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Black Lives Matter Is ‘Alive And Well,’ Co-Founder Says

REUTERS/Christopher Aluka Berry

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Amber Randall Civil Rights Reporter
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A co-founder of Black Lives Matter declared that the movement is still “alive” at the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s Annual Legislative Conference Friday.

Alicia Garza, speaking on a panel about intersectionality and resistance, assured those gathered that the Black Lives Matter movement is still flourishing.

“Let me just start off by saying the movement is alive and well,” Garza said to the audience. “A lot of the times we have this conversation about where is the movement going. But I just wanted to ground us in ‘oh the movement lives.'”

Garza pointed to the policy vision released in 2016 by the Movement for Black Lives, a bail-out effort launched for Mother’s Day and activists showing up to Charlottesville riots as proof that the movement is still fighting.

“What the movement has been doing since Trump and his cronies took over, not just the White House, but two thirds of state legislatures in this country, has been making real the promise of what black liberation can look like,” Garza continued. “Our movement had led the resistance to white supremacy and white supremacists — Charlottesville, Boston, Durham. Our folks were on the front lines of that, making sure that when neo-Nazis come to protect statues of the Confederacy, which isn’t about a way of life, but about maintaining slavery and enslavement. We made sure that we didn’t just talk about statues, but we pointed out that there are living monuments to the Confederacy in the White House and in our Congress.

Garza added that resistance will not always just be protests in the streets, but also focusing on the best ways to fight the agenda of President Donald Trump.

“In this moment what the resistance looks like and feels like is not always just protests in the street. And when we look at Charlottesville we realize very quickly that the right has strategies around our mobilizations. But to fight Trumpism in this moment is not just to fight the ‘orange devil,’ which is what I call him, in the White House. It’s also to fight that agenda,” Garza said.

The panel also included Women’s March organizers Tamika D. Mallory and Linda Sarsour.

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