CRLN and some of Rep. Quigley’s constituents from Third Unitarian Church will send the following letter to him. If you are a constituent in Illinois’ 5th Congressional District, please click here to authorize us to sign your name, too.

September 21, 2021

Rep. Mike Quigley, Congressman, IL-5

Dear Rep. Quigley,

We are meeting today with your Legislative Assistant, Marshele Bryant. The purpose of our meeting is twofold:

1) To request that you co-sponsor two House resolutions on Honduras: the Berta Caceres Human Rights in Honduras Act (H.R. 1574) and the Honduras Human Rights and Anti-Corruption Act (H.R. 2716)

2) To request that you support a pathway to permanent protections for DACA recipients, TPS holders, farmworkers, and other essential workers.

H.R. 1574 would prohibit U.S. assistance to the police and military of Honduras and direct U.S. Representatives of multilateral development banks to vote against providing loans to the Honduran police or military. We thank you for co-sponsoring this legislation in the previous three sessions of Congress and ask that you do so again.

H.R. 2716 would also suspend U.S. assistance to the Honduran police and military until corruption, impunity, and human rights violations are no longer systemic and the perpetrators of these crimes are being brought to justice. In addition, it will impose sanctions on the Honduran president for corruption and human rights abuses and suspend U.S. security assistance and export licenses for covered defense articles and munitions items to the Honduran police and military, among other provisions.

Our organization is in touch with many human rights groups in Honduras, and what they tell us is alarming. Honduras has become a narco-state, as high level Honduran officials use the police and military to protect drug traffickers and their routes in exchange for bribe money. Some Honduran government and security officials are themselves trafficking drugs. Officials also use the police and military to stay in power, directing them to violently put down peaceful protests over election fraud, government corruption, and theft from public funds. Military and police have carried out targeted assassinations against human rights defenders and those who stand up against corruption—there is evidence of death squads within their ranks.

All of this is more than a case of a few bad apples: democracy, the rule of law, public safety, and life itself are being undermined, as evidenced by the large numbers of people leaving Honduras as migrants. The U.S. is currently pretending that by funding the military and police, we are increasing security. We are not. Please do your part to shut down this funding until corruption and impunity for human rights violations cease.

We also wanted to reach out and ask you for your consistent support of immigrants and for your continued support of legislation to provide a pathway to permanent protections for DACA recipients, TPS holders, farmworkers, and other essential workers. 

We know that a pathway to permanent protections is vital to the long term success of our economy, communities and families and an important component to building back better. The public strongly supports a pathway to permanent protections and believes that Congressional action is long overdue. We are confident that enacting these reforms via reconciliation is the best way to finally get it done this year.  

On behalf of the millions of immigrant workers and families, many who have been locked out of the ability to earn a pathway to permanent protections, including DACA recipients and TPS holders who have been essential to our communities’ response and recovery from COVID-19, we urge you to seize this  historic opportunity.

Sincerely,

Since 2009, thousands of Honduran human rights defenders, Indigenous land and water defenders, journalists, union members, campesinos, people who identify as LGBTQ, and people protesting government policies and government corruption have been killed, attacked, criminalized, harassed, and “disappeared” by members of the Honduran military or police forces, or by death squads operating within these forces. The U.S. continues to send funding to both the Honduran military and police forces anyway.

Finally, 12 years after the military coup d’etat in Honduras, there are companion bills in both the House and the Senate that would suspend U.S. military aid and police aid to Honduras, including for training, equipment, weapons and munitions for crowd control (teargas, water cannons, etc.), and place personal sanctions on Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez and other high level officials in his administration or in the Honduran Congress for their corruption and anti-democratic actions. Representative Jan Schakowsky (D-IL-09) introduced the House version, and Senator Jeff Merkley (D-OR) introduced the Senate bill.

This gives us a pathway to pass binding legislation. We need your help to convince enough Representatives and Senators to co-sponsor these bills! With enough co-sponsors, the bills can pass out of committee and go to the floor of the House and Senate for a vote. You can find a list of co-sponsors and the text of the bills at the links in the previous paragraph.

Call the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask to be connected to your Senator (repeat for your second Senator and for your Representative). When you are connected to their office, ask to speak to the foreign policy aide. Be sure to get their name and email address so you can follow up with an email. If the foreign policy aide is not available, ask to leave a message on their voice mail. After you leave the message, send an email to the aide with your message.

Sample script: “My name is _____. I am a constituent of yours. I am calling (or writing) to ask (Senator or Representative _____) to co-sponsor The Honduras Human Rights and Anti-Corruption Act of 2021. The bill number is (S. 388 – Senate; H.R. 2716 – House). The bill calls for the suspension of ‘United States support for the Government of Honduras until endemic corruption, impunity, and human rights violations cease, and their perpetrators are brought to justice.’ Has (Senator or Representative _______) seen this bill? Can I count on them to join as a cosponsor?  Please call me this week at (your phone number) to let me know if you have seen the bill, and if your boss will support it.  For more information or to co-sponsor the bill, please contact (Caroline Kuritzkes and Matt Squeri in Senator Merkley’s office; or Kate Durkin in Representative Schakowsky’s office).”

Please contact Sharon at shunter-smith@crln.org when you send your message and call, especially if you get a response. 

For fuller context of present-day Honduras, see the recent article in Harper’s Magazine by Andrew Cockburn, “Narco in Chief: How America Enables Corruption in Honduras.”