American Indian Community House’s Rent Campaign

I (Elana) am attempting to try a multi-state life, basing myself mostly on Munsee Lenape and Mohican land (NJ) with regular trips into other Munsee Lenape, Mohican, and Canarsie lands (NYC). The plan sounded fun, but the reality of frequent transitions reminds me that while change can be good, it quite often feels uncomfortable, untethering, and destabilizing. How do I have a relationship with the land when I can’t regularly greet the same bushes and trees? Plants like permanency, too: you may be able to repot or move them occasionally, but mostly they need a stable spot where they can put down roots in order to grow and thrive.

Musing on permanency naturally calls up the journey of a local organization with which SURJ-NYC’s Indigenous Solidarity working group has been growing our relationship. For more than five decades, the American Indian Community House (AICH) has served as a gathering place and cultural home for Indigenous people living in New York City. Through changing times, AICH has remained committed to strengthening community, honoring cultures, and creating opportunities for Native people to gather, connect, create, and thrive.

In March of this year, AICH moved into a new home at 234 West 39th Street in Manhattan. Having moved locations many times over the years, AICH leadership is hopeful that this space will be a place to nourish community and grow its offerings. After all, by the time AICH had been in the space for three months, it had already held 21 events with a total of 575 attendees, including First Foods Pantry distributions of Indigenous foods, Indigenous Futures/Indigenous Pathways programs for young adults navigating Native life in NYC, Women’s Talking Circles, and more.

We at SURJ-NYC-IS have supported fall fundraisers for AICH in the past, but this year feels especially meaningful with AICH’s new sovereign space. Their leadership isn’t shy about naming permanency as a priority, or that they see community as integral to reaching that permanency. Currently, monthly sustaining donors cover 40% of the space’s rent, which AICH’s donor newsletter, The Shoreline, called “a huge gift.” AICH would love for monthly donors to cover 100% of the rent, ideally by the end of this year — which feels like a perfect opportunity for the SURJ-NYC community to step up. Long before the gentrification that many of us have observed and even benefitted from, the first humans who lived where we do were forcibly removed — not to mention tortured, enslaved, and decimated by genocide. The concept of reparations as payment for past wrongs falls a bit flat to me in the context of cultures oriented around gift-giving and reciprocity — particularly as AICH is multitribal, not necessarily composed of the nations that originally lived here. What if, instead, we viewed movement of funds to AICH as reciprocity, acknowledging the sovereignty and power of Native folks who live in NYC, and being invited into their circle of allies in response? What if our gifts of funds resulted in the gift of experiencing Indigenous imagination, beauty, and solidarity first-hand?

Sign up to become a monthly donor to AICH here. Whether you can move $1/month or $1000, you’ll be invited into AICH’s story and helping Indigenous folks thrive in the city we all love. 

With care,

SURJ NYC Indigenous Solidarity coordinators (Katharine, Elana, Sarah, Kristin, Alison, & Kyle)

Join Us In-Person On October 3rd!

Instead of a normal chapter meeting in October, we’re having our first-ever SURJ NYC members gathering on Saturday October 3rd from 2:00pm - 4:00pm in Central Park! 

Come get to know other SURJ NYC members and help envision and build what we collectively want from SURJ NYC membership. We’ll also have an open discussion with each of our action working groups about a question they are pondering right now. Join us to take a deeper look into how we work with partner organizations and what is coming up in those relationships and projects.

Not a member yet? Sign up here! Not sure about becoming a member but curious to learn more? Come to this event! While it is about membership, it is open to everyone.

What Does It Mean To Be a SURJ NYC Member?

Being a SURJ NYC member means participating in a community of other New Yorkers supporting each other with the personal and political work of dismantling white supremacy. By building trust, deepening political analysis, and taking action together, we are able to accomplish powerful things! In the last year we held down key parts of the campaign that ended ICE detention in New York State, moved tens of thousands of dollars to our partner organizations, and had hundreds of conversations with white voters in Southern Brooklyn about electing Zohran Mamdani, among many other things.

SURJ NYC members make the following commitments to their anti-racist practice:

  • Move money: Make at least one generous-for-you donation to people-of-color-led organizing each year.

  • Move self: Engage in study and self-reflection to deepen your understanding of how white supremacy operates and how to dismantle it.

  • Move community: Participate in calling in the white people in your networks.

  • Move power: Take concrete action designed to effect change on the material reality of white supremacy in NYC. (Go to a rally, call your representative, participate in a direct action, etc.)

  • Move into relationship: Build relationships with other people in SURJ NYC. Seek out people to learn from, process with, and give and take feedback with.

Whether you’re already a member or interested in learning more, we’re looking forward to seeing you on October 3rd! We'll be in the grassy area to the west of Pinebank Arch in Central Park. Please email us at nycsurj@gmail.com to share any access needs.

