Under Lock & Key

In the last issue, we mentioned the removal of Spanish-language content from federal websites. Since then, we’ve seen the Pentagon removing information about Navajo code-talkers, Jackie Robinson, Tuskegee Airmen and Japanese who fought for the U.$. in World War II from their websites.

The U.$. military helps to impose fascism on the oppressed people of the Third World when they get out of line. But now that fascism is coming home, the oppressed nations here are the first to feel the brunt.

There’s a long history of the U.$. military using benefits and even citizenship to bribe people to fight for them. There’s also a long history of the United $tates not always coming through with their promises. This erasure of oppressed people from their history is just one more slap in the face of those who thought they’d get in with the Amerikans by fighting in their wars. And we see it as a petty sign of how Amerika is taking a different approach to oppressed people in this country.

The Regime

While Trump wasn’t so different as a U.$. president first time around, we can look to his current cabinet to confirm the consolidation of fascists for this second term.

Does anyone think a Euro-immigrant from apartheid South Africa who throws Nazi salutes, and is the richest persyn in the world, is a friend of oppressed nations? How about Pete Hegseth, the guy with the Christian nationalist tattoos now in charge of the military that already had a white nationalist militia problem? Who ironically closed his self-leaked plans to bomb Yemen with:

“We are currently clean on OPSEC. Godspeed to our Warriors.”

President Trump recently told Salvadorian President Bukele to “build five more places” to hold “homegrown” criminals from the United $tates, referring to the giant Salvadorian “terrorist” concentration camp Trump has begun sending people to. Stephen Miller, deputy chief of staff for policy and homeland security adviser to Trump, when asked if Mahmoud Khalil will be deported, replied:

“Yes he will, as will anyone who preaches hate for America.”

Vice President J.D. Vance is a benefactor of another of the richest people in the world, Peter Thiel, who also funds Curtis Yarvin, who Vance says he takes much influence from. Yarvin believes New Afrikans have lower IQs and that their enslavement was thus justified because they were destined to be slaves. Yarvin is paraphrased as writing:

“He then concluded that the “best humane alternative to genocide” is to “virtualize” these people: Imprison them in “permanent solitary confinement” where, to avoid making them insane, they would be connected to an “immersive virtual-reality interface” so they could “experience a rich, fulfilling life in a completely imaginary world.”“(1)

This will sound very familiar to regular readers of ULK. This is the future of prison tablets. A slow genocide that avoids the current messiness of videos of dead babies inspiring young anti-imperialists to destroy weapons manufacturing plants of companies like Elbit Systems.

These are just some highlights of the current regime that have been exposed in much more depth by others over the past year. These people do not want us and they’re serious about it.

Peak Integration?

By the 1960s, the injustices of Jim Crow had garnered sympathy and support from many sectors for the self-determination of the internal semi-colonies (in particular the Black/New Afrikan nation). Since the victory of the Civil Rights Act, that support has declined, replaced with an imperialist project of assimilation. At this point, most of us have only lived in an integrated United $tates, which has greatly reduced the interest in national liberation on occupied Turtle Island. Of course the disproportionate poverty, homelessness, murder and torture of oppressed nations continues, but many in the internal semi-colonies joined the Amerikan consumer class post-integration as well. As a result, we have more Uncle Toms and Tio Tomas than ever before (especially the Tios and Tias who continue to join the U.$. military at increasing rates).

Black Lives Matter (peaking in 2020) and the al-Aqsa Flood in 2023 brought an uptick in support for national liberation. With the resumption of the U.$.-i$rael war on Palestine and Lebanon, breaking peace deals in both cases, opposition to what the imperialists are doing in the Middle East continues to rise within the United $tates. We also think the internal actions of the current Trump regime are already beginning to heighten contradictions and broaden the base for possible alliances as the fascist enemy consolidates its forces against us.

Deportations have targeted those from Latin America and the Muslim world so far. As the prospect of war with China advances we will also see the rise of racism against Chinese people (or those perceived to be Chinese) in this country, as we have seen in the past, as recently as the COVID-19 pandemic.

You Can’t Think Racism Away

While liberals think we can (and have) made progress against national oppression by fighting “wrong ideas” in peoples’ heads, racism is in reality a product of national oppression. It cannot be ended without the national liberation of the oppressed.

The reason people believe in integration is that they believe that the wealth and prosperity of the United $tates can exist without oppressing and exploiting other nations. It cannot. And the Trump regime has a more realistic understanding of this than most Amerikans.

As support for national liberation and alternatives to the current system grow, we must make this point very clear. We must draw a clear line between the proletarian line and the social fascist and crypto-Trotskyist lines that have historically linked the struggle against oppression with the struggle for more wealth for Amerikans. The struggle for more wealth always wins out. This is why the labor aristocracy is the main force for fascism, even if the imperialists are doing most of the work so far.

<sup>Notes:
1. Gil Duran, 22 July 2024, Where J.D. Vance Gets His Weird, Terrifying Techno-Authoritarian Ideas, The New Republic.
2. MIM 2005 Congress, The labor aristocracy is the main force for fascism.</sup>

Tabletas en Florida DOC

Cuando las tabletas primero salieron en 2017, las primeras tabletas los vendieron a los presos, yo fui uno de ellos a los cuales sus seres queridos le compraron una. Luego FDOC decidió cambiar el correo postal a correo digital, so la seguridad de FDOC recogió todas las tabletas (incluyendo esos que los presos pagaron). Después regresaron y le dieron una tableta gratis a todos los presos. Desde ese tiempo hasta ahora las tabletas han sido actualizados no menos de tres veces.

Este camarada recientemente salio de Close Management (CM) y fue transferido a Hamilton C.I. Desde que llegue a esta prisión, he encontrado que durante el ultimo año el Sargento encargado de Propriedad ha estado confiscando tabletas, dando reclusos reportes disciplinarios por “manipulación de las tabletas” en la mayorídad de la veces – los presos se encuentran culpable en 99% de los casos. Son puesto en suspensión indefinida por poseer otra tableta y imponen un préstamo de $130 por reconstitución que tienen que pagar. Por un tiempo, FDOC nos dieron un poco, pero después regresaron ha quitarnos todo. FDOC nos regalaron las tabletas, pero porque son propiedad del estado, tienen un a excusa para llevárselas.

La Población Prisionero

Yo llevo 28 años internado en las prisiones y todo ha cambiado. Esto ya no es una prisión, se ha convertido a un centro de guardería infantil donde los tontos pueden pasar el tiempo. Todos quieren ser parte de una pandilla, pero antes que tomas ese juramento, dejame recordarte que es necesario entender porque esa nación, grupo, o pandilla fue nacido. Nació por parte de los oprimidos para pelear en unidad (como colectivo) contra la opresión. Y quien son los opresores? Los puercos que trabajan aquí, la administración, la sistema, el estado, y el gobierno. Yo conozco mi historia, sabes la tuya?

FDOC tiene un total de no mas de 30 guardias trabajando por turno (1/4 de ellos trabajan horas extra) y eso es contando el personal que trabaja en los controles del área en frente del prisión. Es una vergüenza que un grupo tan pequeño de puercos puedan controlar, oprimir y abusa a un grupo de 1250 a 1500 presos, matones, gánsteres, criminales y pandilleros. Los presos de FDOC no tienen unidad y menos tienen respeto a ellos mismo. Digo que no tienen respeto a ellos mismo porque puede ser que yo tengo un deuda de una sopa de 78 centavos y ya están listo para matarme, pero los puercos te pueden llamar un “montón de perras” ha ti y tu dormitorio entera y no hacen nada pero seguir con su cabeza abajo.

En el FDOC, la mayoría de los pandilleros prefieren tener un puerco como amigo en vez de otro preso que tiene el mismo colores de uniforme. Respetan mas a los puercos que a sus compañeros presos. Ali-al Haf de Georgia, leí tu articulo en ULK Winter 2025 – no estas solo! Yo también creo que esto es un virus contagioso. Ahora los presos están haciendo el trabajo de los puercos. Revisan y chequean que las puertas de tu celdas están asegurados, pasan correo, y ellos se aseguran que no comes dos veces en la cafetería, hasta los puedes ven parados al lado de un puerco como guardaespaldas. Pasan besando el culo pero al fin del día están igual como yo; encerrado en una celda. No importa como positiva sea tu opinión sobre los puercos, porque al fin del día ellos no van as arriesgar sus cheques de pago para ti. Coño Preso – no seas ciego y mira el color de tu uniforme! No te das cuenta que es un diferente color?

Aprendan la diferencia entre un derecho y un privilegio. Aprendan y usen la sistema de quejas institucional (Grievances). Necesitas dejar un historial pasado escrito en caso si la situación necesitar ir a otro nivel. Un historial pasado escrito enseña prueba que trataron una ruta de paz antes de elevar la forma de lucha.

Todos esos camaradas del pasado que sacrificaron sus sentencias, fechas de salidos, salud, familia, libertad, y otros que hasta fueron mártires que sacrificando sus vidas solamente para que esta generación se tiren sus manos arriba y rendirse? De verdad? Esto es como estamos sirviendo nuestro tiempo en 2025? Donde están tus cojones??

Unámonos todos bajo una misma linea de pensamiento. Antes de que te quejas por no tener una tableta o por no poder ver el partido en el tele, necesitamos a pensar sobre los precios de las cantinas, de como ganar mas “gain-time”, como traer libertad provisional ha los presos de vida como yo, y como mejorar la comida. Disculpame pero la prisión no es un lugar donde vienes para pasar el tiempo con tus amigos y donde se pasa un bien tiempo. Esto es el cementerio de los muertos con vida, donde tu futuro se puede cambian completamente en menos de 15 segundos. No te olvides de quien eres, de tu cultura, y de donde vienes. No te sometes al trabajo del puerco. No me sorprendo si en algunos años solamente ofrecen nuestra visitas por video y paran todo contacto físico. Si no nos unimos y no nos levantemos como un pueblo, como una familia, vamos a seguir de perder. Recuérdate que antes de que fuiste un pandillero, fuiste un hombre, un ser humano – no un animal. Niego que me tratan y que me tienen cautivo como uno. No quiero abrazos con la vida hasta que mi pueblo sea libre.

A handful of comrades in different cities on the outside have pledged to fast, study and do prisoner support work on 9 September 2025 in honor of the Attica uprising, and in solidarity with comrades organizing inside on this same day. This is the annual Day of Peace & Solidarity initiated by the United Front for Peace in Prisons over a decade ago. As we go to print, Palestinians just recognized Palestinian Prisoners’ Day on April 17. September 9th is like our Prisoners of Amerikkka Day. And this year we aim to carry the torch outside and hope to inspire others to participate.

The act of fasting forces us to slow down, be more reflective and think of others across the country doing the same thing, for the same cause. A larger group of outside comrades will also be coming together the day before to continue ongoing discussions about the Maoist-led united front here on Occupied Turtle Island. We will discuss how to best build this movement to be resilient in the long-term task of ending imperialism. We may also organize events on September 9th.

Comrades inside prison should also hold local discussions about Attica, about the anti-imperialist prison movement, and about the United Front for Peace in Prisons. Comrades can join us by abstaining from food, drugs, television, video games and other pleasure-driven activities that day, and engaging in study, discussion, outreach and reflection instead. Get our September 9th study pack, start planning now. We’ll print an updated list of plans in the next ULK.

On 17 March 2025, one of the U.$. propaganda arms of Imperialism “Voice of America” was shut down. This came after major cuts to USAID, which serves U.$. interests through aid to people in crisis situations in other countries. Of course any time any of the capitalist institutions is shut down it’s a good thing. But these institutions of “soft power” influence are being replaced with trade war in the form of massive tariffs, and possibly hot war with ramped up military spending.

Voice of America? Voice of Imperialism.

It was World War II which compelled the United $tates to create the “Voice of America” (VOA) after taking a page out of Nazi Germany’s radio propaganda outlets. The VOA was used to play propaganda radio programs to countries opposed to U.$. imperialism. Over the years VOA has funded and created various propaganda broadcasts such as Radio Free Europe, Radio Free Asia and Radio Marti aimed at Cuba. VOA would essentially transmit U.$. propaganda at the targets with a goal to foment unrest, rebellions and to destabilize the targets. USAID, established in 1961, provides actual resources to influence conditions on the ground. Amerikans should keep this in mind when they get upset about Russian propaganda on the internet.

VOA often was used to promote and support opposition forces within a country that was targeted while spreading lies, disinformation and smear campaigns against those in power. No doubt countless lives were negatively affected if not lost to those who took directives or followed the advice from VOA in the decades it was in service. Perhaps we may never know the totality of damage that VOA is responsible for in its reign of terror. The Trump Administration has shut down the VOA, citing it as having become “radical” and pushing liberal views. We believe there is more to it and it’s important that the Chican@ Nation understands what this shut down means.

On the one hand, we welcome the death of VOA; however, to be honest, the VOA was no longer as vital to imperialism today as it was 80 years ago at the height of radio around the world. Today, many of the targets that the United $tates is focused on have blocked access to VOA via internet or radio waves. It was no longer as accessible as it once was. Furthermore, the occupiers seek to harness resources for harsher forms of oppression. The radio waves today are also packed with white nationalist broadcasts, on radio and internet podcasts and other media in multitudes that the days of WWII never dreamed of. Indeed, Goebbels would have soiled his pants in glee over the flood of white power media spewed out to the world from these false U.$. leaders. So, in that sense eliminating the VOA was simply trimming the fat for the oppressor nation. The state has developed the white nationalists to an extent where they can now supplement the capitalist state allowing Amerikkka to reroute its resources. As revolutionaries, we should glean the lesson in this and work harder to develop our independent institutions among the Chican@ masses while adjusting our resources to other much needed areas in our work.

Is the U.S. Tariff War Class Warfare?

Recently a bourgeois “journalist” asked a Trump official about the tariffs and how it’s “hurting” the economy. The capitalist politician said the tariffs were “class warfare” and that this warfare was being waged by the current administration on behalf of the working class. This of course is a gross distortion of the reality of what is taking place. What we are seeing is not class warfare. It is inter-imperialist rivalry where imperialists are fighting over resources, rare minerals and clout in the world. “Class War” is the furthest from the reality, if anything it’s the imperialist class fighting for who is going to exploit the proletariat of the world the most.

Political democracy in the United $tates is bourgeois in nature and one way that it survives another day is in fooling the masses into believing that it operates in their interests. It promotes the false narrative that it is fighting for equality for the people but true “equality” can only come when classes don’t exist, when capitalism – the very system which keeps the U.$. on life support– no longer exists. This is how ridiculous the U.$. bourgeois democracy is. But this is nothing new. Lenin spoke of the capitalists selling snake oil in the guise of democracy. This is because it lulls the masses into believing that the capitalist state is truly working in the people’s interests. Listening to the capitalist press (U.$. Corporate News Media) the masses believe in the propaganda that they do not need to engage in national liberation struggles because the colonizers are engaging in “Class War” and working towards equality. Aztlán will only be free as a class when we are free as a nation. Shutting down a propaganda arm or charging tariffs do not bring us one iota closer to national liberation. We don’t want money or lies, we want to be free!

MIM(Prisons) update: As we go to press Trump had put significant tariffs on goods coming into the United $tates from almost every other country, then quickly repealed them after bond markets became unstable (because other countries began to question the reliability of U.$. debt pay offs). The only new tariff increase the U.$. has maintained as we write this is on Chinese goods, which has triggered a tariff war between the United $tates and China. This is a war that Trump will not want to back down from, but China has less reason to back down since they are actually a self-sufficient economy.

Since the overthrow of socialism in China in 1976, the Chinese proletariat have been brought into the world capitalist system, becoming the source of much of the cheap goods (and surplus value) in the United $tates. As these economies became tightly intertwined over the last 50 years, the large proletariat in China has supported the smaller, but still significant, labor aristocracy consumer class in this country. The United $tates no longer produces enough to support its own people, even if we cut our consumption to more modest means. We have become a mall economy, where we buy and sell to each other the things that other countries make. While this system has been booming for decades, Trump is correct that this is not sustainable. The trade imbalances the Trump regime used to calculate the new tariffs notably excluded services, only accounting for trade deficits in goods. This is because Trump has been touting a plan to bring goods manufacturing back to the United $tates by forcing other countries to invest here.

It’s interesting to watch Amerikan social fascists, who for decades have lamented the loss of “good manufacturing jobs” to China suddenly be worried about becoming slaves in computer chip factories. They seem to now admit the truth that to destroy the relationship with China will lead to a significant reduction in capitalist trade and profits globally in the short term, as well as the ability of Amerikans to enjoy the consumption levels that we have enjoyed since WWII.

