80% of Prisoners at Ohio's Marion Prison Test Positive for COVID-19
Azzurra Crispino | zcomm.org | 2020-05-07
Calls Grow for Mass Release…
zcomm.org/znetarticle/80-of-prisoners-at-ohios-marion-prison-test-positive-for-covid-19/

Ecuador's Moreno govt persecutes opponents as coronavirus catastrophe exposes its neoliberal war on public sector
Denis Rogatyuk | thegrayzone.com | 2020-05-06
Sentencing former President Rafael Correa and Jorge Glas to eight years in jail and barring them from public office for…
thegrayzone.com/2020/05/06/ecuadors-moreno-persecutes-coronavirus/

PLANDEMIC, a film about the global plan to take control of our lives, liberty, health & freedom
Vanessa Beeley | thealtworld.com | 2020-05-06
"ABOUT THE FILM Humanity is imprisoned by a killer pandemic. People are being arrested for surfing in the ocean and meditating in nature. Nations are collapsing. Hungry citizens are rioting for food. The media has generated so much confusion and fear that people are begging for salvation in a syringe. | Billionaire patent owners are pushing for globally mandated vaccines. Anyone who refuses to be injected with experimental poisons will be prohibited from travel, education and work. No, this is not a synopsis for a new horror movie. | This is our current reality. | Let's back up to address how we got here… In…
thealtworld.com/vanessa_beeley/plandemic-a-film-about-the-global-plan-to-take-control-of-our-lives-liberty-health-freedom

First COVID-19 Death in Immigration Detention a Result of Continued Dehumanization of People by ICE
commondreams.org | 2020-05-06
______________________________…
commondreams.org/newswire/2020/05/06/first-covid-19-death-immigration-detention-result-continued-dehumanization?cd-origin=rss

SPLC's Civil Rights Memorial Center, closed due to COVID-19, publishes children's activity book online
splcenter.org | 2020-05-06
splcenter.org/news/2020/05/06/splcs-civil-rights-memorial-center-closed-due-covid-19-publishes-childrens-activity-book

Army Abducts Fateh Secretary In Al-Jalazoun
IMEMC News | imemc.org | 2020-05-06
Israeli soldiers abducted, on Wednesday evening, the secretary of Fateh movement in the al-Jalazoun refugee camp, north of the central West Bank city of Ramallah. The Palestinian Prisoners' Society (PPS) has reported that the soldiers abducted Tha'er Nakhla, while he was heading back home after a visit to the al-'Ezariyya …
imemc.org/article/army-abducts-fateh-secretary-in-al-jalazoun/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=army-abducts-fateh-secretary-in-al-jalazoun

Israeli army bombs three different locations inside besieged Gaza strip
Peoples Dispatch | peoplesdispatch.org | 2020-05-06
Israel continues its oppressive policies against Palestinians and has seized fresh Palestinian lands and demolished houses. It is also refused calls to release Palestinian prisoners in light of the COVID-19 emergency…
peoplesdispatch.org/2020/05/06/israeli-army-bombs-three-different-locations-inside-besieged-gaza-strip/

Mumia Abu-Jamal: 'On Prison Guards'
Mumia Abu-Jamal | workers.org | 2020-05-06
This slightly edited commentary from April 24 by political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal is available at prisonradio.org/media/audio/mumia. Mumia Abu-Jamal By Mumia Abu-Jamal I remember in [State Correctional Institute] Huntington and even in [SCI] Green. You know, when I was alone with a [guard] talking man-to-man, the guy said: "Listen, I'm a . . . | Continue reading Mumia Abu-Jamal: 'On Prison Guards' at Workers.org…
workers.org/2020/05/48287/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=mumia-abu-jamal-on-prison-guards

The Case for Prison Abolition: Ruth Wilson Gilmore on COVID-19, Racial Capitalism & Decarceration
Staff | democracynow.org | 2020-05-05
The spread of COVID-19 threatens the lives of more than 2.3 million people locked up in prisons and jails throughout the United States. We look at how the call to release prisoners during the coronavirus pandemic makes the case for prison abolition, with scholar Ruth Wilson Gilmore, co-founder of California Prison Moratorium Project and Critical Resistance and the author of "Golden Gulag: Prison, Surplus, Crisis, and Opposition in Globalizing California." Her forthcoming book is "Change Everything: Racial Capitalism and the Case for Abolition."
www.democracynow.org/2020/5/5/ruth_wilson_gilmore_abolition_coronavirus

