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Demands to Cancel Rent Escalate During COVID-19 Shut Down

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A caravan attendee applies a Rent Strike Committee poster on their car before departing in with other attendees in Oakland on May 22. Photo by Michelle Snider.

As a caravan of organizers departed a Dollar Tree parking lot in Oakland with various rent strike signs and flags attached to their vehicles Friday, May 22, a passing motorist honked and yelled out of their driver side window, “Thank you! Thank you for that!”

Leaving at around 3:15 p.m. the caravan headed to 10 Mosser Captial owned buildings in Oakland to spread the word of their strike. They then regrouped to head to San Francisco by 5:30 p.m. in order to, “issue CEO Neveo Mosser a 30-day notice to pay to cancel rent or quit,”  per a mass-distributed email said, which included the hashtags #MakeThemPay #CancelRent.

The caravan was led by a campaign hub for organizations called The Action Center on Race and the Economy (ACRE). The campaign hub website says it is “working at the intersection of racial justice and Wallstreet accountability.”

Before the economy was shut down due to COVID-19, organized movements like Moms 4 Housing, a group of homeless moms who took over a corporate-owned home late last year to make a point that housing was available but kept unaffordable on purpose, was already being organized and in action. Now that many people have been forced out of work since March, the pressure to cancel rent has increased.

In an e-mail detailing the plan and route for the caravan, an attachment from ACRE titled Make Them Pay explained the rent cancelation demands.

According to the ACRE report, “Extending current moratoriums on evictions is not enough. Those moratoriums do not alleviate the growing financial burden of unpaid rent, mortgage, utility, and other housing-related bills that will come due in the near future. Millions of Americans won’t be able to pay months of housing expenses after eviction moratoriums expire and the economy reopens. That’s the harsh reality.”

It also said organizers identified more than 200,000 people who engaged in rent strikes on May 1 across the country.

ACRE report says the CARES Act gives $170 billion in tax benefits to real estate and rich millionaires. It also points to the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act giving nearly $50 billion to real estate.

Michelle Snider

Associate Editor for The Post News Group. Writer, Photographer, Videographer, Copy Editor, and website editor documenting local events in the Oakland-Bay Area California area.

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Oakland Post: Week of June 4 – 10, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of June 4-10, 2025

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Remembering George Floyd

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — Minnesota State Attorney General Keith Ellison acknowledges that the Floyd case five years ago involved a situation in which due process was denied, and five years later, the president is currently dismissing “due process. “The Minnesota Atty General also says, “Trump is trying to attack constitutional rule, attacking congressional authority and judicial decision-making.” George Floyd was an African American man killed by police who knocked on his neck and on his back, preventing him from breathing.

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Mural showing the portrait of George Floyd in Mauerpark in Berlin. To the left of the portrait the lettering "I can't Breathe" was added, on the right side the three hashtags #GeorgeFloyd, #Icantbreathe and #Sayhisname. The mural was completed by Eme Street Art (facebook name) / Eme Free Thinker (signature) on 29 May 2020. (Wikimedia Commons)
Mural showing the portrait of George Floyd in Mauerpark in Berlin. To the left of the portrait the lettering "I can't Breathe" was added, on the right side the three hashtags #GeorgeFloyd, #Icantbreathe and #Sayhisname. The mural was completed by Eme Street Art (facebook name) / Eme Free Thinker (signature) on 29 May 2020. (Wikimedia Commons)

By April Ryan
BlackPressUSA Newswire

“The president’s been very clear he has no intentions of pardoning Derek Chauvin, and it’s not a request that we’re looking at,” confirms a senior staffer at the Trump White House. That White House response results from public hope, including from a close Trump ally, Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. The timing of Greene’s hopes coincides with the Justice Department’s recent decision to end oversight of local police accused of abuse. It also falls on the fifth anniversary of the police-involved death of George Floyd on May 25th. The death sparked national and worldwide outrage and became a transitional moment politically and culturally, although the outcry for laws on police accountability failed.

The death forced then-Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden to focus on deadly police force and accountability. His efforts while president to pass the George Floyd Justice in policing act failed. The death of George Floyd also put a spotlight on the Black community, forcing then-candidate Biden to choose a Black woman running mate. Kamala Harris ultimately became vice president of the United States alongside Joe Biden. Minnesota State Attorney General Keith Ellison prosecuted the cases against the officers involved in the death of Floyd. He remembers,” Trump was in office when George Floyd was killed, and I would blame Trump for creating a negative environment for police-community relations. Remember, it was him who said when the looting starts, the shooting starts, it was him who got rid of all the consent decrees that were in place by the Obama administration.”

In 2025, Police-involved civilian deaths are up by “about 100 to about 11 hundred,” according to Ellison. Ellison acknowledges that the Floyd case five years ago involved a situation in which due process was denied, and five years later, the president is currently dismissing “due process. “The Minnesota Atty General also says, “Trump is trying to attack constitutional rule, attacking congressional authority and judicial decision-making.” George Floyd was an African-American man killed by police who knocked on his neck and on his back, preventing him from breathing. During those minutes on the ground, Floyd cried out for his late mother several times. Police subdued Floyd for an alleged counterfeit $20 bill.

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Oakland Post: Week of May 28 – June 30, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of May 28 – June 3, 2025

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