The United $tates has been preparing for war with China for years as this economic relationship has supported their continued rise to a technologically advanced super power. You cannot have imperialism without the contradictions between nations. And that includes the contradiction between the exploiter and exploited nations as well as between the imperialist nations themselves (such as the U.$. and China). Since there are no more non-capitalist countries to pull into this exploitative system, the expansion of finance capital is reaching its limits. Trump’s pulling back from tariffs on most countries indicates a disagreement among the imperialists on how to proceed. But at this point the only way for the imperialists to create the opportunity for expansion that the collapse of Chinese socialism offered is the destruction of capital via massive war. A war that the U.$. military and other imperialist militaries are ramping up for. Such a war poses a great threat to all people of the world, but especially those in the imperialist core who have been insulated from war for many decades. The only wars we support and will serve in is the wars for national liberation and for socialism of those under the boot of imperialism.

One of the foremost promises of the Trump/Vance campaign was a crackdown on gender expression and transgender existence in the United $tates; we are now watching this being carried out. On his first day in office, Donald Trump signed Executive Order (E.O.) 14168 against “gender ideology”, and, as with most changes under his administration, the effects of this order strike most harshly at the oppressed masses – in this case, prisoners in particular. This executive order states that it “shall ensure males are not detained in women’s prisons or housed in women’s detention centers.” Though its ramifications are being fought in courts, people behind bars have already seen changes play out for trans and gender-non-conforming prisoners. The Trump regime has also instructed amendments to the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) to remove special protection for gender non-conforming people in prisons, as ineffective as PREA has been.

According to the Federal Bureau of Prisons, there are about 2200 transgender people in the feds, which is about 1.5% of federal prisoners. Of those, only 20 are trans wimmin in wimmin’s prisons. While over 1500 trans wimmin are held in men’s prisons. A prisoner in FCI-Waseca reports that the 2 trans wimmin at that facility were immediately packed out to go to men’s facilities, but one was returned a week later.(Ultra Violet Vol. XXXVI, No.4, Spring 2025) The courts have issued a temporary restraining order (TRO) against the E.O., and multiple lawsuits have been filed. Anyone interested in contacting the lawyers who have filed the class action lawsuit (which covers all transgender people in the BOP) against the executive order can write:

As the basis for gender oppression is located in leisure time, and as prisons seek to control prisoners’ leisure time to a degree rarely seen elsewhere in this country, MIM(Prisons) identifies the struggles of trans prisoners as a particularly sharp form of gender oppression. Furthermore, as prisons reinforce the segregation of already-oppressed people along “sexed” lines, gender diversity – especially among trans wimmin – is punished both legally and extralegally behind bars. These punitive measures have only heightened under the new administration, and MIM(Prisons) surveyed trans prisoners regarding the recent changes.

A trans womyn at FCI Seagoville responded:

“The staff under our previous warden told the transgender prisoners that we were to turn in all our dresses, blouses, bras and panties to laundry and send our commissary-bought undergarments home. That lasted a day and then the same staff told us about the E.O. stated that there was a judicial claim that rescinded the order, therefore, go to laundry and get your clothes back. That lasted about a month, then the warden left under the Trump ‘federal buy out.’ Our new interim warden took our items away, stating unless we were part of the TRO, then she could take our items. Then said if we return our clothes ‘without a fuss,’ we could keep our hormones… for now.

“We had a laser hair treatment machine and then after the E.O. came out, it just up and disappeared. All our transgender programs, including our psychology lead support group, have been eliminated.

“A trans woman has been on suicide watch ever since she was told to turn in her girl clothes. Staff let her out after 2 weeks, sent her to laundry. The supervisor there said ‘you are a man, in a man’s prison, therefore you will wear man clothes.’ She went to psychology, where they basically told her that ‘we can’t help you.’ She went back on suicide watch and is still there.

“The transgender women here decided to hold our own support group out on the recreation yard. That lasted about 3 weeks, until the interim warden shut it down supposedly because drugs were found on the yard.”

The imposition of gender as a repressive system is clear here, with the confiscation of clothes items, and the forceful insistence that one of the girls discussed “is a man in a man’s prison.” These prison staff taking glee in sexually, verbally, and physically attacking these trans prisoners on the basis of gender are undoubtedly gender oppressors (see MIM Theory 2/3: Gender and Revolutionary Feminism).

With regards to the shutting down of the support group, we see these repressive tactics wielded against any group of prisoners that poses a threat to the system. More often, we see these slanderous lies about drugs and crackdown on leisure time wielded against political organizers, but clearly the prison administration sees trans wimmin discussing their lives and struggles as something dangerous. We would love to exchange ideas around gender with this group and others and offer the pages of ULK as an organizing space as you struggle to keep your local group functioning.

In FCI Seagoville, local USW comrades are helping organize the transgender wimmin incarcerated there. The linking of the struggle for transgender rights to the movement for broader solidarity in prisons is excellent, and we hope that the comrades there continue to build broad unity.

A trans man from FMC Carswell was not able to fully respond to our survey:

“I was just released from suicide watch 3 days ago. Things are hard and oppressive as well as slanderous but I’ll speak on these things when I’m in the right headspace.”

Ey went on to forward us documents regarding a legal case ey’s filing against the designated wimmin’s prison, telling us that the Trump administration’s decree that trans prisoners cannot access transgender medical or mental health services has led to eir self-injurious tendencies worsening, and that ey is suing on the grounds that they are not giving em proper treatment to keep em safe.

The willingness to take away services at the risk of peoples’ lives exposes the inhumanity of this system. Gender oppression is a system and until we destroy it people will be subject to such treatment.

A trans womyn from USP Tucson reported:

“[The prison guards are] glad that [the executive order] is being done so that they can stop all this… We used to only be able to be pat down by female guards, now that’s gone and male guards can touch us like that!”

This E.O. further drives home how what we understand as “gender” – that is, one’s relation to gender oppression – is neither defined solely by chromosomes, nor biological sex, nor identity. Certainly, strip searches and cavity searches are sexually violating, and are a form of gendered violence that people face by the very fact of being a prisoner of the United $tates. We wholeheartedly stand with this comrade in agreement that the imposition of male guards on trans wimmin is dangerous and shows how this executive order has nothing to do with “safety.”

However, we’d like to solicit input both from this womyn and from any other prisoners reading, regarding whether having strip searches by female guards is less violating. We have printed many reports and statistics exposing the role of female staff in gender the oppression of prisoners.(see ULK No. 1) So we think there’s more to do to stop sexual assault.

This comrade from Tucson also reported that there are 25 to 32 other transgender wimmin in eir prison, and that ey has been taking charge in helping to keep them all calm. Solidarity between prisoners is a necessary first step for the struggle for a world free of all forms of oppression. Sanity and solidarity are necessary in this time, but ultimately are useless without a clear understanding of the ways to fight back (both in the short term – grievances, petitions, legal suits – and in the long term, fighting for a classless, and thus genderless, world). Can you turn your support group into a study group, or a group designated to supporting each others’ grievance campaigns, work/hunger strikes, etc.? Make contact with USW members to organize with them, as the wimmin in Seagoville have done, or join USW? We can think of no better way to support each other than to stand up for each other.

If Trump’s recent executive orders have shown us anything, it’s that concessions from the bourgeoisie towards oppressed people – trans healthcare, media representation, things like that – can be taken away just as quickly as they are granted. Oppression against trans people represents the cutting edge of gender-based oppression in the United $tates today, and trans prisoners are feeling it the most sharply.

Nobody is made safer by commissaries no longer carrying makeup and bras, or by prisoners being denied even the right to choose the name they use. The gender-oppressors in this country are by and large united around a reactionary return to “biological gender.” Just as there’s no such thing as “human nature” abstracted away from society, there’s no such thing as “biological gender” in a vacuum. No humyn is born biologically predisposed to desire makeup and small underwear, nor is a humyn born biologically predisposed to cut their hair short. Gender is a complex system almost entirely social in nature, and MIM(Prisons) defends those attacked by reactionaries who have at the heart of their attacks not “safety” or “logic” but a lashing out at the erosion of the hetero-patriarchal nuclear family.

For understandings of gender that go beyond the crude male-female hierarchical binary the state would impose, we advise reading MIM Theory 2/3, and Engels’ Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State. And see our resolution Attacking the Myth of Binary Biology: MIM(Prisons) Eliminates Gendered Language. We would love to correspond more with any other prisoners, but especially trans and queer ones, and discuss our thoughts on what “gender” actually is.

In a world free from oppression, what would gender look like? We don’t know for sure. What we do know, though, is that deviations from the rigid, Euro-Amerikan-centered, patriarchal gender system would see space for gender oppressed individuals to flourish rather than being punished as they are in the United $tates.

The current rollback on transgender rights is alarming and dangerous, but we can’t get caught up in simply attacking one axis of oppression without attacking the whole thing – the dominance of the oppressor class, epitomized in the world today by imperialism and in the United $tates by national oppression (of which incarceration is a significant part). Joining the anti-imperialist movement is the fastest path to ending oppression of all people.

Intensificando la amenaza de pandillas peligrosas con “súperpredadores.” Usando informantes confidenciales, tatuajes, y apariencia para catalogar personas como “pandilleros.” Usando esa conexión de pandilla para encarcelar y torturar a la gente. Estos métodos draconianos son familiares a lectores de ULK, y para esos que han pasado tiempo en cárceles estadounidenses en general. El régimen de Trump ha echo esta noticia para el país entero.

En las semanas recientes, cientos de venezolanos han sido deportados de los Estados Unidos a una megacarcel en El Salvador. El régimen de Trump ha justificado esto con La Ley de Enemigos de 1798, que permite la deportación de no ciudadanos durante tiempo de guerra, y fue usado durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial para deportar los alemanes y italianos y juntar los japoneses en campos de internamiento, apoderándose de sus activos para los euro-amerikanos. Trump reclamo que estas personas fueron parte de una pandilla conduciendo “guerra irregular” en los Estados Unidos, pero no hay evidencia que Tren de Aragua es una organización amplia y funcional aquí. En febrero, el Departamento de Estado estadounidense designaron Tren de Aragua, Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13), y una lista de carteles mexicanas como “organizaciones terroristas extranjeras.”

Una corte federal ha ordenado una pausa a estas deportaciones, pero el Departamento de Justicia esta desafiando la orden. Una batalla legal continua, mientras el poder ejecutivo continua a desafiar las cortes.

Venezuela ha sido un objetivo consistente del imperialismo estadounidense desde que obtuvo poder Hugo Chávez en 1999.(1) De resultado casi 600,000 venezolanos han sido aceptados en los Estados Unidos con Estatus Protegido Temporario (TPS). Trump intento a cancelar el TPS para los venezolanos, pero una corte federal ha determinado eso como un acto ilegal. Sin el TPS, muchos de Venezuela, Haití, Ucrania, Sudán, Afganistán y otros lugares no podrían continuar a trabajar en los Estados Unidos legalmente y podrían ser deportados legalmente.

Kilmar Armando Ábrego García esta recibiendo atención especial de que la administración de Trump admitió que su deportación fue un error, y que no lo pueden regresar de la custodia salvadoreña. Esto es a pesar de que había una orden del la corte que prevenía su regreso a El Salvador, donde se había escapado de violencia pandillera cuando era joven. Ábrego García no tiene cargos criminales, si sirve de algo, pero fue catalogado como un miembro de MS-13 por un puerco mencionando un “informante confidencial” cuando estaban acorralando trabajadores hace algunos años. Como resultado, Ábrego García ha sido desaparecido de su familia y mandado a una unidad de tortura en el mero país que huyo por razones de seguridad.(2)

El ACLU obtenido una copia del “Alien Enemy Validation Guide” siendo usado para deportaciones. Después de establecer que alguien es mayor de los 14 años, de origen Venezolano y sin ciudadanía estadounidense, un sistema de puntuación es usado para “validar” pandilleros. Un tatuaje de “TdA” te da 4 puntos mientras 8 puntos son requeridos para calificar como validado. La guiá del Departamento de Seguridad Nacional muestra una lista de imágenes de tatuajes como coronas y estrellas que son “TdA”. También, poniéndote mercancía de los Chicago Bulls y Michael Jordan está en la lista. Cuando fue la ultima vez que has visto alguien con un tatuaje de una estrella y portando Air Jordans?

Persiguiendo Activistas Estudiantiles

Instituciones educacionales desde Universidad de Columbia en Nueva York hasta es sistema de la Universidad de California están esforzando la represión fascista en sus campos, de expulsando estudiantes durante la presidencia de Biden, a haciéndolos desaparecer de las calles y de sus hogares bajo el régimen de Trump. Estudiante de Tufts University Rümeysa Öztürk esta detenida por escribiendo un articulo criticando el genocidio en Palestina causado por los Estados Unidos y Israel y el campamento estudiantil propalestina el año pasado, contó su historia en una declaración reciente del 18 de Marzo 2025:

“Me llamo Mahmoud Khalil y soy un preso político. Les escribo desde un centro de detención en Luisiana… Fui detenido el 8 de marzo por unos agentes del Departamento de Seguridad Nacional (DHS, por sus siglas en inglés). Se negaron a aportar una orden judicial y nos abordaron a mi esposa y a mí de manera agresiva cuando regresábamos de cenar.…

“Mi detención fue una consecuencia directa de ejercer mi derecho a la libre expresión, ya que abogaba por una Palestina libre y el fin del genocidio en Gaza; genocidio que se reanudó con fuerza el lunes por la noche. Con el acuerdo de alto al fuego que se pactó en enero ya roto, los padres y madres de Gaza vuelven a mecer mortajas minúsculas en sus brazos y las familias se han visto obligadas a escoger entre la hambruna y el desplazamiento forzoso o las bombas. Es nuestro imperativo moral persistir en la lucha por su libertad absoluta.”

“[La Universidad de] Columbia me fichó por mi activismo y abrió una dictatorial oficina disciplinaria con el fin de saltarse el debido proceso y silenciar a los estudiantes criticando a Israel. Columbia ha cedido ante las presiones estatales, proporcionando expedientes académicos de sus estudiantes al Congreso y acatando las últimas amenazas de la administración de Trump. Algunos ejemplos claros de esto son mi detención, así como la expulsión o suspensión de al menos veintidós estudiantes de la Columbia —algunos despojados de sus títulos pocas semanas antes de graduarse— y la expulsión de Grant Miner, presidente del sindicato Estudiantes Trabajadores de Columbia (SWC, por sus siglas en inglés), en la víspera de las negociaciones contractuales.”

“En todo caso, mi detención es un testimonio de la fuerza del movimiento estudiantil para cambiar la opinión pública hacia la liberación palestina…” (4)

Otros estudiantes que han sido perseguidos se han escondido. A la misma vez, estudiantes por todas partes del país están uniéndose para apoyar y defender los que puedan ser destacados después. Elogiamos la solidaridad que estamos viendo. Escuelas y prisiones son realmente únicos en nuestra sociedad dado de las identidades de sus poblaciones y sus habilidades a organizar. Con los anuncios recientes del régimen de Trump que van a deportar ciudadanos estadounidenses con récord criminal al Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo en El Salvador, prisioneros tienen que estar preparados para confrontar el enemigo juntos en la manera que lo están aprendiendo a hacer los estudiantes. Aunque hay muchos ejemplos recientes que dice lo contrario, hay una historia larga de prisioneros estadounidenses apoyándose debido a la consciencia del grupo que viene con confrontando un opresor común cada día.

Fascismo De Regreso a su Hogar

Los Estados Unidos ha usado el régimen de aislamiento de largo plazo por décadas a un nivel no visto en cualquier otra parte en la historia humana. Médicos para los Derechos Humanos (PHR por sus siglas en inglés) salieron con un reporte en 2024 exponiendo el uso del régimen de aislamiento en los centros de detención en contra de las direcciones del gobierno para limitar su uso cuando es absolutamente necesario. Documentaron alrededor de 14,000 casos de personas siendo puestas en aislamiento por ICE de 2018 a 2023. El régimen de aislamiento tardaba por un promedio de 27 días, con 42 casos tardando mas de un año. En 2024, ICE detuvo mas de 35,000 personas, ahora siendo el sistema de detención inmigratoria mas grande del mundo.(5)

Condiciones probablemente son peor para los que son transferidos a El Salvador, donde el Presidente Bukele ha declarado que la única manera que los pandilleros pueden salirse del Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo (CECOT) que construyo en 2023 sera en un cajón. Con una capacidad de mas de 40,000, hay 65 a 70 prisioneros mantenidos en cada celda. “Prisioneros de CECOT no reciben visitas y nunca están permitidos a salir. La prisión no ofrece talleres o programas educativas para prepararlos a regresar a la sociedad después de sus sentencias.”(6) Bukele ha estado promocionando fotos de pandilleros con la cabeza rasurada, vestidos de todo blanco, siendo maltratados por guardas enmascarados por linea desde que abrieron la prisión. Esta campaña de propaganda ha apelado a los elementos profascista de Amerika. Y con ese apoyo, Trump esta incorporando esta prisión en el sistema internacional de prisiones amerikanas y mandando cienes de personas ahí de los Estados Unidos. Este es un cambio cerca de la casa del interconexión de sitios oscuros, y prisiones famosas como Abu Ghraib y Guantánamo, que fueron usados para torturar y aguantar preso sin juicio personas oprimidas al través del mundo Musulmán.

