News Feeds

Feb 21, 2021 – The myth of “sex work” w/ Esperanza Fonseca and Khara Jabola-Carolus

Jabola-CarolusEsperanza Fonseca and Khara Jabola-Carolus from AF3IRM join host Jen Marley to discuss the relationship between the sex trade, militarization, and global imperialism. 

Listen to The Red Nation Podcast on Spotify, SoundCloud, and Apple Podcasts. Listen and download for free on Libsyn. Watch on The Red Nation Youtube Channel.

The Red Nation Podcast is sustained by comrades and supporters like you, power our work here: www.patreon.com/redmediapr

The Red Nation Podcast is produced by Red Media.

The post The Red Nation Podcast #Throwback appeared first on The Red Nation.

Signs warning of contaminated water and fish, Houston Ship Channel.  Photo credit: Lauren Murphy, Amnesty International

Last month, both Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch released reports about human rights abuses perpetrated by the petrochemical industry in the Gulf Coast.  The AI report is titled The Cost of Doing Business? and addresses the impacts on urban communities around the Houston Ship Channel. The HRW report “We’re Dying Here” looks at rural communities in Louisiana’s Cancer Alley.

The USA is the world’s largest oil and gas producer and accounts for more than a third of global oil and gas expansions planned through 2050. Much of these fossil feedstocks will go to the rapidly growing plastics and petrochemical industries in the region between Houston and New Orleans, the “sacrifice zone” that already contains the highest concentration of petrochem plants in the country.

Texas – Houston Ship Channel

Amnesty International researchers detail the negative effects of over 600 petrochemical manufacturing sites concentrated around the Houston Ship Channel, a dredged waterway cut through the former Buffalo Bayou to connect East Houston industries to the Gulf of Mexico.  It is one of the busiest waterways in the world, and the surrounding metropolitan cities hold 44% of the USA’s petrochem production capacity.  Port Houston exports 59% of all US plastic resins, 73% of polyethylene (which is made into PET bottles).  Pollutants present in alarming rates throughout the area include volatile organic compounds (VOCs), such as benzene, 1,3-butadiene, dioxane, ethylene, toluene, styrene and xylene; greenhouse gasses such as methane, carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide; and particulate matter (PM). Ozone, a secondary pollutant formed from the reaction between VOCs, oxides of nitrogen and sunlight, creates persistent toxic smog.  Formaldehyde, another secondary pollutant created by reactions from mixed chemicals, is also present at dangerous levels.

From the Amnesty International report

Negative effects on the health of workers and residents range from headaches, dizziness, and vomiting as well as acute eye and lung irritation immediately after these chemicals are released, to asthma and other chronic respiratory illnesses, miscarriages and premature births, and numerous forms of cancer from repeated exposure.  Benzene is particularly noxious – the WHO has said that exposure to benzene is “a major health concern” with no safe level of exposure.  When accidents lead to large fires, high levels of benzene may be present in the air for over two weeks.  Residents are rarely informed of chemical releases and they often struggle to access real-time information, with only unpleasant smells in the environment to tip them off to the danger.

Chemical disasters happen so frequently that they have become normalized for some residents.  The AI report states that since 2021 there have been at least 15 chemical explosions, fires and toxic releases reported along the Houston Ship Channel, resulting in at least 28 workers being injured and one death.  In 2023 alone, residents along the Houston Ship Channel experienced at least seven petrochemical disasters, including six fires.  These figures only capture high-profile chemical disasters that receive media coverage and not the many less visible chemical releases that can still have devastating impacts.

The CAPECO disaster, 2009 in Puerto Rico, another region overburdened by environmental racism.  Photo credit: US Chemical Safety Board

Hurricanes and heavy rains can also lead to catastrophic chemical spills.  Even in ordinary conditions, the industry is careless about containing leaks and discharges.  Between 2019 and 2021, nationwide 83% of refineries report violating their permitted limits on water pollutants.  Communities closest to facility fencelines face the greatest harm and have the least time to react in the event of a catastrophic release.  Those lower-income and racialized people can have up to 20 years shorter life expectancy compared to averages in the disproportionately affluent and white neighborhoods in western Houston, and much higher rates of all types of cancer.

The Houston metro area, rapidly expanding due to the burgeoning petroleum industry, is incredibly diverse but also extremely racially segregated.  A lack of zoning regulations means that industrial facilities are sited right next to residential areas, almost always communities of color.  The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) has clearly shown that they prioritize industry profits over these communities.  State records show that TCEQ imposed penalties in less than 3% of cases of unpermitted pollution releases in recent years. A recent review called TCEQ commissioners “reluctant regulators” that encourage industry to “self-police.”  Companies routinely avoid penalties for pollution releases by invoking the “affirmative defense,” a loophole in Texas laws that waives enforcement for air pollution that the company reports as “unplanned and unavoidable.”

AI reports that a former air pollution investigator for the City of Houston said, “These fines, they’re hardly a drop in the bucket… They mean nothing when the companies are pulling in billions of dollars a year.”  A professor at Rice University explained, “The fines that companies pay are so small compared to the value of the petrochemical products they sell that they can be seen as a routine cost of doing business.”  Frustration over underenforcement of already weak regulations was echoed by community members: “TCEQ is so ineffectual. Their fines are so limited. If you do the math for the violations… a company gets fined less than one person who’s affected by it would spend on medical bills. So, it’s very unfair.”

Making their disregard for residents’ health insultingly clear, in June 2023 the Texas legislature passed SB 471, stipulating that TCEQ does not need to investigate or even respond to certain complaints, especially from residents who have filed multiple complaints in the past.

