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Value Our Families Advocacy Toolkit

The Value Our Families Campaign exists to protect, preserve, and strengthen the family immigration system and promote an immigration system that is informed by love, empathy and justice. We are a network of local and national community-based and advocacy organizations who reject attacks and proposed harmful changes to our current family-based immigration system. We also will work together to build public support for an immigration system that protects and promotes family unity and contributes to the American social and economic fabric.

This Value Our Families Advocacy Toolkit provides a set of tools to help secular and faith groups take action and educate community members about the importance of family-based immigration.

Table of Contents

The Power of Advocacy        2

Where to Start: Team Building        4

How to Organize a Community Education Event        5

How to Prepare & Organize In District Advocacy Meetings        6

Advocacy Materials & Resources        8

Media & Outreach Resources        10

TAKE ACTION: Tell Congress to Protect Immigrant & Refugee Families, Uphold Family Unity        14

SAMPLE LOCAL WELCOME RESOLUTION        15

Sample Letter to State & Local Leaders        16

Additional Resources & Contact Information        18

The Power of Advocacy

What is Advocacy?

Effective advocacy enables immigrants and allies to shape the public narrative and political will, influence policy makers and people in power, and change hearts and minds on important immigrant and refugee rights issues. Advocacy helps to amplify voices of impacted communities and includes activities like public education, relationship-building with policy makers, voter registration, and media engagement. Advocacy can lead to systemic, lasting, positive change that helps people integrate and thrive in their communities.

Who You Are. Why You Care. What You Want.

It is more important than ever to meet with your local, state, and national policy makers to educate them about the vital role that immigrants and all newcomers play in your communities. Because change takes time, meetings with policy makers should be viewed as part of a continuing process of gathering and sharing information, building relationships, and developing and carrying out advocacy strategies. The Trump administration has issued a series of new policies and proposals to attack our immigration system, lowering the number of immigrants and refugees welcomed into the U.S., deporting as many people as possible and preventing others from naturalizing. With these changes, the administration sends a message of exclusion to families, immigrants, refugees, asylum seekers, and others seeking a safe place to call home. We need our national, state, and local elected leaders to hold the administration accountable and proactively seek policies that have a positive impact on people’s lives.

Building Power for Family Immigration

A good time to meet with your Members of Congress and/or their staff is during Congressional recesses when they are in their state and local offices to meet with constituents. Schedules fill up very quickly for these recess periods, so reach out to set up a meeting as soon as possible.

Be an Advocate

Developing relationships with, and educating policymakers is necessary if we want to see welcoming policies and attitudes toward immigrants and their family members. A powerful constituent visit involves impacted communities and allies who join together. Having a team of immigrant leaders, faith leaders, employers, and other community members who meet regularly is essential in building meaningful relationships with policy makers. It is important that policy makers understand that their constituents care about immigrants and their families and that immigrants are their constituents — they live, work, and contribute in their communities, may obtain U.S. citizenship, and may vote.

Your Voice Matters

Your story as an immigrant, part of a family of immigrants, or supporter of family immigration is your most important qualification as an advocate. Talk about the way your community welcomes immigrants and the positive contributions they make to your community. Tell policy makers that you care about immigrants and they will increasingly vote to support humane and moral immigration policies and family-based immigration.

Engaging National and State Elected Leaders

At the national and state levels, individuals who oppose immigrants’ rights are making their voices heard loudly and frequently to policy makers. These groups utilize anti-immigrant, anti-refugee, anti-family, and anti-Muslim rhetoric and draft legislation to engender fear and foster hostile atmospheres for newcomers. If we want policy makers to support positive legislation and oppose proposals that would turn our backs on immigrants and violate our values of welcome and hospitality, then they need to hear from immigrants, their families, and supportive community members.

Engaging Local Policy Makers

There are positive proposals that local elected officials can adopt to affirm the importance of family immigration and foster communities of welcome. City, municipal, and other local councils and commissions need to hear that their communities stand ready to welcome and help immigrants integrate and thrive. Urge your local leaders to adopt welcoming resolutions that extend hospitality to immigrants and all newcomers.

Build Communities of Welcome

Families are the basic unit of strong communities. Hosting community or congregational events, interfaith vigils, or events at school provides the opportunity for impacted individuals, people of faith, and community members to express how welcoming immigrants is part of our nation’s shared values and community traditions. Interfaith events offer an opportunity to reflect on the deep scriptural and spiritual roots of our work to support immigrants and refugees. Click here to see a framework The United Methodist Church General Board of Church & Society developed to build and facilitate welcome and inclusiveness of immigrants and refugees.

