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What is Sponsorship?

Sponsors are U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents who are willing to submit paperwork to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to secure an asylum-seeker's release and then to receive an asylum-seeker in their home upon their release.

SURJ asks that sponsors make a commitment to provide food, shelter, clothing, medical care, legal support, and other hospitality to asylum-seekers for at least six months to a year. 

Sponsors are being creative in order to mitigate the possible spread of the COVID-19 virus. We ask that all asylum-seekers go into quarantine for two weeks. If this isn’t possible to do in the sponsors home, we will work together to find other accommodations. People who can’t provide housing are becoming financial sponsors to help with the additional needs of sponsoring at this time. Others who can’t host a migrant for 6 months to a year, may have a space that could accommodate them for these first two weeks, after which the migrant would move to their long-term host sponsor. 

We encourage sponsors to partner with one or two volunteers to support both them and the asylum-seeker. Support partners can help with finding needed resources, including financial support. They can help with shopping and basic necessities and in some cases,  with language interpretation as well. As a sponsor, you are joining a vast network of people across the country who have opened their homes to offer this particular kind of accompaniment, and who find themselves transformed by the experience. Many of these sponsors have been zooming and supporting each other long before COVID -19 struck. We will work with you and talk about the resources and support that we and others can provide. You will not be alone.

The Bay area is an especially important destination for people seeking asylum. California is the only state that provides paid medical care for asylum seekers. Asylum seekers in California can get a driver’s license and CalFresh. The Northern California immigration court grants asylum to 46% of asylum seekers, while in other parts of the country judges grant asylum in as few as 2% of the cases they rule on.

The Bay Area has large and welcoming LGBTQIA+, Latinx, immigrant and other supportive communities with many resources to support asylum-seekers in their transition to a new life.

Back to Sponsor an Asylum-Seeker

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  • Home
  • Start here
    • Start here
    • Other Chapters
  • Take Action
    • Events
    • Action Hour Signup
    • Newsletter Signup
    • Legislative Action List
    • Put up a BLM Sign
    • Get a Black Lives Matter T-Shirt
    • Asylum Seeker Sponsorship >
      • What is Asylum?
      • What is Sponsorship?
      • Become a Sponsor
      • Asylum Seeker Support Partner
  • Get Educated
    • Blog
    • Study and Action Series
    • Resources for Families
    • COVID-19 & Racial Justice
  • About Us
    • Vision, Mission, Values
    • Community Partners
    • Committees
  • Donate