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INDIVISIBLE SANTA FE
Next Meeting
Monday February 10, 2025 @7pm.
Christ Lutheran Church
1701 Arroyo Chamiso Road
Santa Fe
SOMOS ACCION IMMIGRANT AND WORKERS RALLY FEB 2, 2025 ROUNDHOUSE
LATEST NEWS
Report Exposes How ICE Exploits Data Brokers to Undermine New Mexico's Immigration Protections
A report released yesterday by Somos Un Pueblo Unido, Just Futures Law, Empower, and Mijente reveals how federal immigration agencies are bypassing New Mexico's immigrant public safety policies by purchasing sesitive personal information from data brokers or obtaining it through state law enforcement networks.
The report also examines how federal immigration agencies, such as ICE, obtain highly sensitive personal information from New Mexican departments, including state motor vehicle records, and use this information to fuel deportation efforts. Highlights of the report can be found in this PowerPoint designed by Mijente.
New Mexico's long tradition of passing local and state policies aimed at integrating mixed-status immigrant families into public safety efforts, such as providing driver’s licenses regardless of immigration status, and prohibiting the use of local resources to aid in deportation schemes, is undermined through ICE’s multi-million dollar contracts with data brokers, such as LexisNexis, which sells New Mexicans’ information from residents’ most recent addresses to all the cars registered in their names to their birthdates.
Easy access to our personal information enables ICE to stay informed on personal information, making it easier to target immigrants.
he reports proposes several policy recommendations to safeguard the privacy of all New Mexicans, including requiring all companies that purchase information from the MVD database certify that the information will not be used to enforce federal immigration laws.
This week, Sen. Antionette Sedillo López introduced Senate Bill 36 at the 2025 Legislature which would limit the disclosure of New Mexicans' sensitive personal information by state employees and would restrict the use of MVD records by data brokers.
UNITED STATES CONGRESS
H.R.21 - To amend title 18, United States Code, to prohibit a health care practitioner from failing to exercise the proper degree of care in the case of a child who survives an abortion or attempted abortion. UPDATE: HOUSE PASSED THE BILL AND SENT IT TO THE SENATE.
H.R.404 - To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to remove silencers from the definition of firearms, and for other purposes. (119th Congress)
NEW MEXICO STATE LEGISLATURE ACLU focus for Legislation session
Banning Invasive Internet Sweeps Online companies amass vast troves of sensitive personal data about each of us through our internet activity which enables discriminatory practices. Banning the Use of Untrustworthy Facial Recognition Technology: All New Mexicans deserve to live their daily lives free from government surveillance and wrongful arrests
Protecting Privacy from Mass Surveillance: This legislation seeks to ensure that, absent a warrant,ALPR records of where New Mexicans who are nsuspected of a crime are deleted within thirty (30) days.
Visit the ACLU legislation page for a complete list of legislation we're working on this session.
SB21 Pollutant Discharge Elimination Act Senate Conservation Committee Do Pass recommendation with amendment. The bill is now with the Senate Judiciary Committee.
SB22 Water Quality and Pollution Senate Conservation Committee Passed recommendation. The bill is now with the Senate Judiciary Committee
Please visit our Actions in New Mexico Page
for Information about things you can do to help others in this urgent time.
Among presidential speechwriters, “laundry list” is a devastating insult. It refers to a bland recitation of policy proposals with no coherent theme or inspiring message to bind them. (Another devastating speechwriter insult is “Christmas tree,” which means a speech that has something for everybody but no central focus.)
Trump’s second Inauguration Day was a laundry list of Christmas Trees.
First, he gave a speech in the rotunda that promised a “golden age” but was really just a disorganized to-do list. Over lunch, he added more items to the to-do list. Then he went to the Oval Office and signed a whole bunch of executive orders and pardons, a few of which fulfill campaign promises, many of which push the limits of presidential power. Read the full article here
Please see our About Us/Weekly To Do Page for important contact information you may need
INDIVISIBLE NATIONAL
(published Thursday January 30, 2025)
Today, some of the most extreme, unqualified, and dangerous cabinet nominees in the history of the republic appear before the Senate for their confirmation hearings.
Kash Patel, a MAGA-true believer who has salivated about prosecuting members of the media and helped produce a rendition of the "Star-Spangled Banner" sung by violent January 6 inmates (pre-pardon), will make the case for leading the FBI.
Tulsi Gabbard, a Putin apologist with no real intelligence experience, a person who was denied sensitive information while in Congress because colleagues feared she’d leak it to her pal and deposed war criminal Bashar al-Assad, will explain why she should be trusted to be the next Director of National Intelligence.
