BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//Metuchen Democrats - ECPv6.16.4.1//NONSGML v1.0//EN CALSCALE:GREGORIAN METHOD:PUBLISH X-ORIGINAL-URL:https://www.metuchendemocrats.org X-WR-CALDESC:Events for Metuchen Democrats REFRESH-INTERVAL;VALUE=DURATION:PT1H X-Robots-Tag:noindex X-PUBLISHED-TTL:PT1H BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:America/New_York BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT DTSTART:20160313T070000 END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 TZNAME:EST DTSTART:20161106T060000 END:STANDARD BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT DTSTART:20170312T070000 END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 TZNAME:EST DTSTART:20171105T060000 END:STANDARD BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT DTSTART:20180311T070000 END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 TZNAME:EST DTSTART:20181104T060000 END:STANDARD END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T110000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T150000 DTSTAMP:20170221T024755Z CREATED:20170221T024755Z LAST-MODIFIED:20170221T024755Z UID:748-1487847600-1487862000@www.metuchendemocrats.org SUMMARY:Recess Resistance: Immigrant Rights Day of Action DESCRIPTION:As our members of Congress return home for the recess\, join us to oppose Trump’s deportation machine and its corporate beneficiaries\, and call for an end to ICE Raids that divide our families.\n•11am: Action at Elizabeth Detention Center\, 625 Evans St\, Elizabeth\, NJ a privately run immigration detention center where 300 immigrants are held awating deportation proceedings. Call for and end to raids and private detention centers.\n•1:30pm: Rally at Congressman Lance (R-07) office 425 North Avenue East\, Westfield\, NJ to demand he call for an end to immigration raids.\nThe Trump Administration has escalated raids on immigrants and their families over the past weeks. Hundreds of immigrants from across New Jersey and the East Coast are detained in the Elizabeth Detention Center\, a nerve center in the deportation network and privately owned detention center.\nCOSPONSORS: American Friends Service Committee\, Faith in New Jersey\, Make the Road Connecticut\, Make the Road New York\, Make the Road Pennsylvania\, SEIU 32BJ\, Wind of the Spirit\, Working Families Alliance NJ\, New Jersey-Delaware Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild. URL:https://www.metuchendemocrats.org/event/recess-resistance-immigrant-rights-day-of-action/ END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T120000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T130000 DTSTAMP:20170215T013725Z CREATED:20170215T013725Z LAST-MODIFIED:20170215T013725Z UID:637-1487851200-1487854800@www.metuchendemocrats.org SUMMARY:D.I.R.E Meeting DESCRIPTION:Event Source: InterFaith Rise\nInterFaith Rise is helping form a rapid response team in Middlesex County. Thursday\, February 23rd\, is the first meeting of D.I.R.E. It will be held at 12 noon in the Reformed Church in HP parlor. You can call in at 605-475-4850 code 5897 if you are interested in hearing our conversation but cannot attend.\nSign up information in the website link below: http://www.direteam.org/\nD.I.R.E is a rapid response team that is local to Middlesex County but part of a network of Rapid Response Teams being planned in partnership with Faith In New Jersey.\nThe goal of D.I.R.E is to run interference between ICE and its Enforcement & Removal Operations in our communities.\nWe will… \n\nform text/app systems for communicating emergencies while they are occurring.\ncreate an ‘army’ of concerned citizens who will rush to places of crisis to bear witness\, take video and offer support to victims and families.\nInform the news media immediately if ICE is hurting members of our community.\npush for towns to use their NIXEL systems to inform communities of ICE/ERO action in their neighborhoods.\nencourage school boards\, municipalities etc…to adopt Sanctuary City resolutions that disconnect them from the work of ICE/ERO.\ncreate a media\, social media nightmare for the President in the aftermath of any raid or detention of a resident in our community.\nspeak truth to power.\npush our legislators to introduce real immigration reform based on the Senate bi-partisan plan from 2012.