Smoke and flares from petrochemical plants restarting after Hurricane Ida, 2021.  Photo credit: Julie Dermansky

Louisiana – Cancer Alley

As if these stories about Houston were not appalling enough, the Human Rights Watch report about “Cancer Alley” exposes even more egregious environmental racism.

Between Baton Rouge and New Orleans, the banks of the Mississippi River are clustered with over 150 industrial facilities, nearly all of which process fossil fuels.  This industry has become a defining feature of Louisiana’s identity.  The state’s first oil well was drilled in 1901, and offshore oil extraction was innovated there in 1947.  Production boomed and imports arrived as well.  Today, Louisiana oil refineries account for one-sixth of the nation’s total capacity, with refined petroleum shipped abroad or pumped through pipelines to the various petrochem plants in Cancer Alley.  The story is similar for methane gas.  The most active methane gas market center in North America, the Henry Hub in Erath, interconnects nine interstate and three intrastate pipelines.

Louisiana has the highest per-capita energy consumption in the USA, mostly because of these industries (only 7% of total energy goes to homes).  It has the worst pollution – according to an analysis of 2021 EPA data, the average Louisiana resident was exposed to four times more industrial pollutants than the average American.  The majority of air pollution is occurring in Cancer Alley, as well as the majority of non-nitrate water pollution (nitrates come from fertilizers and are by far the highest source of water pollution).  Huge amounts of toxic petrochem byproducts are leached or even dumped directly into the Mississippi River.  The EPA found in 2016 and again in 2020 that residents of Cancer Alley were exposed to more than 10 times the health risks experienced by residents living elsewhere in the state.  The most polluting operations are disproportionately concentrated within Black communities, and even more facilities are currently being built in those areas.  Most residents in Cancer Alley are descendants of formerly enslaved people who had bought small parcels of old plantations.  The industry moved in later, and many folks feel like the state prefers to let them move out or die off rather than protect their health and humanity.

Petrochemical plants right next to communities in “Cancer Alley.”  Photo credit: Julie Dermansky

The HRW research indicates that many of the plants in Cancer Alley are constantly in “significant violation” of the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act.  One site that they studied had faced six enforcement actions in the last three years, but was fined a mere $300 total.  Since 2018, the EPA has required oil refineries to install air monitors that measure benzene at the fencelines of their facilities.  Data from these monitors indicate that actual emissions can be as much as 28 times the amounts reported by companies.  So far only 13 petrochem facilities nationwide have been compelled to install these monitors, and only a few have collected enough data to be useful.  Those in Cancer Alley are routinely emitting benzene well above legal limits.

But state regulators do nothing to change this situation.  Interviewees told HRW that the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality (LDEQ) was actively “hostile” to their interests, acting as a “rubber stamp” and a “revolving door” for the industry.  A 2021 audit found that LDEQ failed to adequately track facilities’ emissions reports, including facilities that failed to submit reports entirely. Penalties were not tracked, and frequently were not paid.  It takes an average of 20 months for LDEQ to issue enforcement actions after known violations.

Meanwhile, residents continue to be exposed daily to the same chemicals described above, and feel the same effects.  The planned expansions of petrochem plants and pipelines promise to worsen these conditions.  Pipelines (including carbon pipelines) are much less visible yet insidious, since they receive little attention from regulators, but have high incidences of leaks and spills caused by hurricanes as well as normal wear and tear, and their construction cuts apart and destroys sensitive bayou ecosystems, thereby amplifying all the other negative effects of the industry.

The petrochemical industry has no right to treat our community as a sacrifice zone. It is high time for regulators, legislators, NGOs, and the public to fight for the urgent needs of environmental justice communities.

– Juan Parras, TEJAS

Jeff Landry, a fossil fuel industry lawyer and now the state’s governor, has been an outspoken defender of the status quo.  It was his lawsuits that negated Obama’s Clean Power Plan and Biden’s fossil fuel leasing ban.  In early 2023, the EPA had been negotiating improvements to LDEQ’s permitting process, such as assessments of cumulative impacts from existing health hazards and racial discrimination.  But Landry sued the federal government again, making a sort of “reverse racism” argument that unless a law explicitly says that its intended purpose is to harm people of color, any claims that discrimination is occurring are politically-motivated attacks by partisan regulators “moonlight[ing] as social justice warriors.”  One month after the dispute was filed, the EPA abandoned its Title VI investigation, presumably in fear of a judge agreeing with Landry and setting a precedent which would limit their ability to use the Civil Rights Act in the future.  Recently, Landry made a highly unusual move by initiating a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) suit against the EPA, collecting the names and contact information of activists and journalists who have been trying for years to hold LDEQ accountable.  This is widely viewed as an aggressive intimidation tactic aimed at silencing environmental justice communities.

Members of Inclusive Louisiana, RISE St. James, and Mount Triumph Baptist Church announcing a 2023 lawsuit requesting a moratorium on new oil and gas industry in St. James Parish.  Photo credit: Antonia Juhasz, Human Rights Watch

Why These Reports Matter

Framing the daily activities of the petrochem industry as human rights abuses is an important step in holding polluters accountable, as it brings various UN resolutions into the conversation, as detailed in both reports.  The communities of the Houston Ship Channel and Cancer Alley, and other overburdened communities in the USA, can be seen as the “Global South within the North” because the non-white, non-affluent residents often bear little responsibility for these harms yet struggle to live amidst the impacts.

