June, 24 2021, 04:41pm EDT
Amnesty International USA Urges Congress to Pass the Break the Cycle of Violence Act
Amnesty International USA Commends Senator Cory Booker and Representative Steven Horsford for Their Reintroduction of Life-Saving Legislation
Funding Community Gun Violence Prevention Groups
WASHINGTON
At a time when guns are killing more and more Americans, Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Representative Steven Horsford (D-NV) took bold action today by reintroducing the Break the Cycle of Violence Act. Their leadership is a call-to-action for all Senators to join them in battling the United States' decades-long gun violence epidemic.
Amnesty International USA (AIUSA) commends Senator Booker and Representative Horsford. Their call must be heard and responded to by President Biden, Congress, and state and city leaders. The bill includes measures AIUSA has long advocated for and will provide sustained funding for lifesaving programs run by leaders with lived experience in communities most impacted by gun violence.
In a new policy briefing, "From Pain to Progress: Confronting the Struggle on the Front Lines of America's Gun Violence Crisis," AIUSA lays out how centering investment in community violence intervention programs can be a key way to curb gun violence across the country.
"Reintroducing the Break the Cycle of Violence Act, and signing it into law, will give local heroes and the programs they run to reduce gun violence the financial support that's been missing for far too long," said Ernest Coverson, Amnesty International USA's End Gun Violence Campaign Manager. According to a study by physicians and researchers featured in the American College of Surgeons Journal, gun violence costs the U.S. healthcare system $170 billion per year. The Health Alliance for Violence Intervention concluded that it would cost an estimated $670 million per year -- $5.36 billion over eight years -- to fund sustained and adequate violence intervention programs in the 48 U.S. cities with the highest rates of violence.
"Senator Booker and Representative Horsford's introduction of this critical measure offers Congress an opportunity to make fundamental changes in how the United States addresses gun violence and to make our communities safe. We can do better, we will do better, and this is just the first step in reimagining a country that is safe for all," said Coverson.
AIUSA and community organization partners in the "Invest In Us" coalition have long pushed for legislation which would support funding and implementation of evidence-based violence prevention and intervention programs, with at least $5 billion over the next eight years in federal funding for local community gun violence prevention programs.
"Local intervention programs like BRAVE save lives," said Lamar Johnson Jr., Violence Prevention Coordinator of the BRAVE Youth Leaders in Chicago, IL. "It gives kids in the inner city a platform and humanizes them. Gun violence is inherently linked to human rights, because as a human being you deserve respect and to be seen. Anything that creates trauma, abuse and inequity is a human rights issue -- and gun violence does that. It touches everyone." Evidence-based violence intervention and prevention programs have been successful in some of the hardest hit cities in the U.S. In Boston, Operation Ceasefire reduced youth homicides by 61% when it was first introduced in the 1990s. More recently, the Cure Violence model reduced homicides by 38% in Chicago in targeted districts compared to districts that did not receive the intervention. Similar programs have helped stem the tide of violence in Philadelphia, Oakland, California; New Haven, Connecticut; and New York City. As gun violence rates continue to rise, only eight U.S. states have passed measures to support evidence-based violence prevention and intervention programs.
Gun violence remains a uniquely American issue that continues to undermine and threaten the human rights of everyone living in this country. Gun homicides in the U.S. disproportionately impact Black and brown communities, with African American men being ten times more likely to be the victims than white American men. Gun homicides are also the leading cause of death among Black men and boys ages 15-34, and the third-leading cause of death for Hispanic men in the same age range.
Children and youth contextualize the United States' gun violence in particularly horrific, and what should be unacceptable, terms. Killing an average of 109 people each day, gun violence is the third leading cause of death among U.S. youth ages 15-24 and the fourth leading cause of death for children ages 10-14. "Black and brown children and teens are disproportionately impacted by shootings nationwide," said Jasmeet Sidhu, AIUSA's lead gun violence researcher. "Survivors, family members and witnesses to gun violence carry devastating, long-lasting trauma, not to mention the short- and long-term health care costs of treatment. We should be investing in communities and trying to break the cycle of violence, rather than over-policing communities in crisis. The legacy of gun violence in the United States is not one our youth should have to carry forward."
