The founders of Black Lives Matter urged UC Riverside students and community organizers to rely on one another at a time when they say President Donald Trump’s administration is targeting women, immigrants and people of color.
“It’s going to take all of us to stop what 45 is doing right now,” said Patrisse Cullors, co-founder of Black Lives Matter, referring to Trump, the 45th U.S. president.
Cullors and Alicia Garza, who together founded Black Lives Matter, an international organizing network, talked to a packed crowd at UC Riverside on Wednesday. The room at the Highlander Union Building appeared to be filled to capacity. Some students stood against the wall. A number of security guards were present.
The duo talked about the origins of Black Lives Matter, which started as a hashtag reacting to the July 2013 acquittal of George Zimmerman, a Florida neighborhood watch volunteer, in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed black teenager.
A large part of the UCR discussion dealt with how people from different backgrounds can work together to organize against the number of executive actions Trump recently has signed.
Trump has moved to temporarily ban refugees and immigrants from seven mostly Muslim countries from entering the U.S. He also has moved to deport immigrants convicted or charged with committing a crime.
Earlier this year, House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., said Republicans would move to defund Planned Parenthood as part of a push to repeal Obamacare.
“They’re coming after all of us, and we don’t have the luxury of abstaining,” Garza said.
“This is an opportunity for us to build a different movement,” she added. “That’s not to say that this is the time to stop holding people accountable for the ways that we get erased or moved out of the way.
“What’s the work that we need to do together,” she asked, “so that we can actually fight together?”
The event was co-sponsored by UC Riverside’s Center for Ideas and Society and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, which had given UCR over $450,000 in grants over three years to conduct seminars on campus diversity and marginalized groups.
