Our work of Mercy involves meeting the needs of the suffering wherever they are: feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless, visiting the sick and imprisoned. Additionally, Mercy demands attention to structural sin and the root causes of poverty and injustice, including advocating for better policies and laws to support the most vulnerable.
Jump to our summary of a legislative priority topic:
- Climate
- Extractivism
- Voting Rights
- Gun Violence
- Administration Policies on the Treatment of Migrants
- Immigration Protections & Pathway to Citizenship
- Pentagon Spending
- Criminal Justice Reform
Here’s an overview of the legislation and actions by Congress and the Biden administration which the Mercy Justice Team is currently watching, particularly around the Critical Concerns.
Climate
More than 400 Mercy advocates signed a letter to the Biden administration before the international climate talks (COP 29) this fall, urging strong action in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and assisting the most vulnerable countries with adaptation to and loss and damages from climate change. The administration announced on Dec. 19th that it was setting a target of reducing emissions by 61-66 percent below 2005 levels in 2035.
The Justice Team joined dozens of other secular and faith groups in opposing the Energy Permitting Reform Act (S. 4753), and the bill did not make it to a full Senate vote before the end of the year. The bill had some provisions to speed up permitting for clean energy transmission, but it also included more oil and gas lease sales on public land and water and sped-up permitting of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) terminals that threaten local communities’ health and safety. We stood firm on not sacrificing these communities in exchange for some needed measures for the energy transition. We expect that the next Congress will pursue even more problematic legislation in 2025.
Extractivism
The FOREST Act, which aims to bar imports of goods sourced through illegal deforestation, with a focus on beef, cocoa, palm oil, rubber and soy, never made it out of committee. A bill passed by the New York State legislature to require state agencies to take tropical deforestation into account in purchasing decisions was vetoed by Gov. Kathy Hochul.
The Justice Team helped develop Faith Principles for Sourcing Transition Minerals and met with congressional staff to talk about the need to ensure that mining for the energy transition follows strict social justice and environmental justice provisions. These principles will be important for assessing legislation in the 119th Congress, which is expected to prioritize loosening regulations for mining on public land.
Voting Rights
The John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and Freedom to Vote Act, which are designed to strengthen voting rights and overturn state-level voting restrictions, never made it out of committee in the 118th Congress. Bills that would have curtailed voting rights never came to a House floor vote. The Faithful Democracy coalition, which the Justice Team participates in, will be advocating against bills in the next Congress that threaten voting rights.
Gun Violence
Mercy supported the recently passed historic legislation aimed at gun violence prevention following the mass shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde. This law offers the most comprehensive attempts at strengthening the nation’s gun laws in almost thirty years:
- enhances background checks for gun buyers under the age of 21
- provides $750 million to assist states in implementing Red Flag laws
- closes the “boyfriend loophole” by disarming domestic abusers even if they are not married
- establishes the first-ever federal laws against gun trafficking across state lines and straw purchases
- provides $250 million in funding for evidence-based community violence prevention programs
- expands school safety measures and mental health services and access in communities and schools
Even as we celebrate this victory in reducing gun violence in our communities, we continue to advocate for proven measures that were unaddressed by this legislation including a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. We call on the new Congress to continue efforts at gun violence prevention, specifically addressing violence enabled by civilian access to military-style weapons of war.
Administration Policies on Treatment of Migrants
Advocacy continues around urging the Biden administration for reforms to enable a safe and fair asylum process at the border. Public health order Title 42 (barring immigrants from entering the country) was ended in May and new procedures were set up for processing immigrants from select countries where the U.S. does not have diplomatic relationships allowing for deportations, including with Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua. Other new procedure criminalizes and puts a five year bar on migrants who cross in-between ports of entry, and (similar to the Trump era) requires migrants seeking asylum at the border to show they had applied for asylum in third countries in route to the U.S.
Advocacy has been successful in urging the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to extend Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for some countries, but more durable and inclusive forms of protection are needed for those seeking refuge and establishing new connections in the United States. With Haiti, the DHS extended and re-designated TPS for Haiti, yet has continued deportation flights to Haiti, even as the country consumed in violence and chaos.
Immigration protections and pathway to citizenship
We continue to push for legislation that provides permanent protections for immigrants, including a pathway to citizenship – for DACA recipients (Dreamers), farmworkers, essential workers, and others with temporary status. These are often piecemeal legislative efforts, as comprehensive immigration reform is not expected to be taken up in the current session of Congress. Mercy’s advocacy has been important, however, even if defensive in nature to stop legislation introduced by some lawmakers pushing an extreme anti-immigrant agenda, using immigrants as pawns to score political points. Efforts were made by some of these Members of Congress to codify mass expulsions (including Title 42) into law, but so far these efforts have been defeated. The Schools Not Shelters Act is pending a vote in late July, legislation to prohibit the use of certain school facilities that receive federal funding from being used to house any migrants.
Pentagon Spending
Consistent with Mercy’s commitment to nonviolence, we advocate for cuts in excessive military spending and redirection of funds to programs that address the greatest threats to our security — climate change, lack of affordable housing and health care, systemic racial oppression and spiraling economic inequality. Policymakers vigorously debated cuts to human needs programs to avoid economic default by raising the debt ceiling earlier this spring, yet there was no consideration in these debates to cut the Pentagon budget, despite reports of price gouging, inability of the Pentagon to pass an audit, and the fact that half of its budget goes to private weapons contractors.
In early July, the House of Representatives voted to authorize the Biden Administration’s $886 billion budget in the FY 2023 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) and the Senate is expected to take up this legislation in late July before their August recess. This amount is $28 billion more than the current year’s budget and does not even include emergency military aid to Ukraine.
Mercy advocates joined other peace and social justice groups to call for a 10% cut in the Pentagon budget and shifting the resources to address human needs, an initiative introduced both as an amendment to the NDAA and as a stand-alone bill: People Over Pentagon Act. While an uphill challenge, this annual effort to cut 10% works as a strategy to get more Members of Congress adding their names as co-sponsors of the People Over the Pentagon demands, building momentum for successive years’ debates.
Criminal Justice Reform
Just in time for Christmas, President Biden commuted the death sentences of 37 people on federal death row. More than 470 Mercy advocates had signed a letter to the president urging him to take such action before he leaves office.
The RESTORE Act, which would repeal a lifetime food assistance ban on persons with felony convictions on their records, never made it out of committee. Bills that would end the practice of solitary confinement in prisons and immigrant detention facilities also never advanced.