See you there!
SURJ NYC

Block by Block: From Minneapolis to Memphis to Mississippi

I know it can be extremely hard, and I know it can be extremely dangerous. But we need y'all. We literally need white organizers to organize other white people.

— Rukia Lumumba, Co-Director of the Movement for Black Lives’ Electoral Justice Project 

Organizing white people out of white supremacy is white people’s work. The Movement for Black Lives’ Electoral Justice Project and other Black-led organizations across the South have been asking white people to take this on, and movement leaders have been clear that elections are strategic ground for it. This year, that means the midterms.

The elections this November decide who controls Congress, and MAGA’s whole operation for winning them runs on recruiting white people. It doesn’t work without white people who go along with it. In Go Get Your People, Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson counts roughly 41 million white people who were eligible to vote in 2024 and didn’t – a bloc bigger than every swing state margin combined. They aren’t lost, she writes, they’re unorganized.

“Elections do not necessarily liberate us. Organized people do,” Rukia Lumumba said. Racism is how the far right wins elections – not a tactic alongside their strategy, but the engine of it. Every white person we move out of that engine shrinks the margin they are counting on, this November and beyond.

In May, Tennessee Republicans dismantled the state’s only majority-Black congressional district and redrew it to take in rural, white, Republican-leaning areas. State Representative Justin Pearson, a Black Democratic politician and community organizer, won the primary anyway and is on the ballot in November. Winning now means winning over white voters in those new areas.

In SURJ’s recent webinar, White People’s Work in the Midterm Election, Justin and Rukia laid out why this work falls to white people, and why it’s antiracist work. “Black people should not have to carry both the burden of surviving white supremacy, and convincing white people to reject it,” Rukia said. “It’s an investment that we will all benefit from,” Justin added. It’s worth your time.

Winning the midterm elections won’t end the fight against white supremacy on its own. But it changes the terrain the rest of our organizing happens on. Every seat we flip is less power for the machinery deporting our neighbors, stripping away healthcare, and criminalizing the people who resist – and more capacity for direct action, mutual aid, and base-building. Imagine where we could focus our energy instead of spending everything we have responding to the next racist attack.

Block by Block is SURJ National’s 2026 campaign to win the midterms, enforce the results, and grow our base along the way. Whatever happens in November, we come out of this with more white people organized, more leaders, and more neighbors in the fight for racial and economic justice.

No one said fighting white supremacy would be easy. Register to join us on September 27th, for hands-on training on organizing white people this election. You will practice real conversations, build skills for possible scenarios we may face in order to defend this election, and leave with concrete next steps. No organizing experience necessary!

In solidarity,

SURJ NYC

Twenty-Five Years After 9/11, Islamophobia is Still Alive and Well

As the 25th anniversary of 9/11/2001 approaches, Islamophobia is rampant. This week in a convoluted rant against Islam, Rudy Giuliani said Mayor Mamdani should skip the memorial ceremony and a petition to bar Mamdani from attending reached 100,000 signatures. 

In today’s newsletter we’re reflecting on how 9/11 shaped Islamophobia, but also Muslim political power in NYC. The Gothamist published an article on “How post-9/11 Islamophobia sparked a Muslim political awakening in NYC”. We’ve included the beginning here and encourage you to read the rest.

Just a few days after the 9/11 attacks, then-16-year-old Faiza Ali was wearing a hijab at a Rite Aid near her home in Midwood, Brooklyn, when a screaming woman told her to leave. The woman pushed Ali's little sister as other customers and a security guard stood by idly.

Ali Najmi remembers when his Pakistani immigrant mother stopped wearing her traditional shalwar kameez outside their home in Glen Oaks, Queens. She started covering the Quran she read on the subway with a paper bag.

And Ramzi Kassem, who volunteered as a legal translator at a nearby prison, remembers being briefly detained by a guard who suspected he might be a terrorism suspect.

Twenty-five years later, the three now hold key appointments in the administration of the city’s first Muslim mayor, Zohran Mamdani. Their paths to the halls of power show that the wave of post-9/11 Islamophobia that cast Muslims as adversaries also sparked a political awakening among a generation that went on to help Mamdani get elected.

‘Islamophobia after 9/11 became a kind of institutionalized force, primarily through different forms of government repression,’ said Moustafa Bayoumi, a Brooklyn College professor who has written about Muslim political organizing in New York City. ‘The younger generation especially decided that they had to meet those challenges head-on, and they really began organizing collectively under the banner of being Muslim American.