Where to Start: Team Building

The art of team building is a critical component to advocacy. Team building brings together diverse voices – such as first-generation immigrants, faith leaders, resettlement staff, refugee leaders, concerned community members and others – who speak to the importance of welcome and helping immigrant families integrate and thrive from several perspectives. This is how you can get started in creating and sustaining teams of people who can take action together for change.

Visualizing Team Building

How Do I Build a Team?

Step 1: Internal Assessment

What are you passionate about? Why? What in your life journey has brought about this passion?

What policy changes (national and local) would you and your community like to see?

How could you see your community working to be part of bringing that change about?

What does being an “advocate” mean to you?

Step 2: One on One Relationship Building

Face to face meeting in a mutually preferred location

Intentional conversation, not an interview

Listening for passion, vision, stories -- what in their life story has led them to care about these issues?

Work together to identify other people who would be interested in joining you

Each agree to reach out to people who share your vision and help build / energize a team

Step 3: Grow Your Team

Who else might care and be interested?

Ask each person to reach out to 3-5 more people and have one-on-one meetings

Set a timeline for a team meeting

Step 4: Bring the Team Together

Goal: bring together a solid group of 8-20 people

Create a common vision: what are our hopes and expectations?

Create an action plan: How do we build toward bringing that vision to life?

Who are natural allies who can be energized into being advocates and champions?

Identify next steps, including ways to engage with policy makers and other influential people.

For more information on how to engage in organizing and teambuilding, click here.

Connect with immigrants and refugee rights groups near you: https://www.informedimmigrant.com/.

How to Organize a Community Education Event

There are countless opportunities for you to create a team that represents an important sector of the community that supports immigrants and family immigration. By convening a group of individuals together to speak to their individual and collective reasons for supporting immigrants and families in their community, you can amplify individual support for immigrants into a strong unified message. We encourage you to bring together a diverse group of individuals, from all walks of life and industries, not forgetting to include immigrants themselves, to meet with local and national leaders.

Host Community Education Event or Interfaith Vigil

Mobilizing actions or vigils at strategic locations, such as at ICE, CBP, or local Representatives and Senators offices are important for sustained opposition to family separation and the ban on asylum seekers at the southern border. Hosting events like interfaith vigils also provide the opportunity for faith leaders to express how welcoming immigrants is part of all faith traditions, reflecting on the deep scriptural and spiritual roots of our work to support immigrants. Even small events, multiplied across the country, will send a powerful message to the Trump administration and Congress that upholding family unity and welcoming immigrants is a moral issue that is important to people of faith and conscience.

Click here for an interfaith vigil toolkit on family unity.

Rapid Response Actions

Rapid response must be done extremely quickly (within 24-48 hours of the news) to effectively share a bold voice that is relevant to the news media cycle. Click here for an interfaith vigil toolkit on family unity with template agendas, advisories, and releases. Here are some tips for rapid response mobilizations:

Don’t forget to invite your Member of Congress and send information to their local and DC offices!

How to Prepare & Organize In-District Advocacy Meetings

It is more important than ever to meet with your local, state, and national policy makers to educate them about the vital role that immigrants and all newcomers play in your communities. Because the process of change takes time, meetings with policy makers should be viewed as part of a continuing process of gathering and sharing information, building relationships, and developing and carrying out advocacy strategies. A good time to meet with your Members of Congress and/or their staff is during Congressional recesses when they are in their states and local offices. Calendars of in-district time can be found here for the Senate and House of Representatives. Schedules fill up very quickly for these recess periods, so reach out as soon as possible.

Steps to Prepare and Organize Your Meeting

1. Create an advocacy team: An ideal team consists of different stakeholder voices such as impacted individuals (immigrants, family members), immigrants’ rights advocates, faith leaders, business leaders, military veterans, and community leaders who can all share in the planning, outreach, and coordination of advocacy actions and speak to the diversity of support for family immigration. Convene in advance to discuss current relationships with policy makers, goals, asks for the meeting, what you want to learn, and an agenda for a successful meeting.

2. Learn about your elected officials: Are your Members of Congress in Congressional leadership, or on the Senate or House Appropriations Committees; Senate or House Judiciary Committees; Senate or House Homeland Security Committees; or Senate or House Foreign Relations Committees? If so, they have jurisdiction over various aspects of the refugee program. Even if they aren’t in leadership or on these committees, their vote is still important, and they can still be champions for refugees. Note: To learn more about your governor, state legislators, mayor, and local officials, click here.