\nwork with attorneys to seek legal responses to the Executive Order.\naccompany immigrants to scheduled appointments with ICE. URL:https://www.metuchendemocrats.org/event/d-i-r-e-meeting/ LOCATION:Reformed Church of Highland Park\, 19 S 2nd Ave\, Highland Park\, NJ\, 08904-2238\, United States ATTACH;FMTTYPE=: END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T133000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T150000 DTSTAMP:20170223T012230Z CREATED:20170223T012230Z LAST-MODIFIED:20170223T012230Z UID:756-1487856600-1487862000@www.metuchendemocrats.org SUMMARY:Rally Thursday to Stop Assault on EPA DESCRIPTION:Join with us this Thursday\, February 23rd as Congressman Frank Pallone Jr.\, the New Jersey Sierra Club and activists come together against the attack on the EPA and President Trump’s environmental rollbacks. We are coming together to oppose Scott Pruitt as the new Administrator and stop him from dismantling the EPA. We will rally to defend the EPA’s vital programs to ensure we have clean air\, safe drinking water and are taking immediate action on climate change. Our event will demand the Trump Administration continues to clean-up New Jersey’s toxic sites\, protect our waterways\, and stop any plans to drill off our coasts or on public lands.\nThe event will be held outside the EPA’s Region 2 Laboratory and Environment Center in Edison\, New Jersey\, since the lab and its staff could be impacted by the Trump Administration’s cuts. The rally will begin at 2:00 PM on Thursday\, February 23rd at 2890 Woodbridge Ave in Edison\, NJ 08837. Please arrive early to find parking.\nRSVP and more information: Jamie Zaccaria at jamie.zaccaria@sierraclub.org URL:https://www.metuchendemocrats.org/event/rally-thursday-to-stop-assault-on-epa/ LOCATION:2890 Woodbridge Ave in Edison\, NJ 08837 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T160000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T210000 DTSTAMP:20170212T200348Z CREATED:20170212T200348Z LAST-MODIFIED:20170212T200348Z UID:565-1487865600-1487883600@www.metuchendemocrats.org SUMMARY:Resisting the Trump Administration: A Teach-In for Action DESCRIPTION:Resisting the Trump Administration: A Teach-In for Action Sponsored by Rutgers AAUP-AFT and The United Methodist Church at New Brunswick \nPanels with Rutgers Faculty\, Students\, and the New Brunswick Community\nAudience Participation\nOrganizing Breakout Sessions\nFebruary-23-Teach-In-Flyer URL:https://www.metuchendemocrats.org/event/resisting-the-trump-administration-a-teach-in-for-action-sponsored-by-rutgers-aaup-aft-and-the-united-methodist-church-at-new-brunswick/ LOCATION:United Methodist Church\, 323 George St\, New Brunswick\, NJ\, United States ATTACH;FMTTYPE=: END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T174500 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T193000 DTSTAMP:20170223T031114Z CREATED:20170223T031114Z LAST-MODIFIED:20170223T031114Z UID:778-1487871900-1487878200@www.metuchendemocrats.org SUMMARY:Demand Hudson County Stop Detaining Immigrants and End 287(g)! DESCRIPTION:Hudson County currently detains 618 immigrant detainees in its county jail and has a cooperation agreement with ICE to carry out the deportation priorities set by Trump.\nJoin us Thursday at 5:45 PM at the Hudson County freeholders meeting to express our opposition to the county’s 287(g) agreement\, which deputizes Hudson Corrections Officers to function as ICE officers\, and demand that DeGise end the contract with ICE for detaining immigrants in the County Jail for profit. While it is the County Executive Tom DeGise\, not the Freeholders\, who has the authority to terminate this agreement\, we need to educate the Freeholders about the misstatements that DeGise made during his State of the County address last week. Read our op-ed published in the Jersey Journal: http://www.nj.com/opinion/index.ssf/2017/02/pact_means_hudson_county_obligated_to_carry_out_tr.html\nIn last week’s State of the County address\, Hudson County Executive Tom DeGise attempted to defend his decision in July of 2016 to renew the County’s 287(g) agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). In this morally suspect and poorly conceived attempt\, DeGise made so many factually incorrect assertions that the only conclusion is that he either deliberately lied or fundamentally misunderstands the legal implications of the 287(g) agreement he authorized.