Calls Grow for Mass Release from Ohio's Marion Prison as 80% of Prisoners Test Positive for COVID-19
Staff | democracynow.org | 2020-05-05
We get an update on one of the worst coronavirus outbreaks in the United States, at the Marion Correctional Institution in Ohio, where 11 prisoners and one staff member have died, and at least 80% of prisoners and half of the prison staff tested positive. Despite growing calls to release thousands of Ohio's nearly 50,000 incarcerated people as the coronavirus spreads, Governor Mike DeWine has only approved the release of more than 100 people in the state's prisons. "We're seeing a few people being released … but not anywhere near the 20,000 [we are] demanding," says Azzurra Crispino, whose husband, James, is in…
www.democracynow.org/2020/5/5/marion_correctional_institution_coronavirus_outbreak_calls

Solitary Confinement Used For Children As Young As 11 After COVID-19 Exposure
Staff | therealnews.com | 2020-05-05
Lawyers say Maryland's Department of Juvenile Services and the Department of Correctional Services aren't being transparent about conditions in juvenile detention centers.
therealnews.com/stories/solitary-confinement-juvenile-detention-eleven-coronavirus-exposure-maryland

Víctor Polay: Incarceration in a Peruvian Naval Base
Peoples Dispatch | peoplesdispatch.org | 2020-05-05
The political prisoner has spent the past two decades in complete isolation in a special penitentiary center on a Naval Base in Peru. Amid the spread of COVID-19 the incarcerated population is especially at risk…
peoplesdispatch.org/2020/05/05/victor-polay-incarceration-in-a-peruvian-naval-base/

Moral Choices for Today's Physician
Berwick DM. | jamanetwork.com | 2020-05-05
In this essay, Don Berwick considers moral choices physicians face personally, organizationally, and globally and exhorts them to understand that the health of humanity depends on their speaking out against the social injustice of overpricing drugs and services, mass incarceration, and the lack of environmental responsibility.
jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2765426

My Name Is Not "Interpreter"
Montenegro RE. | jamanetwork.com | 2020-05-05
In this essay, the author relays his personal experience with ethnicity-based discrimination and discusses the "microaggressions" that medical trainees from underrepresented groups based on race/ethnicity, gender, or sexual orientation experience.
jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2765422

Detainees put at high risk for COVID-19 at Madison, Wi., jail
Annika Lee | liberationnews.org | 2020-05-05
To protect them from COVID-19, incarcerated people must be freed.
liberationnews.org/detainees-put-at-high-risk-for-covid-19-at-madison-wi-jail/

Palestinian Prisoner Re-Detained on the Day of his Release
Ali Salam | imemc.org | 2020-05-05
Israeli forces, on Monday morning, arrested Nihad Zgheir, as soon as he was released from Israel's Gilboa jail, Quds News Network reported. The Committee of the Families of Jerusalem Prisoners told QNN that Zgheir, 42, who was released from prison Monday morning, after serving 35 months, was re-arrested by the …
imemc.org/article/palestinian-prisoner-re-detained-on-the-day-of-his-release/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=palestinian-prisoner-re-detained-on-the-day-of-his-release

We should never forget Bobby Sands, nor the brutality of the Thatcher government in Ireland
Peter Bolton | thecanary.co | 2020-05-05
Today marks the 39th anniversary of the death of Bobby Sands inside the H-blocks of Long Kesh internment camp. On 5 May 1981, Sands laid down his life for his and his comrades' right for recognition as political prisoners. On this day, we should remember the sacrifice he made for the cause of Irish freedom. But his struggle does not just provide an example that all anti-imperialists should follow. It also serve…
thecanary.co/opinion/2020/05/05/we-should-never-forget-bobby-sands-nor-the-brutality-of-the-thatcher-government-in-ireland/

COVID-19: UN teams step up efforts to protect rights in prisons, as revolts intensify worldwide
news.un.org | 2020-05-05
As senior UN officials spread the alarm over the rapid spread of COVID-19 through prisons

Boyle Heights celebrates May Day for the 6th consecutive year
Fight Back | fightbacknews.org | 2020-05-04
Los Angeles, CA – On Friday, May 1, a car protest of over 40 vehicles driven by workers, teachers and activists took to the streets for the sixth consecutive year to celebrate International Workers Day, May Day, in the Boyle Heights neighborhood. Organized by Centro CSO, this year's May Day protest focused on Trump's attacks on immigrants and called for free healthcare for COVID-19 patients, support for public education, jailing killer cops and community control over the police. | "The coronavirus pandemic has affected oppressed nationalities like African Americans, Chicanos and American Indians the most. Unsafe…
www.fightbacknews.org/2020/5/4/boyle-heights-celebrates-may-day-6th-consecutive-year

