Get QuoteDark Inspirational Quotes App

" I am the executive director of the Black Alliance for Just Immigration, which is the country's only national immigrant rights organization for black immigrants and African Americans. Being the daughter of Nigerian immigrants really drove me to do this type of work. "

Related Quotes:

" Civility is the recognition that all people have dignity that's inherent to their person, no matter their religion, race, gender, sexuality, or ability. "

Opal Tometi

Gender

Religion

Recognition

" Despite claims that there are good and bad cops, we know that the system is failing everyone - including the police. "

" What we are oftentimes reminding people of is the fact that the history of police in the U.S. was that they were slave patrols. They were quite literally created in order to capture enslaved Africans. "

" Trump's racism has clearly driven his policy decisions during his first year in office - from his Muslim ban and his despicable treatment of DREAMers to his ruthless ramp-up of immigration raids and the callous termination of protections for Haitians and Salvadorans who fled natural disaster and violence. "

" Many of the concessions that leading Democrats seem willing to make - from cutting diversity visas to chipping away at family visas - would be made on the backs of black immigrants, people from Africa and the Caribbean who deserve these policies to remain intact as some of the few legal tools they have to immigrate to this country. "

" I think about issues like climate change, and how six of the 10 worst impacted nations by climate change are actually on the continent of Africa. People are reeling from all sorts of unnatural disasters, displacing them from their ancestral homes and leaving them without a chance at making a decent living. "

" The black immigrant experience in the U.S. must be understood not in contrast to the African American experience but as an integral part of it. "

" If black lives mattered, I believe that policing and immigration enforcement would not be the devastating force that it is in our communities. "

" We deserve a multiracial democracy that works for all of us. "

Opal Tometi

Works

Democracy

" To fully understand the black immigrant experience in the U.S., we must understand it not in contrast to the African-American experience, but central to it. "

" African-Americans and black immigrants share a resilience and a determination for a better life. "

" Lean into your curiosity about any issue, and there will likely be people to share a little bit more of their knowledge and insight and give you ideas on how to make change. "

" I just look back at my time in college and think about how much my community activism and my work in neighborhoods really informed my actual academic career and beyond... It can provide a way better learning than the traditional classroom setting. "

" We deserve to live in a world where there's no impunity, but beyond this question of impunity, there are all these structures that are actually doing a disservice to our people. "

" Being in the immigrant rights space, I've heard a lot of transactional talk with questions like, 'When will black people show up for immigrants?' "

" We came in as organizers before creating the Black Lives Matter network and project, and we are still organizers, strategists, political thinkers, and philosophers, so we actually have a lot ideas and a lot of really thought out strategies. "

" Many thought that the abolition of slavery, the end of Jim Crow, and the legislative progress of the Civil Rights Era, among other watershed moments, would have fundamentally done away with the racist structures that have long oppressed black people. However, we know that has been far from the case. "

" Only when the oppressed are heard can we have an honest solutions based dialogue. "

" There was a time when my uncle was in an immigration detention center, and members of our community would take turns visiting him each weekend. That instilled in me the value of taking care of each other even if the systems aren't working in your favor. "

" I call on Democrats to use their leverage to fight for a clean DREAM Act and to reject Trump's racist agenda - not only in word but in deed. "

" As an immigrant justice advocate, I, of course, want legal status for everyone trying to make it in this country. "

" Racism should be a core concern for all Americans in every area of our lives. "

" The U.S.' refusal to acknowledge the plight of displaced Haitians and maintaining inhumane practices of neglect, disrespect, and violence amounts to a gross violation of human rights. "

" To me and to a number of other activists from the U.S., we believe that the human rights movement has to evolve and understand the global implications of structural racism. This means engaging the United Nations and a variety of other human rights bodies. "

" From my youngest brother to immigrant women to black queer folks, those are the people who keep me going. When I think about their various acts of courage, it reminds me that I am not alone and that we can do even more, and we deserve more, so we have to keep going. "

" My parents migrated to Phoenix, AZ, in the '80s, and I watched them work tirelessly to provide for me and my siblings as they encouraged us to pursue our dreams. "

Opal Tometi

Phoenix

Work

" We must create a committee to address the long-standing discrimination against black people in America. "

" Knowing that there is a community of people on every corner of this planet that believes in justice, that is willing to sacrifice, and that is willing to take a stand is the most heartening thing. "

" We have to start imagining a new reality - this will mean fewer police and more social workers and teachers. This will mean creating more economic possibilities and investment that preserves and does not displace our communities. "

" Due to broken windows policing, the following interactions can lead to tickets, arrests and summonses, warrants if tickets go unpaid and, in some cases, violence: jaywalking, sleeping on a park bench, spitting, putting your feet up on the subway, and more. "