FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 15, 2025
Media Contact: Melissa Garriga | [email protected]
CODEPINK Statement on Military Control of the Roosevelt Reservation
CODEPINK strongly opposes President Trump’s latest executive order giving the U.S. military control over the Roosevelt Reservation—a 60-foot-wide stretch of land along the southern borders of California, New Mexico, and Arizona. This illegal order is being used to apprehend people “trespassing” on what they have just declared as a U.S. military zone. This move is a clear attempt to circumvent the Posse Comitatus Act, a law from 1878 that stops the military from acting like a police force inside the U.S.
Migration is a human right. Mobilizing the U.S. military against people who are seeking security is dangerous and inhumane. This order adds to the harmful trend of treating migrants like criminals and turning our border into a militarized zone. Bringing troops into this situation undermines basic constitutional protections and opens the door to even more extreme actions without proper checks and balances.
One of the principal root causes of migration to the United States stems from U.S. foreign policy decisions that deliberately destabilize governments with which the U.S. disagrees. Migrants are often fleeing countries suffocated by sanctions placed on them by the U.S. While the root causes of migration remain unaddressed, further militarization will not reduce migration to the United States or make anyone safer. It will waste taxpayer money while increasing incarceration, human rights violations, and death at the border.
Over the past few months, the Trump administration has ignored or rewritten laws to fast-track detentions and deportations — even for people who hold legal status — and ignored any courts that have objected. When such abuse of the U.S. legal system goes continually unchecked, the risk of even more widespread and heinous human rights violations become even greater for non-citizens and citizens alike.
CODEPINK calls for an end to the militarization of our border.
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