Abolish ICE-Be The Change We Need!

Abolish ICE. Be the change we need to make a difference and to hold this administration accountable. 

Call 202-224-3121 and follow the prompts

 • Say "Hello, my name is (say your name), and I am a constituent of (name your city and state). ICE has harmed, murdered, and kidnapped people all over the country. You are elected to protect us, not fund this violence. Block all ICE funding now! Thank you”

Here is a link to printable resources on knowing your rights when dealing with ICE:

Print at home materials 

Know Your Rights Cards (in many languages): https://www.ilrc.org/redcards#print

WAND Canvassing material / fliers for work places: https://drive.google.com/.../1KxHWFlya2zVuIUP3N...

Rights for pregnant, postpartum, lactation undocumented people as of ICE Directive: https://www.instagram.com/p/DKre3WMN0zP/?img_index=1

Actual ICE Directive: https://www.ice.gov/.../11032.4...

Transcript

Speak: 0:08

Welcome to Birth As We Know It, a podcast that is dedicated to recognizing the many different ways that birth unfolds. I am your host, Kiona Nessenbaum. I have experienced birth as a doula, a student midwife, a birth assistant, and as a mother of three amazing children of my own. After attending over 140 births, I've realized that each birth experience is truly unique. So make sure you subscribe and join me as we are guided through many different birth experiences through the lens of the storyteller. Please be aware that some of these stories can be triggering to hear. So feel free to pause, take a breath, and come back and listen whenever you're ready. With that said, let's prep ourselves to dive deep and get detailed about what really happens in the birth space.

Interview: 1:04

Hello everybody, and welcome back to the Birth As We Know It podcast. Today, we have a different kind of episode. I will actually be talking to you directly solo. This episode will also not be very long, but it is a very important episode. So let me just start off by saying I attended the PodFest Multimedia Expo of 2026 in Orlando, Florida. it was my third year attending. And what I pulled most from this PodFest conference was the importance of authenticity and connection. So I'm going to be very authentic and hopefully you can connect in some way with this. I have been super busy this month, as I'm sure many of us have, but let me dive into what I've been doing. I have co-founded a birth and postpartum doula collective and have been building up that business with my doula partner. We have not yet publicly announced it officially, but the website is live. But that public announcement will be coming soon. So stay tuned for that. I am also actively back as a birth and postpartum doula. So my schedule has been super jam-packed with client visits. In addition to that, my kids have started up their sports. And so of course, I'm running back and forth from wrestling, basketball, gymnastics, and doing all the things that make sense to do as a parent when it comes to supporting your kiddo in their extracurricular activities. And I have also been working on building a stronger co-parenting relationship to make sure that, you know, we are on the same page when it comes to all things that have to do with our kiddos. Now, in addition to being busy and adjusting to the chaos of all things in my work and family life, there is also extreme chaos, imbalance, and inhumane situations actively happening in the world as I record this. And let's be real, the state of the world is not something we can ignore and impacts every single one of us. So outside of me being a podcast producer, and outside of you being a podcast listener, we are parents, siblings, cousins, friends, and more. But most of all, we are all human. And we all deserve to be treated with love, care, and respect. We shouldn't have to live in fear for our own lives, the lives of our babies, or the lives of those around us. The sad part is that this kind of inhumanity is not new. It's something that has been repeated over and over in different capacities all over the world for centuries. But one thing that is newer is the technology that is accessible to the public that makes the first person on the ground experiences to learn more. It's another person who has used to be. It's a powerful tool to do it. The phones, computers, and tablets that we have every day and can't seem to live without can be used as tools and weapons. The person that is holding the device gets to decide how they use it. Or like many situations in the past, that choice is made for you based on your skin tone. I say all of this to say, don't just sit back and do nothing. Fit into the change where you can. Not all of us can be in the front line as protesters and leaders, but all of us can pick up our phones and make calls to our senators to voice our concerns of the injustices around us and how we don't want our money to be used for murder. So what you can do is call call 202-224-3121, and follow the prompts. And once you get to the senator voicemail box that you are trying to reach, you can say something as simple as, hello, my name is blank, and I am a constituent of name your city and state. Then follow it up with ICE has harmed, murdered, and kidnapped people all over the country. You are elected to protect us, not fund violence. Block all ICE funding now. Thank you. And the awesome thing is when you call remember call 202-224-3121, you can do it for states that you don't even live in. So you can continue to be a voice that is against all of this injustice. Now, back to birth work, some of the ways we are seeing ICE invade and impact the birth workers here in the greater Seattle area are ICE is not only present in our neighborhoods and public streets, but near hospitals with word that they are trying to infiltrate labor and delivery wards. The most recent attempt I heard of was in a local hospital in Tacoma, Washington. This led us in the birth community to have more in-depth conversations with our clients on how to best prepare by bringing copies of their documentation when applicable and providing printable resources to the families we serve as well as to each other throughout the birth working community. This is so that people can be aware of their rights when dealing or being confronted with ICE. Now, like I said, I know this is a different kind of episode, but I think this information is really important to share. I do have amazing birth stories that are coming in the future, but it's really hard to just sit in that narrow spot of being a podcaster without trying to ruffle feathers, right? Because all of us are impacted by everything that's happening right now. And so I decided to utilize my platform to just voice that there are ways that we can contribute to the change that we need. So thank you so much for tuning into the Birth As We Know It podcast. I love you all and let us all stick together, stay safe, stay warm, and do what we can to love, support, and respect one another. All right, friends, thank you for tuning in, and I will talk to you all again soon. Bye for now.