Member Strategy Session: Occupation Of Our Neighborhoods

This year millions are facing an unprecedented incursion on self-determination. This summer the federal government approved an increased budget for immigration and detention to $170 billion dollars, including tripling the budget for ICE, 300% increase in detention, and allocating hundreds of millions to private contractors for heightened surveillance. State and national lawmakers are escalating their attacks on communities by deploying National Guards, while siphoning hundreds of millions of dollars away from investments in housing, public health, and community safety. Meanwhile, Congress has rejected investments in Medicaid and Medicare for low-income families and seniors that experts project will lead to 22 million people losing their healthcare.

Communities are mobilizing to protect vulnerable neighbors from militarized escalation from the National Guard and ICE and demanding lawmakers adopt solutions to the root causes of community safety. From rural New York, Memphis, to Charlotte, organizations are practicing local self-governance and building broad coalitions of frustrated neighbors. Democracy must be actively practiced, and that practice presupposes the rule of law. Philanthropic investment in mutual aid, community safety, and leadership development ensures the protections and policies that sustain democracy don’t erode as militarized responses become normalized.

Join this discussion on January 22, 2026 at 12pm CT for a discussion with leaders from the Free901 campaign in Memphis, TN as they share their work and how normalizing the military’s presence in our neighborhoods threatens every community.