Posted on August 3, 2020

Black Lives Matter Founder: DNC Platform Must Call for Defunding Police, Abolishing ICE

Joshua Klein, Breitbart, July 31, 2020

Self-proclaimed Marxist and Black Lives Matter (BLM) co-founder Patrisse Cullors called on Democrats to make “sea changes” to their party platform and adopt radical legislation that calls to defund the police force, eliminate both the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and close all federal prisons and immigration detention centers, alongside various other radical demands — otherwise, “any claims of allyship and solidarity with our work to fight for black liberation are for naught.”

Cullors stated there is “an opportunity right now to right the course of history” and warned that if not careful, the Democratic Party “will miss its greatest opportunity” to lead our country to the “true American revolution.”

The radical BLM co-founder was addressing the Democratic National Convention’s (DNC) virtual party platform meeting on Monday, only weeks before the start of the summer convention. {snip}

Cullors also expressed a non-compromising attitude toward adopting some of the most radical policies:

Until and unless our leaders become signatory to the BREATHE Act — to legislation that eliminates the federal government’s ability to give multi-million dollar grants to militarize police forces; dismantles punitive like ICE, Border Patrol, and the DEA; ends the use of surveillance systems being used to target protesters; and bans the use of police agencies to suppress political dissent — the Democratic Party of today will be remembered as the party of complicity. The party that refuses to sacrifice its own creature comforts and material securities to ensure it walked the walk. So before you leave today, I want you to answer this question for yourselves: Which side of history is my party actually on?

In a call following her remarks, Cullors told Axios that she and other activists are “playing the long game” and that “even if we get Trump out in November we will still be having this same conversation about police violence with Biden in office.”

Cullors also added that earlier this month, the Movement for Black Lives (M4BL) policy team met with members of Biden’s campaign to discuss the BREATHE Act.

The BREATHE Act:

Formulated by the radical Movement for Black Lives (M4BL) — a coalition of more than 150 organizations and championed by Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) and Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) — the bill, posted on breatheact.org, is broken into four sections that focus on reforming federal institutions and policies.

The first section calls for moves such as divesting from police agencies like the DEA and ICE, dramatically reducing the Department of Defense budget, ending life sentences and mandatory minimum sentences, closing all federal prisons and immigration detention centers, and decriminalizing and retroactively expunging both state and federal drug offenses.

The second section calls for federal grants to incentivize local jurisdictions to decarcerate jails and/or defund police forces, close detention facilities, abolish state gang databases, remove police from schools, repeal all juvenile offenses, eliminate all court fees and forgive past debts.

The section also calls for a new program that would send trained civilian specialists, rather than police, to respond to 911 calls in order to reduce unnecessary contact between law enforcement and community members.

The next section calls for allocating new money for social equality in communities that provide equitable funding for all schools; developing school curricula that examines the impacts of colonialism, genocide against indigenous peoples and slavery; closing youth detention centers; and providing a lifetime of free access to education for undocumented immigrants, including those who are currently or were formerly incarcerated.

The final section calls for reparations for those incarcerated, including enfranchisement to vote; creating a public financing program for campaigns powered by small-dollar contributions; incentivizing states to increase voter turnout; and allowing undocumented immigrants to vote in local and state elections.

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