The TN Immigrant & Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC) and the American Muslim Advisory Council (AMAC) each received grants from the Proteus Fund, itself a recipient of millions of dollars from the George Soros Open Society Foundations. The grants to the two Tennessee organizations were made through the Proteus “Security & Collaborative Rights” (SCR) initiative. TIRRC received a $40,000 grant: To support TIRRC’s leadership development and civic engagement work with MASA [Muslim, Arab and South Asian] communities. This will include public education on immigrant and refugee policies at the local, state, and federal level and building MASA immigrant civic engagement through naturalization, voter engagement, and policy advocacy. AMAC received a $7,000 grant: Given the recent uptick in Immigrations and Customs Enforcement targeting and detaining Kurdish community members in Tennessee, SRC support will allow AMAC to implement plans to continue to provide a hotline, media outreach, and Know Your Rights seminars for the community. Shireen Zaman is Proteus SCR’s Program Director. Named by the Obama White House as a “Champion of Change, Zaman is also the former Executive Director of the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding (ISPU). With offices in Dearborn, Michigan and Washington, D.C., the ISPU works to promote the interests of…
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