Onward,

SURJ NYC

As Black August Ends, the Racial Justice Battle Continues On

This past Friday, August 28, was the 63rd Anniversary of the March on Washington. Thousands of people gathered in DC to show the energy from across the country to Defend the Right to Vote and Democracy. Speakers included Guerline Jozef of the Haitian Bridge Alliance, MLK Jr’s granddaughter Yolanda Renee King, Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, Human Rights Campaign executive director Kelley Robinson, Working Families Party director Maurice Mitchell, and more. They spoke on the need for us all to do our part to push back against fascism and save democracy.

On Saturday, August 29, the December 12th Movement commemorated the 25th anniversary of Durban UN Conference Against Racism.  “Durban 400" refers to a coalition of grassroots activists from the African diaspora who traveled to the 2001 United Nations World Conference Against Racism in Durban, South Africa. The organizing story is in this documentary and shows the beginning of a critical push to show that governments were not telling the whole truth when claiming that racism was a thing of the past. This work from 2001 continued leading to the Resolution in March 2026 that trafficking of Africans and chattel slavery was the gravest crime against humanity. This recent NYCLU report shows how that history is still playing out today.

To close out Black August, Movement for Black Lives is calling for support for their Elder Care Fund which is M4BL's commitment to ensuring the liberation of political prisoners is a lifelong right – extending to the medical, spiritual, and healing care our elders need whether they're still incarcerated or returning home. It’s our opportunity to return support to leaders who actively, and unapologetically, fought for intergenerational liberation.

In solidarity,

SURJ NYC

Let's Talk About Thanksgiving at September's Chapter Meeting

Many, if not most of my friends say that Thanksgiving is their favorite holiday.

My partner, Kristin, and I have never really been those people, having somewhat complicated family connections, a story to which I’m sure many can relate. However, we enjoyed our yearly #friendsgiving for a while there. Everyone does potluck, gets to share a little taste of home, and then chill with chosen family.

But something never felt fully right to us about this celebration.

We began to interrogate this feeling, starting with the food commonly associated with Thanksgiving, which led us to examine how settler-colonialism is literally cooked into our most common recipes. This opened a door, but there was still something deeper that felt off. So, we started looking at holiday traditions from an ancestral and trauma-informed point of view, which introduced us to exploring the Wheel of the Year.

While deepening our organizing at the beginning of lockdown, we attended the Rethinking Thanksgiving webinar, co-sponsored by Catalyst Project. It blew our minds wide open – giving us context and analysis about what felt wrong here. From then on, instead of celebrating Thanksgiving and/or friendsgiving, we’ve attended the webinar annually and started watching the livestream of the National Day of Mourning – “a day of remembrance and spiritual connection, as well as a protest against the racism and oppression that Indigenous people continue to experience worldwide.” We finally found a practice of the holiday that felt more aligned with the values we were showing up for in our organizing. For the last few years, we’ve attended the National Day of Mourning, in person, with our organizing community, the SURJ NYC Indigenous Solidarity Coordinators, and even some of our loved ones.

SURJ NYC Coordinators attend the National Day of Mourning in 2024.

SURJ NYC Coordinators attend the National Day of Mourning in 2024.

These have now become some of our traditions, and although they’re more aligned, they’ve come with a loss. As we unlearn white supremacy and settler-colonialism day-by-day and year-by-year, we must also face grief and disillusionment. This work is hard, and in a world that’s burning down, with a cascade of increasingly terrifying headlines daily, the small joys we still hold, like a holiday meal shared with loved ones, can feel even more acutely painful to examine. And yet, if we truly want to live in a liberated world, we must learn how to navigate this discomfort and seek support whenever we can, particularly in community. 

Chapter meeting is coming up on September 3 and the SURJ NYC Indigenous Solidarity Coordinators will be hosting a tender, honest conversation about what it might mean to show up to Thanksgiving differently. We’ll discuss many different options for how to align our actions with our de-colonial values on this complicated holiday, while holding the complexities about what we might be giving up in the process.

This chapter meeting is for everyone. Do you resonate with any of the above? Come on out. Are you activated or challenged by it? Come on out. Are you unsure what exactly we’re talking about and want to learn more? Is there someone you’ve been wanting to bring into SURJ NYC to see what we’re all about? This is a great opportunity for all of that.

Weaving this way of showing up into our resistance movements against authoritarianism and imperialism feels especially important to us right now. There are no easy answers. We’re here to ask hard questions together, learn from each other, and offer support around the pain points we’ve encountered as we’ve moved away from ‘traditionally’ celebrating Thanksgiving.

We hope you’ll join us - register here.

In solidarity,

Kyle & Kristin, and your SURJ NYC Indigenous Solidarity Coordinators (Alison, Elana, Grace, Katharine, and Sarah)

Block by Block Training

In 2026, our movements have already delivered powerful blows to the Trump administration’s billionaire agenda, and we’re in the best position yet to stop their death march and weaken their power. Millions of white people are rising up– it’s our role to be ready to move them away from authoritarianism and into movements of resistance.

