Stronger Together: Expanding Oregon’s Accompaniment Network
On September 24th, as part of our commitment to building power across diverse migrant communities, IMIrJ partnered with APANO to conduct a training on how organizations can build their own accompaniment program infrastructure. Community members in attendance were from the Asian Health & Service Center, Cambodian Community Organization, Hmong American Community Organization, Chinese American Organization, & various other leaders from the community.
During our day at APANO we were able to prepare these various organizations to better understand the legal demands being put on migrant communities, how to support individuals summoned to ICE check-ins, how to report on ICE activity, how to create family preparedness for possible detentions, & how to call for community support if ever somebody is detained.
This day of building with APANO is another step in IMIrJ’s work to build a powerful movement of accompaniment across our region. As fascist attacks on migrant community members continue to escalate, the need for building community power becomes ever more imperative.
We continue collaborating with partners across Oregon to develop networks of accompaniment & deportation defense. Nobody should face fascism’s deportation machinery alone. Please reach out to our accompaniment team if your community organization is interested in developing its own systems of accompaniment. We call on all our partners to join the Deportation Defense Coalition to continue building systems that protect all of us!
Connect with us at accompaniment@imirj.org
Contact the DDC at bit.ly/ddcinterest