When Red-Faced America Paid Reparations to Detainees

From George Takei's graphic memoir They Called Us Enemy.

Given the disgraceful circumstances of our concentration camps for immigrants, asylum seekers, and whatever brown skinned legal residents and citizens get swept up, perhaps it is good to remember this tidbit of American History.  Will our heirs and progeny be as mortified by us and how will they have to atone for our crimes?

On August 10, 1988, more than 45 years after the start of internment, the United States government authorized reparations payments to Japanese-Americans detained during World War II.

President Ronald Reagan signing the bill apologizing for World War II internment of Japanese-Americans and authorizing largely symbolic reparations.  Regan was less interested in justice for the formerly interred than in sullying the reputation of Democratic Party hero Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Ten weeks after the December 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, ordering 120,000 people of Japanese descent—including 75,000 American citizens—into internment camps. The announced purpose was to protect the West Coast from sabotage and collusion with the enemy, but the perceived threat was based more in racial prejudice than military strategy, as the great majority German-American and Italian-American residents were allowed to remain in their homes undisturbed.  And despite the large pre-war German-American Bund with its openly pro-Nazi rallies and proven networks of spies and saboteurs.  

For the length of the war, Americans of Japanese descent and Japanese nationals—many of denied American citizenship based on racially discriminatory quotas—were imprisoned in makeshift internment camps throughout the West Coast and as far east as Arkansas. Interned people were forced to abandon their homes, farms, and businesses, or sell them at rock bottom prices, losing economic stability and generational wealth. The 1944 U.S. Supreme Court decision Korematsu v. U.S., upheld Roosevelt’s executive order.

A member of the Nesei 442nd Regiment on guard in France in 1945.  Under Trump many immigrant volunteers in the U.S. Armed Forces who had tacitly been promised a path to citizenship were targeted for deportation.

Despite the trauma the great majority of the detainees remained loyal to America and thousands of their young men volunteered for service in the Armed forces.  That included members of the 442nd Infantry Regiment made up of Nisei—second generation American citizens—that became the most decorated unit of it size during the war for its hard-fighting service in Italy and France

After the war, Japanese-Americans returned home to distrust and resentment. Wartime internment traumatized an entire generation of people and continues to impact their descendants.

After the war the detainees were often unwanted back in their home communities.

Inspired by the Civil Rights Movement, survivors of internment organized to demand that the United States government address this history.

In 1980, Congress established a commission to investigate the internment camps and their legacy. The report decried Japanese internment as a “grave injustice” and acknowledged that the internment was fueled by “racial prejudice, wartime hysteria, and a failure of political leadership.”

The decade-long efforts of Japanese American civil rights advocates were realized when President Ronald Reagan signed the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, which provided an apology and compensation of $20,000 to living survivors of Japanese internment. An estimated 50,000 people interned during the war died before the reparation act’s passage.

Although Japanese Americans were gratified by the acknowledgement of the grave injustice done to them and for the formal apology, the cash settlements were a drop in the bucket compared to actual losses. 

A one day evacuation sale at a Japanese-American owned business.  Many did not have the time or opportunity to even attempt to get some value for their abandoned property.

Hard working and industrious Japanese had some of the finest farms on the West Coast, prosperous businesses in towns and cities as well as high-rates of home ownership.  All of that caused resentment and envy by their neighbors, many of whom swooped in to claim their property legally or by winked-at outright theft.  A mere $20,000 came nowhere near making up those losses, especially considering inflation.  And by denying recompense to the tens of thousands who had already died, their heirs were effectively cheated as well.

In the decades after the apology and reparations, a public consensus grew that the internment was one of the blackest episodes in American history.  But under the Trump maladministration and its xenophobic immigration policies with new camps were built—and proposals made to actually use former Japanese internment camps—sprang up like mushrooms.  A slew of apologists, right-wing ideologues, and outright White nationalists—not only defended the camps but exult in them.  And they assailed the birthright citizenship of the Nisei generations.  Like Japanese millions of Latinx Americans are still derided as alien stains on White America.

A Trump re-election rally in Iowa where more than half of his supports agreed that World War II internment was justified and wanted the same treatment for Muslim-Americans.  They also supported the border concentration camps by even larger margins.

Trump shared that view and occasionally threatened to try to end birthright citizenship by fiat—executive order.  Many of his Make America Great Again devotees cheer it on.  An unthinkable cancer is still spreading.

All because we are already forgetting the lessons of Manzanar.

Two Years Ago Lights for Liberty Shined in Woodstock

The crowd listens to speakers at the Woodstock Lights for Liberty rally.  The McHenry County government center looms behind the fenced off parking lot with the Jail on the left.  Immigrant detainees are held on the fourth floor. Missy Funk photo.

Note—The fight for immigration justice and against detention began well before the Coalition to Cancel the ICE Contract in McHenry County swung into action last year in the midst of the global Coronavirus pandemic.  The Latino Coalition, McHenry County League of Latin American Citizens (LULLAC), and the old Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Woodstock organized the first march from the Square to the County complex back in 2007.  Since then, there were many marches and vigils, large and small.  Immigration was a key issue at the hugely successful Hate Has No Home Here march around Woodstock Square and rally in March 2017.  But the largest rally at the Jail, Lights for Liberty Woodstock, was held two years ago on July 12, 2019.  This is an account of that event that I posted on the Blog the next day.

In more than 50 years as an activist it was the first time I remember a crowd gathering to the sounds of a sousaphone ensemble.  Sousaphones Against Hate lent a joyous Wisconsin brat and beer vibe to the steady stream of folks carrying signs and folding chairs who were filling the grassy strip along Route 47 to participate in Lights for Liberty Woodstock, the rally and vigil at the McHenry County Jail/Immigrant Detention facility.  It was one of more than 500 such events across the country in addition to a number of other anti-ICE marches and protests in cities great and small—an eruption of Resistance to the terrorizing and oppression of immigrants and asylum seekers.

Organizers and volunteers had been working overtime for weeks to make the event a reality.  We coordinated our efforts through conference calls facilitated by Leni Manaa-Hoppenworth and Scott Cross of Indivisible Illinois—an indispensable asset and major co-sponsor of the event.  Volunteers, many of whom had never met or worked together before, came from all over the Chicago area joining local lead organizers Patrick Murfin, hereafter known as the Old Man of the Tree of Life Unitarian Universalist Congregation Social Justice Team, and Elisabeth Hubbard of Lake County.

Together we shared tasks and responsibilities, lined up 11 other co-sponsoring organizations, recruited speakers, attended to innumerable logistic and support details, and finally assembled, with some last minute juggling a coherent and effective program that would discuss the many aspects of the current crisis.  Elisabeth Hubble acted as our registration person for speakers, stage manager, and general major domo who kept the program running smoothly.  The Old Man was joined on stage by immigration attorney Lillian Gonzalez as co-hosts.

The Old Man as a co-host of the rally. Dawn Anderson photo.

Earlier in the afternoon after some semi-comic glitches we managed to drag a rented 4 X 8 foot stage section and a battery powered p.a. podium half a block and set them up near the chain link fence that blocked off half of the jail parking lot which was under re-construction.  We met with friendly but firm Sheriff Department officers, who told us that unlike previous similar rallies in the same location, we could not set foot on any of the parking lots surrounding the Jail, Court House, and County government complex. 

Our experienced and efficient event marshals under the leadership of Dee Darling—veterans of several marches and events on Woodstock Square—helped folks safely cross Rt. 47 from parking at the school across the street.  As we made last minute arrangements around the stage—the p.a. system on the podium emitted screeching feedback and we were rescued by Scott Cross’s small portable unit with a hand-held microphone—and as the sousaphones played the swelling crowd spread out along Rt. 47 holding up hand-made signs to the busy street traffic passing by.  Many cars honked their support.

Promptly at 7pm we began the rally program.  The crowd turned to face the stage and was continually reinforced through the evening.  At its peak the press and several experienced crowd estimators figured that 400-500 were in attendance.

