Other Ongoing Initiatives

Confronting the Criminalization of Human Rights Defenders and Abuse of Our Communities

This initiative was created in response to a series of arrests of housing rights activists from across the country that expose not only the emergence of a disturbing and serious threat to democratic engagement, activism, and political freedom, but also sheds light on the constant threat of housing push-out policies, e.g., federal rental assistance “one-strike” policies and the Safer Cities Initiative in downtown Los Angeles, that low-income residents are facing on a daily basis.

We have begun documenting numerous cases, bring particular attention to recent occurrences in New Orleans, Chicago and Los Angeles.

One way in which we have begun to respond to these blatant attacks on human rights defenders, is through the use of UN reporting mechanisms, such as the Urgent Appeal process to the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, Margaret Sekaggya.