Juan Parras of Texas Environmental Justice Advocacy Service (TEJAS), a close ally of JTA, responded to these reports by speaking about the experience in his neighborhood: “Manchester is the most polluted and most densely industrialized community in Houston. We are overwhelmed with the excessive burdens of environmental racism – health problems, poisoned air and water, and constant stress. We have tried numerous times to bring this to the attention of regulators, but they seem to view the situation as unfortunate yet irreversible. Although we often feel hopeless, this invocation of international human rights treaties may finally put enough pressure on government to hold companies accountable. The petrochemical industry has no right to treat our community as a sacrifice zone. It is high time for regulators, legislators, NGOs, and the public to fight for the urgent needs of environmental justice communities.”

In fact, these human rights abuses extend far beyond frontline workers and fenceline communities.  Without major reductions in the manufacturing of plastics and other petrochemicals, even 100% renewable energy cannot keep us within global emissions targets.  But this industry continues to grow exponentially.  The big oil and gas companies are counting on it to keep their profit margins high even as vehicle and power plant technologies change.  Climate chaos will have at least some effect on every part of the planet, but the Gulf Coast is one of the very most vulnerable areas, with rising sea levels, increasingly strong storms, and sweltering heat.  It is ironic that the industries located in that region are some of those chiefly responsible for the impending catastrophe.  Yet the executives and stockholders of the corporations that own these facilities live far away.  They no doubt intend to wring out as much money as possible right now, then shutter the plants when forced to make safety improvements for health or disaster readiness reasons.  The communities that have been condemned as sacrifice zones will be left behind.

Houston playground adjacent to refinery.  Photo credit: Lauren Murphy, Amnesty International

In addition to the worldwide human rights abuses which are perpetrated by those responsible for global warming, the presence of petrochem byproducts – and even those products themselves – constitute an unjust toxic trespass.  A recent report by Defend Our Health studies the numerous negative impacts of polyethylene terephthalate (PET, the substance used to make clear plastic drink bottles) from extraction, manufacturing, and waste.  The entire PET supply chain spans not only the Gulf Coast region but also many other locations around the USA.  The majority of those facilities are located in low-income communities of color.

The plastics industry has consistently lied to the public about the safety and recyclability of their products.  Another recent report by Center for Climate Integrity shows that well over 90% of plastics have been landfilled, incinerated, or leaked into waterways, ecosystems and communities.  Despite industry claims that recycling can solve the problem, evidence collected from the industry itself shows that this unacceptable trashing of our health and environments will never change.  Very few plastic products are actually recyclable, and manufacturers have a powerful profit incentive to ensure that everything they sell is single-use, driving endless demand for more production.  All their talk about new recycling technologies is deceptive nonsense – so-called “advanced recycling” means melting plastic back into oil and burning it as fuel, and the majority of the facilities designed to do this have not been profitable and have closed a few years after swindling public money out of lucrative municipal contracts.  Despite decades of PR campaigns fooling people into thinking that they just need to “do their part” by placing plastic containers into curbside recycling bins, plastics pollution has become one of our most serious crises, with microplastics found even in clouds.

Small-scale plastic recycling in Indonesia, one of the countries to which Global North waste management companies send plastic trash when it cannot be recycled at a profit.  The man in the foreground is cooling melted plastic into bricks which can be sold to manufacturers, inhaling toxic fumes in the process.  Photo credit: Focusfeel [wikimedia commons]

EJ Communities Need a Just Transition

We must stop making all this plastic junk designed expressly to become garbage as quickly as possible.  While there may be some limited defensible uses of plastics in the fields of medicine and electronics, nearly all of the products being made today are completely unnecessary.  Plastics cause so much more harm than good.

We need to uplift the voices of those fighting for their lives in the face of environmental racism and toxic trespass, supporting them to come together, frontline workers and fenceline communities united in creative problem-solving, finding real solutions that can build regenerative solidarity economies that move them toward a healthy and dignified future.  These frontliners are already advocating numerous policy solutions.  First, subsidies that currently prop up fossil fuel extraction and petrochemical production must be reallocated to research and new facilities for benign, sustainable chemistry.  And then, an option that would be easy to achieve immediately would be to expand and replicate existing “orphaned well programs” in which governments and companies collaborate to pay local workers to safely clean up abandoned wellsites and restore ecosystems (the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law included $4.7 billion to do just this, a tiny baby step toward plugging the estimated 300,000-800,000 unidentified orphaned wells across the USA).  State legislators should provide funds for additional just transition initiatives similar to California’s HEAL initiative.  Federal funding from the Inflation Reduction Act should grow community resilience by building locally-controlled small-scale renewable energy and public transportation.  A union-led initiative called the Texas Climate Jobs Project is organizing efforts to do exactly that as the basis for a truly transformative just transition.  Their study shows that this transition can create 1.1 million jobs in Texas alone (and cites other researchers’ estimate of 25 million jobs nationwide).

The great potential of a just transition is true not only in Texas, but everywhere, and it goes far beyond job creation.  An illuminating report by the Tellus Institute, now over a decade old but more relevant than ever, demonstrates how transitioning our waste management systems to keep materials out of landfills and incinerators by reusing and repurposing as much as possible could create 2.3 million jobs nationwide, as well as reduce emissions and, crucially, slash production of toxic plastics, leading to health improvements in countless communities.  California’s Recology is at the leading edge of this increasingly popular transition toward “zero waste.”