3. Have a plan: Before you enter an advocacy visit, meet with your group beforehand to assign roles:

4. Debrief: It’s important to debrief as a team in a separate location following the meeting. As a group, ask: What did we hear and learn? Did we get what we wanted? How did we work together as a team? What are the next steps? How can we engage this policy maker in the future, perhaps through event invitations, etc.? Share your reflections with Value Our Families' advocacy staff (see last page for contact information).

5. Follow-up: Send a thank you email to the staff after the meeting with any information they asked for and any other relevant information you think would be helpful. Inviting the staff and/or official to an upcoming event to meet with immigrants is an excellent next step!

Advocacy Materials & Resources

The Trump administration has issued a series of new policies and proposals to administratively attack our immigration system, lowering the number of immigrants and refugees welcomed into the U.S., deporting as many people as possible and preventing others from naturalizing. For example, the proposed public charge rule attacks our family-based immigration system, moving us away from a country where people from all backgrounds can seek a better life and towards a system that treats people like commodities. Many of the administrative changes have created an atmosphere of mistrust across agencies that is terrifying immigrants from interacting with their government. For a backgrounder on the impact these harmful administrative changes have had on immigrant families, please click here.

Advocacy Folder: Click here to access materials for meetings with national, state, and local policy makers.

Talking Points

Frequently Asked Questions

Source: National Immigration Forum, https://immigrationforum.org/article/fact-sheet-family-based-immigration/

(1) What is family-based immigration?

Family immigration is the primary basis for immigration to the United States. Our current family-based immigration system was established by the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 to end the previous racist national origin quotas which heavily favored immigrants from Northern and Western Europe and that began with the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. Under current immigration law, U.S. citizens and lawful permanent residents (LPRs) can sponsor certain family members for a visa that provides permanent residence, also known as a “green card.” Today, family visas account for about 65 percent of immigration visas each year.

(2) Who is eligible for a family visa?

Immediate relatives: 1) spouses of U.S. citizens; 2) unmarried children under 21 of U.S. citizens; 3) orphans adopted abroad, 4) orphans to be adopted in the U.S., by U.S. citizens; and 5) parents of U.S. citizens who are at least 21 years old.

Family preference categories: 1) unmarried sons and daughters of U.S. citizens, their spouses and their children; 2) spouses, minor children and unmarried sons and daughters over 21 of LPRs; 3) married sons and daughters of U.S. citizens and their spouses and minor children and 4) brothers and sisters of U.S. citizens, and their spouses and minor children, provided the U.S. citizens are at least 21 years old.

Most people who come to the U.S. through family immigration are spouses and children of U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents. In 2015, spouses and children accounted for 69% of family immigration and 44% of total immigration.

Note: U.S. citizens and LPRs cannot sponsor other family members such as grandparents, aunts, uncles, in-laws and cousins for immigration.

(3) How many relatives does an immigrant typically sponsor?

3.5 relatives. In past decades, each immigrant has typically sponsored an average of approximately 3.5 relatives, which includes spouses and children.

(4) What are the requirements for family visas?

Sponsor in the U.S., application, numerous screenings and background checks, interview, fee and medical examination. The sponsor must also submit a signed affidavit of support stating that he or she will be financially responsible for the applicant(s).

(5) Are there any problems with the family immigration system?

Yes. It can take years or even decades for a family member to get their visa. There is a maximum of 480,000 family visas per fiscal year and 7 percent cap each year for family visas issued for each country. These limits, combined with high demand, create substantial backlogs in most of the family preference categories. In FY 2017, there was a 35% increase in the backlog of non-immediate family petitions.

Media & Outreach Resources

Publishing opinion editorials (op-eds) and letters to the editor (LTEs) are a great way to get the attention of the administration and your Members of Congress. But first, you need to write a piece that tells your story – not just the facts.

  1. Call on the Trump administration and your Member of Congress (by name!) to defend our values, uphold family unity, and ensure family-based immigration is protected.
  2. For people of faith, include your faith tradition, scriptural grounding, and congregational affiliation to demonstrate your connection to the community.
  3. Here is a messaging memo and talking points on family immigration and the Value Our Families Communications Toolkit for template language, pitching instructions, and additional guidance.
  4. Let us know if you get published by sending a link and the text of your media piece to Bilal Askaryar at media@cwsglobal.org, so that we can share these with your Member of Congress.

