A Note From Victor on Indigenous Peoples Day
After being officially criminally indicted by the state of Georgia and reaching seven months of incarceration, I wish to speak again.
Today, on Indigenous People’s Day, I want to raise my voice to remind everybody that this marks 531 years of Indigenous resistance here on Turtle Island. As Indigenous people, we must go beyond mere representation and celebrations. Police, prisons, reservations, detention centers, and borders operate through a shared logic of immobilization, containing our oppressed communities in their racial system.
I am right now in a place that shouldn’t be holding any people, a place that should not exist. A place that has caused many cases of human rights abuses and violations, a place where many people have lost their lives. A place where people don’t have proper shelter and healthcare. The people here are refugees. The prison industrial complex exists for profit; the goal of CoreCivic is to maximize profits, not to follow a moral compass by treating people with dignity. When you put corporations in charge of human beings, you will see flagrant violations of human rights, even to the point that people are dying. Everyone outside should raise their voice and demand that this stops.
In times of rising xenophobia and racism, we see images of thousands of migrants and refugees trying to cross the southern colonial border and we hear the rhetoric of border crisis. In reality, there is no border crisis but a displacement crisis. The war on migrant and refugee people does not exist separate from anti-Indigenous and anti-Black violence. Border imperialism is structurally bound up in genocide. Crees and Anishinaabe from Canada and Yaquis from Mexico crossed into the U.S. in the late 19th and early 20th century and engaged in political struggles for recognition to challenge the state’s subjugation of them as “foreign Indians” and “illegal immigrants.”
Many southern immigrants/refugees are also Indigenous people and Black relatives. Borders and xenophobic immigration laws are rooted in Indigenous dispossession and anti-Black violence. In these 531 years of Indigenous resistance, I stand in solidarity with the relatives and Indigenous nations and communities remembering their old teachings, stories, songs, and remembering that we are all still warriors. Solidarity with migrant and refugee relatives at the southern colonial border, across the world, and behind bars in these detention centers/concentration camps. Solidarity with the land defenders fighting the Mountain Valley Pipeline Black Snake and protecting life. Solidarity with Gaza — we are all owed dignity, personhood, respect.
As an Indigenous migrant man, I have been called many things by the state. Now more than ever, I continue resisting this ridiculous narrative and these new RICO charges. I’m a sundancer, a land defender, a frontliner, living in occupied Indigenous land and territories with obligations and responsibilities due to my presence here—I’m a warrior not by anyone else’s definition other than my own and my people’s. These are the identities I hold dear. Because some of these identities have been used as a weapon to oppress me, I use them as a weapon of my own liberation. I protect, nurture, and love in these deep ways.
I have been shot by rubber bullets many times; maced, tear-gassed, and pepper sprayed more times than I can remember; I have been bitten and attacked by dogs, I have had guns pointed at my face by white supremacists, sprayed by water canons under freezing temperatures, tased a few times and injured many more. And I have always been proud to uphold my responsibilities and take a stand to defend people and land, even though standing up to the repressive power of the state has had a cost—the latest, this indictment, these seven months of incarceration and the so-real-now threat of deportation and removal from this land, this precious land. The land of my relatives, the land where my family lives, the land where my father is buried.
This is who I am. In this continuous detention, I’m fed up with the degradation and the conditions, but I want you all to know that I keep resisting and standing up against the daily conditions, against the dehumanization, and against this fucked up system that separates us. I live a life that I don’t regret.
Homies and comrades, to all of you who I love: Resist with a depth beyond recognition. Now and forever, keep loving deep, nurturing freedom, valuing life, protecting the sacred, raising hell. We are unstoppable, we are an extension of Earth, we are spirit, we are power, and there can be no borders, restrictions, or jails for that. Until our paths cross and you see me again next to the moon puppy.
Solidarity with the people standing up against the police state and with the resistance to anti-Black racialized state violence. Freedom to stay, freedom to move and the right to return. From Stewart Detention Center, Unit 6B—close the camps, free us all!
Updates and Messages
1. I completely refuse this indictment and the new charges as this ridiculous narrative and lies of the state of Georgia continue.
