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House Co-Sponsorship Memoranda
House of Representatives
Session of 2019 - 2020
Regular Session
MEMORANDUM
| Posted: | September 24, 2020 11:23 AM |
|---|---|
| From: | Representative Dan Frankel and Rep. Mary Jo Daley, Rep. Joseph C. Hohenstein, Rep. Sara Innamorato, Rep. Danilo Burgos |
| To: | All House members |
| Subject: | Condemning the Practice of Coerced Sterilization |
| In the 1900s, the government forced immigrants, Native Americans, Black and Brown people, people with disabilities, and the poor to undergo procedures that eliminated their ability to have children. These actions will forever remain one of America’s worst abuses of human rights and a shameful stain on its soul. There is an eerie familiarity between our country’s dark past and the allegations of dehumanization in a recent Department of Homeland Security whistleblower report. On September 14th, several legal advocates filed a whistleblower complaint on behalf of detainees and a nurse at private U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center in Georgia. The complaint alleges an abnormally high rate of hysterectomies on detainees with no informed consent. Interviews found the women did not understand what procedure they were undertaking or why they needed this life-altering procedure, and that medical staff failed to use proper communication methods with those who do not speak English. The report went as far as describing the alleged coerced sterilizations in the facility as an “experimental concentration camp.” The reports of coerced sterilization, if true, are a violation of one’s freedom over their own body. Regardless of a person’s immigrant status, ethnicity, or spoken language, each person deserves the dignity and privacy of bodily autonomy, and the opportunity to make informed choices. Please join us in condemning the practice of coerced sterilization by co-sponsoring this Resolution. |
Memo Updated: September 24, 2020 11:24 AM