Workers sort recyclables at Recology facility, Davis CA.  Photo credit: Recology

At every level of public discourse and governance we must debunk the industry lies about “plastics circularity” and demonstrate real circular economies, based on principles of zero waste, localized production, traditional ecological knowledge, and grassroots democracy.  One way that JTA is trying to do so is by engaging with the ongoing negotiations to create a UN Treaty on Plastics Pollution, fighting to maintain the integrity of the “just transition” vision in the face of mounting corporate cooptation.  Another is working with the Environmental Justice Communities Against Plastics (EJCAP) coalition to push California lawmakers and regulators to close loopholes and improve effectiveness in recent plastic waste reduction law SB 54.

Other groups are beginning to find success with tactics that apply pressure upstream from the manufacturers, pushing pension funds, universities and banks to divest from polluters, demanding that insurance companies revoke policies for facilities that endanger the planet, and organizing the labor sector within predatory private equity firms that own many of the worst offenders.

An additional path that surely will be pursued by states, municipalities and advocacy groups is litigation demanding payments from the offending corporations, both in terms of damages to victims and compensation for the mounting costs of disposal.  The fossil fuel companies should be legally restricted and financially reprimanded the same way that big tobacco companies were handled.  In tandem with this top-down approach, concerned citizens can advocate for the bottom-up demand to change our laws to roll back the suite of unfair court rulings collectively known as “corporate rights” and to ensure rights for communities and environments (the movement to establish “legal rights for rivers” is succeeding around the world).

The Mississippi River.  Photo credit: Ken Lund [wikimedia commons]

Fossil fuel companies have seen record profits in the years since the pandemic began.  These profits belie the excuse that inflation is caused by supply chain disruptions.  It has become increasingly clear that this lying, cheating, psychopathic industry is at the climax of its abusive behavior of hoovering up heaps of cash by extracting the wealth of the earth while externalizing all the costs onto EJ communities and ecosystems.

We must not let oil and gas corporations continue their human rights abuses by allowing them to sidestep into equally harmful plastics and petrochemicals.  We must work together to change our economic systems into something life-giving and holistic, respecting our neighbors and environments, repairing our past harms, and regenerating our relations.  We must build the best alternatives by cultivating community power and grassroots democracy.  Please take the terrible findings of these reports and transform them, not into passive hopes and prayers for the unfortunate folks on the frontlines and fencelines, but a strong motivation and vigilant commitment to struggle with the workers and communities organizing for a just transition.  Remember, “Transitions are inevitable. Justice is not.”

Content Petrochemical Industry Impunity Must Be Stopped appears first in Just Transition Alliance.

Episode 347 of The Red Nation Podcast

Sardana Nikolaeva (Sakha), Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Toronto’s Ziibiing Lab (@ziibiinglab), returns to the podcast to discuss her new study, “Indigenous Diamonds: Extractivism and Indigenous Politics in the Diamond Province of Russia”

Read the report here
https://www.ziibiinglab.org/indigenous-diamonds

Check out her prior episode, “Indigenous People and the Soviet Union: a Sakha perspective”

Check out her prior episode, “Indigenous People and the Soviet Union: a Sakha perspective”
https://directory.libsyn.com/episode/index/id/26618079

Listen to The Red Nation Podcast on Spotify, SoundCloud, and Apple Podcasts. Listen and download for free on Libsyn. 

The Red Nation Podcast is sustained by comrades and supporters like you. Power our work here: www.patreon.com/redmediapr

The post The Red Nation Podcast – Indigenous diamonds w/ Sardana Nikolaeva appeared first on The Red Nation.

Feb 23, 2020 – Palestine is an Indigenous struggle w/ Elena & Orien

Turtle Island is rising up! #ReconciliationisDead, #WetsuwetenStrong blockades, Tohono O’odham resist the border wall, settler elections, & Palestine! Red Nation comrades Orien LongKnife (@beshnez) & Elena Ortiz (@spiritofpopay) join the conversation.

Listen to The Red Nation Podcast on Spotify, SoundCloud, and Apple Podcasts. Listen and download for free on Libsyn. 

The Red Nation Podcast is sustained by comrades and supporters like you, power our work here: www.patreon.com/redmediapr

The Red Nation Podcast is produced by Red Media.

The post The Red Nation Podcast #Throwback appeared first on The Red Nation.

Episode 346 of The Red Nation Podcast

TRN Podcast co-host Jen Marley is joined by Mekha Aponte, Levi Harter, Marquel Musgrave to discuss the status of children in our world today, breaking down power imbalances between youth and adults, and the joy of reclaiming revolutionary parenting.

Watch the video edition on The Red Nation Podcast YouTube channel 

Episode cover art:  Jen’s great-grandmother and Pueblo potter, Candelaria Gachupin Zia,  with one of her sons.

The Red Nation Podcast is produced by Red Media and is sustained by comrades and supporters like you. Power our work here: www.patreon.com/redmediapr

Listen to The Red Nation Podcast on Spotify, SoundCloud, and Apple Podcasts. Listen and download for free on Libsyn. 

The post The Red Nation Podcast – Decolonial parenting w/ Mekha Aponte, Levi Harter and Marquel Musgrave appeared first on The Red Nation.

Episode 345 of The Red Nation Podcast

On February 10, 2024 at Nuwu Art Gallery on unceded Paiute territory (Las Vegas, NV), a group of Indigenous women organized a call to action to change the Kansas City NFL team’s name. This press conference occurred the night before the Super Bowl and was moderated by Fawn Douglas from Nuwu Art Gallery. The main speakers–Amanda Blackhorse (nomorenativemascots.org), Gaylene Crouser from the Kansas City Indian Center, and Rhonda LeValdo (notinourhonor.com)–are all longtime activists of the movement to change racist teams names across the US, resulting in many victories.

