Univision reporter sheds light on the hard journey of a Tahirih client and explains the importance of ‘gender’ becoming a basis of asylum.

International human rights law forbids sending people back to the country that they are fleeing when their lives are on the line. Black immigrants, including Haitians, have been discriminated against—and it’s costing lives. For months, thousands of Haitian asylum seekers and other Black migrants have been expelled from this country and denied their legal right to seek asylum. Black migrants deserve to be welcomed with dignity, not face an endless cycle of inhumane and violent treatment at the hands of our government.

October 11 marks both International Day of the Girl and Indigenous Peoples’ Day, observances that illuminate the ways gender-based violence particularly impacts those who live at the dangerous intersections of sexism, racism, and xenophobia.

Tahirih’s Force Marriage Initiative team wrote an op-ed published in Teen Vogue that explains how R&B star Aaliyah was able to be married to R. Kelly when she was just 15 years old. 

Read the full article here.

Emiene Wright, associate editor for Caroline and Pine, explains the impact of North Carolina’s recent child marriage bill that will soon go into effect. Casey Carter Swegman, Tahirih’s Force Marriage Initiative Project Manager, weighs in on how this law is a step into the right direction but there’s a lot more work to be done.

The Department of Homeland Security issued broad new directives to immigration officers that will go into effect on November 29, 2021. Although these new enforcement and deportation guidelines clarify that not everyone who is an undocumented immigrant should, or can, be removed from the United States, the memo gives worryingly broad discretion to individual ICE and CBP agents to carry out the enforcement priorities and risks the removal of survivors of gender-based violence.

The Tahirih Justice Center strongly condemns the administration’s racist and brutal mistreatment of Haitian refugees at the U.S. southern border.

Support Afghan refugees seeking safety in the U.S.

While the proposal has some positive impacts on immigrant survivors of gender-based violence, some aspects of the proposed rule will also be harmful.

As advocates working to end forced marriage in the United States, we are very familiar with the many misconceptions about the issue. Even among other anti-violence advocates, forced marriage remains under-recognized and poorly understood.