Spy Plane Resumes Flights Over Baltimore Amid COVID-19
Staff | therealnews.com | 2020-05-04
The expensive aerial surveillance program won't help heavily disinvested Baltimore, say Ceasefire co-founder Erricka Bridgeford and author Brandon Soderberg.
therealnews.com/stories/spy-plane-aerial-surveillance-baltimore-appeal-aclu

Venezuela: 45 Killed in Guanare Prison Riot
Paul Dobson | venezuelanalysis.com | 2020-05-04
The government pledged to investigate the May 1 riot, which it described as an attempted breakout.
venezuelanalysis.com/news/14863

[Editorial] COVID-19: remaking the social contract
The Lancet | thelancet.com | 2020-05-02
"Allegiance, after all, has to work two ways; and one can grow weary of an allegiance which is not reciprocal." The British playwright David Hare quoted this line by the American writer James Baldwin in his recent reflections on the UK Government's response to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Baldwin's reminder and warning in the context of civil rights in the mid-20th century USA speak now in the pandemic to communities the world over who are unsure of their governments' allegiances to them.
thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30983-1/fulltext?rss=yes

Sudan bans female genital mutilation, UNICEF vows to help support new law
news.un.org | 2020-05-02
The United Nations Childen's Fund (UNICEF) welcomed the landmark move by Sudan's transitional government this week to criminalize female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C), with a three-year jail sentence for offenders.
news.un.org/feed/view/en/story/2020/05/1063122

[Perspectives] Death of a courtier
Sarah Ditum | thelancet.com | 2020-05-02
A plague sweeps the nation, the head of state's health is threatened, and the business of government is rendered fragile and unsteady. It has been over a decade since Hilary Mantel began her Thomas Cromwell trilogy with Wolf Hall in 2009, and 8 years since 2012's Bring Up the Bodies, but what felt like an arduous wait now seems like nothing but impeccable timing. Cromwell even ends the novel under his own version of lockdown as a prisoner in the Tower of London. The world has been uncannily prepared for The Mirror & the Light.
thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30939-9/fulltext?rss=yes

[World Report] Prisons are "in no way equipped" to deal with COVID-19
Talha Burki | thelancet.com | 2020-05-02
Prisons are a hotspot for COVID-19. In theory, prisoners have the same right to health as anyone else, but the reality is very different. Talha Burki reports.
thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30984-3/fulltext?rss=yes

Coronavirus-positive scientist to return home from U.S. jail: Tehran
Tehran Times | iranian.com | 2020-05-04
Sirous Asgari, an Iranian scientist imprisoned in the United States who has contracted the novel coronavirus, will return home soon, according to Iran's Foreign Ministry. During a press conference on Monday, Foreign Ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi said the ministry is following up on Asgari's case both in Iran and in the U.S. Asgari, who has …
iranian.com/2020/05/04/coronavirus-positive-scientist-to-return-home-from-u-s-jail-tehran/

A County Jail Battles COVID-19 and the Opioid Crisis–At the Same Time
Marcia Brown | progressive.org | 2020-05-01
The pandemic and an increase in immigration detainees create a double whammy for the rural Ohio jail.
progressive.org/dispatches/county-jail-battles-covid19-and-opioid-crisis-brown-200501/

How to Protest in a Pandemic
Emerson Sykes | aclu.org | 2020-05-01
For centuries, Americans have taken to the streets when they've had grievances to share. We've taken to the streets to make our voices heard, to effect change, and to feel and display the power and solidarity of mass gatherings. But with physical distancing and shelter in place orders prevalent throughout the U.S. and the world, how do we responsibly exercise our First Am…
aclu.org/news/free-speech/how-to-protest-in-a-pandemic

McDonald's Employees are Working through the COVID-19 Pandemic. So Why Don't They Have Access to Paid Sick and Family Leave?
Nicole Regalado | aclu.org | 2020-05-01
Essential workers are on the front-lines during the COVID-19 pandemic, and have suffered higher infection rates because of it. Yet too many of these workers do not have access to paid sick leave and family leave. That means that if an employee comes down with COVID-19, they must choose between safeguarding their own health and the health of others, and potentially losing their job. Nobody should have to make this choice. , , Essential businesses include ubiquitous fast-food chains like McDo…
aclu.org/news/racial-justice/mcdonalds-employees-are-working-through-the-covid-19-pandemic-so-why-dont-they-have-access-to-paid-sick-and-family-leave