In July 2020, the Washington NFL team changed their name from the anti-Indigenous R-word slur to the Washington Football Team, and then the Washington Commanders in 2022. The success of this change can be attributed to the women on this panel and their movements. It was expected that the Kansas City team would follow suit, but it has yet to change its racist team name.

On February 7, 2024, Amanda Blackhorse posted this call to action:

The Kansas City “Chiefs” once again make it to the Super Bowl with their mockery of a name, logo, and complete misappropriation and disrespect for real and actual Native people, who have protested their franchise for years. Despite psychological research stating Native mascots and stereotypes of Native people (Friberg, Markus, Oyserman, & Stone 2008) harm native youth, the KC team continues to stonewall Native people and stand on the wrong side of history.

We know native cultural appropriation is a billion-dollar industry and the franchise has been living well off of the backs of Native people. With their growing popularity and the “swifting” of the NFL, we want to remind the public that not all franchises last forever. The Washington team and the Cleveland team had their success and downfall. What’s been consistent is Native people standing against the theft of their identities and culture. We call on all Indigenous people, tribes, tribal leaders, Native organizations, Native artists, singers, drummers, and allies to stand with us on February 11, 2024 outside Super Bowl LVIII to protest the KC franchise. We ask these organizations and tribes make public statements standing in solidarity with Native organizers, Not in Our Honor, Kansas City Indian Center, Nuwu Art, and AZ rally. Protest will be held at Allegiant Stadium.

Watch the video edition on The Red Nation Podcast YouTube channel

The Red Nation Podcast is sustained by comrades and supporters like you. Power our work here: www.patreon.com/redmediapr

The post The Red Nation Podcast – Not in Our Honor – Press Conference appeared first on The Red Nation.

The Just Transition Alliance is hiring!

We’re looking for a half-time Policy Organizer (remote) and a half-time Administrative Assistant (San Diego)

If you’re interested, please email Nona Chai: nona@jtalliance.org.

Please help us spread the word

Content Job Opening at JTA! Administrative Assistant appears first in Just Transition Alliance.

The Just Transition Alliance is hiring!

We’re looking for a half-time Policy Organizer (remote) and a half-time Administrative Assistant (San Diego)

If you’re interested, please email Nona Chai: nona@jtalliance.org.

Please help us spread the word

Content Job Opening at JTA! Policy Organizer appears first in Just Transition Alliance.

A Love Letter to Black America during Black History Month

The Coalition of Communities of Color (CCC) humbly acknowledges Black History Month for all of the sacrifice and struggle Black folks in America have endured since our unceremonious rending from our native land.

We further acknowledge the innumerable contributions made by Black people to the America we now call home – gifts born out of creativity, necessity, ingenuity and brilliance. We built America.

CCC admires you for your determination during the Civil Rights movement, which afforded long overdue rights not just to people of African descent, but for all people not participating fully in America.

We're also deeply grateful to our Black-led CCC member organizations, whose visionary work and essential contributions are paving the way towards stronger, more resilient communities. We urge everyone to learn more and support their work:

• Africa House

• Imagine Black 

• KairosPDX

• Portland Community Reinvestment Initiatives

• Urban League of Portland

• Self Enhancement, Inc. 

As our own Black-led organization, CCC is dedicated to relentlessly addressing the injustices around Black folks and other people of color, concentrating our focus this year on building power for BIPOC voices through our 2024 legislative agenda and the upcoming elections. 

Again, thank you, Black America, for all that you have given us.

We love you. We appreciate you. We thank you, and we will try to honor and be worthy of all that you have done for us. It is enough.

Sincerely,

Marcus C. Mundy, CCC Executive Director

Salem in Session

Oregon leaders kicked off the 2024 legislative short session earlier this month. Our member-driven process has identified key priorities to support economic opportunity, invest in childcare access, strengthen immigrant protections, and more.

>>> Read which priorities CCC members endorsed here.

ICYMI: Save the Date for May 31st

Join us for the Summer Soirée, CCC’s annual fundraiser. More details to follow. Interested in becoming a Sponsor? Download our Sponsorship Packet here or contact CCC's Development Manager Lucero Valera Brambila at Lucero@coalitioncommunitiescolor.org with any questions.

Upcoming Events

• Wednesday, Feb. 21 │ Unite Oregon’s 2024 Lobby Day. Register here.

• Saturday, Feb. 24 and Sunday, Feb, 25 │ Junction Ave: Black-owned business market with food, shopping and music, hosted by Self Enhancement, Inc. at the Center for Self Enhancement (3920 N Kerby Ave., Portland) from 10:00 AM–5:00 PM.

• Wednesday, March 6 │Urban League of Portland’s Our Voices United Legislative Day of Action. Register here.

Feb 15, 2020 – #WetsuwetenStrong w/ Karla Tait

Dr. Karla Tait is a member of the Gilseyhu Clan of the Wet’suwet’en First Nation and a trained psychologist who specializes in decolonizing healing. In this interview, she gives a historical and cultural context to the mass Indigenous uprising #WetsuwetenStrong that is rocking so-called Canada. She was arrested alongside other Indigenous matriarchs protecting Wet’suwet’en territory after police violently raided Unist’ot’en Camp this month.

