The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is sending up to $3 million to an activist group that advocates for slashing police budgets and prison closures to pursue “climate justice” for convicts and “reentry communities.”
The Ella Baker Center for Human Rights (Baker Center) and the Insight Garden Program were selected for receipt of between $1 million and $3 million to pursue “Environmental and Climate Justice in Prison and Reentry Communities.” The Baker Center has previously endorsed or advocated for left-wing activist positions like defunding the police, effectively decr
The funding that the Baker Center is receiving comes from a roughly $2 billion “Environmental and Climate Justice Community Change” EPA grant program endowed by the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), President Joe Biden’s signature climate bill, according to the EPA. The Baker Center is the partner organization to the Insight Garden Program, which was the lead applicant.
It’s always been and will always be #DefundThePolice https://t.co/VwwqIEJqcj
— Ella Baker Center (@ellabakercenter) May 1, 2024
“This project will engage up to 1,350 individuals in California prisons and reentry communities to learn more about the unique environmental and climate justice challenges faced by these communities-such the impact of dangerous heat waves on populations housed in aging facilities without adequate cooling or ventilation-and identify potential solutions,” according to EPA. “The project will also establish a statewide Environmental Advisory Board to educate policymakers about these challenges and develop policy recommendations to improve conditions.”
The Baker Center supports defunding the police, and called for “complete divestment from police” in November 2021 following the acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse. As recently as May, the organization also called for Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom to shutter five prisons in the state.
The group also commended the passage of California’s Proposition 47, which passed in 2014 and effectively decriminalized shoplifting by making the theft of property valued below $950 a misdemeanor instead of a felony, according to the Superior Court of California. Proposition 47 preceded a major uptick in retail theft in the state, according to the California Public Policy Institute, and the state has seen retailers and businesses depart from cities like San Francisco thanks in part to increased theft and criminality.
The Baker Center “[works] toward a Queer Black Feminist Liberation” and “[strives] to not replicate white supremacy culture — such as fear of open conflict, perfectionism, power hoarding, microaggression, and individualism — and directly confront anti-Blackness personally, organizationally, and in our communities,” according to the “Our Values” section of its website.
The organization also operates a “Civic Leader’s Hub” and a “Voter Hub,” according to its website. The “Voter Hub” includes a link to a California state voter registration website, as well as information about which incarcerated or formerly-incarcerated people are eligible to vote in California.
“The Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, the most recent funding was announced last week, is getting between one and $3 million,” Republican West Virginia Sen. Shelley Moore Capito said at a Wednesday press conference addressing the EPA’s activist awardees. “And they are actively advocating to defund police, decriminalize shoplifting and abolish our prisons… I mean, this is taxpayer dollars, and what do they have to do with telling people how to live and cope better and clean up their environment?”
The Baker Center joins a growing list of left-wing activist groups receiving taxpayer cash from the EPA. Other groups include the Climate Justice Alliance, which is receiving $50 million to be a pass-through grant maker, as well as the New Jersey Alliance for Immigrant Justice and the New York Immigration Coalition, which are partner organizations in a coalition awarded $50 million through the same EPA pass-through grantmaking program.
The EPA and the Baker Center did not respond immediately to requests for comment.
Featured image credit: Environmental Protection Agency EPA. Photo: mccready https://www.flickr.com/photos/mccready
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