thenation--2020-07-13--Witnessing the Pandemic From the Front Lines at New York City’s Oldest Public Hospital

“ This will define your life , ” my attending physician said .
it was the middle of an April night in the intensive care unit .
Covid-19 was surging through New York City , overwhelming hospitals .
Earlier that evening , another of our patients died .
Our team had worked desperately to save his life .
When I called his wife to give the news , she wailed into the phone in horror and disbelief .
During a rare lull in our work , my attending , a pulmonary and critical care physician , asked how I was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ resident physician in internal medicine , still training to practice medicine independently .
I rely on my attendings to guide me through uncertainty .
“ I ’ m OK , ” I told him , hoping that saying it would make it true .
Before Covid came , I had accepted a three-year fellowship position , which begins this July , to specialize in pulmonary and critical care medicine .
PCCM physicians are meant to be experts in lung diseases , procedures like intubation , and ventilator management .
The field ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the sickest Covid patients .
My experience in this crisis has been shaped not only by my field and the fact that I am in New York City but also by the hospital where I work .
Bellevue in Manhattan is the nation ’ s oldest public hospital , known for its response to prior scourges like yellow fever , tuberculosis , and AIDS .
Today it is one of 11 public hospitals that make up NYC Health + Hospitals , including Elmhurst Hospital in Queens , Lincoln in the Bronx , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of H+H , Bellevue provides care to anyone who comes through its doors .
Among its patients are some of the most marginalized New Yorkers : the homeless , incarcerated , impoverished , and undocumented .
It was Bellevue ’ s history that drew me to train here .
That it has been at the forefront of epidemics and in the care of the marginalized is no accident .
Infectious diseases have a long history of preying on the neglected and oppressed .
When the Covid pandemic began , there was talk of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as history would have predicted , that turned out not to be the case .
Black and Hispanic New Yorkers 45 to 64 have died from Covid at about three times the rate of their white counterparts .
Among the younger population , the disparity is even more stark : Black and Hispanic New Yorkers 18 to 44 have died at nearly five times the rate of their white counterparts .
While wealthy New Yorkers have sought safe haven in home offices and vacation homes , the virus has spread rapidly through the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , and homeless shelters .
As I tend to my patients in the Covid ICU , I struggle to process reality .
The attending physicians who are my teachers have few answers ; this disease is new to all of us .
Faced with so much uncertainty and devastation , history is the closest thing I have to a guide .
I grew up about a three-hour car ride north of Bellevue—but a world apart .
Saratoga Springs was comfortable and homogenous .
We had a backyard pool , a wood-paneled station wagon @ @ @ @ @ @ @ youngest of six siblings in a big Irish Catholic family , I was under the impression that my great-aunt ’ s marriage to an Italian Catholic made our family multicultural .
My grandfather , a signals officer on a Navy ship in World War II , referred to New York City as “ the zoo , ” conjuring in my mind a wild and dangerous place .
As a teenager , I knew I wanted to become a doctor .
I spent the summer after my freshman year in college in a lab @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
I was terribly bored and not very good at it .
Realizing that if I wanted to someday care for patients , I needed to learn about health care at the human level , the next summer I persuaded the staff at a small HIV/AIDS advocacy organization in San Francisco , Project Inform , to take me on as an intern .
Project Inform was founded in 1985 by AIDS activist Martin Delaney to expedite the development and distribution of potential AIDS treatments .
He said the 1980s in the Castro neighborhood @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s gay community , was like “ walking in the graveyard.
” As he and his friends faced the devastation of this new disease , they were met with government silence .
President Ronald Reagan didn ’ t give a major public address on the crisis until 1987 , after nearly 21,000 Americans had died of AIDS .
Looking back on the crisis , Delaney estimated that he ’ d lost 80 percent of his friends to the disease .
He died of liver cancer in 2009 .
Over his years of AIDS @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ally in Dr. Anthony Fauci , who was appointed head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in 1984 and remains in that position .
Fauci said of Delaney , “ Without his tireless work and vision , many more people would have perished from HIV/AIDS… .
He was a formidable activist and a dear friend.
” As a 19-year-old intern at Project Inform in 2008 , more than a decade after the peak of the AIDS crisis in the United States , I didn ’ t see young gay men @ @ @ @ @ @ @ treatment .
By then , effective treatments had been developed ; the critical issues were lack of access to treatment and prevention .
( HIV/AIDS still disproportionately affects people of color and the poor—the same groups disproportionately affected by Covid . )
Nonetheless , the legacy of those desperate early years was palpable there .
The middle-aged gay men I worked with , whether they had been infected by the virus or not , were all survivors of a plague .
What It Means When You Wear a Mask—and When You Refuse To @ @ @ @ @ @ @ HIV/AIDS physician so I could learn about her career in medicine .
In a conference room in her clinic , the gray-haired doctor told me that she had lost over a thousand patients to AIDS .
I recall sensing that her soul was tired .
Talking with her , I realized how little I knew of the devastation and destruction of disease .
I wondered if I could ever do such heartbreaking work but also longed to have such a sense of purpose .
When I started my biology and chemistry premedical courses @ @ @ @ @ @ @ involved a straightforward formula of studying science and wanting to help .
What I learned about AIDS , beginning with my time at Project Inform , added vital complexity to that formula .
I learned that like a virus , neglect and oppression can kill and that like medication , activism can save lives .
I realized all the medical training in the world can still leave doctors powerless in the face of disease .
I came to believe that sometimes the most important work a doctor can do is to be present @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sorrow .
On July 1 , 2017 , a month after graduating from medical school , I started my three-year internal medicine residency at Bellevue .
These years have been an education in the bodily manifestations of inequality .
Though my colleagues and I strive to provide excellent medical care , our tools are inadequate to mend the harm done by racism , mass incarceration , inadequate housing , poverty , and cruel immigration policies .
In my primary care clinic , I struggled for months trying to help an undocumented immigrant manage @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , I suggested he inject insulin multiple times a day because once a day didn ’ t seem to be working .
He told me that wasn ’ t possible at his workplace—a low-wage job with few protections .
So I proposed plan B , and when that wasn ’ t possible , plan C. We worked together within the constraints of his life to try to prevent the complications of diabetes , like blindness , amputations , and kidney failure .
In the back of my mind , I feared we were @ @ @ @ @ @ @ months remaining in my residency , the Covid pandemic was declared .
As my friends with office jobs began working from home , I worried about people like my primary care patient , who wouldn ’ t have that option .
Would information on the new virus be available in his language ?
If he lost his job , what source of income would he have as an undocumented immigrant ?
If he got infected , how could he maintain social distance in overcrowded housing to keep his family and neighbors safe ?
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ face a higher chance of death because of his poorly controlled diabetes , itself largely the product of his difficult circumstances ?
By the end of March , I was caring for patients with Covid in the ICU .
Nearly all of them were intubated and on ventilators because their lungs were so severely damaged from the virus .
A necessary but unfortunate consequence of this was that I couldn ’ t talk to my patients and get to know them .
Which may be why the memory of one patient with whom @ @ @ @ @ @ @ mind .
Mr. Perez ( I have changed his name to protect his privacy ) was a middle-aged man with diabetes who came to the hospital with a fever and cough .
His oxygen levels were normal when he tested positive for Covid .
However , his blood work came back with severe electrolyte derangements , likely triggered by the disease .
Perez diligently covered his mouth with a face mask , only briefly revealing a gentle smile when the nurse checked his temperature .
When I told him that he had Covid @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , I wondered if he realized he was on a precipice .
I hoped that my mask and face shield concealed my fears and that my voice conveyed optimistic competence .
“ Gracias , doctora , ” he said , steadying his gaze straight ahead .
Our 54-bed ICU was overflowing with Covid patients , so we wheeled Perez to a satellite unit , a part of the hospital that had been temporarily converted into an ICU to manage the surge .
The satellite ICU had several beds in an open arrangement .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Aside from Perez , all the other patients had breathing tubes in their mouths and their eyes closed .
I worried what he would think of his own fate , seeing the others .
I assured him that while all the other patients had Covid , his case was different , as he needed just medications , not a ventilator .
“ Va a estar bien , ” I told him .
It ’ s going to be OK. Not long after we arrived in the ICU , Perez ’ s heart @ @ @ @ @ @ @ plummeted .
Alongside an attending physician volunteer from the West Coast and an agency nurse from the South , I pushed fluids and medications into his veins to control his heart rate .
He shook with chills as I wrapped him in blankets and rubbed his back .
Sweat dripped down my back under my plastic gown as I whispered to my attending , “ I don ’ t have a good feeling about him.
” Eventually , we stabilized him .
His heart rate and blood pressure came back to normal .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Va a estar bien , ” I said again , hoping he might get some rest .
I was about to leave the satellite ICU when I saw my attending on the other side of the room with another patient .
He was standing over a bed alongside two nurses , his head bent down in thought .
I approached to ask if they needed help .
But before I could open my mouth , I saw that the nurses were zipping shut a white bag that held the patient ’ s body @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people with Covid , I braced myself for a deluge of patient deaths unlike anything I had ever experienced .
By the time I met Perez , hundreds of New Yorkers were dying each day .
Through our efforts , we saved many lives .
But so many of my patients died , including Perez .
Though we corrected his electrolyte issues and stabilized him for the night , Covid blossomed in his lungs .
Despite medicine ’ s best tools , he did not survive .
People cope with this crisis in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to focus on the silver linings .
Bellevue began playing Journey ’ s “ Don ’ t Stop Believin ’ ” on the overhead speakers whenever patients were discharged .
Colleagues post on Instagram the chalk messages on sidewalks that tell us we are heroes .
These gestures bring some people real joy , and I don ’ t want to take that from them .
But for me , they are like cupcakes on an empty stomach—though temptingly sweet , they ultimately leave me feeling starved for real sustenance .
I find @ @ @ @ @ @ @ devastation of this crisis to be seen and acknowledged for what it really is .
I don ’ t want to be soothed so much as believed .
During the surge , when I had a few days off , I started to question myself and what I had seen with my own eyes .
Was it really that bad ?
Are you sure you ’ re not exaggerating this ?
And then a text from a friend working in the hospital , grieving the death of another patient , brought the visceral @ @ @ @ @ @ @ State Budgets to the Brink What It Means When You Wear a Mask—and When You Refuse To More in this series During the surge , when every patient in our ICU had Covid , I would sometimes walk a long lap around the unit .
I wanted to see all the patients through their glass doors not to check on their vital signs or assess their breathing but to acknowledge them as human beings .
That private ritual allowed me to hold in my mind both the individual tragedy of this disease and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Since Covid came to New York City , I have been thinking of my time working in HIV/AIDS that so deeply shaped my outlook on medicine more than 10 years ago .
Dr. Abigail Zuger was , like me , a resident physician in internal medicine at Bellevue .
From 1981 to 1984 , she cared for scores of people with AIDS .
“ We grew accustomed to watching our AIDS patients die amid all the glitter of medical technology , ” she wrote in 1987 .
“ We could offer them only @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Reflecting on his experience , Fauci said , “ With AIDS in those days , I saved no one .
It was the darkest time of my life.
” For me , it is a balm in this crisis to remember an earlier generation of doctors who witnessed so many patients die of a new disease while they themselves felt powerless .
Their example gives me strength to face our new reality .
Some of my colleagues describe what we have seen as war .
Others call it a mass casualty event .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ words to name it .
But whatever we call it , I do not want to rush to heal from it .
I need time to sit in the darkness and tend to the sorrow .
When my patients are on the precipice , I want the strength to look down into the abyss with them .
I know how tempting it is to reach for comforting platitudes : I told Perez he would be OK .
But we can ’ t address this crisis , individually or societally , unless we see @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as we wish they were .
Our country alone has lost more than 120,000 lives to this pandemic .
That number grows daily .
Even as we work to treat the sick and prevent Covid ’ s further spread , we must also remember the dead .
From the AIDS Memorial Quilt to ACT UP die-ins , AIDS activists showed us that mourning and memorial are necessary , life-sustaining work .
Without it , the dead suffer a second death of erasure .
They become data points devoid of individuality and meaning .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ have lost , our commitments to protect the living ring hollow .
As I walked the halls of our ICU during the April surge , I remembered the words of Prior Walter , the protagonist of Tony Kushner ’ s two-part play about the AIDS crisis , Angels in America .
Prior knows the precipice between life and death .
He has stared into the abyss and come back to tell us , “ This disease will be the end of many of us , but not nearly all , and the dead @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with the living… .
We won ’ t die secret deaths anymore .
The world only spins forward .
”

