George and Amal Clooney Are Donating $100,000 to Help Migrant Children

“We can’t change this administration’s policy, but we can help defend the victims of it.”

George and Amal Clooney are stepping up in a big way to help migrant children who were separated from their parents at the border. On Wednesday, they announced that their Clooney Foundation for Justice donated $100,000 to the Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights, a human-rights group that advocates for immigrant children.

“At some point in the future our children will ask us: is it true, did our country really take babies from their parents and put them in detention centers? And when we answer yes, they’ll ask us what we did about it. What we said. Where we stood,” Amal said in a statement. “We can’t change this administration’s policy, but we can help defend the victims of it.”

This is just the latest philanthropic effort to come from the Clooneys’ foundation. They have also partnered with the Southern Poverty Law Center to combat hate groups, worked with UNICEF to help Syrian refugees get an education, started a trial monitoring program to keep tabs on human rights violations, and sponsored the resettlement of Syrian and Yazidi refugees in the United States. They also donated $500,000 to the March for Our Lives after the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, and showed up to the event in Washington in March.

The Young Center encourages people to take action against family separation by contacting elected officials, participating in a march on June 30, and signing up to be a volunteer child advocate.

This weekend, we’ve heard from countless people horrified by the treatment of children and families at the border, especially their forced separation. The Young Center provides Child Advocates for these separated children, and we’ve been flooded with new requests. Our job: to get them back to their parents, safely.⠀ ⠀ These kids need allies—Child Advocates, attorneys, and more compassionate policymakers. To guide them through the hostile immigration system, and to reunite them with their parents where they belong, where they’re safe. #KidsNeedAllies #AlliesNotAdversaries

A post shared by The Young Center (@theyoungcenter) on May 28, 2018 at 11:12am PDT

“This Administration’s policy disregards international law and basic principles of human decency. To treat children in such a cruel manner not only violates their legal rights but also their basic needs,” Maria Woltjen, the executive director of the Young Center. “We are doing everything we can to advocate on behalf of the thousands of children who are separated and alone, and we are grateful for the generous support of George and Amal Clooney and the Clooney Foundation for Justice—it could not be more vital at this time.”

Via Harper’s Bazaar US