To get ready for all of this, a group of SURJ NYC leaders have been trained and are now bringing that training to our local community: the Block by Block Training and Action Series. This series will equip SURJ NYC members and our allies and friends with the tools to organize our communities here in New York City, get into formation, and do our part in this national campaign. We’ll host sessions on Saturday, August 15th and Sunday, August 23rd from 1:00–4:00pm on both days.

As ICE has its eyes set on the next invasion location and the 2026 midterm elections approach, can you join us to be ready to win?

Block by Block is SURJ's national campaign for 2026 to:

  1. mobilize members into mass actions like marches and local ICE resistance

  2. elect working class champions and block MAGA candidates

  3. grow our power by bringing more and more people into our movement

In this training, you’ll learn everything you need to implement this strategy. We’ll train on recruitment and building a local movement, strategic noncooperation, building electoral power, and more. We’ll provide all the structure, toolkits, and guidance you need to plug into our national program and make a real difference– block by block.

The MAGA agenda wants to use this year to elect more of their people to rig elections, destroy what’s left of our social safety net, deport hundreds of thousands more of our neighbors, and ensure that Wall Street and Silicon Valley overlords have free rein to take advantage of us all.

Solidarity is rising — and if we keep it up, we’ll not only stop their strategy, we’ll have a mass movement of people who are fighting for not a return to the status quo, but an entirely new vision for this country.

Register to Join Us

Onward,

SURJ NYC

August Chapter Meeting

At this month’s chapter meeting on August 6th we’ll learn about an exciting court watching project, discuss how the federal government is escalating against groups and individuals fighting its agenda, and hear from SURJ NYC members who attended a national SURJ training focused on coordinated strategy for the midterms. Learn more and sign up here!

First up we’ll hear about the Black August Week of Court Watching. This series of actions is happening Monday August 10th - Thursday August 13th and will illuminate the ways that broken windows policing is continuing to harm Black and poor New Yorkers, and call for Mayor Mamdani to take action and deliver the new approach to community safety that he has promised. There are morning, afternoon, and evening shifts every day - sign up here to join one! You’ll be paired with a trained organizer and share observations to help us make the case for fully ending broken windows policing. There will also be an optional training this evening (8/4) at 7:00pm on Zoom if you'd like to get some more context for the action. We'll talk about how arraignments work, what we're looking for when we court watch, and share logistical information about how to show up. Join us if you're free and interested. 

Then we’ll learn about legal action the federal government is pursuing against protestors and groups organizing against its activities. We’ll discuss how we can all be ready to protect each other.

And finally, we’ll hear from a group of SURJ NYC members who attended a national SURJ training focused on coordinated strategy for the midterms — how we work with accountability partners to win big and enforce our victories in the midterms. They’ll share what they learned and walk through the concrete next steps for plugging into this work. If you’ve been looking for a clear way to get involved before the midterms, this is it.

In solidarity,

SURJ NYC

Land Stewardship: A Recharge for the Soul

Coney Island in Brooklyn: Nathan’s hot dogs, Luna Park, the Brooklyn Cyclones. If you haven’t been — or haven’t been in awhile — you should give it a go.

It’s the back half of summer, and there’s been a lot going on: continued fights against authoritarianism and ICE violence, the end of another devastating SCOTUS term, an undeclared war in Iran, as well as the ever intensifying effects of the climate crisis – wildfire smoke, flooding, and historical heatwaves. There have also been some wins: Dignity Not Detention ending detention contracts in NY, and massive resistance to the monster STAMP data center proposal upstate, for example.

It’s exhausting, and it has been for a long while. Rest is needed to recharge and reconnect to your centered self in organizing for racial justice. The beach at Coney Island can offer this, as can a swim in the ocean or the joys of the amusement parks that line the boardwalk, if that’s your thing.

You wouldn’t necessarily know it from Coney, but a little further up the coast, to the east, sits Marine Park — a salt marsh and public park. Like the rest of the city, this land was originally stewarded by the Lenape people, in what were important hunting and fishing grounds. Over 80% of New York City’s vital salt marshes have disappeared due to shoreline development. These wetlands are crucial habitat for many species of wildlife as well as helping to clean water and prevent flooding. We’ve got crabs. We’ve got shorebirds. We’ve got mussels and fish.

And, this being NYC, we’ve got trash to pick up.

On August 23, 2026, SURJ NYC’s Indigenous Solidarity Working Group invites you to join us in land stewardship, learning and connection at Marine Park in Brooklyn from 11:00am-1:00pm. We’ll learn more about the history of colonization in our city, the effects on this site, and we’ll take action together in person to help clean up this vital shoreline.

One of the best ways to connect and recharge is through land practice; by showing up to the land we inhabit, making a simple offering, and allowing ourselves to be changed by listening deeply to what’s returned. There’s nothing quite as fulfilling and invigorating as the experience of land practice with your organizing community — a recharge for the soul.

