Campaign News

“In order to effect that change," said Julio López Varona, the co-director of community dignity campaigns at the Center For Popular Democracy, the consequences for profiting from the debt must be clear.”

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Washington, D.C.-- In response to plans by Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders to address justice reform as a part of their respective 2020 presidential campaign platforms, a coalition of diverse organizations led by Black and brown organizers, researchers and justice activists who represent people impacted by incarceration and working towards a new vision of community safety, released the following statement: 

“For Black and brown communities, justice reform is about transforming a current system that is corrupt and rotten to its core. It’s also about redefining public safety in a way that prioritizes investments in community-led solutions that center dignity and respect for everyone. 

“Our coalition believes that justice system reform must include proactive solutions that acknowledge and seek to repair harm for every person who has been impacted by existing and historical policies, and shifts the $200 billion our country spends annually on policing and prisons to real community resources. 

“The release of strong justice reform plans from presidential campaigns represents a big moment for grassroots organizations and social movements. It follows the lead of Black and brown communities and organizations who have long been fighting for an end to criminalization and incarceration, as well as a shift in how we define and resource public safety.

“It’s clear that presidential candidates are listening to our organizations and including many of our policy demands around decarceration and dismantling the harm caused by the ‘94 Crime Bill. However, the only justice plans that can move forward will require the sustained leadership of impacted communities, grassroots organizations, and Black and brown-led social movements.  

“We will continue pushing both Democrats and Republicans to engage communities through a people’s process that recognizes directly impacted people as the policy experts on justice transformation who can speak from experience about the devastation of criminalization and incarceration and offer community-oriented solutions that reduce harm.”

“We will also continue to fight for policies that create a new meaning of safety and justice informed by communities, and recognizes the full humanity and dignity of all people, including non-carceral responses to gender and gun violence, ending life without parole, decriminalizing sex work, and decriminalizing migration.”

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Center for Popular Democracy, Dream Defenders, Law for Black Lives, BYP100, JustLeadershipUSA, The National Council of Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women, PolicyLink, and many more.

Una polémica se desató por el retiro de una réplica de la Estatua de la Libertad frente a las oficinas de Servicios de Ciudadanía e Inmigración (USCIS) en Washington, D.C., ya que organizaciones civiles acusaron que fue Ken Cuccinelli, director de esa dependencia, quien ordenó retirar dicha escultura que daba la bienvenida a los inmigrantes.

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The deadly mass shooting in El Paso this past weekend was an attack on a U.S. city that many of us call home. It is also a city that has been one of the safest in the country for years, and it is now a city where there were almost as many murders Saturday morning as there were in all of last year. It is a city that is more than 80 percentLatino, including many immigrants. So let’s call Saturday’s heinous act of violence what it is: a carefully calculated and purposeful hate crime targeted at the Hispanic and immigrant community. It is an act of domestic terrorism.

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