January 26, 2023

On November 8th, Jefferson County voters elected seven Judges from a slate of candidates Louisville SURJ endorsed as the best choice to serve on the District Court, Circuit Court, and Court of Appeals. Notably, Louisville SURJ-endorsed candidate, Tracy Yvette Davis, beat Judge Mary Shaw – the judge who authorized the no-knock warrant that the police who killed Breonna Taylor used when they entered her apartment. Louisville SURJ selected these candidates for our slate of endorsements after hundreds of hours of court watching, where we tracked Judges’ use of cash bail, noting trends in how judges set bail based on  race, charges, and type of representation. 

Over 100 volunteers with Louisville SURJ contacted over 2,500 residents in majority-white neighborhoods and distributed tens of thousands of copies of the Judge endorsement slate to Jefferson County voters. Louisville SURJ has been working for years to end the practice of cash bail, which holds people who have not been convicted of a crime in cages because they do not have the ability to pay. Eleven people died in Louisville’s jail in the year before the election. 

Kentucky Lead Organizer, Alex Flood, said of the win: “Tonight was the biggest inflection point in our campaign to end cash bail. For years we have knocked the doors of voters and observed judges in the courtroom. With every circuit and district judge on the ballot we saw an opportunity to make an immediate impact on the issue. We complimented our court watch program with interviews and questionnaires and endorsed a slate of judges who could make a substantive and immediate change in the lives of anyone unfortunate enough to be brought into our injustice system. With tonight’s results less people will go to jail on an unaffordable bail, less will experience the cruel, inhumane, and deadly treatment of that jail, and another step towards the abolition of wealth based detention was taken.”

In December we celebrated that organizers across the state of Georgia helped power Senator Raphael Warnock over the finish line to bring us closer to a progressive majority in the Senate. Good organizing not only wins elections, but grows the people power we need in the days ahead. Progressive organizations led by Black women in Georgia have been building power across the state for decades, and SURJ was proud to do our part in majority-white communities. 

In the runoff alone, over 700 SURJ members took action with us. We sent over 1 million texts, had nearly 100,000 conversations on the phone, and hit the doors on the ground in the final weeks to make sure white people turned out alongside our partners of color. 

After the disappointing polling about white people in Georgia coming out of the general election, we’re proud that SURJ’s organizing was a clear example of white people taking responsibility for organizing other white folks away from the right and into progressive multiracial coalitions. It illustrates what we know is true: white people are moveable. We just have to engage them. 

SURJ members made more than 110,000 calls as part of Protect Kentucky Access, a powerful, multi-racial coalition in Kentucky, and blocked a near-total ban on abortion. This is how we beat the Right. SURJ brings white people into multiracial fights by engaging real issues that affect them. When we organize, we win.

SURJ members held tens of thousands of one-to-one conversations with voters, from Louisville to Appalachian Eastern Kentucky. Organizing around “shared interest”– what white people stand to gain in working for justice– is central to SURJ’s strategy. This Kentucky win is shared interest in action. We spoke to white voters in long-form conversations where we listened, engaged, and helped them identify abortion as an issue those at the top use to build political power. 

And it worked. 

As a racial justice organization, we worked on this issue not only because SURJ has deep roots in Kentucky, but because abortion is an issue that the Far Right has strategically built power around for decades as a part of a racist backlash to Civli Rights wins. If we want to break the power that the Far Right wields over white people, we need to take on their issues– like abortion, immigration, trans rights– and bring white people with us. 

Real talk: Kentucky is a state that is very white. It’s also a state that’s been abandoned for decades by leaders. We have seen that when we engage white people in deep, meaningful ways, they come with us– and tonight’s victory is a resounding example. It’s not rocket science, it’s basic good organizing. And we can do it across the country.