La mayoría de la prensa están reportando que los amerikanos pagaron $6 millón dólares para que 238 prisioneros sean puestos en CECOT, que algunos señalan que es mucho menos de lo que costaría a encarcelarlos en los Estados Unidos. Pero es una cantidad que va a ayudar El Salvador inmensamente para que puedan fundar su monstruosidad de cárcel. No tiene sentido que los imperialistas están pagando para que aguanten a estos prisioneros, pero después reclamen que no pueden regresar personas como Ábrego García de regreso a sus familias.

En los 1980s, los Escuadrones de La Muerte patrocinados por los Estados Unidos, entrenados en la Escuela de las Américas en Georgia, mataron y desplazaron muchas personas en América Central que estaban luchando por el socialismo y por poder sacar el imperialismo de sus países.(7) Muchos niños de esta guerra en El Salvador fueron desplazados a Los Angeles donde se unieron a Barrio 18 o crearon la nueva Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13), fueron perseguidos por el estado, y después mandados a regreso a El Salvador. Reportamos sobre los esfuerzos en haciendo paz entre estos grupos en 2013, que coincide con la inversión por USAID y el desarrollo de las prisiones en El Salvador inspiradas por los Estados Unidos.(8) Pero las condiciones para la gente de El Salvador no mejoraron, y votaron por el Presidente Nayib Bukele que utilizo las organizaciones lumpen en su organización política y después los traiciono como un chivo expiatorio por el mal del país en una campaña fascista de represión.(9)

La lucha contra el fascismo en este país depende en la reunión de personas para defender las poblaciones migrantes y estudiantes que están siendo atacados en este momento. En cuanto el fascismo continué a subir, vemos las campañas de grupos como el ACLU acercándose mas a los de MIM(Prisons). Mientras están pasando batallas legales importantes, también vemos el reconocimiento extendiendo que no podemos depender en las cortes para que nos salven. Debemos de tener un plan B. Debemos de crear nuestro plan B.

<sup>Notas:
1. Soso of MIM(Prisons), January 2019, Imperialists Push Coup in Venezuela to Secure Oil for Amerikans, Under Lock & Key 67.
2. Democracy Now!, 2 April 2025.
3. https://www.wlrn.org/immigration/2025-03-31/ice-tren-de-aragua-venezuela-deportation-el-salvador
4. https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/a-letter-from-palestinian-activist-mahmoud-khalil
5. Physicians for Human Rights, 6 February 2024, https://www.wlrn.org/immigration/2025-03-31/ice-tren-de-aragua-venezuela-deportation-el-salvador.
6. Aleman & Cano, 17 March 2025, “What to know about El Salvador’s mega-prison after Trump sent hundreds of immigrants there”, Los Angeles Times.
7. MIM(Prisons), June 2009, FBI Arrests Peacemaker, Under Lock & Key 9.
8. MIM(Prisons), March 2013, One-Year Anniversary of Peace Treaty in El Salvador, Under Lock & Key 31.
9. Badgreen of MIM(Prisons), September 2023, 8,000 Military and Police Deployed in Cabanas Province, El Salvador, Under Lock & Key 83.</sup>

I would like to clarify terms or, perhaps better stated, to give solidity to concepts. Those of us in these revolutionary spaces tend to preach to those who are already converted who don’t need convincing. We become a sort of revolutionary ghetto developing our own lingo so that we become isolated and our movements incognito. An essential part of any resistance is the ability to reach people, the common people, where they are, and to do that they have to know what we’re talking about. So, what does it even mean to protest? To resist? What is the best way to deal with oppression? The proletariat (common people) need to know.

Protesting usually takes the form of taking to the streets en masse to express grievance about an issue. An archaic definition of the word is “to make known,” which protesting excels at, getting the word out. The problem with this tactic is that it is the only tactic people, the masses, are familiar with. Protesting is temporal in nature, it cannot last forever, and every oppressor knows this. People come out, make a lot of noise, but ultimately go home and go back to regular life. Moreover, in the United States there are rules on how citizens are allowed to protest, because protests have to be “peaceful” and “lawful”. Note: anytime an authority is telling you how to “resist” them it is because they know it will not work. Can a movement be effective while following the rules of the oppressor? Any movement that tries to be peaceful, unoffensive or otherwise not disruptive is still-born in its inception. By nature, resistance is not peaceful. It will offend, and it must disrupt the actions of those who seek to oppress you. Protesting is a viable tactic, but we must recognize its limits.

Resistance is something different than a mere protest. Resistance makes an all-out effort against whatever power is creating the negative condition under which the people suffer. It does not marry itself to a singular strategy or tactic. Rather, resistance is “by any means necessary”. It can pick one tactic, use it, then switch to another tactic. Resistance has the flexibility to change according to circumstance. Resistance also has no time limit. It can last for months, years and even generations before victory is won. Case in point: NATO, which contains some of the world’s most powerful militaries, occupied Afghanistan for 21 years. When they pulled out in 2021, the Taliban, which had been resisting occupation for decades against military superpowers, took the country within the month. From this example we can learn some essentials of resistance. (1) It has no time limit. (2) There must be the belief that victory is possible. (3) It must come from ideology, not a mere trend. And (4), perhaps the most important, resistance comes from self-sacrifice. When you make the decision to align yourself against oppressive systems, take stock of the cost. Know that your movement may well out-live you. You must believe what you’re fighting for is not only righteous but also possible. The movement may cost you time, money, status, relationships, even your life or your freedom. You may not live to see the good you’re fighting for be actualized. Will you put in the work anyway? For the sake of future generations? If you are not able to pay the costs, this is not the right place for you. Self-sacrifice is not for everyone. “Revolutionary suicide” was the phrase the founder of the Black Panther Party coined.

Power does not lose its grasp willingly. Power wants to proliferate itself, to maintain its experience of control. It will not let go without a fight. If you’re willing to keep resisting, not just merely making noise in protest, then there is room at the table for you. And if you’re serious about tomorrow’s work you will start wherever you are, with whatever you have, today.

MIM(Prisons) responds: We agree with the righteous call of Fred Hampton, “I am the proletariat, I’m not the pig”, as we too fight in the interests of the international proletariat. However, today we’d say the vast majority of people in this country are not of the proletariat, and this is important for understanding the class interests around us and how to organize those around us to be in line with the proletariat, who are mostly located in Third World countries. And we agree sacrifice is necessary, but everyone should get in where they fit in. The movement’s success requires all levels of support.

18 February 2025 – There is a report from Zambia of the collapse of a tailings dam that held acidic waste from a copper mine.(1) The collapse released millions of liters of waste containing concentrated acid, dissolved solids and heavy metals into a stream connected to the Kafue River in Zambia. China is the dominant player in copper mining in Zambia. China uses the copper in smartphones and other technology. The devastating consequences of this environmental catastrophe include the widespread killing of aquatic life in the river, contamination of water used for industrial and agricultural operations as well as polluting the drinking water of some five million people in Zambia. Chinese-owned copper mines have been accused of ignoring safety, labor and other regulations in their imperialist pursuit of earth minerals such as copper in Zambia. China is using classic imperialist tactics such as the exporting of capital to secure minerals and other resources by promoting development programs that put countries such as Zambia in debt to them. Zambia is reportedly more than $4 billion in debt to China. Zambians have already defaulted on payments in 2020 to other nations as well. Clearly we have another case of Chinese state-run corporations operating without regards to humyn life or the environment.

In conclusion, as a voice in the anti-imperialist movement I encourage comrades to realize it is not just Amerikans or Europeans who build their wealth and higher standards of civilization through the manipulation of underdeveloped nations. We stand against all nations that are imperialist! Nations we should be also speaking about in ULK. Nations such as China, Russia and Iran. I mention Iran because the spread of Islam is also a form of imperialism. Religion has been the reason for uncounted billions of people who suffer mentally, physically and even face death. Something that should be more deeply explored in ULK articles.

Charlie of AIPS responds: Orko is right when ey says that China is an imperialist country. We have no disagreements there. Nor do we disagree with eir statement that we should “stand against all nations that are imperialist.” So why do we focus on the imperialism of the U.$. in our work? Because anti-imperialism is a question of political line, while our political work is mediated by the strategies and tactics we undertake. If you are not familiar with this terminology from the MIM(Prisons)-ran study groups, let me rephrase. Anti-imperialism is a fundamental stance that we require others to hold if we are to collaborate with them. We will not waver on this point. But as we move beyond the fundamentals, we must consider the particulars of our unique political situation. We operate within the strongest imperialist country that has ever existed in humyn hystory: the United $tates. Our work can have no other aim, then, than to grow and strengthen the existing Communist movement that resides within the $tates. We must also acknowledge that one of the hallmarks of “patriotic” attitudes in the U.$. is criticizing the imperialism of other countries while defending the imperialism of the $tates. You can observe this yourself in seeing how united Democrats and Republicans are in denouncing countries such as China, Russia and Iran. As supporters of the international Communist movement, we must distinguish ourselves and our politics from the bourgeoisie and their lackeys. How is this distinction to be made if we simply echo their points on foreign affairs (though, admittedly, with more theoretical backing)?

On the note of religion, we must mention that religion, while fundamentally idealist and antithetical to Marxism, has a dual character. This is to say, religion can be used both for reactionary ends as well as for revolutionary ends. Palestine is the perfect encapsulation of this. The U.$.-backed Zionist entity termed “I$rael” uses religious arguments to justify their brutal murder and oppression of Palestinians. On the other side, revolutionary groups such as Hamas are inextricably linked to religion through their Islamic beliefs. The key is to consider the particularities of the situation at hand: Which nations are involved? Which classes? Which side, if any, is revolutionary at this time? Which groups are tied to religious movements, and how are these movements connected to the previous questions? To write off religion as a whole would be an error given the reality that it can be wielded for revolutionary means.

This all being said, we heartily welcome the contributions in this article from comrade Orko. It is well-worth noting that the logic of capitalist-imperialist countries all over the world follow the same general trends as outlined by V. I. Lenin in eir groundbreaking work Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism. But so long as our practice is confined to the borders of the U.$., that is where our focus must lie.

MIM(Prisons) adds: As Charlie mentions, we use the term imperialism to refer to the highest stage of capitalism as described by Lenin. The forcible spread of Islam and Christianity hundreds of years ago predated imperialism. And to use the history of Islam to call Iran imperialist today makes no sense. During the invasion of Afghanistan by the United $tates, pseudo-feminists made the same claim about the Taliban being “imperialist,” therefore justifying the murder of Afghan civilians (including wimmin), via their islamaphobia. Currently Iran and China are primary targets of Amerikans threats. A war with either will likely mean a global inter-imperialist war. This is not in the interests of the international proletariat. Nor is it in the interests of oppressed nations on occupied Turtle Island who will also face increased attacks when Amerikan nationalism is stoked.

^{Notes: (1) “A river ‘died’ overnight in Zambia after an acidic waste spill at a Chinese-owned mine” Associated Press, 15 March 2025.}

Triggers

Addiction does not develop overnight, nor does recovery. Addiction can be devastating to not only the user who is addicted but eir friends and family. In fact, addiction is a cultural phenomenon because it is not specific to any particular race, gender, age, or class. It is developed in the home through parents or family members who are addicts, through friends, TV, music, and other observable things in our environment. It is in every community, in every country, and on every continent. The irony is that as much support as there is for an addict’s recovery, that recovery does not come overnight. In fact, reportedly those who do enter recovery programs have a 60 to 80% chance of relapse before achieving permanent recovery! This is something I have experienced first hand, and I am here to talk to those comrades who put addicts like myself down. To them I offer the following challenge: instead of doing nothing but complaining about addicts, start a recovery group. This would be something more truly revolutionary! Because bitching about it does nothing to help an addict nor have you said anything to persuade me to want to change.

To them I say, “Yeah I’m an addict,” my addiction began in my home. My father smoked cigarettes and kept a supply of liquor under the counter in our kitchen. Drinking was a casual event with family and friends, usually on holidays. I also observed these similar behaviors through TV shows, movies, and commercials. As I grew into a teenager, I heard numerous music lyrics referencing drinking and using various kinds of drugs ranging from marijuana to heroin to cocaine to prescription drugs. Though I was told by my parents, family, and drug programs such as D.A.R.E. to stay away from these things, TV and my experience taught me something different. It looked like everyone on TV was feeling good and having fun and from my experience, it was and did most of the time make me feel good. In fact, it made me feel so much better when I was experiencing loneliness, stress, and conflict at home and within the family, boredom, anger, unrealized feelings of being trapped, depression, and more.

I’ve listed below what are commonly known as “triggers”. There are 10 major triggers I will identify here that can be associated and experienced by most humyn beings through some stage of eir life and not just addicts. For me the following 10 major triggers have not only been a part of my first experiences with drugs and alcohol but especially my relapse and effects of being imprisoned for over 25 years.

The Ten Major Triggers

1. Loneliness (even in the physical presence of family and friends)

2. Stress and conflict at home and within the family

3. Boredom or, in other words, lack of meaningful activities or challenging work

4. Anger and the feelings of being trapped (i.e. accumulated resentments, etc.)

5. Depression (worse with women than men)

6. Spirituality, or feeling like life is meaningless without a higher power

7. Secret disappointment with the straight life

8. Euphoric recall of being high

9. Secret thoughts of drugging or experimenting with a new and different chemical or drug

10. Reactive denial to using or thoughts of it

I was never taught any fundamental coping skills to combat these triggers throughout my life growing up at home or school. Even the coping skills I did learn in recovery groups didn’t seem to work. These feelings and thoughts seemed to always effect me no matter what. I also found out addiction is something that can be hereditary and generational. What does this mean for my persynal recovery? I do not know, but my current struggle is real and I can not experience recovery by myself. So if you are an addict and not just an addict who is addicted to drugs and alcoholic but are under the definition of the United Struggle from Within Revolutionary 12 Step Program, then I want you comrades to listen. Not only you comrades but especially the comrades who do nothing but bitch about us addicts who use K2, suboxone, and whatever else as defined by the comrades who came together to create the Revolutionary 12 Step Program. I want you all to join me in my recovery, in our recovery, together.

P.S. This kept me from using so far today.

MIM(Prisons) responds: The Revolutionary 12 Step Program pamphlet has been one of our most frequently distributed publications in recent years. Unfortunately the main author and comrade who was training others to lead the program has not continued this work. For now we hope to continue the conversation, development and promotion of revolutionary recovery here in the pages of ULK. As comrade Menlo suggests, we want to create a community here through our readers’ own stories of recovery. And we thank comrade Orko and comrade Menlo for kicking this off.

Another publication we want to recommend to those working around recovery (whether you yourself are addicted or those around you) is Under Lock & Key No. 59. You can just ask us for the “drug issue” of ULK. It gives some deeper historical and sociological background on the fighting of addiction in the revolutionary movement.

As Orko explains above, addiction is a product of our environment. That is why when communists seized power in China they were able to eliminate almost all addiction in short time. And it is why people who had been life long addicts suddenly quit to join revolutionary organizations in the United $tates during the Black Power movement. The hope, meaning and empowerment that comes with revolutionary organizing is key to the success of our own revolutionary recovery programs.

In anticipation of some responses we might get to this article, we’d like to ask Orko and other readers for ideas on how to reach those stuck on drugs. We hear from a lot of readers who say they are surrounded by zombies, and feel like there is no way to reach such people because they are always high. What can be done to shift this reality and reach those in need?

