a cosponsor]: Addresses are here.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS

4. Drone strike kills children

Seven children were among the civilians killed by a U.S. drone strike against an Islamic State car bomb; along with their family, they were getting out of a nearby car, the New York Times reported. At least 90 civilians–along with 13 U.S. military personnel–were killed by the Islamic State attack on the Kabul airport. Meanwhile, the Afghan health care system is at risk, as the closure of banks means that hospitals cannot pay workers or buy supplies, as woman health workers stay home, and as foreign donors (including the World Bank and European Union) stop providing funds in the wake of the Taliban takeover, Al Jazeera reports. The WHO and Doctors Without Borders have had difficulty flying medical supplies into the region. RLS

5. US arms sales to Saudi Arabia harm children, could be blocked

Between 2015 and 2020, the U.S. sold $10.7 billion in arms to Saudi Arabia, most of which it used in the catastrophic war again Yemen. As a consequence of that war, half of the children under 5 in Yemen are malnourished, and 400,000 could die if they do not receive immediate treatment, according to Forbes.

In April, the House passed the Protection of Saudi Dissidents Act (H.R.1392), which blocks arms sales to Saudi Arabia and requires actions in response to the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was a Saudi journalist and official U.S. resident. Since leaving the house, this legislation has been with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which has not yet acted upon it. S-HP

If you think there should be action on this issue, remind the Senate Foreign Relations Committee of the importance of protecting journalistic freedom globally, urge swift, positive action on H.R.1392 by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and tell your Senator you want to see their support for H.R.1392 when the legislation reaches the Senate Floor. Addresses are here.

SCIENCE, HEALTH, TECHNOLOGY & THE ENVIRONMENT

6. Most important back-to-school supplies: Masks

As kids too young to be vaccinated head back to in-person school, the possibility that COVID will spreading among them is of grave concern. As the Toronto Star points out, whether kids are likely to transmit COVID depends in part on the vaccination rates in the community around them. (The Star offers a school-by-school analysis of vaccination rates in each Toronto community, while the Local offers a list of high-risk schools.)

In the US, ten states require masks in schools while eight–Arizona, Arkansas, Iowa, Oklahoma, Florida, South Carolina, Texas and Utah–forbid districts from requiring them, according to the Pew Trusts. In July, the CDC recommended that in view of the Delta variant and the increased numbers of COVID cases that are filling up hospitals, masks should be required in schools.

With 32 states leaving decisions about requiring masks up to individual districts, Mom’s Rising recommends that parents write their superintendents and their school boards, download a vaccine fact sheet to share with other parents, and urge that children old enough be vaccinated.

You can find the petition, sample letter and other recommendations for action at the Mom’s Rising website.

7. Children of color more likely to die from flu

Children of color are more likely to hospitalized and are three to four times more likely to die from the flu, according to Consumer Reports, citing a new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). The youngest children are the most vulnerable. The researchers, who were affiliated with the CDC and 18 other academic institutions and health departments, looked at 113,352 flu hospitalizations; they note that the most important strategies to prevent flu deaths in children are immunizations and anti-viral treatment. The flu kills 12, 000 to 61 ,000 people (both children and adults) each year. RLS

8. Use of pesticide that damages children’s brains now must be drastically reduced

Beginning in February, agricultural use of chlorpyrifos in the U.S. will be cut by over 90%. Chlorpyrifos, a pesticide, is known to cause neurological damage in children and is correlated with low birth weight, lowered IQs, and developmental problems in children, according to the New York Times. During Trump’s administration, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) chose not to ban chlorpyrifos, despite overwhelming evidence of the dangers it presented. In response, a suit was filed challenging that decision. The 9^th Circuit Court of Appeals has now ruled that evidence of chlorpyrifos’ dangers is so overwhelming that unless the administration can demonstrate new, convincing evidence of its harmlessness, most agricultural uses of the chemical must be ended. The Biden EPA chose not to challenge this decision. Because the change is the result of a court ruling, there will be no mandatory public comment period, which could have allowed continued use of chlorpyrifos while a proposed ban worked its way through the federal rule-making process. S-HP

It is worth thanking the current EPA for refusing to support the Trump EPA’s misleading claims about chlorpyrifos and for agreeing to ban most uses of the chemical: Michael S. Regan, Director, Environmental Protection Agency, 1200 Pennsylvania NW, 20460, (202) 564-4700.

RESOURCES

Heather Cox Richardson has some excellent reflections on the March on Washington and voting rights.

The International Rescue Committee is working to assist refugees caught in the violence in Afghanistan.

The American Medical Association (AMA) has a useful FAQ about COVID-19 and the vaccines.

Mom’s Rising  has a summer postcarding campaign that may interest you, along with a five simple, clear actions you can take each week.

Data on refugees in the US: Pew Research Center. Refugee statistics worldwide: UNHCR.

No More Deaths/No Más Muertes‘ three-part report, Left to Die, details how asylum-seekers in the desert are abandoned by the Border Patrol. Though 911 calls are routed to them, they did not respond in 63% of cases. Lee Sandusky’s piece of literary journalism, “Scenes from an Emergency Clinic in the Sonoran Desert,” eloquently describes the work No More Deaths/No Más Muertes does.

The National Lawyers Guild has a series of webinars on issues from the global repression of voting, the local suppression of voting and the detention of immigrants.

A trans hotline with both Canadian and US numbers–and with operators who speak Spanish–provides services by and for trans people. You don’t need to be in crisis to call, and if you are a friend or a family member of a trans person, you can also call to find out how to support them. If you would like to know more about the organization, see their staff bios here.

The Americans of Conscience checklist has new actions every other week that will enable you to make your voice heard quickly and clearly. In addition, they have a good news section that will help you keep going.

Among the organizations that supports kids and their families at the border is RAICES, which provides legal support. The need for their services has never been greater. You can support them here.

Al Otro Lado provides legal and humanitarian services to people in both the US and Tijuana. You can find out more about their work here.

The Minority Humanitarian Foundation supports asylum-seekers who have been released by ICE with no means of transportation or ways to contact sponsors. You can donate frequent-flyer miles to make their efforts possible.

The group Angry Tias and Abuelas provides legal advice and services to asylum-seekers at the border. You can follow their work on Facebook and see the list of volunteer opportunities they have posted.

Our main project this week is a database of 90 pieces of federal legislation that would affirm voting rights and protect the integrity of elections. We would prefer to see comprehensive pieces of legislation, notably the For the People Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, go through, but by time Congress amends those pieces of legislation enough to pass them (and who knows if that’s possible?), they’re probably going to be significantly less comprehensive than there were at the onset. A glance at this document will show how many separate pieces of legislation it would take to have the same effect as the For the People Act or the John Lewis Voting Rights Act.

There may, however, be some sense in going for things piecemeal. Breaking voting rights up into many smaller issues should mean we can get some things accomplished—and we definitely need to accomplish some things by 2022. And bringing up legislation one piece at a time will force those opposed to go on the record again and again and again as refusing to protect the vote.

If we take a piecemeal approach, we can also focus our efforts on one or more specific committees. If we want increased voter registration opportunities, we can look at the database and see that we need to be putting pressure on the House Administration Committee (with other committees added for specific pieces of legislation). If we’re concerned about the number and accessibility of polling places, we can look at the database and see that we need to be putting pressure on the House Administration and Judiciary Committees and the Senate Rules and Administration Committee. And we can offer members of those committees lists of specific pieces of legislation they could choose among.