\nThe bottom line is that 287(g) agreements deputize local law enforcement to act as ICE officers and participate in the processing and deportation of Hudson County’s immigrant communities. These agreements have nothing to do with setting standards or priorities for who to target. DeGise’s claim that the County’s 287(g) agreement “narrow the category of individuals who may be flagged for an ICE detainer to only those who pose a meaningful threat to public safety” is patently false.\nIn reality\, the County’s 287(g) agreement now requires the County to carry out Trump’s Executive Order 13768\, targeting nearly all immigrants\, including those whom have been merely charged but not convicted of a crime\, and those whom ICE merely suspects of criminal activity.\nThe term “287(g)” refers to Section 287(g) of the federal Immigration and Nationality Act (INA)\, which allows\, but does not require\, state or local governments to enter into a contract with ICE pursuant to which local law enforcement officers perform the function of immigration officers at the expense of the state or local government.\nHudson County’s 287(g) agreement with ICE deputizes County Corrections Officers at the County Jail to function as ICE officers – to interrogate\, charge\, and detain any immigrant detained at the jail – all at the expense of Hudson County taxpayers. In this remark\, Hudson County is an anti-immigrant outlier in New Jersey; only two of New Jersey’s twenty other counties – Salem and Monmouth – also have 287(g) agreements.\nNeither Section 287(g) of the INA nor the text of Hudson’s 287(g) agreement set any standards for prioritizing which individuals to target. Instead\, these priorities are set by the Executive Branch – first Secure Communities\, then the Priorities Enforcement Program (PEP)\, and now Trump’s EO 13768.\nDeGise claimed that Hudson’s 287(g) agreement operates under PEP standards set by President Obama\, but he failed to mention that Trump’s EO 13768 abolished PEP and replaced it with a set of priorities that targets almost everyone\, including immigrants who have been merely charged but not convicted of a crime\, and those whom have not been charged with any crime but ICE merely suspects of having committed a crime. The Department of Homeland Security issued a memo to implement EO 13768 on February 17\, which lists these priorities and states\, that DHS “no longer will exempt classes or categories of removable aliens from potential enforcement.”\nThe County’s 287(g) agreement explicitly states that the Hudson County Department of Corrections “shall follow ICE’s civil immigration enforcement priorities\,” which means that Hudson County is now legally obligated to carry out Trump’s Executive Order.\nTherefore\, when DeGise falsely claimed that Hudson has the right under law to “continue to operate 287(g) under the standard we signed on for — the Obama standard\,” he was either deliberately lying or has no idea how 287(g) works. Hudson County Corrections Officers are now legally bound\, deputized agents of the Trump Administration’s “deportation force.”\nSo why did DeGise defend this immoral\, heartless\, and indefensible program? Perhaps because Hudson County pairs its 287(g) agreement with a contract with ICE by which ICE pays the County to detain immigrants in the county jail. The County profits financially\, when\, rather than being released\, immigrants whose criminal charges are dismissed or otherwise resolved continue to be held on immigration matters. The County’s 2016 budget reveals that in Fiscal Year 2015 the County received $20.5 million from the federal government for incarcerating immigrant detainees.\nOver the past year\, the number of immigrant detainees has increased from about 450 to about 618. Simultaneously\, since January 1 of this year\, the number of criminal defendants detained in the jail pretrial has decreased to 550 under the State’s new pretrial release law. It seems that Hudson County is in a race to fill empty criminal defendant beds with immigrant detainees to collect federal cash.Yet DeGise mentioned none of this in his address.