PHOTO CREDIT: Evan Casey
Close the Camps Rally
According to the advocacy group MoveOn, over 180 “Close the Camps” events occurred across the nation Tuesday.
Hundreds of protesters took to the streets Tuesday as part of Milwaukee’s “Close The Camps” National Day of Action. Protesters mainly called for the closing of detention facilities used to hold migrant children and families near the southern border.
According to the advocacy group MoveOn, over 180 “Close the Camps” events occurred across the nation Tuesday. Beyond closing the camps, demonstrators also called for withholding funds for “family detention and deportation,” as well as “Bear Witness and Reunite Families,” according to a press release.
Demonstrators in Milwaukee organized outside of the U.S. Federal Building, shutting off a part of Wisconsin Ave. for an hour. Over ten local and state leaders attended the event and spoke in opposition to what is occurring at the border.
This comes after a DHS Office of Inspector General report released Tuesday found an uptick in border patrol apprehensions, as well as serious accusations of overcrowding. The report said DHS officials “observed serious overcrowding and prolonged detention in Border Patrol facilities requiring immediate attention.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Evan Casey
Close the Camps 3
Around 200 people took part in the rally Tuesday.
“We do need to hold our elected officials accountable and make sure they are going to do what they said they were going to do,” said State Representative Marisabel Cabrera. “They said they would stand up for immigrants ... now is the time.”
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Cabrera said she is working on state legislation that would make Wisconsin a sanctuary state.
“Listen, they are concentration camps,” said Tony Baez, director of District 6 of the Milwaukee Board of School Directors. “I’m an educator and I want to make sure that educators in Milwaukee, from all ranks, support the idea that it is wrong in this country, today, to have separation of families and children. To do the inhumane kind of things that they are doing at the border is wrong.”
Darryl Morin, the past national vice president of LULAC Wisconsin, echoed those concerns.
“We keep hearing on TV about ‘those children’ who can go back home,” he said. “Someone needs to remind these people that we all came from the same place, we are all each other's brothers and sisters and they are our children.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Evan Casey
Close the Camps 3
The rally lasted nearly an hour, shutting off a portion of Wisconsin Ave.
