Standing Firm: Building Black Power and Ensuring Voter Safety

Last week, America was reminded yet again of the plague of gun violence and decades of hateful rhetoric turned violent when a 20-year-old white male and registered Republican opened fire during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. In the hours and days immediately after the incident, accusations of political violence sprang forth, leaving many to wonder what impact this moment will have on the already electric 2024 election cycle. 

Political violence and the backlash to efforts that invest in equity and justice are not new issues. Black and brown communities have had to deal with the enduring threat of white supremacist violence, police violence, and legislative violence for generations. Building Black political awareness is not just about representation; it’s about creating the capacity to address systemic issues comprehensively. 

Daily, our communities are plagued with gun violence that all too often is seeded by systemic factors facing our people — a fact clearly reflected in the Gun Violence Archive. In 2023 alone, gun violence claimed 18,854 lives and resulted in 632 mass shootings. The statistics underscore the urgent need for comprehensive action to address both the immediate threats and the underlying causes of violence in our communities. 

But gun violence is just one facet of the challenges we face. The Southern United States is battling one of the earliest hurricane seasons on record, leaving tens of thousands without power and hundreds homeless. We’re confronting the largest environmental crisis in our history, with corporate pollution contaminating our air and water. Simultaneously, we’re witnessing the most significant assault on public education since the era of segregation.

Those interconnected crises — from gun violence to environmental disasters to educational inequality — highlight why building Black political awareness is crucial. The stakes have always been high, but if we fail to meet these challenges head-on, the threat we face will block our prosperity for years to come. 

We know that building Black political awareness is not done in a vacuum. The truth is that OUR community’s issues must remain our organization’s top priority as we move through the cycle of education, registration and mobilization. The necessity for the protection of voters has been a significant part of every phase of voter engagement and now is even more relevant as we face the backlash of an already racially charged state and nation. For these reasons, during the 2020 pandemic, we launched our most extensive program to date, SafeVoterNC.org. This initiative continues to amplify the critical need for both voter safety and election protection. For Black voters, the two issues have always been intertwined as we have historically and systemically faced violence while pursuing our American dream. Now, the broader Democratic ecosystem is finally acknowledging the reality of violence that our communities have long endured. 

We thank our over 300 power builders across the state who are working in cities and towns and talking to rural and urban voters about the solution to the violence we see through the power of the ballot. We stand with all victims of violence from George Floyd to individuals in Sandy Hook in Newtown, Connecticut; from the failed coup d’etat on Jan. 6, 2020, to the active-shooter situation  Saturday afternoon in Butler; from civil rights to women’s rights to voting rights. 

Next week marks the 100-day countdown to the 2024 election. As we continue our efforts to prepare our electorate, we will maintain the protocols we have in place along with state and national partners to ensure our efforts and actions focus on keeping our staff and volunteers safe while ensuring voters are not intimidated, turned off, or turned away at the ballot box. This effort is not just about protecting the vote but utilizing every resource at our disposal to ensure voting is a safe space for the exercise of our democracy for all. 

As always, we remain closer to the people and oppose forces actively working against equity and justice.