At present, there are around 32,000 immigrants in US immigration detention and most of them are separated from their families and their children. In order to help such individuals, Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement, has organized National Visitation Month of Action and various communities across the country have decided to join CIVIC and support the cause.
Immigrants are placed in detention and they will remain in immigration detention until the immigration officers ascertain their immigration status. Most of the individuals who are detained, include Green Card holders, asylum seekers, victims of crimes, human trafficking and domestic violence and some of them are family members of US citizens. While people gather with relatives and friends, during this holiday season, such immigrant families are detained and are unable to meet or talk to their family members.
CIVIC, is now fighting for the rights of the detained immigrants and wants to connect the immigrants with their family members and with the community and so it has organized visitation programs and has declared December as the month of visitation. This program will offer medical and legal support to the immigrants who are detained and will make sure that the detained immigrants are connected with the external world.
The Month of Action, aims at ending the alienation of the immigrants who are detained and CIVIC is likely to start 18 such programs in the next two years. CIVIC will address the effects of the immigration detention system on the immigrants who are placed in detention. During this month, CIVIC volunteers will support the immigrants who were placed in detention for a year and more. Ana, who is a victim of human trafficking, is one such immigrant who was detained for more than a year. CIVIC supported Ana by visiting her and offering legal help and now she is reunited with her little daughter.