Here is a list of the relevant committees, their contact information and their chairs to make your job a little easier. Note that you may have to expand some of the columns to see all the committees involved with a particular piece of legislation. S-HP

DOMESTIC NEWS

1. Gunshot detection algorithms result in false arrests

Data from the gunshot detection firm ShotSpotter has been used in 200 court cases nationwide, according to a comprehensive investigation by the AP. However, its algorithms, which it keeps as a proprietary secret, are significantly inaccurate, as the AP was able to demonstrate, miscounting the number of gunshots or mistaking fireworks or cars backfiring for gunshots. Even more alarming, employees changed the data ShotSpotter produced at the request of police. 

These flaws are not abstractions. The AP recounts the heartbreaking story of Michael Williams, an innocent black man accused of killing someone who had asked him for a ride. He was arrested not based on witness identification or any information other than the data from ShotSpotter, and spent a year in jail, during which he had COVID twice, episodes which left him with a tremor that prevents him from feeding himself. SpotShotter data in fact do not work in cars, but still Williams was imprisoned; later information emerged that ShotSpotter analysts do not receive any formal training and that ShotSpotter employees had changed the report on the sound from a firecracker to a gunshot at the request of police, and altered the location from where it had actually been detected to Williams’ street.

On top of its inaccuracies and vulnerability to manipulation, ShotSpotter does not reduce gun violence or gun homicides, according to a study cited by the AP from the Journal of Urban Health; in contrast, the study authors wrote, “Counties in states with permit-to-purchase firearm laws saw a 15% reduction in firearm homicide incidence rates; counties in states with right-to-carry laws saw a 21% increase in firearm homicide incidence rates.” RLS

INTERNATIONAL NEWS

2. What they knew, when they knew it and what they would (not) admit to knowing in Afghanistan

In a report this week, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction mapped the failures of American efforts in Afghanistan, according to an investigation by ProPublica, which wrote, “The U.S. effort was clumsy and ignorant, the report says, calling out the hubris of a superpower thinking it could reshape a country it didn’t understand by tossing gobs of money around.” Noting that the war cost the lives of 2,443 U.S. servicemembers and more than 114,000 Afghans, ProPublica also notes that the Inspector General has been pointing out the flaws in America’s Afghan strategy for 13 years. In 2019, the Washington Post drew on confidential documents that demonstrated that “senior U.S. officials failed to tell the truth about the war in Afghanistan throughout the 18-year campaign, making rosy pronouncements they knew to be false and hiding unmistakable evidence the war had become unwinnable.” See reporter Sarah Chayes’ quite remarkable analysis and history of the region. “The Ideas of August.” RLS

3. Evacuations from Afghanistan

Heather Cox Richardson has a quiet summary of where things stand vis a vis the evacuation of Americans and their allies from Afghanistan. She points out: “Yet, on CNN this morning, Matthew Dowd, who was the chief strategist for the Bush-Cheney ticket in 2004, noted that more than 20,000 people have been evacuated from Afghanistan without a single loss of an American life, while in the same period of time, 5000 Americans have died from Covid-19 and 500 have died from gunshots.” Twelve Afghan civilians died as people rushed the airport.

Still, American veterans are getting frantic messages from the Afghan interpreters who worked with them, imploring the veterans to help them get out of the country with their families, Business Insider reports. The State Department says it had a backlog of 17,000 visas from the Trump administration, though it only issued 134 between January and March of 2021. The US says it is committed to evacuated 50,000 – 60,000 Afghans. 

Canadian interpreters and others who worked for Canadian forces are equally frantic, as the Toronto Star points out, describing the case of a man and his family who have appropriate documents but who are not being permitted to board an aircraft, as flights out had been delayed for a week. Outside the airport, it is cold at night; food and water are scarce. Still, Canada has authorized its special forces to go outside the borders of the airport to bring in Canadian citizens and some 6,000 Afghan nationals and their families who assisted Canadian forces, which Britain and the US has not, according to the Globe and Mail. In addition, Canada has authorized 15,000 Afghans who are in refugee camps outside the country to resettle in Canada. RLS

SCIENCE, HEALTH, TECHNOLOGY & THE ENVIRONMENT

4. Treatment for prevention and treatment of COVID vastly underused.

COVID deaths occurred much earlier than was generally thought–in January 2020–and in disparate locations, at least in California, Georgia, Alabama and Oklahoma, according to an article in the Mercury News. The Mercury suggests that COVID cases probably first appeared in November and December, though researchers have not been able to confirm this possibility. The newspaper provides a table of deaths from pneumonia, flu and COVID

If you think we’re out of these woods, read ProPublica’s remarkable story about the exhaustion and frustration of the EMTs transporting COVID-19 patients to overcrowded hospitals. The reporter, Ava Kofman, spent three weeks riding with EMTs, documenting how long their patients had to wait in the halls and how depleted basic supplies were, from masks to oxygen. This piece was produced in April, when we thought we were emerging from the pandemic and well before the Delta variant took hold. 

As we noted previously, monoclonal antibodies are a proven treatment for COVID; they have also just been shown to be effective among high-risk people who have been exposed to COVID, according to the Washington Post. They are free and available as an infusion in most hospitals, but they have been very much underused. The treatment needs to be given within 10 days after symptoms begin. RLS

RESOURCES

The International Rescue Committee is working to assist refugees caught in the violence in Afghanistan.

The American Medical Association (AMA) has a useful FAQ about COVID-19 and the vaccines.

Mom’s Rising  has a summer postcarding campaign that may interest you, along with a five simple, clear actions you can take each week.

Data on refugees in the US: Pew Research Center. Refugee statistics worldwide: UNHCR.

No More Deaths/No Más Muertes‘ three-part report, Left to Die, details how asylum-seekers in the desert are abandoned by the Border Patrol. Though 911 calls are routed to them, they did not respond in 63% of cases. Lee Sandusky’s piece of literary journalism, “Scenes from an Emergency Clinic in the Sonoran Desert,” eloquently describes the work No More Deaths/No Más Muertes does.

The National Lawyers Guild has a series of webinars on issues from the global repression of voting, the local suppression of voting and the detention of immigrants.

A trans hotline with both Canadian and US numbers–and with operators who speak Spanish–provides services by and for trans people. You don’t need to be in crisis to call, and if you are a friend or a family member of a trans person, you can also call to find out how to support them. If you would like to know more about the organization, see their staff bios here.

The Americans of Conscience checklist has new actions every other week that will enable you to make your voice heard quickly and clearly. In addition, they have a good news section that will help you keep going.

Among the organizations that supports kids and their families at the border is RAICES, which provides legal support. The need for their services has never been greater. You can support them here.

Al Otro Lado provides legal and humanitarian services to people in both the US and Tijuana. You can find out more about their work here.

The Minority Humanitarian Foundation supports asylum-seekers who have been released by ICE with no means of transportation or ways to contact sponsors. You can donate frequent-flyer miles to make their efforts possible.