What Happened When I Needed an Abortion During the Pandemic
Anonymous Mother in Tennessee | aclu.org | 2020-05-01
I am a 30-year-old woman and mother of three kids living in Tennessee. My oldest is just over two years old. My two girls are nine-month-old twins. Because the twins were born prematurely, they have significant medical needs. I have no family living nearby, and very little caregiving support. I tried to get my son into daycare earlier this year, but the childcare facility

A COVID-19 Balancing Act: Public Health and Privacy
aclu.org | 2020-05-01
Some states are officially loosening their stay at home restrictions, and more will join in the coming months as Americans attempt to inch their way back to pre-COVID-19 life. Some of us will return to work, gather in small groups, and maybe even dine at a neighborhood restaurant. , , As we proceed, what will it take to keep us safe and prevent new spikes in infections? Many experts say we won't be out of the woods until there's a vaccine, but how would a national vaccination plan even work? At the same time, technological solutions are being proposed, especially related to contact tracing, the process b…
aclu.org/news/civil-liberties/a-covid-19-balancing-act-public-health-and-privacy

How the ACLU is Responding to the Pandemic, Visualized
aclu.org | 2020-04-30
The COVID-19 pandemic has closed down many businesses, but the ACLU's work of defending and expanding civil liberties and civil rights continues, essential as ever. At the ACLU, our most immediate focus has been on issues arising from the government's response

Utah's Shiny Surveillance Technology to Address COVID-19 Fails Miserably
Jason Stevenson | aclu.org | 2020-04-30
How many times have you failed to get a new digital device working properly the first time? While toddlers can (amazingly) master iPhones in minutes, some tech gadgets require many troubleshooting attempts to activate. And even then, they might fizzle., , Last month, the state of Utah learned that simple tech lesson in a very public way., , As part of a series of measures to respond to the coronavirus outbreak, Utah Gov. Gary Herbert issued an executive order requiring every adult crossing the Utah border to submit an electronic State of Utah Travel Self-Declaration Form with details about their contact info…
aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/utahs-shiny-surveillance-technology-to-address-covid-19-fails-miserably

Four Myths About Trans Athletes, Debunked
Chase Strangio | aclu.org | 2020-04-30
For years state lawmakers have pushed legislation attempting to shut trans people out of public spaces. In 2020, lawmakers zeroed in on sports and introduced 20 bills seeking to ban trans people from participating in athletics. These statewide efforts have been supported through a coordinated campaign led by anti-LGBTQ groups that have long worked to attack our communities. , , Before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down most state legislatures, Idaho became the first state to pass a sweeping ban on trans people's participation in a…
aclu.org/news/lgbt-rights/four-myths-about-trans-athletes-debunked

Federal Bill Would Release Vulnerable People from Prisons to Help Stop Spread of COVID-19
Kanya Bennett | aclu.org | 2020-04-29
A month ago, Congress gave the Department of Justice (DOJ) and Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) increased authority to reduce the federal prison population. On March 29th, Congress passed the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act ( CARES Act), providing DOJ and BOP with the ability to expand home confinement eligibility. Then, Attorney General William Barr "applaud[ed] the substantial steps ta…
aclu.org/news/prisoners-rights/federal-bill-would-release-vulnerable-people-from-prisons-to-help-stop-spread-of-covid-19

Headlines for April 28, 2020
Staff | democracynow.org | 2020-04-28
Known U.S. Deaths Top 56,000 as New Study Shows True Number Likely Much Higher, Trump Ignored Early Intelligence Reports as Coronavirus Spread, Trump Denies Responsibility for Spike in Disinfectant Poisonings, Texas Reopens Businesses, California Warns Against Violating Restrictions | , Trump's Plan to Give Commencement Address at West Point Could Bring Back 1,000 Cadets to Campus, NY Cancels Primary After Removing Bernie Sanders from the Ballot , U.N. Calls for Release of Immigrant Prisoners as San Diego Facility Refuses to Allow Face Mask Delivery, More Cases Reported at Prisons as New Study Shows 96% of Inmate…
www.democracynow.org/2020/4/28/headlines

Trump attacks trans health access during a pandemic
Aviva Levine | liberationnews.org | 2020-04-28
Under an expected rewrite of part of the ACA, discrimination against trans people in health care would be legally permitted.
liberationnews.org/trump-attacks-trans-health-access-during-a-pandemic/

First person to die in Alabama's prisons with COVID-19 spent more than four decades behind bars
splcenter.org | 2020-04-22
splcenter.org/news/2020/04/22/first-person-die-alabamas-prisons-covid-19-spent-more-four-decades-behind-bars