COLORADO STANDS WITH ATLANTA. COP CITY WILL NEVER BE BUILT.
We, the undersigned members of the Colorado Solidarity Coalition to #StopCopCity, announce our formal solidarity with the movement to Defend the Atlanta Forest and Stop Cop City. We join with you to ensure that Cop City will never be built.
We vehemently reject the City of Atlanta’s leasing of 381 acres of the Weelaunee Forest previously earmarked for a public park to the Atlanta Police Foundation for the construction of their militarized training facility (aka Cop City), or for any other purpose. In addition to certain, detrimental, irreparable environmental devastation for surrounding communities and ecosystems, we see this as an act of aggression against the very people of Atlanta they claim to serve. Cop City will protect the interests of the corporations bankrolling its construction over the communities who oppose it.
We also recognize the national ramifications of police being trained in tactical urban warfare—which will be used against all of us, everywhere. It doesn’t end at our borders. Militarized violence against, and control of, Indigenous, African/Black, and Palestinian communities is the United States' biggest export, and Cop City, like similar militarized training facilities in the United States, is geared to provide material support and training to violent, repressive settler-colonial projects all over the world.
We acknowledge the Weelaunee Forest sits on stolen Muscogee land and is a former site of a slave plantation and then a prison farm. The destruction of the forest and watershed to build this facility, on this land, in a predominantly Black community, purpose thereof to enforce rising fascism, reflects a continuation of the colonizer mentality and perpetuates systemic oppression in all its forms. We reject any proposed use of this land that does not include returning it to the public to be utilized and enjoyed as a “People’s Forest,” as promised.
We oppose the proposed land trade between Dekalb County and Ryan Millsap for use of a film studio, as it will further marginalize surrounding communities and cause additional environmental harm; Intrenchment Creek Park must remain a public park.
We condemn the use of force and manipulation of the criminal legal system to intimidate activists and violate their rights. Opponents of Cop City are being wrongly incarcerated on frivolous and overinflated charges (including dozens of charges of domestic terrorism), being denied bond or given exorbitant bond, and being held in solitary confinement. These are constitutional violations and are further evidence of how Cop City and projects like it are being used to perpetuate and enforce the rise of fascism.
Atlanta forest defenders are not terrorists; this is a movement—a passionate, lifesaving movement—and those involved care deeply about our environment, public health and safety, and one another. Police have been weaponized throughout US history to quash every progressive social movement—and it ends here. We will honor our ancestors by continuing their fight for collective care and ensuring a livable, sustainable world for our future generations.
We know that all forms of oppression are systematically enforced by a racialized, militarized, violent police force. If Cop City is built, similar projects will emerge all over, even here in Colorado. We are lending our public support to the people of Atlanta, and vow to continue to help bring national attention and awareness to the movement to Defend the Atlanta Forest and Stop Cop City.
The planned construction of Cop City is undemocratic, oppressive, and violent. This is not public safety; this is the further advancement of organized, state-sanctioned violence against oppressed groups at all intersections on a mass scale to maintain an increasingly inegalitarian social order. We reject this devastating act of organized abandonment and costly investment in a compromised and violent institution, where the safety of the privileged is valued over the safety of the whole.
We are not powerless. This unjust, hierarchical, racialized caste system only works if we participate in it—and we will no longer be complicit in our own oppression. As abolitionists, we know that the safest communities are not those with the most police; the safest communities are those with the most resources. Investing in our communities is what will keep us safe; we keep us safe. We demand that the police stop defunding us.
Lastly, we offer our most sincere, heartfelt condolences for the loss of your comrade, Manuel Esteban Paez Terán (aka Tortuguita) and demand all officers involved be held accountable for their assassination; we stand with you, and we grieve with you.
We, the undersigned, stand with the people of Atlanta in moral outrage and unwavering support in fighting for our collective liberation—and we are officially joining the movement to Defend the Atlanta Forest and Stop Cop City.
Colorado Solidarity Coalition to #StopCopCity:
Black Sex Workers of Colorado
Boulder Democratic Socialists of America
Bring Our Neighbors Home Coalition
Colorado May Day Club, a chapter of CPUSA
Colorado Springs Democratic Socialists of America
Denver Alliance for Street Health Response
Denver-Aurora Community Action Committee
Denver Democratic Socialists of America
Denver Justice Project
Denver SURJ
Food Not Bombs Boulder
Harm Reduction Action Center
Jewish Voice for Peace, Denver/Boulder Chapter
The Lakewood Left
Little Read Books
National Lawyers Guild, University of Denver Chapter
SAFE Boulder
Southern Colorado Black and Pink
Swing By Street Supply Mutual Aid
