June, 20 2019, 12:00am EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Paul Kawika Martin, Peace Action, 951-217-7285 cell, pmartin@peace-action.org
Gabe Murphy, Peace Action, 510-501-3345 cell, gmurphy@peaceaction.org
Senate Votes to Block Arms Sales to Saudi Arabia and the UAE
WASHINGTON
In response to the Senate voting to block arms sales involving Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and other countries, Paul Kawika Martin, Senior Director for Policy and Political Affairs at Peace Action, released the following statement:
"When Trump vetoed legislation earlier this year to end U.S. involvement in the war in Yemen, Congress said it would keep pushing. Today the Senate delivered on that promise, offering yet another rebuke to this administration's reckless foreign policy in the Middle East. By passing these joint resolutions, led by Senators Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Lindsay Graham (R-SC), Jack Reed (D-RI) and others, Congress is forcing the president to either stop arming countries that are using U.S. weapons to starve the people of Yemen, or issue more vetoes and defend the indefensible. If Trump does veto these resolutions, Congress should vote to override in order to help bring the terrible war in Yemen to an end.
"Sooner or later, Trump and those in Congress who defend his policies in Yemen will realize that the political cost of keeping the U.S. involved in a war that 75 percent of Americans oppose is not worth the pats on the back they'll get from Saudi Arabia and the arms industry."
Peace Action is the United States' largest peace and disarmament organization with over 100,000 members and nearly 100 chapters in 34 states, works to achieve the abolition of nuclear weapons, promote government spending priorities that support human needs and encourage real security through international cooperation and human rights.
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'Are We in a Police State?' Progressives Demand End to Crackdown on Campus Protests
"I know from experience that these actions are traumatizing and dangerous; they do nothing to address the underlying issues and simply fuel more violence against non-violent protesters," said Rep. Cori Bush.
May 01, 2024
Progressive members of the U.S. Congress on Wednesday demanded an end to nationwide police attacks on pro-Palestinian campus protests following
violent raids and mass arrests at universities across the country, from Columbia in New York City to the University of South Florida in Tampa.
"The continued repression and violence against anti-war student activists and their allies by Columbia University, NYPD, and Mayor [Eric] Adams is abhorrent and barbarous," Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.) wrote on social media. "The nationwide crackdown on protesters must end."
More than 300 demonstrators were arrested at Columbia and the nearby City College of New York late Tuesday alone, bringing the total number of arrests at dozens of universities across the U.S. to more than 1,000.
In a statement Tuesday, Bush said she was "appalled" by the police response to demonstrations at Washington University in St. Louis, which is in the Missouri Democrat's district.
"The police brutality, mass arrests, suspensions, evictions, and wholesale bans on access to the St. Louis campus are inappropriate, unacceptable, and outright shameful," said Bush. "Washington University administrators have joined the disgraceful nationwide trend of violent, aggressive responses by university administrators and local law enforcement aimed at curbing the rights to free speech and assembly by students, faculty, staff, and community members."
"Violently assaulting and injuring people who are courageously advocating for peace and justice for Palestinians and Israelis alike is unconscionable," she added. "I know from experience that these actions are traumatizing and dangerous; they do nothing to address the underlying issues and simply fuel more violence against non-violent protesters."
The continued repression and violence against anti-war student activists and their allies by Columbia University, NYPD, and Mayor Adams is abhorrent and barbarous.
The nationwide crackdown on protesters must end. https://t.co/UbImkexSzH
— Cori Bush (@CoriBush) May 1, 2024
Bush is part of a growing chorus of progressive lawmakers, advocacy organizations, and human rights experts condemning U.S. universities for siccing police officers on nonviolent demonstrators who are pushing their schools to divest from companies profiting off Israel's war on Gaza and criticizing the Biden administration's continued support for the Netanyahu government.
Like many on Capitol Hill and across corporate media, President Joe Biden has
attempted to cast the protests as "antisemitic," giving tacit support to efforts to disband them and prompting warnings that the White House is further alienating young voters.
"Summoning excessively armed, militarized police onto college campuses to violently arrest unarmed students engaged in non-violent protest—students surviving and matriculating through the mass shooting generation—is shameful, misguided, and inhumane," Rep. Summer Lee (D-Pa.) said late Tuesday. "Student protests against injustice are not new. From Birmingham to Kent to Soweto, we've seen the devastating results of excessive police force. History has sided with the students every time. Political and university 'leaders' should know better than to repeat condemned history."
Video footage and photographs that have gone viral in recent days show police officers assaulting students, professors, and journalists in an attempt to crush a campus protest movement that has spread across the nation over the past two weeks.
Sarah Leah Whitson, executive director of Democracy for the Arab World Now, said Wednesday that "the use of city police to dismantle peaceful protests on college campuses in the United States, coupled with
proposed legislation to punish Americans for criticizing Israel, is a dangerous assault on our democracy and a sign of the very creeping authoritarianism infecting so much of the world."
"The Biden administration has been a shameful accomplice in sacrificing American free speech and civil society at the altar of Israeli interests and demands," Whitson added.