If you would like support writing, pitching, or placing a faith leader piece, please reach out to Bilal Askaryar at media@cwsglobal.org.

Opinion Editorials (Op-Eds)

Op-Ed Quick Facts:

Op-Ed Template:

(Borrowed from Op-Ed Project)

  1. Lede -- What’s the news hook? Why should we care about this topic?
  2. Thesis -- What is your piece about?
  3. Argument -- What do you know based on evidence, stories, first-hand experience?
  4. 1st Point
  5. 2nd Point
  6. 3rd Point
  7. “To Be Sure” paragraph -- address any potential flaws or counter-arguments
  8. Conclusion -- Circle back to your lede

Sample Op-Eds:

Letters to the Editor (LTEs)

LTE Quick Facts:

LTE Template:

Opening: Reference the article you are responding to and point out the statement or topic that you agree or disagree with.

Body: Describe why you agree or disagree with the statement or topic discussed. Be sure to include anecdotes or facts and statistics to back up your claim. You can also devote this purely to expressing your opinion on the topic.

Conclusion: Your resolution to the problem at-hand or a call to action.

Draft Pitch Email for Media Invitation and Follow Up from Advisory

Hello,

I hope you are well! I wanted to let you know of a potential story opportunity in regards to immigrant families in CITY/STATE. On DATE, ORGANIZATION will host a [EVENT TYPE, ie: welcoming dinner] with immigrants from COUNTRIES. Joining together in a MEAL/DISCUSSION, community leaders including LIST, will join immigrant families to create a welcoming community and uphold family unity.

We would like to highlight the human stories behind the family based immigration program, particularly how families and faith communities are impacted by the political debate and various policy proposals. Given your past articles highlighting refugees/immigrants, I would love to offer you an exclusive interview with the group next DATE if you are interested.

I have attached the invitation flyer to this email with a full list of individuals in the group, but please let me know if you are interested or if you have any questions.

Sincerely,

NAME

Draft Pitch Email for Op-Ed

Dear Editor,

As U.S. policies undermine our nation’s commitment to family unity, our ORGANIZATION/CONGREGATION is working with immigrant families and doing our part to create a welcoming community. Serving as a leader with ORGANIZATION, I had the unique opportunity to host/attend EVENT, (include brief details).

The event inspired me to author the attached op-ed, detailing my experience and reaffirming the need for us all to work together and create an inclusive community. In light of recent anti-immigrant, anti-family, and anti-refugee rhetoric in particular, this piece offers a timely response and highlights the urgent need to create a welcoming place for all people.

Please feel free to contact me at EMAIL or over the phone at PHONE NUMBER if you have any questions or would like to discuss the piece in greater detail. Thank you in advance for your consideration!

Sincerely,

NAME

Sample Social Media

  1. “Like” Value Our Families on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/valueourfamilies/
  2. Follow VOF partners on Facebook and Twitter: List of organizations and social media handles here
  3. Use #ValueOurFamilies to join the conversation on social media

Social Media Tactics:

Example: VOF Public Charge Digital Week of Action

Sample Facebook Posts from the 2018 Election Cycle:

Sample Twitter Posts from the 2018 Election Cycle:

Today is National #CitizenshipDay, but the Trump admin is scapegoating our communities & keeping our families apart. Let’s remind Congress members to #ValueOurFamilies this November, and READ more about the harmful proposals to eliminate family immigration https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/immigration/2018/09/06/trump-wants-slash-family-based-immigration-banning-parents-siblings-and-adult-children/341832002/

Spokesperson + Story Collection

Powerful personal stories are key to shifting the narrative to reflect our values and priorities. Every advocacy campaign needs to develop strong messengers who can deliver powerful personal stories in a way that connects to our desired policy change.

Value Our Families online story collection form: https://goo.gl/uakK97

Sample story collection outreach email:

Value Our Families: Share Your Immigration Story

We want to hear your family stories and how you, your parents, or your grandparents came to the U.S.! We are collecting stories as part of the #ValueOurFamilies campaign. The campaign seeks to protect, preserve, and strengthen the family immigration system and promote an immigration system that is informed by love, empathy, and justice. We want to share how your story--and the amazing stories from tens of thousands of others--have contributed to the greatness in America.

Value Our Families is a network of local and national community-based and advocacy organizations who fight back against attacks and harmful changes that would block immigrant families from reuniting. We also build public support for an immigration system that protects and promotes family unity and strong communities.

