Rent Refusers

On Thursday May 7th at 6:30 pm show up for some coast to coast homeless solidarity at the @mayslesdocumentarycenter ! Please join us in welcoming our comrades from @poormagazine for a one night only screening in so-called NYC of their new film @crushingwheelchairsmovie . This feature film created entirely by unhoused and formerly unhoused Bay Area residents is about the violence of poverty, gentrification, homelessness, police terror and sweeps. They tell a lived experience story our own targeted neighbors are living through everyday too thanks to the knife in the back from @nycmayor . Mamdani promised to do better by homeless New Yorkers but after only a few weeks in office he caved in to the ruling class and restarted the same violent sweeps policy initiated by his predecessor the fascist pig Eric Adams. This non-documentary yet real as fuck fim depicts the struggles of a community living under the threat of the violence of sweeps. It is a threat that is being carried out in every town and every city (red or blue) across these stolen lands. This is where we're at for poor people in America. The highest court in the land ruled in favor of criminalizing homeless folks for existing in public spaces. Municipalities across the country jumped on that to enact their own anti-homeless laws. So-called progressive and far right electeds equally embrace garbage trucks, police and detention camp shelters as their solutions for houselessness. There is no path to safety for poor people in this political system. There is only the offer of band aids as we bleed to death inside a crushing machine. We must make our own safety by building our own systems of care and defense. This Thursday come out to support these unhoused and formerly unhoused filmmakers who have come a very long way to be in community and build with us. Only by doing for each other will we undo what has been done to us. This is the work.

Homeless people have created a powerful movie about homelessness and are bringing it to East Coast Turtle Island! Come see the moving new film at these amazing venues across the East Coast. We'll be joined by incredible comrades & orgs doing powerful work to combat homelessness in their communities. TICKETS available at the LINK IN BIO! East Coast Tour Screenings Dates and Locations: May 5: Boston, MA Somerville Theatre (7:30pm) 55 Davis Square, Somerville, MA @somerville_theatre May 6: Western Mass. Northampton Center for the Arts (5:30pm) 33 Hawley St, Northampton, MA 01060 @nohocenterforthearts May 7: New York, NY Maysles Documentary Center (6:30pm) 343 Malcolm X Blvd, New York, NY 10027 @mayslesdocumentarycenter May 8: (2 event day!) Poughkeepsie, NY & Red Bank, NJ 1) Vassar College (11am) 124 Raymond Ave, Poughkeepsie, NY 12604 @vassarcollege 2) Basie Center Cinema House (6:30pm) 36 White St, Red Bank, NJ 07701 @basiecenter May 9: Philadelphia, PA Bok Building (6:30pm) 821 Mifflin St, Philadelphia, PA 19148 @buildingbok May 11: Baltimore, MD SNF Parkway Theatre (Evening time TBA) 5 W North Ave, Baltimore, MD 21201 @mdffparkway May 12: Washington, DC AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center (6pm) 8633 Colesville Rd, Silver Spring, MD 20910 @afisilvertheatre Please share this message with friends & family! We are a no-budget production passionate about sharing this powerful movie-medicine. Tickets can be reserved at the link in our bio! Thank you for all the love, support & solidarity! We’ll see y’all there! #independentfilm #indiefilm #povertyscholarship

