A New Campaign Demands Assata Shakur’s Removal from FBI Watch List

An international coalition of grassroots organizers and elected officials have launched a campaign demanding that the U.S. government lifts its embargo on Cuba and takes Assata Shakur off the FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorist Watch List.  

Shakur, 76, a veteran of Black Panther Party and Black Liberation Army, escaped from a New Jersey state prison in 1979 —  two years after she was convicted and sentenced to life for the murder of a New Jersey state trooper. 

That conviction has been heavily contested among Black nationalists and Pan-Africanists. 

Since her escape, Shakur has been living in Cuba under political asylum. In 2013, the FBI under President Barack Obama placed Shakur on its Most Wanted Terrorist Watch List. Shakur, the first woman ever to make the list, has a $1 million federal bounty on her as well as a $1 million bounty issued by the Office of the Attorney General of New Jersey.  

On Wednesday, Oct. 11, more than 50 elected youths, elected officials, musicians, educators and grassroots organizers gathered virtually to launch what’s been dubbed as The Appeal for Assata & Cuba. For more than an hour, they lionized Shakur as an enduring symbol of African liberation while denouncing the U.S. government’s designation of Shakur as a terrorist. 

Several speakers also laid out plans for a long-term, multifaceted campaign that involves educators, artists and elected officials. Prince George’s County At-Large Council member Calvin Hawkins, who counted among those most vocal about The Appeal for Assata & Cuba, expressed plans to call on other elected officials to support this cause.

“I’m standing with the Black liberation movement and Black liberators as an elected council member in Prince George’s County,” Hawkins said. 

“I will work with elected officials to [to help them understand] that we can’t be comfortable in our elected position and forget about those who struggled and gave the ultimate sacrifice [for us] to sit in these elected offices,” Hawkins continued. “It will take us in elected offices to tell our government that enough is enough. I stand prepared to assist in any way.” 

Cuba and the U.S. Continue to Clash on the Embargo 

Recent talks between Cuba and U.S. officials yielded no change on two polarizing issues — Cuba’s placement on the U.S.’ list of state sponsors of terrorism and the Biden administration’s continuation of a Cold War-era economic embargo. 

Although President Joe Biden (D) rolled back restrictions that former Republican President Donald Trump imposed on remittances and food, Cuban officials said those overtures don’t suffice. During the latter part of September,  Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel visited the United Nations in New York City to continue working on the aforementioned issues. 

Not long after Diaz-Canel returned to Cuba, Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez-Parrilla reported that an unidentified assailant threw a Molotov cocktail at the Embassy of Cuba on 16th Street in Northwest, which first opened in 2015 when Cuba and the U.S. restored diplomatic ties that had been severed since the 1960s. 

A similar event took place in 2020 when someone fired shots at the embassy building. Jake Sullivan, the White House’s national security advisor, reportedly condemned the attack the next day and said systems had been put in place to ensure a solid investigation and prevent future attacks. 

Starting Oct. 11, and in the weeks and months leading to Feb. 21, the anniversary of Malcolm X’s assassination, coalition members plan to promote The Appeal for Assata & Cuba through various means. Educators, artists and influencers have been called on to host events, conduct classroom lessons and produce music and art in alignment with Shakur and Cuba. 

Organizers on the Oct. 11 call said they will soon send letters to activist-academic Angela Davis, the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC), and the National Black Caucus of State Legislators to elicit their support. 

In 1998, CBC members either supported or abstained from voting on a congressional resolution requesting Cuba’s extradition of Shakur, who by that time had been living in Cuba for nearly 20 years. A spokesperson for Rep. Steven Horsford (D-Nev. 4th District), the current chair of the CBC, forwarded an Informer inquiry about The Appeal for Assata & Cuba to a CBC communications staffer, who has since not responded. 

For some people, like Fravia Marquez of Venezuela, demanding that the bounty be lifted off of Shakur is a no brainer, especially when one considers the forces that she and other Black people organized against in the 1970s. 

“We know how COINTELPRO was against the Black Panther Party and part of the plans against revolution in countries like Cuba and Venezuela,” Marquez, the second adviser to Venezuela’s National Assembly, said during the launch event for The Appeal for Assata & Cuba. “We are always seen as terrorists. We are cataloged as terrorists. [That’s why] we will always be calling to stop the blockade on Cuba. Cuba has helped the world without asking for anything in exchange.” 

U.S. Surveillance, Detainment, and Isolation of Freedom Fighters

In 2021, then-Rep. Bobby Rush, a founding member of the Illinois Black Panther Party, introduced the COINTELPRO Full Disclosure Act. If passed, the legislation would’ve made public the remaining records of the surveillance program intended to stop “the rise of a Black Messiah who could unify and electrify the militant Black nationalist movement,” as expressed by J. Edgar Hoover, the first FBI director. 

Bilal Sunni Ali, a founding member of the New York City Black Panther Party, has set his sights on further exposing the impact of COINTELPRO. On Oct.11, he provided details about how the New Jersey court system convicted Shakur despite questions about how she murdered New Jersey State Trooper Werner Foerster on the New Jersey turnpike in 1973 with an injured arm. 

“The Black Liberation Army secured a release because of the U.S.’ failure to exact justice on [Assata Shakur’s] behalf,” Sunni Ali said. “Despite the inability to identify Shakur as a perpetrator, the state still found her guilty. The only thing she was ever found guilty of was felony murder in the incident of her arrest.” 

Other supporters of The Appeal for Assata & Cuba include the International Black Freedom Alliance, the National Conference of Black Lawyers, along with Grammy-nominated singer-rapper Mumu Fresh, former New York City Council member Charles Barron, former Alabama Senator Hank Sanders, Mass Emphasis Children’s HIstory & Theatre Company, the Thomas Sankara Pan-African Library in Burkina Faso, Bokar Ture, son of Kwame Ture, Abeeku Dada, a Cuban-trained doctor and son of Mukasa Dada, and Yohance Maqubela, son of Dick Gregory and Lillian Gregory. 

In his remarks, Obi Egbuna Jr. of the Zimbabwe-Cuba Friendship Association drew connections between Shakur’s situation and that of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., W.E.B. Dubois, Paul Robeson, Septima Clark and others who, regardless of their political leanings, had been ostracized for their critique of U.S. foreign policy and the government’s treatment of Black people. 

Several minutes before, the Rev. Dr. Madeline McClenney of the Exodus Foundation spoke about how the U.S. government, since Shakur’s conviction and escape, has continuously fallen short of the values outlined in its founding documents. 

“Not only should mercy be granted to those living under harsh sentences, but Assata Shakur and the people of Cuba living from frozen bank accounts and denied visas,” McClenney said. “Our moral authority that we think we have as a nation is at stake here. It’s astounding that the state would keep a bounty on the head of a woman facing the terrorism she faced as a Black woman in her country.”