EDITOR’S NOTE: The Nation believes that helping readers stay informed about the impact of the coronavirus crisis is a form of public service. For that reason, this article, and all of our coronavirus coverage, is now free. Please subscribe to support our writers and staff, and stay healthy.
This article appears in the July 27/August 3, 2020 issue.
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“This will define your life,” my attending physician said. it was the middle of an April night in the intensive care unit. Covid-19 was surging through New York City, overwhelming hospitals. Earlier that evening, another of our patients died. Our team had worked desperately to save his life. When I called his wife to give the news, she wailed into the phone in horror and disbelief.
During a rare lull in our work, my attending, a pulmonary and critical care physician, asked how I was holding up. I’m a resident physician in internal medicine, still training to practice medicine independently. I rely on my attendings to guide me through uncertainty. “I’m OK,”
I told him, hoping that saying it would make it true.
Before Covid came, I had accepted a three-year fellowship position, which begins this July, to specialize in pulmonary and critical care medicine. PCCM physicians are meant to be experts in lung diseases, procedures like intubation, and ventilator management. The field’s foreseeable future—and therefore mine—is largely devoted to the sickest Covid patients. Current Issue View our current issue
My experience in this crisis has been shaped not only by my field and the fact that I am in New York City but also by the hospital where I work. Bellevue in Manhattan is the nation’s oldest public hospital, known for its response to prior scourges like yellow fever, tuberculosis, and AIDS. Today it is one of 11 public hospitals that make up NYC Health + Hospitals, including Elmhurst Hospital in Queens, Lincoln in the Bronx, and Woodhull in Brooklyn. Like the rest of H+H, Bellevue provides care to anyone who comes through its doors. Among its patients are some of the most marginalized New Yorkers: the homeless, incarcerated, impoverished, and undocumented.
It was Bellevue’s history that drew me to train here. That it has been at the forefront of epidemics and in the care of the marginalized is no accident. Infectious diseases have a long history of preying on the neglected and oppressed. When the Covid pandemic began, there was talk of it being a great equalizer. But as history would have predicted, that turned out not to be the case. Black and Hispanic New Yorkers 45 to 64 have died from Covid at about three times the rate of their white counterparts. Among the younger population, the disparity is even more stark: Black and Hispanic New Yorkers 18 to 44 have died at nearly five times the rate of their white counterparts. While wealthy New Yorkers have sought safe haven in home offices and vacation homes, the virus has spread rapidly through the city’s essential workplaces, jails, and homeless shelters. Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann
As I tend to my patients in the Covid ICU, I struggle to process reality. The attending physicians who are my teachers have few answers; this disease is new to all of us. Faced with so much uncertainty and devastation, history is the closest thing I have to a guide.
I grew up about a three-hour car ride north of Bellevue—but a world apart. Saratoga Springs was comfortable and homogenous. We had a backyard pool, a wood-paneled station wagon, and a golden retriever. The youngest of six siblings in a big Irish Catholic family, I was under the impression that my great-aunt’s marriage to an Italian Catholic made our family multicultural. My grandfather, a signals officer on a Navy ship in World War II, referred to New York City as “the zoo,” conjuring in my mind a wild and dangerous place.
As a teenager, I knew I wanted to become a doctor. I spent the summer after my freshman year in college in a lab injecting messenger RNA into zebra fish embryos. I was terribly bored and not very good at it. Realizing that if I wanted to someday care for patients, I needed to learn about health care at the human level, the next summer I persuaded the staff at a small HIV/AIDS advocacy organization in San Francisco, Project Inform, to take me on as an intern.
Project Inform was founded in 1985 by AIDS activist Martin Delaney to expedite the development and distribution of potential AIDS treatments. He said the 1980s in the Castro neighborhood, the hub of San Francisco’s gay community, was like “walking in the graveyard.” As he and his friends faced the devastation of this new disease, they were met with government silence. President Ronald Reagan didn’t give a major public address on the crisis until 1987, after nearly 21,000 Americans had died of AIDS. Looking back on the crisis, Delaney estimated that he’d lost 80 percent of his friends to the disease.
He died of liver cancer in 2009. Over his years of AIDS treatment advocacy, he had found an ally in Dr. Anthony Fauci, who was appointed head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in 1984 and remains in that position. Fauci said of Delaney, “Without his tireless work and vision, many more people would have perished from HIV/AIDS…. He was a formidable activist and a dear friend.”
As a 19-year-old intern at Project Inform in 2008, more than a decade after the peak of the AIDS crisis in the United States, I didn’t see young gay men dying from AIDS with little hope of treatment. By then, effective treatments had been developed; the critical issues were lack of access to treatment and prevention. (HIV/AIDS still disproportionately affects people of color and the poor—the same groups disproportionately affected by Covid.) Nonetheless, the legacy of those desperate early years was palpable there. The middle-aged gay men I worked with, whether they had been infected by the virus or not, were all survivors of a plague. The Mask What It Means When You Wear a Mask—and When You Refuse To Rhea Boyd
That summer I met with a seasoned HIV/AIDS physician so I could learn about her career in medicine. In a conference room in her clinic, the gray-haired doctor told me that she had lost over a thousand patients to AIDS. I recall sensing that her soul was tired. Talking with her, I realized how little I knew of the devastation and destruction of disease. I wondered if I could ever do such heartbreaking work but also longed to have such a sense of purpose.
When I started my biology and chemistry premedical courses, I thought becoming a good doctor involved a straightforward formula of studying science and wanting to help. What I learned about AIDS, beginning with my time at Project Inform, added vital complexity to that formula. I learned that like a virus, neglect and oppression can kill and that like medication, activism can save lives. I realized all the medical training in the world can still leave doctors powerless in the face of disease. I came to believe that sometimes the most important work a doctor can do is to be present with her patients in their fear and sorrow.
On July 1, 2017, a month after graduating from medical school, I started my three-year internal medicine residency at Bellevue. These years have been an education in the bodily manifestations of inequality. Though my colleagues and I strive to provide excellent medical care, our tools are inadequate to mend the harm done by racism, mass incarceration, inadequate housing, poverty, and cruel immigration policies.
In my primary care clinic, I struggled for months trying to help an undocumented immigrant manage his diabetes. Through a phone interpreter, I suggested he inject insulin multiple times a day because once a day didn’t seem to be working. He told me that wasn’t possible at his workplace—a low-wage job with few protections. So I proposed plan B, and when that wasn’t possible, plan C. We worked together within the constraints of his life to try to prevent the complications of diabetes, like blindness, amputations, and kidney failure. In the back of my mind, I feared we were delaying the inevitable.
