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Arizona House Bill 2309

Arizona House Bill 2309

ISSUE UPDATE | PRESS RELEASE

EAST VALLEY (1008-B), WEST VALLEY (11AB-B), AND MARICOPA COUNTY BRANCH-NAACPs
CONDEMN AGGRESSIVE ASSAULTS ON FIRST AMENDMENT RIGHTS OF ARIZONA HOUSE BILL 2309

March 30, 2021

MESA, ARIZONA (March 30, 2021) – The East Valley (1008-B), West Valley (11AB-B), and Maricopa County Branch-NAACPs, stand in complete solidarity with all Arizonans exercising their right to demonstrate in whatever constitutionally-protected manner their consciences dictate. We condemn the anti-American, anti-democratic H.B. 2309 which attempts to criminalize the exercise of free speech and peaceful assembly. Arizonans have the same inalienable rights as all American citizens, including those guaranteed in the First Amendment to the Constitution.

H.B. 2309 would empower police officers to cancel the First Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens if even one person at a demonstration of thousands allegedly engages in an unlawful act. By declaring the demonstration a “violent or disorderly assembly,” police could charge everyone present with a crime—including those who did not engage in a crime, nor even know the individual allegedly engaging in the crime. 

This unconscionable, audacious attack on democracy is an egregious abuse of power which comes as ABC15’s “Politically Charged” series continues uncovering evidence of collusion between members of local law enforcement and the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office to politically prosecute and imprison Black Lives Matter activists. These “repeated allegations of discriminatory arrests and political prosecutions in protest cases” include “police and prosecutors presenting grand jurors with dubious claims, one-sided evidence, exaggerations, and lies,” “creating fictional gangs,” and charging a bystander as a member of a “street gang.”

H.B. 2309 would expand the power of the same police who traded “Challenge coins” engraved with “a slogan used by neo-fascist hate groups to promote violence” which commemorated law enforcement shooting a Black Lives Matter activist in the groin with a non-lethal projectile. It would embolden the same police who, when speaking about Black Lives Matter activists stated, “Gas em. I don’t give a sh** if we just gas them and let them run like crazy…(inaudible) the sh** out of them, who gives a sh**?”

This disturbing, disgusting attempt to imprison Arizonans who peacefully protest the wholly disproportionate incidences of police brutality and racial injustice towards People of Color is abhorrent. We are calling upon Arizonans to stand in defiance to these attacks on civil rights, and contact their Arizona senators and Governor Ducey to demand that these assaults on free speech and peaceful assembly stop immediately. They must unequivocally reject H.B. 2309.

Thank you.

Kiana. M. Sears, President, East Valley NAACP – Arizona (1008-B)

Bishop Anthony Holt, President, West Valley NAACP – Arizona (11AB-B)
Princess Lucas-Wilson, Criminal Justice Committee Chair, Maricopa County Branch-NAACP