We want to lift up positive family immigration stories to contrast the fear mongering narratives that Trump uses against our families at the national level. We must highlight our personal stories, whether we are first- or second-generation immigrants or refugees, affected by the horrific Muslim ban, the new public charge rule, the attacks on DACA, or Trump’s deportation force. We know that when families are together we have stronger communities and thriving economies.

We are looking for stories and spokespeople to uplift our diverse immigration experiences, including how immigrant families contribute to our country and how family members support each other. With your permission, stories may be shared on social media, with reporters, or with members of Congress. We can share your story with your full name, first name only, a pseudonym, or anonymously. But we will work with you to make sure your story is told your way.

Please use our story collection form or contact Monica at info@valueourfamilies.org if you have any questions or need additional information. Thank you for your support!

TAKE ACTION: Tell Congress to Protect Immigrant & Refugee Families, Uphold Family Unity

Background: Families are the foundation of our communities, and as a nation, we believe in the importance of family unity. The Trump administration has issued a series of new policies and proposals to attack our immigration system, lowering the number of immigrants and refugees welcomed into the U.S., deporting as many people as possible and preventing others from naturalizing. With these changes, the administration sends a message of exclusion to families, immigrants, refugees, asylum seekers, and others seeking a safe place to call home. We need our national, state, and local elected leaders to hold the administration accountable and proactively seek policies that have a positive impact on people’s lives. It is critical that we make our voices heard and tell our elected leaders to stop family separation and protect family unity.

CALL YOUR SENATORS & REPRESENTATIVES: Call (202) 224-3121*

*Call 3 times to be connected to your 2 Senators and 1 Representative

Sample Script: "I'm your constituent from [CITY/TOWN], and [as a person of faith], I urge you to honor all of our neighbors by supporting policies that protect and unite refugee and immigrant families and to reject efforts to curtail family immigration. I call on you to hold the administration accountable for processing family reunification cases and oppose any family, asylum, or refugee ban. Please also protect the refugee resettlement program and do everything in your power to see the administration resettle at least this year’s refugee admissions goal of 30,000 - the lowest in U.S. history - and commit to resettle at least 95,000 refugees in FY 2020. I value family unity and believe Congress should act to bring families together, not keep them apart.”

Amplify on Social Media: Don’t forget to share the same message with your Senators & Representatives on social media! Here are sample posts for Twitter:

For a social media and communications toolkit with more sample posts and graphics, please click here.

SAMPLE LOCAL WELCOME RESOLUTION

RESOLUTION RECOGNIZING THE CITY/COUNTY OF [NAME] AS A WELCOMING CITY/COUNTY THAT CELEBRATES THE GROWING DIVERSITY OF ITS RESIDENTS AND ACKNOWLEDGES THAT REFUGEES, IMMIGRANTS, AND ALL NEWCOMERS ENHANCE THE CULTURE AND THE ECONOMY

WHEREAS, fostering a welcoming environment for all individuals, regardless of race, ethnicity, or place of origin, enhances [STATE/LOCALITY] cultural fabric, economic growth, global competitiveness, and overall prosperity for current and future generations;

WHEREAS, there are more than 68 million displaced people that have been forced from their homes, more than any time in recorded history, including over 25 million refugees;

WHEREAS, millions of refugees – regardless of faith or country of origin – are making life and death decisions to flee their homes and neighboring countries because they are unable to access shelter, health care, education, or protection, and neighboring countries have either closed their borders to new arrivals or violence persists in those countries as well;

WHEREAS, the [City/County] of [Name] is home to a diverse population of refugees and immigrants, adding to the economic strength and cultural richness of our community;

WHEREAS, organizations responsible for resettling refugees in our community, as well as numerous other community organizations and religious institutions, have declared their support for resettling refugees and welcoming immigrants in [CITY];

WHEREAS, the [City/County] of [Name] has been an example of a hospitable and welcoming place to all newcomers, where people, families, and institutions thrive and the contributions of all are celebrated and valued;

WHEREAS, cities across the United States have declared themselves to be welcoming to refugees and immigrants, joining a national movement for creating an inclusive community;

WHEREAS, residents of [City/County] of [Name] aspire to live up to our highest societal values of acceptance and equality, and treat newcomers with decency and respect, creating a vibrant community for all to live in;

NOW, THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED BY THE CITY/COUNTY OF [NAME], that the [City/County] of [Name] is hereby declared a Welcoming City, and one that affirms the beauty and richness of our diversity, and one in which all are welcome, accepted, and appreciated.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the [City/County] of [Name] hereby urges other local and state communities to join us in a stronger national effort to resettle the most vulnerable refugees worldwide and help them integrate and thrive.

