PA’s Abolitionist Organizers Win Victory Against Mandatory Life Without Parole

In late March, Pennsylvania’s Supreme Court issued a momentous ruling overturning mandatory life sentences for people convicted of felony murder, also known as second-degree murder. Activists and advocates hailed the ruling as a victory that was years in the making and has the potential to impact the lives of more than a thousand people in the state, a majority of whom are Black.
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Deportation Is Not a Hardship That Shall Pass — It Is an Interminable Agony

Thirty years ago, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) deported my father. He came to the U.S. from the ghettos of Trinidad to the ghettos of Boston and did what he did to survive. For him, that meant selling weed. INS and its successor, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), also deported two of my uncles. Previous presidential administrations called them “felons.
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Robin D. G. Kelley: It’s Not Enough to Abolish ICE — We Have to Abolish Police

Under Donald Trump, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has started appearing ever more like a private militia, unleashing brutal violence against families and displaying sycophantic loyalty to Trump as he mandates the dehumanizing treatment of immigrants. In the days since January, when federal immigration agents in Minneapolis, Minnesota, killed 37-year-old Alex Pretti and 37…
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“Reforms” Didn’t End Police Violence in 2020 and They Won’t End ICE Violence Now

Escalating opposition to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Minneapolis, Chicago, Los Angeles, and beyond is pushing renewed debate within the Democratic Party about Donald Trump’s war on immigrants. From rallies and ICE watch trainings to mutual aid and coordinated strikes, countless people are demanding an end to ICE’s deadly regime. In response to this robust organizing and the high…
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Incarcerated Women Featured in True Crime Media Face Flood of Sexual Harassment

Most true crime media is consumed by women, some of whom may be watching because they relate to the true crime genre’s victims. But another group of true crime junkies has different motives for watching: men looking to connect with incarcerated women. True crime media has manufactured a uniquely degrading pipeline: Women convicted of crimes become involuntary performers in a spectacle that…
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In Battle Over DHS Funding, Reforms Like Body Cameras Are a “Copaganda” Myth

As calls grow to defund and abolish ICE, author Alec Karakatsanis warns that activists should take care to not fall for “copaganda,” which “takes ordinary people who are outraged over what’s happening and converts them into supporting meaningless reforms that actually don’t reduce the size or power or budget of these bureaucracies.” Karakatsanis is the author of Copaganda: How Police and the Media…
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