Yearly Archives: 2017

In the late 1960s and early ‘70s, two names emerged from the Native American and Indigenous community that stood for resistance to white repression and assaults on Native life: Russell Means and Dennis Banks. In a time of mass resistance and social upheaval shown by the anti-war (re Vietnam) and Black liberation movements, Banks was among thousands of young activists of Native, Indigenous communities who rose up to speak – and act – on behalf of the oppressed.

On Nov. 18, Rwandan President Paul Kagame inducted seven thieves without borders and one medical doctor into his “National Order of Outstanding Friendship,” presenting them with medals for “exemplary service” to the nation, meaning himself and his ruling party, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). Kagame is a modern day exemplar of French King Louis XIV’s theory of government: “L’état, c’est moi” (“I am the state”).

A prisoner in New York’s Sullivan Correctional Facility was given a glass-laced pastry by a correctional officer in what he describes as an attempt to murder him. Dr. Al-Fatah Stewart complained about guards destroying his legal work and, in retaliation, he was framed with a weapon, placed in solitary confinement and his food was laced with rocks and glass, now confirmed in a laboratory report. Dr. Stewart reports that “there have been a lot of mysterious deaths at Sullivan, but the families can’t afford autopsies … there are a lot of grievances about staff placing glass in prisoners’ food but nothing is ever done.”

On Tuesday, Nov. 21, more than 100 community members gathered at the Alameda County Board of Supervisors building to demand an audit of Sheriff Gregory Ahern. “We are calling on our county officials to be vigilant and protect our taxpayer dollars,” said Darris Young, senior organizer and advocate with the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights. “Our Board of Supervisors have a responsibility to make sure the budget is being spent effectively to promote community safety, and continuing to increase the sheriff’s budget is not making us any safer.”

The re-emergence of slavery in Libya exposes the reactionary character of the imperialist war waged by the NATO alliance against the country and across North Africa and the Middle East. In Paris Saturday, Nov. 18, more than 1,000 people gathered in front of the Libyan embassy, after a CNN documentary showing the auctioning of refugees as slaves inside the North African country circulated on social media.

On Nov. 21, 150 Oakland youth, clean air activists, workers and labor leaders announced a boycott on Phil Tagami’s Rotunda Building in response to Tagami’s lawsuit against the City of Oakland. Tagami is suing to overturn the popular ban on the handling and storing of coal, so that he can continue with his controversial plan to ship coal through the Oakland Army Base. Oakland communities are responding to Tagami’s attempt to force dangerous, dirty coal dust on the people of Oakland by asking local businesses and organizations to boycott the Rotunda Building.

On Monday, Nov. 21, the Department of Homeland Security announced its inhumane decision to end Temporary Protected Status for nearly 60,000 Haitian immigrants, putting people who have lived legally in the United States for years – and some, decades – at risk to be detained and deported. On the eve of Thanksgiving, the Trump administration has decided to contravene basic humanitarianism in favor of an immigration agenda that is drenched in racism, nativism and xenophobia.

On Friday, Nov. 24, the biggest retail shopping day of the year, also known as “Black Friday,” BlackOut for Human Rights will kick off its fourth annual #BlackOutBlackFriday campaign, urging people nationwide to take part in an economic boycott of major retailers and any corporations that violate human rights standards and/or profit off the pain and suffering of others. Launched in 2014, #BlackOutBlackFriday is a call-to-action encouraging individuals to refrain from shopping to protest social and economic injustice in the U.S. and instead engage in cultural activism.

Dev Mission is recruiting for the Spring 2018 Cohort Session # 3!  Spring program will start on Monday Feb 12th and will end on Friday May 11th,...

Greenaction for Health and Environmental Justice seeks to hire a full time, English/Spanish bilingual and experienced community organizer and policy advocate to work with...

Two years after the historic settlement of Ashker v. Governor of California marked the end of indefinite solitary confinement in California, the Center for Constitutional Rights and co-counsel filed a motion to extend the terms of the settlement by one year, noting that substantial reforms are still needed and the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) continues to violate the constitutional rights of Ashker class members.

