Summer 2024 Newsletter
Welcome to the Chicago Alliance newsletter! Here you'll find updates on all of the work we have going out in the field with our campaigns.
Support the Chicago Alliance!
Help sustain our work with a donation! caarpr.org/fundraising
The Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression (CAARPR) remains vigilant and constantly ready to defend the movement for the liberation of all oppressed and working people, but we need your help.
We are a working class organization, and the support of individuals from the movement is a key component in continuing our work in the struggle. Much of our work is against issues such as police crimes, police torture and wrongful conviction, freeing political prisoners, and fighting for the right to self-determination for oppressed peoples. We are currently entering into the next phase for Community Power Over Policing with a fight for a ballot referendum, which will require massive efforts and also funds.
We don’t rely on massive philanthropic grants or corporate funding, and every dollar from freedom fighters like yourselves goes a long way to assist with necessary costs of printing materials, phone banking, demonstration costs, and keeping the lights on in our office.
Your support is what makes our work possible, and we ask for you to stand with us and the movement by making a contribution today. Any amount helps, and recurring monthly donations go a long way to make our organizing sustainable!
Referendum for Community Power Over Policing and ECPS
ECPS and the Fight for Community Control of the Police
The struggle continues on the road to community control of the police! We continue to fight to implement the gains we made in passing the Empowering Communities for Public Safety ordinance, press for justice using the powers we gained, and we’re pressing to move greater power into the people’s hands through the Referendum for Community Power Over Policing!
The ordinance to put the Referendum for Community Power Over Policing on the ballot was introduced into the City Council on May 22nd of this year, and we are gaining steam in terms of aldermanic support. We have 12 official co-sponsors for the ordinance so far, and we need 26 votes to get it passed! We need all the supporters of our movement to immediately contact their aldermen and demand that they support the ordinance to put this referendum on the ballot.
This referendum would expand the powers of the existing Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability to include the ability to negotiate the Fraternal Order of Police Contract, to set the budget for CPD, and to hire and fire the Superintendent of Police.
You can use our toolkit to find information for your alderperson, see our full list of co-sponsors, and find sample social media content to share uplifting the referendum:
The fight for justice for Dexter Reed is ongoing!
The murder of Dexter Reed underscores how much we need to empower Chicago's Black communities to decide who polices their neighborhoods and how. Over two months after the release of the footage that shows the police shooting at Reed 96 times, the four criminal officers are still with CPD. We continue to stand in solidarity with Dexter's family in their fight for justice, and we demand an end to pretextual traffic stops and tact teams to prevent more people from being killed in the same way.
Out of the movement for justice for Dexter Reed arose two major demands related to CPD policy:
End pretextual traffic stops
End the use of TACT teams
On Thursday June 27th we will take the fight for justice for Dexter Reed, Reginald Clay Jr, Adam Toledo, and many others to the meeting of the newly appointed city-wide Community Commission for Public Safety and Accountability (CCPSA). The Commission has the power to write policy for CPD and can immediately act on these two demands, and we urge them to use that power to abolish tact teams and pretextual traffic stops. We also reaffirm the need to pass the referendum that will strengthen police accountability and increase our power to get justice for those impacted by police crimes.
When: Thursday, June 27th at 6:30 PM
Where: St. Sabina Church, 1210 W 78th Pl
What: Give public comment at the first meeting of the CCPSA demanding they immediately act to create policies eliminating pretextual traffic stops and the use of TACT teams!
March on the DNC
The March on the DNC coalition fights for the rights and liberation of oppressed people and against the exploitation of workers. Beginning on August 19th 2024, we will march on the Democratic National Convention in Chicago to bring the people's agenda to within sight and sound of the Democratic Party leadership. We are expecting tens of thousands of people to show up and protest with us, especially against the US backed genocide in Gaza. The March on the DNC will be a march for Palestine!
We recognize the Democratic Party as a tool of billionaires and corporations. Their actions, such as financing genocide in Palestine and war in multiple countries; continuing the mass incarceration of Black and brown people; deporting millions of immigrants; and neglecting campaign promises made to the oppressed communities who represent their voting base, show that the Democratic Party only serves the agenda of the rich and powerful. Recent gains in the rights of oppressed people have been made by grassroots organizations in spite of a lack of support and often outright opposition from Democratic Party leaders.
History has proven what Frederick Douglass once said: “power concedes nothing without a demand.”
We are calling on other grassroots organizations that are fighting for exploited and oppressed people to unite with us as we take the demands of the people to the Democratic Party in August 2024.
Fight for Permits
While we prepare on the ground for the mass demonstration, we continue to fight for a permit and our constitutional right to protest within sight and sound of elected government officials. The city, along with the Secret Service and Chicago Police Department, are repressing our rights and standing in the way of a justifiable permit to exercise our rights. We will march regardless of a permit, and have made it clear to the city that this march will be family friendly, with elderly, young, disabled, and undocumented people in attendance - all of whom deserve protection from the violence of CPD and the powers that be. Join our fight for permits by visiting this link to sign onto our permit pressure letter.
Fundraising
Hosting a historic national march of tens of thousands of people will require tens of thousands of dollars, so we need material contributions from the people’s movements. If you stand against the war machine and for the rights of working and oppressed people, we call on you to join the march in August and support its build-up. We need funds to ensure that the March on DNC coalition is prepared to organize a march that is family-friendly, accessible to our vulnerable community members, and can withstand the repression of the CPD and other security forces.
You can contribute to the march either as an individual or as an organization by using this link.
Do you or your organization have materials to spare, want to coordinate on fundraising efforts, or have further questions? We want to get in touch. Email us at at contact@marchondnc2024.org.
The Campaign to Free the Incarcerated Survivors of Police Torture (CFIST)
It is fixing to be another Hot Freedom Summer for us in the CFIST committee as we continue to build on our momentum from our pressure campaigns from this Spring which culminated in our People’s Hearing in March. The People’s Hearing was attended by survivors of police torture and wrongful conviction as well as people fighting for their wrongfully incarcerated loved ones. The overarching theme of the hearing was a call for unity, and since then we have been heeding that call, striving for unity across movements.
On May 19th and 20th for example, we joined with the Coalition to March on the DNC and held a large rally in the Gold Coast targeting Chicago Governor JB Pritzker and exposing his complicity in the war on Gaza and the war against Black and Brown communities in Chicago. Under the slogan “FREE THEM ALL! FREE PALESTINE!” the rally exposed the fact that the same people profiting from the mass incarceration of our loved ones here in the US are the same people profiting from the genocide of Palestinians. Speakers included families and survivors of wrongful conviction, such as Darien Harris who was wrongfully convicted for 12 years by testimony from a legally blind “witness” and other police-fabricated evidence. A smaller contingent demonstrated outside of Gov. Pritzker’s home, demanding he act on the 2000+ clemency petitions sitting on his desk, and also divest Illinois from Israel, and the following day we brought those demands to his office downtown.
We continue to draw media attention to high-profile cases such as Rico Clark, Kevin Jackson, and have celebrated numerous victories in the past quarter, such as Sean Tyler and Reginald Henderson successfully fighting for their Certificates of Innocence and Gerald Reed’s defeat of a bogus case against him by vindictive prosecutors who feel he never should have been granted clemency.
We are forging ahead and we continue to grow. We just had one of our largest meetings yet, so we expect to be able to do even more this next quarter, particularly in support of the Referendum for Community Power Over Policing, which will give our communities the power to stop wrongful convictions and police torture at the root. As always, we invite all who believe in justice to join us and fight for it!
To join the CFIST campaign, please visit this webpage and sign up to get involved with CAARPR!
Solidarity With the Palestinian People
CAARPR continues to stand in solidarity with the Palestinian liberation movement in Chicago, led by the U.S. Palestinian Community Network and the Chicago Coalition for Justice in Palestine. In May, we sent members of our organization to Detroit alongside members of USPCN to the People’s Conference for Palestine. The conference was a convening of Palestinian organizations and those fighting against U.S. imperialism, where CAARPR and Michigan chapters of the National Alliance got the word out about the mass March on the DNC in Chicago this August 19 and 22.
The Coalition for Justice in Palestine has continued to mount increasing pressure on Illinois legislators who actively support the ongoing Genocide. CJP has mobilized thousands of Chicagoans to regular rallies and marches that disrupted Michigan avenue during peak shopping hours, raising the demand to end U.S. aid to Israel. We will stay in the streets with our Palestinian comrades until the zionist enemy is defeated, along with their imperialist backers in the U.S.
In addition to political pressure on elected representatives, CAARPR is mobilizing alongside USPCN, Chicago Anti-War Committee and other allies to demand the Vic Theater to cancel the performance of racist, zionist “comedian” Michael Rapaport on November 8th. Please join us in calling the Vic to make sure proponents of genocide are not welcome in Chicago!
Call the Vic Theater: (773) 472-0449
Free Anthony Gay!
Anthony is asking supporters to call Missouri Rep. Emanuel Cleaver and ask that he meet with Anthony. Please call the number below with the following script:
Washington Office: (202) 225-4535
Independence Office: (816) 833-4545
Kansas City Office: (816) 842-4545
If they ask, Anthony's ID number is 23170-026
"I'm calling to ask that Representative Cleaver meet with federal prisoner Anthony Gay. Anthony is a survivor of 22 years of solitary confinement in Illinois prisons, and an advocate for limiting its use across the United States. He's being held at the Medical Facility for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri. He has important insight into the fight to address the abuse of solitary confinement and needs support in his struggle for freedom. Would Representative Cleaver be willing to visit Anthony?"
Continue sending Anthony letters of encouragement and any printed articles relating to the struggle to end solitary confinement:
Anthony Gay, 1900 W. Sunshine Street, Springfield, MO 65807
Justice for Murod Kurdi
June of this year marked one year since Murod Kurdi, a 28-year-old Palestinian American, was killed by a drunk white motorist, Leanne Cusack, who was speeding while on her phone – admissions she made. Despite the cracks on her windshield, Cusack claimed she had not seen Murod, only heard a thump, and continued driving. Instead of calling 911, Cusack contacted her boyfriend and lawyer. At the scene, Cusack confessed to drinking and refused a breathalyzer, even though one of the officers originally made statements that they detected the smell of alcohol on her breath. Oak Lawn Police should have taken her to the police station for a mandatory blood draw. However, they only issued her a speeding ticket and let her go home that night.
Once again at the monthly Oak Lawn Police and Fire Commission meeting on June 5, the all-white racist Police and Fire Commission ignored the demands for justice, shielded the imbecile cops involved in allowing a drunk driver to drive away from the scene of Murod’s killing, and disrespected the Kurdi family as they presented smoking gun evidence that the driver admitted to driving while under the influence. In this meeting, the commission promoted one of the cops, Mark Hollingsworth, who allowed Cusack to flee and is also one of the criminal cops who brutally assaulted and hospitalized teenager Hadi Abuatelah in 2022.
Murod Kurdi and his surviving family received indifference from the Oak Lawn police and the courts, resulting in only 30 hours of community service and a $750 fine administered in traffic court. This is a gross degradation of the value of Murod’s life and is consistent with the attitudes and behavior demonstrated time and time again by law enforcement and the criminal justice system. It may also be noted that during the investigation, which was led by the Oak Lawn Police, Cusack’s story and the statements made by the officers who arrived that evening showed repeated inconsistencies, such as the bar she had been drinking at, the time she had her last drink, and her false claims that she had called the police.
The Kurdi family deserves justice, and Oak Lawn is culpable for concealing this incident. The Arab American Action Network (AAAN) and CAARPR have shown up in support of the family on a monthly basis at the Oak Lawn Police and Fire Commission meeting, demanding justice for Murod, a full investigation into Oak Lawn Police Department by Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul, and asking for Cook County’s State Attorney Kim Foxx to review the case and bring additional charges against Cusack.
“We need an independent investigation because the police will not investigate themselves. That's why we have to do it. Black people, Arabs, Latinos, immigrants, and everyone impacted by police violence needs to come together to hold the police accountable,” said Kobi Guillory, co-chair of CAARPR.
Join us for a protest at the next Oak Lawn Police and Fire Commission meeting!
When: Wednesday August 7 at 5PM
Where: 9446 Raymond Ave, Oak Lawn, IL 60453
