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California Senate Gets Second Chance to Pass Prison Slavery Bill This Week

“One of the preliminary recommendations in our report was to support ACA 3,” said Los Angeles attorney Kamilah V. Moore, chairperson of Task Force. “The Task Force saw how that type of legislation aligns perfectly with the idea of reparations for African Americans.”

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Samuel Nathaniel Brown, at a Reparations Rally on June 12 at the state capitol in Sacramento, helped author ACA 3 while he was in prison. He was released in December 2021 after serving a 24-year sentence. (CBM photo by Antonio R. Harvey).
Samuel Nathaniel Brown, at a Reparations Rally on June 12 at the state capitol in Sacramento, helped author ACA 3 while he was in prison. He was released in December 2021 after serving a 24-year sentence. (CBM photo by Antonio R. Harvey).

By Antonio Ray Harvey, California Black Media

On June 23, the California Senate rejected a constitutional amendment to remove language in the state Constitution that allows involuntary servitude as punishment to a crime with a 21-6 vote.

The 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution, ratified in 1865, prohibits slavery and involuntary servitude with one exception: if involuntary servitude was imposed as punishment for a crime.

The state of California is one of nine states in the country that permits involuntary servitude as a criminal punishment.

Article I, section 6, of the California Constitution, describes the same prohibitions on slavery and involuntary servitude and the same exception for involuntary servitude as punishment for crime.

The number of votes cast in favor of Assembly Constitutional Amendment (ACA) 3, the California Abolition Act, fell short of the two-thirds vote requirement needed to move the bill to the ballot for Californians to decide its fate in the November General Election.

The Senate is expected to hold another floor vote on the legislation this week.

Sen. Sydney Kamlager (D-Los Angeles), who authored ACA 3 in 2021 while serving in the Assembly, said she focused the language in the bill on the slavery ban and vowed to bring it back for a vote when Sen. Steven Bradford (D-Gardena), chair of the California Legislative Black Caucus, asked her about it June 23.

“The CA State Senate just reaffirmed its commitment to keeping slavery and involuntary servitude in the state’s constitution,” Kamlager tweeted.

Jamilia Land, a member of the Anti-Violence Safety, and Accountability Project (ASAP), an organization that advocates for prisoners’ rights, said she remains committed to making sure slavery is struck out of the California constitution.

“All we needed was 26 votes,” Land said. “But we have made amendments to ACA 3 on (June 24). Now it could either go back to the Senate on (June 27) or Thursday, June 30.”

Five Republicans and one Democrat, Steve Glazer (D-Orinda), voted against the amendment.

He stated that the issue is “certainly a question worthy of debate” and “can be addressed without a constitutional amendment.”

“Slavery was an evil that will forever be a stain on the history of our great country. We eliminated it through the Civil War and the adoption of the 13th Amendment,” Glazer said in a June 23 statement. “Involuntary servitude — though lesser known — also had a shameful past. ACA 3 is not even about involuntary servitude — at least of the kind that was practiced 150 years ago. The question this measure raises is whether or not California should require felons in state or local jails prisons to work.”

Glazer said that the Legislative Counsel’s office gave him a “simple amendment” that involuntary servitude would “not include any rehabilitative activity required of an incarcerated person,” including education, vocational training, or behavioral or substance abuse counseling.

The Counsel also suggested that the amendment does not include any work tasks required of an incarcerated person that “generally benefit the residents of the facility in which the person is incarcerated, such as cooking, cleaning, grounds keeping, and laundry.”

“Let’s adopt that amendment and then get back to work on the difficult challenge of making sure our prisons are run humanely, efficiently and in a way that leads to the rehabilitation of as many felons as possible,” Glazer added.

Kamlager says “involuntary servitude is a euphemism for forced labor” and the language should be stricken from the constitution.

The state’s Department of Finance (DOF) estimated that the amendment would burden California taxpayers with $1.5 billion annually in wages to prisoners, DOF analyst Aaron Edwards told Senate the Appropriations Committee on June 16.

“These are facts that we think would ultimately determine the outcome of future litigation and court decisions,” Edwards said. “The largest potential impact is to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, which currently employs around 65,000 incarcerated persons to support central prison operations such as cooking, cleaning, and laundry services.”

Right before the Juneteenth holiday weekend, the appropriations committee sent ACA 3 to the Senate floor with a 5-0 majority vote after Kamlager refuted Edwards’ financial data.

This country has been having “economic discussions for hundreds of years around slavery, involuntary servitude, and indentured servants” and enslavement still exists in the prison system, Kamlager said. She also added that a conflict was fought over the moral issue of slavery.

“This bill does not talk about economics. It’s a constitutional amendment,” Kamlager said. “The (DOF) is not talking about any of this in this grotesque analysis about why it makes more sense for the state of California to advocate for and allow involuntary servitude in prisons. I think (this conversation) is what led to the Civil War.”

Three states have voted to abolish slavery and involuntary servitude — Colorado, Utah, and Nebraska — and in all three cases, the initiative was bipartisan and placed on the ballot by a unanimous vote of legislators, according to Max Parthas, the co-director of the Abolish Slavery National Network (ASNN).

ACA 3 is already attached to a report that addresses the harms of slavery. The Task Force to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African Americans issued its interim report to the California Legislature on June 1.

The report included a set of preliminary recommendations for policies that the California Legislature could adopt to remedy those harms, including its support for ACA 3. It examines the ongoing and compounding harms experienced by African Americans as a result of slavery and its lingering effects on American society today.

“One of the preliminary recommendations in our report was to support ACA 3,” said Los Angeles attorney Kamilah V. Moore, chairperson of Task Force. “The Task Force saw how that type of legislation aligns perfectly with the idea of reparations for African Americans.”

