Take Action
Demand Congress Conduct Unannounced Inspections
People inside the Burlington ICE facility have faced prolonged detention in overcrowded conditions without beds, adequate medical care, sanitation, reliable legal access, or basic dignity. Members of Congress have tried to inspect ICE sites, but DHS and ICE have repeatedly obstructed meaningful oversight through restrictive rules and procedural delays. By law, ICE must allow for unannounced inspections. Without consistent, independent inspections, the public cannot verify what is happening inside and families are left without transparency or accountability. In response, a new group has just been formed named the Congressional ICE Accountability Coalition to push for sustained, coordinated, unannounced oversight visits and public reporting of findings.
The Immigration Justice Action Team (IJAT) is an Indivisible Mass Coalition action group coordinating a statewide effort to pressure U.S. legislators to conduct these unannounced visits. See Congressional Oversight of Burlington Campaign Toolkit to learn how you can get inovlved. IJAT put togeter a Burlington ICE Facility Fact Sheet with key data points and information about the facility.
Get Citizens to Stop Investing in Prison Companies
Many people bank with institutions that invest in or support private prison and detention infrastructure without realizing it.
The De-ICE Citizens Bank group is a public-pressure and education effort that helps people understand these financial links and take action to break them. Click link above to learn more about Citizens Bank and actions you can take. The linked action guide focuses on contacting legislators who use Citizens Bank for campaign finances and urging them to pressure Citizens to cut ties with private prison contractors.
Pressure Congress to Divest from Citizens
Postcards
Securing lasting institutional accountability depends on protecting voting rights and boosting voter turnout. Get involved with these organizations to help voters navigate ID requirements or participate in data-driven, trackable postcard outreach campaigns that let you verify community impact and voter turnout results.
Blue Wave Postcards is a grassroots organization dedicated to increasing voter turnout through personalized, handwritten outreach. Unlike many other postcard initiatives, volunteers purchase their own card kits at a low cost of $0.14 per card. However, physical writing time is significantly minimized because the vast majority of the campaign message is pre-printed on the cards, and the kits include convenient, self-stick pre-printed voter address labels to peel and apply.
VoteRiders is a non-partisan organization focused entirely on voter ID education and assistance. They provide voters with the information and direct legal or financial support needed to obtain required identification and confidently cast their ballots, tracking measurable increases in voter eligibility.
Activate America organizes volunteers to write handwritten postcards to voters in crucial districts. They utilize rigorously tested scripts and follow up with post-election data analysis to verify turnout results and measure the mathematical efficacy of their postcard campaigns.
The Progressive Turnout Project coordinates a massive Postcards to Swing States initiative to rally voters. Their program relies on evidence-based voter models, providing volunteers with clear data and localized metrics to evaluate total outreach results after election cycles close.
The Center for Common Ground runs the Reclaim Our Vote postcard campaign, focusing heavily on fighting voter suppression in underrepresented communities. They incorporate barcode tracking systems on select printed materials to verify delivery results and evaluate localized turnout spikes.
Postcards to Voters consists of volunteers who write friendly, handwritten reminders to targeted voters in close, crucial democratic races. Volunteers manage addresses via an interactive system that updates in real time, allowing organizers to instantly verify campaign coverage and complete target lists.