D.C.-Area Mothers Organize ‘ArrestCPS’ Campaign

In the weeks and months leading up to a Mother’s Day march scheduled to take place in front of the White House, a group of Black women in the D.C. area continue to demand the reunification of Black children who’ve been separated from their families by the government.   

For Mashai Small, this cause is personal. 

“Although some of our family members are praying for us, they don’t want us to deviate from the state’s plan, which is to close the case how they want and basically do what they say,” said Small, D.C. chapter president of the African National Women’s Organization (ANWO).

Small is a soon to be 28-year-old mother of two who’s currently in a battle with Howard County, Maryland officials for custody of her children. She counts among those who are organizing the “ArrestCPS Campaign,” described as an effort to expose the child foster care system’s role in criminalizing Black parents, breaking families apart, and siphoning state funds needed to sustain communities.  

The ArrestCPS Campaign includes court watch, during which members of ANWO, Operation Stop CPS, and other entities support mothers in their appearances before family court judges. It also involves banner drops, a process by which organizers hang up signs across the region targeting child and family service agencies and raising awareness about Small’s story and that of other mothers. 

“It’s been good to [be around] people who get it and who are not forcing you to do what is told of you,” Small told The Informer. “They’re encouraging you to stand up and let your voice be heard.” 

The Fight to Reunite with Collin and Clover

More than a year ago, Howard County Department of Social Services worked with Anne Arundel County Police to take Collin and Clover, Small’s infant son and daughter, from her and her partner Justice Jackson during a nighttime outing in Anne Arundel County, Maryland. 

Small alleged that Howard County officials responded to a tip given by Small’s brother-in-law. In the days leading up to that incident, she refused to acquiesce to a welfare check, out of what she described as a concern that officials were amenable to her brother-in-law’s accusations about Collin’s malnourishment.   

Those accusations, Small said, stemmed from her and Jackson’s religious, spiritual, educational and dietary beliefs. She went on to tell The Informer that Howard County officials designated her and Jackson, 24, as anti-establishment, by virtue of their Moorish nationality. 

The Southern Poverty Law Center and Anti-defamation League of America designate what they describe as the “Moorish sovereign citizens movement” as an anti-government extremist group. The notion of Moorish citizenship, in part, originates from the Moorish Science Temple of America, an Islamic, nationalist institution started by Noble Drew Ali in the early 20th century. 

Small, recounting the night she lost her children, told The Informer that she and Jackson went to Johns Hopkins Howard County General Hospital. That’s where she said the children had been rushed for further testing, despite EMTs from Odenton Volunteer Fire Company Station 28 already collecting vitals. 

As Small recalled, when she and Jackson attempted to feed and change Collin and Clover at the hospital, child services officials directed Howard County police officers and Johns Hopkins security personnel to deny them access. 

Both entities, she said, threatened arrest. 

The couple later appeared virtually before a family court judge, all without a summons on file, Small said. 

Small later told The Informer about receiving a peace order mandating that she stays away from Howard County Social Services Director Geneva Rieu.   

That peace order came amid her and Jackson’s visits to Howard County Department of Social Services in Columbia, Maryland to see Collin and Clover. She told The Informer that, during the initial visit, she and Jackson saw Collin and Clover on Facetime via a social worker’s phone. 

Subsequent in-person visits took place in a small room with a stained carpet, few baby toys, a large two-way mirror and four cameras, Small said. She told The Informer that security officers checked her and Jackson’s bags, wand them down, and, from time to time, expressed concern about them being active shooters, kidnapping their children, and leaving the state. 

Last summer, Howard County officials placed Collin and Clover with one of Small’s family members. Small said she and Jackson have been awarded liberal unsupervised visitation with a mandate to complete multiple mental health evaluations, medical exams, and trauma therapy. 

Such mandates, Small said, conflict with their Moslem religious beliefs and constitutional rights. 

As she pushes back against the mandates, Small also continues to fight for access to court social services documents she said will help her take her case to the Supreme Court. 

Small cited Article 3, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution, telling The Informer that her legal battle with Howard County Department of Social Services should be taking place in a federal venue.  

“We’re not turning to attorneys who have the first duty to the courts. They’re not helping families,” Small said. “They just want us to go through these agreements so the state can go about its business to get this funding and control us,” she continued. “The state attacked us because we know our rights. It empowered them to make it seem like we’re inferior and we should do what they say.”  

The Bigger Picture

The Informer unsuccessfully attempted to gather comment from Howard County Department of Social Services about the circumstances surrounding Collin and Clover’s separation from their parents, the stay-away order levied against Small, and the protocol for engaging parents with differing religious and political beliefs. 

In recent months, Moorish citizens across the United States have caught the eye of law enforcement. In Arkansas, officers arrested two people in January who, out of regard for their sovereignty, moved an RV and trailer onto someone else’s property. Last summer, police in Pittsburgh shot and killed William Hardison, a man who refused to comply with an eviction order. Upon further investigation, authorities found that Hardison declared himself as a Moorish citizen. 

As it relates to child welfare, officers in Georgia arrested a self-identified Moorish citizen couple last spring for alleged extreme child cruelty after their infant children arrived at the hospital with what they later determined to be Vitamin D deficiency and bone malformation.

While Black children represent 14% of the U.S. population, they often account for nearly one in four child abuse and neglect reports and 21% of children entering the child welfare system, according to the Journal of Publc Child Welfare. In 2022, the American Civil Liberties Union and Human Rights Watch found that Black children are also nearly twice as likely to be investigated than their white and indigenous counterparts. 

Advocates say that neglect, as defined by child welfare agencies, often penalizes Black families for experiencing poverty. 

Last year, the American Civil Liberties Union submitted a report to the 139th session of the Human Rights Committee in Geneva that identified the child welfare system as a perpetuation of the U.S.’ white supremacists and settler colonial legacy. The report also posited that family separation of this magnitude placed the U.S. in violation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. 

In January, a cadre of health practitioners and organizers took to Hospital for Sick Children Pediatric Center in Northeast in support of Aziyrah Peters, a Northeast mother fighting for custody of her daughter, Ramyah Peters. 

Peters has since met with members of ANWO. 

Since 2017, ANWO has organized in support of mothers in the U.S. and Europe who lost their children to the child welfare system. Their efforts started in Philadelphia before spreading to New York City, D.C., Florida, California, Sweden and the United Kingdom — places where children experienced harm after entering the foster care system. 

ANWO’s strategy, as explained by ANWO President Yejide Orunmila, involves protests in front of government buildings, court appearances and direct engagement with public employees. Over the years, as government agencies retaliated against ANWO-affiliated mothers with threats of legal action, ANWO pivoted in their tactics. 

Through their efforts, some of the mothers reunited with their children. Orunmila told The Informer that ANWO’s ultimate goal centers on countering the modern-day manifestations of colonialism that are utilized to control Black people and families around the world. 

“Black people in particular need to understand that we’re not safe. Any child can be snatched from their families,” Orunmila said. 

“They go into our communities, use colonial conditions to marginalize the community and make that the prime place where they take our children,” she continued. “It’s amazingly disruptive and unbelievable to see the things they create for parents to get their children back.”