In February and March, the New York Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (DOCCS) underwent a multi-week lock down, imposing terrible conditions on prisoners, including a pause to all visitations, deprivation of food and medical care, and riots in two prisons. During the strike, at least 7 prisoners died, one of whom was beaten to death by staff just as Robert Brooks was. Other deaths seem to be the result of medical neglect from the information released so far. As of writing visitation has apparently resumed, but otherwise bourgeois media has not clearly reported to what extent the lockdown has ended yet, nor have our readers in New York. This situation was caused in part by a wildcat pig strike lasting from February 17 to March 11th which began due to alleged concerns about under-staffing and “working” conditions for correctional officers, namely increased violence towards staff.(1)

Regarding the second death by beating, a comrade reports:

“Just got the 411 on the killing of the prisoner at Mid-State C.F. The first state police who conducted the investigation lied in their report that the prisoner died of an overdose of K2. But the body was too badly beaten to death for that to stick. …The first investigator was moved from his post and transferred but not fired. Crazy!”

As we go to press, 10 more guards have been indicted for the murder of Messiah Nantwi in Mid-State C.F., which is across the street from Marcy C.F. As a writer to ULK pointed out in March, the strike came right after the indictment of ten NY pigs over the earlier murder of prisoner Robert Brooks on 9 December 2024.(2) The New York Focus reported a trend of C.O.s refusing to work, in protest against being held accountable for abuse:

“In 2013, New York City corrections officers (C.O.s) responsible for transporting people from Rikers Island stopped working the day an incarcerated person was supposed to testify about a caught-on-video beating he endured at the hands of guards, who were later acquitted. Two years later, DOCCS corrections officers staged a work slowdown after the prison agency tried to fire guards who beat an incarcerated man, breaking both his legs. Those officers pleaded guilty to misdemeanors, avoiding jail time.”(1)

Currently, six of the former correctional officers involved in killing Brooks are being charged with murder, three with manslaughter, and one with evidence tampering. All ten seem to be negotiating with the NY District Attorney towards settlements, their fortunes at trial not helped by body camera video evidence depicting the murder they committed.(3)

Five days before the pig strike, prisoners rose up at Collins Correctional Facility. As noted by The Real Movement Report, the extent of the uprising varies greatly depending on asking the DOC, former employees, or the press.(4) In response, the New York State prison system was placed on lockdown and Correctional Emergency Response struggled for 12 hours to regain control of the facility. There was another disruption at Riverview Correctional Facility on February 20th which also saw prisoners taking control of some areas and Emergency Response crews eventually reasserting control.(5)

In response to the strikes and riots, over 3500 National Guard members were mobilized by NY Governor Kathy Hochul to bring repression back to the staff-abandoned prisons. Then the state filed an injunction forcing C.O.s to return to work, resulting in an agreement with the C.O. union and termination and ban from future employment of 2000 employees who refused to return by March 4th. The deal reduced 24 hour mandatory overtime for pigs and modified the HALT Act.(6) This 2021 law set a maximum of 15 days solitary confinement for prisoners, established reporting guidelines, and prohibited solitary prior to a disciplinary hearing and access to legal counsel.(7) The state agreed with the union early in March to create a commission examining the HALT Act, and to suspend the portions of the act which require out-of-cell programming for prisoners, for 90 days.(8)

The wildcat strike was not sanctioned by the C.O. union and was illegal based upon a law preventing the striking of certain NY public employees. On March 27th many of the 2000 C.O.s who had been fired and barred from future employment rallied at the state capitol. Despite the pause of aspects of the bill, demonstrators called for further “improvements” to the HALT Act. Although the source in question does not name or count speakers behind each different position from the rally, some called for changes to “make our prisons safer” and others suggested the state follow the Mandela Rules, a series of UN-sanctioned standards for prisoner treatment including a list of “human rights” which are routinely denied to U.$. prisoners including recreation, medical care and healthy food. The Mandela Rules limit solitary to 15 days.(9)

The prisoner (support) movement should organize against the repeal of the HALT Act. Solitary confinement is torture, it harms people, it prevents rehabilitation and prevents prisoners from coming together in a productive way.

The New York State prison system is now attempting to release some prisoners early because of the staffing shortage resulting from C.O. layoffs. Releases may be available to those whose sentences end in 15-110 days and don’t have violent or “serious” felonies, but the scale is unclear.(10) Additional reforms proposed by the Hochul government include expanding programs for prisoners to reduce their sentences, also vague, and lowering the minimum age of C.O.s from 21 to 18 in order to attract more pigs to the workforce.(11) Democrats wish to slightly reduce the prison population and hire new C.O.s whereas Republicans wish to simply reinstate all the dismissed pigs.

This story saw two different NY prison riots develop in which prisoners took control of portions of their prisons for small periods of time. Beyond selfishness, the weakness of these C.O.s was put in full display, needing to depend on emergency responders and the national guard to quell prisoner uprisings. And before all that, a comrade explains:

“Gang members have placed a statewide hit on me all because I gotten myself in an argument with a prison guard at Green Haven C.F. …The gang members are helping the prison administration run the prisons, which you know has a pig shortage. …The head of security is a motherfucker and have you killed quick.”

C.O.s are powerful enough to murder a lone prisoner in an 18-versus-one fight but helpless against the unified actions of even a handful of inmates who are upset with the status quo, as they even rely on other prisoners to do their dirty work.

These events are related to a trend of increasing retaliation against C.O. abuse in NY prisons, 2024 assaults against staff having doubled those of the previous year in certain months.(12) One important question is the underlying reason for the recent increase in retaliation, between poorer conditions, increased repression, heightened class consciousness among the (imprisoned) lumpen, or a combination. A more speculative question is if these instances of prison takeovers represent growth towards prison occupations akin to Attica, complete with advanced leadership and political demands.

Whatever is changing in the relationship between the C.O.s and the state, it is evidently driven by factors within the prison population, in this case greater retaliation against oppression. Can the bourgeoisie resolve the under-staffing crisis without improving conditions in prisons or releasing prisoners? The imperialists need prisons for population control, and simultaneously want high wages, low taxes and high spending on guards to “keep the community safe?” This balance of contradictions parallels ongoing policy debates among the imperialists regarding “border control” and deportation of migrants.

Certainly, the labor aristocrats is favoring more national oppression as a solution to perceived scarcity, rather than the formation of internationalist consciousness. The C.O.s did not rally en masse to convict their murderous co-“workers” but to support them, demanding an increase of repression against prisoners, as well as for reduced mandatory overtime: the timeless labor aristocracy dream of receiving more money for less work relative to the global proletariat. Where is the demonstration for the C.O.s’ victims?

Prisoners and supporters should be organizing against solitary, and asserting more alliances and sovereignty in their prisons in the face of C.O.s who are more concerned with repression than providing food, healthcare or other prisoner needs. Spread ULK to friends, request our September 9th study pack on the history of the Attica rebellion, and please submit any reports regarding conditions in New York or other prisons experiencing neglectful or abusive C.O.s and fighting back.

<sup>Notes:
1. https://nysfocus.com/2025/02/19/why-new-york-prison-guards-strike
2. https://apnews.com/article/new-york-prison-strike-guards-fired-f5700f3437b9021f1435fa90fb8e7f08
3. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/prosecutor-makes-offers-to-10-new-york-prison-guards-charged-in-inmates-death/ar-AA1C0BDP
4. https://therealmovementreport.substack.com/p/new-york-jailer-strikes-enter-7th
5. https://www.wwnytv.com/2025/02/20/inmates-take-over-what-happened-riverview/
6. https://www.northcountrynow.com/stories/after-terminating-2000-corrections-officers-state-plans-to-release-inmates-early-due-to-staffing,292130
7. https://www.nysenate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2021/senate-passes-halt-solitary-confinement-act
8. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/former-ny-correction-officers-rally-for-prison-safety-reforms-amid-mass-firing-controversy/ar-AA1BNMIc
9. https://gothamist.com/news/new-york-prison-strike-ends-as-75-of-officers-return-to-work-officials-say
10. https://www.msn.com/en-ph/news/crime/new-york-to-release-some-prison-inmates-early-over-shortage-of-guard-staff/ar-AA1C6dCv
11. https://www.wrvo.org/2025-04-02/ny-gov-kathy-hochul-proposes-new-prison-reforms-in-the-face-of-staffing-crisis
12. https://www.timesunion.com/projects/2025/prison-turmoil/</sup>

Addiction is a disease/syndrome that is not dependent upon any given drug. As an addict and alcoholic, what this means to me is that I am a meth addict even though I have never tried meth. I am addicted to K2 even though I have never tried K2. My drug of choice is alcohol, but my struggle is with addiction. My method of combating my addiction in prison is:

1. Not using any substances
2. Refusing to be ashamed of myself
3. Sharing my experience, strength and hope with the addict who is still suffering.

While addiction cuts across class, nationality, ideology, and gender, it concentrates in prison as many of us committed crimes in order to fuel our addiction. Addiction thrives in an atmosphere of shame, of hiding, and of loneliness. All of that and more is the atmosphere of prison. It is incredibly difficult to stay sober by myself. I need community in order to maintain my sobriety.

One incredibly important aspect of recovery that is missing from the revolutionary 12 step program is the personal stories of recovery that form the back of each 12 step book. These stories are essential as they serve as that community of recovery and way for us to relate and be inspired. I would be more than happy to contribute to the revolutionary 12 step program.

Oakland, CA – Organizations came together on March 29 for a caravan from East Oakland to City Hall promoting the Artivists Ending Hostilities (AEH) street program. Initiators included a number of former prisoners who participated in the 2011 and 2013 hunger strikes in California, as well as the organization of currently incarcerated people P.E.P. Talk - Pre-Entry Platform. Former prisoners of CDCr spoke at the rally on the need to bring the message of peace from the original AEH (Agreement to End Hostilities) to the streets. Organizers distributed and read the text of original AEH and a recent message from Cellblock 2 Cityblock.

Kat Brooks of the Anti Police Terror Project was one of the speakers who really got to the heart of things:

“The state creates the conditions in our communities that they know creates violence.”

Ey went on to condemn Amerikan koncentration kamps as a form of violence, saying the carceral state is the most violent institution in the world. Another comrade read from/paraphrased the intro of the Communist Party of Aztlán’s essay on homelessness, making the connection that homelessness is also a form of violence that we must come together to end.

Of course, it is up to the oppressed to change our conditions. Youth from Lulu’s House participated in the event, speaking on their own recent transformations from petty criminals to active community members. One said:

“We gotta push the movement too, it starts with us.”

While another pointed out:

“If you’re scared of the youth you’ll never understand them.”

One of the adults present who wasn’t scared to help these youth change was a BART cop (Bay Area Rapid Transit). This “officer friendly” approach is a well-known counter-insurgency strategy of the occupying forces. They hire cops to do community work, who aren’t involved in the violent repression work, but do intelligence gathering for the state while helping to divide the occupied community.

Independence is one of the principles of the United Front for Peace in Prisons for this very reason. There is no progress towards liberation in the united front if it is working with the very imperialist state that is oppressing us.

Minister King X echoed this principle of independence when speaking about learning from the elders released from prison while the U.$. government is smashing the Department of Education. We must learn from the struggles of oppressed people.

Minister King X was one of the MC’s and organizers of the event, representing the Artivist Kadre trying to engage the youth and the oppressed in the movement through artistic expression. Ras Kass was also there representing the Artivist Kadre from Los Angeles. They were sporting patches promoting the New Afrikan Revolutionary Nationalist (N.A.R.N.) ideology and the AEH. The Artivist Kadre are working with P.E.P. Talk, BOSS (another release support program) and others to address racism, fascism, sex trafficking and more in California.

Hyping up the threat of dangerous gangs of “super-predators.” Using confidential informants, tattoos, and appearance to label people “gang members.” Using that gang affiliation to imprison and torture people. These draconian methods are familiar to readers of ULK, and to those who’ve spent time in U.$. prisons in general. The Trump regime has made this headline news for the whole country.

In recent weeks, hundreds of Venezuelans have been deported from the United $tates to a supermax prison in El Salvador. The Trump regime justified this with the 1798 Alien Enemies Act, which allows for the deportation of non-citizens during wartime, and was last used during WWII to deport Germans and Italians and roundup Japanese in internment camps, seizing their assets for Euro-Amerikans. Trump claimed these people were part of a gang conducting “irregular warfare” in the United $tates, but there seems to be no evidence that Tren de Aragua is even a widely functioning organization here. In February, the U.$. State Department designated Tren de Aragua, Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13), and a list of Mexican drug cartels as “foreign terrorist organizations.”

A federal court has ordered a halt to the deportations, but the Department of Justice is defying the order. A legal battle continues, while the executive branch continues to defy the courts.

Venezuela has been a consistent target of U.$. imperialism since the rise of Hugo Chavez to power in 1999.(1) As a result almost 600,000 Venezuelans have been accepted into the United $tates with Temporary Protected Status (TPS). Trump attempted to cancel TPS for Venezuelans, but a federal court has deemed the move illegal. Without TPS, many from Venezuela, Haiti, Ukraine, Sudan, Afghanistan and elsewhere could no longer legally work in the United $tates and could be legally deported.

Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia is getting special attention as the Trump administration admitted eir deportation was a mistake, and that they can’t get em back from Salvadorean custody. This is despite a court order that prevented em from being sent back to El Salvador, where ey had fled gang violence as a youth. Abrego Garcia has no criminal charges, for what that’s worth, but was labelled a member of MS-13 by a pig citing a “confidential informant” during a round up of day laborers some years ago. As a result, Abrego Garcia has been disappeared from eir family and sent to a torture unit in the very country ey fled for safety reasons.(2)

The ACLU obtained a copy of the “Alien Enemy Validation Guide” being used to deport people.(3) Once establishing someone is over 14 years old, of Venezuelan origin and without U.$. citizenship, a point system is used to “validate” gang members. A “TdA” tattoo gets you 4 points while 8 points are required to qualify as validated. The Homeland Security guide lists photos of tattoos like crowns and stars that are “TdA”. In addition, wearing Chicago Bulls and Michael Jordan athletic wear are listed. When was the last time you saw someone with Air Jordans on and a star tattoo?

Student Activists Targeted

Educational institutions from Columbia University in New York to the University of California system are enforcing the fascist repression on their campuses, from expelling students during Biden’s Presidency, to disappearing them off the streets and from their homes under the Trump regime. Tufts University student Rümeysa Öztürk is being detained for writing an article criticizing the U.$.-I$rael genocide in Palestine. Mahmoud Khalil, who was a respected negotiator between Columbia University and the pro-Palestine student encampment last year, told eir story in a recent statement from 18 March 2025:

“My name is Mahmoud Khalil and I am a political prisoner. I am writing to you from a detention facility in Louisiana… On March 8, I was taken by DHS agents who refused to provide a warrant, and accosted my wife and me as we returned from dinner. …

“My arrest was a direct consequence of exercising my right to free speech as I advocated for a free Palestine and an end to the genocide in Gaza, which resumed in full force Monday night. With January’s ceasefire now broken, parents in Gaza are once again cradling too-small shrouds, and families are forced to weigh starvation and displacement against bombs. It is our moral imperative to persist in the struggle for their complete freedom.”

“… Columbia [University] targeted me for my activism, creating a new authoritarian disciplinary office to bypass due process and silence students criticizing Israel. Columbia surrendered to federal pressure by disclosing student records to Congress and yielding to the Trump administration’s latest threats. My arrest, the expulsion or suspension of at least 22 Columbia students – some stripped of their B.A. degrees just weeks before graduation – and the expulsion of SWC President Grant Miner on the eve of contract negotiations, are clear examples.

“If anything, my detention is a testament to the strength of the student movement in shifting public opinion toward Palestinian liberation. …”(4)

Other targeted students have gone into hiding. At the same time, students across the country are coming together to stand with and defend those who may be targeted next. We commend the solidarity being shown. Schools and prisons are somewhat unique in our society due to the collective identities of their populations and their abilities to organize. With the recent announcements from the Trump regime that they will be deporting U.$. citizens with criminal records to the Terrorism Confinement Center in El Salvador, prisoners need to be prepared to stand together as students are learning to do. While there are many recent examples to the contrary, there is a long history of U.$. prisoners standing up for one another due to the group consciousness that comes with facing a common oppressor every day.

Fascism Coming Home

The United $tates has been using long-term solitary confinement for decades on a scale not seen elsewhere in humyn history. Physicians for Human Rights released a report in 2024 exposing the use of solitary confinement in ICE detention centers contrary to government directives to limit its use to absolute necessity. They documented at least 14,000 cases of people being put in solitary confinement by ICE from 2018 to 2023. Durations in solitary averaged 27 days, with 42 cases lasting over a year. At the time, in 2024, ICE held over 35,000 people, making it the world’s largest immigration detention system.(5)

Conditions are likely worse for those sent to El Salvador, where President Bukele has stated that the only way gang members will leave the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) ey built in 2023 is in a coffin. With a capacity of over 40,000, there are 65 to 70 prisoners held per cell. “CECOT prisoners do not receive visits and are never allowed outdoors. The prison does not offer workshops or educational programs to prepare them to return to society after their sentences.”(6) Bukele has been promoting images of shaved gang members, dressed all in white, being warehoused and man-handled by masked prison guards online since the prison opened. This propaganda campaign has appealed to the pro-fascist elements of Amerika. And with that support, Trump is incorporating this prison into the Amerikan international prison system and sending hundreds of people there from the United $tates. This is a shift closer to home from the network of dark sites, and infamous prisons like Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay, that were used to torture and hold without trial oppressed people across the Muslim world.

Most press sources are reporting the Amerikans paid $6 million for 238 prisoners to be held in CECOT, which some point out is much less than what it would cost to imprison them in the United $tates. But it is an amount that will greatly help El Salvador to fund their monstrosity of a prison. It doesn’t make sense that the imperialists are paying to have these prisoners held, but then claim they cannot return people like Abrego Garcia back to their families.

In the 1980s, U.$.-sponsored death squads, trained at the School of the Americas in Georgia, killed and displaced countless people across Central America that were fighting for socialism and to remove imperialism from their countries.(7) Many children of this war in El Salvador were displaced to Los Angeles where they joined Barrio 18 or formed the new Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13), were persecuted by the state, and then exported back to El Salvador. We’ve reported on efforts at peace between these groups in 2013, which coincided with investment by USAID and the building of new U.$.-inspired prisons in El Salvador.(8) But conditions for the people of El Salvador did not improve, and they voted for President Nayib Bukele who both utilized the lumpen organizations in eir political organizing and later turned on them as a scapegoat for the ills of the country in a fascist repression campaign.(9)

The struggle against fascism in this country relies on the coming together of people to defend migrant populations and students currently under attack. As fascism rises, we see the campaigns of groups like the ACLU coming closer to those of MIM(Prisons). As important legal battles are taking place, we also see the spreading recognition that we can’t rely on the courts to save us. We must have a plan B. We must build our plan B.

<sup>Notes:
1. Soso of MIM(Prisons), January 2019, Imperialists Push Coup in Venezuela to Secure Oil for Amerikans, Under Lock & Key 67.
2. Democracy Now!, 2 April 2025.
3. https://www.wlrn.org/immigration/2025-03-31/ice-tren-de-aragua-venezuela-deportation-el-salvador
4. https://www.aclu.org/news/free-speech/a-letter-from-palestinian-activist-mahmoud-khalil
5. Physicians for Human Rights, 6 February 2024, https://www.wlrn.org/immigration/2025-03-31/ice-tren-de-aragua-venezuela-deportation-el-salvador.
6. Aleman & Cano, 17 March 2025, “What to know about El Salvador’s mega-prison after Trump sent hundreds of immigrants there”, Los Angeles Times.
7. MIM(Prisons), June 2009, FBI Arrests Peacemaker, Under Lock & Key 9.
8. MIM(Prisons), March 2013, One-Year Anniversary of Peace Treaty in El Salvador, Under Lock & Key 31.
9. Badgreen of MIM(Prisons), September 2023, 8,000 Military and Police Deployed in Cabanas Province, El Salvador, Under Lock & Key 83.</sup>

Comrade Eseibio, revolutionary greetings, it is my pleasure to have the opportunity to conduct this interview facilitated by the comrades at MIM(Prisons). Let me jump right into these questions:

1. By listening to your work, one can clearly see you have a firm grasp of social development. Can you share how you initially were introduced to revolutionary theory and historical organizations and individuals who practiced a revolutionary line?

My uncle was a Black Panther Party member in the early days of the Party. So I been around it all my life. My first introduction was me as a teenager getting caught shoplifting and sent to juvenile hall, and my uncle came to get me out. That’s something the Panthers did, get young brothers out of jail and juvenile hall. I was too young to understand why he did it. Then when I got a little older I had another mentor named Melvin Dickson who was a Black Panther Party member. He took me under his wing and showed me and taught me everything about being a real revolutionary and pushing a hard revolutionary line.

2. In one of your songs Bust a Cap, you spit: “I’m a revolutionary Black Nationalist,” Is this still your political identification? Why or why not?

Yes. I’m a revolutionary, a Black Nationalist, but also much more than that. Something that the Panthers taught me is that there is no more nations. Just communities. We use the word intercomunualism. Because an attack against one is an attack against all.

3. What do you believe is the current state of the revolutionary Black nationalist movement? What can we do to improve?

I believe the current state of the movement is heading in the right direction. Because comrades are getting more politically educated and are beginning to have more real solidarity with each other. And that’s what will help us organize more effectively.

4. I’ve been told your new project is centered upon Mao’s Red Book. What led you to make that book the inspiration of your project?

Yes all of my album and lyrics reflect the red book. The Black Panthers sold red books at UC Berkley. That’s a book that I read so many times it’s a part of who I am and I don’t go a day with out reading it. The Panthers got a saying: “Malcolm X in my heart, red book in my pocket.”

5. What is your favorite chapter or quote from the Red Book or from Mao generally and why?

That’s easy. The very first quote in chapter one. Because it was written on Sept 15th, and that’s my birth day. It says the force leading the cause forward is the revolutionary party. And our thinking is Marxism-Leninism.

6. With the recent elections and the clear rightward shift among most sectors, What are your thoughts on the best ways to move forward and organize in this political and social climate?

My thoughts are to organize around providing for the children. That’s how the Panthers did it. They started with a stop sign at an elementary school and a free breakfast program that was for the children. By teaching the truth to the youth you’re educating the next generation of revolutionaries to continue the struggle. The elder party members taught me and now it’s my turn to pass on the known. Each one teach one.

7. What are your thoughts about the clear rightward shift of an increasing amount of New Afrikan/Black men? Does this affect our ability to reach the masses, if so how?

Yes it does because they got the money and owns all the radio and TV stations. If we want to reach the masses we gotta be more creative and out organize them and use technology to our advantage.

8. What musical accomplishment are you most proud of? What keeps you motivated?

I’m proud of all my work and my biggest accomplishment is my album that I have not recorded yet. Or even started. It’s and accomplishment for me to keep going and making good music. Just recently I was in a documentary movie called “Stop Selling Grandma’s House.”

9. What artists do you listen to yourself?

I listen to a lot of myself. One artist that I think is dope right now is Dave East. I make beats so I listen to a lot of old school. And I listen to tons of audio books. From people like Malcolm X, Huey P. Newton, etc.

10. In your music you reference Political Prisoners often. Amerika, Inc. denies the existence of Political Prisoners and Prisoners of War within its institutions. Trump calls the cats from the January 6 incident Political Prisoners. So, there is confusion for some on this issue. From your perspective who or what is a political Prisoner/Prisoner of War in the context of occupied Turtle Island?

Because of the politics of America We all are political prisoners and we just don’t know it. There’s only 2 Black Panther Party members in prison left. Mumia abu Jamal and H. Rap Brown [now Jamil al-Amin]. People have that term confused and think that if you throw a rock through a window and getting arrested makes them a political prisoner. But it’s much more than that.

11. Anybody on the inside you want to shout out?

Yes I want to shout out MIM(Prisons) and say “All power to the people!” to all the comrades behind the walls, and free my little cousin Quincy Lane locked up 20+ years in the California prison system. Free Mumia and H. Rap Brown. Let’s organize and watch crime drop and turn all the gang members back into revolutionaries. Listen to my new album “West Coast Revolutionaries.” Oh yea, can’t forget about all of the sisters in prison and all the babies born in jail. Recidivism is a serious thing. Let’s stay out of prison and get back out on the streets organizing our communities.

P.S. Thanks for your time, Comrade-Brotha Eseibio. The ’rades on the inside are bumping your music and we salute you for the content you pushing. Clenched Fist salute. - Triumphant, New Afrikan Political Prisoner

MIM(Prisons) responds: Thanks to Triumphant and Comrade Eseibio for this interview; there are a couple things we’d like to address. First, it is true that Mumia Abu-Jamal and Jamil Abdullah al-Amin are still in prison, however, as far as we know, Kenny “Zulu” Whitmore and Kamau Sadiki are still in prison as well, making at least four former Panthers who are currently incarcerated.

Secondly, we’d like to take this opportunity to discuss the concept of intercommunalism and what it means for our struggle. Huey P. Newton argued that by the 1970s the concept of nation had become obsolete due to the increasing globalization of the world under capitalism. Ey argued that the whole world has become tied together as a unified, economically interconnected system, the idea of any nation gaining independence has become outmoded, and the project of national liberation is not ultimately possible. Newton said we live in an interconnected world system called “intercommunalism,” but the kind of intercommunalism we live in today is reactionary, since it is still based on the overall dominance of the United $tates. Therefore, the project in front of us is to transform reactionary intercommunalism into revolutionary intercommunalism by reorganizing the social relations in society into socialist ones. Armed struggle and revolutionary nationalism were opposed by Newton as outmoded forms of struggle in the years following the peak of the Black Panther Party, after it had split with members who went on to organize Black Liberation Army cells separately. Newton’s faction advocated for building revolutionary intercommunalism community-by-community and building the world into a socialist one on the basis of the strong economic ties created by capitalism.

In practice, the theory of intercommunalism results in “micro-politics.” Instead of fighting for the large goal of national independence and self-determination, we should fight for small, community-level changes that will eventually build up into a global change. Second, intercommunalism prevents us from supporting struggles for national liberation abroad, even though Huey Newton still upheld this to an extent, supporting the Vietnamese struggle against the United $tates; but if we carry the theory to its logical conclusions we cannot come to the conclusion that national liberation is a practicable goal. It goes without saying that these views on what is to be done are in direct contrast to ours. We see our struggle as expressly for the national liberation of the oppressed nations of the whole world, and it is for that reason that we say that we are for the nationalism of the oppressed.

But let us touch on the theory of intercommunalism briefly. It is undoubtedly true that capitalism has a tendency towards the economic integration of all nations into a whole, in a word, towards globalization. However, Newton regards this process as already complete. But if this process is complete, where does the spontaneous tendency towards nationalism arise? The struggle in Palestine, for example, is a spontaneous reaction to national oppression. Why this national division if nations no longer exist? Instead of explaining why national liberation struggles continue, Newton regards them as mistakes. Newton, therefore, fails to explain the events of the world, and merely denounces them. It is evident to anyone who asks the question as to the origin of continuing national liberation struggles that we cannot merely write them off as being the product of people having a false understanding of the world: they are rather based in the real, material interests of the nations involved. To the supporters of the theory of intercommunalism, we ask for an explanation of why national wars continue to exist. In the absence of such an explanation, we regard intercommunalism as an exaggeration of capitalism’s inherent tendency towards globalization, an exaggeration which takes a mere tendency to be already complete.

i want to thank all of those here in NC who responded to my call to action and submitted grievances about the lack of due process when We’ve been validated as a “gang member” and the draconian policies and restrictions we find ourselves subjected to here in North Carolina. This act of unity was so impactful, to the point i was pulled out to meet with Chief of Security Daryll Vann, and 4 other ranking facility intelligence officers.

After having them pull a komrade of mine to be present during this “meeting,” i agreed to listen to what they had to say. The aforementioned individuals asked if i would be interested in drafting up a proposal for the validation process of SRG members and a denouncement process. i immediately declined their offer and was adamant about my decision until the komrade i had accompany me told me “don’t allow this act of unity to be in vain” and he was right.

228 of ya’ll took the time to support me, therefore i agreed to draft up a proposal for new SRG policies here in North Carolina. Never before has this been done and it was made possible because of you all. Thank you again.

In closing, if any of you would like to read more about komrade George Jackson i encourage you to write to:

And request my In the Spirit of George Jackson zine or The Voice of the Lumpen zine that both Komrade Triumphant and i wrote. The New Afrikan POW journals are available as well. Lastly for prisoners here in NC that are serious about their political education, if you don’t already have a copy of Jalil Muntaqim’s We Are Our Own Liberators write to:

There are limited copies, so write to them immediately.

Again thank you all for yall’s support and it’s a must i thank komrades at MIM for publishing my call to action and providing us with a platform to express ourselves that enables us to organize a unified struggle.

Free The Land

MIM(Prisons) adds: The comrade mentions requiring another comrade to be present during the meeting with staff. This is a wise move to prevent rumors from being spread about what went down in said meeting, and the pigs being able to manipulate the narrative. The more witnesses the better.

Second, we agree with the hesitancy to write up a new policy. We see how the same struggle ended in California, though their agreement was made by lawyers in the midst of a lawsuit. The challenge is how to keep the struggle alive, for without struggle, you end up right where you started. A new policy signed off on by a lead organizer can easily pacify people. Until we recognize that this kind of repression will never end without liberation from imperialism, it will continue.

And as the lawsuit in North Carolina advances, we also must remember what it took in California. And after all that sacrifice, the settlement was still a compromise that did not end torture in California prisons, while expanding the list of Security Threat Groups in that state.

This gang validation repression is only expanding as we’ve seen the Trump regime apply it to those outside of prisons who are not involved in any illegal activities. So we should be thinking big picture. And we will continue to stand with and support the comrades in North Carolina coming together to fight arbitrary SRG repression. If comrades inside can send copies of grievances or other documents related to this campaign we will collect and forward them along.

In order to prescribe the Marxist ideology to our Maoist thought much needs to be understood. I believe there is a contradiction that exist that’s unspoken here: race. There seems to be a strong emphasis embraced on race as a “white” verses all other “non-white” races. The contradictions that exist here are that the “white” race is the only oppressor race. There is a huge historical analysis missing here if MIM(Prisons) is going to promote such race politics in what is fundamentally a human attribute that exists in all races of homo sapiens. To include such a factor in any discussion that involves a dialectical materialistic view of economy and government is destructive to the revolution.

The revolution is to promote equality. Ideally I believe to my understanding, an equality based on, “…each one according to their needs.” With that understanding my question becomes, what is the standard of equality on an international scale and how do we get there?

“Race” has nothing to do with our dialectical materialistic analysis because capitalism is based on only one color right now, green. The color of the Amerikan dollar which is the world’s reserve currency! So if MIM(Prisons) comrades are going to discuss economy, based on capitalism, socialism, and communism through Maoist thought then speak from the perspective of an economist. Or if it is government, then I guess the contradictions need to be explored to define the nation MIM(Prisons) looks to build because as a comrade I feel alienated based on “race.”

Wiawimawo of MIM(Prisons) responds: You’ll be hard-pressed to find MIM(Prisons) talking about race, since, as this comrade points out, race is not real. The problem is, we talk about the New Afrikan nation, or the Chican@ nation, and our readers think we’re just using fancy words to talk about race.

Perhaps this is an example of us getting a bit ahead of the masses here leading to miscommunication. Another comrade recently submitted a long paper explaining what the New Afrikan nation was because they felt new readers of ULK were confused by it. It’s interesting, since we adopted the term New Afrikan from the prison movement. But goes to show how things have changed. We will be utilizing this feedback to consider how we can improve ULK. But New Afrika is already well-defined in our pamphlet Power to New Afrika, which our New York comrade above has read.

Another source of confusion is that the imperialists will always try to deny the nationality of the oppressed. It’d be hard to find someone who doesn’t recognize Haiti as a nation, because they fought and won their liberation in 1804. Like New Afrika, they are a nation of people from all over the African continent, with a sprinkling of Europeans, that were merged by force to form a new nation. New Afrika has not yet won it’s liberation, so it gets less recognition than Haiti does.

We agree with our comrade above that capitalism is motivated by profits. Racism, and the idea of race itself, arose with the system of capitalism. Though there were certainly other systems of caste and class before. The United $tates of Amerika project was central to the development of race theory. In fact, the internal semi-colony of New Afrika would not exist without racial ideology that separated the first slaves based on what continent they came from. So we may be one of the last places to rid ourselves of this backwards way of thinking, it was so important to what this project is about.

