Minutes for November 2022 meeting

 16 November 2022

AIUSA Group 342 meeting (via Zoom)

In attendance: Barbara, Bob, Heather, Bill, Marsha

GREETINGS AND MEMBER CHECK-INS

GUN VIOLENCE REPORT [Bob]

• Looking through the photographs in the CeasefirePA literature he has received, Bill observes that all of the politicians who advocate for gun control are Democrats. He sees zero Republicans in the mix. 
• The 10th anniversary of the Sandy Hook shooting is coming up on December 14. Since that event, the only gun control measure enacted is the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, which was passed June 25 (and got support in response to the Uvalde shooting).
• The PA House impeached Philly D.A. Krasner today. However, a 2/3 vote in the PA Senate is needed to convict, and if the vote goes along party lines (which is almost certainly will), the GOP does not have enough votes. This impeachment is a dog-and-pony show to appease the GOP base. 
• The Democrats are poised to take control of the PA House. If they can control at least one chamber, this will prevent the GOP from trying to sneak in legislation (especially anti-abortion legislation) by putting it on two consecutive legislative ballots. 

MIGRANTS' RIGHTS [Bill]

• "Amnesty has thrown in the towel, apparently": Bill is having trouble finding info/campaigns/actions on Amnesty's website on this issue.
• Bill is interested in housing refugees (and wrote to the governor of Ohio offering to do this).
• Our last Amnesty case file, Ivo Feh (Cameroon), was released from prison last December. Do you want to take on another case file?
• Some discussion of this. Barbara will look into it.

OTHER DISCUSSION

• Do we want to meet bimonthly? --> Sure, let's try it. (We can always switch back to monthly if we like.) We will skip the December meeting and meet again via Zoom in January. Maybe we can do an in-person meeting at Wegmans in the spring.
• Any other actions we can take? --> We can continue to use the Google Group for sharing actions, news, etc. Everyone should feel free to post there.

WRITE FOR RIGHTS 2022

Discussion of five cases (we'll discuss the other five next time):

• LUIS MANUEL OTERO ALCANTARA (CUBA): "ARTIST JAILED FOR PROTECTING FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION"
• ALEKSANDRA SKOCHILENKO (RUSSIA): "SHE OPPOSED THE WAR, NOW SHE FACES PRISON"
• YREN ROTELA AND MARIANA SEPÚLVEDA (PARAGUAY): "DON’T TELL US WHO WE ARE"
• ZINEB REDOUANE (FRANCE): "KILLED BY A TEAR GAS GRENADE"
• VAHID AFKARI (IRAN): "TORTURED AND UNJUSTLY JAILED FOR PROTESTING"

           

NEXT MEETING: Wednesday, January 18, 7:30 p.m (via Zoom)