With just four months remaining in my residency, the Covid pandemic was declared. As my friends with office jobs began working from home, I worried about people like my primary care patient, who wouldn’t have that option. Would information on the new virus be available in his language? If he lost his job, what source of income would he have as an undocumented immigrant? If he got infected, how could he maintain social distance in overcrowded housing to keep his family and neighbors safe? If he became ill, would he face a higher chance of death because of his poorly controlled diabetes, itself largely the product of his difficult circumstances?
By the end of March, I was caring for patients with Covid in the ICU. Nearly all of them were intubated and on ventilators because their lungs were so severely damaged from the virus. A necessary but unfortunate consequence of this was that I couldn’t talk to my patients and get to know them. Which may be why the memory of one patient with whom I did speak stands out in my mind.
Mr. Perez (I have changed his name to protect his privacy) was a middle-aged man with diabetes who came to the hospital with a fever and cough. His oxygen levels were normal when he tested positive for Covid. However, his blood work came back with severe electrolyte derangements, likely triggered by the disease.
Perez diligently covered his mouth with a face mask, only briefly revealing a gentle smile when the nurse checked his temperature. When I told him that he had Covid and needed to be in the ICU, I wondered if he realized he was on a precipice. I hoped that my mask and face shield concealed my fears and that my voice conveyed optimistic competence. “Gracias, doctora,” he said, steadying his gaze straight ahead.
Our 54-bed ICU was overflowing with Covid patients, so we wheeled Perez to a satellite unit, a part of the hospital that had been temporarily converted into an ICU to manage the surge. The satellite ICU had several beds in an open arrangement. No walls or curtains separated the patients. Aside from Perez, all the other patients had breathing tubes in their mouths and their eyes closed. I worried what he would think of his own fate, seeing the others.
I assured him that while all the other patients had Covid, his case was different, as he needed just medications, not a ventilator. “Va a estar bien,” I told him. It’s going to be OK.
Not long after we arrived in the ICU, Perez’s heart rate skyrocketed, and his blood pressure plummeted. Alongside an attending physician volunteer from the West Coast and an agency nurse from the South, I pushed fluids and medications into his veins to control his heart rate. He shook with chills as I wrapped him in blankets and rubbed his back. Sweat dripped down my back under my plastic gown as I whispered to my attending, “I don’t have a good feeling about him.”
Eventually, we stabilized him. His heart rate and blood pressure came back to normal. He was warm and comfortable. “Va a estar bien,” I said again, hoping he might get some rest.
I was about to leave the satellite ICU when I saw my attending on the other side of the room with another patient. He was standing over a bed alongside two nurses, his head bent down in thought. I approached to ask if they needed help. But before I could open my mouth, I saw that the nurses were zipping shut a white bag that held the patient’s body.
After my first shifts caring for people with Covid, I braced myself for a deluge of patient deaths unlike anything I had ever experienced. By the time I met Perez, hundreds of New Yorkers were dying each day. Through our efforts, we saved many lives. But so many of my patients died, including Perez. Though we corrected his electrolyte issues and stabilized him for the night, Covid blossomed in his lungs. Despite medicine’s best tools, he did not survive.
People cope with this crisis in different ways. I understand the need to focus on the silver linings. Bellevue began playing Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’” on the overhead speakers whenever patients were discharged. Colleagues post on Instagram the chalk messages on sidewalks that tell us we are heroes. These gestures bring some people real joy, and I don’t want to take that from them. But for me, they are like cupcakes on an empty stomach—though temptingly sweet, they ultimately leave me feeling starved for real sustenance.
I find myself instead longing for the horror and devastation of this crisis to be seen and acknowledged for what it really is. I don’t want to be soothed so much as believed. During the surge, when I had a few days off, I started to question myself and what I had seen with my own eyes. Was it really that bad? Are you sure you’re not exaggerating this? And then a text from a friend working in the hospital, grieving the death of another patient, brought the visceral memories rushing back. Coronavirus Amid Partisan Politicking, Revelations on a Covid Origins Article Jimmy Tobias It’s Not “Unreasonable” to Want to Change Our Rotten Health Care System Gregg Gonsalves Covid Has Left Deep Wounds in America’s Rural Communities Anne N. Sosin
During the surge, when every patient in our ICU had Covid, I would sometimes walk a long lap around the unit. I wanted to see all the patients through their glass doors not to check on their vital signs or assess their breathing but to acknowledge them as human beings. That private ritual allowed me to hold in my mind both the individual tragedy of this disease and the massive scale of the crisis.
Since Covid came to New York City, I have been thinking of my time working in HIV/AIDS that so deeply shaped my outlook on medicine more than 10 years ago. Dr. Abigail Zuger was, like me, a resident physician in internal medicine at Bellevue. From 1981 to 1984, she cared for scores of people with AIDS. “We grew accustomed to watching our AIDS patients die amid all the glitter of medical technology,” she wrote in 1987. “We could offer them only comfort, sympathy, and palliation.” Reflecting on his experience, Fauci said, “With AIDS in those days, I saved no one. It was the darkest time of my life.” For me, it is a balm in this crisis to remember an earlier generation of doctors who witnessed so many patients die of a new disease while they themselves felt powerless. Their example gives me strength to face our new reality.
Some of my colleagues describe what we have seen as war. Others call it a mass casualty event. I am still struggling to find the words to name it. But whatever we call it, I do not want to rush to heal from it. I need time to sit in the darkness and tend to the sorrow. When my patients are on the precipice, I want the strength to look down into the abyss with them. I know how tempting it is to reach for comforting platitudes: I told Perez he would be OK. But we can’t address this crisis, individually or societally, unless we see things as they really are, not as we wish they were.
Our country alone has lost more than 120,000 lives to this pandemic. That number grows daily. Even as we work to treat the sick and prevent Covid’s further spread, we must also remember the dead. From the AIDS Memorial Quilt to ACT UP die-ins, AIDS activists showed us that mourning and memorial are necessary, life-sustaining work. Without it, the dead suffer a second death of erasure. They become data points devoid of individuality and meaning. When we neglect to honor those we have lost, our commitments to protect the living ring hollow.
As I walked the halls of our ICU during the April surge, I remembered the words of Prior Walter, the protagonist of Tony Kushner’s two-part play about the AIDS crisis, Angels in America. Prior knows the precipice between life and death. He has stared into the abyss and come back to tell us, “This disease will be the end of many of us, but not nearly all, and the dead will be commemorated and will struggle on with the living…. We won’t die secret deaths anymore. The world only spins forward.”