Rabbi Maralee Gordon.  Kathy Brady-Murfin photo.

After a welcome and some brief house-keeping announcements the program began with Marilee Gordon, the retired Rabbi Emeritus of the McHenry County Jewish Congregation, a leading member of the interfaith group Faithbridge, and a jail visitor for the Interfaith Community for Detained Immigrants (ICDI).  She grounded her remarks in the requirements to welcome and harbor immigrants and strangers found in the Torah and Talmudic teachings as well as in the Christian New Testament, and Islamic scripture.

Latino youth.  Democratic Party of McHenry County photo.

She was followed on the stage by Melanie Schikore, Executive Director of ICDI who put a personal face on people detained in the McHenry County Jail and other detention center and ended with the admonition that we all must work to free those who are held, often in terrible conditions in the border camps, demand that the government’s punitive immigration policies be reversed, and demand that ICE, the stormtroopers for enforcing that policy, be abolished.  She was the first of many speakers to reference the nation-wide family raids that have been touted the administration and which striking terror in many communities.

                                    Melanie Schikore of the Interfaith Community for Detained Immigrants (ICDI).  Missy Funk photo.

Dave Trost representing McHenry County Progressives read a moving message from a detainee at a one of the Illinois detention centers.  Sara Crosental, a young woman from Rising DREAMERS Unite recounted her personal story of being awakened by armed, unidentified men in black crashing into her family home to drag her father away.

Carol Huntsinger, a Lake County church musician led the crown in the first song of the evening, the Civil Rights anthem We Shall Overcome.  Later veteran singer/guitarist Norm Siegel, who the Old Man has known since the days of the Earl of Old Town and the great Chicago folk music scare fifty years ago led a rousing rendition of Woody Guthrie’s This Land is Your Land and began the candlelight vigil with the familiar spiritual This Little Light of Mine.

Dr. Marjorie Fujara, child abuse pediatric specialist.  That's musician Norm Siegel left of the stage and co-host Lillian Gonzalez on the right in the white and black stripes.  Missy Funk photo.

Dr. Marjoie Fujara, a child abuse pediatrics specialist for the Cook County Department of Health, explained the impact of child maltreatment and toxic stress on unaccompanied minors seeking refugee status.

Lea Grover of the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN) discussed the sexual abuse and violence that many women and children endure not only in detention custody, but by employers, husbands, mates, and others who know that the victims will be unlikely to report crimes for fear of being exposed to arrest and deportation.

                                                    Lea Glover--Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN).  Photo by Missy Funk

At this point the Old Man needs to explain his near constant presence on stage.  Contrary to rumor, I was not just trying to hog the camera.  I had real trouble getting on and off of the 16 inch high stage platform, especially as the night wore on.

Co-host Lillian Gonzalez spoke as a former undocumented alien who became a lawyer representing clients enmeshed in the system.

Vigil signs and candles.  Photo by Scott Cross.

Lisa Arvanites of McHenry County NOW spoke on the special dangers that members of the LGBTQ face especially trans women of color who endure a triple whammy of discrimination and marginalization face.

Kristina Zahorik, the Chair of the Democratic Party of McHenry County and of the Illinois Democratic County Chairs Committee, told of her personal political re-awakening after the disastrous 2006 election that brought Donald Trump to power along with enlarged majorities in the House and Senate and control of most state governments.  She was given hope by the groundswell of activism that returned the House to a Democratic majority including new Representatives Lauren Underwood and Sean Casten, brought J. B. Pritzker to the Governorship, and elected 5 Democrats to the county Board.

Kristina Zahorik, Chair of the McHenry County Democratic Party with the elusive Elizabeth Hubbard a principle organizer and stage manager.  Kathy Brady-Murfin photo.

Scott Cross, Executive Director of Indivisible Illinois spoke to actions folks can take moving forward including keeping regular contact with state and Federal legislators and office holders to demand action on immigration and other critical issues; being ready to take to the streets in more actions, rally, and marches including civil disobedience; actively working on upcoming campaigns, and most importantly joining or starting grassroots organizations working to effect change.