The group Angry Tias and Abuelas provides legal advice and services to asylum-seekers at the border. You can follow their work on Facebook and see the list of volunteer opportunities they have posted.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS

1. After 20 years and 47,245 civilian deaths, the US leaves Afghanistan; the Taliban had secretly negotiated with cities to surrender.

 In a simultaneously precipitous and long-overdue move, President Biden affirmed former President Trump’s agreement to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan, but now has had to deploy thousands more to deal with the chaos that has resulted, the BBC reports. The mainstream media has mostly forgotten that the original agreement was Trump’s, so Biden is being widely blamed for the inevitable consequences of withdrawal, with Republicans literally removing sections of the Republican National Committee website that touted Trump’s plans to withdraw, as Heather Cox Richardson points out. Indeed, his administration seems not to have anticipated the swift advance of the Taliban nor to have adequately planned for the protection of civilians who assisted US troops. ​Some failure of intelligence meant that the US apparently did not know that direct negotiations with the Taliban were taking place on the local level over the last year and a half, according to the Washington Post, with small municipalities and provincial capitals having made agreements with the Taliban to surrender. ​

Like the last 20 years, the first six months of 2021 have been deadly for civilians in Afghanistan. The Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission says that civilian casualties have increased by 80 per cent over the first six months of 2020, with 1677 civilians killed and 3,644 injured. The Commission says that of the total casualties, “the Taliban is responsible for 56 percent, pro-government forces are responsible for 15 percent, Daesh is responsible for seven percent, and unknown perpetrators are responsible for 22 percent.”

The AP offers a calculation of the costs to the US of a war never declared by Congress. The US poured in as much as 2 trillion dollars, all funded by debt–and lost 2,488 American armed forces personnel, 3.846 contractors; countless veterans also cope with physical and mental injuries. Canada deployed 40,000 troops over 13 years in Afghanistan, where 150 Canadians died.

The Post analyzes some of the foreign policy errors that led to this moment, while Phyllis Bennis, a fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies, speaking to Democracy Now,  puts it more starkly: “There was not at that time [when the US attacked Afghanistan]—there is now not—a military solution to terrorism,” she said, “which was ostensibly the reason for the invasion and occupation of Afghanistan.”​ The failures are decades long; in 2008, Conn Hallinan wrote in Common Dreams  that “By any measure, a military “victory” in Afghanistan is simply not possible. The only viable alternative is to begin direct negotiations with the Taliban, and to draw in regional powers with a stake in the outcome: Iran, Pakistan, Russia, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, China, and India.​”​ ​​

Speaking to Democracy Now, ​Bennis goes on to point out that the enormous investment of money and troops in Afghanistan did not produce an army and a government capable of or inclined to resist the Taliban​; Mike Jason, a former US Army colonel writing in the Atlantic, analyzes the errors the US military made in its training missions there​. More ominously, Bennis cites​ evidence from Human Rights Watch and elsewhere is that CIA-trained death squads in Af​ghanistan will continue to kill civilians.

The speed of the Taliban’s advance is clearly catastrophic for certain groups of civilians. Aid groups have been desperately trying to get visas for their allies for a month, the Washington Post reported. The Intercept vividly describes the circumstances of people trying to leave. According to US News and World Report, sixty nations have called on Afghanistan to permit foreign nationals and Afghanistanis who wish to leave to do so.

Canada also did not arrange for those who had supported its mission there to be evacuated in time, and family members in Canada are frantic. Ottawa has closed its embassy and thousands of Afghanistanis are crowded in and around the airport in Kabul, hoping for flights out, according to the Toronto Star; the AP reports that Canada is sending troops in to evacuate embassy staff. Veterans and other volunteers have been trying for weeks to get interpreters and other diplomatic staff out, lodging them temporarily in safe houses, according to the Globe and Mail. “1,200 of those they were trying to evacuate are now stuck in Kandahar,​” the Globe and Mail writes, “​​and an additional 800 to 900​ are waiting in safe houses in Kabul for evacuation by the Canadian government.​” ​Canadian forces left Afghanistan in 2014. 

Particularly at risk are women and girls in Afghanistan, whose futures may now be truncated, as Nicolas Kristof, who covered Afghanistan for the New York Times, wrote on Facebook. ​He is particularly concerned about female educators, and suggests that the US should “fly in military planes, grant at-risk Afghans instant visas on the tarmac (even if they don’t have passports), get them out and sort it all out later. It’s not optimal, but it will save lives. And it would be the right thing to do.​”​ Women’s rights activists recognized by North America also told the Post that they are endangered; ““We were the ones who raised our voices for years,” one woman said of her fellow female activists. “Afghanistan is on fire. No one has a visa. No one has anything. Honestly, I am lost.” RLS

DOMESTIC NEWS

2. Staff in detention centers told to downplay COVID, per whistleblowers

According to two whistleblowers, Health and Human Services staff at the centers where asylum-seekers are imprisoned are mistreating children (see story below) and exposing those detained to COVID. NBC News quoted them as saying, “Covid was widespread among children and eventually spread to many employees. Hundreds of children contracted COVID in the overcrowded conditions. Adequate masks were not consistently provided to children, nor was their use consistently enforced.” They allege they were required to downplay the effects of COVID by the HHS public affairs office, according to NBC.

According to the AP, 19,000 children unaccompanied by family were stopped at the border in July. Children coming to the border by themselves are exempt from Title 42, the CDC regulation that requires almost everyone else–including families with children–to be immediately deported on the grounds that they could bring COVID in. However, those who make it in–only children and particularly vulnerable adults–are more likely to acquire COVID when they get here rather than to bring it in, according to the AP. The percentage of detained people with COVID has gone up from 2% to 6%, according to NPR; detention centers do not observe distancing protocols and mix infected and uninfected people together. The Brennan Center has a detailed time-line and history of COVID infections and challenges to conditions in detention centers; the Center points out that at one facility–the Farmville ICE Detention Center in Virginia–almost 75% of those held there have tested positive for COVID. 

The program which allows vulnerable adults and families to enter–ordinarily those urgently in need of medical treatment–is likely to end next week, as the ACLU has decided to stop negotiating with the Biden administration over Title 42 and resume litigation. The AP quoted Neela Chakravartula, managing attorney for the Center for Gender & Refugee Studies, as saying: “We are deeply disappointed that the Biden administration has abandoned its promise of fair and humane treatment for families seeking safety, leaving us no choice but to resume litigation.” RLS

3. Abysmal conditions for children in detention–still

The New York Times has been reporting on problematic conditions at the Pecos and Ft. Bliss Emergency Intake Centers (EICs) that house unaccompanied minors entering the U.S. This spring the government established a dozen EICs, almost all run by outside contractors, to house the increasing number of unaccompanied children. At this point, only four of those EICs remain in operation, including Pecos and Ft. Bliss. These emergency shelters, which house approximately 30% of the unaccompanied minors in U.S. custody, have lower standards than licensed shelters, and the contactors running EICs have limited experience running facilities for children making issues like mental health, bullying, and assault particularly problematic. Neither facility was designed to house minors. Pecos is a former oil industry labor camp; Ft. Bliss is a military site, reportedly with significant toxic pollution.

