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FEB 10, 2026
Dear Supporter Ji,
This is Munmeeth Kaur, the Legal Director here at the Sikh Coalition. I wanted to share two exciting new hires we’ve already made this year—Sumouni Basu as Immigration Justice Habeas Attorney Fellow and Sahib Sohal as Sikh Immigrant Justice Fellow—and provide some insight on how our immigration work continues to grow and change in this critical moment.
As we’ve seen immigration enforcement become more aggressive and sweeping over the course of the past year, I’m reminded of my own experience back in 2019. Seven years ago, the first Trump Administration was targeting asylum seekers, including many from the Sikh community, and detaining them in facilities where they had no means to contact their family, no access to articles of faith like clean dastaars, and no information about their legal rights available in Punjabi. When I stepped in to help in this urgent situation, I realized how few Punjabi-speaking public interest attorneys there were to stand up for these vulnerable people. I noted at the time that the Sikh Coalition was one of the only organizations taking action, too—but that there was an incredible gap that we all needed to work together to fill.
2026 is 2019, but at a far more extreme scale. The Sikh community is one of many being swept up in a dragnet of unlawful stops, arrests, and detentions. It’s not just asylum-seekers who are being targeted, but all kinds of immigrants—including legal residents—who have been integral to their families and communities here for years or even decades. Cases like Bibi Harjit Kaur’s clearly show that our community is not exempt. Moreover, federal agents’ increasingly violent tactics have resulted in a record number of deaths in custody and brutal killings of citizens protesting in the streets of Minneapolis.
Clearly the gap we needed to fill in 2019 is even bigger now—but welcoming Sumouni and Sahib to our growing team is just one step forward. While the Sikh Coalition still isn’t in a position to provide direct representation to clients in immigration proceedings, we do have the expertise and the unique perspective to fight unlawful arrests and detention. Our efforts will be grounded in habeas corpus, a fundamental right that existed centuries before the U.S. Constitution: Governments cannot indefinitely or arbitrarily detain human beings. As we pivot to more of this habeas work, we’ll be filing challenges on behalf of Sikh detainees—and where federal judges find that the government acted improperly or is detaining them without reason, we’ll fight to return them to their families and communities.
This new legal work comes amidst other efforts throughout our organization. We continue to create and share immigration resources specifically for sangat: See our latest document in both English and Punjabi, and our full library of content here. And on the advocacy front, we are pushing Congress to pass legislation like the Protecting Sensitive Locations Act and the VISIBLE Act, arguing in favor of easier visa processes for granthis and other non-citizen religious workers, and both leading and joining coalition efforts to ensure oversight of DHS.
The challenges we are facing are stark, but we are committed to fighting for basic values like liberty and due process. As always, we thank you for your support—and urge you to practice your faith fearlessly.
Chardi Kala,
Munmeeth Kaur
Legal Director
The Sikh Coalition
Updates from Legal Safety and Security’s efforts, posted on a regular basis.
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