November 23, 2021

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After Rittenhouse verdict, activists fear for their safety at future demonstrations

By Adrian Florido, NPR

Adrian Florido: Police and vigilantes, says Erin Heaney (National Director for SURJ), respond less aggressively when there are white people in a crowd. The fact that Rittenhouse was acquitted despite his victims being white, she says, drives home the threat that nonwhite protesters face if the verdict emboldens more vigilante violence.

Erin Heaney: It reaffirms the need for those of us who are white to be putting our bodies on the line and also, you know, doing the long haul organizing.

Adrian Florido: She says many of the white people her group organizes are new to racial justice work. And though many are shaken by Friday’s news…

Erin Heaney: One thing we are seeing is that, like, many, many new people are finding our organization and, you know, signing up saying, I want to do something – really just, like, in the last couple days. So I think there is a risk that people are going to be more scared. But I also think that the news also is moving more people into wanting to fight for racial justice.

Click here to listen to the full story on NPR News.

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image shows many people gathered at a protest. Attica Scott is speaking through a microphone. In the background a number of white people are holding a SURJ banner.

Kyle Rittenhouse verdict sparks Louisville protests

By Ayana Archie, Louisville Courier Journal | Photo by Joe Sonka

About 50 people gathered in downtown Louisville on Saturday afternoon to protest the verdict in the Kyle Rittenhouse case. Rittenhouse was found not guilty on all charges against him Friday, more than a year after he shot three men during a protest in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

The protest, which took place on the steps of the Hall of Justice, was organized by the Louisville chapter of Showing Up for Racial Justice, whose goal is “bringing more white people into racial justice movements for change.”

Anice Chenault, part of the LSURJ leadership team encouraged people to use their anger toward the criminal justice system to bring about change, starting with those around them. 

“We feel this anger,” she said. “We say to ourselves and people who we know agree with us that this is wrong. But we got to start saying it to people who don’t agree with us. We have to start saying it in public. You have to start taking risks at work. Because if we don’t speak up, especially white folks, every time we don’t say something there is an assumption that we agree.” 

Read the rest of the article at the Courier Journal here.

Kyle Rittenhouse verdict sparks Louisville protests Read More »

image shows a group of about 15 white people outside under a tree in a neighborhood. They are holding signs that say "Kim Beaty for sheriff"

2021 Buffalo Sheriff’s Race

In the 2021 Buffalo Sheriff’s Race, SURJ Buffalo joined a multi-racial coalition of local partners to do our part to disrupt the cycle of violence in the Erie County sheriff’s office. Though our candidate, Kim Beaty, did not win the election, our work in majority-white communities moved white voters to support progressive criminal legal reforms.

In Erie County, the Right has maintained power of the sheriff’s office — and for over 15 years moved white voters to elect Tim Howard, one of the deadliest sheriffs in the country  — through “law and order messaging” for decades despite having a Democratic majority by 22 percentage points. This election, we knew that Tim Howard’s endorsed successor would use the same racist messaging to appeal to white voters.

As a part of a mutli-racial coalition on the ground in Buffalo (including our partners Black Love Resists in the Rust), SURJ Buffalo answered the call to organize our own, just as we did in the 2016 sheriff race. We set out to talk with suburban white voters about the deadly jail conditions in Erie County because those are the folks most targeted by the racist “law and order messaging” of the Right. 

Through an extensive canvassing and phone banking program, over one thousand SURJ members took action to make 53,000 phone calls, knock 6,000 doors, and have 7,800 conversations — securing 2,300 vote commits for Kim Beaty, ​​a Black Democratic sheriff candidate. 

Here’s what happened in those conversations:

In every single conversation, we found someone who had been locked up in the Holding Center, knew someone who had, or were worried about their loved ones struggling with mental health or substance use and what could happen if they were to end up there. It’s clear that all of us are impacted by the carceral system in some way. It harms us all, even those of us who are white.

Our work in this race reminds us that we can talk to white voters in the suburbs about criminal justice reform without ignoring race — and that we can effectively move them to support progressive reforms when we engage in conversation. In fact, they are waiting to hear from us. The very voters we have been told “don’t want to talk about criminal justice reform,” were ready to talk about their own need for jail reform.

2021 Buffalo Sheriff’s Race Read More »

image shows a large group of white people sitting in a park pavillion, raising their hands. Many of them are wearing black tshirts that say "citizens for a safer Cleveland."

Citizens For a Safer Cleveland

In the 2021 general election, SURJ Ohio members in Cleveland, Ohio joined a multiracial coalition of Black-led partner organizations to mobilize voters and win on Issue 24 — a ballot initiative that will create the most powerful  police civilian review board in the country, thereby putting the final decision on police policies and the discipline of officers in the hands of the people. 

In a heavily policed city like Cleveland — where, 7 years ago, 12-year-old Tamir Rice was murdered by cops in less than 2 seconds after Cleveland Police arrived on the scene to a child playing with a toy in his local park — many thought that the Fraternal Order of Police would block an accountability measure like Issue 24. But the measure passed by 18 points – a result of years of deep organizing in multi-racial communities led by Black Lives Matter Cleveland and families who have been affected by police violence. 

SURJ Northeast Ohio (SURJ-NEO) led an extensive canvassing and phone banking program targeting majority-white communities in the City. Over 100 SURJ Ohio volunteers had almost 4,000 conversations at the doors and over the phone with white voters in Cleveland to mobilize them in support of Issue 24 and the Citizens for a Safer Cleveland campaign.

Campaigns like Yes on Issue 24 are not simply election season fights. 

Back in 2015, after the murder of Tamir Rice, white SURJ Ohio members began asking this question: “How can we organize white people in this historical moment of police accountability?”

The answer from our Black partners was resounding: accountability processes are only as good as the people who show up for them. White folks must show up.

And so, as part of a multiracial coalition, SURJ Ohio members participated at every Community Police Commission meeting for over 4 years —  making sure that white folks did our part to hold the city accountable. That commission eventually went on to be the working group that worked with the families to create the initial ballot initiative known as Issue 24.

The Issue 24 ballot initiative victory is the result of over 6 years of long-haul organizing that followed the leadership of those most impacted by police violence.

Citizens For a Safer Cleveland Read More »

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