Save the date and keep an eye out for future information. We hope to see you there!


In solidarity,

SURJ NYC

P.S. At next month’s chapter meeting on August 6th we’ll learn about an exciting court watching project, discuss how the federal government is escalating against groups and individuals fighting its agenda, and hear from SURJ NYC members who attended a national SURJ training focused on coordinated strategy for the midterms. Learn more and sign up here!

Moments to Celebrate, Reflect, and Act

This week the city is buzzing - the Knicks victory, LGBTQ Pride Month, the Puerto Rican Day parade, and World Cup fever. You can feel it. Meanwhile, Trump in DC is also doing wild things every day, but we are winning. With the country’s 250th anniversary approaching, this is a good moment to reflect and act. 

Voting is happening (Early voting began this week)! Congress, State Assembly, State Senate, Comptroller and committee district leaders who decide judges.

This Friday is Juneteenth, and there’s much to celebrate. It also raises an important question for white and European-descended folks: Is attending celebrations appropriate? How do we work towards collective repair and show up in solidarity with Black communities not just on Juneteenth, but every day? 

One answer: support reparations! A movement for reparations is really happening. Learn the latest, explore how to connect, and practice talking with others about what reparations actually means. Join us this Juneteenth at 12:00 PM to discuss all of this with Reparationists from the Fund for Reparations Now!

New York City has a Commission on Racial Equity (CORE) and a reparations process is beginning! Also, New York State is inviting public participation through hearings, community events, and written or recorded testimony. You can share input directly! Or call or email your support and comments to 518-473-3997 or ReparationsCommission@reparations.ny.gov.

Meanwhile, nationally, HR 40/S 40 is being pushed along with a comprehensive reparations package. Ayanna Presley and the Congressional Black Caucus spoke about it last week:

Also, internationally unified reparations work is happening too! This March, the UN declared that the trafficking of Africans and chattel enslavement is the gravest crime against humanity, and the next step is a gathering in Ghana this week.

America’s 250th anniversary should be a moment to celebrate how far we’ve come and commit to finishing the work of making freedom and equality real for all. Instead, a white supremacist faction is steering us backwards. The MAGA regime is in the midst of trying to whitewash our past so they can whitewash our future: erasing the history of enslavement and genocide and rolling back hard-won civil rights victories. We refuse. While they plan a sanitized celebration of the 250th, we are gathering to repair our full history rather than erase it. Celebrate the progress we have made through struggle and commit to the work to ensure liberty and equality for All of U.S. There are actions in NYC and DC on June 27th.

At chapter this month we covered attacks on the Voting Rights Act. One lesson is that NY was one of the first states needing oversight, not just the South. Tomorrow, come hear from Beth Howard of Appalachia on how we can all fight together.

There's no shortage of what's coming: critical Supreme Court rulings on trans rights and birthright citizenship, ongoing wars and genocide, new trillionaires, ICE, and a NYC budget that will test if Mamdani can keep his promises. We can’t afford to be passive and fragmented. We don't have to agree on everything, because we agree on more than we don't.

Onward,

SURJ NYC

The Fight for Voting Rights Continues

“When we look at the supreme court’s action against the Voting Rights Act, it’s really a kneecap – a way to discriminate, to silence voters who fought so hard for this right….I think it’s an assault on the struggle of the civil rights movement. We cannot turn around. We’ve come too far.”

These are words that Sheyann Webb-Christburg shared with The Guardian in the wake of the late April 2026 Louisiana v. Callais SCOTUS decision challenging Louisiana’s 2nd Black congressional district. Sheyann was known as “the smallest freedom fighter” of the 1960s Civil Rights Movement because she participated in the Selma’s Bloody Sunday March in 1965 at just eight years old. 

If you just did some quick math, you realized that Sheyann is in her late 60s today. People in this country put their lives and livelihoods on the line to support the passing and ongoing protection of the Voting Rights Act — and some of those individuals, like Sheyann, are still with us today. Sheyann and others who risked so much are witnessing the final stages of its gutting under our current Supreme Court and the shameful racial gerrymandering across several states in the weeks to follow.

Hear directly from Sheyann in this short video from the ACLU about why and how her involvement in Bloody Sunday forever changed her mindset towards voting rights:

Justice Elena Kagan declared in her minority dissent in Callais that the decision renders Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act “all but a dead letter.” For this reason, Sheyann Webb-Christburg and Americans around the country are incensed.

Do you need a place to process your anger? Or perhaps a space to learn more about the far-reaching consequences of these decisions? Join SURJ NYC at our June 2026 Chapter Meeting this Thursday at 6:30pm to learn in community, and then to practice ways of pushing back on this assault on voting rights, particularly as white people. Together, we will move money and practice challenging the dominant narratives that got us to this moment.

In solidarity,

SURJ NYC

Dignity Not Detention Passes in New York State

This week SURJ NYC and our fellow members of the Dignity Not Detention campaign are thrilled to see New York State divest from the business of immigration detention through the recently adopted state budget. 

As a core component of the prison-industrial complex, immigration detention is deeply intertwined with white supremacy and intersecting forms of violence. Under the current federal regime, moreover, ICE operates as a tool of state control, targeting communities of color and, increasingly, those who support them, sowing fear and suppressing dissent. Banning state and local immigration detention contracts and restricting the federal government's efforts to expand detention through warehouses is crucial for the safety of all New Yorkers, as well as for democracy itself.

Jorge (not his real name), who was detained at Orange County Jail in 2021, describes it plainly in the coalition’s statement:

“The rooms were so small, there was no recreation, no time outside, we were held inside for months. Knowing that immigration detention is ending there brings me real relief. No one should have to experience what I went through.”

This victory is a testament to the conviction of directly impacted New Yorkers and passionate volunteer organizers: parents, artists, teachers, students, writers, immigrants and their loved ones. Since the bill was introduced in the 2021 legislative session, members of SURJ NYC have facilitated weekly phone zaps, organized and attended rallies locally and across the state, written letters to friends in detention, lobbied in Albany, fundraised tens of thousands of dollars for directly impacted community members, and in general, deeply participated in the campaign’s organizing. We are grateful to everyone who has shown up for the campaign and helped build this powerful community.

We look forward to celebrating this win, reflecting on the hard work that went into it, and moving into what comes next. The work is not yet done. ICE has the authority to release many of the people who are currently in detention. But we know that instead they will threaten to transfer people to federally run ICE detention sites in New York or retaliate by sending them to faraway states. The coalition is monitoring this closely and will advocate for releases and against transfers. We will continue to support New Yorkers in detention and mobilize to oppose the federal government’s detention expansion efforts.

Join us as we discuss the win and take action for the next stages of the fight: 

Onward,

SURJ NYC

Join Us in Reading Beth Howard's "Song For a Hard-Hit People"

If you’re anything like me, you’ve been thinking a lot about the South this week. Hearing SCOTUS further gut the Voting Rights Act was infuriating. Then watching state after state pause their elections to re-draw maps with no voter input, in order to eliminate Black electoral power, has been devastating. I’ve also had to call in fellow liberal-left Northerners stereotyping and worse.

It’s time to get clear about what our stakes are, as white antiracists, in organizing for racial justice and collective liberation and what that looks like across our country broadly.

What a moment to be reading Song For a Hard-Hit People: A Memoir of Anti-Racist Solidarity From a Coal Miner's Daughter by SURJ National’s Cultural Strategist, Beth Howard, who speaks to exactly these themes. In this memoir, she shares her pathway to antiracist organizing, which is inextricably linked with her experiences growing up in Appalachia. In her own words, “I’m committed to racial justice because I am a working-class white Appalachian, not in spite of it.”

You may remember Beth’s viral piece, Rednecks for Black Lives, written in Summer 2020 as a call for white antiracist solidarity. Surrendering the people of the South to be organized by MAGA or left behind is not an inevitability, and is certainly no formula for victory – and Beth has proven that with her work at SURJ (here’s her on Instagram this weekend speaking out).

Get your hands on this book (or e-book, or audiobook!) and get inspired, then join the Calling In team to reflect on the memoir and how it models what multiracial solidarity can look and feel like. We’ll meet Wednesdays June 10 and June 17, 7:30–9:00 PM on Zoom. Come either week or both – Beth herself will join us June 17th for a Q&A!


Hope to see you there!

- Kristin & the SURJ NYC Calling In Team

Join Us at a Rally to Freeze the Rent!

Instead of a normal chapter meeting, this month we are rallying together to freeze the rent! On Thursday, May 7 the Rent Guidelines Board is holding a Preliminary Vote that will set the range of possible changes to one-and-two-year rent-stabilized leases. Many organizations including New York State Tenant Bloc and Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) are hosting a big rally outside the meeting to put pressure on the Board to freeze the rent!

SURJ NYC will meet at 5:00pm in Long Island City on the south east corner of 47th Avenue and Van Dam Street and then walk together to join the rally just down the block outside of LaGuardia Performing Arts Center. The rally starts at 5:00pm, doors open for the public meeting at 6:00pm, and the meeting begins at 7:00pm. RSVP to let us know you are coming!

 

This meeting is the first public vote in a two month process that will culminate in a final vote on June 25th that determines the final rent increases. There are many public meetings and opportunities to testify during this period (check out the full schedule). There is also a lot of exciting organizing happening over the next two months to push for a rent freeze. Here are a few ways to get involved:

See you on Thursday!