Photo by Amanda Follett Hosgood

Support Unis’tot’en Camp: https://unistoten.camp

Listen to The Red Nation Podcast on Spotify, SoundCloud, and Apple Podcasts. Listen and download for free on Libsyn. 

The Red Nation Podcast is sustained by comrades and supporters like you, power our work here: www.patreon.com/redmediapr

The Red Nation Podcast is produced by Red Media.

The post The Red Nation Podcast #Throwback appeared first on The Red Nation.

Our ED José Bravo is a force to be reckoned with–from participating in the drafting team for the Principles of Environmental Justice to helping to organize the shut down of dangerous waste incinerators in Tijuana, Kettleman City, and East LA and so much more.

To celebrate his steadfast service to Indigenous, people of color, and low income communities for over 27 years, would you please consider making a donation to the Just Transition Alliance for his birthday?  

Content Happy Birthday, José! appears first in Just Transition Alliance.

Episode 344 of The Red Nation Podcast

*Note: This is the unlocked portion of the episode. To listen to the rest of the conversation, become a patron of Red Media for as little as $2 a month to access this and other great bonus content. Alternatively, you can watch the entire episode for free on our YouTube channel, which is linked below*

TRN Podcast host Jen Marley talks with comrades Levi Harter and Maira Olivias-Rios about the colonial origins of “romance”, how “love” has been commodified, and the necessity of reclaiming love as a part of revolutionary praxis.

Watch the video edition on The Red Nation Podcast YouTube channel 

The Red Nation Podcast is sustained by comrades and supporters like you. Power our work here: www.patreon.com/redmediapr

Listen to The Red Nation Podcast on Spotify, SoundCloud, and Apple Podcasts. Listen and download for free on Libsyn. 

The post Romantic Love Is A Weapon Of Capitalism W/ Maira Olivia-Rios And Levi Harter appeared first on The Red Nation.

Outside of Allegiant Stadium on unceded Paiute land, a coalition of Native-led organizations held a protest hours ahead of Super Bowl 58. The organizers also held a press conference the night before.

Over a dozen Native relatives chanted “Stop the Chop. Change the Name” on the intersection of Hacienda Ave and Polaris Ave in front of thousands of people entering the stadium. We held signs that read “your chop is synchronized racism” “shake it off. Stop the chop” “Kansas City playing Indian since 1963” and “Native-themed mascots cause harm to all children”.

Amanda Blackhorse, a longtime Diné organizer who brought the coalition of Native-led organizations together for this action, linked the connection of the erasure of Native people in the US through racist imagery, to the genocide happening in Gaza. Amanda Blackhorse stated, “This country doesn’t care about Indigenous people. Because if they did, they wouldn’t be committing genocide against Indigenous people in Palestine”

We thank Amanda Blackhorse for inviting The Red Nation to this action and organizing it. Follow the coalition of organizations for updates on changing racist Native imagery in sports: AZ to Rally Against Native Mascots (@aztorally), No More Native Mascots (nomorrnativemascots.org), Kansas City Indian Center (kcindiancenter.org), and Not In Our Honor (notinourhonor.com)

Special gratitude to Nuwu Art + Community Center(@nuwuare) for hosting the space.

To listen to the interviews gathered at Super Bowl 58 from the organizers and supporters of today’s action, listen to The Red Nation podcast and subscribe to our Patreon.

#superbowlLVIII #decolonization #gaza

Follow us on Tiktok! @therednationpodcast

Heres what the Super Bowl won’t tell you… Stop the chop! Change the name! #notyourmascot

♬ original sound – The Red Nation Podcast

The post Change the name of the Kansas City football team! appeared first on The Red Nation.

We are pleased to announce a collection of essays titled Power Lines: Building a Labor-Climate Justice Movement, co-edited by our dear friend Jeff Ordower and published just a few days ago by The New Press.

Shantell Bingham of Climate Justice Alliance says, “Power Lines presents critical case studies on advancing all communities towards a just transition. The book provides key insights directly from the frontlines on how we can organize our communities towards collective power, navigate tensions, and truly advance change. This book makes it more apparent the critical role that labor plays, and needs to play, in advancing a just transition.”

It features an interview with José Bravo describing the origins of the just transition movement.

Excerpt:

Just transition is not a cookie-cutter approach. It’s not one thing for everyone. But I can tell you beyond a shadow of a doubt that if a just transition doesn’t have workers and there’s only communities at the table, then it’s not a just transition, and vice versa.  If it only has workers and the community’s not at the table, then it’s not a just transition. A just transition is literally a cradle-to-grave approach that removes the exploitation out of the whole process of production.

Content Get Your Copy of “Power Lines: Building a Labor-Climate Justice Movement” appears first in Just Transition Alliance.

Feb 10, 2020 – Venezuela & anti-imperialism w/ Onyesonwu

Onyesonwu joins us for a report-back from recent African and Indigenous delegations to Venezuela, and why the Bolivarian Revolution is leading at the forefront of the global anti-imperialist movement.

Onyesonwu is an organizer with the All African People’s Revolutionary Party and the All African Women’s Revolutionary Union as well as an editor with Hood Communist.

Read the Final Declaration of the World Conference Against Imperialism: http://hoodcommunist.org/2020/02/06/final-declaration-of-the-world-meeting-against-imperialism/

Read the Declaration of the First International Gathering of Indigenous Peoples: https://therednation.org/2020/01/11/declaration-of-the-first-international-gathering-of-indigenous-peoples-guayana-venezuela-oct-31-2019/ 

Listen to The Red Nation Podcast on Spotify, SoundCloud, YouTube, and Apple Podcasts. Listen and download for free on Libsyn. 