"We must stand with our young people and demand justice and freedom for Palestinians and everyone in this world."
In a floor speech on Wednesday, Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.)—a longtime educator and former school principal—said that in the past he's had guns pulled on him "multiple times by law enforcement simply for being a Black man in America."
"Now I see guns being drawn on peaceful protesters at Columbia University," said Bowman. "When I was 11 years old, I was a victim of police brutality simply for being Black in America. And now I see that brutality being inflicted on peaceful protesters at Columbia University. And for what? Simply for exercising their First Amendment rights to peacefully assemble as they protest the collective punishment and murder of civilians in Gaza."
"Are we in a police state, or is this a democracy?" the New York Democrat asked. "We must stand with our young people and demand justice and freedom for Palestinians and everyone in this world."
When I was 11, I was a victim of police brutality just for being Black in America. Now I see that brutality being inflicted on peaceful students at Columbia and across the country.
We must stand with our students to demand liberation for Palestinians and everyone in this world. pic.twitter.com/aCORt8uOwA
— Congressman Jamaal Bowman (@RepBowman) May 1, 2024
The outspoken progressive support for the student protesters comes as police crackdowns continued on campuses across the country, with dozens more students arrested Wednesday at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, the University of Georgia, and other schools.
Responding to police repression at Florida universities, ACLU of Florida interim executive director Howard Simon said Wednesday that "cracking down on peaceful protestors is likely to escalate—not calm—the tensions on campus, as events of the past week have made abundantly clear."
"Threatening students with expulsion from their university or deportation from the country does not align with the obligations of public officials to respect First Amendment rights regardless of the point of view that is being expressed," said Simon. "Universities are meant to be havens for robust debate, discussion, and learning—not sites of censorship where administrators and politicians squash political discourse they don't approve of with threats, arrests, rubber bullets, and tear gas."
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Party Leaders 'Utterly Isolated' as College Democrats Back Campus Protests
"Each day that Democrats fail to stand united for a permanent cease-fire, two-state solution, and recognition of a Palestinian state, more and more youth find themselves disillusioned with the party," said the College Democrats of America.
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Progressive lawmakers and rights advocates on Wednesday implored U.S. President Joe Biden and the Democratic Party to listen to young voters who oppose the government's funding of Israel's bombardment of Gaza, as the party's student organization announced its support for campus anti-war protests that have spread across the country over the past two weeks.
The College Democrats of America refuted Biden's suggestion last week that the protests are inherently antisemitic and urged the president to listen to the widespread calls for him to demand a permanent cease-fire in Gaza and end funding for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), which is set to receive an additional $17 billion following Biden's signing of a foreign aid bill last week.
By failing to listen to those demands—backed by 77% and 56% of Democratic voters, respectively, according to recent polling—Biden risks losing crucial support from the voting bloc that the College Democrats has been tasked with engaging for decades.
"As College Democrats, we are committed to the re-election of President Biden and Democrats across down-ballot races in every corner of our nation," the organization said. "However, as representatives of youth across the country, we reserve the right to criticize our own party when it fails to represent youth voices... As young voters, we are well aware that come November, our votes will determine who wins the White House. The White House has taken the mistaken route of a bear-hug strategy for [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu and a cold-shoulder strategy for its own base and all Americans who want to see an end to this war."
"Each day that Democrats fail to stand united for a permanent cease-fire, two-state solution, and recognition of a Palestinian state, more and more youth find themselves disillusioned with the party," warned the College Democrats.
The group added that "calling for the freedom of Palestinians is not antisemitic, and neither is opposing the genocidal acts of the far-right radical extremist Israeli government."
The statement was spearheaded by the organization's Muslim Caucus, led by Wake Forest University student Hasan Pyarali.
"To the students out there protesting we stand with you!" said Pyarali. "To those seeking to silence us, know this: we will never back down in our fight against hatred and genocide!"
Sunjay Muralitharan, vice president of the College Democrats and a student at the University of California, San Diego, toldThe New York Times that the rapid spread of mass protests at schools across the country—and the aggressive response by police, who have arrested more than 1,200 people with the tacit approval of Biden—has caused the organization to reevaluate its role in a critical election year.
"We're realizing that our duty as College Democrats is to be representatives of college students to the party, rather than vice versa," Muralitharan told the Times. "As it stands right now, young people starkly differ on the issue of Palestine/Israel from the Democratic Party apparatus. And throughout the nation, we're witnessing Joe Biden, Democrats across the ballot, losing scores of young voters over this issue."
The organization released its statement hours before the New York Police Department stormed the campus of Columbia University and forcibly removed students who had occupied a building and displayed a sign proclaiming it Hind's Hall, after six-year-old Hind Rajab, who was killed by the IDF in January along with paramedics whom Israel had promised safe passage in order to save the child.
Images of violent arrests have spread on social media in recent days, including a video of Southern Illinois University Edwardsville professor Steve Tamari, who was beaten and slammed to the ground by police at a protest at Washington University in St. Louis last weekend.
