Breanna Champion is the Co-Chair of the organization Black Youth Project 100, and is demanding the that all local, state, and federal budgets defund the police and instead use that money as an investment into “Black futures.”
Appearing on MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell Reports, Champion stressed that her group’s goal was not to get Mayor, and former Obama Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel (D) to resign, but was instead to defund the police department. She explained that the money used to finance the police department would instead be used to “fund our communities and things that we need.” She did not specify what those things might be nor did she explain who would keep the citizens of Chicago safe after the removal of the police force.
Chicago has seen more than four hundred gun related homicides this year alone despite the increased gun control laws that Democrats have successfully pushed through. The majority of those homicides are described as Black on Black violent crimes.
According to the Black Youth Project 100’s website, the goals of the organization go beyond defunding the police forces in communities. The organization is also seeking reparations for chattel slavery, Jim Crow laws, and mass incarceration.
Other demands include a guaranteed income for all, living wages, a federal jobs program, and freedom from discrimination for all workers.
The Windy City Times was able to interview the Black Youth Project 100 leader Charlene Carruthers about how she sees the organization’s mission.
Carruthers expanded on the points that Champion made on MSNBC to also include the decriminalization of marijuana and other petty crimes. She explained that the group is calling for an “independent civilian police accountability council that has real hiring, firing, subpoena and budgeting power.”
The Black Youth Project was just one of the groups that refused to meet with Mayor Rahm Emanuel after the dash cam video, showing the death of Laquan McDonald, was released to the public.
When asked why she refused the meeting, Carruthers said that the purpose of the meeting was wrong. The mayor was calling for a meeting with black organizations to ease anger and resentment from African-American people who are being told that violence against them from the police force is institutionalized. She said that her group is working to help the communities, not those, “Who actually harm and commit violence against us.”
Since the election of Barack Obama as president, the country has seen the rise of anti-police rhetoric, and even an increase in the number of police officers who have been assassinated.