|
Dear John,
BIG news: Kelly Gonzalez Aguilar, a 24-year asylum-seeker who needlessly spent three birthdays in the U.S. behind bars, has been freed from ICE detention. Please join us and celebrate Kelly’s freedom by sending her a note with warm wishes!
Amnesty supporters like you helped make her freedom possible: together, we and our coalition partners drove over 80,000 emails, letters, faxes, and petition signatures to ICE. Additionally, our advocacy staff on the Hill — along with Amnesty members like you kept the pressure up on ICE through engagement with your legislators. And we won.
Kelly is a transgender woman who fled Honduras at twelve years old, seeking safety. After she arrived in the United States seeking protection, ICE detained her in August 2017.
She had been locked up for over 1,000 days. But after immense pressure from Amnesty, TransLatin@ Coalition, American Friends Service Committee, National Immigrant Justice Center and other coalition partners — she is free!
This is especially heartening because Kelly had been terrified about contracting COVID-19 in detention, where inadequate measures are taken by authorities to protect detainees and staff from the virus.
In the spring, she told Amnesty campaigners, “Our lives are in danger because there are people here who tested positive for the COVID‐19 virus and there is nothing we can do. More detainees keep coming and going. This is a time bomb for our lives. We pray that someone will do something.”
You — and thousands of Amnesty supporters — helped answer Kelly’s prayers.
Let’s help Kelly celebrate! Send Kelly your best wishes now.
With you by our side, our team will continue our efforts standing up for asylum-seekers unjustly detained by ICE. Here’s to future wins ahead!
Sincerely,
|