As the final speaker of the evening finished volunteers distributed vigil candles to those who didn’t bring their own which were lit as the gloaming settled in over the Jail.  After a period of song and silent witness a car caravan from Aurora organized by Stand and March and Uni2 arrived.  They processed though the hushed crowd carrying seven white wooden crosses representing the five children known to have died this year in custody, and Oscar Alberto Martinez his 23-month-old daughter Angie Valeria who drowned trying to cross the Rio Grande to seek asylum.   They placed the crosses in a row by the stage and knelt behind the crosses.  No vestige of whispering or rustle of a distracted crowd lingered.  After several minutes of silence Casotio “Casey” Cuevas spoke emotionally on behalf of the members of the caravan.

Car caravan from Aurora entrance with crosses.  Judy Stettner photo.

When the vigil wound down, volunteers quickly took down the stage and carted it, table, chairs, bottled water and other items to vehicles.  One of the last volunteers on the grounds was the tireless Missy Funk of McHenry County Progressives and Woodstock Pride looked up and saw lights flashing in the slit windows of the Jail’s fourth floor where immigrant detainees are held.  They were aware of the vigil and that folks on the outside had not forgotten them.  They were flashing, probably at risk of punishment, a thank-you.

The candle light vigil.  Scott Cross photo.

Finally, I would like to acknowledge all of the organization who co-sponsored the rally and vigil—the Democratic Party of McHenry County, Illinois Muslim Civic Coalition, Indivisible Illinois, Indivisible Brookfield, ICDI, League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), McHenry County Democratic Women’s Club, McHenry County National Organization for Women (NOW), McHenry County Progressives, Rape Abuse and Incest National Network (RAINN), Sousaphones Against Hate, Woodstock Pride, Women’s March, None of the Above, and the Tree of Life Unitarian Universalist Congregation Social Justice Team.

Cancel the ICE Contract in McHenry County Plans Roadside Rally in Algonquin

The Coalition to Cancel the ICE Contract in McHenry County will hold a Roadside Rally this Saturday, May 8 in downtown Algonquin at  Route 62 and Main Street from noon to 1:30 pm. 

Supporters and participants are invited to bring signs demanding that the McHenry County Board finally vote to end the Federal contract to use the County Jail as an immigrant detention center.  Masking is required and social distancing will be observed. 

The McHenry event is one of a series of  events that have taken the struggle to every corner of McHenry County.  The final roadside rally before an expected vote by the County Board on Wednesday, May 18 will be held in Huntley from noon to 1:30 pm on May 15 along Route 47 at  Deicke Park.  

Coalition to Cancel the ICE Contract in McHenry County members and friends hold a banner at a roadside rally in McHenry on April 24.

The Coalition to Cancel the ICE Contract in McHenry County was formed by concerned organizations committed to immigration justice and ending the ICE contract with McHenry County Jail and includes 30 groups from the County and region.  Over 2000 signatures on a petition to end the contract were recently presented to the Board and 482 individuals now are registered on the Coalition’s Facebook Group. 

For more information visit the Facebook Page at  https://www.facebook.com/CancelICEContractMcHenryCounty.

That Time Red-Faced America Paid Reparations to Detainees

From George Takei's graphic memoir They Called Us Enemy.

Given the disgraceful circumstances of our concentration camps for immigrants, asylum seekers, and whatever brown skinned legal residents and citizens get swept up with the not to mention the mass raids last week at Mississippi poultry plants, perhaps it is good to remember this tidbit of American History.  What will our heirs and progeny be mortified by us and how will they have to atone for our crimes?

On August 10, 1988, more than 45 years after the start of internment, the United States government authorized reparations payments to Japanese-Americans detained during World War II.

President Ronald Reagan signing the bill apologizing for World War II internment of Japanese-Americans and authorizing alargely symbolic reparations.

Ten weeks after the December 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, ordering 120,000 people of Japanese descent—including 75,000 American citizens—into internment camps. The announced purpose was to protect the West Coast from sabotage and collusion with the enemy, but the perceived threat was based more in racial prejudice than military strategy, as the great majority German-American and Italian-American residents were allowed to remain in their homes undisturbed.  And despite the large pre-war German-American Bund with its openly pro-Nazi rallies and proven networks of spies and saboteurs.  

