This Mother’s Day Black-led liberation organizations are giving at least 30 women nationwide the gift of freedom.
These women are among the 62 percent of people in jail in the U.S. who are legally innocent and awaiting trial, but cannot afford bail.
The Movement for Black Lives, ColorsofChange, Southerners on New Ground (SONG) and 22 other Black liberation organizations created National Mama’s Bail Out day, which will free Black women in over a dozen jails in Atlanta, Houston, Minneapolis and other cities. Many of these women are being charged with low-level offenses, such as loitering or small scale drug possession.
Not all of the women are biological mothers.
“When we talk about black mamas, we know that mothering happens in a variety of ways,” Mary Hooks, co-director of the Atlanta-based LGBTQ organizing project SONG, told The Nation. “Whether it’s the mothers in the clubs who teach the young kids how to vogue, or the church mothers who took care of me.”
The campaign has raised over $250,000 so far and still collecting donations. Other organizations and cities are taking similar action, like a group of Philadelphia Black-led organizations that have raised over $18,000 and plans to bail out at least 10 additional women.
“All mothers are not celebrated,”said Arissa Hall, an organizer for the campaign, to The Nation.“Black moms especially have not been granted that title of motherhood,”
