Complete this form to add your organization as a signatory.

If you live in Maryland, you can send an email to the Montgomery Senate Delegation and Maryland Senate President here.

Dear Montgomery County Senate Delegation:

We are deeply concerned and demand a retraction of your November 8th public letter which explicitly threatens the immigration rights non-profit, CASA, by stating that you intend to “re-evaluate” their legislative funding. The reason is because they expressed their support of Palestinian human rights and grief over Israel’s bombing and cutting off of food, water and electricity in Gaza.

While your threat targets CASA directly, it also threatens thousands of immigrants and low-income communities that rely on CASA’s safety net and advocacy services. And your statement further sends a “chilling effect” to the growing (and now even majority) number of Americans who want the genocidal attacks on Gaza to stop and have been expressing sentiments similar to those in CASA’s tweet.

It is sadly ironic that your letter boasts that you “support freedom of speech” when in fact, the letter itself has the specific intent of leveraging your governmental power to punish an organization that expresses an opinion that differs from yours. The very action that the First Amendment was written to outlaw. Following through on this threat would be an unconstitutional condition on a public benefit.

 It is also important to call out the racial underpinnings of your letter. CASA’s tweet noted that “the Palestinian struggle mirrors our own.” Simply put, their statement reflects the lens of their lived experience. In clamping down on criticisms of Israel and support of Palestinian human rights, you now have also dismissed the collective lived experience of those who are not in seats of power, and have been personally impacted by colonialism. Because their truth differs from yours, it must be discounted.

Several of you also have histories that span more than a decade of demonizing Palestinian human rights activists. For example, in 2014, Archbishop Desmond Tutu personally called out one of you because you had been referring to Palestinian human rights advocates as Nazis and members of the Ku Klux Klan. In another example, one of you deliberately darkened a photo of an activist for Palestine who was challenging you in a primary election.

 In the closing of your letter, you state that you hope your reprimand of CASA will be a “learning opportunity” for them. This statement is incredibly paternalistic. Further, the lesson that your letter teaches is that elected officials in Montgomery County have a contempt for our foundational civil liberties; and a politicized compassion that is tone deaf to how occupation and colonialism factor into the narrative fabric of marginalized communities, like those from Latin America and Palestine.  

We demand that you retract your name from the letter and affirm your support for the civil liberties of all Montgomery organizations and residents, not merely the ones that you agree with.

Sincerely,

350.0rg

Arab American Anti-Discrimination Committee (Maryland Chapter)

Arab American Institute

Arab Word Studies, American University

Backbone Campaign

Baltimore City Green Party

Baltimore County Young Democrats

Baltimore Nonviolence Center

Baltimore Palestine Solidarity

Baltimore Peace Action

Baltimore Phil Berrigan Memorial Veterans For Peace

Baltimore Student Union

Baltimore Women in Black

Bethesda African Cemetery Coalition

BIPOC MOCO Green New Deal Interns (Montgomery County)

Bridge America

Casa Baltimore Limay

Caucus of African American Leaders

Community Actively Seeking Transparency (CAST)

Defending Rights and Dissent

Diaspora Pa’lante Collective

Episcopal Peace Fellowship-Palestine-Israel Network

Faith Strategies

Friends of Latin America

Friends of Sabeel North America (Palestinian Christians)

Friends of Wadi Foquin (under the United Methodist Church’s General Board of Global Ministries)

Harriet’s Wildest Dreams

High Note Consulting

Indian American Muslim Council

Johns Hopkins University Arab Society Club

June and July Therapy

Justice for All

Maryland2Palestine

Montgomery County Civil Rights Coalition

Montgomery County DSA

Montgomery College Muslim Student Association

Muslim Advocates

National Arab American Medical Association

National Domestic Workers Alliance

National Lawyer’s Guild, DC Chapter

The Noor Center

No Separate Justice

Oakland Law Collaborative

Our Revolution

Our Revolution, Howard County

Our Revolution, Prince George’s County

Palestinian Christian Alliance for Peace

Palestine Legal

Palestinian Youth Movement – DMV Chapter

Partnership for Civil Justice Fund

Pax Christi, Metro DC- Baltimore

Pax Christi, USA

Peace Action Montgomery

Peace Action, USA

Peace and Justice Coalition of Prince Georges County

Progressive Democrats of Howard County

Progressive Maryland

Resource Generation, Baltimore Chapter

Runners4Justice

ShutDown DC

Students for Justice in Palestine, Howard University

Students for Justice in Palestine, American University

Showing Up for Racial Justice Annapolis and Anne Arundel County (SURJ3A)

Teaching for Change

Towson Young Democratic Socialists of America

US Campaign for Palestinian Human Rights

Walt Whitman High School Muslim Student Association

Virginia Coalition for Human Rights

WRITE! for Justice, Human Rights, and International Law in Palestine

Signatories (in an individual capacity)

Rev. Graylan Scott Hagler, Pastor Emeritus, Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ

Steve Sosebee, President, the Palestine Children’s Relief Organization