For the length of  the war, Americans of Japanese descent and Japanese nationals—many of denied American citizenship based on racially discriminatory quotas—were imprisoned in makeshift internment camps throughout the West Coast and as far east as Arkansas. Interned people were forced to abandon their homes, farms, and businesses, or sell them at rock bottom prices, losing economic stability and generational wealth. The 1944 U.S. Supreme Court decision Korematsu v. U.S., upheld Roosevelt’s executive order.

Despite the trauma the great majority of the detainees remained loyal to America and thousands of their young men volunteered for service in the Armed forces.  That included members of the 442nd Infantry Regiment made up of Nisei—second generation American citizens—that became the most decorated unit of it size during the war for its hard-fighting service in Italy and France.

A member of the Nesei 442nd Regiment on guard in France in 1945.

After the war, Japanese-Americans returned home to distrust and resentment. Wartime internment traumatized an entire generation of people and continues to impact their descendants. 

After the war the detainies were often unwanted back in their home communities.

Inspired by the Civil Rights Movement, survivors of internment organized to demand that the United States government address this history.

In 1980, Congress established a commission to investigate the internment camps and their legacy. The report decried Japanese internment as a “grave injustice” and acknowledged that the internment was fueled by “racial prejudice, wartime hysteria, and a failure of political leadership.” 

The decade-long efforts of Japanese American civil rights advocates were realized when President Ronald Reagan signed the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, which provided an apology and compensation of $20,000 to living survivors of Japanese internment. An estimated 50,000 people interned during the war died before the reparation act’s passage.

Although Japanese Americans were gratified by the acknowledgement of the grave injustice done to them and for the formal apology, the cash settlements were a drop in the bucket compared to actual losses.  

A one day evacuation sale at a Japanese-American owned business.  Many did not even have the timer or opportunity to even attempting to get some value for their abandoned property.

Hard working and industrious Japanese had some of the finest farms on the West Coast, prosperous businesses in towns and cities as well as high-rates of home ownership.  All of that caused resentment and envy by their neighbors, many of whom swooped in to claim their property legally or by winked-at outright theft.  A mere $20,000 came nowhere near making up those losses, especially considering inflation.  And by denying recompense to the tens of thousands who had already died, their heirs were effectively cheated as well.

In the decades after the apology and reparations, a public consensus grew that the internment was one of the blackest episodes in American history.  But now with new camps—and proposals to actually use former Japanese internment camps—springing up like mushrooms, a spate of Trump apologists, right-wing ideologues, and outright White nationalists—not only defend the camps but exult in them.  And they assail the birthright citizenship of the Nisei generations.  The Japanese like the millions of Latino American citizens are derided as alien stains on White America.

A Trump rally in Iowa where more than half of his supports agree that World War II internment was justified and wanted the same treatment for Muslim-Americans.  They support the border concentration camps today by even larger margins

There is every evidence that Donald Trump shares that view—he has threatened to try to end birthright citizenship by fiat—executive order—and many of his Make America Great Again devotees cheer it on.  An unthinkable cancer is spreading.

All because we are already forgetting the lessons of Manzanar.

Lights For Liberty Shined in Woodstock

The crowd listens to speakers at the Woodstock Lights for Liberty rally.  The McHenry County government center looms behind the fenced off parking lot with the Jail on the left.  Immigrant detainees are held on the fourth floor. Missy Funk photo.

In more than 50 years as an activist it was the first time I remember a crowd gathering to the sounds of a sousaphone ensemble.  Sousaphones Against Hate lent a joyous Wisconsin brat and beer vibe to the steady stream of folks carrying signs and folding chairs who were filling the grassy strip along Route 47 to participate in Lights for Liberty Woodstock, the rally and vigil at the McHenry County Jail/Immigrant Detention facility.  It was one of more than 500 such events across the country in addition to a number of other anti-ICE marches and protests in cities great and small—an eruption of Resistance to the terrorizing and oppression of immigrants and asylum seekers.

