465 Search results for "criminal justice"

The US has a long record of violence against Black Americans, especially in the form of public lynchings. Paying close attention to this history, and how these actions are often seen as justified, can explain how today’s political violence against Muslims, Mexicans, and refugees continues to be normalized in this society. This week, I read […]

Days after clinching the U.S. presidency in November, Donald Trump appointed Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions as his pick for Attorney General of the U.S. Department of Justice. From stating he was once “okay with the Ku Klux Klan” until he learned they smoked marijuana, to prosecuting Black activists in the decades following the fall of […]

Last week, six students from wp.blackyouthproject.com’s high school journalism program traveled downtown to Columbus Drive and Congress for the Women’s March. Their goal: Talk to as many protesters as possible about why they joined the demonstration and what issues were important to them. Here’s what students learned …

Barack Obama has already commuted more prison sentences than any other U.S. President. However, he’s not finished doing so with only a few days left in his term. President Obama has commuted the prison sentences of Chelsea Manning and Oscar López Rivera, among more than 200 others. 

As President-Elect Trump’s Attorney General nominee Jeff Sessions attends confirmation hearings and defends his abysmal civil rights record, we must heed the voices of the past that worked to prevent him from obtaining a federal position in the 1980s.

The President-Elect is struggling to book acts for his inauguration as act after act refuses to take part in it. However, that doesn’t mean that they’ll all be sitting on their couches at home while he’s sworn in. It has been announced that Solange Knowles and Angela Davis will now be appearing at the Jan. […]

“Why do we accept forms of security that are rooted in violence?” – Angela Davis, Lecture at University of Chicago November 2016 When I first learned of prison abolition it was from Angela Davis during a lecture she gave at my college campus in 2009. The concept of prison abolition seemed so large and out […]

Starting in 2017, schools in Missouri will no longer handle the aftermath of fights between students internally. According to a new statute, School Resource Officers (SROs) and local authorities will now get involved and students may be charged with a felony. Think Progress originally reported that the new statute will take effect on Jan. 1 and could play […]

This holiday season, many of us will return home to our families, who, even though they love us very much and we love them, may hold different political beliefs. It won’t be easy. The current political moment is an especially tough one if you or your loved ones voted for different presidential candidates back in […]

For those of us who consider ourselves believers in social justice, reckoning with the Thanksgiving holiday can easily become hairy. On the one hand, it is a rare opportunity for families, particularly those that are working class, to come together, eat delicious food (depending on who makes it) and strengthen their bonds. And yet, as […]

I felt my heart sink when Kalief Browder’s name suddenly began trending on Twitter in June of last year. Just a couple years older than I am, Browder ended his life after suffering through three years of being beaten and held in solitary confinement in a Rikers Island prison for a crime he did not […]

Buzzfeed reports that two inmates have died in prisons that have played a role in the national strike that’s fighting against unfair labor practices and poor living conditions.