Noting the budgeting disparity and failure to invest in proven solutions, Coverson said, "We fund policing, but we don't fund gun violence prevention programs and the heroes that run them. According to the Vera Institute, we spend over a hundred billion dollars a year on policing in the United States, yet gun violence is worse than ever. To end this cycle of gun violence, we first have to recognize it for what it is: a national human rights crisis. Only then will our government do what's right and invest in our future by funding community gun violence prevention programs."
The Break the Cycle Act would help reduce gun violence by:
- Propose to authorize $6.5 billion over 8 years to invest in effective community-based violence intervention programs and provide jobs to youth between the ages of 16-24;
- Propose to authorize $5 billion over 8 years for a competitive grant program to community-based organizations and local units of government that develop effective, prevention-oriented violence reduction initiatives focused on young people at high risk for violence; and
- Propose to authorize $1.5 billion over eight years for the Improving Approaches for Communities to Thrive (IMPACT) grant for eligible organizations and units of local government to provide job training, education, apprenticeship, skilled trades training, or other paid and unpaid work experiences for youth in communities disproportionately affected by gun violence.
Amnesty International is a global movement of millions of people demanding human rights for all people - no matter who they are or where they are. We are the world's largest grassroots human rights organization.
(212) 807-8400LATEST NEWS
Blinken Hasn't Ended Aid for Israeli Military Units Tied to Killings, Rapes
"Blinken continues a very long American tradition of very selective enforcement of human rights laws," said one critic.
Apr 18, 2024
Amid global condemnation of Israel's assault on the Gaza Strip and the Biden administration's complicity, ProPublicarevealed Wednesday that U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has for months ignored staff recommendations to cut off American aid to Israeli military and police units accused of human rights violations including killings and rapes.
"The incidents under review mostly took place in the West Bank and occurred before Hamas' October 7 attack on Israel," which was the catalyst for the current Israeli escalation in Gaza, reported ProPublica's Brett Murphy. "They include reports of extrajudicial killings by the Israeli Border Police; an incident in which a battalion gagged, handcuffed, and left an elderly Palestinian American man for dead; and an allegation that interrogators tortured and raped a teenager who had been accused of throwing rocks and Molotov cocktails."
Murphy obtained government documents and emails and spoke with current and former U.S. State Department officials, who said the recommendations from the Israel Leahy Vetting Forum—named for former Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), who authored laws restricting aid to human rights abuses—were sent to Blinken in December and "they've been sitting in his briefcase since then."
While U.S. President Joe Biden has gradually increased his criticism of Israeli forces killing civilians in Gaza, "multiple State Department officials who have worked on Israeli relations said that Blinken's inaction has undermined Biden's public criticism, sending a message to the Israelis that the administration was not willing to take serious steps," Murphy wrote.
The Israeli government did not respond to the reporter's request for comment, but a U.S. State Department spokesperson did. "This process is one that demands a careful and full review," the American representative said, "and the department undergoes a fact-specific investigation applying the same standards and procedures regardless of the country in question."
Global critics have long accused the U.S. government of giving Israel special treatment while Israeli officials and troops subject Palestinians to apartheid, ethnic cleansing, occupation, settler colonization, and now "plausibly" genocide, according to the International Court of Justice. Since October, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have killed at least 33,970 people in Gaza.
The reporting sparked a fresh wave of outrage. The U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights declared that "this is how Antony Blinken will go down in history: for enabling Israel to commit the gravest of war crimes with U.S. tax dollars."
Alex Kingsbury, a member of The New York Times editorial board, noted that "Blinken continues a very long American tradition of very selective enforcement of human rights laws," while Brandon Friedman, a former Obama administration official, said that "this would be a career ender for a normal Cabinet secretary under normal circumstances."
Democracy for the Arab World Now "submitted Leahy sanctions requests for two of the Israeli units that Antony Blinken has putzed and punted on, in breach of U.S. law, despite clear evidence of despicable abuses—[including] torture, executions, and even murder of an American," according to executive director Sarah Leah Whitson. "But Antony Blinken insists on special privileges and exemptions for Israel, refusing to hold it accountable, U.S. law be damned."