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration denounces the Department of Homeland Security’s inhumane decision to terminate Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for nearly 60,000 Haitian immigrants who are firmly rooted in the United States. On Nov. 20, DHS announced that it would terminate TPS for Haitian nationals effective July 22, 2019. TPS was first granted to Haitian immigrants in 2010 following a 7.0 magnitude earthquake that devastated the island, killing 230,000 residents and displacing nearly 3 million.

Soon the Supreme Court will decide whether to hear a case with the potential to end this nation’s abominably long and freakish experimentation with the death penalty. That’s right, drum roll, please. Because, if it grants certiorari in Hidalgo v. Arizona – a case Harvard law professor Laurence Tribe describes as emblematic of “the problems with our [country’s] current capital punishment regimes” – America’s broken and vile “machinery of death” can finally be trashed in the junkyard of our dark, wayward humanity. Implore the Supreme Court to wipe capital punishment’s bloody stain away. Forever.

A while back, people might have argued that this was a statement of journalistic exaggeration, a way to grab the reader’s attention by fear mongering, but today it is an unfortunate statement of fact when one looks around the region. While the intensity and unrelenting nature of this year’s hurricane season has captured a great deal of media attention, the way these storms have intersected with the region’s indebtedness, vulnerable, dependent economies and correspondingly weakened state capacity has not.

The Pennsylvania Department of Corrections sent a letter to Workers World Publishers on Oct. 13, informing us that the denial of Workers World issue 35, Aug. 31, into Pennsylvania prisons has been “overturned.” A previous DOC letter to Workers World Publishers on Sept. 11 stated: “The August 31 issue of Workers World newspaper has been denied to all inmates housed in Pennsylvania prisons.” Their reason: The issue contained articles that “call for people to join the fight against white supremacy.”

After spending over seven years in solitary confinement, I was finally given the opportunity to go back to the general population through a re-entry program in which we must re-enact scenarios that focus on putting one in a no-win situation where they’re accused of something someone else did, know who the culprit is, and are threatened with a disciplinary case. In situations like these, most of us will stand firm and not snitch, but from the looks of these classes they are designed to train us into snitching in efforts to avoid petty sanctions.

Monday, Nov. 13, was a day of extra-judicial killings of men and women estimated by community residents to total 14, plus a number of disappeared. Many are reported wounded by police gunfire and beatings with hammers. In addition, news reports mention 31 arbitrary arrests, and many children and adults were injured by the very potent tear gas used by the police. In the northern city of Cap-Haitien, marching students shouting, “Down with the army, long live education, long live schools!” were brutally attacked by the police using tear gas and batons.

On Nov. 8, a federal judge said that he will dismiss a lawsuit against San Francisco State University, several SFSU administrators and Professor Rabab Abdulhadi. The suit was filed in June by The Lawfare Project, the self-described “legal arm of the pro-Israel movement.” Lawfare accused defendants of “fostering a hostile environment for Jewish students” by tolerating the activism of Palestinian students and loud criticism of Israel’s policies. “I am pleased that the judge saw through the bunch of lies by The Lawfare Project,” Abdulhadi said.

Several inmates at Wabash Valley Correctional Facility have announced that they have begun a hunger strike to protest their deteriorating conditions. Their immediate demands include removal from camera monitored cells, relocation from abusive staff, and the cessation of tampering with food and the confiscation, reading and withholding of mail by administration. Charges are often brought as a form of reprisal, beginning with disciplinary reports filed by disgruntled or sadistic guards looking to punish inmates for refusing passive obedience to their oppression.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) propagates injustice as stark as slavery or South African apartheid. It’s a Western court that prosecutes Africans exclusively. In June 2011, the ICC indicted Libyan President Muammar al-Qaddafi and his son Saif al-Islam Qaddafi. Now, six years later, Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda has announced that she will investigate Burundian officials for crimes against humanity allegedly committed during the country’s past three years of civil unrest.