Please join the Center for Constitutional Rights, Donkeysaddle Projects, Tayba Foundation, and Missouri Prison Reform for a virtual discussion about the intersection of Islamophobia and anti-Blackness within U.S. prisons on Wednesday, April 17, at 8 p.m. ET.

In February 2021, a group of Muslim men incarcerated at a Missouri prison were violently pepper sprayed and brutalized while gathered to pray in the common area—for no other reason than the fact that they were praying. This incident, while harrowing, was not isolated. Rather, it is emblematic of the twin pillars of anti-Black racism and Islamophobia that undergird so much violence within prisons, as well as the inhumanity of the prison system overall. 

Speakers will discuss this incident and the anti-Blackness and Islamophobia that incite similar violence within prisons. 

Center for Constitutional Rights Political Education and Research Manager maya finoh will moderate this discussion. Panelists include Reggie (Qadir) Clemons, one of the men who was assaulted; Ronnie Amiyn, a Muslim man who was formerly incarcerated in Missouri; Rami Nsour, founding director of the Tayba Foundation; Kimberly Noe-Lehenbauer, Esq, Council on American-Islamic Relations attorney for the men who were assaulted; and Jen Marlowe, Donkeysaddle Projects founder, who investigated and reported on the incident for Al Jazeera English.