Organizers and volunteers had been working overtime for weeks to make the event a reality.  We coordinated our efforts through conference calls facilitated by Leni Manaa-Hoppenworth and Scott Cross of Indivisible Illinois—an indispensable asset and major co-sponsor of the event.  Volunteers, many of whom had never met or worked together before, came from all over the Chicago area joining local lead organizers Patrick Murfin, hear after known as the Old Man of the Tree of Life Unitarian Universalist Congregation Social Justice Team, and Elisabeth Hubbard of Lake County.

Together we shared tasks and responsibilities, lined up 11 other co-sponsoring organizations, recruited speakers, attended to innumerable logistic and support details, and finally assembled, with some last minute juggling a coherent and effective program that would discuss the many aspects of the current crisis.  Elisabeth Hubble acted as our registration person for speakers, stage manager, and general major domo who kept the program running smoothly.  The Old Man was joined on stage by immigration attorney Lillian Gonzalez as co-hosts.

                                    The Old Man as a co-host of the rally. Dawn Anderson photo.

Earlier in the afternoon after some semi-comic glitches we managed to drag a rented 4 X 8 foot stage section and a battery powered p.a. podium half a block and set them up near the chain link fence that blocked off half of the jail parking lot which was under re-construction.  We met with friendly but firm Sheriff Department officers, who told us that unlike previous similar rallies in the same location, we could not set foot on any of the parking lots surrounding the Jail, Court House, and County government complex. 

Our experienced and efficient event marshals under the leadership of Dee Darling—veterans of several marches and events on Woodstock Square—helped folks safely cross Rt. 47 from parking at the school across the street.  As we made last minute arrangements around the stage—the p.a. system on the podium emitted screeching feedback and we were rescued by Scott Cross’s small portable unit with a hand-held microphone—and as the sousaphones played the swelling crowd spread out along Rt. 47 holding up hand-made signs to the busy street traffic passing by.  Many cars honked their support.

Promptly at 7:30 pm we began the rally program.  The crowd turned to face the stage and was continually reinforce through the evening by a steady stream.  At its peak the press and several experienced crowd estimators that 400-500 were in attendance.

Rabbi Maralee Gordon.  Kathy Brady-Murfin photo.

After a welcome and some brief house-keeping announcements the program began with Maralee Gordon, the retired Rabbi Emeritus of the McHenry County Jewish Congregation, a leading member of the interfaith group Faithbridge, and a jail visitor for the Interfaith Community for Detained Immigrants (ICDI).  She grounded her remarks in the requirements to welcome and harbor immigrants and strangers found in the Torah and Talmudic teachings as well as in the Christian New Testament, and Islamic scripture.

Latino youth.  Democratic Party of McHenry County photo.

She was followed on the stage by Melanie Schikore, Executive Director of ICDI that put a personal face on people detained in the McHenry County Jail and other detention center and ended with the admonition that we all must work to free those who are held, often in terrible conditions in the border camps, and demand that the government’s punitive immigration policies be reversed, and demand that ICE, the stormtroopers for enforcing that policy, be abolished.  She was the first of many speakers to reference the nation-wide family raids that have been touted the administration and which striking terror in many communities.

Melanie Schikore of the Interfaith Community for Detained Immigrants (ICDI).  Missy Funk photo.

Dave Trost representing McHenry County Progressives read a moving message from a detainee at a one of the Illinois detention centers.  Sara Crosental, a young woman from Rising DREAMERS Unite recounted her personal story of being awakened by armed, unidentified men in black crashing into her family home to drag her father away.

Carol Huntsinger, a Lake County church musician led the crown in the first song of the evening, the Civil Rights anthem We Shall Overcome.  Later veteran singer/guitarist Norm Siegel, who the Old Man has known since the days of the Earl of Old Town and the great Chicago folk music scare fifty years ago led a rousing rendition of Woody Guthrie’s This Land is Your Land and began the candle light vigil with the familiar spiritual This Little Light of Mine.

