Advocates from across the country are calling on Governor Hochul and Mayor de Blasio to immediately end the transfer of women and transgender, gender non-conforming, non-binary, and/or intersex people from Rikers Island to correctional facilities in upstate New York, as reported by POLITICO.

Over fifty organizations including the National Organization for Women, New York Transgender Advocacy Group, National LGBTQ Task Force, the Immigrant Defense Project, Transgender Law Center, Center for Constitutional Rights, have signed on to a letter decrying the ill-conceived plan.

“The transfers are a reckless response to a crisis that has been most acute in the men’s jails,” the letter reads in part. “Shipping women and trans people to state prison will further separate them from families and children, community support, legal defense teams, and social workers.”

The Legal Aid Society and New York City’s other defender organizations have also signed the letter and continue to call for decarceration, the only real solution to the humanitarian crisis on Rikers. They demand that the Governor work with the Mayor,  community advocates and organizations to immediately release all vulnerable populations from DOC custody.