Minneapolis, MN – More than 20,000 people marched here, May 26, to demand justice for George Floyd, an African American man who as murdered by Minneapolis police on May 25. The three-mile march filled city streets for blocks and then closed a major four-lane highway. It started at the murder scene at Chicago Avenue and 38th Street and went to the Third Precinct station on Lake Street, where intense clashes took place. Police fired tear gas and rubber bullets. Bricks broke some of the stations windows, a police car was demolished, and the slogan “I can’t breathe,” were visible on the station’s wall.

Angel Smith-El of the Twin Cites Coalition for Justice for Jamar (TCC4J), states, “During a time where people are already stressed because of COVID-19 the police took full advantage by killing an unarmed Black man. He laid with his face to the ground begging for the cop to get off his neck because he couldn't breathe. The officer continued to push his knee deeper into George's neck even after he was unconscious.”

Smith-El continued, “This is the time for us as a community to stop these killer cops once and for all. This is the time to implement community control of the police.”

TCC4J is also demanding the four cops who killed George Floyd, who were fired by the city the afternoon of May 26, also be prosecuted for murder.

#MinneapolisMN #PoliceBrutality #PeoplesStruggles #Racism #Antiracism #GeorgeFloyd

Tallahassee, FL – On March 20, Tallahassee Police Department Officer Zackri Jones killed 31-year-old Mychael Johnson. Mychael Johnson was the second person shot and killed by Jones, and the first since Lawrence Revell became chief of police in January. Revell’s nomination in November and his later appointment led to protests due to his killing of George Williams, a Black teenager, in September 1996.

The Tallahassee Police Department has issued statements claiming that Johnson had attempted to steal a car and had fought with Officer Justin Davidson before being shot and killed by Jones. However, the family is questioning whether the police have told the full story.

“Mychael was fun, loving, intelligent, he was a giver, and a protector, he was a son, brother, father, and a great friend to have known,” Johnson’s sister Mildred Richardson said. “I think that there is way more to the story that we aren’t getting and the small details that we have received just doesn’t sound like him at all, it’s just not sitting well and adding up with the family.”

The family is also questioning whether the police were justified in using deadly force.

“What I think happened is that he was afraid, he wasn’t trying to hurt anyone, but he didn’t want to go back and have to spend time in a broken prison system,” said Mychael Johnson’s mother Evelyn Johnson. “I feel like he was running for his life because he was scared. It’s sad that I reached out to his probation officer, the police office, the Apalachee center, and the Leon county sheriff’s department, before this point. And the only thing that they assisted with was taking his life.”

The Tallahassee Community Action Committee (TCAC) has criticized the lack of transparency from TPD. They organized community members to call into police and city officials on March 25 to ask for the release of body cam or dash footage and for an independent investigation led by the community.

“We can’t let the police investigate themselves, as we see time and time again that the police never have a transparent process,” said TCAC President Regina Joseph. “We need an independent investigation for this case, and every case from now. That is why we are fighting for community control of the police. We need an elected body that will investigate all police crimes and bring peace and justice to our community.”

“I want people to know what type of person that he was, I don’t want his name to go in vain,” said Mildred Richardson. She continued, “And I also want people to be more aware of the police violence against the Black community, and that if we all stick together so many things can be accomplished.”

#TallahasseeFL #PoliceBrutality #PeoplesStruggles #Racism #Florida #BLM

Racism against Asian Americans is on the rise with 650 attacks reported this last week of March, 2020. As the COVID-19 pandemic deepens, Donald Trump is PURPOSEFULLY inciting these attacks. President Trump is using anti-Asian racism to distract from his bungled COVID-19 response and to demonize China. Despite the fact that Trump previously praised China’s transparency and heroic efforts to curb the pandemic, he is now maliciously labeling the coronavirus as the “Chinese virus.”

Trump has repeatedly defended his racist attacks on the Chinese people, ignoring reprimands from the scientific and medical community. Dr. Mike Ryan, an executive director in the World Health Organization responded implicitly to Trump, saying, “Viruses know no borders and they don’t care about your ethnicity, the color of your skin….it’s really important we be careful in the language we use lest it lead to the profiling of individuals associated with the virus”.

Trump is not alone in promoting these racist attacks. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo refuses to stop referring to Covid-19 as the “Chinese virus” and the “Wuhan virus”. Pompeo’s persistence in inserting racism into the public discourse about COVID-19 has hamstrung international efforts coordinating the efforts to fight the Covid19 pandemic. At the recent G-7 conference, Pompeo's insistence in using the term 'Wuhan virus' made it impossible for the G-7 foreign ministers to issue a joint statement on the pandemic.

In the U.S. House of Representatives, Representative Jim Banks (R-Ind.) and Representative Seth Moulton (D-Mass.) have introduced a resolution blaming China for the coronavirus. To these politicians, it’s more important to distract from U.S. government failures and smear China than to coordinate global efforts to save human lives.