SURJ NYC

Join Us At Beth Howard’s NYC Launch of "Song for a Hard-Hit People"

How does our past shape our organizing for a more just future?

Beth Howard, SURJ National’s Cultural Strategist, beautifully weaves this question throughout her newly released memoir, Song for a Hard-Hit People: A Memoir of Antiracist Solidarity from a Coal Miner’s Daughter. 

You may remember Beth’s viral piece, Rednecks for Black Lives, written in Summer 2020 as a call for white antiracist solidarity. Song for a Hard Hit People shares Beth’s pathway to antiracist organizing, which is inextricably linked with her experiences growing up as a coal miner’s daughter in Appalachia. Hear Beth speak about this in her recent reel about the book.

Join us on Wednesday, April 29 from 5:00pm-7:00pm at Housing Works Bookstore for the New York City stop on Beth’s book tour to hear her reflections as an organizer and writer. Beth will be in conversation with her dear friend Morgan Bassichis, a prominent organizer and spokesperson for Jewish Voice for Peace and writer and star of the critically acclaimed Can I Be Frank?

At the book talk, co-hosted by Libertroph Magazine and Haymarket Books, participants will explore what it means for our stories to be shaped by those who came before us and how understanding our lineage can strengthen our activism. Books will be available for purchase during the event, and there will be time for connection and guided art-making before and after the conversation. Should be fun!

Can’t join us next week but still want to be in conversation with Beth? The SURJ NYC Calling In team is planning a virtual book club in mid-June, featuring an author Q&A with Beth herself on the evening of June 17th. Sign up here to be the first to get the book club full details.

Onward,

SURJ NYC

ICE Out of NY

On Sunday SURJ NYC rallied with nearly 150 New Yorkers from across the state in Goshen, NY, as part of the Dignity Not Detention coalition’s organizing to end the ICE detention contract at Orange County Jail (OCJ). For years, the county has contracted with ICE to detain New Yorkers in inhumane conditions. Currently, OCJ incarcerates more people for ICE than any other site in the state, except sites operated by the federal government, and is increasingly used as an interim site to transfer our neighbors even farther away from their communities. We demand that County Executive Steve Neuhaus end the ICE detention contract with Orange County Jail now!

April 12 rally in Goshen, NY, with SURJ NYC members, demanding that Orange County Executive Steve Neuhaus end the county jail’s contract with ICE.

In addition to organizing to end the OCJ ICE contract, we are also continuing to push for a complete statewide ban on state and local complicity in ICE detention through the Dignity Not Detention Act. DND and New York For All both have broad support in the New York state legislature and in communities across the state. We are joining campaign leaders in calling for the New York state legislature to pass both bills in their entirety immediately. Enough is enough! 

Whether you’re a SURJ NYC member who has been in the movement for a while or you’ve never taken action with Dignity Not Detention, now is the time to get involved in the fight for immigration justice in New York State: 

  1. Join the DND and NY for All mobilization to Albany on April 21 and invite friends to join you — a big turnout is crucial for showing our lawmakers that the time is up for them to pass these crucial bills and protect all New Yorkers.

  2. Help ensure we have broad turnout by contributing to make funds available for DND members who otherwise couldn’t afford to make the trip.

  3. Participate in DND’s weekly phone zaps, on Tuesdays from 1:00pm-2:00pm, or make calls on your own time.

  4. Attend the weekly vigil at the Metropolitan Detention Center, a federal jail where ICE is detaining our neighbors.

  5. Join the next meeting of the SURJ NYC Immigration Justice Working Group on April 28.


Onward,

SURJ NYC

SURJ National Chapter Status

At April’s chapter meeting we will be making an important decision about our status as a chapter of SURJ National.

SURJ National has undertaken a process to formalize the relationship between the National organization and chapters. They are asking chapters to either sign a legal agreement and abide by a “relational charter” or disaffiliate from the network and cease using the SURJ name and National resources.

At our chapter meeting on April 9th (note date change due to Passover!) we will be conducting our chapter-wide decision-making process to address this issue. This proposal is a bit different from past proposals in that it is being brought to the process by the whole Leadership Crew (LC), rather than a small subgroup of members.

Due to the importance and complexity of this issue and the short timeline given to chapters to make this decision, the LC has already had a number of conversations, conducted research including consulting with a lawyer, and developed a proposal that the LC has come to consensus on. 

Please join us on April 9th from 6:30-8:30pm to discuss the proposal, ask clarifying questions, make amendments, and come to consensus! The proposal will be sent to SURJ NYC members before the chapter meeting. Please read the proposal and the legal agreement and relational charter linked within it before the meeting. Members will also be given information on how to give feedback if they cannot be present for the meeting.

