Immigration – An LGBTQ issue

By Connie Utada, Policy Counsel, Immigration Equality

Join us at Creating Change!

Binational LGBT couples being torn apart by discriminatory immigration laws. Young LGBT immigrants who need the DREAM Act. Transgender immigrants mistreated by ICE. LGBTQ people facing persecution around the world seeking asylum to the US yet facing arbitrary barriers. What do we have in common? We all need comprehensive immigration reform to change a broken, cruel system. And we need to advocate for an end to discriminatory immigration enforcement which tears LGBT Americans from our partners and spouses, and leads to racial profiling.

Going to Creating Change? Attend the Immigration Equality workshop on how to end immigration discrimination!

Although the Immigration debate largely happens at a national level, the fight for reform begins locally … and through coalitions. LGBT and Immigration movements can work together to win passage in Congress of comprehensive immigration reform that includes the Uniting American Families Act (UAFA), which would allow LGBT Americans and immigrants to sponsor their partners, spouses, and children for immigration.

Please join us at our session: “Building Together: LGBTQ and Immigrant Communities Moving Together for Immigration Reform” at 4:45 pm on Saturday, January 28. We will discuss local coalition building to achieve reform nationally and to fight discriminatory immigration enforcement. You will hear from Senator Menendez’ Chief Counsel on LGBT-inclusive immigration legislation; Senator Menendez was the first member of Congress to include UAFA in comprehensive immigration reform legislation. Equality Illinois and Association of Latino Men for Action (ALMA) will present on Chicago’s groundbreaking LGBTQ Immigrant Rights Project – which changed Congressional minds about LGBTQ inclusion in immigration reform.

Hear how to work on a local level for national reform in immigration. We will provide tools to help you organize locally to use your time and talents in the most effective way possible. You will hear insight and the perspective directly from Capitol Hill with Kerri Sherlock Talbot, Senator Menendez’s Chief Counsel. However, the most important work starts with you so, join us on January 28th. We are thrilled to work with you in Baltimore to continue to create change!

See the Creating Change website to find additional immigration-related workshops.

P.S. Are you lobbying with Creating Change on January 26 and an advocate for UAFA? Let us know; email cutada@immigrationequality.org