Memphis aid for released migrants growing, spreading
A brown paper bag shortage sent Lee Coleman, 42, on a impromptu Kroger run. After winding his way through frenzied holiday shoppers scouting for last-minute ingredients, he secured the crucial bags and dashed back to First Congo, where volunteers were making ham and cheese sandwiches.
The sandwiches are bound for Memphis’ Greyhound terminal, where dozens of migrants, the majority of them recently released from detention centers along the southern U.S. border, will be passing through Memphis.
“At this point, it’s been really incredible to have so many volunteers,” Coleman said.
The Commercial Appeal first reported the story of the spontaneously formed aid group, Migration is Beautiful, in early November. The Central American migrants, many fleeing gang violence in Honduras and Guatemala, had been coming through Memphis since early October.
At first, Coleman said, it was just a handful of people scrambling to take care of migrants, who all arrived hungry and without warm clothing to protect them through their chilly travels.
But then, Coleman said, the Memphis Feminist Collective and Comunidades Unidas en Una Voz, two grassroots groups with two different focuses, stepped in to help.
“That’s when things really started to pick up,” Coleman noted, “Those groups have a big reach, and that’s when we started seeing a lot of supplies roll in.”
After that, Migration is Beautiful went from a few volunteers trying to meet basic needs for migrants, to an infrastructure that informally but effectively organizes the growing list of volunteers and supplies that are steadily arriving at First Congo.
Volunteer groups, following Memphis’ lead, also came together in Nashville and Knoxville. Similar informal aid groups were already running in Dallas, Chicago and Washington, D.C., among other large cities.
“I think we hit the right point at the right time,” Coleman said. “With everything going on in the climate of immigration, people just wanted to do something to help.”
‘The Reichstag is burning’
Back in the makeshift headquarters of the aid group, volunteers winding their way through towering stacks of clothing and hygiene items, confirmed Coleman’s theory.
“I came from a country that killed 10 million people,” said Jutta Jacobs.
Jacobs, 72, was born in post-World War II Germany. The Trump administration’s immigration policies are an haunting déjà vu for her.
“The Reichstag is burning,” said Jacobs, referring to the infamous act of arson by a lone Communist in 1933 that would give Adolf Hitler the pretext to advance the Nazi party.
Jacobs believes a similar political environment is already brewing in the U.S. Aiding migrants passing through is a hands-on involvement that gives Jacobs some small sense of resisting what she sees as another xenophobic administration rising to power.
“They killed 6 million Jews and 4 million others,” Jacobs said. “My country did that, my people did that. And, I will do anything, anything to prevent this from happening again.”
Another volunteer, Kathleen Meier, agreed.
“What can an individual do?” asked Meier, a retired nurse. “Maybe you make some sandwiches. It’s one small way to reduce the horror.”
Though donations are pouring in — the group had to put up a sign on First Congo’s door asking for a pause on clothing donations — Coleman said they have thought ahead to the time when, inevitably, the attention dies down.
“I feel like our primary purpose is comfort,” Coleman said. “That mainly means food, and medicine if you have it. The donations, the volunteers ... it’s all been amazing. But, if it all dwindles down, then I feel like we can at least maintain that.”
Coleman says it will be impossible to know when migrants cease to pour through Greyhound stations.
“It’s impossible to know when,” Coleman said. “One of the biggest lessons that I’ve learned through all of this? There’s never enough sandwiches. Never enough.”