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Oakland Post: Week of March 13 – 19, 2024

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of March 13 – 19, 2024

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Oakland Post: Week of March 6 – 12, 2024

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of March 6 – 12, 2024

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Who are the Alameda County District 4 Supervisor Candidates’ Top Campaign Contributors?

Below, we’ve listed each candidate’s 10 highest campaign contributors. For Miley, two of his top campaign donors also bought their own advertisements to support him and/or oppose Esteen through independent expenditures. Such expenditures, though separate from campaign donations, are also public record, and we listed them. Additionally, the National Organization of Realtors has spent about $70,500 on their own independent expenditures to support Miley.

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Jennifer Esteen. (Campaign photo) and Supervisor Nate Miley. (Official photo).
Jennifer Esteen. (Campaign photo) and Supervisor Nate Miley. (Official photo).

By Zack Haber

Nate Miley, who has served on Alameda County’s Board of Supervisors since 2000, is running for reelection to the District 4 supervisor seat.

Jennifer Esteen, a nurse and activist, is seeking to unseat him and become one of the five members of the powerful board that sets the county’s budget, governs its unincorporated areas, and oversees the sheriff, Alameda Health System, and mental health system.

District 4 includes most of East Oakland’s hills and flatlands beyond Fruitvale, part of Pleasanton and unincorporated areas south of San Leandro like Ashland and Castro Valley.

Voting is open and will remain open until March 5.

In California, campaign donations of $100 or more are public record. The records show that Miley has received about $550,000 in total campaign donations since he won the previous District 4 election in March 2020. Esteen has raised about $255,000 in total campaign donations since she started collecting them last July. All figures are accurate through Feb. 20.

While Miley has raised more money, Esteen has received donations from more sources. Miley received donations of $100 or more from 439 different sources. Esteen received such donations from 507 different sources.

Below, we’ve listed each candidate’s 10 highest campaign contributors. For Miley, two of his top campaign donors also bought their own advertisements to support him and/or oppose Esteen through independent expenditures. Such expenditures, though separate from campaign donations, are also public record, and we listed them. Additionally, the National Organization of Realtors has spent about $70,500 on their own independent expenditures to support Miley.

Nate Miley’s top campaign contributors:

The California Apartment Association, a trade group representing landlords and investors in California’s rental housing business, has spent about $129,500 supporting Miley’s election bid through about $59,500 in ads against Esteen$55,000 in ads supporting Miley, and $15,000 in campaign donations.

The independent expenditure committee Preserve Agriculture in Alameda County has spent about $46,025 supporting Miley through about $27,200 in their own ads, and $18,825 in donations to his campaign. Preserve Agriculture has supported reelection efforts for former Alameda County DA Nancy O’Malley, and Sheriff Greg Ahern, a republican. It’s received funding from ChevronPG&E, and a the California Apartment Association.

Organizations associated with the Laborers’ International Union of North America, or LiUNA, have donated about $35,000 in total. Construction and General Laborers Local 304, a local chapter of the union representing which represents over 4,000 workers, donated $20,000.

Laborers Pacific Southwest Regional Organizing Coalition, which represents 70,000 LiUNA members in Arizona, California, Hawaii and New Mexico, donated $15,000.

William ‘Bill’ Crotinger and the East Oakland-based company Argent Materials have donated $26,000. Crotinger is the president and founder of Argent, a concrete and asphalt recycling yard. Argent’s website says it is an eco-friendly company that diverts materials from landfills. In 2018, Argent paid the EPA $27,000 under a settlement for committing Clean Water Act violations.

Michael Morgan of Hayward, owner of We Are Hemp, a marijuana dispensary in Ashland, has donated $21,500.

Alameda County District 1 Supervisor David Haubert has donated $21,250 from his 2024 reelection campaign. He’s running unopposed for the District 1 seat.

SEIU 1021which represents over 60,000 workers in local governments, non-profit agencies, healthcare programs, and schools in Northern California, has donated $20,000.

UA Local 342, which represents around 4,000 pipe trades industry workers in Contra Costa and Alameda counties, donated $20,000.

The union representing the county’s deputy sheriffs, Deputy Sheriff’s Association of Alameda County, has donated $17,000.

Becton Healthcare Resources and its managers have donated $14,625. Becton’s mission statement says it provides “behavioral health management services to organizations and groups that serve the serious and persistent mentally ill population.”

Jennifer Esteen’s top campaign contributors:

Mary Quinn Delaney of Piedmont, founder of Akonadi Foundation, has donated $20,000. Akonadi Foundation gives grants to nonprofit organizations, especially focusing on racial justice organizing,

Bridget Galli of Castro Valley has donated $7,000. Galli is a yoga instructor and a co-owner of Castro Valley Yoga.

Rachel Gelman of Oakland has donated $5,000. Gelman is an activist who has vowed to redistribute her inherited wealth to working class, Indigenous and Black communities.

California Worker Families Party has donated $5,000. The organization’s website describes itself as a “grassroots party for the multiracial working class.”

David Stern of Albany has donated $5,000. Stern is a retired UC Berkeley Professor of Education.

Oakland Rising Committee—a collaborative of racial, economic, and environmental justice organizations—has donated about $3,050.

Fredeke Von Bothmer-Goodyear, an unemployed resident of San Francisco, has donated $2,600.

Robert Britton of Castro Valley has donated $2,500. Britton is retired and worked in the labor movement for decades.

Progressive Era PAC has donated about $2,400. Its mission statement says it “exists to elect governing majorities of leaders in California committed to building a progressive era for people of color.”

East Bay Stonewall Democrats Club has donated $2,250. The club was founded in 1982 to give voice to the East Bay LGBTQIA+ communities.

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