What coordinated resistance looks like
When menacing, armed, masked and unidentifiable brutal bullies abduct people off the streets, or where they live, or work, or go for medical care, or at required court appointments, it is unlawful, overzealous and morally repellent. And, as we all know, it is happening everywhere in the country in violation of due process, whether or not a targeted person has citizenship or not. Everyone, repeat – everyone – has the Constitutional right to habeas corpus and a hearing in a court of law, whether or not born here or seeking amnesty, regardless of gender, age, religion or political affiliation. Full stop.
These criminal kidnappings and “arrests” have got to stop. Right now. And it requires action – planned, coordinated and unified action by ordinary people taking to the streets and acting in accord with the precepts of non-violence and not breaking any written laws in so doing. When flagrant executive abuse has been turned loose and human rights have been hijacked, then it is up to us, we the people, armed with our cameras, our phones and our notebooks to turn the spotlight on a lawless authoritarian federal government through our court system.
In a recent email exchange with City of Sonoma Mayor Patricia Farrar-Rivas I was told the following: “We have a Safe City resolution passed in 2017. Becoming a sanctuary city now would attract attention to the City of Sonoma and Sonoma Valley. I do not believe this is in the best interest for the safety of our residents. I am focused on how we can provide the best protections for our residents. Supporting know your rights efforts and legal aid support.”
What Mayor Farrar-Rivas overlooks is that there are 48 counties and 63 cities in California that hold a sanctuary status, and which firmly believe in its use as a viable tool for the protection of residents’ civil rights and additional safety measures under U.S. Constitutional laws. Passing a resolution establishing sanctuary status for Sonoma is an important initial step by local government in supporting its most vulnerable population.
In so doing it would align the city of Sonoma with Santa Rosa, Healdsburg, and Petaluma with sanctuary status and would signal a growing movement for the formation of an independent, civilian-powered investigative coalition supported by local government.
It is essential that public demonstrations must be alerted and organized following ICE and Homeland Security agents operating extrajudicially, without warrants and using physical coercion as has been perpetrated throughout the country. Nothing is to stop eye-witnesses from filming, capturing audio and interviewing participants, be they agents or bystanders, keeping in mind that these watchdog organizations are preserving the truth about such “arrests” and preparing evidence for possible future prosecution.
Under the aegis of a sanctuary declared city, Sonoma can initiate and channel funding for rapid-response teams and legal defense coalitions working in tandem, and in the process building sanctuary networks countywide established for these purposes.
A prime example for this kind of activist response to ICE raids and other such attacks against our communities is now established and provided by the North Bay Organizing Project. As written, the Project’s mission is to, “mobilize an emergency response network, serve as witnesses to immigration enforcement actions, uphold the rights of immigrants, and provide services to affected North Bay residents”.
To find out more about the North Bay Rapid Response Network and how you can become a part of its important work using legal observation teams, along with accompaniment teams trained in knowing the rights for immigrants and immigrant legal defense, go to: https://www.northbayop.org.
We have to begin seeing that we hold power as well as the executive and its administrative lackies. We can use the courts to support and litigate for state civil rights. We may not be able to curtail the use of national guards or federal troops, but we cannot be interfered with by these agencies if we maintain non-violent actions and break no state laws.
And there is nothing to prevent our educating the public about civil rights and resistance tactics as long as they’re lawful. We have got to get in their faces, figuratively speaking, and shine a harsh light on this attack against our immigrant population, all 12 million of them. We cannot let this country become a Nazi regime, abducting people and deporting them to foreign prisons, destroying families and the existing working economy to boot, all to satisfy the demented minds of those behind rampant authoritarianism.
In the words of Aaron Burr to James Monroe in the time of the Revolution, “All we need do is let the people know in what contempt their masters hold them, then they (the people) will do the rest.”
It is not too late, in fact its time has come.
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