The New York Times points out both that the Pecos contract has been extended through November and may be expanded to include “tender age” children, those between six and twelve years old and that the Department of Health and Human Services Office of the Inspector General has opened an investigation into conditions at Ft. Bliss. In June, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), which runs the EICs, acknowledged to a judge that it lacked enough case managers to ensure that all children being held were released before the maximum legal stay of 20 days. In fact, the average stay at the moment is more than a month. RAICES, a nonprofit supporting refugee and immigrant children, is calling on Secretary of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra to shut down Pecos. One of the organization’s lawyers, Jonathan Ryan, was quoted by the New York Times as observing that conditions at Pecos “are ‘among the harshest and most restrictive of any’ shelter he has visited.” S-HP

If you want these conditions to change, urge President Biden and HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra to take increased, immediate action to improve conditions at Pecos and Ft. Bliss with a goal of ultimately ending the use of EICs. You can also ask your Congressmembers what they’re doing to monitor conditions at Pecos and Ft. Bliss. Contact information is here. You can also sign the RAICES petition calling for the closure of the Pecos EIC.

4. Unethical fundraising

One scam tactic that was used in political fundraising leading up to and following the 2020 election—though it’s not exclusive to this event—is the use of pre-checked boxes in emails. A solicitation email asks for a contribution; further down in the email and less visible is a pre-checked box saying the donation should be monthly or weekly, rather than-one time, or committing the contributor to an additional, larger contribution. Trump used this technique in raising funds for last year’s presidential election, which as the New York Times reports has resulted in $12.8 million in refunds during the first half of 2021 to contributors who unwillingly became monthly or weekly donors through the use of pre-checked boxes. A number of those contributors suddenly found their bank accounts emptied over a period of weeks. In fact, in 2020, U.S. courts upheld the legality of the use of such pre-checked boxes.

 This spring the Federal Election Commission (FEC) unanimously recommended that Congress prohibit campaigns from prechecking boxes for recurring donations, and legislation to do so has been introduced in both the House and Senate. In the Senate that legislations is S.1786, “Rescuing Every Contributor from Unwanted Recurrences (RECUR) Act,” and it is with the Senate Rules and Administration Committee. In the House that legislation, H.R.3832, goes by the less succinct title of “To amend the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 to prohibit the solicitation and acceptance of a recurring contribution or donation in a campaign for election for Federal office by any means that does not require the contributor or donor to give affirmative consent to making the contribution or donation on a recurring basis, and for other purposes,” and it is with the House Rules and Administration Committee. S-HP

If you’d like to put a stop to this tactic, urge the Federal Election Commission to continue looking for ways to end to the use of pre-checked boxes in political fundraising; in addition, you can encourage the Senate Rules and Administration Committee to take swift, positive action on S.1786 and the House Rules and Administration Committee on HB 3832. Contact information is here.

5. Tracking Congress

If you’re the kind of citizen who tries to track Congressional actions, including reports, you know how difficult it can be to locate a specific document, depending on the agency that created it and that agency’s methods of allowing public access. (And if you’re not that kind of citizen, maybe you should consider becoming one, at least on a set of topics that are of particular importance to you.)

H.R.2485, the Access to Congressionally Mandated Reports Act, has the potential to make your work a bit easier. As the official summary of H.R.2485 explains, “This bill requires the Government Publishing Office (GPO) to establish and maintain a publicly available online portal containing copies of all congressionally mandated reports. A federal agency must submit a congressionally mandated report and specified information about the report to the GPO between 30 and 45 days after submission of the report to either chamber or to any congressional committee or subcommittee.” Under limited and very specific circumstances a report can be withheld from the online portal, but overall H.R.2485 will make it much easier to see the kind of information Congress is requiring and/or generating. H.R.2485 is currently with the House Homeland Security Committee. S-HP

If you want to get your hands on these reports, urge swift positive action on H.R.2485 by the House Homeland Security Committee: Representative Bennie G. Thompson (D-MS), Chair, House Homeland Security Committee, H2-176 Ford House Office Building, Washington DC 20515, (202) 226-2616. @BennieGThompson.

SCIENCE, HEALTH, TECHNOLOGY & THE ENVIRONMENT

6. Stopping the drug monopolies

Let’s take a moment to consider the use of “sham citizen petitions” and “product hopping” in enabling drug manufacturers to maintain monopolies on drugs and keep their prices high.

  Citizen petitions can be filed by anyone when the Food and Drug Administration is considering approving a generic or biosimilar version of an existing drug. The point of such petitions was to allow patients to advocate for themselves regarding drug approval, and the FDA is obligated to consider and respond to every citizen position regarding a generic or biosilmilar before that drug can be approved. The “sham” comes in when drug manufacturers who hold a monopoly on a specific medication file citizen petitions with the FDA with the purpose of slowing down approval of generics and biosimilars. Anyone can file such a petition, and each petition moves back the generic’s/biosimilar’s possible approval date.

  Many drug manufacturers whose monopoly rights on a drug are about to expire develop new formulations of that drug that have little or no therapeutic difference. The new formula can be patented, restarting the “monopoly clock” and preventing approval of generics or biosimilars.  The Senate now has the opportunity to vote on legislation that would significantly limit sham citizen petitions and product hopping. S.1425, the Stop STALLING Act, establishes rules to prevent the filing of sham citizen petitions. S.1435, the Affordable Prescriptions for Patients Act, targets the use of minor formulation changes to avoid approvals for generics/biosimilars. Both pieces of legislation have made it through the Senate Judiciary Committee, meaning that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer can bring them to the floor of the Senate. S-HP

If you want to see this legislation go forward, urge the Senate Majority Leader to place S.1425 and S.1435 on the Senate calendar: Senator Charles E. Schumer (D-NY), Senate Majority Leader, 322 Hart Senate Office Building, Washington DC 20510, (202) 224-6542. @SenSchumer. You can also check to see if your Senator is a cosponsor of S.1425 and a cosponsor of S.1435, thank or nudge them as appropriate and insist that they support these pieces of legislation that would limit cynical moves preventing approval of generics/biosimilars by pharmaceutical companies. Find your Senators here.

RESOURCES

The International Rescue Committee is working to assist refugees caught in the violence in Afghanistan.

The American Medical Association (AMA) has a useful FAQ about COVID-19 and the vaccines.

Mom’s Rising  has a summer postcarding campaign that may interest you, along with a five simple, clear actions you can take each week.

Data on refugees in the US: Pew Research Center. Refugee statistics worldwide: UNHCR.

No More Deaths/No Más Muertes‘ three-part report, Left to Die, details how asylum-seekers in the desert are abandoned by the Border Patrol. Though 911 calls are routed to them, they did not respond in 63% of cases. Lee Sandusky’s piece of literary journalism, “Scenes from an Emergency Clinic in the Sonoran Desert,” eloquently describes the work No More Deaths/No Más Muertes does.

The National Lawyers Guild has a series of webinars on issues from the global repression of voting, the local suppression of voting and the detention of immigrants.

A trans hotline with both Canadian and US numbers–and with operators who speak Spanish–provides services by and for trans people. You don’t need to be in crisis to call, and if you are a friend or a family member of a trans person, you can also call to find out how to support them. If you would like to know more about the organization, see their staff bios here.

The Americans of Conscience checklist has new actions every other week that will enable you to make your voice heard quickly and clearly. In addition, they have a good news section that will help you keep going.

Among the organizations that supports kids and their families at the border is RAICES, which provides legal support. The need for their services has never been greater. You can support them here.

