“Like most Americans, we at the Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS) were horrified at the death of Minneapolis resident George Floyd while in police custody. The death of African Americans at the hands of police continues to be distressingly common in our country. We stand in solidarity with the rightful anger of people of color and their allies at the outrageous devaluation of the lives of African Americans, Native Americans, and communities of color by the authorities.
This devaluation is part of a broader pattern of institutional racism that permeates our history. We see this pattern clearly in our work at NIRS. Polluting energy facilities, such as oil, gas, coal, and nuclear power plants, are often sited well away from affluent white neighborhoods and much closer to black, brown, and lower wealth neighborhoods. Low-income people and people of color living near these facilities suffer from higher rates of diseases, such as asthma and cancer, than their more affluent white counterparts who live away from fossil fuel or nuclear power plants. And these same communities are also being hit first and hardest by the effects of climate change caused by big polluters.
None of these injustices happen in isolation. Segregation, discrimination, and environmental injustice do not persist without over-policing and incarceration to keep people in line. Whether it is environmental injustice or police brutality, we must stand up to institutional racism wherever we see it. For our everyday work at NIRS, that means confronting a nuclear industry all too willing to dump its hazardous waste into socially and economically disenfranchised communities. But right now, it also means standing shoulder to shoulder with those protesting George Floyd’s death and calling out institutional racism in all its forms.”
For interviews, contact:
Tim Judson, Executive Director, Nuclear Information and Resource Service
301-270-6477
timj@nirs.org
Ways to help
- Donate generously to the NAACP and support their #WeAreDoneDying campaign;
- Support Color of Change’s request that you text ‘Floyd’ to 55156 to demand the officers who killed #GeorgeFloyd be charged with murder;
- Donate to the all volunteer, Native-led Navajo & Hopi COVID19 relief.
- Call for justice for George Floyd. The ACLU in Minnesota can tell you how to do so.
- Donate to the Official George Floyd Memorial Fund started by George Floyd’s brother, Philonise Floyd.
- Donate to the Minnesota Freedom Fund working with the National Lawyers Guild and Legal Rights Center to help bail out arrested protesters.
- Donate to the Black Visions Collective (BLVC) that “believes in a future where all Black people have autonomy, safety is community-led, and we are in right relationship within our ecosystems.”
- Donate to the North Star Health Collective who are providing street medics and health care providers during protests.
- Donate to Reclaim the Block. “Reclaim the Block began in 2018 and organizes Minneapolis community and city council members to move money from the police department into other areas of the city’s budget that truly promote community health and safety.”
- Join Arm-in-Arm for Climate, which aims to “ignite a transformational era that ends the climate crisis through sustained disruptive humanitarianism centering economic and racial justice;”