Assata the Unflinching

Dear President Barack Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder,

At the risk of running afoul of the PATRIOT act, we declare that we still love and respect Assata Shakur no matter what you say.

The FBI’s Aaron Ford, head of the Newark (NJ) division, announced the renewed manhunt for Assata.

Assata Shakur

Black people are in a new nadir, and Assata Shakur comes out of a tradition of committed revolutionaries who have resisted the forces that got us there. Assata is truly a political prisoner because, as Eugene Puryear says, “what changed in the recent days and weeks to now put her on the ‘Most Wanted Terrorists’ list? The FBI presented no evidence against her and revealed no terrorist plots. Assata’s real crime, FBI spokesman Aaron Ford said, was that from Cuba she continues to ‘maintain and promote her … ideology’ and ‘provides anti-U.S. government speeches espousing the Black Liberation Army message’—an ideology and message that the U.S. government has declared ‘terrorism.’” In other words, she is suddenly a “terrorist” because she has remained ideologically committed to Black freedom. 

Read more at Assata the Unflinching on The Feminist Wire...