My name is Petra. I am an immigrant rights activist in Arizona, as well as a mom, a grandmother and a human being. A few weeks ago I visited a border patrol holding facility in Nogales, Arizona, that housed 800 unaccompanied children under 18-years-old, including some children as young as five or six, without an adult family member. What I saw that day will stay with me forever.

It was disturbing. I saw the faces of children with fear and desperation in their eyes. Children locked behind cages with barbed wire that reminded me of dog kennels. I will never forget the pain in their eyes. Something must be done to help them.

In the last few months we have witnessed an unprecedented number of unaccompanied refugee children arriving at our southern border from El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Honduras. Thousands of children have made the perilous journey in order to escape crime, gang violence, sexual abuse, and other dangers in their home countries. How we respond to these children in the coming weeks will define us as a nation and our legacy for years to come.

Will you stand on the right side of history and take action on behalf of these children? Click here to take action now.

We have seen the response from House and Senate Republicans, who want the children to be stripped of their rights and immediately deported. Deporting children back to the countries they are fleeing from puts their lives at risk and is unacceptable. This kind of response is shameful! Even from a party with a long history of callousness towards vulnerable populations, this is a new low.

We need real leadership from Congressional Democrats to stop Republican’s shameful attacks. We need Democrats to stand up now for the rights of refugee children at the border. Take action now to tell Democrats in Congress to stand up and protect the rights of the children!

Right now members of Congress are hearing from both sides. As we speak, anti-immigration groups are organizing and calling on Congress to speed up deportations and strip refugee children of some of their most basic legal rights, which exist to ensure that they get a fair hearing and to protect them from being sent back to violence in their home country. We need to make sure that our message is louder. With your help we can drown out messages of hate and replace them with messages of compassion and tolerance.

Which message do you want to send? Take action now by making a call!

In solidarity,

Petra Falcon
Executive Director, Promise Arizona

By CAP Action War Room

EPA Hearings Show Just How Much Polluting Energy Companies Are Desperate And In Denial

In early June, the Environmental Protection Agency issued the latest piece in the Obama Administration’s Climate Action Plan: a proposed rule to dramatically cut carbon pollution from America’s coal-fired power plants in the coming decades. The rule is an essential step for public health and for slowing the effects of climate change.

Today marks the next formal phase in the rule-making process: public hearings on the rule are taking place today and tomorrow in four cities around the country, with up to 1,600 people slated to offer their comments. These individuals include some of the foremost proponents and opponents of the rule — and the activity surrounding these hearings encapsulates just how desperate and out of touch polluters and their allies who oppose the rule are.

Take Rep. Mike Kelly (R-PA). In remarks at an event at the Heritage Foundation, Kelly likened the new EPA rule to terrorism. “You talk about terrorism — you can do it in a lot of different ways,” he said. “But you terrorize the people who supply everything this country needs to be great — and you keep them on the sidelines — my goodness, what have we become?”

This isn’t the first time climate deniers and opponents of renewable energy solutions have made this outrageous comparison. In fact, Rep. Kelly is really just drawing from the talking points of polluters. The polluter-front group Environmental Policy Alliance ran a print ad in Washington, D.C. media last month making similar comparisons, and the Koch-backed Heartland Institute lost funding after running billboards that equated people who believe in global warming to the Unibomber in 2012.

Here’s another: At the public hearing on the EPA rule in Washington, D.C., the Vice President of coal mining giant Peabody Energy referred to the climate science of which 97 percent of scientists agree as “climate theory.”

On the other side, Center for American Progress Vice President of Energy Policy Greg Dotson also testified at the hearing, urging the EPA to stay committed to reducing emissions: “protecting our children from carbon pollution is your legal duty. And it’s everyone’s moral obligation.”

In addition, the White House released new evidence to coincide with the hearings that warns of the cost of climate inaction. The report estimates that delaying climate action to the point at which emissions rise to 3 degress Celsius above pre-industrial levels, rather than 2 degrees, would cost the U.S. economy $150 billion a year.

Here are just a few other facts on why the new EPA rule, and the projected 30 percent reduction in carbon emissions because of it, is so vital:

• 6,600: The possible premature deaths avoided annually when a 30 percent cut in carbon emissions is achieved.
• 150,000: The possible number of asthma attacks per year avoided when a 30 percent cut in carbon emissions is achieved.
• 490,000: The possible number of missed school or work days avoided when a 30 percent cut in carbon emissions is achieved.
• $93 billion: The possible economic value of the public health benefit when a 30 percent cut in carbon emissions is achieved.
• $7: The amount in health benefits that Americans will see for every dollar invested as a result of this plan.

BOTTOM LINE: The new EPA rule is a huge step for public health and for our children’s futures. The companies that oppose this rule are desperate, dirty, and in denial. For other health threats like arsenic, mercury, and lead, we set limits on contaminants to keep people safe. But we let dirty power plants release as much carbon pollution into the air as they want. That needs to change.