@StateDept In 2023, we documented Israel counter-terrorism YAMAM unit\u2019s abuses, including two extrajudicial killings & two indiscriminate and reckless killings, including of a child in Jenin in March 2023, constituting gross violations of human rights under Leahy Law & war crimes under Rome\u2026— (@)
The Council on American-Islamic Relations' Robert S. McCaw said in a statement that "despite these internal report State Department reports detailing egregious human rights abuses by the Israeli government, including allegations of rape and torturing children in the West Bank, Secretary Blinken has ignored his own staff and continued to greenlight weapon shipments to the responsible Israeli military and police units."
"The glaring disconnect between the gravity of the accusations and his refusal to act on them is deeply disturbing," McCaw added. "Secretary Blinken must halt any further weapons transfers that the Israeli government will use to commit more human rights violations."
Human rights attorney Qasim Rashid pointed out that in contrast with how the Biden administration has treated Israel, the U.S. government pulled funding from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East—as Palestinians in Gaza starve to death—over the "mere allegation" that a small number of staff were involved with Hamas.
"If we had been applying Leahy effectively in Israel like we do in other countries, maybe you wouldn't have the IDF filming TikToks of their war crimes now because we have contributed to a culture of impunity," Josh Paul, a former director in the State Department's Bureau of Political-Military Affairs and a member of the forum who resigned in protest in October, told Murphy.
Another State Department official, Annelle Sheline, stepped down late last month as a foreign affairs officer at the Office of Near Eastern Affairs in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor. She said that with the U.S. government continuing to arm Israel as it devastates Gaza, "trying to advocate for human rights just became impossible."
Sheline's resignation came just days after the Biden administration accepted Israeli government assurances that its use of U.S.-supplied weapons complies with international law—which human rights advocates and officials worldwide, including some congressional Democrats, have challenged over the past few weeks.
Over two dozen Democrats wrote Wednesday to Blinken and two other top officials that "we remain concerned by the stark differences and gaps in the statements being made by the State Department and White House on how Israel has not been found to be in violation of international humanitarian law, either when it comes to the conduct of the war or when it comes to the provision of humanitarian assistance, which are contradictory to those made by prominent experts and global institutions."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Trump Eyes Social Security Cuts By Slashing Payroll Tax
"He is dusting off the old Republican playbook and bringing back the strategy known informally as 'Starve the Beast,'" said one advocate. "In this case, Social Security is the beast."
Apr 18, 2024
Amid new reporting that former U.S. President Donald Trump's economic advisers are urging him to cut the federal payroll tax, a key revenue source for Social Security and Medicare, advocates on Thursday urged voters to remember that the presumptive Republican presidential nominee has long threatened to do just that.
"Don't be fooled," said Nancy Altman, president of Social Security Works, which lobbies to strengthen the social safety net for retired Americans. "At the end of his term in office, Trump delayed Social Security's dedicated revenue paid from workers and their employers. He was quite explicit that, if reelected, he would convert that delay into a permanent cut."
Altman was referring to an executive order Trump signed in August 2020, allowing companies to delay payroll tax payments—an option most companies declined to take as the Treasury Department made clear they would have to pay all of the deferred taxes the following year and that employees would see smaller paychecks as a result of the program.
Trump promised to make the payroll tax cut permanent, and as Reutersreported late Wednesday, the former president is discussing the proposal with economic advisers including Fox News host and former National Economic Council Director Larry Kudlow and right-wing commentator Stephen Moore.
The former president is weighing cuts to Social Security's revenue stream even as Republicans complain that the popular program is unaffordable and push to raise the retirement age to delay Americans' use of the funds.
The GOP has long claimed Social Security is headed toward insolvency and pushed to privatize the program or cut benefits, but last year's Social Security trustees report found that the program's trust fund currently has a $2.85 trillion surplus and could pay 80% of benefits for the next 75 years even if Congress takes no action to expand it—as long as it continues to be funded through taxes.
"Social Security can only pay benefits if it has sufficient dedicated revenue to pay its costs. That is why it doesn't contribute even a penny to the deficit," said Altman. "If Trump succeeds in slashing that dedicated revenue so that it is no longer sufficient to fully cover the cost, it will result in an automatic benefit reduction. This would happen without any Republicans having to vote for the cuts, or Trump having to sign them into law."
"He is dusting off the old Republican playbook and bringing back the strategy known informally as 'Starve the Beast,'" said Altman of Trump. "In this case, Social Security is the beast."
Along with cutting payroll taxes, which are paid by workers and employees and amount to 7.65% of each employee's gross pay in order to fund senior citizens' post-retirement income, Trump has proposed extending the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, the vast majority of which benefited the wealthiest Americans, according to the Economic Policy Institute and the Center for Popular Democracy.
Altman noted the contrast between Trump's tax proposals and those of President Joe Biden, who has proposed strengthening Social Security and extending its solvency by requiring people with wealth over $100 million to pay at least 25% in income taxes, raising the corporate tax rate to 28%, and quadrupling the stock buyback tax to disincentive companies lavishing their shareholders with their profits instead of investing in their workforce.
"The choice this election is clear: Trump and the Republicans will cut Social Security and give tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires," said Altman. "The Democrats will expand Social Security, paid for by requiring millionaires and billionaires to pay their fair share."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Watchdogs' Database Details Right-Wing Efforts to Sway US Supreme Court
"Supreme corruption demands supreme transparency," said one campaigner behind the new effort.
Apr 18, 2024
A trio of progressive watchdog groups on Thursday unveiled a new database detailing the "troubling connections" between the U.S. Supreme Court's right-wing justices, the conservative organizations that have intervened in cases before the court, and the wealthy donors funding them.
Take Back the Court, Revolving Door Project, and True North Research published the database at SupremeTransparency.org, which "shines a spotlight on the complex web connecting justices to powerbrokers and the organizations that those powerbrokers fund, lead, and are otherwise linked to."
The watchdogs found that nearly 1 in 7 amicus briefs filed during the 2023-24 Supreme Court term were lodged by at least one powerbroker-affiliated organization. This affects 32 different cases before the court.
"The current U.S. Supreme Court has gone rogue."
For example, in Moore v. United States—in which the Supreme Court could preemptively ban or limit wealth taxes—half of all amicus briefs were filed by groups affiliated with right-wing powerbrokers.
In Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, groups funded by billionaire industrialist Charles Koch want to scupper the Chevron deference, a 40-year precedent under which judges defer to the legal interpretations of federal agencies if Congress has not passed any laws on an issue. Powerbroker-affiliated organizations have filed more than one-third of the amicus briefs seeking to overturn the Chevron doctrine.
"Far too often people with insidiously close ties to justices like Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, such as Harlan Crow and Paul Singer, signal their interest in the outcome of cases by funding, leading, or influencing organizations that file amicus briefs," Revolving Door Project executive director Jeff Hauser said in a statement.
"There is just as much of a conflict of interest when a justice hears a case involving a benefactor as a named party and one in which the person who illicitly enabled their luxurious lifestyle is 'merely' similarly situated to one of the parties," Hauser added.
According to SupremeTransparency.org:
The current U.S. Supreme Court has gone rogue. The right-wing justices that make up the court's supermajority frequently toy with precedent and the rule of law to issue opinions that not only defy the will of a majority of Americans, but also rewrite constitutional principles, overturn widely respected legal precedents, and gut longstanding rules that protect the public interest.
In just the 2021 and 2022 Supreme Court terms alone, the court overturned Roe v. Wadeafter 49 years; gutted both the decades-old Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act; overturned a 100+ year old gun safety law; eroded the National Labor Relations Act (adopted as part of New Deal reforms to protect workers); broke with their own procedures regarding standing to sue in order to block student debt relief; and reversed decades of precedent to end the decadeslong practice of race-conscious college admissions policies that promoted diversity and redressed discrimination. But this radically reactionary court and its radically reactionary justices aren't acting alone.
"Supreme corruption demands supreme transparency," said Take Back the Court president Sarah Lipton-Lubet. "It's no secret that the many of the rich benefactors cozying up to the conservative justices are the same people who fund right-wing organizations with business before the court."
"But too often, stories about the Supreme Court don't connect these dots—and as a result, they leave us with an incomplete picture," she continued. "The truth is right-wing powerbrokers are seemingly paying to play; they're funding groups that are weighing in on court cases even as they buy access to the justices who will rule on those cases."
"It's just one of the ways our Supreme Court is deeply, fundamentally broken," Lipton-Lubet added. "And it's a reminder of how urgent and necessary it is that we reform this corrupt court."
Last year, the Supreme Court adopted a Code of Conduct that contained few new rules, no enforcement mechanism, and was widely panned as a toothless public relations stunt. Bolder proposals for reforming the high court include term limits and increasing the number of justices.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular