Take Action Now!
Want to make a difference but not sure how? These one-time actions are a great place to start.
Now: RAC-TX Legislative Advocacy: Democracy Protection + Racial Justice- Despite the passage of HB6+SB7, the bills we're organizing against, our advocacy has made an impact. See the end of the email for more details!
- For Everyone: Join the RAC-TX 2021 Democracy Protection Campaign. We continue to meet with our legislators to advocate for voting rights, specifically against HB6 and SB7. Though SB7 has passed the House, there may be a conference committee to whom we can advocate. To continue our important work, please sign up to join the democracy protection campaign.
- For Teens (and allies): Join the RAC-TX 2021 Racial Justice Campaign. Sign up to receive RAC-TX updates and be notified when issue briefings are scheduled.
5/20, 3:30 PM: HIAS National Celebration and Next Steps
• Join HIAS Grassroots National for a gathering and celebration to review what we’ve accomplished so far and begin to plan our next steps together. Register at the zoom link here.
• Thank you to volunteers who worked on the HIAS Lobby efforts. We contacted Austin-area Members of Congress through virtual meetings and provided videos and written materials that show our support for Refugees and Asylum Seekers:
Sandy Dochen, Merle Dover, Lea Isgur, Lora Ann Gerson, Rachel Gunner, Bettie Forman, Stan Adelman, Adam Orman, and Carol Brown.
Thank you, Team!
• If you want more info on the HIAS Grassroots National group and our monthly meetings, call or text Nancy Wolf (512-917-3731, nwolf1000@gmail.com).
Now: Refugee Donations Requested
With the news of refugees at the border and concern over their welfare, there are many opportunities to participate and make a difference. The charities are asking for monetary donations rather than goods which are difficult to sort and disperse.
Central Texas:- Donations to Refugee Fund: Anyone who can contribute (from either congregation) can give to the Refugee Task Force Fund on the Temple Beth Shalom website or contact Russ Apfel.
- Food Deliveries for Refugees: Anyone interested in providing food to an asylum-seeking family on a bi-weekly basis (directly or through a donation) can contact Cathy Campbell.
- Refugee Services of Texas reports that asylum seeker support services in Austin are overwhelmed. Because families are being treated humanely and released after a day or two of processing at the border, non-profits in Texas that are assisting asylum-seekers will need more resources. Contact Ahmed Abbas at RST by email at Aabbas@rstx.org to assist. Monetary donations and legal assistance are needed.
At the Border:- In El Paso, Annunciation House has been helping migrants for 43 years by providing shelter, basic necessities, and education. Annunciation House has a 100,000 square foot facility that provides housing and meals until transportation to their families can be made. Donations are needed and all funds go to housing these families. Donate at annunciationhouse.org.
- In McAllen, URJ Temple Emanuel is collecting monetary donations to support the work of the Catholic Charities of the Rio Grande Valley’s Respite Center which provides vital support to newly arrived immigrants and asylum seekers. Donate at https://temple-emanuel.com/community/donations-payments/. (Select donation type of General Fund and then specify in the Comment box that your donation is for Catholic Charities Respite Center.)
Temple Beth Shalom Congregants: We're surveying experiences of antisemitism to share within our community. Please share here.
Join a Movement!
Change happens person by person. Our community social justice leaders would love to talk to you about how we can make it happen, together.
Religious Action Center - Texas (RAC-TX)
• Email Rabbi David Segal, Liz Mitlak (CBI), or Sandy Dochen (TBS) to get involved, or learn more about our main issue, Democracy Protection, here.
• RAC-TX advocates for our Jewish values at a statewide level with other Reform congregations. We have no set ideology, and our policy priorities are determined entirely by Reform Jewish congregations across Texas. We make our voice heard with our community.
HIAS Jews for Refugees
• Check with Russ Apfel and Cathy Campbell for updates on the Temple Beth Shalom Refugee Task Force, Austin Sanctuary Network, and refugee activities at CBI. They work closely with Ahmed Abbas, the asylum caseworker at Refugee Services Texas. For more info about HIAS contact Nancy Wolf or click here.
• Founded as the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society in 1881 to assist Jews fleeing from progroms in Russia and Eastern Europe, HIAS has touched the life of nearly every Jewish family in America. These Jewish refugees were facing barriers of language, customs, discrimination, and even worse. Today HIAS continues to help refugees, no matter their religion, ethnicity, or nationality, to escape persecution and resettle in safety, reunite families who have been separated, and help them build new lives all around the world.
Refugee Services of Texas (RST) partners with Temple Beth Shalom and Congregation Beth Israel
• RST is the largest refuge resettlement agency in Texas and has worked with TBS and CBI for several years on a number of projects including Welcome Teams, apartment set-ups, the Asylum Seekers Assistance Program (ASAP), the Shalom Supper, a winter clothing drive, and support for survivors of trafficking. There are many volunteer opportunities through RST which can be found at their monthly newsletter: What's happening at RST (mailchi.mp).
Advocates for Social Justice Reform
• Email Bob Batlan at asjraustin@gmail.com or Rachel Gunner at rachelgunner@hotmail.com to join or learn more here.
• Next meeting: 5/17, at 10:00 a.m.
