The Tahirih Justice Center opposes amendments to Senate Bill 35 (S35), a bill that was originally intended to increase North Carolina’s age floor to marry and protect girls and young women from the harms of child marriage. After substantial revisions by Senate leadership, the bill in its current form falls far short of progress and will continue to put children in North Carolina, and increasingly neighboring states, at risk of exploitation under the guise of marriage and other devastating lifelong harms.

The administration is considering an overhaul of the asylum system at the U.S. southern border, which includes moving some asylum cases from the purview of the immigration courts within the Department of Justice to the Department of Homeland Security to speed up case processing. As the administration continues to respond to challenges at the border, Tahirih urges the government to center immigrant survivors’ due process rights and take steps to change several policies in place that will immediately help survivors of violence, while improving case processing.

Tahirih calls on the administration to prioritize policies that secure justice and safety for immigrant survivors of violence. This starts with repealing Title 42, which the previous and current administrations continue to use to illegally expel adults and children with their families seeking asylum—leaving them vulnerable to further violence and trauma.