Al Otro Lado provides legal and humanitarian services to people in both the US and Tijuana. You can find out more about their work here.

The Minority Humanitarian Foundation supports asylum-seekers who have been released by ICE with no means of transportation or ways to contact sponsors. You can donate frequent-flyer miles to make their efforts possible.

The group Angry Tias and Abuelas provides legal advice and services to asylum-seekers at the border. You can follow their work on Facebook and see the list of volunteer opportunities they have posted.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has brought us news we should already know: The climate crisis is not in some future but is already here. The earth is set to arrive at or exceed the critical 1.5 C. increase over the next two decades; we are already at 1.1 degrees C. As the writers put it in the press release, “For every 1.5°C of global warming, there will be increasing heat waves, longer warm seasons and shorter cold seasons. At 2°C of global warming, heat extremes would more often reach critical tolerance thresholds for agriculture and health.” To even hold the increase at 2 degrees C will be impossible “unless there are immediate, rapid and large-scale reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.” Regional information can be found on their interactive atlas.

SCIENCE, HEALTH, TECHNOLOGY & THE ENVIRONMENT

1. Legislation to address wildfire smoke

Another of the health threats from the climate crisis is the smoke that accompanies wildfires. Smoke from the immense Dixie fire in California has reached Tennessee, and the fires in British Columbia have made the skies in Ontario hazy. Even those living far from the actual fire location can be breathing air with dangerously high particulate matter. An article in the journal Nature points out that 7.4 million children are affected by wildfire smoke annually; the smoke tends not to be caught in their noses and goes straight to their lungs, which are still developing and therefore are especially susceptible to long-term effects. Adults are also vulnerable to wildfire smoke, which has been shown to raise the death rate even in otherwise healthy adults, causing about 339,000 deaths per year worldwide, according to a 2012 study cited by WebMD–numbers for the more recent period are not available. And if a person already has respiratory issues, the threat from fine particulate matter–especially if toxic fuels are burning–is even greater. (The CDC suggests measures people can take to mitigate the threat to some degree.)

As a result of these hazards, Congress is beginning to consider legislation that would address the threat posed by smoke as well as by fire:

◉S.2423, the Wildfire Smoke Relief Act, would provide necessary medical equipment to those at risk from wildfire smoke or, if that is not available, temporary housing in an area not significantly affected by wildfire smoke. S.2423 was introduced by Oregon’s Senator Ron Wyden. Currently its only cosponsor is Oregon’s other Senator Jeff Merkley. The Wildfire Smoke Relief Act is with the Senate’s Homeland Security Committee.

◉S.2421, the Smoke Research and Planning Act, requires EPA research on wildfire smoke and its mitigation. It would establish four Centers of Excellence for Wildfire Smoke at higher education institutions and would create a community grant program to support wildfire smoke mitigation projects. S.2421 was introduced by Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley, and its only cosponsors at the moment are Oregon’s Senator Ron Wyden and California’s Senators Dianne Feinstein and Alex Padilla. The Smoke Research and Planning Act is currentlywith the Senate’s Environment and Public Works Committee.

◉S.2419, the Smoke Emergency Declaration Act, would allow the President to declare a smoke emergency, including doing so in anticipation of such an event. Governors would also have the right to petition the President to declare a smoke emergency. It would allow the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to provide assistance to those affected by a smoke emergency. S.2419 also creates Small Business Administration (SBA) grants for businesses impacted by a smoke emergency. The Smoke Emergency Declaration Act was introduced by Oregon’s Jeff Merkley and is cosponsored by Oregon’s Senator Ron Wyden and California’s Senators Dianne Feinstein and Alex Padilla. This legislation is with the Senate’s Homeland Security Committee. S-HP/RLS

You can do something to save your own lungs here–as well as those of others. You can urge the Senate Homeland Security Committee to take swift, positive action on S.2423 and S.2419. You can also tell the Senate Environmental and Public Works Committee to act quickly on S.2421. You also might suggest that your Senators (if you’re not from California or Oregon) become cosponsors of S.2423, S.2421 and S.2419 and thank Senators Feinstein and Padilla for cosponsoringS.2421 and S.2419; also ask that they also support S.2423 (if you are in California). Addresses are here.

DOMESTIC NEWS

2. Representatives Bush, Pressley, and Omar get some eviction protection restored

Eviction at any time is a catastrophe. Eviction during a pandemic compounds the danger, NPR points out, as evicted residents may stay with family members and friends, increasing exposure. The Eviction Lab, which points out that landlords attempt 3.7 million evictions annually, keeps a database on evictions. Small landlords, too, are at risk of defaulting on their mortgages, according to the Wall Street Journal, and in California, a number of them are suing the state to rescind the ban on evictions, even though landlords can be reimbursed for unpaid rent through a federal fund, the Mercury News points out. Homelessness in California, which has half of all unhoused people, rose by 6.8% between 2019 and 2020, and by 16.2% between 2007 and 2020, according to a HUD study quoted in State of Reform, a health policy thinktank. 

The House left for its summer recess without taking action to extend the eviction moratorium put in place by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that was set to expire on July 31, despite the fact that distribution of these funds has been delayed repeatedly. To protest the House’s failure to act, Representatives Cori Bush (D-MO), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), and Ilhan Omar (D-MN), chose to sleep outside the capitol to draw attention to the eviction moratorium’s expiration. Shortly after that, in order to ensure that all COVID-19 funds marked for rental assistance were distributed before the moratorium ended, the CDC extended the moratorium through October 3. 

Whether this move will benefit renters—or which renters it will benefit—is an open question. The Supreme Court (SCOTUS) issued a ruling in June allowing the eviction moratorium to remain, but that ruling assumed that the eviction moratorium would expire on July 31. Shortly before the moratorium’s expiration, the 6^th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the CDC has acted beyond its powers in declaring the moratorium. As a result, the states of Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, and Michigan have no obligation to continue the moratorium. If you are facing eviction, CNBC has a list of steps you can take. S-HP/RLS

You can thank Representatives Bush, Pressley, and Omar for their protest, which shone a light on the crisis U.S. renters are facing. You might also express your disappointment at the House’s failure to extend the eviction moratorium. Addresses are here. In addition, Moms Rising has important information on the effect of eviction on families and a way to engage.

3. Funds for child care and early learning proposed

If we were to draw up a list of basic services that are assumed to be “rights” in other industrialized nations, childcare and early education would appear near the top of the list. Childcare costs more than the actual income of many working-class Americans. Some states offer universal preschool, but many don’t, and that presents another cost working-class parents can’t afford. The Universal Child Care and Early Learning Act (S.1398 in the Senate; H.R.2886 in the House) could change all that. This legislation would provide the Department of Health and Human Services with funds for child care and early learning programs for children ages 6 weeks through school age that would be open to all regardless of family income, disability status, citizenship status, or employment of a family member. Most families would have to pay a subsidized fee for these services, but they would be waived for children from families with incomes below 200% of the poverty line, and would be capped at a maximum of 7% of family income regardless of income level. Our pessimistic selves may see the success of this legislation as a pipe dream, but to be ultimately successful we need to be making noise now, even if change will come slowly. S.1398 is with the Senate’s Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee. H.R.2886 is with the House Education and Labor Committee. S-HP

If you want to send a message that early childhood education and childcare are priorities, you could urge swift, positive action on the Universal Child Care and Early Learning Act by the appropriate committees. You could also see whether your Senators are co-sponsors of S.1398 and THANK/NUDGE as appropriate. You can also see whether your Representative is a co-sponsor of H.R.2886 and also thank/nudge as appropriate. Addresses are here.

