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YGB and Groundwork hosted an action yesterday to highlight the vast disparities in the Dane county injustice system. Here is the statement that we brought to the Police Department, The DA’s office and the Jail.

July 21, 2015

To: Madison Police Department, Dane County District Attorney, and Dane County Sheriff,

People of color, specifically Black people are disproportionately targets of the injustice system at every level, from arrests, to referrals, to sentencing, incarceration and beyond. The Dane County Criminal Justice system is guilty of leading the nation in racial disparities. A so called progressive county.

As we know, we account for 5-6% of Dane County’s total population, but make up close to 50% of the jail population. Therefore we demanded that 350 Black people be freed from the shackles of 21st century slavery. In doing so, the jail populations will reflect a world where racism and white supremacy does not exist.

Or, Dane County can arrest 6,000 white people, we are sure UW-Madison has more drugs flowing through it than the south side of Madison. This will create equality within our so called justice system. But, we believe that incarceration is not the answer, but instead creates a brutal cycle of oppression, especially for our Black brothers and sisters living in poverty.

We stand here today, to share our stories, our experiences, our lives, and our humanity. We stand here today to show the devastating impact state violence has on people of color, particularly Black people. Such state violence perpetuates the robbery of the Black body, a story as long as the history of America. Such state violence waters the roots of white supremacy in this county. The 350 are not data points, are not statistics, but are humans, with individual stories and struggles. Each number is a white person that walks with an invisible shield of whiteness protecting them from an evolved form of slavery. Each one of these criminal acts would land a Black American in a slave pen. Each arrest, each stop is a traumatic experience, being Black in America is a traumatic experience that weighs on your mind, body, and soul.

Black people are not inherently criminal, in fact the real crime is the poverty, the real crime is state violence. So we demand the immediate release of 350 21st century Black slaves from the Dane County jail.

All Power to the People,

The Young Gifted and Black Coalition,
Groundwork Madison,
& community members for racial justice

Madison, July 21, 2015

PETITION: http://tinyurl.com/no2os3p

Good evening family!

http://movementforblacklives.org/

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or send checks to: Friends of the School Bus 5  

P.O. Box 141 Stoughton, MA 02072

Four of the union’s leaders were unjustly and illegally fired by the union-busting Veolia Corp in November 2013—and still haven’t gotten their jobs back.

The company they are up against, recently renamed Transdev, is not only notorious for union-busting—which is bad enough—but Transdev supports Israeli apartheid by operating segregated rail lines in the occupied West Bank.

But unlike many protracted union struggles, this union—Steelworkers Local 8751, with a majority immigrant workforce of Haitian, Cape Verdean as well as African American workers—has won a series of stunning victories in its fight for justice.

The first one came in early March, when a transparent union-busting attempt by Veolia to frame union Vice President Steve Kirschbaum with a series of false felony charges was crushed. A working class jury returned a not-guilty verdict in a record ten minutes.

That was round one. Round two came when, in the union’s highest-ever election turnout, the members voted in the full slate of Team Solidarity candidates—led by the fired leaders!—by a landslide to the union’s Executive Board.

Team Solidarity’s winning slate, including the illegally fired leaders

One could compare this righteous upset to socialist labor leader Eugene Debs getting a million votes for U.S. president while in jail for opposing World War 1. As sweet as this second victory was, the members know that the third and final battle has not been won: the reinstatement of the four.

Veolia has gone even further in its attempts to break this mighty union. To give just one example, they illegally issued an ultimatum, with threats to eliminate a million dollars in retroactive pay raises, if the workers do not accept a concession-laden “last best offer” to replace the contract that expired June of last year. Not only is Veolia trying to starve out the four, the company is using every trick in the book to create a division between them and the membership as contract negotiations drag on.

Veolia has yet again underestimated the united resolve of this class-conscious, militant union, whose members march with the Black Lives Matter and LGBTQ movement. But the four do need help to continue this fight. This isn’t the typical case of a strike where the union has a strike fund—though a strike may well be coming. The four fired drivers, out of work 22 months, are relying on solidarity donations to support themselves and their families while they fight for their jobs and perform their duties as elected union leaders.

Online campaign: ​youcaring.com/rehirethe4

Send checks to:

Friends of the School Bus 5

P.O. Box 141 

Stoughton, MA 02072

The group Europe Says OXI has put out a call for a day of global demonstrations:

#THISISACOUP protest: OXI means OXI, NO to financial blackmail, solidarity with the Greek people!

The only option left for us now is escalating the struggle to the streets and the workplaces. Forced by the Troika the Greek government will on Wednesday be effectively implementing legislation that the people voted NO against over little more than a week ago. All red lines have been crossed. It’s up to us to defend them. So we call on everyone all over the world to take to central squares that day, to loudly say:

OXI means OXI!

OXI to austerity!

OXI to capitulation!

OXI to a third memorandum!

YES to democracy and people’s power

The only dividing line right now, in Greece and in those in solidarity is this:

Do you fight or do you capitulate?

We choose to fight. We hope to see you in the streets.
_________________________

For all the solidarity groups organizing protests in their own city, we ask you to make an eventpage with the title “#THISISACOUP – OXI means OXI; solidarity from [fill in city]” and send the eventpage-link to us at Europe says OXI so we can list the different solidarity initiatives here.

http://njpop.org/wordpress/

The MILLION PEOPLE’S MARCH Against Police Brutality, Racial Injustice, And Economic Inequality, happens Saturday, JULY 25, 2015,12 Noon, at the Lincoln Monument, near intersection of West Market Street & Springfield Avenue, Newark, New Jersey. The march is sponsored by People’s Organization For Progress (POP), and endorsed by community, labor, student, and progressive organizations. Planning for the march takes place at POP meetings every Thursday, 6:30pm at Abyssinian Baptist Church, 224 West Kinney Street, Newark, New Jersey. All are invited. For information call (973) 801-0001. Please share this message. POWER TO THE PEOPLE!!!