RFK Jr., a man who buys into some of the most bizarre conspiracy theories imaginable, backs a national abortion ban, faces sexual assault allegations, and whose healthcare experience includes (or is limited to) exacerbating a deadly measles outbreak with his vaccine denialism, will be back on the Hill as he seeks to lead the Department of Health and Human Services.
But this email isn’t about any of them. Yes, you should absolutely call and email your senators to urge them to vote NO on all three. We’ve got tools to help you do it here.
This email, however, is about another extremely dangerous nominee who has garnered far less attention -- and whose confirmation could be voted on by the full Senate as early as tomorrow. We’re talking, dear friends, about Project 2025 architect, mastermind behind Trump’s sweeping (and illegal) spending freeze, and nominee to lead the “nerve-center” of the federal government -- Russell Vought.
Let’s back up.
If you’ve been following our emails or checked the news this week, you’re aware that on Tuesday, Trump’s Office of Management and Budget issued a memo freezing virtually all federal spending -- funds allocated by Congress for things like Medicaid, housing assistance, scientific research, food for hungry families, and a million other things.
These were funds that the Constitution does not allow the president to withhold. So before the freeze was set to take effect (and after a tremendous amount of chaos and fear was unleashed), a federal judge blocked it. Then, amidst massive public backlash, and nonstop calls to House and Senate offices(thanks to all of you), the White House backpedaled and rescinded the memo.
We wish that were the end of the story. But it is not. Quickly after the memo was rescinded, Trump’s press secretary volunteered that they were only rescinding the document, not the intent behind it. That statement was confusing, but clear enough about the administration’s illegal intentions that another judge felt the need to issue a second order blocking the funding freeze.
Obviously, the administration bungled this. And clearly, they’re not done trying. That’s why Trump wants Russell Vought at the helm of OMB.
What does Vought have to do with the funding freeze? Well, the entire concept is kind of his "Hot to Go" (or depending on your generation, perhaps his "Free Bird"). Read his academic writings, and he waxes on about the president remaking government by withholding funds from programs that don’t align with his ideological agenda. Watch his Senate hearings, and he croons about the president’s right to do it, Constitution and Supreme Court guidance be damned.
In fact, while serving as OMB Director for a brief time during Trump’s first term, he tried it on a much smaller scale -- freezing funds allocated for Ukraine (an impeachment resulted). The move was later deemed blatantly illegal.
The Office of Management and Budget is often called the "most important agency you’ve never heard of" because it really does hold a lot of power -- coordinating policy across all government, overseeing budgets, and more.
Russell Vought has an even more expansive view of the agency’s power -- he views it the “nerve center” of the federal bureaucracy and believes that under the right leadership (his), it can totally bypass Congress and give Trump king-like powers. He wrote an entire chapter about it in Project 2025 -- the Heritage Foundation blueprint for an autocratic second Trump term. You may recall Trump disavowing the plan on the campaign trail. But surprise, now that he’s president, he’s seeking to install its authors in the highest positions of government.
If Vought is confirmed, chaotic funding freezes like we saw this week will only be the beginning. Together, Trump and Vought will seek to transform the government into a tool of far-right ideology, Christian Nationalism, and political revenge against Trump’s enemies.
We’ll be honest. Vought is not going to be the easiest of Trump’s nominees to block. His MAGA bona fides and extensive experience in Washington give him a lot of cred with Republican senators.
But this week, senators also witnessed his plans put into action -- and the mayhem it caused in their states as millions who rely on government grants nearly had their lives, businesses, and education upended. All senators, especially Republican senators, need to understand that a yes for Vought is a yes for the exact funding freeze that was just rescinded.
No amount of expert questioning during a senate hearing could have better illustrated the danger Vought poses. We all witnessed it. Now, it’s up to us to make sure senators don’t hear the end of it -- and to demand they vote no.
In solidarity,
Indivisible Team
If there's one universally accepted truth in the modern age, it's that sequels suck. And Trump 2.0 will be no exception. Trump, Vance, and their MAGA minions feel vindicated by the victory of their bigoted, fascistic clown show of a presidential campaign. Trump takes office with a plan to institute the worst parts of Project 2025. He’ll be enabled by a judiciary packed with right-wing ideologues and a congressional majority stacked with MAGA foot soldiers. And he’s assembled a bloc of corporations and billionaires eager to do his bidding in exchange for tax cuts and corrupt favors. But he has no mandate for the staggeringly harmful agenda he’s about to unleash on the country. And together, we have the power to fight back — and win.
Democracy is in grave peril, but it is not dead. Fascists depend on convincing us to give our power away and fall in line, that the fight is over and we lost. And while we must be clear-eyed about the threat, we must not do the fascists’ work for them by giving them powers they do not have. Trump wants to govern as a dictator, but he has the slimmest possible congressional majority and a grossly unpopular agenda. Winning an election with 49.9% of the vote (of those who voted) does not make him a Dictator for Life and does not make Project 2025 the law of the land.
