This year marks 25 years in a row that prisoners and supporters have participated in the annual event known as Running Down the Walls (RDTW), often running or walking simultaneously in many cities and prisons at once.

RDTW is a non-competitive 5K run/jog/walk/roll to raise awareness and funds for political prisoners as the primary fundraiser for the ABCF Warchest Program with a portion of funds raised also supporting local groups of the organizers’ choosing– see event details below for specifics. Over the years, RDTW has raised *tens of thousands* of dollars and lots of awareness around the struggle to free political prisoners. Find a local event or participate remotely and ask your comrades, family and friends to sponsor you to make the positive impact of the 25th anniversary bigger than ever!

Chicago
September 15th – 5pm
MCC Chicago – 71 W Van Buren
MARCH & RALLY – 5K MARATHON – BIKE & RUN – BANDS & DJs

Eugene, OR
September 15th – 1pm
Owen Rose Garden (300 N Jefferson Street) near the river (follow signs)

Los Angeles
September 15th – Registration begins at 10am
Echo Park Lake – 751 Echo Park Avenue

Lowell, MA
September 15th – 11am
Boarding House Park – 40 French St.

Mexico City, Mexico
Saturday September 14 10:00 am
San Juan de Aragon Forest.
Access 8 (on Av.608, leaving Metro Bosque de Aragon)
Registration: $50 (to support Jorge Esquivel @YorchLibre )

New York
September 15th – 2pm
Prospect Park- Lincoln Rd/East Lake Drive, east of the Terrace Bridge 

Olympia, Washington
St’cas Running Down the Walls
Sunday, September 15.
Noon at Heritage Park
Participation fee: 1 hr wage – no one turned away for lack of funds
Shirts: sliding scale 10$-20$ (BYO shirt, they’re printed on site)
Pre-run group warm up stretching & post-run prisoner letter writing and vegan grilling.
Contact:[email protected]

Philadelphia (shirts shipped worldwide for remote participants)
September 15th – 11am sharp (Yoga warm-up at 10am)
FDR Park
Registration deadline is September 1st (use link above)

Portland, OR
September 15th – 11am
Tilkum Bridge (East Side)

Sunday, September 17
11am sharp (Yoga warm-up at 10am)
FDR Park (or remote)
Register online by September 3

Philadelphia Anarchist Black Cross and MXGM Philly invite you to our sixth annual Running Down The Walls (RDTW)! Join us for another revolutionary 5K run/walk/roll and day of solidarity amplifying the voices of our comrades behind bars, lifting them up in their struggles, and maintaining material support. We will ship official shirts nationwide to people who register to participate remotely, pay online and leave their shipping address in the comment box! If you’re joining us in person and would like to participate in light yoga and warm-up stretches before, please arrive by 10am and bring a mat if you can.

Running is not required! You can also walk, roll, or cheer. 5K is two loops around the park and at a walking pace will take about 45-60 minutes. Light refreshments and socializing will take place in the park afterward.

This year’s event will benefit the ABCF Warchest and Weelaunee forest defenders facing repression from the ongoing efforts to #StopCopCity. Join us as we once again raise energy and funds for the freedom of political prisoners and the struggles they are caged for.

Cop City Will Never Be Built!

Vive vive Tortuguita!

#StopCopCity #DefendWeelaunee #JusticeForTort

If you cannot make it to the event or would like to make an additional contribution, please sponsor a participant either outside prison, inside prison, or one of each. Contact us for more information on sponsoring!

Proceeds will be split between the ABCF Warchest Program and legal aid to support arrestees from the movement to Stop Cop City. This program sends monthly stipends to political prisoners and prisoners of war who have insufficient, little, or no financial support. Since inception, the program has gathered almost $235,000, and this year’s event is sure to bump that over $250,000! Due to the abominable conditions that political prisoners and freedom fighters are subjected to, and the prevalence of health issues from medical neglect, they need our support now more than ever. Join us as we celebrate our successes this last year and build momentum for the struggles ahead! We will both celebrate Dr. Mutulu Shakur’s release from prison since our last event and recommit ourselves to the struggles he dedicated his life to <3.