The comrade also asks about our vision for the future. Well we’d suggest reading Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism and other works by V.I. Lenin on the national question for background. Because imperialism is a system of oppression/exploitation of most nations by a few, we see the most important source of change, towards a world of equality, to be found in national liberation struggles that challenge that system; from Palestine to Aztlán. Decades ago MIM put forth the theory of the Joint Dictatorship of the Proletariat of the Oppressed Nations (JDPON) as a vision for how socialism can be imposed on Amerika itself. This is because we don’t believe a majority of Amerikans will support socialism at this stage. This idea is also found in Lenin and in Chinese Maoist thought. At the time MIM was discussing the carving up of what is now the United $tates territory into a New Afrikan Black Belt, Aztlán for the Chican@ nation, various First Nation territories. MIM also suggested that Amerika and Kanada were one oppressor nation. Some of these ideas seem much closer to reality today with Amerikan imperialism looking to incorporate Canada, and California looking for separate trade deals with China with popular support.

We have readers who say we’re anti-Black for citing Marx, and readers who say we’re anti-white for applying the ideas of Lenin. The reality is, all of these critics are too brainwashed by the “white man” to see things beyond this racial lens. Yes, the New York prisoner above we’re talking to you as well, you are the one too stuck thinking in racial ideas, not us.

Now to be fair, this is the dominant thinking of our society. So we must learn to speak Marxist truths that people stuck in imperialist, racist thinking will understand. We also recognize that the oppressed nations are more likely to be led to the truth. So we cannot avoid alienating people who identify as “white” and generally should not try to. These forces are either enemies of the revolution, enemies of equality, enemies of communism, or will have to be won over in a later stage of struggle. This is true because of their racial identities, which are the subjective reflections of their material reality as exploiters. Race is divisive – that’s why the imperialists have used it for hundreds of years.

The Barnes Review published, in their October 1996 edition, a criticism of Marx and Engels as “anti-black racists.” What followed were a series of quotations which prove this point beyond much doubt. Not only did Marx and Engels believe that Black people were inferior to whites, they upheld slavery as progressive at certain points in history, even in North America. We will not and do not contest the author on these unassailable points; we merely seek to show the deeper relations embedded within this “statement of facts.”

Modern society is built upon social relations which are wholly at odds with its technological capacity. This basic fact results in the myriad social problems we encounter in every facet of society. Our task is therefore, first, to understand these social relations, and second, to grasp the manner in which they may be transformed. This is the world-historical gift which Marx gave to the world: a guide to action. This is the essence of Marxism as a revolutionary doctrine. With this perspective on the world, who could think to waste the precious time they have on discussions of personalities? How dedicated someone is to “the cause,” how far someone was able to purge their thinking of bourgeois ideology, whether someone is patriarchal or racially prejudiced in their thoughts and actions – these are topics of gossip, and as such are not questions worthy of discussion in the tasks of a revolutionary organization. What will we focus on: the method of transforming reality in the interests of anti-imperialism, or the racial prejudices of individuals? Discussions of Marx which rise above useless biographical gossip have long become a literary rarity.

Marx and Engels upheld the racial inferiority of certain races. That is a demonstrable fact. What of it? On this our authors tell us nothing. We would like to inform the authors of this reputable and eminently revolutionary newspaper, to return the favor, that the Volga flows into the Caspian, and that horses eat oats. What wondrous facts!

There is one attempt at a discussion of a meaningful topic, however:

“Virtually every serious study concerned with the economics of employing black slaves in the American South shows, with little room for contradiction, that the importation of free white workers from Europe (skilled and semi-skilled) would have proven far more profitable economically.”

This is all we are told as a refutation of Marx’s view that slavery was an integral component in the development of the United States’ economy. It is clear to all that this is merely a platitude, a hint at a position, in order to give some measure of legitimacy to the real object of this article: to imply that Marx’s theories are merely a set of subjective views which may be regarded as reactionary and therefore worthy of being simply set aside. The reactionary nature of a theory, however, is no argument against it, however much it may seem to us that this is the case. Every proposition must be regarded objectively, concretely, and scientifically. Any deviation from this, such as the deviation exemplified by The Barnes Review, is a deviation towards post-modern thought. The question then passes to the clash between Marxism as a modernism with the movement which succeeded it, an important question, but one exceeding the bounds of this reply.

It is worth noting that white nationalist magazines coming out of Washington DC like The Barnes Review and The National Interest spend time “exposing” Marx like this. The latter is the home of Francis Fukuyama’s “end of history” thesis, that saw U.$. imperialism’s global hegemony after the collapse of the Soviet Union as the pinnacle of humyn society, proving the alternatives unworkable. Today the imperialists clearly disagree, as they work to upend the status quo of the United $tates dating back to Fukuyama’s 1989 work. And communists have always disagreed, pointing to the continued heightening of the contradictions within capitalism that Marx elucidated, and the bourgeoisie largely ignores. The early attempts at socialism in the USSR and China were massively successful for decades, with China building on the lessons learned in the USSR. While these early attempts were ultimately overthrown, the proletariat does not give up so quickly.

As for The Barnes Review, their latest issue condemns funding to I$rael and exposes the propaganda around Hamas. So far so good. Then it links all of this to “international Jewry.” While many fascists today support the fascist project of I$rael, The Barnes Review keeps it old school by exposing Marx and the Jews as the source of evil. Here we see how a publication can mix correct conclusions with metaphysical methods of understanding the world. In contrast Marx and Engels, despite having some incorrect conclusions around race, had (and developed) a scientific method of understanding the world that is dialectical materialism, which continues to be a tool for understanding and transforming our world.

Readers of ULK will read many other, less mainstream, publications in their search for answers, for the source of the evil they see in the world. While the I$rael lobby is certainly the enemy of the people, and generally speaking, so is “the white man,” it is the system of imperialism that we must focus our ire at. There is no metaphysical, absolute source of evil; oppression is the product of economic forces that Marx did so much to expose for us. And it is in the resolution of the contradictions of the imperialist system (the contradiction between exploiter and exploited nations, the contradiction between the means of production and the relations of production, etc) that we can build a society without so much unnecessary humyn suffering as ours.

As many of our readers know, one of the primary obstacles MIM(Prisons) and AIPS face in our work is the censorship of our mail by prison administrators. In ULK 86, we published a censorship report detailing some of the brazen lies these administrators use to justify withholding mail from their rightful recipients. Not much has changed on this front, but that’s to be expected. After all, did we really expect the pigs to stop their oinking?

At the same time, our efforts to combat this censorship have not wavered. We have continued to respond to every instance of censorship we receive notice about, whether that notice be from the prison itself or from a comrade on the inside. Since our last report, we have issued over 20 appeals to censorship cases which have included more than 50 letters being sent to prisoners, wardens, and various government institutions. Unfortunately, most of the appeals we send out do not result in successes where our mailed materials get to their intended recipients. The most frequent conclusion of our appeals is that the prison simply stops responding to our communications. Even when we play by their rules, the oppressors still can decide, at any point, to do whatever it is they want. This is exemplified by the following case of censorship in Georgia.

Georgia and CoreCivic

Back in October 2024, we received several letters we sent to prisoners at Coffee Correctional Facility in Nicholls, Georgia marked “Return to Sender” and “Unauthorized Materials”. The materials we sent them were, ironically enough, our guide to fighting censorship as well as our unconfirmed mail form simply asking whether they received the materials we had previously sent. When we tried to file an appeal for this censorship and to follow up with the prisoners at this facility over the proceeding months, all of our attempts were returned with the word “BANNED” handwritten on the envelopes. It is worth noting that Coffee CF is ran by the company CoreCivic and that we have had similar issues with getting mail to prisoners located at other CoreCivic-ran facilities.

The U.$. courts have ruled that prisons are not allowed to institute blanket bans on materials sent from a publisher, yet this is exactly what has happened to us at Coffee CF. Despite the fact that the materials contained nothing that could be construed as a “security threat” (a favorite of the pigs that work in the mail room), the prison administration has refused to address anything we sent them. The lesson here is the same as outlined above: the government and prisons make up endless rules, protocols, and policies while selectively choosing, on any given day, which to follow and which to discard. The natural question, then, is, why do we commit to fighting censorship when our efforts can be nullified by any random C.O. working in the mail room?

Censorship as a Site of Struggle

It is common in political spaces for people to talk about “human rights”. Endless debate is had over defining what exactly a “human right” is and when it is okay to violate said rights (which is typically just a post-hoc justification of the abuse and murder of the oppressed). We here at MIM(Prisons) and AIPS, however, disdain the very category of “human rights” itself. We say that there are no rights, there are only power struggles.

Thus, when we discuss a subject such as censorship in prisons, there are two ways to view it. From one perspective, the prisons are infringing on the rights of prisoners as established by government institutions and this is morally incorrect because violating someone’s rights is intrinsically wrong. An alternative perspective, and the one we in MIM(Prisons) and AIPS advocate for, is that prisoners receiving mail and prison administrators deciding what mail to censor are two competing forces who are engaged in a struggle for political power. When you view the world through this lens, it becomes clear that discussions over “human rights” are nothing more than a way to obfuscate the underlying struggles taking place. The state says you have the “right” to send and receive mail while in prison, but provides endless stipulations on this “right”: you can’t send too many pages, your mail has to be formatted in this way, you can’t have this type of image, you can’t say these certain combinations of words, and you certainly can’t suggest any unorthodox political ideas.

Our fight against censorship, then, should not be misconstrued as us capitulating to the logic of the Amerikan state which claims to uphold the “rights” of all. We see reality for what it is. When we push back against prison censorship, we are standing on the side of prisoners in their struggle for power against the oppressors of the U.$. state. We stand for the oppressed. We stand for you. Won’t you stand with us in this struggle for power?

Back in September, as part of Prison Banned Books Week, MIM(Prisons) had pledged to send out more free literature (not counting our newsletter) this winter than any other winter since 2020. Prior to 2020 our organization was bigger both inside and outside, and as a result our Serve the People Free Political Books to Prisoners Program was also larger.

Despite our efforts, we failed pretty hard at meeting this modest goal. It was not for lack of books, nor was it for lack of funding, though we could use help there. It was for lack of participants in the program. Part of this, again, is due to our limited reach with a lower number of subscribers. But even if we normalize for number of subscribers we mailed out more lit last winter than this one.

Therefore it seems it is our inability to recruit people into the program that is our main limiting factor. We attempted to boost the program in 2 main ways. First we printed a large ad in the center spread of ULK advertising some popular books we offer, with an explanation of how to get said books in large font. We know people saw the ad because many wrote in asking for the books in it. But almost no one actually followed the instructions for how to join the program.

The second way we attempted to promote the free books program was through persynal correspondence. We fairly aggressively wrote to people asking for books explaining how the program works.

One possible explanation for this failure is that people in prison just want free books, but aren’t actually interested in anti-imperialist organizing. It has always been the case that the vast majority of our subscribers are not actively involved in the work we do. There are also a myriad of subjective explanations for why people don’t get involved despite having interest. Promoting a Revolutionary 12 Step Program is an attempt to address one of the possible limitations.

Yet, objectively, the number of people in U.$. prisons and the oppression they are facing has not changed significantly. Some prison systems, like in California, have seen significant structural changes in the last ten years. K2 and tablets have been the biggest change countrywide.

Despite the challenges it is up to us to find ways to reach the oppressed masses and serve them in a way that is engaging to them. Us means MIM(Prisons), AIPS, and especially USW comrades who are working on the ground amongst the prisoner population. Our failure to expand the book program this winter is another data point, along with our declining subscribership over many years, to measure our work.

I just received and read my first issue of Under Lock & Key. Thank you and your contributors for putting out such a thought provoking publication! I especially appreciated the reporting on Palestine and Syria.

…Would it be out of line for me to offer a criticism? In the graphic of Hitler and Netanyahu – a legitimate comparison! Netanyahu is portrayed with a yarmulke, which he seldom wears, and side-locks, which he has never(?) worn, thus emphasizing his Jewishness, when the real problem is his Zionism. I happen to believe that all of us have a degree of anti-semitism (and anti-blackness, misogyny, etc.) instilled in us by growing up in this society and it’s important to keep centering love and solidarity toward our Jewish anti-Zionist brothers and sisters.

MIM(Prisons) responds: Yes, we always welcome criticism, especially from our fans and comrades. And we completely agree that Zionism is the enemy, as an extension of imperialism, and not Jews or even Judaism. Jewish people in this country have been represented disproportionately at the front lines of opposing the genocide in Gaza in recent months.

2 April 2025: Today thousands of Haitians marched on the capital in Port au Prince demanding action be taken against the gangs controlling most of the city. Some protestors were armed. As the government has not taken action to protect the people, some local police have begun arming the people with weapons seized from the gangs. The government responded to the protest with massive tear gas attacks and firing live rounds into the air.

The new government took power in November with help from the U.$. imperialists, the latest in a series of comprador states since the overthrow of popular president Jean-Bertrand Aristide in 2004. Since being the first victorious slave revolution in 1804, and a bastion of anti-slavery in the 1800s, Haiti has been a target of the European imperialists. This imperialist meddling has created the conditions of the current failed state.

The fighting spirit of the Haitian people lives on, as does their efforts to build strength through unity, even as current conditions seem dire. Haitian refugees from this violence are one of the targets of the Trump regime for deportations, as they currently can qualify for Temporary Protective Status (TPS). If Trump can remove TPS it will worsen the humanitarian crisis in Haiti in the short-term and threaten the safety of those deported.

^{Notes: Kevin Pena, Flashpoints, 2 April 2025.}

An Arkansas prisoner 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 advance 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.

MIM recognizes the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense (BPP) as the most advanced communist vanguard to have existed in North America. Specifically, we uphold the BPP from 1966 to 1970. For our analysis of the BPP see our study pack Defend the Legacy of the BPP.

12 January 1865: During the Civil War 20 New Afrikan leaders meet with General Sherman of the Union. 19 of the 20 state that they prefer to live separate from the United $tates. Initially land in the south was given to New Afrikans with the Union victory, but when President Andrew Johnson came to power ey re-established Euro-Amerikan rule in the south.

1914: Marcus Garvey founds the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA), a pan-Afrikan, pro-capitalist movement that recognized Euro-Amerikans would never live with New Afrikans as equals. UNIA organized 5 million followers in a movement to return to Afrika and built a number of successful businesses before Garvey was arrested in 1925 and deported to Jamaica.

1917: The African Black Brotherhood (ABB) for African Liberation and Redemption formed as the first Marxist Revolutionary Black nationalist organization in the United $tates, at a time when a free New Afrikan proletariat was migrating from the south to urban centers. The ABB merges into the American Communist Party in the late 1920s.

1952: Malcolm X, a son of Garveyite parents, is paroled from prison and immediately begins organizing with the Nation of Islam, quickly becoming its most influential leader, until ey is expelled in 1964.

1962: Huey P. Newton meets Bobby Seale at a rally at Merritt College opposing the blockade of Cuba. The Revolutionary Action Movement (RAM) is founded by “revolutionary Black nationalists” (including Max Stanford) seeking to organize an armed struggle to win national liberation for the “colonized Black nation” based in Marxism-Leninism and inspired by Mao Zedong and Malcolm X.

1963: RAM goes underground. Mao Zedong puts out an essay calling on support for Black Liberation Struggle at the behest of Robert F. Williams who was in China in exile after first going to Cuba in 1961 to avoid legal attacks by the U.$. imperialists.

1964: RAM develops armed self-defense units with Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in the Mississippi delta region. Malcolm X becomes a RAM officer and travels through Africa building support.

28 June 1964: Malcolm X (now el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz) returns from Africa and forms the Organization of Afro-American Unity (OAAU) with John Henrik Clarke, the OAAU was to be the broad front organization for the now underground Marxist cadre organization RAM.

21 February 1965: Malcolm X is assassinated. Bobby Seale swears to “make his own self into a motherfucking Malcolm X.”

August 1965: Watts rebellion breaks out in Watts, California, after two New Afrikan stepbrothers and their mother are subject to violence from a white pig. Both cops and white citizens of Watts are beaten by New Afrikans, riots break out throughout the city, and the National Guard are sent in.

1966: Seale leaves RAM, to work with Newton, over lack of material support against police brutality and “inability to organize brothers on the block.” Seale disagrees with RAM’s insistence on the revolutionary vanguard being clandestine. This is later addressed by Newton in the essay, “The Correct Handling of a Revolution” (1967).

1966-67: Newton and Seale adopt the imagery of a black panther, sell Little Red Books to purchase guns, and rent an office for the first chapter of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, at the time an armed group in confrontation with police.

21 February 1967: Eldridge Cleaver and the RAM-affiliated Black Panther Party of Northern California hold a memorial for Malcolm X. Seale, Newton, and other Panthers provide an armed security detail for Betty Shabazz, his widow. Newton says their ability to stand up to police at the event finally convinced Cleaver to join the BPP.