Intercept journalist Ryan Grim said the statement from the College Democrats, as well as the Fairfax County Democratic Committee's support for the campus protests, announced on Monday, showed that the party leadership has rendered itself "utterly isolated" by continuing to defend and fund Israel's military, even as it's killed at least 34,568 Palestinians—the majority of whom have been women and children.
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) urged the party to "listen to the moral sentiments of young people... about ending this brutal war and paving a way for peace."
"Reminder: It's not anti-war protesters that will hurt Democrats politically, it's the war itself that will hurt Democrats politically," said former Ohio state Sen. Nina Turner. "Protest is a pillar of democracy and Democrats can either listen to the protests and the polls, or not and face the electoral consequences."
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House GOP Anti-Wildlife 'Extremists' Approve Boebert's Delisting of Gray Wolves
"The inappropriately named 'Trust the Science Act' not only puts endangered gray wolves at risk for extinction, but it completely undermines the purpose of the Endangered Species Act," one wildlife advocate said.
May 01, 2024
Overriding the opposition of more than 100 environmental groups, the Republican-led House of Representatives passed a bill on Tuesday that would strip gray wolves in the Lower 48 states of their protections under the Endangered Species Act.
The so-called Trust the Science Act, which was introduced by far-right election denier Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), passed by a narrow 209-205 margin. It would reimpose a Trump administration decision to delist gray wolves that was later overturned in federal court.
"This move by extremists in Congress to push forward an anti-wolf, anti-science bill is irresponsible and emboldens cruelty towards gray wolves," said Endangered Species Coalition executive director Susan Holmes.
"This is yet another troubling sign that our elected leaders in the House are increasingly choosing to subvert our nation's landmark environmental laws and ignore the biodiversity crisis that threatens wildlife populations around the globe with extinction."
There were once around 2 million gray wolves in North America, but they were nearly hunted to extinction with government support. After the federal government began to protect them in the 1960s, their numbers rebounded to around 6,000, but they only roam through less than 10% of their historic range in the lower 48 states.
Scientists have discovered that wolves are very beneficial for the ecosystems they inhabit; their reintroduction into Yellowstone National Park increased the park's biodiversity by controlling elk and deer that had overgrazed trees, allowing willows and aspens to thrive and attract the song birds and beavers that depend on them.
"The inappropriately named 'Trust the Science Act' not only puts endangered gray wolves at risk for extinction, but it completely undermines the purpose of the Endangered Species Act," Raena Garcia, senior fossil fuels and lands campaigner at Friends of the Earth, said in a statement. "The ESA is essential environmental legislation that needs to be strengthened, not weakened. As a keystone species that plays a vital role in preserving biodiversity, the livelihood of gray wolves can't be dictated by industry-driven politicians."
The Endangered Species Act Coalition and Friends of the Earth Action were two of the more than 100 groups that sent a letter to representatives on Monday urging them to oppose the bill. In the letter, they pointed out that the Trump-era ruling it is based on was overturned because of its faulty science: It based its determination for national wolves on only two populations, it did not define what it meant by a "significant" portion of the species' range, it did not consider what it means for gray wolves to have lost so much of their historic range, and it did not account for the fact that West Coast wolves and northern Rocky Mountain wolves have different ancestries. Despite these flaws with the decision, the bill would also prohibit courts from weighing in a second time.
"The 'Trust the Science Act' undermines the integrity of the ESA by forcing the reinstatement of the Trump administration's scientifically indefensible delisting rule and precluding judicial review, undermining the rule of law that holds government officials accountable in the courts," the conservation groups wrote.
Environmental organizations also argue that the bill would put wolves at even greater risk from human violence. In Wyoming, where wolves are delisted, a man recently injured a young wolf and showed it off at a local bar before killing it. When wolves were delisted during the Trump administration, a hunt reestablished in Wisconsin killed off up to a third of the state's wolves.
"The recent torture and killing of a young gray wolf in Wyoming shows how critical the Endangered Species Act protections are for the survival of this species core to our country's natural heritage," Holmes said.
The bill also comes as the Earth is losing species at such alarming rates that scientists say humans have likely instigated a sixth mass extinction.
"This is yet another troubling sign that our elected leaders in the House are increasingly choosing to subvert our nation's landmark environmental laws and ignore the biodiversity crisis that threatens wildlife populations around the globe with extinction," Robert Dewey, vice president of government relations for Defenders of Wildlife, said in a statement. "Wolves play hugely important roles in maintaining healthy ecosystems and cutting short their recovery will only harm our nation."
"The majority of Americans believe that protecting biodiversity should be a national priority and today their voices were stifled," Dewey continued. "We urge the Senate to take the scientifically sound path forward and not take up this bill."
Whatever the Senate decides, it is unlikely the bill would become law while President Joe Biden is in office. The Executive Office of the President's Office of Budget and Management issued a statement on Monday saying the Biden administration "strongly opposes" the bill, arguing that its passage "would undermine America's proud wildlife conservation traditions and the implementation of one of our nation's bedrock environmental laws."
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