Say Their Names! Down with white supremacy NOW.
The National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression condemns the brutal white supremacist terrorist attack carried out on Saturday, May 14th at the TOPS supermarket, located in the black community of Buffalo, New York. 18-year-old white supremacist, Payton Gendry, carried out the vicious attack, with eleven of the 13 people Gendron shot being African American, and all ten deaths being those who were black.
We send our heartfelt condolences to the families and loved ones of those lost and to the black community of Buffalo during this time.
These attacks continue a long line of repressive acts towards the growing Black Liberation Movement. We have seen repressive state laws passed designed to repress protests and the Black Liberation Movement. We can’t forget the vicious 2015 murder of Black churchgoers by white supremacist Dylan Roof at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in downtown Charleston, South Carolina, where he murdered nine African Americans. Neither can we forget the acts of racist vigilantism, such as the murder of Ahmaud Arbery and Travyon Martin by white supremacists.
Acts of white supremacist violence are not new to the United States. The terror attacks carried out by Gendron and Roof and the white supremacist ideology they both espoused are no different from the vicious ideology of the KKK and other racist formations that have reigned terror over Black communities for decades. They exist at the root of this country’s history, and there was growth in their ranks under the Trump administration, culminating in the January 6th insurrection. We have seen GOP politicians fan the flames of their rhetoric in the form of public policy in states such as Texas, Florida and others. Still, we have seen an unwillingness from Democratic Party leadership and President Biden’s Department of Justice to fight white supremacy and stop the growth of these toxic movements.
We are calling on the Department of Justice to combat acts of racial terror like what we saw in Buffalo, New York. The dragging of their feet must end. Now is the time for decisive action.