Adrian Ventura is fundraising
Emergency Funds for Families Affected by ICE Enforcement
On April 14, ICE agents ambushed CCT member Juan Francisco Méndez and his wife Marilú in their car en route to a medical appointment. The couple asked the agents to wait until their attorney arrived, but one of the operatives used a sledgehammer to smash the car window, and the couple was removed by force. ICE had no warrant, and although Méndez has no criminal record and is working with his attorney on an asylum claim, ICE sent him to a detention facility and began deportation proceedings.
We started this GoFundMe campaign in March, after agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) stormed a car wash in New Bedford on March 11 and arrested three Guatemalan workers.
Since then, there have been several additional ICE raids in our community, and well over a dozen community members are now in immigration detention, leaving behind over 40 dependents, including spouses and minor children.
We know that the government has its eye on communities like ours, with large numbers of vulnerable immigrants, and we fear that these are just the opening salvos, and ICE may return and detain more members of our community.
We are raising money to create a rapid response fund so we can support these detainees and their families by securing legal assistance, and providing material support when breadwinners are detained. Please give as generously as you can and help us out by sharing with your contacts.
Your donations will help these families:
- pay rent and utility bills
- purchase food
- secure bond for the detainees
- find legal counsel
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169 supporters
Around midnight on April 19, fire raged through the apartment building at 1283 Acushnet Avenue in the North End of New Bedford, destroying the homes and belongings of over 20 Central American immigrant workers and their families. Two men, Tomás Gómez and Juan Macario, perished in the blaze. Centro Comunitario de Trabajadores (Community Workers' Center) advocates for the rights of immigrant and low-wage workers, and we are raising money to help these workers who lost everything but the clothes on their backs. We are also raising funds to repatriate the remains of Tomás and Juan. Burial in one's hometown cemetery is an important part of our Mayan cultural traditions. It will costs approximately $10,000 to repatriate the two victims' remains. Please help us support our brothers and sisters!
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