The Red Nation Podcast is sustained by comrades and supporters like you, power our work here: www.patreon.com/redmediapr

The Red Nation Podcast is produced by Red Media.

The post The Red Nation Podcast #Throwback appeared first on The Red Nation.

Episode 343 of The Red Nation Podcast

February 6th is International Day of Solidarity with Leonard Peltier and All Political Prisoners. Today marks the 49th year of Leonard Peltier’s wrongful imprisonment. Free Palestine! Free Leonard Peltier!

01. [00:00] TRN-KREZ Morning Show

Feb 6 , 2024 – Good morning, Turtle Island

02. [01:15] 49

May 3, 2023 – President Biden: Free Leonard Peltier – Amnesty International USA

Leonard Peltier, a Native American activist, has been imprisoned for nearly 50 years in the USA for a crime he maintains he did not commit. There are serious and ongoing concerns about the fairness of his trial and conviction. Tribal Nations, Nobel Peace Laureates, former FBI agents, numerous others, and even the former U.S. Attorney, James Reynolds, whose office handled the prosecution, have called for Leonard Peltier’s release. Watch to learn more.

03. [04:14] Whistleblower

Jan 18, 2023 – Ex-FBI Agent breaks the silence on Leonard Peltier and COINTELPRO w/ Coleen Rowley X

The first FBI agent close to the Leonard Peltier case is calling for his freedom. Coleen Rowley recounts, in this wide-ranging and exclusive interview, her time as an agent in the Minneapolis field office. For nearly 50 years, the FBI has indoctrinated its agents on a specific version of events that led to Leonard Peltier’s arrest, conviction, and imprisonment. The mentality then, Rowley argues, is little different than the mentality today. That’s why she decided to break the silence and is calling on President Joe Biden to grant Leonard Peltier executive clemency.  

Rowley gives us an insider’s view of the FBI and how the dark and violent history of COINTELPRO, which targeted civil rights leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. and social movements like the Black Panthers and AIM, didn’t end in 1971. It morphed and evolved over the years and continued well into the U.S. war on terror. Despite attempts at reform and accountability, the FBI continues its ongoing persecution of political prisoners like Leonard Peltier and the unarmed Water Protectors at Standing Rock.

04. [17:00] Don’t Believe Lies

Mar 28, 2022 – The importance of Leonard Peltier to Indigenous peoples

Co-hosts of Red Power Hour Melanie Yazzie and Elena Ortiz on the meaning of Leonard Peltier to Indigenous peoples.

05. [32:02] Oglala

Jul 25, 2022 – Remembering the Reign of Terror at Oglala

It’s been 47 years since the shootout at Oglala that left two FBI agents and a young Native man named Joe Stuntz dead. While Leonard Peltier unjustly sits in prison for the events of that day, the shootout and the deadly legacy of the “reign of terror” remain an open wound for community members and the American Indian Movement. Here’s their story.

06. [38:07] Father

Sep 4, 2022 Leonard Peltier’s Walk to Justice

The American Indian Movement has organized “Leonard Peltier’s Walk to Justice” from Minneapolis to Washington, D.C., where organizers plan to meet with government officials to demand the release of Peltier from the U.S. federal prison system. This recording is taken from the kickoff event in Minneapolis held on August 31st.

07. [44:10] Walk to Justice

Nov 20, 2022 – “Your people are coming for you”: the Leonard Peltier Walk to Justice 2022

The Leonard Peltier Walk to Justice kicked off in Minneapolis, Minnesota on September 1st, 2022. Ten weeks and 1103 miles later it reached Washington, D.C., where a rally was held demanding the freedom of Leonard Peltier, unjustly imprisoned for over 47 years.

08. [01:01:58] 79

Sep 12, 2023 – ‘A stain of injustice’: Free Leonard Peltier White House rally

On September 12, hundreds gathered on Piscataway lands in front of the White House to demand executive clemency for Leonard Peltier, who celebrated his 79th birthday that day. A caravan of supporters, family, and loved ones departed after ceremony from Rapid City, South Dakota en route to Washington, D.C.– a 1,600 mile journey that arrived on Monday, September 11.

09. [01:06:38] We Are Victorious 

Nov 23, 2023 – National Day of Mourning 2023

An annual tradition since 1970, National Day of Mourning is a solemn, spiritual and highly political day. Many of us fast from sundown the day before through the afternoon of that day (and have a social after NDOM so that participants in NDOM can break their fasts). We are mourning our ancestors and the genocide of our peoples and the theft of our lands. NDOM is a day when we mourn, but we also feel our strength in action and solidarity.

10. [01:18:55] Free All Political Prisoners

Feb 7, 2020 – Rise Up For Peltier Demonstration – Tiwa Territory

February 7, 2022, Albuquerque A.I.M. Grassroots, Indigenous Rights Center, and The Red Nation host the demonstration Rise Up For Peltier in downtown Albuquerque in front of the Pete V. Domenici United States Courthouse.

The Red Nation Podcast is sustained by comrades and supporters like you. Power our work here: www.patreon.com/redmediapr 

The post The Red Nation Podcast – Leonard Peltier Mixtape Vol. 2 appeared first on The Red Nation.

Episode 342 of The Red Nation Podcast

Maryam Jamshidi (@MsJamshidi), a University of Colorado Boulder Law School professor, explores the meaning and political potential of the International Court of Justice ruling on the genocide in Gaza.

