Mustafa Ali-Smith

In my latest for @truthout I wrote about our urgent need to abolish the death penalty. So many lives lost. Rather than practices rooted in power and retribution, we need a framing of justice that centers rehabilitation—one grounded in healing, transformation, and human dignity.

Claudette Colvin paid the price of the ticket, the cost of admission to this American struggle for dignity and freedom. We are living our lives, in part, because of what she sacrificed. open.substack.com/pub/redesignam…

News broke yesterday that Claudette Colvin died at the age of 86. And I find myself sitting with the weight of it—the weight of a name that should have been a household name but became, instead, a story many of us may have never heard before.

The ICE killing in Minneapolis represents a refinement of what Noem and Trump and the American right's underlying message has distilled into: that the right kind of people are entitled to destroy anything that threatens, frightens, impedes or even annoys them, and that this right is so sovereign and so unencumbered that any misapplication of it rises only to the level of collateral damage. bit.ly/4symglZ

In my most recent essay, I put some words together about ICE, which, to talk about ICE is to talk about violence in this country. How it is defended. How it is maintained. Read below: open.substack.com/pub/redesignam…

On this day in 1931, a mob of 2,000 white people seized a Black man named Raymond Gunn, placed him on the roof of a school for white students, and burned him alive. calendar.eji.org/racial-injusti…

My latest essay: The Price of Freedom: on clemency power and the selective nature of American mercy. open.substack.com/pub/redesignam…

“I tell my students, ‘When you get these jobs that you have been so brilliantly trained for, just remember that your real job is that if you are free, you need to free somebody else. If you have some power, then your job is to empower somebody else”. - Toni Morrison born Feb 18.

Unhoused people face a litany of unfair criminal charges simply because they’re unhoused – usually for actions they take when just trying to survive. Clearly, the solution to homelessness is not more criminalization. No one should be punished for not having a place to stay.

1 in 3 people behind bars is in jail. Most have yet to be tried in court and are legally innocent. Does that look like a system built on justice?

Sending a big congratulations to @DorothyERoberts, @ruha9, and the rest of these remarkable folks!

The death penalty is always an atrocity, not just for the wrongfully convicted. We must abolish it. truthout.org/articles/the-d…

two beautiful poets are gone.

What do you even say to this. Our justice system failed us. It failed Marcellus.

Tonight, our legal system tragically failed Marcellus “Khaliifah” Williams for the final time. The state of Missouri executed Mr. Williams in a horrific display of inhumanity, despite compelling evidence of his innocence. Tonight, we mourn his loss and honor his legacy.

We wish we had better news. But as of now, #MarcellusWilliams is still scheduled to be executed by Missouri tonight at 6 p.m. central for a crime he is totally innocent of. ⁠ Don’t stop sharing his story. It’s not too late to save an innocent life.⁠ innocenceproject.org/petitions/stop…

On Oct. 17, Texas plans to execute Robert Roberson for a crime that never occurred. The lead detective on his case now says Roberson is innocent and should be set free. My latest for @theappeal. theappeal.org/robert-roberso…

@Taylor_Made20 Great work Taylor! Congratulations!

This weekend I was fortunate enough to be honored by my Alma Mater as one of the Alums under 40 making notable strides in their field. Sensational weekend. Incredibly thankful. The journey continues. 🍊

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