thenation--2020-07-13--‘The Nation’ Names Kali Holloway as Columnist

New York , NY—July 13 , 2020—The Nation , America ’ s leading magazine of progressive politics and culture , today named Kali Holloway ( @ kalihollowayftw / New York , NY ) as a monthly columnist , covering inequality across race , gender , and class , and the devastating consequences inequality holds for the most vulnerable .
She will also be contributing several longer-form features each year .
Her first official column , out today , is “ Black Trans Lives Must Be Front and Center.
” “ From her first column , Kali has proven herself a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Nation editor D.D .
Guttenplan .
“ We ’ re delighted to have her on our masthead , and to have her voice and sharp intelligence in The Nation on inequality—the central issue of our time.
” “ American institutions , organizations , and systems have been shaped by inequality in ways both visible and hidden , micro and macro—and far too often , those inequities go unacknowledged , ” added Holloway .
“ I ’ m thrilled to have a home at The Nation to lift up and spotlight the lived experience @ @ @ @ @ @ @ through which to truly see our collective selves and the society we live , and to interrogate the functions of both.
” Holloway will be working with senior editor Emily Douglas , who said : “ In her features and columns for The Nation and other outlets , Kali ’ s voice , reporting , and historical analysis resound with moral clarity .
We are so pleased to be sharing her work with our readers on a regular basis.
” In her new role , Holloway will follow and comment on the perennially @ @ @ @ @ @ @ inequality both reflected in , and reinforced by , art and media ?
How do our press corps and news outlets ignore inequality , and at the same time , reify those inequities ?
What are the historical roots of our longstanding inequities , and how has inequality been both deliberately and inadvertently codified into law ?
How does capitalism exploit political , social , economic , gender and racial inequities , and who benefits ?
In times of crisis—like the moment we currently find ourselves in—how are inequities brought into stark relief @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for potential change , both good and bad ?
Holloway is the director of the Make it Right Project , a national initiative dedicated to taking down Confederate monuments and telling the truth about history .
Her previous commentary and reporting for The Nation includes : “ The Violence Didn ’ t Start With the Protests ; ” “ Ahmaud Arbery ’ s Killers Understood White Freedom Perfectly ; ” “ The Coronavirus Reveals That the Stars Are Not Like Us ; ” and “ Since Emancipation , the United States Has Refused @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s writing has also appeared in The Guardian , Salon , TIME , Huffington Post , The Daily Beast , The National Memo , Jezebel , and numerous other outlets .
She was previously associate editor at AlterNet and worked in production , programming , and outreach on short films and documentaries , including PBS ’ s POV , PBS ’ s The New Public , HBO ’ s Southern Rites , The New Black , and DJ Mojo : Music is Life .
The Nation ’ s robust coverage during the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and inflamed injustice across the sociopolitical spectrum—has championed progressive values and celebrated the power of protest in shaping a better , braver , and more just world .
Holloway joins a host of Nation writers singularly committed to combatting injustice and inequality , including justice correspondent and “ Objection !
” columnist Elie Mystal , civil rights correspondent Rev .
Dr. William J. Barber II , and strikes correspondent Jane McAlevey , among others .
For interview requests or further information , please see contact information above .
ABOUT : Founded by abolitionists @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the breadth and depth of political and cultural life , from the debut of the telegraph to the rise of Twitter , serving as a critical , independent , and progressive voice in American journalism .

Contact: Caitlin Graf, The Nation, press [at] thenation.com, 212-209-5400
New York, NY—July 13, 2020—The Nation, America’s leading magazine of progressive politics and culture, today named Kali Holloway (@kalihollowayftw / New York, N.Y.) as a monthly columnist, covering inequality across race, gender, and class, and the devastating consequences inequality holds for the most vulnerable. She will also be contributing several longer-form features each year. Her first official column, out today, is “Black Trans Lives Must Be Front and Center.”
“From her first column, Kali has proven herself a natural in the form,” said Nation editor D.D. Guttenplan. “We’re delighted to have her on our masthead, and to have her voice and sharp intelligence in The Nation on inequality—the central issue of our time.”
“American institutions, organizations, and systems have been shaped by inequality in ways both visible and hidden, micro and macro—and far too often, those inequities go unacknowledged,” added Holloway. “I’m thrilled to have a home at The Nation to lift up and spotlight the lived experience of inequality. It is a prism through which to truly see our collective selves and the society we live, and to interrogate the functions of both.”
Holloway will be working with senior editor Emily Douglas, who said, “In her features and columns for The Nation and other outlets, Kali’s voice, reporting, and historical analysis resound with moral clarity. We are so pleased to be sharing her work with our readers on a regular basis.”
In her new role, Holloway will follow and comment on the perennially relevant and timely topic: How is inequality both reflected in, and reinforced by, art and media? How do our press corps and news outlets ignore inequality, and at the same time, reify those inequities? What are the historical roots of our longstanding inequities, and how has inequality been both deliberately and inadvertently codified into law? How does capitalism exploit political, social, economic, gender, and racial inequities, and who benefits? In times of crisis—like the moment we currently find ourselves in—how are inequities brought into stark relief, and what makes those moments opportune for potential change, both good and bad? Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann
Holloway is the director of the Make it Right Project, a national initiative dedicated to taking down Confederate monuments and telling the truth about history. Her previous commentary and reporting for The Nation includes: “The Violence Didn’t Start With the Protests;” “Ahmaud Arbery’s Killers Understood White Freedom Perfectly;” “The Coronavirus Reveals That the Stars Are Not Like Us;” and “Since Emancipation, the United States Has Refused to Make Reparations for Slavery.” Current Issue View our current issue
Holloway’s writing has also appeared in The Guardian, Salon, Time, HuffPost, The Daily Beast, The National Memo, Jezebel, and numerous other outlets. She was previously associate editor at AlterNet and worked in production, programming, and outreach on short films and documentaries, including PBS’s POV, PBS’s The New Public, HBO’s Southern Rites, The New Black, and DJ Mojo: Music is Life.
The Nation’s robust coverage during the Trump administration—an administration that has singularly embraced and inflamed injustice across the sociopolitical spectrum—has championed progressive values and celebrated the power of protest in shaping a better, braver, and more just world. Holloway joins a host of Nation writers singularly committed to combating injustice and inequality, including justice correspondent and “Objection!” columnist Elie Mystal, civil rights correspondent Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II, and strikes correspondent Jane McAlevey, among others.
For interview requests or further information, please see contact information above.
ABOUT: Founded by abolitionists in 1865, The Nation has chronicled the breadth and depth of political and cultural life, from the debut of the telegraph to the rise of Twitter, serving as a critical, independent, and progressive voice in American journalism.
###


thenation--2020-07-13--Tear Down the Monuments, Bring Our Cities to Life

The Nation and Magnum Foundation are partnering on a visual chronicle of untold stories of the coronavirus crisis and the struggle for racial justice—read more from The Invisible Front Line .
—The Editors1 ichmond , a.—I have been living on and off in Richmond for the past few years , and like most people here , I avoided Monument Avenue .
The avenue runs through the heart of Richmond and , apart from one statue of the Richmond native tennis star and humanitarian Arthur Ashe built in 1996 , featured a string of five monuments memorializing confederate leaders : Stonewall @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Davis , Matthew Fontaine Maury , and Robert E. Lee .
All of these men fought and died for the right to enslave and dehumanize Black men and women .
These symbols of racist violence and white supremacy have loomed over the people of Richmond , the majority of whom are Black , for over 130 years .
Now , in a flash , only one is left standing.2 Over the past month , the former capital of the Confederacy has become a national epicenter of the Black Lives Matter movement , with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the city ’ s racist shrines , the Robert E. Lee Memorial , its focal point .
The Lee Memorial is now covered from top to bottom with anti-racist art and graffiti , and the surrounding area has been reclaimed as the Marcus David Peters Circle , after an unarmed 24-year-old Black man who was killed by Richmond police in 2018 while suffering a mental health emergency.3 The transformation and revitalization of what used to be an oppressive and uninviting space is breathtaking : Every day for over a month , people of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ out of town , have been visiting the Marcus David Peters Circle to witness history in the making .
They climb all over the colorfully spray-painted base of the monument , take pictures , write graffiti , draw pictures , play music , spin records , shoot basketball , kick soccer balls , dance , socialize , and have water balloon fights .
Activist encampments and booths providing food , water and hand sanitizer surround the circle , as well as a radical library , pop up gardens , and a nightly projection @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the monument in images of victims of police violence , Black leaders , and film clips of civil rights speeches .
Parents come to the site to teach their children , and other parents to mourn their children lost to police violence.4 I spent one afternoon with Emily DeCarlo , the mother of 31-year-old Angel DeCarlo , who was shot and killed by a Hopewell , Va. , police officer in 2018 .
At the base of the monument , Emily built a shrine of candles , flowers , photos , and words @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The day we met , she also brought a blanket imprinted with Angel ’ s image and one of her daughter ’ s favorite possessions , a crown of sparkly white feathers.5 Emily told me how Angel wanted to be a star and loved to sing , dance , and make recordings : “ She was so much more than what she was portrayed to be by the police.
” Angel DeCarlo was murdered by a police officer who claims that DeCarlo matched the description of a nearby robbery suspect and that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ignoring their commands to stop running .
But Emily says , “ He ’ s lying .
Other witnesses know he ’ s lying .
And he knows he ’ s lying.
” According to Emily , Angel did not own a gun , but she did have ample reason to fear the police .
Angel suffered from mental health issues , and had recently been arrested and imprisoned for two months for “ failure to identify to a police officer ” during a manic episode , instead of being provided the mental @ @ @ @ @ @ @ she was finally released , she was required to see a case manager three times before she qualified for inpatient mental health hospitalization—when she was killed , she had one case manager visit left to go.6 Emily hopes that the renewed focus on police violence will bring long overdue attention to her daughter ’ s case , but she also wants a place to share stories and remember her daughter in public , to make her pain and loss visible in a space reclaimed as a monument and memorial to Black lives .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ I counted 42 memorials dedicated to Black men and women killed by the police surrounding the statue ’ s base.7 By and large , the atmosphere at the Marcus David Peters Circle is peaceful and inspiring—almost everyone I spoke to who was visiting the area for the first time commented on the undeniable “ good vibes.
” Up until late June , local media coverage of the Lee monument was dominated by the frequent standoffs between protesters and police trying to clear the area at night , sometimes with tear gas and rubber @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been arrested .
Sometimes during the day , cars drive by to hurl insults or throw things into the circle , and activists have formed a small , armed security detail of their own .
However , for the past week , and since I have been documenting the circle , things seem to have remained calm and with minimal police presence.8 After activists took it upon themselves to remove some of the smaller statues commemorating anti-black violence and settler colonialism ( including a bust of Christopher Columbus , which was dragged into @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been systematically removing the remaining statues .
This week I joined hundreds of onlookers to witness the removal of the Confederate Soldiers and Sailors Statue and one of the last Confederate statues left on Monument Avenue , that of Stuart .
Now only the 14-foot-tall bronze sculpture of Lee on horseback remains .
The process of removing Lee is being held up in court by a descendant of the couple who signed a deed giving the monument ’ s land to the State of Virginia , yet everyone from the mayor of Richmond @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for its removal.9 Meanwhile , these statue removals have been criticized by some as nothing more than baby steps in the greater battle against systemic racism and police violence .
Activists , led in part by Marcus Davis Peters ’ s mother and the local anti–police violence organization Justice and Reformation , have been calling for much more than symbolic gestures .
Their demands include a Marcus Alert to insure that mental health professionals , as opposed to armed and improperly trained police officers , are first responders in situations like the one @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in jail .
They also call for defunding the police ( with funds reallocated to public education , human services , the environment , and general community welfare ) , an independent civilian review board with subpoena power to investigate claims of police abuse , the reopening of the Peters case , the dropping of all charges against all community members who have been arrested in connection with this current cycle of protests , and lastly , the removal of all of Richmond ’ s Confederate monuments.10 For now , Marcus Davis Peters @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hub for all this organizing .
In less than a month , a former monument to the Confederacy has become a powerful place of protest , a vibrant space for expression and a living , breathing work of art .
What was once a symbol of hate has transformed into a true community space , one that educates visitors about this country ’ s enduring legacy of racial violence , and provides a glimmer of the world this movement hopes to build.11

Katie Orlinsky, The Nation, Magnum Foundation

The Nation and Magnum Foundation are partnering on a visual chronicle of untold stories of the coronavirus crisis and the struggle for racial justice—read more from The Invisible Front Line. —The Editors1
R ichmond, V a.—I have been living on and off in Richmond for the past few years, and like most people here, I avoided Monument Avenue. The avenue runs through the heart of Richmond and, apart from one statue of the Richmond native tennis star and humanitarian Arthur Ashe built in 1996, featured a string of five monuments memorializing confederate leaders: Stonewall Jackson, J.E.B. Stuart, Jefferson Davis, Matthew Fontaine Maury, and Robert E. Lee. All of these men fought and died for the right to enslave and dehumanize Black men and women. These symbols of racist violence and white supremacy have loomed over the people of Richmond, the majority of whom are Black, for over 130 years. Now, in a flash, only one is left standing.2
Over the past month, the former capital of the Confederacy has become a national epicenter of the Black Lives Matter movement, with the tallest and most prominent of all the city’s racist shrines, the Robert E. Lee Memorial, its focal point. The Lee Memorial is now covered from top to bottom with anti-racist art and graffiti, and the surrounding area has been reclaimed as the Marcus David Peters Circle, after an unarmed 24-year-old Black man who was killed by Richmond police in 2018 while suffering a mental health emergency.3
The transformation and revitalization of what used to be an oppressive and uninviting space is breathtaking: Every day for over a month, people of all ages, both local and from out of town, have been visiting the Marcus David Peters Circle to witness history in the making. They climb all over the colorfully spray-painted base of the monument, take pictures, write graffiti, draw pictures, play music, spin records, shoot basketball, kick soccer balls, dance, socialize, and have water balloon fights. Activist encampments and booths providing food, water and hand sanitizer surround the circle, as well as a radical library, pop up gardens, and a nightly projection that drapes the of south side of the monument in images of victims of police violence, Black leaders, and film clips of civil rights speeches. Parents come to the site to teach their children, and other parents to mourn their children lost to police violence.4
I spent one afternoon with Emily DeCarlo, the mother of 31-year-old Angel DeCarlo, who was shot and killed by a Hopewell, Va., police officer in 2018. At the base of the monument, Emily built a shrine of candles, flowers, photos, and words telling the story of her slain daughter. The day we met, she also brought a blanket imprinted with Angel’s image and one of her daughter’s favorite possessions, a crown of sparkly white feathers.5
On the Fourth of July, a mother and daughter embrace while reading the memorial shrines to Black men and women killed by police violence that surround the base of the Robert E. Lee statue. (Katie Orlinsky)
Emily told me how Angel wanted to be a star and loved to sing, dance, and make recordings: “She was so much more than what she was portrayed to be by the police.” Angel DeCarlo was murdered by a police officer who claims that DeCarlo matched the description of a nearby robbery suspect and that she pointed a handgun at officers after ignoring their commands to stop running. But Emily says, “He’s lying. Other witnesses know he’s lying. And he knows he’s lying.” According to Emily, Angel did not own a gun, but she did have ample reason to fear the police. Angel suffered from mental health issues, and had recently been arrested and imprisoned for two months for “failure to identify to a police officer” during a manic episode, instead of being provided the mental healthcare she so desperately needed. When she was finally released, she was required to see a case manager three times before she qualified for inpatient mental health hospitalization—when she was killed, she had one case manager visit left to go.6
Emily hopes that the renewed focus on police violence will bring long overdue attention to her daughter’s case, but she also wants a place to share stories and remember her daughter in public, to make her pain and loss visible in a space reclaimed as a monument and memorial to Black lives. In addition to Angel’s, I counted 42 memorials dedicated to Black men and women killed by the police surrounding the statue’s base.7
By and large, the atmosphere at the Marcus David Peters Circle is peaceful and inspiring—almost everyone I spoke to who was visiting the area for the first time commented on the undeniable “good vibes.” Up until late June, local media coverage of the Lee monument was dominated by the frequent standoffs between protesters and police trying to clear the area at night, sometimes with tear gas and rubber bullets, and dozens of people have been arrested. Sometimes during the day, cars drive by to hurl insults or throw things into the circle, and activists have formed a small, armed security detail of their own. However, for the past week, and since I have been documenting the circle, things seem to have remained calm and with minimal police presence.8
After activists took it upon themselves to remove some of the smaller statues commemorating anti-black violence and settler colonialism (including a bust of Christopher Columbus, which was dragged into a lake), the city has been systematically removing the remaining statues. This week I joined hundreds of onlookers to witness the removal of the Confederate Soldiers and Sailors Statue and one of the last Confederate statues left on Monument Avenue, that of Stuart. Now only the 14-foot-tall bronze sculpture of Lee on horseback remains. The process of removing Lee is being held up in court by a descendant of the couple who signed a deed giving the monument’s land to the State of Virginia, yet everyone from the mayor of Richmond to the governor of Virginia have called for its removal.9
Meanwhile, these statue removals have been criticized by some as nothing more than baby steps in the greater battle against systemic racism and police violence. Activists, led in part by Marcus Davis Peters’s mother and the local anti–police violence organization Justice and Reformation, have been calling for much more than symbolic gestures. Their demands include a Marcus Alert to insure that mental health professionals, as opposed to armed and improperly trained police officers, are first responders in situations like the one that killed Peters and put Angel DeCarlo in jail. They also call for defunding the police (with funds reallocated to public education, human services, the environment, and general community welfare), an independent civilian review board with subpoena power to investigate claims of police abuse, the reopening of the Peters case, the dropping of all charges against all community members who have been arrested in connection with this current cycle of protests, and lastly, the removal of all of Richmond’s Confederate monuments.10
The Hammond family from Richmond, Virginia on the Fourth of July at the newly renamed Marcus Davis Peters Circle. (Katie Orlinsky)
For now, Marcus Davis Peters Circle on Monument Avenue serves as the hub for all this organizing. In less than a month, a former monument to the Confederacy has become a powerful place of protest, a vibrant space for expression and a living, breathing work of art. What was once a symbol of hate has transformed into a true community space, one that educates visitors about this country’s enduring legacy of racial violence, and provides a glimmer of the world this movement hopes to build.11


thenation--2020-07-13--Black Trans Lives Must Be Front and Center

In June 2011 , a Black transgender woman named CeCe McDonald was walking with friends to a grocery store in her Minneapolis neighborhood when a group of white bar patrons began hurling racist , homophobic , and transphobic slurs , calling them “ bitches with dicks , ” “ faggots , ” and suggesting they “ go back to Africa.
” A white woman in the group became physically violent , throwing a glass at McDonald ’ s face that sliced open her salivary gland , requiring 11 stitches .
When a male attacker lunged at her as she attempted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ her life , grabbed a pair of scissors from her purse to defend herself , fatally stabbing her assailant in the chest .
Despite a clear claim to self-defense , McDonald was the only person arrested at the scene .
A Minneapolis court—after ruling her white male attacker ’ s swastika tattoo , meth intoxication , and assault rap sheet inadmissible—convicted her on a reduced charge of second-degree manslaughter and sentenced her to 41 months in a prison for men .
Amid the worldwide outcry over criminal justice abuses against Black lives , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ same police department and prosecutor ’ s office that dragged their feet on arresting and charging George Floyd ’ s white police officer murderer acted swiftly in their punishment of a Black transgender woman who had defended her own life .
Multiple studies demonstrate the outsize damage done by racist and transphobic policing .
While a quarter of white trans and gender-nonconforming people report being treated disrespectfully during interactions with police , that figure skyrockets to 47 percent among Black trans and gender-nonconforming people , according to a 2011 report by the National @ @ @ @ @ @ @ board , 22 percent of trans and gender-nonconforming people report law enforcement harassment , versus 38 percent for those who are Black .
( One 2008 report noted that Black and Latinx trans women had a name for their constant police profiling as sex workers : “ walking while trans.
” ) Six percent of trans and gender-nonconforming people overall report physical abuse by police , and 2 percent report sexual abuse by them .
Those numbers climb to 15 percent and 7 percent , respectively , among Black trans and gender-nonconforming people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , McDonald ’ s treatment by the cops and the courts reveals a problem that lies not just with the Minneapolis Police Department but with the American criminal justice system .
While trans and gender-nonconforming people are arrested at disproportionate rates to cisgender people , transphobic and racist policing has resulted in nearly half—47 percent—of Black trans and gender-nonconforming people spending time behind bars .
After arrest , trans people are particularly susceptible to various forms of violence because they are often placed in facilities based on their gender assignment instead of their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ trans and gender-nonconforming people who have spent any time in jail or prison report being physically assaulted there , and 32 percent report being sexually abused in custody .
Because of biases in sentencing , while just 2 percent of white trans and gender-nonconforming people have served five or more years behind bars , 10 percent of Black trans and gender-nonconforming people have been incarcerated for five to 10 years .
Five percent remained in prison for a decade or more .
There are many more stories like McDonald ’ s .
In @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Latinx trans woman , reported that New York City police officers sexually and physically assaulted and humiliated her , then jailed her with male inmates whose physical attacks left her with “ broken cartilage in her nose , a broken tooth , and abrasions and bruises to her face and body , ” according to an Amnesty International report .
A 2019 video of cops in Kansas City , Mo.
, arresting Breona Hill , a Black trans woman , shows them slamming her head into the concrete twice before kneeling on her @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the officers ’ statements , ” according to the local prosecutor .
Layleen Xtravaganza Cubilette-Polanco , another Black trans woman from New York City , died last year in solitary confinement at Rikers Island , where she was being held on misdemeanor charges .
Video shows that as she lay unresponsive in her cell , officers stood outside the door laughing before seeking medical assistance that might have saved her life .
And on May 27—two days after Floyd ’ s killing—a Black trans man named Tony McDade was fatally shot by Florida @ @ @ @ @ @ @ reports .
The Violence Didn ’ t Start With the Protests The Coronavirus Reveals That the Stars Are Not Like Us In its conspicuous disregard for the safety of Black trans and gender-nonconforming people , the criminal justice system is complicit in an epidemic of violence that has seen at least 21 trans or gender-nonconforming people killed in the United States this year alone .
Those deaths occurred against a backdrop of the Trump administration ’ s unstinting assault on transgender rights .
There are also long-standing disparities in areas like employment and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ discrimination .
Even before the coronavirus crisis , Black trans folks were twice as likely to be unemployed as Black cis people , 38 percent were living below the poverty line , and 42 percent had experienced homelessness at some point .
Those numbers have likely worsened during the pandemic .
It ’ s critical that the fallout from racist and transphobic policing receive greater attention—and that conversations around defunding bloated police budgets and reinvesting in communities highlight how that money can benefit Black trans and gender-nonconforming folks .
More attention has been @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as with the Brooklyn Liberation march last month , which drew 15,000 people , and the recent Queer Liberation March for Black Lives and Against Police Brutality .
But emphasizing the particular devastation that policing does to Black trans lives and the focus on mitigating those issues should be consistently front and center .
We ’ re at a crucial moment in which all Black lives need recognition .
And erasure , we should remember , is yet another form of violence .

This article appears in the July 27/August 3, 2020 issue.
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In June 2011, a Black transgender woman named CeCe McDonald was walking with friends to a grocery store in her Minneapolis neighborhood when a group of white bar patrons began hurling racist, homophobic, and transphobic slurs, calling them “bitches with dicks,” “faggots,” and suggesting they “go back to Africa.” A white woman in the group became physically violent, throwing a glass at McDonald’s face that sliced open her salivary gland, requiring 11 stitches. When a male attacker lunged at her as she attempted to flee, McDonald, fearing for her life, grabbed a pair of scissors from her purse to defend herself, fatally stabbing her assailant in the chest. Despite a clear claim to self-defense, McDonald was the only person arrested at the scene. A Minneapolis court—after ruling her white male attacker’s swastika tattoo, meth intoxication, and assault rap sheet inadmissible—convicted her on a reduced charge of second-degree manslaughter and sentenced her to 41 months in a prison for men. Amid the worldwide outcry over criminal justice abuses against Black lives, it’s worth recalling that the same police department and prosecutor’s office that dragged their feet on arresting and charging George Floyd’s white police officer murderer acted swiftly in their punishment of a Black transgender woman who had defended her own life.
Multiple studies demonstrate the outsize damage done by racist and transphobic policing. While a quarter of white trans and gender-nonconforming people report being treated disrespectfully during interactions with police, that figure skyrockets to 47 percent among Black trans and gender-nonconforming people, according to a 2011 report by the National Center for Transgender Equality. Across the board, 22 percent of trans and gender-nonconforming people report law enforcement harassment, versus 38 percent for those who are Black. (One 2008 report noted that Black and Latinx trans women had a name for their constant police profiling as sex workers: “walking while trans.”) Six percent of trans and gender-nonconforming people overall report physical abuse by police, and 2 percent report sexual abuse by them. Those numbers climb to 15 percent and 7 percent, respectively, among Black trans and gender-nonconforming people.
As in Floyd’s case, McDonald’s treatment by the cops and the courts reveals a problem that lies not just with the Minneapolis Police Department but with the American criminal justice system. While trans and gender-nonconforming people are arrested at disproportionate rates to cisgender people, transphobic and racist policing has resulted in nearly half—47 percent—of Black trans and gender-nonconforming people spending time behind bars. After arrest, trans people are particularly susceptible to various forms of violence because they are often placed in facilities based on their gender assignment instead of their gender identity. Nearly one-third of Black trans and gender-nonconforming people who have spent any time in jail or prison report being physically assaulted there, and 32 percent report being sexually abused in custody. Because of biases in sentencing, while just 2 percent of white trans and gender-nonconforming people have served five or more years behind bars, 10 percent of Black trans and gender-nonconforming people have been incarcerated for five to 10 years. Five percent remained in prison for a decade or more. Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann
There are many more stories like McDonald’s. In 2006, Mariah Lopez, a Black Latinx trans woman, reported that New York City police officers sexually and physically assaulted and humiliated her, then jailed her with male inmates whose physical attacks left her with “broken cartilage in her nose, a broken tooth, and abrasions and bruises to her face and body,” according to an Amnesty International report. A 2019 video of cops in Kansas City, Mo., arresting Breona Hill, a Black trans woman, shows them slamming her head into the concrete twice before kneeling on her head and neck “in contrast to the officers’ statements,” according to the local prosecutor.
Layleen Xtravaganza Cubilette-Polanco, another Black trans woman from New York City, died last year in solitary confinement at Rikers Island, where she was being held on misdemeanor charges. Video shows that as she lay unresponsive in her cell, officers stood outside the door laughing before seeking medical assistance that might have saved her life. And on May 27—two days after Floyd’s killing—a Black trans man named Tony McDade was fatally shot by Florida police who repeatedly misgendered him in subsequent reports. More From Kali Holloway Inside the Cynical Campaign to Claim That Affirmative Action Hurts Asian Americans August 9, 2023 It’s Not Just Corporate Pride Boycotts—Right-Wingers Are Escalating Their Anti-LGBTQ Campaign June 23, 2023 Affirmative Action Is in the Supreme Court’s Crosshairs June 22, 2023
In its conspicuous disregard for the safety of Black trans and gender-nonconforming people, the criminal justice system is complicit in an epidemic of violence that has seen at least 21 trans or gender-nonconforming people killed in the United States this year alone. Those deaths occurred against a backdrop of the Trump administration’s unstinting assault on transgender rights. There are also long-standing disparities in areas like employment and housing, undergirded by anti-trans and anti-Black discrimination. Even before the coronavirus crisis, Black trans folks were twice as likely to be unemployed as Black cis people, 38 percent were living below the poverty line, and 42 percent had experienced homelessness at some point. Those numbers have likely worsened during the pandemic.
It’s critical that the fallout from racist and transphobic policing receive greater attention—and that conversations around defunding bloated police budgets and reinvesting in communities highlight how that money can benefit Black trans and gender-nonconforming folks. More attention has been given to those issues of late, as with the Brooklyn Liberation march last month, which drew 15,000 people, and the recent Queer Liberation March for Black Lives and Against Police Brutality. But emphasizing the particular devastation that policing does to Black trans lives and the focus on mitigating those issues should be consistently front and center.
We’re at a crucial moment in which all Black lives need recognition. And erasure, we should remember, is yet another form of violence.


