Roqayah is off this week, so Kumars is joined from the top of the hour by Albuquerque-based community organizer Selinda Guerrero, founder of the Albuquerque Mutual Aid Coalition and National Action Coordinator for Save the Kids, an all-volunteer organization working to end the school-to-prison pipeline. Selinda also organizes with Building Power for Black New Mexico, Forward Together, and the Industrial Workers of the World’s Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee (IWOC), and heads the New Mexico chapter of the prison-industrial complex abolitionist group Millions for Prisoners.
After sharing a bit about her background as an organizer and the genesis of the mutual aid project she helped kick-start earlier in the pandemic, Selinda fills listeners in on the plight of her husband and fellow Black Lives Matter activist Clifton White, who helped organize BLM protests in the wake of George Floyd’s murder and was arrested on June 1 by Albuquerque police under extremely dubious circumstances. Selinda and Kumars discuss the conditions Clifton and other incarcerated people are facing from California to Louisiana as coronavirus continues to ravage the US prison system. Selinda relays testimonials from those behind bars, highlights their organizing in the face of government depravity, and reflects on what it means to be a political prisoner.
Please call Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham at (505) 476-2200 and Albuquerque Mayor Tim Keller at (505) 768-2200 and demand the immediate release of Clifton White (DOC #60458). You can find a complete list of numbers to call and a sample script here. You can also follow the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee at @IWW_IWOC and IWOC New Mexico at @IwocNew.
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