| Black Agenda Report

Jamiles Lartey
New York Tried to Get Rid of Bail. Then the Backlash Came
13 May 2020
The no-bail movement was on a roll from Vermont and New Jersey to Alaska and Georgia – and then the lock ‘em up mob struck back. “Lawmakers in Illinois and Colorado are feeling confident that they won’t face the same kind of backlash.” The national drive to reduce jail and prison…
Tunde Osazua and Netfa Freeman
First Somali Congressperson Legitimizes AFRICOM and US Drone War
13 May 2020
Rep. Omar recently commended the US war machine for increasing the “transparency” and “accountability” of its bombing of her native country. “Instead of this being an asset to expose AFRICOM and to the decolonization Africa, Rep. Omar validates the role of AFRICOM.”
Dean Spade and Roberto Sirvent, BAR Contributors
BAR Abolition & Mutual Aid Spotlight: Alisa Bierria
13 May 2020
In light of the pandemic, we have seen an extraordinary emergence of mutual aid strategies around the world. “If states can release thousands of people from jails to avoid worsening a pandemic, do we even need jails at all?”
Jennifer S. Leath
BAR Book Forum: Symposium on Sarah Haley’s "No Mercy Here"
13 May 2020
Georgia’s convict leasing system was created to devour Black people of both genders. White women defended the sterilization of Black women presumed to be inherently lascivious alongside the lynching of Black men presumed to be inherent rapists.”
Telesur
US Blocks Vote on UN’s Bid for Global Ceasefire Amid COVID-19
13 May 2020
The US veto trashes the UN’s efforts to convince armed factions in more than a dozen countries to call for temporary truces as the world battles the pandemic. “The U.S. is playing the ‘blame game.’" International diplomats were stunned and frustrated Friday after the United States again…
Quetzal Cáceres
The Sheepdog Caucus and So-Called “Democratic” Socialists
13 May 2020
The “democratic” socialist worldview supports socialism except in places where people are actually trying to build it. “The notion of ‘democratic’ socialism as espoused in the US generally functions as a veiled accessory to the ideology of American Exceptionalism.”
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Archaic capitalism’s COVID cops?
13 May 2020
What if COVID-19 came and drove down crime by 40%? What if capitalism’s cops be- came useless patchwork quilts of punitive policing—cruel citations and fines? Stagecoach drivers in Tesla times? Milk pails beneath bulls on the Sahara Desert? What if we found we could live …
Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
Trump wins! Completing Obama’s Pivot to Asia and the Confrontation with China
13 May 2020
The Trump administration is determined to “put China in its place,” a white supremacist mindset that will inevitably lead to monumental errors of judgement. “U.S. policymakers are openly advocating war with China.”
Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor
Joe Biden, Kim Jong-Un, and the Dialectics of White Supremacy
13 May 2020
White supremacy shapes every aspect of imperialism and must be understood from a dialectical perspective if socialism is to ever become a possibility in the United States. “White supremacy protects Joe Biden like a prison guard protects the warden.”
Margaret Kimberley, BAR senior columnist
Freedom Rider: New Attacks on Venezuela
13 May 2020
The Democratic Party’s “left” wing is mute on the latest US aggression against the people and government of Venezuela, thus giving assent to Trump by their silence. “Neither the Congressional Black Caucus nor the Congressional Progressive Caucus have spoken out against the latest intervention.”