Category: Articles

A series of anti-poverty policies and programs in response to the pandemic offers a glimpse of what is possible when we center the needs of the poor in public policy.

the Grio
By Shailly Barnes, The Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II, and Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis
August 11, 2021

Hundreds were arrested last week outside the Senate Hart building near Capitol Hill in nonviolent direct action to demand voting rights, an end to the filibuster, and economic rights for all. Organized by the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival, the action brought together poor and low-wage workers, clergy and people of conscience, all committed to fighting for a multiracial democracy that works for everyone.

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On Choosing Community Over Chaos

Tom Dispatch
By Liz Theoharis
August 10, 2021

My father, Athan G. Theoharis, passed away on July 3rd. A leading expert on the FBI, he was responsible for exposing the bureau’s widespread abuses of power. He was a loyal husband, dedicated father, scholar, civil libertarian, and voting-rights advocate with an indefatigable commitment to defending democracy. He schooled his children (and anyone who would listen, including scholars, journalists, and activists from a striking variety of political perspectives) to understand one thing above all: how hard the powers-that-be will work to maintain that power and how willing they are to subvert democracy in the process. His life is a reminder that much of American politics in 2021 is, in so many ways, nothing new.

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The attack on democracy currently playing out in D.C. and in state legislatures like Texas is the worst we have seen since Reconstruction. At the center of this crisis are poor women—especially poor women of color.

Ms. Magazine
By Dr. Liz Theoharis and Roz Pelles
July 22, 2021

On Monday, July 19, nearly 100 women were arrested with the Poor People’s Campaign in Washington, D.C. while protesting the filibuster and demanding full voting rights and living wages. These women—a multiracial group of leaders from major labor unions, religious denominations, national organizations and grassroots communities that represent millions of people—demanded action from Congress and the president by August 6, the anniversary of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. 

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In this op-ed, protesters Sophia Theoharis Caruso, Isabel Peterson, and Indi Barnes explain why pro-democracy activism is important to them and why they decided to join the Poor People’s Campaign.

Teen Vogue
By Isabel Peterson, Indi Barnes, and Sophia Theoharis Caruso
July 21, 2021

On July 19, 2021, we joined the Poor People’s Campaign as we protested near Capitol Hill with 100 people from all over the country who are willing to risk arrest to get voting rights, and to speak out against the voter suppression tactics rolling out across the country. Even though we’re not old enough to vote yet, we’re still ready to fight for our right to do so when the time comes because we’ve seen from history that democracy has to be fought for.

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‘Critical race theory’ fearmongering seeks to paint anyone who wants to speak truth as un-American, unpatriotic and un-Christian.

USA Today
By Rev. Liz Theoharis
July 10, 2021

In 2018, a year after then-President Donald Trump took office, I was in Kentucky with the Poor People’s Campaign, along with the Rev. Dr. William Barber. We were in Harlan County, home to historic labor struggles that led to better wages and working conditions for people across the nation, but now a place with some of the highest poverty rates in our country. In the middle of the afternoon, hundreds of residents gathered together to talk about the reasons why poverty is so widespread today and the central role poor people can play in leading a spiritual and material revival. 

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Some U.S. lawmakers are all too willing to sign off on another holiday, especially if they can use it as cover while actively working to suppress voting rights, block living wages and reparations, fight against healthcare, and more.

Common Dreams
By Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis and Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II
June 23, 2021

Last week, an overwhelming majority of Congress voted to make Juneteenth a national holiday. Just days later, many of the same politicians voted to block the For the People Act and continue to uphold the filibuster and resist other legislative actions to protect our democracy, lift up poor rural and urban areas, raise wages, and expand social programs for the poor.

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The first two have much to teach us about the possibilities and dangers that abound today.

Tom Dispatch
By Liz Theoharis
June 22, 2021

West Virginia, a state first established in defiance of slavery, has recently become ground zero in the fight for voting rights. In an early June op-ed in the Charleston Gazette-Mail, Democratic Senator Joe Manchin vowed to maintain the Senate filibuster, while opposing the For the People Act, a bill to expand voting rights. Last week, after mounting pressure and a leaked Zoom recording with billionaire donors, he showed potential willingness to move on the filibuster and proposed a “compromise” on voting rights.

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Women like Claire McClinton, Johnnie Tillmon, and Julia Ward Howe have allowed us glimpses of what a country that served and empowered all women looks like.

Tom Dispatch
By Liz Theoharis
May 13, 2021

One hundred and fifty years ago, in the bloody wake of the Civil War, the abolitionist Julia Ward Howe issued a “Mother’s Day Proclamation.” The world, she wrote, could no longer bear such terrible violence and death. She called on women across the country to “rise up through the ashes and devastation” and come together in the cause of peace. Forty years later, her daughter Anna Jarvis created Mother’s Day.

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Biden can’t fight inequality without debt cancellation.

Slate
By Liz Theoharis and Astra Taylor
April 6, 2021

As a devastating pandemic raged, America’s billionaires amassed an additional $1.3 trillion in wealth over the last year, while millions of regular people lost their jobs, health insurance, and homes. The most vulnerable among us have been hardest hit and are, research shows, the least able to recover.

The passage of the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan is a welcome development. President Joe Biden, one headline proclaimed, has “launched the second war on poverty.” That’s certainly what this country needs.

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Pro-austerity and anti-poor economic policies, along with over-militarization, have kept America in a death spiral for the past half-century.

Tom Dispatch
By Liz Theoharis
April 5, 2021

Fifty-four years ago, standing at the pulpit of Riverside Church in New York City, Martin Luther King, Jr., delivered his now-famous “Beyond Vietnam” sermon. For the first time in public, he expressed in vehement terms his opposition to the American war in Vietnam. He saw clearly that a foreign policy defined by aggression hurt the poor and dispossessed across the planet.

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