April 1967: The Panthers begin organizing in North Richmond, holding two armed rallies and distributing newspapers informing about the murder of Denzil Dowell by the pigs and the need for armed self-defense.

2 May 1967: A delegation of thirty Panthers go to Sacramento to challenge the passing of a new bill prohibiting carrying arms in public. Twenty-four New Afrikans are accosted and arrested on the way home – 22 armed Panthers, as well as unarmed Eldridge Cleaver and an unarmed, unaffiliated New Afrikan passerby.

May 1967: The Black Panthers publish their Ten Point Program, laying out what they believe and what their demands for New Afrika are.

12 July 1967: Rioting breaks out in Newark, NJ, a majority-New Afrikan city under oppressor-nation control, after a New Afrikan cab driver is beaten too badly to walk. Molotov cocktails are thrown and businesses are looted as the rebellion grows. Twenty-one New Afrikans are murdered by police.

23 July 1967: Urban rebellion breaks out in Detroit, MI, going beyond looting to tactics such as arson and sniping. 33 New Afrikans are killed, as well as ten whites, many of them government officials.

27 October 1967: Newton shoots notorious racist pig John Frey, killing him; Frey shoots Newton in the stomach. Newton’s trial for the murder of Officer Frey sparks the “Free Huey!” movement, wherein Newton is presented as resisting the perpetration of violence against New Afrikans by the occupying-force pigs.

17 October 1967: White youth radicals protest the draft in Oakland, attempting to shut down the induction center, and are met with violent repression. Further rallies and riots against the draft eventually merge with the “Free Huey!” campaign, among both the white and New Afrikan left.

1968: RAM disbands and decides to coordinate through other groups such as the Black Liberation Party, African Peoples’ Party and House of Umoja. BPP rules state: “no party member can join any army force other than the Black Liberation Army.”

28 January 1968: Seale gives a speech at a UC Berkeley rally linking the struggles of anti-draft protestors with police brutality against New Afrikans.

31 March 1968: Malcolm X Society hosts 500 New Afrikan nationalists for the Black Government Conference in Detroit; they initiate the Provisional Government of the Republic of New Afika (PG-RNA) to be composed of Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and South Carolina.

4 April 1968: Martin Luther King Jr. is martyred in Memphis, Tennessee. Rebellion erupts in Memphis, and then sweeps New Afrikan neighborhoods. The Panthers play a role in quelling riots in many cities to encourage more organized rebellion.

6 April 1968: Lil’ Bobby Hutton, a 17-year-old Black Panther, is martyred by police in West Oakland while doing armed pig patrols with Eldridge Cleaver.

8 September 1968: FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover designates the BPP as “the greatest threat to the internal security of the country.”

Fall 1968: Cleaver goes into exile in Cuba.

17 January 1969: Los Angeles chapter leaders Bunchy Carter and John Huggins shot and killed by US organization members on UCLA campus, provoked by FBI interference. BPP leadership institutes a policy to expel those in clandestine military formations. Geronimo ji Jaga Pratt, with eir experience in the U.$. military, takes Carter’s position as Southern California Minister of Defense and begins building chapters across the south while developing underground cadre units as well

July 1969: BPP hosts Revolutionary Conference for a United Front Against Fascism conference in response to others looking to them for leadership, bringing together 4,000 activists, majority Euro-Amerikan. Bobby Seale stresses class struggle and condemns Black racism. The conference creates National Committees to Combat Fascism across the country under BPP leadership that focus on control of the police and freeing political prisoners. Cleaver appears publicly in Algiers, Algeria where ey will establish the BPP international office.

5 November 1969: Seale sentenced to four years in prison for sixteen counts of contempt, because of his outbursts during the trial. Originally being tried as part of the Chicago 8 for “inciting a riot” at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, ey was bound and gagged during the trial. Seale was released in 1972.

4 December 1969: Fred Hampton, leader of the Chicago chapter, is assassinated by Chicago police and FBI. The pigs killed Hampton as ey was successfully uniting lumpen organizations in Chicago of different nationalities in the original Rainbow Coalition. The BPP was also in the process of expanding the Central Committee beyond the trusted founders in Oakland to include leaders like Hampton. This never happened and contributed to the splitting of the party over regional differences.

1969: Los Angeles pioneers the first-ever Special Weapon Assault Team, or SWAT, against BPP office building in L.A.

July-August 1970: Eldridge Cleaver and Elaine Brown join a delegation of people from the U.$. visiting North Vietnam, North Korea and China.

5 August 1970: Huey P. Newton is acquitted and released from prison, taking control of the underground military operation that was built while ey was incarcerated.

7 August 1970: Jonathan Jackson is killed at the Marin County Courthouse attempting to free eir brother George Jackson.

August 1970: Geronimo ji Jaga Pratt goes underground to develop BLA and establish guerrilla bases, with support of the party.

October 1970: People’s Republic of China Premier Zhou Enlai hosts Newton, Elaine Brown and other Panthers. Tens of thousands gather in Tiananmen Square to honor their visit They also visit Jiang Qing.

December 1970: Newton and Elaine Brown send Melvin “Cotton” Smith, a secret police informant, to Dallas to meet with Pratt.

8 December 1970: Pratt, Will Stanford, Will “Crutch” Holiday, and George Lloyd arrested in Dallas; Cotton is arrested shortly after as well.

1971: The BPP splits.

January 1971: Newton and Brown publicly denounce Pratt and others arrested in Dallas for counter-revolutionary behavior. Panther 21 (NYC) issue statement from prison supporting Weather Underground, condemning BPP for ignoring Panther 21 and Weather.

23 January 1971: Newton publishes his theory of “intercommunalism” arguing that nations and national liberation were no longer relevant in global capitalism, which ey introduced at a speech at Boston College in November 1970 following release from prison.

28 January 1971: FBI offices in Boston, NY, LA and San Francisco receive memo to capitalize on the rift over armed struggle within BPP.

13 February 1971: NY Panthers Michael Tabor, Dhoruba Bin Wahad and Connie Matthews were expelled after they went underground.

26 February 1971: Newton and Cleaver (in Algiers) have a phone conversation on live TV that ends with Cleaver calling for the reinstatement of expelled members from NYC and LA and the resignation of David Hilliard as Chief of Staff. Newton follows up by calling Algiers and expelling all Panthers at the BPP International office. Elaine Brown replaces Eldridge Cleaver on the Central Committee of the BPP.

3 April 1971: Cleaver faction begins publishing own newspaper Right On! calling for insurrection as The Black Panther newspaper moves away from calling for “revolution now.”

17 April 1971: Newton puts out statement “On the Defection of Eldridge Cleaver…” stating that “We will never run for political office…”

19 May 1971: On the 46th birthday of Malcolm X the BLA shoots two cops protecting the house of the NY District Attorney in charge of prosecuting the Panther 21.

18 August 1971: FBI and police raid headquarters of the Provisional Government of the Republic of New Afrika in Mississippi.

21 August 1971: Field Marshall George Jackson is killed by guards at San Quentin State Prison in California. BLA carries out multiple retaliatory attacks on police in San Francisco, and ends support for clandestine military action in Oakland.

1971-1973: 2 years following split the FBI would attribute 20 police deaths to the BLA, while claiming police killed 7 BLA members and imprisoned 18 key members. In 1971 the BLA calls for a strategic retreat, but it is too late for many and the organization is too decentralized to pull back.

1972: Bobby Seale released from prison, but at by this time the BPP was becoming little more than a local community organization in Oakland. “Afro-American Liberation Army” used in place of BLA in Humanity Freedom Peace in 1972 – reprinting essays by Geronimo Pratt. AALA claims action in Los Angeles.

1973: Elaine Brown runs for Oakland City Council.

1973: In the two years after the BPP split, the U.$. government attributed the deaths of 20 police officers to the BLA.

14 November 1973: Police kill Twyman Meyers in an ambush in the Bronx, after which they declared they had “broken the back” of the BLA.

1974: Huey Newton flees to Cuba to avoid criminal charges and Brown takes over as chair of the BPP securing federal and foundation funding for its programs.

1975: Between 1973 and 1975, the FBI claims responsibility for 7 assassinations and the capture of 18 other BLA members.

1975: Imprisoned BLA members sum up last four years in report “Message to the Black Movement” that says, “we lacked a strong ideological base and political base,” and initiated the BLA – Coordinating Committee (BLA-CC), publishing a newsletter circulated in prisons. By this time, BPP chapters with links to the BLA have no above-ground presence.

1977: Newton returns from Cuba, Brown resigns from the BPP after an incident where Newton supported male members of the party who assaulted a womyn in the party in retaliation for the womyn reprimanding a male member for lack of discipline.

2 November 1979: BLA members successfully break Assata Shakur out of prison.

1980: NYPD and FBI form the Joint Terrorist Task Force (JTTF) to coordinate search for Assata and to smash the BLA.

1981: Brinks truck holdup with BLA and Weather members involved led to other militants getting targeted, proving that BLA still had strong membership years after big raids. The Joint Terrorist Task Force would go on to conclude that the Revolutionary Armed Task Force (including Weather and BLA members) had conducted many robberies throughout the late 1970s.

December 1981: Last known action of the BLA according to the JTTF.

June 1982: Black Panther Party closes its last office.

November 1993: Former BLA members issue public call to form a New Afrikan Liberation Front.

March 1998: the NALF and PGRNA-sponsored Jericho ’98 mobilized at least 5000 people around the country for political freedom for nationalist-related prisoner organizing.

Sources: * Triumphant, Black August 2022, Power to New Afrika, MIM Distributors. * Akinyele Umoja, June 1999, “Repression breeds resistance: The black liberation army and the radical legacy of the black panther party, New Political Science. * Joshua Bloom and Waldo E. Martin, Jr., 2013, Black Against Empire: The History and Politics of the Black Panther Party, UC Press, Berkeley.

MIM(Prisons) preface: Below, a comrade in United States Penitentiary - Tucson tells a story about how prison staff institute arbitrary mass punishment. Often such mass punishment comes in the form of lockdowns, which have seemingly become more common in recent years. All level IV prisoners in California are currently on lockdown, and had access to their tablets and phones taken away. The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation announced this on 8 March 2025, calling it “modified programming” as it applies only to level IV prisoners.(1) They have ordered the lockdown in response to an alleged surge in violence, yet we know that these forms of group punishment, and the new form of punishment of taking tablets away, only leads to more violence. As always, this isn’t about safety, but about control. In addition, the Ashker settlement, which followed the biggest hunger strikes to ever occur in U.$. prisons, supposedly prohibits collective punishment. So this “modified programming” is a violation of the CDCR’s own rules and court orders. But no significant organization currently exists inside to hold the pigs to their words. And with communications locked down the CDCR will control the narrative through its agents in the prisons.

A comrade in Allred Unit in Texas reports how lazy staff use collective punishment:

“TDCJ has started something new where if anyone get caught smoking or think they were smoking they locking the whole pod down for 15 days and they take away phones, e-messages, music, law library, Pando app, visits, commissary and school. I am about to write my step 1 grievance. If you can please point me to an attorney on this issue because they are putting other inmates lives in jeopardy and then telling all prisoners to start snitching, when the laws are the ones bringing the drugs inside the unit. It’s a way for them not to run day room.”

And a comrade in St. Brides CC in the Virginia DOC reports that rec has been very limited due to “Deuce” or K2 since last summer. Eir pod was on sanctions for months last summer with limited JPAY kiosk, no rec, no chow hall, and no programming. When someone “fell out” on K2 that persyn would be removed from the pod, yet the people remaining would be punished! Most recently,

“they still have not brought rec back to normal hours and they hardly offer many programs – especially when you consider all the days classes are canceled. I dream of the day when they bring back some type of normalcy.”

Recently comrades in the North Carolina Department of Adult Corrections launched a campaign to combat the system of labeling prisoners Security Risk Group (SRG). We’ve begun to receive grievances from people held in conditions similar to those temporary measures by CDCR above, but for years or decades, as CDCR has also done historically; all because of who these prisoners allegedly associate with, not because they have committed any crime or broken any rule. These forms of group punishment date back centuries in this country in the form of national oppression, but today they are legalized in the form of gang injunctions and security threat group designations.

The oppressed nation of Palestine knows well the wrath of collective punishment it has faced for decades by the U.$. outpost known as “Israel.” While U.$. prisoners face torture, Palestinians are currently facing starvation as I$rael has cut off aid to Gaza for over a week, starting 2 March. This came in response to Hamas demanding that I$rael continue to meet the terms of the ceasefire agreement from 19 January. This has turned the month of Ramadan into more suffering and worrying rather than generosity and worship for Palestinians. Then on 9 March I$rael cut off electricity to Gaza, which will also prevent desalinization plants from providing the water which the people depend on. With Gaza’s official death toll at over 60,000 since the recent invasion by I$rael began, the genocide continues through the illegal denial of basic needs to the people.

As the comrade below says, such collective punishment is an international war crime. It is used to crush whole populations to the will of those in power. And just as it breeds resistance in U.$. prisons, it breeds resistance in the Palestinians suffering at the hands of I$rael, as well as millions of supporters watching the genocide unfold. The future of the oppressed nations around the world lies in uniting in a common struggle against imperialism.

Notes: CDCR High‑Security Areas Placed on Modified Movement

A Federal prisoner: The administration (Warden, Associate Warden, Captain) use frivolous excuses to apply mass punishment on prisoners. Officers abuse their authority and use excuses to “justify” punishment. It may sound better if I explain the situation:

18 December 2024 – I was in the Education building, doing some research. About 8:30 AM, there was an incident call, or what we call the “deuces.” This is when there is a situation, like a fight, happening somewhere on the compound. At the time, we were all outside or about the compound. It was outdoor rec for many, some were on the yard, some were indoors at the chapel, or indoor rec, or library.

But when the “deuces” are hit, everything stops temporarily. In this case, the officers all ran towards E Unit. We all looked to see if there was a fight; you’d hate to see a fight so close to Christmas, because the Warden and staff will use any excuse to lock us down over the holidays and claim “safety and security.”

As it turns out, the incident wasn’t an incident at all. Several guys heard on the hand units that they said, “Stand down, false alarm.” What that meant was that there was nothing to really worry about.

But, less than five minutes later, they called for everyone to leave the programs building. This was very frustrating to those trying to work. Many were in classes, some working on legal work. It is very frustrating when USP Tucson finds reasons to shut everything down. They have a very malicious history of doing this and are too incompetent to hold staff accountable for preventing us from programming.

So, I walk out, with everyone else, and heard that they will do a “Yard Recall.” That means everyone has to go back to their dorms. When I got outside, I asked a few guys that were on the yard: “so, what do we know?” They told me that it was a false alarm, but somebody may have said something to one of the female officers, and she felt “offended,” so she told the Lieutenant, who called for an entire recall.

I was frustrated. What did ANYBODY in the programs area have to do with ONE person on the yard with bad behavior? If what the guys on the yard said was true, then there was no reason to use mass punishment. I came out of the building and looked back and saw how many guys were coming out. They may have been over 100 people affected by this cowardly move by the staff. Guys in the chapel, who had nothing to do with the incident. Guys in indoor recreation that had nothing to do with what happened outside. Guys in GED classes and those in the library, who were nowhere near the incident. All being punished because staff “got in their feelings.”

What a cowardly act.

We were on the yard until 9 AM when they opened the gates and everyone went back to their units. I noticed there was no official “Yard Recall” as they should have done. While we were out there, I saw guys talking to one of the Lieutenants, asking why the severe action. I didn’t hear what he said, but I saw the extreme disappointment in the prisoners, as if the answer didn’t make sense.

Why shut EVERYTHING down for what one person did? This again is called Mass Punishment, and it is strongly frowned upon by most nations. The United Nations has what is called the Nelson Mandela Rules, and one of the elements is that they forbid mass punishment in prisons. Most nations signed on to this, but the United States never ratified it… explains why they still do it.

In 2024, there have been about 102 lockdowns on the compound at USP Tucson, compared to 118 in 2023. In 2024, there have only been SIX instances where the “deuces” were hit for altercations. In 2023, there were 25. This is a significant decrease in violence on the compound.

Since 23 May 2024 to the current date (December 18th), there has only been ONE incident regarding a fight. That was on September 22nd, and staff wrongly used that excuse to change to a “staff assault” so that they could punish the entire facility for at least 30 days on lockdown. They then punished us by decreasing the phone calls from 10 minutes with an hour wait to a five minute call with a 90 minute wait, making it extremely difficult to communicate with families.

Since we came off the lockdown of September 22nd, coming off in late October, there have been about 18 lockdowns… NONE of them were because of physical altercations. They were all “administrative.”

What I am showing is that, even though this is a prison and a penitentiary, the people here have done as much as they could possibly do to reduce the violent incidents in the prison. When a prison can go from 25 lockdowns because of fights to currently six, it shows that, for the most part, we know how to behave.

But, if we are going to be punished every time ONE person does something wrong, then staff has created a standard that nobody can hope to attain. The Warden is either a fool to think that every single day on a penitentiary should be hassle and violent free, or he is maliciously bent on punishment for the prisoners.

If the Associate Warden ignores the fact that the prisoners here have done all they could to stay out of trouble and creates excuses as to why we are being punished, it is clear that she has no interest in rehabilitation.

In all this, no prisoner was able to rehabilitate, because USP Tucson was so busy looking for another screw to put in the population. There was no security issue. It was a false alarm, but they found a reason to disrupt every single angle for rehabilitation. This is the perfect picture of mass punishment in prisons, yet staff all consent to it while hiding behind made-up policies that don’t exist.

I’ve often said, “sometimes the worst people in prisons aren’t the ones behind the steel doors, it’s the ones coming out the parking lots of those prisons.” We simply cannot live with the program in USP Tucson. The Warden, Associate Warden, Captain and all the departments refuse to let us reform.

As i’ve indicated in my previous writings on the subject, the California Department of Corrections and “Rehabilitation” (CDCr) thoroughly co-opted the momentum of the hunger strikes and the B.S. multinational Agreement to End Hostilities (AEH), so i won’t repeat all that here, but a few points must be reiterated.

Firstly, CDCr had no choice but to “compromise,” but used the watered down “5-core demands” and its self-imposed leadership to initiate a pacification and disruption program. Not only was solitary whittled down and trinkets issued en masse, but gang (so-called STG) leadership was empowered in a direct CDCr/STG collaboration to help police other prisoners and distinguish between good and bad prisoners, etc.

Secondly, CDCr/CCPOA “rebelled” and did its best to undermine these “reforms”, and the scrutiny they felt. This looked like allowing inmates to assault each other with virtually no consequence and even going so far as to allow inmates to sign “mutual combat chrons” even when it was an obvious assault i.e. 5 on 1, sneak attacks, dope fiend moves etc. etc., and of course real mutual combats.

Usually prisoners that are as “tough” as we are would sign the chrono which served 2 purposes for the pigs: 1. they didn’t have to write “enemy” or “separation” chronos and, 2. they didn’t have to inform Sacramento of these new wave “Gladiator Fights” and especially assaults which would’ve shown the public how untenable CDCr is.

Lastly here CDCr allowed and brought in boatloads of drugs, so that K2/Spice flooded the “market.” This was/is especially what connects prison gangster leadership to CDCr and perhaps the main thing that gets them to be used as mouthpieces of CDCr. [MIM(Prisons) adds: we’ve been documenting this across the country’s prison system for years, and California was late to the game here.]

Anyways, there’s been 2 murders here within a few days: one on my yard and one on another facility. Someone off the row is reported to have had a dead cellie (undetected) in the cell for 2 days – so much for welfare checks huh?

The next day someone overdosed on spice and died. They put the entire prison on lockdown (for their failures). No canteen, yard, etc. over here. i tried to get some unity to address at least the canteen since it had shit to do with this yard and address the contradictions this exposed for CDCr and its dirty hands and inability to “rehabilitate” shit. But this new culture is too ingrained for much unity, sadly most are big-ass cry babies since drugs/liquor etc. is always right around the corner and most don’t see CDCr (as a whole) as an opposing force.

Shit i was even told i shouldn’t disparage all C/O’s as pigs and this contradicts my previous point that we can’t make blanket condemnations against “our” own people like “nigga’s ain’t shit!” i was trying to draw from BLA-CC collected works on the “class” point there. But the self-hatred is palpable in 2025. Here we’re so warped even Euro-Amerikans say nigga nigga nigga to refer to themselves and others. Latinos tho got it super bad and this new New Afrikan gang culture encourages our self-hatred. It’s pretty bad.

Anyways, not only was i screamin’ in the wind soon as we came up 3 prisoners assaulted another one and the “pigs” encouraged them (per usual) to sign mutual combat chronos so no one was separated, etc. Usually if one wants to retaliate it’ll just be written as another mutual combat but this cat came out with a knife and laid one out right in front of the pigs – DOA.

Now we’re on lockdown (which means shit to the propped up leadership CDCr has empowered as they’re always out). But the news says Lancaster has heightened security due to “a surge of violence.” This may prove to be a nodal point as CDCr must not only justify its actions but it will use this to “take their prison back”. i’m told all Level 4’s are affected and even tablets will be taken.

All that most people see is a lockdown “period” so until CDCr begins to reconfigure prisons – which they’re doing right now. i don’t see much mass consciousness, but i’ve made a few solid connections and hope this is something that pulls us forward. We’ll see.

Greetings,

I’m writing to express my gratitude to the publishers of Under Lock & Key. I was in receipt of your newspaper (the Fall 2024 issue, No. 87) and I appreciate it. The content was very informative. I was recently introduced to the prison movement by my comrade. So I am fairly new to the movement, but I’m not new to the struggle or to the oppressive ways of this noxious system.

I have been incarcerated now for 14 years. I understand that there are plenty of significant issues going on world-wide in and outside of this wicked prison system, but I would like to shine light on the fact that two thirds of the prisoner population here in North Carolina is strung out on drugs. These so-called “correctional facilities” are actually drug-infested mental health institutions. I have watched the expansion of the drug K2 (a chemical based toxin) transform the entire prison system as a whole. This drug is commonly referred to as “prison crack” due to the addictiveness of this poison.

When I first entered the prison system, brothers used to share knowledge, work out together, play cards or chess, etc. The prison guards (C.O.’s) used to have a certain respect/fear of us due to the unity we displayed. However, K2 has single-handedly dismantled and diminished every aspect of that culture. The C.O.’s no longer respect us as a whole because now when they enter a block 80% of the inhabitants are incoherent; unable to talk, walk or even simply pick their heads up to acknowledge the fact that the so-called authorities/overseers have entered the block.

A majority of the people in prison wake up and before they even brush their teeth they inhale the chemicals of this despicable substance – subduing faithfully to this drug all day. This routine is repeated daily. Not all but most of the K2 users wake up just to chase after the intense, short-lived high all throughout the day. These days turn to weeks, weeks to months, and months to years. This is a dangerous cycle that has plagued the N.C. prison system.

K2 has caused guys to neglect their morals and principles. No longer caring how others perceive them. Most K2 smokers carry themselves like fiends selling anything and everything they can get their hands on: shoes, food, hygiene items, literally everything they own. I have witnessed people sell their free, state-provided food trays, starving themselves and surviving off only one meal a day just to get high. Ruining relationships with family and friends due to them constantly calling trying to manipulate them out of money on a relentless search of monetary donations to purchase more K2. They show no regard for the actual well-being of the members of their support system.

In summary, this drug is causing people to exit prison worse than they were when they came in, if indeed they make it home at all. The K2 toxin has been known to cause death on many occasions. All of this has increased the need for those of us who are conscious to make it a priority to help push the agenda of MIM’s “Revolutionary 12 Step Program” designed to expose and combat addiction. Again, I would like to say thank you to the publishers of ULK for providing a platform for us prisoners to express ourselves freely. I will continue to advocate for the MIM movement. Thank you for your time and attention.

Florida DOC Tablet Saga

When tablets came out in 2017 the very first tablets were sold to the prisoners. I had a loved one to buy me one. Then the Florida Department of Corrections (FDOC) decided to change the mail to digital mail, so FDOC picked up all tablets that the prisoners paid for and came back around and passed out free tablets for every one. Since then all tablets have been updated no less than three times.

This comrade just got released from a Close Management Unit and was transferred to Hamilton C.I. Since I got here I found out that for the past year the Property Room Sergeant has been confiscating tablets, most of the time giving prisoners a disciplinary report for tablet tampering in which prisoners are found guilty 99% of the time and are suspended indefinitely from having another tablet. On top of this, most now have a loan on their inmate trust fund account of $130 restitution. FDOC gave a little for a period of time, then turned around and took everything. They gave the tablets, tablets belong to the state, and now they have an excuse to take them.

The Prisoner Population

I’ve been in prison for 28 years and this whole thing changed. This is not a prison anymore, this is a child care center for these fools to hang out. Everybody wants to belong to a gang but let me remind you that before you take that oath, you need to find out why that nation, group, or gang was born. It was born by the oppressed to fight in unity as a group against oppression. Who is the oppressor? Pigs that work here, the administration, the system, the state, the government. I know my history, do you know yours?

FDOC have a total of no more than 30 officers per shift (with 1/4 of them pushing overtime) and that is counting the front controls operators. It is embarrassing how that small group of pigs can control, oppress, and abuse no less than 1250 to 1500 prisoners, thugs, gangsters, criminals, and gang members. FDOC prisoners have no unity and no self-respect. I said self-respect because I might have a debt of a 78 cent soup and you ready to kill me, but the pigs call you and the whole dorm a “bunch of bitches” and you put your head down.

FDOC prisoners, mostly gang members, would rather have the pigs as a friend than anybody else with the same uniform color. They respect the pigs more than their fellow prisoners. Ali-al haf from Georgia, I read your article in the ULK Winter 2025 issue – you are not alone! I think it is a virus that is spreading. Now prisoners do the pigs’ jobs. They check and make sure that your cell door is secure, they pass mail, they make sure you don’t eat twice in the chow-hall, they even stand next to some of the pigs like bodyguards. All this ass kissing and at the end of the night your ass is just like mine: locked down behind a door. It doesn’t matter how down you might think the pigs will be, at the end of the day they will not put their paychecks on the line because of you. Coño Preso – look at the fucking color of your uniform. Ain’t you noticed that it has a different color!

Learn the difference between a right and a privilege. Use the grievance process, you must leave a written historical track in case issues need to be handled at another level. Written proof is all there is that shows a peaceful avenue was tried before going all the way out. All those comrades that in the past sacrificed their prison sentences, release dates, family, and some of them even their lives for this new generation to throw their hands up and surrender. Really? That is how we’re doing time in 2025?? Where are your cojones??

Let’s get together in the same line of thought. Before you complain about not having a tablet or not being able to watch the game on TV, we need to think about how high canteen prices are, receive more gain time, bring parole to lifers like me, get better food. Sorry, but prison is not a place that you come to to hang out with your homies and have a good time. This is the cemetery of the walking living dead, where your whole future could change in 15 seconds. Don’t forget where you are, your culture, where you came from. Do not submit to do the pigs’ work. I won’t be surprised if in a few more years visitation is done solely via video and they stop all contact visits. If we don’t get together and stand up and work as a group, as a family, we are going to keep losing. Remember that before you became a gang member you were a man, a human being – not a beast. And I refuse to be trapped like one. No quiero abrazos con la vida hasta que mi pueblo sea libre.

A Georgia prisoner echoes Ali-al haf’s report: Here at Baldwin State Prison in Hardwick, Georgia, some things are the same as Valdosta, GA. Gang members having a room all to themselves and picking on the weak, taking all their property.

In one building the unity manager has her boys, [gang members] to beat some prisoners up (mostly whites). It is told that the female officer unit manager is a [gang] member. She is always talking down to the whites.

The drugs are plenty here and the drug called strips is where most go to.

The mail system is really screwed up. Mail is passed out maybe two times a week. The mailroom officer puts mail out daily for night shift to pass out.

Stabbings happen daily. Some cut themselves to be placed in the hole to get away from the gang members. Some gang members force some, mostly whites, to put money on their books or send them cash and make them go to the store for the full amount only to take it from them and officers let it happen.

Baldwin State has nicknames such as “Bloody Baldwin”, “Body Bag”, and “Cut Throat”. The names fit well.

$prayer responds from Pennsylvania: Our comrades here in the PADOC would rather be focused on going at each other and being on the C.O.’s side and doing a bunch of nonsense, it’s sad. Our comrades aren’t even focused on their own lives like they should be instead of worrying what others are doing. They oppress their other comrades like they’re the oppressor, like they’re not oppressed by the oppressors too. The oppressing comrades do what the oppressors want them to do so they take the heat off of their own backs and put it on their own comrades’ backs. Like I really can’t believe all of the OPPRESSION between comrades, it’s really sad. Like the oppressing comrades call us (who stand against the criminals of permission “cops”) rats, but look at what they’re doing, they’re doing the oppressors’ bidding. So who’s the real rat? They are, aren’t they, since they’re doing the oppressors’ bidding right? They really need to ask themselves who’s the rat. We’re supposed to stand up to our oppressors, not stand with them against our own comrades. Am I right or am I wrong?

MIM(Prisons) adds: We also published a report in February from a Tennessee prisoner being extorted by a drug gang that was protected by staff. Ali-al haf’s article really struck a cord with our readers, indicating the state of affairs across the prison systems on occupied Turtle Island. This relates to our campaign: Stop Snitching, Stop Collaborating, where comrades have repeatedly pointed out that you can’t snitch on pigs. These prisoners described above are collaborating with the enemy.

But lumpen orgs working with the imperialists is not a forgone conclusion. We know this because there are plenty examples in history of lumpen orgs working on the side of anti-imperialism, especially in the internal colonies of the United $tates. We also know this because, as Trauma points out, there is a common material interest in the lumpen coming together for conditions and for respect. And as $prayer says, most prisoners should be comrades on the same side. We can make that happen through education and organization. We must build institutions that serve the interests of the lumpen better than the state does, to win over the masses.

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>

We have the First Step Act (FSA) here and if on wait list or just in programs/classes our phone minutes are supposed to be free! They were charging me again since COVID is gone, but I filed. They now give me six calls free so they know I was right. But they are actually supposed to give all sentenced prisoners 570 minutes so I filed further just today. This has to go to region, which here is in Kansas. So if they deny it I’ll take it to DC! I gave some guys here my info and they said they’ll file so maybe there is some hope here after all! If we don’t fight together they’ll bully us and do whatever the hell they want! And I will do my best to not allow that to go down.

Here they keep coming up with what they call Institutional Supplements and for the FSA it states those aren’t required, so I’m fighting that part right now. I’ll keep you posted. Let your federal readers know that if you’re in a lock up situation such as the ADX, SMU or CMU or lock down they are still allowed FSA incentives, even if you’re just on a wait list for programming. And if you aren’t getting it, then file.

Comrades in SCI-Muncy came together to draft a petition for people imprisoned by the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections. The petition demands that the state ensure that grievances be addressed by PADOC staff in a timely manner, and that people do not face retaliation for filing a grievance. The comrades ask for additional contacts to add to the list to send the petition to, and any other edits from others in Pennsylvania.

Last summer, around June, I ordered several copies of the North Carolina Grievance petition from MIM, then had copies made and sent out. Then I announced to the block how to use the petition forms as a solution to our grievances not being answered. The forms were then distributed in the block, door-to-door in our segregated dorm. Sadly some papers were heard being ripped up as soon as they entered the cell. I challenged the chicken-shits to reveal themselves, to no avail. The remaining forms were distributed in other blocks. It wasn’t long before I realized hardly anyone would use the forms.

A couple weeks later my neighbor mentions the petition during a conversation with someone else and was telling the guy, “the police gave it to him, he saving it to the day he need to file a grievance so he could attach it to the grievance.” Translation: he has no idea how to use the petition.

Other than some people being lazy and others who just don’t care, this is what I learned:

• I can’t assume we are all convicts
• Gather participants first and speak to each of them to confirm their ambitions
• Write directions on top of the form, where to send it, such as “send to address on last page or which ever office/dept you’re trying to target”
• Sometimes an orchestrator may need to influence members to participate

Close fist, Panther struggle

Anti-Imperialist Prisoner Support Responds: This comrade’s resilience in the face of the in-justice system is admirable. Rights and well-being of prisoners are completely secondary to the main objective of national oppression. However, we should remember that many prisoners face a choice between attempting to integrate into the imperialist machine and rejecting the U.$. in favor of proletarian internationalism. “U.$. Citizen” is a false identity that on the one hand, seeks to unite the masses of oppressed nations with their oppressors, and on the other hand seeks to draw the lumpenproletariat into closer benefit from the spoils of imperialism via citizenship in the empire. Each of these reasons must be rejected in our work if we wish to fight for a society without oppression, forging a new internationalist identity that fights for national liberation independent from the empire.