Adopted this the X day of [Month Year].

Sample Letter to State & Local Leaders

Dear Members of the [STATE / LOCAL] Delegation,

We, the undersigned immigrants’ rights, civil rights, community, and faith-based organizations, write to strongly urge you to protect our family-based immigration system. Furthermore, we express our strong concerns about reports that [[the Trump Administration may be proposing changes to our family-based immigration system]]. Any changes to our immigration system will greatly affect the state of [STATE], which is home to more than [X million] immigrants. We strongly support urgent passage of the [Reuniting Families Act] and we oppose cuts to overall levels of green cards and cuts to our family-based immigration system, such as sponsorship of siblings, parents, and adult children.

Family is a cornerstone of our American values, yet our outdated immigration system often hurts families by keeping loved ones apart for years through red tape, bureaucracy, and harsh enforcement tactics. We believe that the proud American tradition of being a nation of immigrants must continue in the 21st century by strengthening our family-based immigration system. It is an integral part of our humanity that children – at any age – are our family. That brothers and sisters are our family. Families must not be manipulated and used as bargaining chips in a misleading and misguided attempt to characterize immigration as “zero-sum.”

We look to your leadership as members of the [STATE] Congressional Delegation to stand up for a just, fair, and forward-looking immigration policy that protects undocumented youth while upholding our family-based immigration system. We must revamp the family-based immigration system so that husbands, wives, parents, brothers, sisters, and children do not have to wait decades – and as long as 23 years – to live together in the United States.

The myth of “chain migration” fails to articulate the reality faced by families who are separated for years, even decades. A 2006 study shows that the average immigrant will bring only 2.1 family members through reunification.[1] Once the all-too-low quota of available visas is reached each year, individuals must wait for the next year. During this entire process, family members are unable to visit the United States. Furthermore, family visas are only available to limited close family members: husbands and wives, children, parents, and brothers and sisters of U.S. citizens. Cousins, uncles, aunts, grandparents are not eligible. Protecting all family immigration categories is good for American society.

America has always recognized that family members play an important role in helping immigrants build communities. Family members help to take care of young children so that other family members can work. Brothers and sisters support each other’s dreams, help each other find jobs and provide both emotional and financial support and care for each other’s families. We cannot attract and retain the best and the brightest if those coming to share their hard work and talents face long term or permanent separation from close family members. Having loved ones together in the U.S. increases the ability of immigrants to focus on putting down permanent roots in their new country.

Protecting all family immigration categories is also good for the American economy - for both native-born and immigrant workers. To further restrict the family immigration categories would cripple the economic growth of our nation. As they have always done, today’s immigrants fuel our economy by starting businesses, thereby creating jobs for all American workers. The Partnership for a New American Economy found that more than 200 of the Fortune 500 companies were founded by immigrants or their children. These businesses in turn create jobs for native-born and immigrant workers. The admission of adult children and siblings has a direct impact on the viability of immigrant entrepreneurship. Adult children, brothers, and sisters often contribute to family-owned businesses, pooling resources such as time and money to ensure the success of their ventures.

[STATE] has been a major gateway for immigrants. Our state exemplifies the enormous political and economic clout of immigrants and accounts for innumerable stories of immigrant success in climbing the socioeconomic ladder over time. Immigrant families together work hard, pay taxes, buy homes, and start job-creating businesses. Immigrants comprise [insert proportion] of the [STATE] labor force, and immigrant entrepreneurs own more than [insert proportion] of all businesses in the state.[2] This economic output of our community, facilitated by family reunification, has benefited all of us.

Family-based immigration is essential to ensuring the continued vitality of our economy, particularly here in [STATE]. Family members are critical in helping immigrants put down roots in this nation. Therefore, we strongly urge you to promote family unity. Immigration policies must reunite families, not divide families and keep loved ones apart for years or even permanently.

For questions, please contact [NAME, EMAIL, PHONE NUMBER]. Thank you for your immediate attention to this matter.

Sincerely,

[[List organizations here]]

Additional Resources & Contact Information


Value Our Families Toolkits

Value Our Families Advocacy Staff

[1] Bin Yu, Rhode Island College, “Immigration Multiplier: Measuring the Immigration Process,” Population Association of America 2006 Meeting, available at https://paa2006.populationassociation.org/papers/61643.

[2] American Immigration Council fact sheets for your area are available at https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/topics/state-by-state