The truth is that political power resides in many places -- from local to state to federal. To stave off the fascists, we must tap into that power in every corner of our country. We must organize ourselves to block their attacks, break MAGA’s political strength, and build a winning majority coalition of our own. Leadership in this moment must come from regular people, not just politicians. Elected Democrats will need our encouragement, support, and cajoling to find their spines and fight back. Elected Republicans can and must break with MAGA or be held accountable for the harm they cause. This guide outlines concrete strategies and tactics that collectively will help us limit harm, win in 2026, and throw MAGA out in 2028.
Eight years ago, we wrote the Indivisible Guide to organizing locally to pressure Congress and block the Trump agenda. Now, we’re offering our best advice on how everyday people can organize to stop Trump 2.0. There’s a lot we don’t know about what needs to be done. We’ll need to learn and experiment as we go. But we hope that this guide will be useful for people across the country who are grappling with what they can do in this moment.
Our shared future depends on everyday Americans choosing to fight back. We believe each of us has a role to play — in blue states, red states, and political battlegrounds across America. We believe MAGA will seek to divide and conquer us, isolating us one by one in an attempt to fracture our resolve. We believe standing together, Indivisible, is the only way to protect our families, our neighbors, and our democracy. And we believe that we will win.
Chapter 1: What Happened and Why it Matters. Heading into the 2024 election, Americans were angry about inflation and frustrated with the status quo. Some voters either flipped to Trump or didn’t vote at all. That gave Trump the margins to win -- but it doesn’t give him a mandate for dictatorship or Project 2025. Americans of all stripes are going to be pissed when Trump 2.0 comes to town dressed in chaos, corruption, and cruelty. We can stoke that backlash to break up their coalition and build ours.
Chapter 2: A Quick Primer on Constituent Power. Trump wants us to believe that the presidency is all-powerful. It ain’t true. Political power in our democracy overlaps between local, state, and federal electeds. Your power comes from your ability to be a source of support (or a pain in the ass) to those electeds. You can use this power to get them to stand up to Trump 2.0 or face political consequences. We review the basics of constituent power -- what it is, how it works, and how yours can do the most good in this moment where you live.
Chapter 3: The Plan to Get Through the Next 2 Years. Our best chance to get through this era with some amount of democracy intact is to hang on until 2026 and win big in the midterms -- breaking Trump’s hold on Congress and making sure election deniers and saboteurs aren’t in charge of the 2028 election. We’ve boiled it down to three big plays:
You’ll plug into the plays that make the most sense for where you live and the leverage you have. Think of it as a giant national pro-democracy team -- some of us are playing offense, some are playing defense, but if we all play our roles, we’ll make it through together.
Chapter 4: Protect and Prepare. Things are about to get much worse, and we need to treat an attack on one as an attack on all of us. That means supporting communities under threat and preparing to operate under increasingly authoritarian conditions. We’ll review how to:
Chapter 5: Practical steps for finding or forming your local Indivisible group. Fascists depend on you, believing you’re alone and powerless. And honestly, on your own, you don’t have a ton of power. But, organized groups of individuals do have power. If you’re a fan of an existing group in your area, join it. If not, get a few friends together, start a new local Indivisible group, and build from there. Your local group is the basis for everything else you can hope to achieve in this period. This chapter includes some starter recommendations for how to pull your new, local, volunteer-led Indivisible group together, connect with others on the ground, and get to work.
Senator Warren says we need to be pushing Senate Democrats (we’re still in power) to confirm as many judges as possible. Here’s a link thru Indivisible to contact our Senators: https://act.indivisible.org/sign/tell-your-senators-fill-every-judicial-vacancy-nowD
TAKE ACTION
Project 2025 Will Ruin YOUR Life: Here’s a link to Dropbox to download your PRINTABLE copy CLICK HERE
As we wait for national legislation, let’s launch a Green New Deal from below | Jeremy Brecher |The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/nov/21/green-new-deal-from-below-legislation
Email from Kamasamudram Ravilocha
On November 9, 2016 a darkness fell across America. Some of us saw the authoritarian nature of Donald Trump and the Republicans who thought to use him. A group of former Obama campaign and administration staffers wrote a guide that changed our lives and helped us learn how to influence elections, influence our members of Congress, and become activists for progressive change.
We started out, like many of you, with a determination that we would never take an election for granted. In February 2017 a group of people met at DeVargas Mall and for the first few months felt the horror of what some of us knew was coming.
Then we got busy.
To enact a lasting change for justice, equity, peace and access to a fair transformation in the United States of America, vote by vote.
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