It is certainly no surprise to us that Trump and his allies would react to this crisis by lashing out in ignorance and fear. We have seen hate-mongering by this Administration in the form of Islamophobic “Muslim bans,” an irrational promotion of the racist border wall, inhumane concentration camps for asylee children, and vindictive sanctions against Venezuela and Iran. Nor are these policies completely out of the blue, given the U.S.’s barbaric history with white supremacy from the two founding sins of genocide of indigenous peoples and the enslavement of Black people in chattel slavery, to the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the Japanese-American concentration camps in WWII, the Jim Crow era, and the mass incarceration of a disproportionate amount of people of color.

Our lamentable history makes it even more incumbent on all people of conscience to refuse to buy into the racist and white supremacist slop Trump is trying to force-feed us. As the COVID-19 pandemic and the consequent economic crisis grows, Donald Trump and his allies will become more frenzied, inciting greater anti-Asian racism in order to shift the blame for their neglectful handling of COVID to China and protect U.S. global domination. The Anti-War Committee condemns anti-Asian racism and all other forms of bigotry. Mass opposition against racist white supremacy, and solidarity with all peoples under attack by the U.S. government are immediately necessary.

The concentration camps imprisoning migrants swept up in Trump's racist immigration policies must be closed. Islamophobic attacks like the Muslim bans must be stopped, sanctions like those imposed on Iran must be lifted. Anti-Asian slurs like 'Wuhan virus' must be exposed as distractions and U.S. intervention. We must demand these from every level of government in the U.S., always pushing government officials to end these racist attacks.

When Chinese people are under attack, what do we do?! Stand up! Fight Back! When Asian Americans are under attack, what do we do?! STAND UP! FIGHT BACK! Fight anti-Asian racism, Islamophobia and all forms of racism! Fight U.S. imperialism!

#UnitedStates #AntiwarMovement #PeoplesStruggles #Racism #Antiracism #Trump #Coronavirus #COVID19 #AsianAmericans

Chicago, IL – The corporate media has missed what is most important about Chicago’s April 2 elections. Its focus on the uninspiring mayoral contest between Toni Preckwinkle and Lori Lightfoot helped contribute to the lowest voter turnout ever. Only 29% of registered voters went to the polls.

What this election did see was a record number of young candidates challenging incumbents, and the greatest amount was in the Black wards of the city. According to Aislinn Pulley, an organizer with Black Lives Matter-Chicago, “What was significant were the young activists – mostly Black and Latino – that fought neighborhood by neighborhood.”

In addition, the agenda of these candidates was progressive. There’s been a polarization on the issues, and while there were fault lines along race and class, the most militant positions had to do with police terror.

Jeanette Taylor was elected alderperson of the 20th Ward, one of the poorest on Chicago’s South Side. After her victory, she wrote to her supporters, “This does not happen without the fight for Dyett, the struggle for a trauma center, the fight for a Civilian Police Accountability Council (CPAC), or the campaign to bring a Community Benefits Agreement to the Obama Center,” and, “If the next mayor wants to close Black schools, lay off Black teachers, protect killer cops, and force Black and Brown and working-class people out of this city, she will have a City Council fighting her at every step of the way.”

Dyett School was threatened with closure by Mayor Rahm Emanuel. In 2015, Taylor helped to lead a hunger strike of parents to save it. She then joined a fight led by Southsiders Together Organizing for Power to compel the elite University of Chicago to open a trauma center on the South Side of Chicago.

Jackson Potter, one of the founders of the Caucus of Rank and File Educators (CORE) in the Chicago Teachers Union, said at the victory party for Jeanette Taylor, “For the first time in history, a Chicago mayor will face a strong city council.”

Chicago cops stage racist protest before election day

One of the platforms in the progressive agenda is for community control of the police. The morning before the election, the racists in the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) showed the need, according to Frank Chapman of the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, “for the Black and Latino communities to have democratic control over who polices their communities and how they are policed.”

The FOP brought out over 100 people, including members of three white supremacist organizations, to protest in front of the office of the Cook County State’s Attorney. The cops, along with Emanuel, were incensed at State’s Attorney Kim Foxx when her office dropped charges against actor Jussie Smollett, who had been accused by the Chicago Police Department of staging a hate crime against himself.

The context for the FOP’s anger is that last year, for the first time ever, a cop (Jason Van Dyke) was convicted of murdering a Black person, and that Black and Latino communities in Chicago are demanding CPAC.

The Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, BLM, Southside Organized for Unity and Power, and the U.S. Palestinian Community Network counter-protested. They were joined by Jeanette Taylor, previous candidate for mayor Amara Enyia, and the Reverend Otis Moss III, pastor of the historic Trinity United Church of Christ. Addressing the FOP, Rev.