thenation--2020-07-13--From Uprising to Reconstruction

From Uprising to Reconstruction

Though it may feel like a new catastrophe happens every day , the catastrophic failure of our institutions to assure the basic safety and security of marginalized people is a historic phenomenon traceable to the origins of our republic .
The pandemic and economic collapse have disproportionately affected Black , brown , and indigenous communities , immigrants , and women .
The people who flooded the streets in the wake of yet more police killings of Black people understand that these reverberations are nothing new .
That ’ s why they are demanding a fight not for piecemeal reforms but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a bottom-up deconstruction of our oligarchic racial and gender caste system and reconstruction of a just and equitable system .
Anything less is unacceptable .
The first step is to understand the unequal power dynamic that allows systems of oppression to persist .
Specific and identifiable actors—corporations , establishment politicians , the rich , white people , men , and US citizens each hold varying levels of outsize power and privilege .
When they wield that power for their own interests at the expense of marginalized communities , they write and rewrite the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ violent hierarchy .
Take corporate America .
From Amazon to Walmart , the same corporations that now loudly proclaim that Black Lives Matter continue to force Black , brown , and immigrant workers to go back to work in the middle of a pandemic that is deadlier for these communities .
They continue to profit from paying poverty wages ( and often stealing wages ) , maintaining unsafe working conditions , misclassifying the status of workers and denying workers their voice and dignity on the job .
These corporations refuse to shoulder any @ @ @ @ @ @ @ can afford child care even as many children can not return to school .
Instead , the cost and time of that burden falls on families or the grossly underpaid care workforce made up of predominantly Black and brown women .
The pandemic has further concentrated the power and control of employers—especially mega-corporations like Amazon and Walmart—over workers , smaller businesses , and whole communities .
Meanwhile , regulators turn a blind eye to corporate and elite malfeasance , even as we see the proliferation of coercive over-policing against Black and brown communities @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on the ground is not lost on ruling powers—those who sit atop our American caste system .
Political and economic elites recognize that movements are making an impact and many elites are counter-mobilizing to suppress our demands and further concentrate their power by dismantling our democratic institutions .
The militarization and escalation of the police response to the protests—egged on from the White House—represent an assault on the democratic principles of free speech and association and bottom-up people power .
Republicans have been suppressing marginalized voters for decades .
And now , they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ election infrastructure—such as the Post Office and the need for vote-by-mail—that we need to assure a fair and safe election in November .
We are witnessing a power struggle over the heart and soul of America ’ s future .
While the establishment fights to uphold the status quo of racial and gender oppression , economic subordination , and the hoarding of political power , our communities are fighting for what we need to live a life of dignity just like everyone else—the ability to go to the doctor when we ’ re @ @ @ @ @ @ @ our families , to have a warm bed to sleep in every night , to have safe and affordable care for our children and to live with joy and not fear .
Ordinary people of all races , led by the Movement for Black Lives and many others , are engaging in deconstruction of our racial and gender caste system and the reconstruction of a new system based on liberation and justice .
History Teaches Us Reconstruction is Possible—and Necessary After the defeat of the Confederacy , the United States made the collective @ @ @ @ @ @ @ radical Reconstruction .
Lasting just a little over a decade , this vast experiment was at the core a fundamental redistribution of power from Southern slaveholding oligarchs to Black Southerners .
Vital public goods—like public education systems—were created for the first time and financed by fairer taxation to pay for them .
Inclusive democratic expansion resulted in Black political power for the first time .
Inequality declined and well-being increased to the benefit of all—Black and white alike—in that short experiment of a multiracial democracy .
In essence , an Abolitionist movement forced @ @ @ @ @ @ @ system .
In the words of historian Eric Foner , we rewrote the fundamental rules of the nation and the Constitution itself—the foundation of our racial caste system—to create a “ Second Founding.
” But power and domination always seek a comeback after defeat .
America ’ s social hierarchy , rooted in a Southern plantation economy central to the country ’ s system of racial capitalism , reasserted itself with the new racial rules of Jim Crow .
This created not only systems of formal segregation , but also the de facto @ @ @ @ @ @ @ indentured servitude , and the rise of the modern prison industrial complex .
Powerful political actors remade our original caste system for a new era and century .
Think of this as American racial caste system , 2.0 .
It took decades of organizing from the 1920s through the 1950s , catalyzed by the Black Freedom movement , to usher in what the late Manning Marable called the Second Reconstruction : the civil rights movement in the 1960s .
This brought a formal end to Jim Crow segregation and secured landmark reforms like @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964 ( known as the “ War on Poverty ” ) , the Voting Rights Act of 1965 , the Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965 , and the Fair Housing Act of 1968 .
Let ’ s call this Reconstruction 2.0 .
Yet , much like political elites at the end of the first Reconstruction , defenders and beneficiaries of racial hierarchy sought retrenchment .
The years to follow saw the rise of Barry Goldwater , Richard Nixon , and a conservative political movement , the “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” politics , the “ war on drugs ” and the rise of modern mass incarceration , and an outright attack on public goods , welfare protections , voting rights , and civil rights apparatus .
Conservatives—and many liberal supporters—effectively recreated levels of segregation , racial wealth gaps , and an erosion of civil rights unseen since before Brown v. Board of Education , or what we might call American racial caste system 3.0 .
Black leaders in the civil rights and welfare rights movements like Ella Baker , Dr. Martin Luther King @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Rustin saw the work of anti-racism and liberation as bound up in a deeper rejection of militarism , imperialism , and capitalism itself .
Needless to say , this radicalism was fought vociferously—and has since been read out of history by the liberal myths of “ nonviolent ” civil rights activism .
From Uprising to a Just , Durable , and Inclusive Third Reconstruction As was the case in the first and second American Reconstructions , the broad-scale and wide-ranging Black Lives Matter movement of protests and organizing today is likely the “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ movement that has drastically sped up changes in public opinion didn ’ t arise out of thin air .
Like plate tectonics , grassroots and movement organizers have been doing the invisible work of community and digital organizing , political education , reimagining public safety and our social contract and mobilizing people to take action that helped to make this a seismic moment in American politics .
It is an earthquake that is upending our foundational 400-years-old racial caste system .
And—crucially—the current uprising is unfolding with and alongside other popular movements for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The immigrant rights movement , the movement for reproductive health care and women ’ s economic justice , the climate justice movement and the struggles for worker justice in many ways exist in deep allyship with the Movement for Black Lives .
And in some cases , the Movement for Black Lives is also a voice for other justice movements that seek to change the social , economic , and political rules .
This intersection and ascendance of multiple intertwined movements is cause for great hope for this moment to lead to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ multiple constituencies and practicing deep fusion with each other have an opportunity to usher in what Rev .
Dr. William Barber has called a third American Reconstruction .
The blueprint for Reconstruction 3.0 is being defined as we speak by directly impacted people engaged in struggle .
Bold ideas for change are emerging from the ground up that , taken together , present a comprehensive vision of liberation for all marginalized people .
It is a vision that is about simultaneously deconstructing our centuries-old racial caste system and reconstructing our communities , our @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of this deconstruction and Reconstruction 3.0 include : • Deconstruct the infrastructure of racial othering and violence at the heart of our policing and incarceration systems that uphold and enforce our racial caste system , and reconstruct infrastructure to empower communities to be agents of their own safety and care .
• Deconstruct systems that politically and economically marginalize immigrants and reconstruct new institutions that ensure all immigrants are fully included in our economy and political system—not as guests but as full-fledged citizens .
• Deconstruct a culture where sexism underpins our economic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ where women and those who are gender-nonconforming have full political rights , power over their own bodies , and equity in economic opportunity .
• Deconstruct an economy of extraction and reconstruct one of liberation that invests in the affirmative provision of care-based public goods like child care , housing , health care , and environmental safety , and that breaks up concentrated wealth and power and redistributes it into the hands of ordinary people , workers , and their communities .
• Deconstruct systems of voter suppression and reconstruct one that proactively @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Black communities , immigrants , and people of color more broadly .
This political project of Reconstruction 3.0 is already underway .
There will inevitably be defenders of the old racial caste regime and backlash to the new world being forged beneath our feet .
We believe we will win .
As the Movement for Black Lives reminds us , it ’ s a “ all hands on deck , no elbows ” moment .
On the superhighway to freedom , while we might be moving in different lanes and at different speeds @ @ @ @ @ @ @ re all headed in the right direction to emancipation and justice .

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Though it may feel like a new catastrophe happens every day, the catastrophic failure of our institutions to assure the basic safety and security of marginalized people is a historic phenomenon traceable to the origins of our republic. The pandemic and economic collapse have disproportionately affected Black, brown, and indigenous communities, immigrants, and women. The people who flooded the streets in the wake of yet more police killings of Black people understand that these reverberations are nothing new. That’s why they are demanding a fight not for piecemeal reforms but for liberation.
This moment calls for a bottom-up deconstruction of our oligarchic racial and gender caste system and reconstruction of a just and equitable system. Anything less is unacceptable.
The first step is to understand the unequal power dynamic that allows systems of oppression to persist. Specific and identifiable actors—corporations, establishment politicians, the rich, white people, men, and US citizens each hold varying levels of outsize power and privilege. When they wield that power for their own interests at the expense of marginalized communities, they write and rewrite the rules that create and sustain an inherently violent hierarchy.
Take corporate America. From Amazon to Walmart, the same corporations that now loudly proclaim that Black Lives Matter continue to force Black, brown, and immigrant workers to go back to work in the middle of a pandemic that is deadlier for these communities. They continue to profit from paying poverty wages (and often stealing wages), maintaining unsafe working conditions, misclassifying the status of workers and denying workers their voice and dignity on the job. These corporations refuse to shoulder any of the costs of ensuring their workforces can afford child care even as many children cannot return to school. Instead, the cost and time of that burden falls on families or the grossly underpaid care workforce made up of predominantly Black and brown women. The pandemic has further concentrated the power and control of employers—especially mega-corporations like Amazon and Walmart—over workers, smaller businesses, and whole communities. Meanwhile, regulators turn a blind eye to corporate and elite malfeasance, even as we see the proliferation of coercive over-policing against Black and brown communities.
But the power of people protesting on the ground is not lost on ruling powers—those who sit atop our American caste system. Political and economic elites recognize that movements are making an impact and many elites are counter-mobilizing to suppress our demands and further concentrate their power by dismantling our democratic institutions. The militarization and escalation of the police response to the protests—egged on from the White House—represent an assault on the democratic principles of free speech and association and bottom-up people power. Republicans have been suppressing marginalized voters for decades. And now, they are moving to delegitimize and defund critical election infrastructure—such as the Post Office and the need for vote-by-mail—that we need to assure a fair and safe election in November. Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann Popular "swipe left below to view more authors"Swipe → The Evisceration of a Public University The Evisceration of a Public University Lisa M. Corrigan The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks The Patronizing Moralism of David Brooks Chris Lehmann “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash “The Blind Side” Was Always Trash Dave Zirin A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life A Grim Chronicle of Trump’s Corrupt Public Life Chris Lehmann
We are witnessing a power struggle over the heart and soul of America’s future. While the establishment fights to uphold the status quo of racial and gender oppression, economic subordination, and the hoarding of political power, our communities are fighting for what we need to live a life of dignity just like everyone else—the ability to go to the doctor when we’re sick, to provide healthy food for our families, to have a warm bed to sleep in every night, to have safe and affordable care for our children and to live with joy and not fear. Ordinary people of all races, led by the Movement for Black Lives and many others, are engaging in deconstruction of our racial and gender caste system and the reconstruction of a new system based on liberation and justice.
History Teaches Us Reconstruction is Possible—and Necessary
After the defeat of the Confederacy, the United States made the collective choice to engage in the project of radical Reconstruction. Lasting just a little over a decade, this vast experiment was at the core a fundamental redistribution of power from Southern slaveholding oligarchs to Black Southerners. Vital public goods—like public education systems—were created for the first time and financed by fairer taxation to pay for them. Inclusive democratic expansion resulted in Black political power for the first time. Inequality declined and well-being increased to the benefit of all—Black and white alike—in that short experiment of a multiracial democracy. In essence, an Abolitionist movement forced a rupture of our American racial caste system. In the words of historian Eric Foner, we rewrote the fundamental rules of the nation and the Constitution itself—the foundation of our racial caste system—to create a “Second Founding.” Current Issue View our current issue
But power and domination always seek a comeback after defeat. America’s social hierarchy, rooted in a Southern plantation economy central to the country’s system of racial capitalism, reasserted itself with the new racial rules of Jim Crow. This created not only systems of formal segregation, but also the de facto enslavement that comes with debt peonage, indentured servitude, and the rise of the modern prison industrial complex. Powerful political actors remade our original caste system for a new era and century. Think of this as American racial caste system, 2.0.
It took decades of organizing from the 1920s through the 1950s, catalyzed by the Black Freedom movement, to usher in what the late Manning Marable called the Second Reconstruction: the civil rights movement in the 1960s. This brought a formal end to Jim Crow segregation and secured landmark reforms like the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964 (known as the “War on Poverty”), the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968. Let’s call this Reconstruction 2.0.
Yet, much like political elites at the end of the first Reconstruction, defenders and beneficiaries of racial hierarchy sought retrenchment. The years to follow saw the rise of Barry Goldwater, Richard Nixon, and a conservative political movement, the “Southern strategy” of racialized “dog-whistle” politics, the “war on drugs” and the rise of modern mass incarceration, and an outright attack on public goods, welfare protections, voting rights, and civil rights apparatus. Conservatives—and many liberal supporters—effectively recreated levels of segregation, racial wealth gaps, and an erosion of civil rights unseen since before Brown v. Board of Education, or what we might call American racial caste system 3.0. Black leaders in the civil rights and welfare rights movements like Ella Baker, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Johnnie Tillman, and Bayard Rustin saw the work of anti-racism and liberation as bound up in a deeper rejection of militarism, imperialism, and capitalism itself. Needless to say, this radicalism was fought vociferously—and has since been read out of history by the liberal myths of “nonviolent” civil rights activism.
From Uprising to a Just, Durable, and Inclusive Third Reconstruction
As was the case in the first and second American Reconstructions, the broad-scale and wide-ranging Black Lives Matter movement of protests and organizing today is likely the “largest movement in U.S. history.” This movement that has drastically sped up changes in public opinion didn’t arise out of thin air. Like plate tectonics, grassroots and movement organizers have been doing the invisible work of community and digital organizing, political education, reimagining public safety and our social contract and mobilizing people to take action that helped to make this a seismic moment in American politics. It is an earthquake that is upending our foundational 400-years-old racial caste system.
And—crucially—the current uprising is unfolding with and alongside other popular movements for racial, gender, and economic justice. The immigrant rights movement, the movement for reproductive health care and women’s economic justice, the climate justice movement and the struggles for worker justice in many ways exist in deep allyship with the Movement for Black Lives. And in some cases, the Movement for Black Lives is also a voice for other justice movements that seek to change the social, economic, and political rules.
This intersection and ascendance of multiple intertwined movements is cause for great hope for this moment to lead to transformative change. Mass movements operating across multiple constituencies and practicing deep fusion with each other have an opportunity to usher in what Rev. Dr. William Barber has called a third American Reconstruction.
The blueprint for Reconstruction 3.0 is being defined as we speak by directly impacted people engaged in struggle. Bold ideas for change are emerging from the ground up that, taken together, present a comprehensive vision of liberation for all marginalized people. It is a vision that is about simultaneously deconstructing our centuries-old racial caste system and reconstructing our communities, our economy and our democracy. The objectives of this deconstruction and Reconstruction 3.0 include:
Deconstruct the infrastructure of racial othering and violence at the heart of our policing and incarceration systems that uphold and enforce our racial caste system, and reconstruct infrastructure to empower communities to be agents of their own safety and care.
Deconstruct systems that politically and economically marginalize immigrants and reconstruct new institutions that ensure all immigrants are fully included in our economy and political system—not as guests but as full-fledged citizens.
Deconstruct a culture where sexism underpins our economic and political systems and reconstruct a culture where women and those who are gender-nonconforming have full political rights, power over their own bodies, and equity in economic opportunity.
Deconstruct an economy of extraction and reconstruct one of liberation that invests in the affirmative provision of care-based public goods like child care, housing, health care, and environmental safety, and that breaks up concentrated wealth and power and redistributes it into the hands of ordinary people, workers, and their communities.
Deconstruct systems of voter suppression and reconstruct one that proactively secures political power for Black voters and Black communities, immigrants, and people of color more broadly.
This political project of Reconstruction 3.0 is already underway. There will inevitably be defenders of the old racial caste regime and backlash to the new world being forged beneath our feet. We believe we will win. As the Movement for Black Lives reminds us, it’s a “all hands on deck, no elbows” moment. On the superhighway to freedom, while we might be moving in different lanes and at different speeds, let’s ensure we’re all headed in the right direction to emancipation and justice.