\nIn short\, DeGise:\n Falsely claimed that the reach of 287(g) is limited to a “tiny number of very dangerous individuals”;\n Falsely claimed that the priority enforcement standards set by President Obama are still in effect;\n Falsely claimed that Hudson County has the right to continue to operate 287(g) under the Obama standards; and\n Failed to disclose that 287(g) is a tool to funnel immigrants into detention beds to fill the County’s purse.\nAs noted by advocates in a March 2016 Letter to the Editor\, 287(g) “denies immigrants due process rights\, funnels them into detention and deportation and tears apart vulnerable families.” Hudson County residents demand that the County immediately end 287(g) and its immigrant detention contract with ICE because under it our County is legally obligated to carry out the racist\, anti-immigrant\, anti-Muslim policies of Donald Trump. URL:https://www.metuchendemocrats.org/event/demand-hudson-county-stop-detaining-immigrants-and-end-287g/ LOCATION:Hudson County Board Of Chosen Freeholders\, 567 Pavonia Ave\, Jersey City\, NJ\, 07306\, United States END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T183000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T203000 DTSTAMP:20170218T035202Z CREATED:20170218T035202Z LAST-MODIFIED:20170218T035202Z UID:695-1487874600-1487881800@www.metuchendemocrats.org SUMMARY:Town Hall: Donald Norcross DESCRIPTION:Register at Link or call 856-216-2119.\nPlease join us for an evening with your elected officials from all levels of government. Hear from elected officials about current initiatives\, services and priorities followed by a Q&A session. All county residents are welcome!\nFollowing the town hall meeting will be a services fair with one-on-one help from: \n\nConstituent Services\nVeterans Affairs\nSenior Services\nHealth & Human Services\nOne-Stop Employment Center\nAnd more! URL:https://www.metuchendemocrats.org/event/town-hall-donald-norcross/ LOCATION:500 White Horse Pike\, Oaklyn\, NJ 08107 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T190000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T210000 DTSTAMP:20170214T015532Z CREATED:20170214T015532Z LAST-MODIFIED:20170214T015532Z UID:617-1487876400-1487883600@www.metuchendemocrats.org SUMMARY:Congressman Tom MacArthur (R-3) Tele-Town Hall DESCRIPTION:Call in to Congressman Tom MacArthur’s (R-3) Tele-Town Hall on WOBM 92.7. Call in 732-237-9626 URL:https://www.metuchendemocrats.org/event/congressman-tom-macarthur-r-3-tele-town-hall/ END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T190000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20170223T210000 DTSTAMP:20170218T033031Z CREATED:20170218T033031Z LAST-MODIFIED:20170218T033031Z UID:682-1487876400-1487883600@www.metuchendemocrats.org SUMMARY:What would you like to share with your Congressman? Essex County DESCRIPTION:For details\, click here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/what-would-you-like-to-share-with-your-congressman-essex-county-tickets-31934233151\nAn open invitation to Congressman Frelinghuysen to address the concerns of his constituents in Essex County.\nRep. Rodney Frelinghuysen says that he values constituent contact and makes it “a priority to meet regularly with constituents.” However\, he has not held a town hall since 2013.\nWe invite Rep. Frelinghuysen to meet with us\, the voters of Essex County\, at a town hall meeting on February 23rd\, 7 PM\, at Temple B’nai Abraham in Livinston (please note change of venue). Please come with questions for the Congressman.\nIn addition to inviting the Congressman\, each town hall will feature a panel of speakers including elected officials from the region and policy experts in health care\, the environment\, immigration\, veterans affairs\, fiscal concerns\, and other issues to address constituent questions.\nThis town hall is part of a series of four events\, one for each county represented in the 11th Congressional District. Join us and let Congressman Frelinghuysen know that voters in all four counties are looking for opportunities to speak with him and for answers to their questions. If possible\, please attend the town hall in your home county.\n  URL:https://www.metuchendemocrats.org/event/what-would-you-like-to-share-with-your-congressman-essex-county/ LOCATION:Temple B'nai Abraham – 300 E. Northfield Road – Livingston\, NJ 07039 END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR