Under Lock & Key

An Arkansas prisoners reports 11 December 2024: At Larry Norris Unit (formerly known as Tucker Max Unit) in Arkansas, the captain on night shift was doing his daily “legal mail” to inmates. They are now bringing a shredder/copy machine/cam recorder for the legal mail. They turn the camera on, give you the ledger to sign stating you were expecting the mail, they open and check your mail, copy it off, then they shred it. The captain also said they just started this today. ADC (Arkansas Department of Corrections) has a policy saying before any new policy takes effect, a memo is supposed to go out 30 days in advanced so everyone can be informed. This is a violation of our attorney-client communications. I have been reading my “Prison Litigation Manual” and I haven’t read any other cases where they copied legal mail. They do copy regular mail but not legal mail.

In Arkansas we don’t have a lot of writ writers and there’s no unity among the prisoners to stand up for anything. I’m still learning that the prisons, courts, everyone works together. You said something in your last letter “Freedom from oppression can’t be won through the courts. The law is a tool of the oppressor.” Break that down some more. Guys were telling me it’s a dirty game and even the law books don’t give you the truth. I’m 23 and still learning all of this but I know I can’t win with violence. Please get back at me and spread the word. Thank you.

I also read about the book ban as well; they’re doing that in Arkansas, you can only order from 1) Bargain book catalog 2) Books a Million 3) Barnes and Noble. You can’t order from Amazon or anywhere, how are the other states fighting it?

A Federal prisoner at USP Tucson reports 25 February 2025: Yesterday, February 25th, I got mail through the regular mail call and got documents from the Supreme Court… THE Supreme Court. It contained 3 pages from the Office of the Clerk dated 5 February 2025.

I thought, “Why didn’t I get this through Legal Mail?” Documents from the Supreme Court is LEGAL mail, even if it is not marked as such. By policy staff are supposed to make an intelligent attempt to determine if the address is actually a legal address or not. But this would not apply to nationally known addresses, like the White House, or a United States Senator… or the Supreme Court! which also states “Official Business” on it.

I also noticed that my mail was photocopied. Why would the mailroom staff make copies of documents from the Supreme Court, without my knowledge? The general idea of making copies was to prevent the introduction of drugs into the prison, but surely USP Tucson is not accusing the Supreme Court of sending contraband, are they?

In addition to this tampering with my legal mail, the letter got to me on 25 February. Even if we allowed 5-6 days to deliver from Washington DC to Tucson, that is almost TWO WEEKS before I got the document.

MIM(Prisons) responds: In response to our comrade in Arkansas, we will try to break down what we said in ULK 87 another way. You mention people telling you the injustice system is a dirty game. That is true, it exists to maintain the system of power of some groups of people over others. Some will conclude there is no point in fighting because in prison we have no rights anyway. This is not a crazy conclusion to come to based on what one sees happening around you in prison, but it is a defeatist and limited view of things.

MIM(Prisons) works to support prisoners organizing against the system of oppression. That organizing requires filing paperwork and waging legal battles. But it is not the legal battles that are decisive, it is the oppressed working together. There are no rights, only power struggles. If we stop struggling, that’s when we’ll have no rights. That is why to say there’s no point in fighting injustice is a defeatist approach.

What too many of our readers fail to grasp is that, as a group, we will not be free until we seize freedom from the oppressors. And we cannot do that as individuals. Rather the majority of the world’s people are oppressed by the current system of imperialism. We work in alliance with that majority to change that system. The courts are part of the existing system. The system can be used to gain some breathing room here and there because the oppressor wants to fool others into believing they are not oppressing people. The system however will not let you change the system, that requires other forms of organizing.

Basic rights like legal privilege to communicate with your lawyer, First Amendment rights to read and communicate with who you want are important protections for the oppressed to be able to defend themselves and develop themselves. As long as the system claims to uphold these rights, we must fight to have them implemented.

Revolutionary greetings comrades. To take the words of Comrade Triumphant of USW’s headline in his powerful article in ULK 83: the Minnesota Department of Corrections “joins list of states using digital mail to disrupt and surveil communications.”(1)

As all dedicated readers of ULK know well, this has been a constant pattern and practice of the fascist predatory pig administrations across AmeriKKKa’s carceral apparatuses contracting with these pig-assisting surveillance companies, such as TextBehind.

On 30 October 2024, the pigs here at so-called Maximum Security Prison - Oak Park Heights distributed the enclosed TextBehind flyer announcing that beginning 1 November 2024, all general mail to prisoners must be sent to TextBehind located in Phoenix, Maryland to be scanned, then re-routed over here to us. Come to find out, every person in the state of Minnesota received this same flyer. Notably, the flyer says that TextBehind does not accept legal mail. However, the Oak Park Heights PIG Administration issued additional memos, those of which I have obtained copies of and enclosed with this letter, outlining policy changes/changes to the definitions of what constitutes legal mail. As shown, the memos mention that some sort of “verification” device, QR code that attorneys must obtain before sending correspondence to their imprisoned clients.

Have you comrades heard of this type of process taking place anywhere else in terms of legal mail?

About a month or so prior to this mail memo, another memo was issued by the pigs (which I haven’t yet obtained a copy of) removing Amazon as an “approved vendor” that we as well as our family and friends can order us books from. The options we were left with are companies that don’t carry a lot of titles, like Blood In My Eye by George L. Jackson; Our Enemies in Blue: Police and Power in America by Kristian Williams; We Reserve the Right to Resist: Prison Wars and Black Resistance by Dequi Kioni-Sadiki; and Black Power Afterlives by Sekou Odinga and Dequi Kioni-Sadiki.

This change was allegedly because of “drugs.”

The entire captive population has been under relentless terroristic attack all under the guise of drugs coming through the mail. Captives are being falsely accused by pigs of being “intoxicated” and sent to solitary confinement even after drug and alcohol testing results are negative; captives have had their visitation and phones wrongfully taken; comrades have had every single piece of paper in their cells confiscated and destroyed by the pigs. I’m talking about one’s trial transcripts, legal documents, book manuscripts, poems, letters, etc.

The strip searches have been incessant. Literally blitzkriegs of sexual assault strip searches. In relation to strip searches in general, I’ve been struggling to end them across the states men’s prisons in Minnesota to be replaced with body scanners. In the women’s prison, they successfully campaigned to have unclothed body searches replaced with body scanners. Minnesota effectively banned the use of strip searches on juveniles. I had an article published on this topic in a local newspaper.(2)

In terms of the mail issue, myself and a few other captives who’ve had their mail from courts opened are exhausting our administrative remedies (grievance process) and conducting research into this issue to bring challenge to this policy in the courts – the struggle is constant.

<sup>Notes: 1. Triumphant of United Struggle from Within, August 2023, “TDCJ Joins List of States Using Digital Mail to Disrupt and Surveil Communications”, Under Lock & Key 83.
2. Shavelle Chavez-Nelson, 4 September 2024, ​Strip searches are sexual assaults by the state”, Minnesota Spokesman Recorder.</sup>

On 5 October 2024, about 150 people organized by the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Local 3585 picketed to call for an end to paper mail in the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC). Another protest is planned for October 17th.

The plague of drugs in U.$. prisons is real, and it has continued in states where digital mail has been implemented. The claim of this “labor” union that staff are being poisoned is not real. In neighboring Indiana, a number of prisoners were threatened with isolation in torture cells for mail that we sent them that was accused of being drug-laced. Further testing proved they were not. Meanwhile, there have now been a number of cases of prison staff across the country claiming extreme medical crises from contacting prisoner mail, following similar claims by street cops, that have never been substantiated by medical professionals. It’s interesting that this “labor” union is willing to stand out on the street and picket for a policy that would give Correctional Officers a monopoly on bringing paper into IDOC facilities.

Even much of the pro-labor union movement in the United $tates will agree that cops aren’t workers, or the oppressed, but rather are the oppressors, regardless of the question of surplus value. And Marxism has always excluded the employees of the state from the proletariat in any country. So it is of little surprise that the AFSCME would be pushing this reactionary policy to eliminate education, resources and community connection in prisons, even if it risks the very safety of their own members.

MIM Distributors submitted the protest email below to Illinois DOC Director Latoya Hughes. We encourage others to send emails or make phone calls or send letters (especially if you are in Illinois). There are more suggested scripts available from campaign initiators working with Midwest Books to Prisoners.(2)

Dear Director Hughes,

I have recently been made aware that several Illinois legislators are calling for an immediate cessation of non-legal paper mail being delivered to people incarcerated in the IDOC. Our organization sends paper mail to thousands of prisoners across the country and we object to this effort to abridge our First Amendment rights to speech and association, as well as those of the people in your prisons. We will be sharing this letter with our members and supporters, especially in the state of Illinois.

Books, newspapers, and other printed materials are a crucial source of information, education and growth for people locked in prison. Letters can be a rare thing to look forward to. Our organization runs study programs, conducts surveys and regularly sends forms to prisoners to get updates on their status. All of these programs rely on prisoners receiving pieces of paper that we send them so they can fill out the forms and return them. The impact of blocking such mail would be massive.

We have been watching the spread of alarmism around drug-laced mail, and have even had such baseless accusations made against our mail! Of course testing proved the accusation false, just as it did in the recent incident at Shawnee, where the testing by Marion Fire Rescue came back false. We’ve also seen multiple cases where staff have claimed to have gotten sick from handling mail, which have been proven to be impossible claims multiple times now. The benefits of education and community connection are proven to help ensure staff safety far more than these imagined risks of being poisoned. Policy should be fact-based and should not succumb to rumors and fear-mongering.

Again, I am writing this email to clearly state my complete opposition to any and all proposals to halt mail delivered to incarcerated people, and urge you not to move forward with this proposal.

Sincerely Concerned,

MIM Distributors

<sup>Notes:
1. Madison Porter, 5 October 2024, Canton prison workers protest how inmates receive mail, 25 News.
2. For more materials on this campaign you can access Google docs here: bit.ly/IDOCmail</sup>

I recently received my first Under Lock and Key (Winter 2023, No. 80) newsletter. I really wish I’d been receiving it years ago, cuz it’s a good read, and very informative.

Just read page 7. Drug addiction remains a primary barrier to unity, and I would like more info on United Struggle from Within’s Revolutionary 12 Step training program. And if, and how, I can get involved, cause here in the Illinois prison system, drugs have become a major issue, especially since Covid hit. Prisoners are having their people dip/spray letters, cards, books, magazines, and even obituaries with drugs and other chemicals in order to eat or smoke the paper to get some type of high. Whatever these guys are smoking is causing them to have episodes such as freaking out, seizures, and even O.D.ing. It’s so bad at times you can see a smoke cloud in the air, and C.O.’s, Sgt’s, Lt’s, and even Major’s have been on a wing during this and have done nothing but tell the wing to put that shit out and spray something in order to cover up the odor, and they’ve even said, smoke it at your own risk and don’t call for help if you O.D. There ain’t a unit, wing, or housing that don’t have an issue with this stuff. Seg and even the infirmary are smoking it up. To a point the staff have given up trying to get this under control and these substances have caused multiple issues for all of us in here.

They’ve gotten real strict on the mail and what we receive and how we receive mail such as letters, cards, photos, and books/magazines. They’ve told us that our letters can’t be more than 3 pages, we can’t receive 2-ply cards, and they can’t have any glitter on them. All photos have to go through a company such as Freeprints or Pelipost, can’t come from our family, friends, Walmart, or Walgreens any more. All books and magazines must come from a vendor or company, and even then, a lot is not allowed, no hard cover books, and can’t be over a certain size.

Also, it plays on us prisoners that have health issues and altered immune systems such as myself. I have breathing issues and I’ve even had a sinus surgery in order to open my nose so I could breathe better. And I use a rescue inhaler and have been put in by my surgeon to have a sleep study done due to my breathing and my surgeon has even said that I need a CPAP machine which is what the sleep study is for.

I’ve even gotten into arguments/fights with cellies that I’ve had over them wanting to smoke this stuff.

I have wrote the warden and the placement officer multiple times, the warden has never responded. And it took me three times writing the placement officer before I got a response. I had asked, “which wings exactly are the non-smoking wings?” “This is a smoke-free institution.”, word-for-word the response I was given.

Staff C.O.’s and nurses crack jokes and talk about how bad the smoking is on a unit or on a wing, and I’ve heard/been told by a few C.O.’s and nurses that some staff have lawsuits in due to them coming in contact with said substance and/or smoke.

There is nowhere in this prison that is smoke free, and with them not having a place for those of us that don’t want to be around this stuff, they are putting us in harm’s way and putting our health at risk.

A couple questions: is this a violation of my rights? What should/can I do about it?

Please help me if you can, thank you!

Please send me the Grievance Campaign – petition for Illinois.

MIM(Prisons) responds: This is the same story we’ve been hearing across the country, and one of the reasons we launched our Revolutionary 12 Step program when we did. It’s almost as if this drug plague prisoners are facing was intentional. You should have received a copy of our 12 Step program by now. Unfortunately we do not have an active training program. But we are looking for experienced comrades to restart our training program, and for comrades on the ground to implement the program and send in reports on its successes and failures and how to improve it. This is an important challenge that the anti-imperialist prison movement must overcome to be successful.

Is the smoke a violation of the law? Yes, as the staff told you it is a non-smoking facility and you have a legal right to not be exposed to second hand smoke there. The Smoke-Free Illinois Act (SFIA) of 2008 forbids smoking in all buildings (with exceptions like homes and designated hotel rooms), where smoking is defined as:

“Smoke” or “smoking” means the carrying, smoking, burning, inhaling, or exhaling of any kind of lighted pipe, cigar, cigarette, hookah, weed, herbs, or any other lighted smoking equipment. “Smoke” or “smoking” includes the use of an electronic cigarette.

Is the smoke a violation of your rights? Well, we’d say there are no rights, only power struggles. So you can use the SFIA to grieve this issue, but if they don’t listen you’ll have to get organized, find allies inside or outside and apply pressure. We’ve sent you the grievance petition, this is one tool you can use to try to organize people around this issue.

The oppression which prisoners face in this country is one result of the global system of imperialism whose primary victims are the oppressed nations globally, meaning that this system is our primary enemy. We must spread the word that prisoners in this country are suffering because the Amerikan empire’s wealth is based on class and national barriers; the Amerikan nation does not want to share its privileged position with Black and Brown people, so they restrict them from employment, from education, from housing, and force them into a life in the “underground.” The solution for the oppressed is not to fight to get into the club, but to unite with the oppressed in the Third World to destroy the club system as a whole and build a socialist world. A world where peoples’ needs are put first, not the current world where people are constantly struggling for petty basic rights like not to have your life threatened by toxic smoke.

We hope those who have been following our series of articles this week have been both angered by what is going on inside U.$. prisons and inspired to action. (see campaign link below to read previous articles)

MIM(Prisons) is in a period of growth, after some setbacks. In recent years we’ve gradually reinstated each of our 3 different levels of correspondence study courses for prisoners. Just this summer we put out a long-planned Reference Guide that contains historical timelines, maps and a glossary to provide background for many of the things we talk about regularly. We’ve released the Revolutionary 12 Steps Program and Power To New Afrika, both written by prisoners, in the last couple years. We continue to put out Under Lock & Key every three months. And we’ve updated a number of other study packs and resources. And we do it all out of our own pockets and volunteer time. So if you can spare some money or some time to support us it can go a long way.

By the time this series of articles reaches most of our readers inside, in Under Lock & Key 87, the holiday season will be approaching. In that spirit and inspired by all this talk about banned books, we are pledging to mail out more books this winter than any other winter in the 2020s so far!

Please see our get involved page for ways to donate and other ways to help out. Outside supporters can help us make this happen by sending cash or stamps, helping acquire in demand books like dictionaries, Black Panther Party, or Marxist classics, or by volunteering in various ways. All of the new publications listed above have been censored in various prisons, even the Reference Guide was censored in Michigan’s Thumb Correctional Facility for being more than 12 pages long! So continued campaigning and legal support is much needed.

