House Plan to Pass Anti-Children, Anti-Family, and Anti-Asylum H.R. 9773 Is Abdication of Congress’ Commitment to Freedom
Over 100 national, state, and local groups call on Congress to uniformly reject HR 9773
After writing a historic blank check to ICE and Border Patrol to further assault our communities, the Trump administration’s allies in Congress are eyeing their next target: children and people fleeing for their lives. The House Judiciary Committee is moving to mark up a new version of H.R.2, a bill anti-immigrant members of Congress first introduced in 2023 to spread fear of a “mass invasion” by immigrants, pit American citizens against their immigrant neighbors, and scapegoat them for the nation’s problems. If passed, this bill would codify the most extreme anti-asylum and anti-children policies in modern American history.
While wrongly touted as a “border security” bill, HR 9773 would have disastrous consequences for people who live here. The bill creates arbitrary penalties to criminalize longtime community members who will suddenly face deportation, when combined with the recent policy aimed at severely restricting the ability for people to gain permanent status in the United States. This will lead to families being separated, chaos in our work force, and an expansion of immigration detention and deportation for longtime residents, including those pushed out of status due to U.S. bureaucratic delays.
The bill would also turbocharge the administration’s cruelty to kids and people fleeing violence abroad by eviscerating landmark protections passed under the bipartisan Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act and decimating the Flores Settlement. This cruelty knows no end. Already, approximately 205,000 children have been separated from their parents due to mass detention and deportation in the past 18 months – leading to hundreds of children being redetained, placed into foster care, and facing life-threatening risks or death after their parents’ rushed deportations. This administration has created new rules to coerce unaccompanied children, including trafficking survivors, to abandon their claims and “self-deport”, and put kids in mass deportation tribunals without legal counsel. It is holding children and families in prolonged detention with insufficient medical care in violation of the Flores Settlement, creating life-long trauma for numerous children, including many who are Indigenous.
This bill tramples on asylum protections passed by Congress over 45 years ago, just as the world prepares to celebrate the 75th anniversary of most nations committing to protect the right to refuge. While our immigration system needs to be modernized to respond to modern migration challenges, this bill does nothing to accomplish that. Instead, it decimates asylum – a life-saving protection for people who are survivors of torture and gender-based violence, outspoken opponents of brutal dictatorships, LGBTQ+ individuals, religious advocates persecuted for their faith, Indigenous Peoples and individuals facing racial violence, among other at-risk groups. Already, this administration has shut down asylum processing across the Southern border and deported hundreds to torture prisons. Tens of thousands of people, including some who have judicial orders of protection based on refugee claims, have been sent to third countries to which they have no connection and where they face arbitrary detention, torture, and even onward refoulement to their country of persecution. This bill would compound these harms and expel asylum seekers from local economies – spiraling the already devastating job loss ushered in by this administration’s mass deportation policies.
This is not a border security bill; it is a bill to codify and accelerate attacks on lawful immigration, longtime residents, vulnerable children, and people seeking refuge. It will subject potentially millions of our neighbors and hard-working families to ICE’s inhumane, deadly, and lawless prisons.
Every member of Congress should rise in opposition of H.R. 9773 and recommit the United States to protect the rights of our immigrant neighbors, children, and people seeking refuge.
Signed:
Acacia Center for Justice
AFT
Alianza Americas
American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)
Americans for Immigrant Justice
American Friends Service Committee (AFSC)
Asian Americans Advancing Justice | AAJC
Ayuda
Bend the Arc: Jewish Action
Border Kindness
California Immigrant Youth Justice Alliance
California Pan-Ethnic Health Network
CASA
Center for Gender & Refugee Studies
Center for Human Rights and Constitutional Law
Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP)
Center for Victims of Torture
Center American Resource Center- CARECEN of Northern California
The Children’s Partnership
Church World Service
Climate Refugees
Coalition on Human Needs
Community Change
Communities United for Status & Protection (CUSP)
Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund
The Door- A Center of Alternatives, Inc.
East Bay Sanctuary Covenant
Equality California
Estrella del Paso
First Focus Campaign for Children
Freedom Network USA
Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project
Florida Immigrant Coalition
Galveston-Houston Immigrant Representation Project (GHIRP)
Haitian Bridge Alliance
Her Justice
HIAS
Human Rights First
The Human Trafficking Legal Center
Humanitarian Outreach for Migrant Emotional Health (H.O.M.E.)
Immigrant Children Advocates’ Relief Effort (ICARE)
Immigrant Defenders Law Center (ImmDef)
Immigrant Legal Resource Center (ILRC)
Immigration Equality
Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti
International Mayan League
International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP)
Jesuit Refugee Service USA
Jewish Community Action
Jewish Family Service of San Diego
Jobs with Justice
Justice in Motion
Justice + Joy National Collaborative
Just Solutions
Just Detention International
Kino Border Initiative
La Union del Pueblo Entero (LUPE)
Latin America Working Group (LAWG)
Legal Aid Society of San Mateo County
Legal Momentum, the Women’s Legal Defense & Education Fund
League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC)
Legal Key Partnership for Health and Justice
Local Progress
Loyola Law School, Sunita Jain Anti-Trafficking Initiative
Massachusetts Law Reform Institute
Mauritanian Network for Human Rights
Michigan Immigrant Rights Center
MPower Change Action Fund
National Association of Social Workers
National Association for Youth Law
National Center for Youth Law
National Council of Jewish Women
National Education Association
National Immigrant Justice Center
National Immigration Law Center
National Immigration Project
National Low Income Housing Coalition
National Partnership for New Americans
Network of Jewish Human Service Agencies
Oasis Legal Services
OneAmerica
Reconstructing Judaism
Refugee Advocacy Lab
Refugee Council USA
Refugees International
Rainbow Railroad
Robert & Ethel Kennedy Human Rights Center
Rocky Mountain Immigrant Advocacy Network
Services, Immigrant Rights and Education Network (SIREN)
Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund (SALDEF)
Silver State Equality
Sisters of Mercy of the Americas – Justice Team
Survivor Justice Center
Tahirih Justice Center
Together & Free
T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights
UnidosUS
United Church of Christ
United We Dream Network
Unitarian Universalist Service Committee
Voto Latino
Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA)
Welcome With Dignity Campaign
Witness at the Border
Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights