June 20, 2018

Standing Up against the separation of families: Kidlit Says No Kids in Cages. This fundraiser started by authors Margaret Stohl and Melissa de la Cruz now totals twenty kidlit authors, who released a statement on Monday, June 18, condemning the U.S. policy of separating children from their immigrant parents as they cross the border. “We believe the “Zero Tolerance” directive issued by Attorney General Jeff Sessions is cruel, immoral and outrageous. We believe the Department of Justice is engaging in practices that should be restricted to the pages of dystopian novels.”

Contributions will be divided evenly between Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services (RAICES), the Florence Immigrant and Refugee Rights Project, the ACLU, the Women’s Refugee Commission, Kids in Need of Defense (KIND), and Al Otro Lado.

NOTE: Error correction: this article previously stated that the amount raised by this group was $1.6 million. That was incorrect. As of Wednesday, June 20, the group had raised nearly $161,000 with a goal at that time to reach $175,000. We apologize for the error.

Heather Murphy Capps

Heather Murphy Capps has always had a deep appreciation for comfort and elegance. She and Claudia would have run out of money quickly together but would absolutely have been on the same page about taxis and nice restaurants. And of course, solving mysteries about beautiful art. That said, Heather also appreciates Jamie’s love of complication, which is why she spent several years living in rural Kenya and then became a television news reporter, which involved standing for hours in the middle of hurricanes and political battles. Now she’s raising middle-grade readers and writing for them. She loves to read and write books with lots of great science, magic, mystery, and adventure. Heather is the communications coordinator for Mixed-Up Files, as well as creator/curator for our We Need Diverse MG series. She is committed to creating more diversity in publishing.