CoSI to start fundraiser for immigrant community
Scarlet & Black 2025-03-03
In response to national and statewide immigration policy changes, Grinnell-based volunteer organization Community Support for Immigrants (CoSI) is starting a fundraiser to assist immigrants in Central Iowa and developing an emergency response plan, said John Ashby, co-chair of the CoSI Steering Committee.
“I think it’s realistically possible we could raise $10,000, and that would give us enough to be of some help,” Ashby said. “We’re being pestered by people that want to help, which is a really good sign.”
Ashby said the organization and the immigrant community is uncertain about the effects of Trump administration policies. To Ashby, the biggest concern about the Trump administration policies is the fate of children whose parents are arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
“The fear is real,” Ashby said. “People are not letting their kids go to school … they don’t know what to do if ICE does call home. It’s a way, way more difficult situation than it was back in 2020.”
“The safety of the children — that’s something we could really be left with,” Ashby said. “We and our churches can behave legally. That doesn’t mean we can keep them [ICE] out.”
The safety of the children — that’s something we could really be left with. We and our churches can behave legally. That doesn’t mean we can keep them [ICE] out.
— John Ashby
Ashby said that an immediate concern for many local immigrants was the closing of the JELD-WEN window manufacturing plant in Grinnell, which led to the loss of about 300 jobs.
“The people we contacted with respect to JELD-WEN seem to be on top of getting themselves other jobs,” Ashby said. “Not as good as JELD-WEN — that was a really good job, with good pay and good benefits. That’s 300 lost jobs among the lowest-income workers … it’s a huge hit.”
Since its founding in 2018 following an ICE raid in Mount Pleasant, much of CoSI’s work has involved raising funds to support other organizations working to help immigrants.
“Our members wanted … a way to step in and help people,” Ashby said. “They can see a little bit behind the veil here of Grinnell that it’s not perfect.”
Recently, CoSI has been working to develop an emergency response plan in the event of sudden immigration policy changes, coordinating the response with local Lutheran and Catholic churches as well as volunteers. Ashby said he hopes to involve schools in the plan to help protect kids whose parents have been detained.
During the height of the pandemic, CoSI sent masks and sanitizer to local immigrants, and after the U.S. pulled out of Afghanistan, CoSI raised about $24,000 for Afghan refugees.
“We generally raise money so that we have, sometimes as much as $10,000 in the bank, and other migrant agencies would sometimes use us,” Ashby said. “There was another person … who’s very active in the community organizing side … and she, in her visit, explained … ‘What you’re good at is raising money.’”
In 2021, CoSI intervened with support when ICE cancelled contracts with a major Iowa detention facility.
It’s sometimes things as basic as giving somebody a ride, which the Iowa State Legislature is now trying to turn into a crime.
— John Ashby
“Everybody that they were holding would just be walked out the front door with nothing,” Ashby said. “We were able to get 100 bucks into each of their accounts.”
Ashby also drove a man to Toledo, IA from Grinnell in 98-degree weather.
“He could only get the bus as far as Grinnell,” Ashby said. “I just got a phone call. I showed up at the bus and I was able to drive him up … it’s sometimes things as basic as giving somebody a ride, which the Iowa State Legislature is now trying to turn into a crime.”
House Study Bill 15, which was introduced in the Iowa state legislature in January, criminalizes the “smuggling” of an undocumented migrant. Amid anxiety about immigration policy changes, Ashby is keeping CoSI’s central mission in mind.
“The point is to be open and responsive to trying to create this place to be a more welcoming community, specifically for immigrants,” Ashby said. “It’s a very wide-open thing.”