Check out her recent article, “Instruments of Dehuman­ization”

Watch the video edition on The Red Nation Podcast YouTube channel

The Red Nation Podcast is sustained by comrades and supporters like you. Power our work here: www.patreon.com/redmediapr

Listen to The Red Nation Podcast on Spotify, SoundCloud, and Apple Podcasts. Listen and download for free on Libsyn. 

The post The Red Nation Podcast – Unprecedented? The ICJ ruling on genocide in Gaza w/ Maryam Jamshidi appeared first on The Red Nation.

Jan 31, 2021 – Public Land Is Stolen Land W/ Dina Gilio-Whitaker

Dina Gilio-Whitaker joins hosts Jen Marley and Nick Estes to discuss her book As Long as Grass Grows: The Indigenous Fight for Environmental Justice, from Colonization to Standing Rock (2019) and what she foresees from Biden’s climate policies.

Listen to The Red Nation Podcast on Spotify, SoundCloud, and Apple Podcasts. Listen and download for free on Libsyn.

The Red Nation Podcast is sustained by comrades and supporters like you, power our work here: www.patreon.com/redmediapr

The Red Nation Podcast is produced by Red Media.

@therednationpodcast #Throwback
The Red Nation Podcast: 
Jan 31, 2021 – Public land is stolen land w/ Dina Gilio-Whitaker
Dina Gilio-Whitaker joins hosts Jen Marley and @Nick Estes ♬ original sound – The Red Nation Podcast

The post The Red Nation Podcast #Throwback appeared first on The Red Nation.

We're excited to announce that CCC’s Summer Soirée is returning on Friday, May 31st – you won't want to miss it. Join us this year for a night of community, entertainment, and wonderful surprises. Stay tuned for more details to come!

WHEN: May 31st, 2024

WHERE: Avenue event space

Become a Sponsor

If you are interested in sponsoring our annual fundraiser, we'd love to hear from you. Click the button to download our Sponsorship Packet or contact our Development Manager Lucero at lucero@coalitioncommunitiescolor.org.

The Oregon Legislature has just convened for its short session, and we are proud to announce that the Coalition of Communities of Color (CCC) has endorsed 10 legislative priorities for the year 2024. These priorities have been determined through a member-driven process and include measures to support economic opportunity, strengthen immigrant protections, and more. We invite you to continue reading to learn more about CCC's 2024 legislative agenda or our involvement in past sessions.

• CCC’s 2024 Legislative Agenda

• Learn more about our previous work with our 2023 Legislative Session Recap, and see our member endorsement process

Carryover Priority Legislation from 2023

• Fund the Employment-Related Daycare Program

• Child Care Facilities Fund (HB 4158)

• Fund Oregon Individual Development Account Initiative (HB 4131)

• Fund Universal Legal Representation

• Economic Equity Investment Act (HB 4041)

New Priority Legislation for 2024

• Healthcare Interpreter Reform (SB 1578)

• Expanding Voters' Pamphlet Translation (SB 1533)

• Establishing Immigrant and Refugee Student Success Plan (SB 1532)

• Family Financial Protection Act (SB 1595)

• CHIPS Child Care Bill (HB 4098)

CCC-Endorsed Items for 2024 Child Care

Fund the Employment Related Daycare (ERDC) Program:

Fund the Employment Related Daycare program to address the projected shortfall in program funding and end the waitlist to better help families who are working, in school, or receiving Temporary Assistance for Needy Families pay their child care costs. Take action with Child Care for Oregon. 

Child Care Facilities Fund (HB 4158):

Develop and improve child care by improving access to financial assistance for licensed home-based and small center child care providers. 

CHIPS Child Care Bill (HB 4098):

The Federal CHIPS Act provides Oregon CHIP manufacturers subsidies to build the infrastructure they need to grow this sector. Leveraging existing state child care systems will ensure CHIPS applicants meet application requirements.

Economic Justice

Fund the Oregon Individual Development Accounts Initiative (HB 4131):

Provides funds to support financial security and work towards a self-determined savings goal through this matched savings program. A total of $13.8 million in matching funds was distributed in the last two years, and nearly half of those funds went to BIPOC participants. 

Economic Equity Investment Act (HB 4041):

Allocates funding to the Economic Equity Investment Program created in 2022 that provides one-time grants to culturally-responsive community-based organizations with programs that build wealth for people experiencing economic risk factors. 

Family Financial Protection Act (SB 1595):

Strengthen protection for consumers who are sued by debt collectors and have wage or bank account garnishments or liens on their home. This bill would also make it easier for consumers to fight back against debt collectors and debt buyers who try to collect from the wrong people.

Health Care

Healthcare Interpreter Reform (SB 1578):

Helps create a path toward fairer compensation for healthcare interpreters and increase access by creating a public online scheduling portal with billing and payment services for Medicaid healthcare interpreters in Oregon.

Democracy

Expanding Voters' Pamphlet Translation (SB 1533):

Increase the number of languages for the Voters’ Pamphlet from top 5 most spoken languages to top 10 statewide and increase the threshold for individual counties to include any language that has 100+ speakers to 300+.

Immigrant and Refugee Support

Establishing Immigrant and Refugee Student Success Plan (SB 1532):

Directs the Oregon Department of Education to develop an advisory committee to inform the development and implementation of a plan to support the success of immigrant and refugee students.

Fund Universal Legal Representation:

Continue funding to provide no-cost immigration legal services to Oregonians through a statewide collaborative of community based organizations, nonprofits and attorneys.