ACTIVE NONVIOLENCE & PEACEMAKING

TAKE ACTION: Find a Path to Peace with Korea

 Korea needs peace, and the world needs Korea to achieve peace.United for Peace and Justice invites us to sign a petition to President Trump to conclude a binding peace agreement constituting a formal and final end to the state of war between North Korea, South Korea, and the United States. The petition also urges efforts to reunite Korean American families with family members in North Korea. TAKE ACTION

Senate Rejects Attempt To Curb Trump's Iran War Powers

 Senators blocked an effort last week to restrict President Trump’s ability to go to war with Iran, handing a victory to the White House.Senators voted 50-40 on the proposal from Democratic Sens.Tim Kaine (Va.) and Tom Udall(N.M.) to block the president from using funding to carry out military action without congressional authorization. MORE

NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT

Bolton Declares New START Extension ‘Unlikely’

 Prospects for extending the 2010 New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) dimmed in late June as U.S. National Security Advisor John Bolton criticized the pact that is due to expire in February 2021. "There’s no decision, but I think it’s unlikely,” he said in an interview. His comments came less than a week after top U.S. and Russian arms control diplomats met in Prague to discuss the resumption of talks on strategic stability and the future of New START. MORE

US Arms Control Office Critically Understaffed Under Trump

 A state department office tasked with negotiating and implementing nuclear disarmament treaties has lost more than 70% of its staff over the past two years, as the Trump administration moves towards a world without arms control for the first time in nearly half a century. The Office of Strategic Stability and Deterrence Affairs has been whittled down from 14 staffers at the start of the Trump administration to four, according to the former staffers. MORE

IMMIGRATION

Trump Vows to Move Forward With Citizenship Question on Census

 President Trump said on Wednesday that the Commerce Department is "absolutely moving forward” with plans to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census, contradicting statements made by his Department of Justice and Wilbur Ross, the Commerce secretary, and calling reports based on them "fake.” MORE

20 Ways to Help Immigrants Now

 Immigrant children are dying in federal custody. Children in detention are being denied basic supplies like soap and blankets. Trump threatened then delayed mass immigration raids across the country, using the plan as a bargaining chip with Congress, while families are left in an ever-heightened state of uncertainty. While Congress is continually being called to act, Yes magazine outlines 20 ways we can take action to help immigrants in transition, in detention, and in crisis. MORE

Jewish Protesters Block Road to Migrant Detention Center

 Rejecting the notion that denouncing immigrant detention centers as "concentration camps" does harm to the memory of the Holocaust, 200 Jewish people demonstrated at a facility in New Jersey and demanded the release of the thousands of immigrants in U.S. custody. Police arrested 36 of the protesters from the grassroots group Never Again Action. MORE

ENVIRONMENT

TAKE ACTION: End JPMorgan Chase's Fossil Fuel Funding

 As the biggest funder of fossil fuels – including fossil fuel expansion -- JPMorgan Chase is now the worst bank in the world for people and the planet. In the last three years, the bank’s fossil fuel financing totaled over $195 billion – nearly 30% higher than the next largest bank funder. Green America urges us to tell JP Morgan Chase to stop financing fossil fuels and fossil fuel expansion and support renewable energy and human rights. TAKE ACTION

US Produces Far More Waste and Recycles Far Less of It Than Other Developed Countries

 The US represents just 4% of the world’s population, but it produces 12% of global municipal solid waste. In comparison, China and India make up more than 36% of the world’s population and generate 27% of that waste. The figures emerge as the world faces an escalating waste crisis driven largely by plastics piling up in developing countries and the oceans. MORE

HUMAN TRAFFICKING

TAKE ACTION: End Forced Labor in Qatar

 Last year, Qatar passed an important law that signaled progress in ending the employment system that leaves migrant workers dependent on their employers and vulnerable to exploitation. But a recent undercover investigation has exposed that migrant workers are still having their wages and passports withheld, leaving them vulnerable to forced labor. Freedom United asks us to call on Qatar to end forced labor in their country. TAKE ACTION

Talking About Race and Human Trafficking

 Due to the disproportionate number of children of color who are trafficked each year, human trafficking is a racial justice issue. The sexual exploitation of people of color that developed during slavery and colonization impacts cultural expectations and beliefs about the availability and use of children of color for commercial sex today. MORE

Could Human Trafficking On The High Seas Be Stopped By An Online Tracker?

 A new electronic mapping tool is said to be able to detect possible human trafficking, forced labor and illegal fishing on the high seas. The online monitoring system uses publicly available data to check questionable activities of fishing boats including port avoidance, extended time at sea, or the muting of a tracking device which shows the location of the vessel. Irregular patterns could indicate trafficking and exploitation of workers on board the ships. MORE

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE & SEXUAL ASSAULT

Why We Often Don’t Believe Women Who Report Sexual Assault

 The response to sexual assault allegations made by writer E. Jean Carroll against President Trump is again raising questions about what women face when they take their accusations public. Judy Woodruff of PBS spoke with Emily Bazelon of The New York Times Magazine and Soraya Chemaly of the Women’s Media Center Speech Project about rape myths, language around assault and the role of masculinity. MORE

"Invisible" Brain Injuries in Domestic Violence Go Unrecognized

 Domestic violence survivors commonly suffer repeated blows to the head and strangulation. This sort of trauma has lasting effects that should be widely recognized by advocates, health care providers, law enforcement and others who are in a position to help, according to the authors of a new study. The new study found that 81 percent of women who have been abused at the hands of their partners and seek help have suffered a head injury. MORE

POVERTY & SOCIAL JUSTICE

TAKE ACTION: Raise the Minimum Wage

 Since the minimum wage was first established in 1938, it has never gone so long without an increase. Congress is finally responding to pressure to take action on the Raise the Wage Act of 2019. NETWORK Lobby urges us to tell our Representatives to vote yes to pass this legislation and to reject amendments that would weaken its benefits for low-income workers. TAKE ACTION

Rising Enthusiasm for Medicare for All Has Provoked Dramatic Surge in Industry-Backed Lobbying

 A new report by the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen shows that "rising enthusiasm for Medicare for All has prompted the health care industry to increase its lobbying against the proposal dramatically," suggesting that powerful healthcare interests perceive the movement to replace the nation's for-profit system "as a politically viable threat." MORE

George Soros, Other Wealthy Donors Urge 2020 Democrats to Embrace Wealth Tax

 Headlined by George Soros and Abigail Disney, a group of billionaires and multi-millionaires have penned an open letterto 2020 presidential candidates asking that they support a wealth tax on the richest Americans. The group argued a wealth tax would help address climate change and income inequality while strengthening Democratic institutions. MORE

DEATH PENALTY

Stephen Michael West is scheduled to be executed on August 15 by the state of Tennessee for the murder of Wanda Romines and Shelia Romines. Please hold Stephen, Wanda, Shelia, their families and the people of Tennessee in prayer. TAKE ACTION