2. Much love, respect, and gratitude to my Native family for always holding me during this detention, for never leaving me alone, for always making sure that I have the help, the legal support, and the protection that I need during this captivity. You all are a blessing in my life. Thank you for always reaching out to me—for the prayers, the sacredness, and the medicine. I love you all more than I can express in these colonial languages.
3. In these times of extreme xenophobia and racism, I ask everybody in the spirit of collective liberation to stand in solidarity and support of migrant/refugee relatives all across the land. Especially in places like Florida, New York, the southern border where the relatives are facing persecution and the brute enforcement of the migra/police state. Walls and borders can’t stop the migration of animals, the river, the movement of people, or the spirit of freedom.
4. Shoutout to the homies defending the land and fighting to stop the MVP Black Snake. Your hearts and commitment inspire me. To support the land defenders resisting the MVP pipeline, please donate to the Appalachian Legal Defense Fund: http://bit.ly/applegaldefense
5. To my homies in SLC, and to the homies who were by my side since the start of this incarceration, you are my community, my thoughtful comrades. I’m so lucky for your presence in my life. I can’t wait to be around all of you. Much love and respect your way.
6. Mountain Lion, thank you for your presence and your care since the beginning. Your letters and your art brighten my days and fill this dark cell full of colors and warmth.
7. To the rad crew in Savannah, GA. I love the fact that you are always in contact and that I’m getting a lot of letters from all of you. Your letters are the best and are what my spirit needs. Please keep in touch and keep sending mail! Sorry if I haven’t answered yet; I have been really exhausted lately, but soon I’ll write back to all of you.
8. To the comrades in Poland, Germany, Greece, you are completely right: “No human is illegal; the illegal one is the state.” You said I inspire you all. I say you all inspire me. You are in my mind and in my fist.
9. Organizing and resistance never stop; even behind bars, the struggle for dignity and respect and against degradation and dehumanization is alive and full of collective power. To all of you who took the time to call and send letters demanding better food and humane treatment for the detainees in the Stewart Detention Center, to all of you who join your voices, to all the voices here. I’m happy to inform you that the food is getting better by the day. The products are fresh, we’re getting more fruits and veggies, and the food even tastes better (this is a lot for carceral food). A big salute of solidarity and struggle from all the detainees of units 6A, 6B, and 6C. Please keep writing, demanding better food until this becomes a norm in this facility. You can write to:
Stewart Detention Center
ATTN: Warden Russell Washburn
146 CCA Road
Lumpkin, GA 31815
The strongest weapons the prison industrial complex has are isolation, silence, and darkness. By raising all our voices together, we are shaking the foundation of this system of despair.
10. Thank you to the homies and compass of the Final Straw and the Fire Ant Collective for the rad articles and the badass zines. Please keep sending more and staying in contact until all are free.
11. To Coyote for always holding the smoking mirrors where I can see my multiple me and my whole self, for the wild ride and for showing me how to survive.
12. So much gratitude and love to my father, Tortuguita and my brother Charles shining among the stars, all warriors in their own ways, for the inspiration, the dreams, and the protection.
13. Thanks to all of you beautiful people for all the letters, cards, books (books are lifesavers, and they have made me feel less alone), funds on my books for phone and commissary (I share all I have with many detainees who don’t have any support at all. So there are other people, not only me, reading the books and eating the stuff from the commissary). I’m sorry that I haven’t yet written back to a lot of my homies and comrades who have been reaching out, as I have been really exhausted, but soon I am going to start writing letters to you. Also, I have never been a big coffee drinker, but now I get it and enjoy a good cup of coffee daily, thanks to all of you. It’s like the comrades here always say (and I want to emphasize that all prisoners are political): “Gangsters drink 40s, hustlers drink coffee.” This is a tough, rough experience, but thanks to all of you, I am never alone, with freedom in our hearts and love that endures. Solidarity!
14. Support and solidarity with the rest of the people who have been incarcerated and indicted in Atlanta. If you can, please show solidarity with them by making a donation to their legal defense: https://communitymovementbuilders.org/donate/
15. Solidarity is a practice. On Indigenous People’s Day, please support Indigenous communities defending their land. Please support Mama Julz, a warrior for justice with Mothers Against Meth Alliance (MAMA) on Oglala territory:
Venmo: @Julie-Dreamer
PayPal: @JulzRich
CashApp: $MamaJulz73