4. New legislation would prohibit religion from being used to ban travel

Former President Trump’s ban on travel to the US by anyone from a group of Muslim-majority countries not only intensified Islamophobia in the US but derailed the lives of millions of people–include those who had already been approved to visit or immigrate. As the American Friends Service Committee explains, some of these were refugees, fleeing violence and/or living in refugee camps. Adding injury to injury, people from Somalia, Syria, Sudan, and Yemen already in the US also had their Temporary Protection Status revoked, leaving them stranded.

Others were trying to rejoin family members, go to universities, or obtain medical treatment unavailable elsewhere. Not only did those unable to travel suffer, but family members already in the US had to deal with a family divided. Muslims from Iran were especially impacted, as the sanctions against Iran cut off many options for them at home.

The NO BAN Act, H.R.1333, was written in response to the Trump administration’s sweeping ban on travel to the U.S. This legislation prohibits discrimination on the basis of religion in immigration-related decisions. It also requires that any travel bans be narrowly defined; that Congress be consulted before such bans are issued; and that Congress must be notified within 48 hours of the administration issuing a travel ban or the ban becomes invalid. The NO BAN Act also allows those in the U.S. and harmed by such a restriction to sue in federal court. H.R.1333 was passed by the House on April 21 and has been with the Senate Judiciary Committee since May 27. S-HP/RLS

If you want to act on this, you can urge swift, positive action on H.R.1333 by the Senate Judiciary Committee to prevent the kinds of travel abuses put in place by the Trump administration from being used again. Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL), Chair, Senate Judiciary Committee, 224 Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington DC 20510, (202) 224-7703. You can also tell your Senators you want them to advocate for H.R.1333 when it reaches the Senate floor.

5. California legislature acts on gun violence

Homicides in California increased by 31% last year, according to the AP; a third of the victims were Black.  The increase does not appear to be a function of the pandemic, the AP noted, but it pointed out that a third of these deaths were caused by a gun, and quoted Attorney General Rob Bonta as noting a “connection to a 65.5% increase in sales of handguns and 45.9% increase in long-gun sales last year. The 686,435 handguns sold was a record, while the 480,401 rifles and shotguns was second only to 2016.”

The California Legislature is currently on break and will be reconvening on August 16, and a number of gun safety and police accountability efforts should be coming up then. A quick run-down:

◉AB-1223 would tax the sale of firearms and ammunition in order to fund gun violence intervention and prevention programs.

◉AB-1057 would assure that police have the right to seize ghost guns from individuals who are a danger to themselves or others.

◉AB-988 would fund a crisis hotline that would dispatch mental health professionals, not police, with the intention of preventing suicides, including “suicide by cops.”

◉AB-490 would expand the ban on choke holds and use of positions likely to cause asphyxia.

◉SB-2 would end qualified immunity for police.

◉SB-715 would tighten gun regulations and would also allow the State Attorney Generalto investigate police violence resulting in death of an unarmed civilian, including cases where there is a dispute regarding whether that civilian was armed.

Both Senate bills have made it through the Senate, and these, along with AB-1223, are currently with the State Assembly. AB-490, AB-988, and AB-1057 have made it through the Assembly and are with the state Senate.

For information about federal gun legislation, see the bills in our database that originated in the House and that for the most part are still stalled there. 

If you want to see action on gun violence and police accountability, urge your Assemblymember to support SB-715, SB-2, and AB-1223 and your California Senator to support AB-490, AB-988, and AB-1057.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS

6. Mexico sues US gun manufacturers

In case we need more evidence that gun proliferation in the U.S. is out of control, note that 25 million guns crossed the border into Mexico last year, according to a Washington Post study last fall. American guns are being used to kill police officers in Mexico, and the number of homicides involving guns has risen precipitously, from fewer than 20% in 1997 to 69% in 2018, As a result,  Mexico is suing a group of U.S. gun manufacturers—including Smith & Wesson, Barrett Firearms, Beretta USA, Glock, and Colt—and asking for damages of $10 billion, tighter controls on U.S. gun sales, and better security features on weapons.

 Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard is quoted in the Washington Post explaining, “If we don’t file a suit like this and win it, [manufacturers] are never going to understand, they’re going to continue doing the same thing andwe will continue having deaths every day in our country.” The suit alleges that U.S. arms manufacturers are deliberately designing guns that will appeal to crime groups, citing the example of a Colt .38 engraved with the face of Mexico’s revolutionary hero Emiliano Zapata. The chances for this suit’s success are limited. In 2005 Congress passed the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, whichprotects firearms manufacturers from civil liability. S-HP/RLS

If you want to address this issue, you might direct the President, the cabinet, and Congress’ attention to this lawsuit and emphasize that our failure to reasonably regulate weapons is not just killing Americans—it’s killing people outside of this country and generating international animus. Addresses are here.

RESOURCES

The American Medical Association (AMA) has a useful FAQ about COVID-19 and the vaccines.

Mom’s Rising  has a summer postcarding campaign that may interest you, along with a five simple, clear actions you can take each week.

Data on refugees in the US: Pew Research Center. Refugee statistics worldwide: UNHCR.

No More Deaths/No Más Muertes‘ three-part report, Left to Die, details how asylum-seekers in the desert are abandoned by the Border Patrol. Though 911 calls are routed to them, they did not respond in 63% of cases. Lee Sandusky’s piece of literary journalism, “Scenes from an Emergency Clinic in the Sonoran Desert,” eloquently describes the work No More Deaths/No Más Muertes does.

The National Lawyers Guild has a series of webinars on issues from the global repression of voting, the local suppression of voting and the detention of immigrants.

A trans hotline with both Canadian and US numbers–and with operators who speak Spanish–provides services by and for trans people. You don’t need to be in crisis to call, and if you are a friend or a family member of a trans person, you can also call to find out how to support them. If you would like to know more about the organization, see their staff bios here.

The Americans of Conscience checklist has new actions every other week that will enable you to make your voice heard quickly and clearly. In addition, they have a good news section that will help you keep going.

Among the organizations that supports kids and their families at the border is RAICES, which provides legal support. The need for their services has never been greater. You can support them here.

Al Otro Lado provides legal and humanitarian services to people in both the US and Tijuana. You can find out more about their work here.

The Minority Humanitarian Foundation supports asylum-seekers who have been released by ICE with no means of transportation or ways to contact sponsors. You can donate frequent-flyer miles to make their efforts possible.

The group Angry Tias and Abuelas provides legal advice and services to asylum-seekers at the border. You can follow their work on Facebook and see the list of volunteer opportunities they have posted.

Black American women die in childbirth at three times the rate of White women; for every death, there are 70 “near misses,” which can have long-term effects on women’s health, according to the American Journal of Managed Care. Canada does not keep race-based data on maternal mortality, but Black women in Canada have almost double the rate of pre-term births compared to White women, though pre-term births were a third lower in Canada than in the US (likely due to universal government-funded health care). Women and infants of all races were more likely to die in rural areas, and rates are significantly increasing, likely due to closures of obstetric facilities, according to a study available on Pub Med. Legislation to address these and other disparities is pending; the week following the very first Emancipation Day (in Canada) would be a good time to nag those who represent you.

DOMESTIC NEWS

1. Legislation to address the needs of vulnerable mothers–Black, veteran, incarcerated

 In March, the number of Black women looking to give birth outside of a hospital setting rose, the New York Times reported. Why? The Times offers two primary reasons: racial inequities in health care and COVID-19—also related to racial inequities in health care. The U.S. has the worst rate of maternal mortality among industrialized nations, largely as a result of racial inequities that permeate our medical system. Black women are four times more likely to die giving birth than white women. In New Jersey, Black women giving birth face a risk of mortality seven times greater than that faced by white women.     

The Black Maternal Momnibus Act (H.R.959 in the House; S.346 in the Senate) addresses discrepancies in healthcare for Black mothers. Among the provisions of the House version this ambitious piece of legislation are a housing for moms grant program; investments in community-based organizations addressing Black maternal outcomes and mental health; prenatal and postpartum childcare; support for veterans giving birth; grants to grow and diversify the perinatal workforce; protections for incarcerated moms; funding for data collection and analysis and studies to determine causes and solutions to the race-based differences in maternal outcomes. In the House, this legislation is with a number of committees and subcommittees: Energy and Commerce (and its Subcommittee on Health); Financial Services; Transportation and Infrastructure (and its subcommittees on Water Resources and Environment, Highways and Transit, and Coast Guard and Marine Transportation); Education and Labor; Judiciary (and its Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security); Natural Resources (and its Subcommittee for Indigenous Peoples); Agriculture (and its subcommittee on Nutrition, Oversight, and Departmental Regulations); and Veterans’ Affairs (and its subcommittee on Health). The provisions of the Senate legislation are essentially similar, though differently organized in places. The Senate version is with the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee. S.346 is with the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee. RLS/S-HP

To nudge this legislation forward, see the contact information here.

2. Legislation would support rural moms

Last November 19, to mark National Rural Health Day, the American Hospital Association (AHA) presented information on the lack of prenatal, obstetric, and postpartum care for rural mothers and on some programs being developed in response. In fact, half of all U.S. rural counties do not offer obstetric services and difficulty in recruiting and retaining healthcare workers of all types has left many current rural healthcare providers short staffed. The Rural MOMS Act (H.R.769 in the House; S.1491 in the Senate) would establish rural obstetric networks, provide demonstration grants for healthcare training on maternal health in rural areas, and incorporate maternal health into some existing telehealth networks. It would also require the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to report on maternal health topics, including health inequities. H.R.769 is with the House Energy and Commerce Committee, where it has been assigned to the Subcommittee on Health. S.1491 has made it through the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee and can now be brought before the full Senate. S-HP

If you want rural moms to have this support, help push it through the Senate.

3. Legislation to protect nursing moms

Finally, working mothers could receive support through the PUMP for Nursing Mothers Act (H.R.3110 in the House; S.1658 in the Senate), which would amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 to provide workplace breastfeeding accommodations. This legislation has made it through committee in both houses of Congress and can now move on to full votes by the House and Senate. S-HP

You can encourage your senators and representative to move this legislation forward–see how.

4. New legislation would protect documented immigrants’ access to health care

You may remember how the Trump administration tried to keep people who applied for any kind of public benefits from applying for permanent residency status, even though they were otherwise eligible. Called the “Public Charge Rule,” it was removed after much legal wrangling, but immigrant families endured much hardship in the process, including children who were US citizens but whose families were afraid to take them to the doctor for fear of losing the right to apply for permanent residency. The HEAL for Immigrant Families Act (H.R.3149 in the House; S.1660 in the Senate) would ensure that documented immigrant families and families in the U.S. under Temporary Protected Status (TPS) because of conflict or disaster in their country of origin have access to Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), and the various U.S. insurance “marketplaces.” Once enacted by Congress, such healthcare assistance would be more difficult to penalize or revoke. H.R.3149 is with two House committees: Energy and Commerce; and Ways and Means. S.1660 is with the Senate Finance Committee. S-HP

You can help ensure that documented immigrant families have access to health care. Information on contacting appropriate decision-makers is here.

5. Bill to pay farmworkers overtime is stalled

The National Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 instituted overtime pay for U.S. workers. However, this act was written to specifically exclude farm workers from overtime protections. Currently, no state provides overtime protections that acknowledge a 40 hour workweek for farmworkers, though California and Washington will begin doing so in 2022; even then, farmworkers will still lack protection against overtime beyond 40 hours a week in 48 states. The few states that do provide overtime protection assume a sixty-hour workweek, the Pew Trusts report. Working sixty hours a week and more impacts not only farm workers but their children, who are either home alone or are cared for by older children. The Pew Trusts note that growers say that paying overtime will bankrupt them; Maine state Rep. Thom Harnett described the situation this way, according to Pew: “There’s a great deal of empathy for that industry, and I share that,” he said. “I just don’t share putting it on the backs of the workers to be the ones who suffer the most. Because of these exceptions, we have farmworkers who have been stuck in poverty for generation after generation.”

The Fairness for Farmworkers Act, H.R.3194, would provide farm workers with overtime protections nationally, except for those on H-2A visas. Representative Raúl Grijalva (D-AZ) introduced this legislation on May 13, and it has been assigned to the House Education and Labor Committee. Unfortunately, that committee has not yet taken any action on H.R.3194. RLS/S-HP

If you think that the people who provide your food should receive overtime, you can urge swift, positive action on H.R.3194 by the House Education and Labor Committee and ask your Representative to support the Fairness for Farmworkers Act. Representative Bobby Scott (D-VA), Chair, House Education and Labor Committee, 2176 Rayburn House Office Building, Washington DC 20515, (202) 225-3725. @BobbyScott. Find your Representative here.

6. US is about to lose the opportunity to offer 100,000 green cards to legal residents

Green cards allow individuals to live and work in the U.S., but the requirements for getting them are stringent. The Citizenship and Immigration Services site which lists eligibility categories is instructive: it includes immediate family members of citizens, but also Afghan translators, people who have been trafficked, immigrant children who have been abused by their parents, diplomats who can’t go home–and others. 

The U.S. can issue 140,000 green cards each year, but in 2020 the Trump administration only issued 20,000 cards. The 120,000 unused green cards can be carried over and added to the next year’s maximum, but at the end of the extra year they are cancelled if they remain unused. As a result, this year the Biden administration had an opportunity to issue up to 260,000 green cards. However, as Cato Institue researcher David J. Bier pointed out in a Washington Post opinion piece, the administration has said it will fall short of that maximum. Because of slow processing, the U.S. will issue 100,000 fewer green cards than this year’s limit and carry-over would allow. On October 1, the carry-over will expire and those green cards will disappear.

The carry-over resulted from Trump administration policies, which barred most immigrants sponsored by family members from entering the U.S. and delayed the opening of the green card application period by six months, moving it back to October 2020 and creating a bottleneck that it left for the Biden administration to deal with. The U.S. does not have an online immigration application system, which means applications must be sent by U.S. mail, opened individually, and then have applicant data entered by hand into the system. After that part of the process is completed, the next step is fingerprinting. As Bier explains, for most individuals this fingerprinting is redundant because “nearly all employment-based applicants have lived and worked legally in the United States, many for a decade or more, with temporary residency status. This status they maintained by—you guessed it—repeatedly being fingerprinted and passing background checks.” This past year, the usual slowdown caused by the fingerprint requirement was exacerbated because Trump closed all government fingerprinting sites for months during the pandemic. S-HP

If you have looked at the eligibility requirements and think that the U.S. should not allow 100,000 green cards to expire, you can urge the President and the Secretary of Homeland Security to modify green card application processes, perhaps through en masse granting of green cards before investigations are completed, with the proviso that once investigations are completed green cards could be revoked in individual cases when appropriate: President Joe Biden, the White House, 1600 Pennsylvania NW,Washington DC 20500, (202) 456-1111. @POTUS. Alejandro Mayorkas, Secretary of Homeland Security, 3801 Nebraska Ave. NW, Washington DC 20016, (202) 282-8000. @SecMayorkas.

7. School lunches and food insecurity

As part of the response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. instituted a universal free school meal program, which the Biden administration extended through June 2022. Congress now has the opportunity to make this program permanent through the Universal School Meals Program Act (H.R.3155 in the House; S.1530 in the Senate). H.R.3155 is currently with three House Committees: Education and Labor; Science, Space, and Technology; and Agriculture; as well as the Agriculture Committee’s subcommittee on Nutrition, Oversight, and Department Operations. S.1530 is with the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry Committee. S-HP

If you think this program should be made permanent, urge these committees to act swiftly on this legislation, particularly in light of conditions for children living in the 13.9% of U.S. families that are food insecure.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS

8. Canada makes Emancipation Day official

The recognition of August 1 as Emancipation Day in Canada came just this year after years of activism. Slavery was banned in all former British colonies on August 1, 1834, though enslaved people acquired their freedom only gradually, according to the Government of Canada site. Though many parts of Canada have celebrated Emancipation Day for years, only in March of 2021 did Parliament make it official, according to the CBC. Pointing out that marking a day was only a beginning Al Jazeera quoted the Canadian Commission for UNESCO’s blog post this week: “For real progress to continue, we need more than just a tacit acknowledgement from Canadians and our government. Observing a shameful historical moment in our history is one thing. Doing something proactive to address its legacy is another.”

While US history focuses on the 30,000 enslaved people who fled the US to find freedom in Canada, simultaneously some 3,000 people from Africa were enslaved in Canada, along with 50,000 Indigenous people captured from the United States in the 1600s, according to the Canadian Encyclopedia; their average age was 14, 57% of them women and girls. RLS

SCIENCE, HEALTH, TECHNOLOGY & THE ENVIRONMENT

9. Plan on a booster–now

Laurie Garrett, the science writer who won a Pulitzer for chronicling the Ebola virus, says that we should all be getting a booster shot of the COVID-19 vaccine as soon as it is possible. As she puts it in an article for Foreign Policy, “Sure enough, the United States is again awash in virus, with the incidence of new COVID-19 cases having soared 131 percent in the third week of July.” The big danger, she says, is that unvaccinated people–a fifth of the American population–will contribute to ever-more-dangerous mutations of the virus. A few areas in Alberta, Canada, have low vaccination rates–under 40 per cent–as well, according to the CBC. Garrett acknowledges the inequity of people in privileged countries receiving a third dose when those elsewhere have not yet been able to get even one, but she says that the accelerating risks of variants mean that “in the absence of fully effective vaccination of better than 75 percent of adults, a society may act as a herd of walking petri dishes, cultivating immune-escape mutant forms of SARS-CoV-2—that is, mutants that evade existing vaccine.”

An internal CDC document obtained by the Washington Post supports Garrett’s alarm, describing “a variant so contagious that it acts almost like a different novel virus, leaping from target to target more swiftly than Ebola or the common cold.” The CDC is also unsettled by the as-yet-unpublished data which suggest that “vaccinated individuals infected with delta may be able to transmit the virus as easily as those who are unvaccinated.” We should be back in masks, the CDC says–if we ever took them off.

Meanwhile, medical workers–already worn down from working at the precipice of danger and exhaustion for a year and a half–are exasperated and furious. The AP reports on conditions in Missouri, for example, where less than half the population is vaccinated and ICUs are flooded by unvaccinated people. Many doctors and nurses are appalled at some of their own colleagues, whose refusal to get the vaccine has led to the death of patients, according to the New York Times. In Ontario, Canada, health care workers who assist severely disabled patients are not yet required to be vaccinated, although measures to require the vaccine are being considered, according to the Toronto Star. Seven health care organizations released a consensus statement that health care workers must be vaccinated, according to Ars Technica, which quotes a number of medical experts as saying that vaccination for those in the medical field is an ethical issue, given the vulnerability of children and immunocompromised patients.

Lissa Rankin, a doctor and a blogger, expresses her outrage that people who are able to get the vaccine and refuse it based on misinformation are contributing to the continuing distortion of our world, in which children will again have to stay home from school, borders may close, and the collective events we have all missed become unviable again.  “I’ve about had it with my fellow country mates,” she writes, “who refuse to cooperate with solving problems that require global cooperation- not just Covid, but climate crisis, overconsumption and out of control capitalism, world hunger and lack of access to clean water, poverty, environmental issues, and equal rights for people of all races, genders, sexual orientation, disabilities, and any other way in which people get marginalized and oppressed, among other things.” RLS

RESOURCES

The American Medical Association (AMA) has a useful FAQ about COVID-19 and the vaccines.

Mom’s Rising  has a summer postcarding campaign that may interest you, along with a five simple, clear actions you can take each week.

Data on refugees in the US: Pew Research Center. Refugee statistics worldwide: UNHCR.

No More Deaths/No Más Muertes‘ three-part report, Left to Die, details how asylum-seekers in the desert are abandoned by the Border Patrol. Though 911 calls are routed to them, they did not respond in 63% of cases. Lee Sandusky’s piece of literary journalism, “Scenes from an Emergency Clinic in the Sonoran Desert,” eloquently describes the work No More Deaths/No Más Muertes does.

The National Lawyers Guild has a series of webinars on issues from the global repression of voting, the local suppression of voting and the detention of immigrants.

A trans hotline with both Canadian and US numbers–and with operators who speak Spanish–provides services by and for trans people. You don’t need to be in crisis to call, and if you are a friend or a family member of a trans person, you can also call to find out how to support them. If you would like to know more about the organization, see their staff bios here.

The Americans of Conscience checklist has new actions every other week that will enable you to make your voice heard quickly and clearly. In addition, they have a good news section that will help you keep going.

Among the organizations that supports kids and their families at the border is RAICES, which provides legal support. The need for their services has never been greater. You can support them here.

Al Otro Lado provides legal and humanitarian services to people in both the US and Tijuana. You can find out more about their work here.

The Minority Humanitarian Foundation supports asylum-seekers who have been released by ICE with no means of transportation or ways to contact sponsors. You can donate frequent-flyer miles to make their efforts possible.

The group Angry Tias and Abuelas provides legal advice and services to asylum-seekers at the border. You can follow their work on Facebook and see the list of volunteer opportunities they have posted.