The RDU Airport Protests and a Path of Conviction

“Muslims Welcome”

“No ban. No wall. America is for us all.”

“Jews against the Muslim ban”

“HOPE”

“The First Americans were seeking religious freedom”

Fluorescent, pen and ink signs of America’s civic religion bobbed and swayed atop the wave of peaceful protesters in front of RDU’s Terminal 2, providing a closed captions summary of why two thousand North Carolinians had so suddenly, and remarkably gathered at the state’s largest international airport.

One woman, a college student at NC State, had recently received her citizenship at the end of a journey that saw her come to the U.S. as a refugee. She said she came because she knew what it was like for a child not to know if she’d ever find a home again. She was led here by her heart, while the rest of her body followed. And what she hoped for was a saner, fairer policy for an earlier version of herself.

There was a man in his thirties, born and raised in North Carolina, who said he rolled out of bed this morning with a sense of purpose to be a physical representation of the victory of the ACLU in the Eastern District of New York the night before, when Judge Ann Donnelly did her best to halt the chaotic scenes playing out in detention centers across America’s international airports.

A veteran North Carolina lawyer and former board member of the ACLU herself held aloft a sign with thick lettering, a passage from a statute marked by hand-written section signs (§), the key passages of the statute underlined. It was the Establishment Clause she said, and she was here because President Trump’s executive order, a naked ban against Muslims, violated the separation of church and state that it had enshrined in the Constitution — the neon yellow underlines pointed out how for the banner scanners amidst the crowd.

Dozens of family units arrived, children perched on shoulders, with one little girl around four years of age, her short bob rustled by the wind as she was held in the air by her father, holding a hastily printed ink-jet photograph of a similar-looking girl with a pony tail, and a message scribbled underneath “This little girl is three years old. She is my cousin. She was denied entry to the U.S.”

Each person, and family, and couple holding hands, every group of friends and colleagues huddled in crescents facing the direction of an active chant, was a mini-portrait of North Carolina’s humanity, and for me, a refugee from the former-Yugoslavia, it was a reaffirmation that the state which had given me so much still possessed the spirit that saved hundreds, if not thousands of former-Yugoslavs, and allowed them to become, through hard work, and tens of thousands small civic contributions to the fabric of North Carolina, proud U.S citizens.

There is also another version of me, the newly minted immigration lawyer version, which sees the protests through a different lens, one that shows with clarity that each and every person in the gathered crowd has the ability to continue being civically and intimately engaged with the immigration and Constitutional issues that the executive order brought by President Trump has laid bare. This sort of engagement doesn’t require a law degree or access to high-powered political officers; it is instead an engagement born of the power of thousands mortal North Carolinians, in touch with their most hallowed sense of what they known society must be, acting every day.

This power grows when just one Carolinian gets a tickling notion that her friends or family, or the friends of friends and family, are impacted by the unjust immigration ban and other order, laws, and regulations like it to come, and reaches out to help.

This power grows when just one Carolinian is inspired by the actions of national organizations that have a track record of carrying out impactful litigation for immigrant rights, and he donates to them: ACLU Nationwide (can donate directly to the Immigrants’ Rights Project), Northwest Immigrant Rights Project, American Immigration Council, National Immigration Project of the National Lawyers Guild, are some of the best known national organizations, and stalwart local organizations like the North Carolina Justice Center, ACLU North Carolina, and CWS-Durham are excellent choices for donations locally.

This power grows when just one Carolinian wishes to help immigrants directly, and so she goes out to find the proper training — many local lawyers, BIA representatives, and non-profits offer it.

This power grows when just one Carolinian sees injustice in how a particular immigration provision is being enforced in his community, and so he drives down to the police stations and local ICE offices to demand justice.

This power grows when just one Carolinian sees that her place of worship stands for everything that she cherishes in the world, and who then works to reorient the priorities of her faith organization to make the world into what her prayers wish it would be.

To tap into this power, and to be empowered in turn, only requires that any Carolinian who wishes to act embraces the conviction that North Carolina is still the land willing to take on the tired, and the poor, and the huddled masses, and to bathe them in the golden light of freedom, even when the actions of the surrounding world suggest otherwise.

This is because America’s great immigration system is an engine which runs on the fuel that We the People feed it. When We the People embrace our convictions, the power of the President’s pen can be whittled down to a nub no more and no less powerful than the pens, crayons and markers that created the signs floating atop the masses of citizens getting off of their couches and into the streets and airport terminals to protest. “All people are welcome, Welcome home to all” — so did dozens of signs read on Sunday afternoon, and so can the signs that guide our actions continue to flutter in the days and years to come with every attempt we make to translate words into action.

Edit: Local North Carolina Immigrant Organizations You Should Consider Donating Too (and Why):

1. ) CWS-Durham: This secular organization is primarily a resettlement office, and all of their advocacy work on community organizing, anti-Islamophobia work, and immigrant and refugee legal support, stems from this function. Because of the 120 day refugee ban, they have lost program funding to the tune of $100,000 over night. For them, this means immediate cuts in personnel, and their first casualty is their advocacy lead. This is a critical position given the need for strong lobbying, advocacy, and community organizing in today’s political climate. If the ban is extended, then their loss of funding will continue to pile up. The contact here is Ellen Andrews, (919) 680 4310 or eandrews@cwsglobal.org. Their office sits right above Wylan Capital and Parker and Ottis in downtown Durham. They accept targeted donations/allocated deposits
2. North Carolina Justice Center — Important legal organization for immigrants. Before the executive order they had already decided to provide a comprehensive legal clinic for immigrants in North Carolina. They are currently working overtime to move the project along ahead of schedule. Also on their priority list is to develop a program focusing on bullying in schools for immigrant children because that has become a big problem locally in North Carolina. The organization employs full time attorneys who provide direct services with Latino populations and Muslim immigrants. It is ossible to make a targeted donation/allocated deposit or gift. 100% allocated that way. The contact here is Kim-Marie McLellan — kim_marie@ncjustice.org , 919–856–3185
3. Worldrelief Durham — Similar to CWS-Durham, they are mainly a resettlement agency, but faith-based. I don’t have experience working with them, but they are respected locally.