On Monday, July 14th, the Alameda Labor Council passed the following resolution in response to the banning of “Urban Dreams” by the Oakland Unified School District (OUSD).
The “Urban Dreams” website includes course material about Mumia Abu-Jamal which was used in the teach-in for Mumia in Oakland in 1999, comparing Mumia to Martin Luther King, Jr. Because of this, the Fraternal Order of Police attacked the website last April on Fox News, and OUSD administrators immediately and unilaterally took the website down.
This public intimidation campaign comes right after the FOP blocked Debo Adegbele from serving as the Assistant Attorney General for the Department of Justice. Adegbele was involved in defending Mumia while working at the NAACP Legal Defense and Education fund. The FOP whipped up Democratic and Republican support to block his nomination. The FOP believes that, as an outspoken critic of the corruption and racism of the American legal system and both parties of American capitalism, Mumia must be silenced. In additional to legal and media pressure, they have in the past also utilized threats and actual physical violence against Mumia and his supporters.
We demand that the Urban Dreams website be reinstated on OUSD’s website.
The Labor Action Committee to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal