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Call to Action: Ask Your Senators to Provide Funding to Keep Our Elections Safe and Accessible
The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted many facets of normal life and will likely have a disruptive effect on the upcoming November election. Voting, the very foundation of our democracy, requires a safe and secure environment in order to protect the vote, the voter, and the workers who administer the elections. These protections cost money. The pandemic has left states and municipalities fiscally compromised, and yet the onus of election security will still fall on states and local jurisdictions. We must call on Congress, specifically the Senate, to approve the $3.6 billion in funding necessary for states to protect the vote. To do: Contact your senators to let them know you…
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Call to Action: Speak Up for Transparency in COVID-19 Data
The Trump administration has ordered hospitals to bypass the publicly funded Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), requiring that, effective immediately, all COVID-19 patient information be sent to a privately operated central database in Washington. Although advocates such as CDC Director Robert Redfield argue the new process will streamline data, this change does not conform to any standard patterns of data collection and puts this data in private hands. An unprecedented and poorly managed shift in critical data processing adds burdens to overstretched medical establishments, could compromise or lose essential data, and increases the level of chaos in our national response to a rising health crisis. To combat the…
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Nonsensical: Withdrawing from WHO in the Middle of COVID-19
The World Health Organization (WHO), the leading global health agency, declared COVID-19 a pandemic in March 2020, and within weeks the world had seen more than half a million people infected and nearly 30,000 dead. Infections in the U.S. continue to rise. Yet President Trump has formally notified the United Nations that the U.S. will withdraw from the WHO, bringing its U.S. funding to a halt. The U.S. is, by far, the largest contributor to the WHO’s budget. Trump had initially demanded some changes after accusing the WHO of being both China-centric and slow in its coronavirus response — somewhat validly. However, he didn’t get the response he wanted, so…
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Who’s WHO — and Why You Should Care
As we near 3.5 million cases of the coronavirus and surpass 135,000 deaths, President Donald J. Trump has formally withdrawn the United States from the World Health Organization (WHO). The withdrawal comes on the heels of the president freezing funding to the WHO in April 2020. The U.S. contributes upwards of $400 million annually to the WHO and is the group’s largest contributor (though even before the freeze the U.S. was close to $200 million in arrears to the organization). The claims Trump has made to justify the withdrawal — including that the WHO failed to share information in a timely and transparent manner, gave faulty information, and is too…
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Call to Action: Oppose ICE Changes to Student and Exchange Visitor Program
July 14 Update: Federal immigration officials rescinded the new guidelines for the Student Exchange Visitor Program, reverting back to guidance from March 2020 that allows exceptions to in-person class requirements due to the pandemic. On July 6, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced they will be modifying the Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP), which allows international students to study in the United States on F-1 and M-1 visas. As a result of the changes, students who have these visas will be required to leave the U.S. if their college or university is not offering in-person classes. In-person classwork has always been a requirement for these visas, but in…
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Executive Order on Immigration Does Not Make Our Country Safer
President Trump announced his intentions of “prohibiting immigration into our Country” and just last week signed an executive order halting the issuance of green cards, a legal avenue to citizenship. This order covers a very narrow area of immigration law, implies migrants are worsening the effects of the pandemic, and does nothing to make our country more secure. The executive order largely targets individuals who have been seeking entry to the U.S. legally for years or, for some, decades. The Associated Press observed, “the proclamation Trump signed Wednesday will most affect the parents, adult children and siblings of citizens and permanent residents hoping to one day join them in the country.” According to the wording…