Dr. Marjorie Fujara, child abuse pediatric specialist.  That's musician Norm Siegel left of the stage and co-host Lillian Gonzalez on the right in the white and black stripes.  Missy Funk photo.

Dr. Marjoie Fujara, a child abuse pediatrics specialist for the Cook County Department of Health, explained the impact of child maltreatment and toxic stress on unaccompanied minors seeking refugee status.

Lea Grover of the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN) discussed the sexual abuse and violence that many women and children endure not only in detention custody, but by employers, husbands and mates and others who know that the victims will be unlikely to report crimes for fear of being exposed to arrest and deportation.

Lea Glover--Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN).  Photo by Missy Funk

At this point the Old Man needs to explain his near constant presence on stage.  Contrary to rumor, I was not just trying to hog the camera.  I had real trouble getting on and off of the 16 inch stage platform, especially as the night wore on.

Co-host Lillian Gonzalez spoke as a former undocumented alien who became a lawyer representing clients enmeshed in the system.

Vigil signs and candles.  Photo by Scott Cross

Lisa Arvanites of McHenry County NOW spoke on the special dangers that members of the LGBTQ face especially trans women of color who endure a triple whammy of discrimination and marginalization face.

Kristina Zahorik, the Chair of the Democratic Party of McHenry County and of the Illinois Democratic County Chairs Committee, told of her personal political re-awakening after the disastrous 2006 election that brought Donald Trump to power along with enlarged majorities in the House and Senate and control of the majority of state governments.  She was given hope by the groundswell of activism that returned the House to a Democratic majority including new Representatives Lauren Underwood and Sean Casten, brought J. B. Pritzker to the Governorship, and elected 5 Democrats to the county Board.

Kristina Zahorik, Chair of the McHenry County Democratic Party with the elusive Elizabeth Hubbard a principle organizer and stage manager.  Kathy Brady-Murfin photo.

Scott Cross, Executive Director of Indivisible Illinois spoke to actions folks can take moving forward including keeping regular contact with state and Federal legislators and office holders to demand action on immigration and other critical issues; being ready to take to the streets in more actions, rally, and marches including civil disobedience; actively working on upcoming campaigns, and most importantly joining or starting grassroots organizations working to effect change.

As the final speaker of the evening finished up volunteers distributed vigil candles to those who didn’t bring their own which were lit as the gloaming settled in over the Jail.  After a period of song and silent witness a car caravan from Aurora organized by Stand and March and Uni2 arrived.  They processed though the hushed crowd carrying seven white wooden crosses representing the five children known to have died this year in custody, and Oscar Alberto Martinez  his 23-month-old daughter Angie Valeria who drowned trying to cross the Rio Grande to seek asylum.   They placed the crosses in a row by the stage and knelt behind the crosses.  No vestige of whispering or rustle of a distracted crowd lingered.  After several minutes of silence Casotio “Casey” Cuevas spoke emotionally on behalf of the members of the caravan.

Car caravan from Aurora entrance with crosses.  Judy Stettner photo.

When the vigil wound down, volunteers quickly took down the stage and carted it, table, chairs, bottled water and other items to vehicles.  One of the last volunteers on the grounds was the tireless Missy Funk of McHenry County Progressives and Woodstock Pride looked up and saw lights flashing in the slit windows of the Jail’s fourth floor where immigrant detainees are held.  They were aware of the vigil and that folks on the outside had not forgotten them.  They were flashing, probably at risk of punishment, a thank-you.

The candle light vigil.  Scott Cross photo.

Finally, I would like to acknowledge all of the organization who co-sponsored the rally and vigil—the Democratic Party of McHenry County, Illinois Muslim Civic Coalition, Indivisible Illinois, Indivisible Brookfield, ICDI, League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), McHenry County Democratic Women’s Club, McHenry County National Organization for Women (NOW), McHenry County Progressives, Rape Abuse and Incest National Network (RAINN), Sousaphones Against Hate, Woodstock Pride, Women’s March and None of the Above, and the Tree of Life Unitarian Universalist Congregation Social Justice Team.