The closing stretch of 2022 with its holidays and festive gatherings is in sight. No doubt, many of you are eager to gift the new Certain Days calendar to friends and loved ones. However, just because the year is winding down into sweater weather and hot cocoa, does not mean that the Anarchist Black Cross Federation’s struggle against repression will be taking a break.

On the contrary, we plan for 2023 to be full of solidarity, mutual aid, and freedom for political prisoners and we’d love it if you could help us get a head start on those efforts.

Tax Deductible Donations

The ABCF can now provide tax deduction receipts for donations of over $500 through our fiscal sponsor, IDAVOX/One People’s Project.

To take advantage of the tax deduction, make your check payable to “One People’s Project” with “ABCF” in the memo and mail it to: ABCF-OC, P.O. Box 4341, Santa Ana CA 92702. Be sure to include a return address (preferably email) where we can send your receipt back to you. 

Of course, this isn’t the only way to contribute to the work the ABCF does– we can accept contributions of any amount through the normal CashApp, Venmo, PayPal and checks/money orders if no tax deduction is desired. You can also pick up some sweet Pushing Down The Walls and other merch from our Orange County chapter. 

Looking Back and Planning Ahead

Speaking of “the work,” here’s an incomplete list of what we’ve been up to since our last year end round up:

Online and in-person letter-writing events hosted by various chapters, as well as our ongoing administration of prisonersolidarity.com.

ABCF Chapters and comrade organizations all over the US and Canada put together 12 Running Down The Walls 5K events which raised a combined $21,154.84 for the Warchest Program.

Regular, reliable disbursements to the 17 current Warchest Program recipients.

Additionally, we’ve provided mutual aid to comrade organizations internationally as well as individual political prisoner support committees here on Turtle Island. For example:

$2000 to Belarus Anarchist Black Cross to support political prisoners there.

$1500 to Moscow Anarchist Black Cross to respond to the repression of anti-war organizing against Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. We were able to make this transfer before Russia was excluded from SWIFT banking systems.

$1000 to the Civil Liberties Defense Center to assist with their eventually successful representation of Eric King. The BOP’s bogus, retaliatory charges were designed to bury him decades beyond his original sentence.

$4000 to Sundiata Acoli’s post-release support fund.

$1000 to the housing fundraiser for Herman Bell, a former Black Panther and political prisoner who was incarcerated for 45 years.

$1000 to the support committee of Kamau Sadiki to help cover ongoing legal, medical, and visitation costs. 

Now that you have some idea of what to expect from us in 2023, please consider making a contribution and inviting your friends to do likewise. As an organization made up entirely of volunteers, our ability to fight for the survival and freedom of imprisoned comrades is dependent on gifts from our community.

They’re in there for us. We are out here for them.

The Nahuatzen 3 were sentenced to 7 years in prison for “sabotage,” ostensibly for their work as Purépecha rights defenders through Concejo Ciudadano Indígena de Nahuatzen. The Indigenous Citizens’ Council is a direct democracy-style community government in the state of Michoacán, which began a process of gaining autonomous status for the indigenous community in 2015, and has worked to defend the rights of the indigenous people of Nahuatzen. José Antonio Arreola and José Luis Jiménez are part of the Indigenous Citizens’ Council, which, in 2017 was recognized as an indigenous authority by the Electoral Tribunal of the State of Michoacán and the Federal Government of Mexico. José Gerardo Talavera was supporting the council by renting out a space for it to carry out its functions.

The three were arrested when they were evicted from the offices of the National Development Sistem (DIF), accused of stealing a vehicle and other objects that were in the offices a few days before. However, it is believed that the charges against them are an act of retaliation for their work and that of the Indigenous Citizens’ Council in the fight for self-determination for the Nahuatzén community. Due to the dubious circumstances around their case, they were granted a review by the Supreme Court that is supposed to be completed this month!

There are two ways you can take action at this critical juncture to support the release of the Nahuatzen 3:

1) Send a message to Jorge Mario Pardo Rebolledo, the Supreme Court justice that is supposed to be issuing a ruling on their case this month [UPDATE: he is supposed to issue a ruling by January 9th so keep emailed up until then]. He can be emailed at [email protected] or through the contact form on the Mexican Supreme Court website.

2) Donate to the community of Nahuatzen as they continue to solidify their autonomous infrastructure. A recent interview of one of the Nahuatzen 3 describes the public works the community has been able to accomplish in a short time since becoming autonomous including an underground sewer system and an expanded electrical grid. If you would like to donate to support the Nahuatzen 3 and the ongoing work in the community, email phillyabc[at]riseup.net for information on how to transfer funds.

As 2021 comes to a close, the Anarchist Black Cross Federation is stronger than ever before. With community support, we have been able to donate thousands of dollars so far this year to political prisoners. Plus, the ABCF can now accept tax-deductible donations through our fiscal sponsor. With your continued support, we can further the struggle for freedom for all political prisoners.

This year was huge for the ABCF. We welcomed home several comrades after many years in prison: Jaan Laaman, David Gilbert and Russell Maroon Shoatz. As the struggle continues, we also added some newly incarcerated people to the list of people we support: Jessica Reznicek, Dan Baker. We are following cases coming out of the George Floyd uprising and ready to jump in lending support as needed. In solidarity beyond the imperialist border of the U.S., we officially extended our direct support to political prisoners held in Mexico who are now also on our list: Fidencio Aldama, José Antonio Arreola, José Luis Jiménez and José Gerardo Talavera. We also do our part in sustaining the international database of political prisoners on prisonersolidarity.com and have been able to lend monetary support for political prisoners internationally.

In addition to one-time contributions of funds upon a political prisoner’s release or in other urgent situations, our Warchest Program currently provides 17 prisoners with $50 a month to cover basic needs like stamps and phone time. From its inception in November 1994 to date, we have distributed over $158,000 in funds [view our latest Warchest Report accounting for funds raised]. Our internal fundraising has been solid with large and successful Running Down the Walls events, but we want to do so much more in 2022.

We are an all-volunteer organization, dependent on contributions from people who are passionate about social justice. Please make a gift and invite your friends to do the same. Opportunities to free political prisoners are in reach– help us make them come to fruition!

To donate directly to the ABCF, send check or money order made out to Tim Fasnacht to Tim Fasnacht, P.O. Box 8682, Lancaster, PA 17604 or use the links below. To get a tax deduction for donations of $500 or more, make your check out to GLACTS and send to Philly ABC, P.O. Box 8643, Philadelphia, PA 19101 so that it arrives no later than December 27th.

Historically, the ABCF has supported political prisoners in the so-called United States. So as to not base our work around imperialist borders, we are now explicitly supporting political prisoners held on all of Turtle Island. To this end, we have added four political prisoners to our list of people we support:

Fidencio Aldama: an indigenous political prisoner of the Yaqui Tribe, from the town of Loma de Bácum, Sonora. He is serving 15 years and 6 months after being wrongfully convicted of homicide. It is believed that he was targeted due to his support for the indigenous community’s opposition to a gas pipeline.

The Nahuatzen 3: sentenced to 7 years in prison for “sabotage” ostensibly for their work as Purépecha rights defenders through Concejo Ciudadano Indígena de Nahuatzen: José Antonio Arreola, José Luis Jiménez, José Gerardo Talavera

We encourage folks to read about their cases and extend support to them. Notably, all four of these prisoners are indigenous rights activists who have been repressed and criminalized by the Mexican state.

Some additional cases to lend support to as they face charges and repression for promoting indigenous rights:

Fredy García Ramírez: spokesman for the Committee for the Defense of Indigenous Rights (CODEDI), was arbitrarily arrested on November 6th, 2019. CODEDI is an organization that has a long-term commitment to the promotion of the rights of indigenous communities to land, autonomy and self-determination. It focuses on the defense of human rights violations produced by hydroelectric and mining projects in the state of Oaxaca

The Eloxochitlán de Flores Magón 7: locked up for defending autonomous Indigenous governance against cacíques and political parties held since 2014 without trial: Jaime Betanzos Fuentes, Herminio Monfil Avendaño, Fernando Gavito Martínez, Alfredo Bolaños Pacheco, Isaías Gallardo Álvarez, Francisco Durán Ortíz, and Omar Hugo Morales Álvarez