• ASJR is a local advocacy group focusing on issues surrounding criminal justice reform, especially indigent defense, or representation of the poorest defendants. We focus on developing positive relationships with government officials, community leaders, diverse fellow advocates, and people impacted by the criminal legal system. This approach helped lead to the creation of the Travis County Public Defender's Office.
• Current main projects: Gaining approval for and securing funding of legal representation at or before first court appearance (magistration). Supporting County Attorney and District Attorney actions to evaluate cases for dismissal prior to magistration, and joining with officials and the community to provide services that will prevent people from facing the legal system in the first place. These improvements can minimize the disruption to people's lives at the earliest possible moment. To this end, we have spoken before Commissioner’s Court requesting funding to meet that need. We have a subgroup working on policing reform. We are meeting with Sheriff Hernandez concerning a new Women’s Jail.
Texas Anti-Poverty Project
• Email Larkin Tackett at larkin.tackett@gmail.com to join or learn more here.
• Next Meeting: 5/19, 10:30 AM
• Advocate for living wages in Austin by focusing on access to high-paying jobs at the new Telsa giga-factory, for our neighbors experiencing poverty.
MLK Continued Conversations
• Conversations on diversity, equity, + inclusion as individuals + community
• If you are interested in watching the videos from the first two session on implicit bias, they are available to view below:
o Session 2 full video
o Implicit Bias
o Why We're Awkward
o Four i's of Oppression video
o MLK Discussion Guide
o Identity Mining Worksheet
o Bias Recognition Worksheeto Session 3 video Resources to support Asian-American communities, in response to the wave of hate crimes, accessible here. Thanks to a community-wide effort for making this possible.
A Word from Your Social Justice CoordinatorShalom y’all,
These past couple weeks have not been great for voting rights, to be up front with y’all. There are less than three weeks left in the Texas Legislature, so this note is an update on how that’s going. My surprising answer is: as well as we could have hoped for!
In response to the historically well-executed 2020 election, agreed by partisans of all stripes to have been the most secure and highest-turnout election of our lifetime, our state legislature has passed a bill that would suppress votes in every way imaginable. In a surprise move (that blindsided even the bill’s sponsors), HB6 was substituted and combined into SB7, both of which are all-encompassing voter suppression bills. They:
- Allow partisan poll watchers to record absolutely everything in a polling place except the voter screen itself, without recourse for poll workers to expel them
• Criminalize simple mistakes by poll workers and voter assistants, hamstringing essential help for non-English speakers and disabled voters
• Limit how and when we can vote
• Shorten voting hours
• Hamper mail ballot distribution
• Limit temporary polling sites
• End drive-through voting
• Allow candidates to sue their opponents for a new offense called “ballot harvesting,” with a vague definition and a lower standard of evidence (but don’t worry, there’s a similar criminal offense, as well).
This bill passed both the Texas House and Senate. Now either they pick one version to agree on (unlikely), or there will soon be a conference committee to agree on some compromise version.
Now, this may seem at odds with “as well as we could have hoped for.” Yet we knew going into this that voter suppressors had the votes to pass whatever they wanted. The opportunities for change were always in how and what that would look like, not whether that would happen.
At every point of the process, we and our allies have maximized pressure on HB6’s author, Rep. Briscoe Cain. Major businesses came out in opposition. Our rabbis spoke out particularly eloquently! And at every point of the process, we’ve forced errors. When the bill was heard in committee, Rep. Cain (also the committee chair) panic-adjourned the hearing. During the debate on the House floor, Rep. Cain admitted ignorance about racist language in his own bill about the “purity of the ballot box,” which was then stricken. Still, the use of Jim Crow-era language which led to all-white primaries resonated with bill opponents who point out that the kinds of voting banned by the bill are disproportionately non-white.
Because of all Rep. Cain’s procedural irregularities, voting rights supporters in the Texas House were able to call a “point of order,” which sends the bill back to committee to right procedural wrongs, effectively killing it. To avoid this, a 3 AM compromise was struck, reducing criminal penalties for election law violations and limiting criminal liability for honest mistakes made by voters and those who help them cast a ballot. To quote an opponent of the bill, "These took this bill from very ugly to just ugly.” That’s a win we should celebrate!
Without our pressure, the missteps that made those marginal improvements possible may never have happened. The quotes from Rep. Cain’s flubs on the floor of the House are all on the record for the inevitable lawsuit over these bills, and they do not help his case. Every link in the past two paragraphs is major news coverage spreading awareness of how bad these bills are. That lays the foundation for more of our nonpartisan Get Out The Vote outreach next fall, with an even easier ask: vote because they don’t want you to.
So like last time I mentioned the shameful voter suppression bills in the Texas Legislature, because of how singularly important our democracy is, this one has a direct ask: will you join our rapid response network in fighting back against voter suppression? The fight isn’t over yet - we can still make calls to the conference committee to pressure them, and we can make sure our entire community knows exactly what’s happening to our democracy, so that when the time comes, we can preserve it the only way we can: voting in spite of suppression.
As always, regardless of shul affiliation, the point of contact for every initiative listed would be happy to have your help. And if you simply want to ask how best to be an ally, or how we got here, please reply to this email, fill out the form above, or call me. My email is jason.austinsocialjustice@gmail.com, and my number is 469-834-9987.
Thank you!
L'shalom,
Jason Taper, Social Justice Coordinator
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