Prisoners can help us get more books out by taking the steps to join our Serve the People Free Political Books to Prisoners Program. Get others to sign up for a subscription to ULK or become a distributor of ULK in your prison. Let us know what organizing work you are doing, what your local study group is discussing, what questions are coming up for you and your comrades. By doing these things you can receive books to help with your local work and studies. We have books on Black/New Afrikan studies, Chican@ studies, First Nation studies, gender, economics, history of Chinese socialism, the Soviet Union, books by Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Mao and more.

As a person who has been the target of long-standing censorship campaigns, i would like to give my voice to the discussion around censorship in this time of organizing against this tool of counter-insurgency.

Recently, in Texas’ prison system, an anthology that speaks to the torture of solitary confinement was censored. The reason given is that it purportedly contains content that threatens the security of the prison by encouraging prisoners to engage in disruptive behavior such as strikes, etc. i took part in this anthology and to be clear there is not any language speaking to the disruption of the prison system. There is language that speaks to the dismantling of long-term/indefinite solitary confinement, which is illegal in many places, is considered torture internationally, and which the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) itself admits may cause harm or damage to the mental health of the affected person. So the thinking of the thought police is that it is a threat to security to speak out against torture, but it is not a threat to security to maintain torturous conditions. What sense does that make?

This censorship is of the second volume of this anthology series called Texas Letters (see: texasletters.org). Volume one, which contains the same sort of content from many of the same writers, is approved. So what happened between the time of January 2023 and May of 2024, the respective release of each volume? A one word answer: Success. The first volume was released at the beginning of the last state legislature session. A session where a coalition of people were behind House Bill 812 (HB812), a bill intended to end indefinite solitary confinement. As a way to increase the popularity of the bill the book was distributed to all the law makers. Ultimately the bill didn’t pass, however the promotion of the direct letters and experiences of those incarcerated in solitary confinement in Texas grew. The prolific female writer Kwaneta Harris, who has been in solitary confinement for years, was featured in various high profile publications including The New York Times, speaking to the experience of solitary confinement in Texas, particularly how it is in prisons designated for women. Al-Jazeera and NPR featured interviews on the book and the experiences of Texas solitary confinement. Advocates continue to build momentum and public opinion against the use of solitary Confinement, and it is upon this back drop that when Texas Letters Volume 2 appeared, it was censored throughout the state prison system.

This is a move tyrants use to quell social discourse; to control the narrative and therefore evolution of the system never comes. This is a move to quell any form of resistance. Even that which is peaceful becomes a “threat to the security of the institution”, those who take part in such actions become “threats to the security of the institution” people known for “organizing and influencing other inmates” and therefore are confined in solitary confinement or held in said confinement if already there.

This process of events is no surprise. It is a reflection of the practices coming out of the highest level of government in the state, directly a representation of the tyrannical regime Greg Abbott desires and runs himself.

See, in Texas, the Governor appoints the Executive Director of TDCJ, the Texas Board of Criminal Justice, and the parole and pardons board. The Director’s Review Committee (DRC) is the body that governs censorship inside the prisons. This committee is appointed by the Director. So what We end up with is a DRC of political appointees, appointed by a political appointee, a gang of political careerists, all kissing the ring of the top man, the governor of Texas, all falling in line with his neo-confederate agenda. As such We have a prison system that is over saturated with Christian fundamentalism, stale reforms, faith-based programs, and because any volunteer program has to go through the chaplaincy department there is no secular, dissident voices, programs or activities. All because TDCJ is in the business of cultivating ZOMBIES, those who talk when and how they’re told, walk when and how they’re told, think when and how they’re told. This is considered reform and anything outside of that is a threat to security worthy of censorship.

This type of tyranny should be important to everyone because We should want to stop this sort of government over-reach before it becomes too extreme. Tyranny only becomes emboldened with time and a lack of resistance of its subjects.

I am lucky this far to have received my mail [including many newspapers, study packs and books from MIM Distributors], but the tablets are soon to arrive. As far as books go, I am unable to order any as there seems to be some type of mystery in that realm. No books until further notice, and nobody appears to be able to guide you in the proper direction.

Their goal seems to be to stop the flow of contraband into the prison. Yet, there seems to be more of it than food on your tray. People are falling out and sent right back to the place they came out of to be back in the same shape they left in: on drugs. They appear to do nothing about the problem. A person on drugs can walk right past an officer and he acts as if he doesn’t see him. The smell of something on fire stays in the air. You are forced to sleep in a room with unbearable smoke fumes in the air. All they want is for the alarm to not go off. Smoke bailing out of some buildings; isn’t that something?

Yes, we’re going to have to accept the tablets because they can solve the problem of unbearable conditions - or so they say!

MIM(Prisons) adds: Despite word from prisoners in Tennessee that there are new restrictions on books coming in, we have not been able to confirm the new rules. We have heard from other Books for Prisoners programs that they have stopped sending books to Tennessee. The Tennessee Department of Corrections’ website hosts the Inmate Mail policy dated 8 December 2023, which states:

“Printed materials may be received by inmates in an unlimited amount, provided they are mailed directly from the publisher(s) or recognized commercial distributor.”

Despite some censorship, and mail gone missing, MIM Distributors has been able to deliver books to TN prisoners prior to December 2023. And lately our biggest problem has been with Tennessee rejecting manila envelopes because they think they might harbor drugs!

As we’ve reported in Texas and elsewhere, drugs in prisons have risen to all-time highs, despite Covid-19 restrictions on visitations and new digital mail policies. And science has proven that drug addiction is a product of bad living conditions. So not only are prison staff bringing in drugs, they are driving prisoners to use them through their repressive and alienating conditions.

UPDATE 28 September from a TN prisoner: I’m currently being held at Morgan County Correctional Complex and I need your help/advice. Excluding religious books, I’m only allowed to receive 5 books, from only 3 vendors that prison officials have chosen! How can I further my education if I’m only allowed to receive 5 books? I’m working on my pending criminal and civil cases, and of course I’ll need more than 5 law books, but with this restriction, that’s not possible! This restriction is under the guidance of Warden Shawn Phillips who can be reached at (423) 346-1300.

The comrade included documentation showing the only approved vendors to be: Abebook.com [sic], bookshop.org and 21st century Christian bookstore. And apparently prisoners can give books to mailroom to be thrown away in order to receive additional books!

As we approach the end of Prison Banned Book Week we are pausing our campaign, which has been going on over the last couple months, to support prisoners in Pendleton Correctional Facility, Indiana. Supporters should stop gathering signatures and mail out any remaining postcards soon.

It was reported to MIM(Prisons) that 6 prisoners were threatened with drug charges, and torture in long-term isolation, for mail received from MIM Distributors. The mailroom claimed smudges of ink (that were obviously from the printer) were indications that the mail was laced with drugs. Of course, subsequent testing of the mail proved there were no drugs on them. This type of treatment has earned Indiana state a grade of D for their mail censorship, not an F because most letters do get through as does some literature.

In response to these threats, comrades in Anti-Imperialist Prisoner Support (AIPS) and other supporters hit the streets with a postcard campaign. We told people about what was going on, and asked them to sign a postcard and mail it to the administration. The postcards called out the political repression and demanded that it be stopped. Dozens of postcards were mailed to the Pendleton Administration, from near and far away, over the last couple months.

In the midst of the postcard campaign we received news that the threats had seemingly been dropped. But censorship has continued and a lawsuit is still being pursued. One of the comrades targeted at Pendleton says:

“I have not received Under Lock & Key 86 mailed out [1 month ago]. I’ve written the mailroom 2 times now and as of today have not received it.”

Ey did receive our article on the postcard campaign, which has been copied and distributed around the prison. Ey says:

“Thank you all for bringing this injustice to light!”

Thanks to the comrades on the outside who supported this campaign. We are declaring this phase over, but will continue to report on the happenings in Indiana prisons.

Outreach Report

In one locale, over 35 petitions were collected alongside distributing ULK 86 directly to passerbys. There was substantial immediate enthusiasm for discovering a publication written by prisoners, especially regarding solidarity with Palestine. Each persyn AIPS met was interested both in receiving a newsletter as well as signing a petition to mail.

AIPS also maintained a presence at Socialism Conference 2024 which took place in Chicago during the end of August. Here, over 100 copies of ULK were handed out and dozens of postcard petitions were signed by those interested in the struggle of prisoners. It was also encouraging to see those on the outside were interested in learning about the abuses and injustices prisoners face, either through attending panels hosted at the conference or by talking directly with passer-bys.

While there was no negative reception, no recipients in either location were familiar with ULK or MIM(Prisons). Only very few recognized the MIM name from prior exposure. It is indicative of a low tide in the movement here that most are completely unfamiliar with anti-imperialist prisoners. This represents an opportunity and responsibility to publicize our work and recruit more volunteers.

Among this small sample of the public, found tabling in busy urban areas, at local leftist events, or at the aforementioned conference, there were multiple people who were very enthusiastic about the newspaper and our work in spite of lacking all prior familiarity. This welcome enthusiasm also resulted in some “pig questions”: those which, if AIPS answered publicly, would inevitably feed valuable information to the pigs (in other words, agents of the state). The size of a political group, their location, and their leadership structure are examples of questions unnecessary to answer in order to work with others. That information only helps enemies who wish to study, surveil or even infiltrate anti-imperialist organizations. And we don’t say this to pretend that we are a big organization but rather to encourage people to do the work that they see as the most correct.

AIPS comrades encountered some popular confusion about MIM(Prisons)’s line on (non)exploitation of prisoners. Some people thought MIM(Prisons) was fighting against the for-profit prison system. Most prisons are not private. And even companies like JPay, Securus, and GTL that are profiteering off prisoners are making very small amounts of money compared to the cost of running the criminal injustice system, which the Prison Policy Institute put at about $182 billion. MIM(Prisons)’s actual line is that prisons are an immense cost to Amerika: a cost sustained for the purpose of social control, especially for the national oppression of First Nation, New Afrikan and Chican@ liberation movements. In the end, this cost is worthwhile if Amerika is able to prevent the masses of oppressed nations from fighting for autonomy in land and resources. But still, the benefits yielded are not profits in terms of capital but the containment and suppression of the internal semi-colonies within the United $tates. Imprisonment is a form of absolute immiseration that we think of in the realm of genocide rather than exploitation. The suppression of rebellious groups helps the settler Amerikan nation maintain its position on top. AIPS incorporates this understanding in our prisoner correspondence and campaign work.

The Florida Department of Corrections has been on a censorship tirade, which serves as a nice compliment to their habit of banning books.(1). The FDOC has a rule (Section 15 of 33-501.401) which authorizes the impoundment or rejection of any publication which “depicts how to make an instrument to apply a tattoo … describes tattooing techniques … or contains a tattoo pattern or photograph …”

ULK’s have been censored because certain pages “Could be used as tattoo patterns.” That is, the FDOC has the right to censor any publication which contains anything which could possibly serve as a pattern for a tattoo, and whether it could be a tattoo pattern is up to their discretion. Their censorship “rules” say “censor whatever you want!”

Not a single one of our publications has ever listed tattoo patterns. We print the art that prisoners send us, and images that help express the articles they accompany. We have a recommendation for the FDOC: prisoners could use their cell bars as tattoo patterns. How about you remove them?

In the last four years, of all the prison systems where we’ve sent 10 or more books, Florida has the highest rate of censorship at about 30% of books or pamphlets (excluding our newsletter and letters to prisoners). Meanwhile only 26% of books we’ve sent to Florida in that time have been confirmed received by the prisoner. The week before Prison Banned Books Week, JPay returned some articles we printed and mailed to a reader after many publications we sent were censored. JPay enclosed FDOC censorship forms in each envelope that were not filled, therefore not providing any justification for returning our mail. We give Florida a grade of D for their mail policies and practices. They are one of the worst, but not as bad as states that block any piece of mail we send in.

We will continue to be censored so long as we reveal the oppression in the United $nakes. We will fight it until the oppressed have been liberated.

1: Patricia Mazzei, 22 April 2023, “Florida at Center of Debate as School Book Bans Surge Nationally”, The New York Times