These Miami activists are fasting for 100 hours to challenge Trump's order on sanctuary cities
On January 25, Donald Trump signed an executive order to defund sanctuary cities that protect undocumented immigrants. The following day, Miami Mayor Carlos Gimenez, a Cuban refugee, became the first mayor in the country to officially and publicly comply with Trump’s divisive order. He even got a thank you tweet from the president himself: “Strong!”
Gimenez’s actions have turned Miami-Dade, a county made up of more than 156,000 undocumented immigrants, into a battleground for Trump’s immigration policy. Former Miami Mayor Manny Diaz weighed in to disagree with Gimenez’s decision to “bow down” to Trump instead of challenging the constitutionality of the executive order, as several mayors across the country have done. Diaz also reminded the mayor of his roots: “Mayor Gimenez and I both came to this country as refugees, without legal status, and we became Americans. Fifty years later, we became mayors. Had mayors back then acted as Mayor Gimenez has now, we may not have had that chance. Miami is a city built on the hopes and aspirations of immigrants. Our mayor must be a leader, not a follower.”
This week, a group of young activists employed an age-old immigrant activist tradition of resistance: fasting. The Miamians, one of whom is undocumented, have spent the last 100 hours—four days—without food, sitting outside the mayor’s office, and sleeping in a local church. The fast isn’t a protest, says Tomas Kennedy, Chair of the Miami-Dade Progressive Caucus and one of the activists participating, but more like a spiritual demonstration aimed at raising awareness and consciousness about an issue. The activists will break their fast following Friday’s commission meeting, where 13 city officials, seven of whom are Cuban-born immigrants, will vote on whether to uphold the mayor’s decision.
I spent some time with the group of activists, who were in good spirits Thursday and cracking jokes about Trump’s press conference, and asked why they each decided to join the fast.