Important reminder: Last October, SURJ NYC established a more formal membership structure. Part of that approved proposal was that only SURJ NYC members participate in the chapter-wide decision-making process. Everyone is welcome to come to observe but we will ask that only members use their red, yellow, and green “cards” to express agreement or disagreement and suggest modifications. If you want to participate in this process, sign up as a SURJ NYC member!

Onward,

SURJ NYC

Protecting Free Speech, Condemning Hate Speech

While the number of horrors in this moment can be overwhelming, it seems important that SURJ NYC explicitly condemn the Islamophobic white supremacist agitator and cronies who protested last weekend at Gracie Mansion spewing anti-Muslim hate. Our mayor and the Muslim community have been contending with an increase in anti-Muslim hate speech and threats. We strongly condemn this.

Unfortunately, most of the press has focused on the two teenagers from Pennsylvania who were reacting to that anti-Muslim hate message with violence.

As Mayor Mamdani said

I do not agree with the white supremacist protesters but I defend their right to protest. But violence will not be tolerated.

Meanwhile just days before, our friends at JFREJ and many others pushed back on the "buffer zone" bills, which were introduced under the auspices of fighting antisemitism and would have limited First Amendment rights within 25 feet of all religious institutions and healthcare facilities. We cannot, in our deep-blue NY State, accept anything less than full protections for rights to free speech and free assembly; we also know that limiting these rights does not make Jews or anyone else safer. 

These issues will continue and we must be clear eyed and careful in thinking through and defending our beautiful diverse city. 

In solidarity,

SURJ NYC

Build Skills and Practice Calling In With Us

We know we need to move more white people into our movement to fight for economic and racial justice. We also know that many people have been misled by false narratives, and the racist divide and conquer strategies of authoritarian leaders. There are also people who agree with some of our values, but who are not taking action to support these values. This is where Calling In comes in.

Calling In can be both a conversational framework and a movement strategy to gain political power. That’s why the SURJ NYC Calling In Team is excited to announce a new monthly space to process and practice difficult conversations in community. Join us this spring on Zoom the third Monday of each month from 8-9pm for Calling In Practice Hour!

If you’ve recently had a conversation come to an impasse over differing beliefs and perspectives, or are struggling to have productive conversations with friends, family, neighbors, or colleagues, bring your own example(s) and talk through it with the support of others committed to a world where everyone can thrive.

Since there will not be any formal instruction, Calling In Practice Hour is best suited for folks who already have some familiarity with the Calling In framework from a Calling In workshop, or from Loretta Ross’s book or teaching.

If you are new to Calling In, please join the full workshop on Monday March 30 from 7:00-8:45pm to learn the Calling In framework - and then you can sign up to attend subsequent Practice Hours.

With patience, skills, and practice we can win allies and accomplices to our work by calling people in, rather than calling them out. 

In Solidarity,

SURJ NYC’s Calling In Team

Resisting State Violence and Imagining a Safer Future

Over the first two months of 2026, we have witnessed a terrifying escalation of state violence in Minneapolis and across the country. This has been met with inspired organizing efforts and new calls to Abolish ICE. While some rush to differentiate between local police departments and federal immigration agencies, we know that ICE is part of a long history of state sanctioned violence against Black and brown people, poor and working class communities, and those who dare to challenge the interests of the elite. 

As our partners at Justice Committee recently stated:

Just like local police, ICE relies on the same excuses to justify their violence. After ICEWatcher Alex Pretti was killed, Border Patrol agents claimed “he had a gun.” After ICE agent Jonathan Ross shot Renee Nicole Good, he said he “feared for his life.” We have heard this before. Minnesota officer Jeronimo Yanez killed Philando Castile after Philando calmly disclosed that he was legally carrying a firearm. NYPD Lt. Jonathan Rivera killed Allan Feliz because he claims he believed Allan’s vehicle was threatening officers’ lives. These are not coincidences—they are patterns.

Here in New York City the NYPD shot three New Yorkers in less than three weeks, including 22-year-old Jabez Chakraborty, who was shot in front of his family less than a minute after police entered their home. Jabez’s family called 911 for mental health care. They have been met with violence, interrogation, harassment and manipulation.

SURJ NYC’s Beyond Policing Working Group exists to both resist current state violence and imagine and advocate for a system that actually keeps us safe. At next week’s chapter meeting, we will be exploring how ICE intersects with the history of policing in this country and checking in on Mayor Mamdani’s plans for a Department of Community Safety.  We will then be joined by Christina Sparrock, founder of the NYC Mental Health Collective and a member of the Daniel’s Law Taskforce, to learn more about the state of alternative responses to mental health crisis in NYC.

Join us on Thursday, March 5th at 6:30pm to learn more about these efforts and actions you can take to create the world we want!

In Solidarity,

SURJ NYC

 
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