Educators and public employees across NY State are demanding the New York State Teacher Retirement System divest from prison companies CoreCivic and GEO Group.

NYSTRS is investing pensioners’ money in companies that are profiting off of pain – owning hundreds of thousands of shares in prison industry companies: Core Civic and The GEO Group. CoreCivic and Geo Group are two of the largest corporations cashing in on the private prison industry, who make billions in revenue every year off of the incarceration and detention of our communities. These companies also lobby for “tough on crime” policies and other policies which disproportionately criminalize Black and brown communities, immigrant communities, and poor and working class communities.

While other pension funds across the country, and across the state, have divested from CoreCivic and GEO Group in response to the companies’ pattern of human rights abuses and the risk such conduct poses to pensioners’ investment return, NYSTRS has yet to take action. In June, 2017 The New York City Pension System, which includes New York City teacher pensions, announced that they would divest from the prison industry.

Continuing to invest in CoreCivic and GEO makes NYSTRS complicit in the Prison industrial complex and the school-to-prison pipeline. We call on NYSTRS to immediately divest.

Families for Freedom + UndocuBlack Network + Freedom to Thrive + Black Alliance for Just Immigration

Abdikader Mohamed, who is currently being detained at the CoreCivic operated Elizabeth Detention Center in New Jersey.   Abdi, a native of Somalia, has been unjustly detained since December 2017 when he was first picked up at JFK airport, less than a week after Trump’s Muslim Ban went into effect.

While in detention he has experienced serious health concerns and was hospitalized for tuberculosis. During his hospitalization he suffered inhumane treatment including being shackled to his hospital bed for ten days. His health remains at risk as long has he is detained and denied proper medical care.

Abdi’s wife and two young children currently reside in Ohio, where they have been deprived of their father.  Abdi deserves to be reunited with his family. No one should have to endure what Abdi has. Please show your solidarity and support for Abdi by taking action today.