We know it's short notice but please pull up on Sunday! It's appropriate that Sunday's sweep defense teach-in and homeless solidarity organizing sign-up event is at @morusnyc , the standing monument to the ongoing struggle for community control over our own streets because a little over four years ago just down the block, militant sweep defense exploded under a scaffolding off the corner of East 9th Street and Avenue B. It was an hours long stand off between pigs and housed and unhoused encampment defenders that ended with a mass arrest by SRG in front of throngs of media. That day energized the organizing for a time. But the Adams harm machine did not falter and eventually no-notice emergency sweeps hampered our efforts as we could not show up for a sweep we did not know was happening. The intensified persecution wore on homeless New Yorkers and drove them into the shadows to avoid the attention of the state. Sweep defense organizing stalled out but then in the fall of 2023 we met @edua_r1691 Eduardo had been senselessly assaulted at his encampment by pigs from the 9th precinct so he chose to get his justice in his own way. For Eduardo sweep resistance was about redirecting all the trauma homeless New Yorkers had absorbed from sweeps and blowing it right back in the pigs' faces. Whenever cops showed up to sweep his encampment a growing number of anti-pig graffiti tags would greet them. Then he would go off. He would rage hell at them so loudly neighbors would come to their windows to watch. He pushed them just as far as he thought he could without catching charges. This sweeps resistance wasn't about civil disobedience and planned arrests it was about what another unhoused comrade named Trip called "chaotic justice" and it took a toll on the pigs who had the misfortune to be sent our way. In the end the 9th precinct threw everything they had to wipe out Eduardo's encampment but you can still find him every Sunday in that same spot at @anarchy_9_9 . This Sunday besides practical info about the process of sweeps and how to support our neighbors facing them join us for a discussion with Eduardo about militant sweep defense. Let's find that energy again.

UPDATED GOAL: $515/$2,000 Venmo: @catcatlady Comment 💕

Sweeps are about disappearing homeless people. The point is either to force them into the carceral shelter system they sleep on the streets to avoid or to drive them into the shadows so they are always fearful of drawing the attention of the brutality of the state. We will not allow complicit electeds like @nycmayor to hide the harm they are allowing the ruling class to inflict on us. Thousands sleep on the streets, a hundred thousand are warehoused in shelters and millions struggle every month to keep an eviction notice off their doors because the ruling class have extorted a stranglehold on this land and the buildings on it through hundreds of years of state supported violence. They can only sustain that grip if we allow it. Mutual aid and community defense is how we start tearing off the fingers at our collective throats. Updates coming soon for Manhattan and Bronx sweep defense training and homeless solidarity organizing sign-up events. Appreciate y'all so much @bkjailsupport for welcoming us last night!

While these settler towns try to "sweep" us to death Houseless peoples /sweeps survivors /gentriFUKation warriors /eviction resistors /povertyskolas /street corner teachers & more created our own Movie about our own HERstories and Histories and we tryna come on a humble UnTour to Lenape (NYC Philly ) Wampanoag(Boston Western Mass ) Baltimore , DC Cherokee , Lumbee, & more, and other occupied territories in back east turtle island to share with other houseless and housed comrades in resistance -pls support this self-determination cinematic medicine - sending love and gratitude to co-sponsors and warriors @rentrefusersunited @wspmutualaid @imixwhatilike and anyone else who wants to support or co-sponsor pls DM -theater venues and tix will b announced soon ! Pls share !!! This is an all ComeUnity project -no festival love /no Hollywood love @crushingwheelchairsmovie @anarchy_9_9 @friendofafriend_nyc @rentrefusersunited @wspmutualaid @dr_jasmine_syedullah @picturethehomeless @ppehrc

Not a lot of folks have a good grasp of what sweeps actually are. So Mamdani supporters were very susceptible to the spin that sending police to forcibly displace homeless people from their living spaces and robbing them of their belongings to coerce them into carceral shelters is the humane thing to do and that anything else is abandonment. "Why do you want Mamdani to abandon people to die in the streets?" They jumped in the comments. Shut the fuck up. For the past four years we have watched the City sweep the same folks week after week without giving them the help they need. All the while keeping over 4,000 supportive housing units -meant specifically for people coming off the streets- vacant and collecting dust. That is what abandonment looks like and that is the route Mamdani has chosen to take. Anyways, after the past few weeks of showing up for our neighbors at Mamdani's sweeps we can confidently report back that NOTHING HAS CHANGED. Outreach leading sweeps not police? No it's still the same happy collaboration between DHS outreach and NYPD to enforce the displacement and property seizure of folks who have very little and have nowhere to go. At one sweep six pigs hovered over someone on a blanket while DHS threatened forced hospitalization if they didn't move. This person wasn't even scheduled to be swept, the notice was for across the avenue! As always cops are hyper focused on coercing people into giving up belongings; "what is that? Why do you need that?" as they're reaching for the item until you practically have to snatch it away to save it. DHS outreach is still as low effort as ever, congregate shelters are the main option available to folks considering placement. Connecting folks to supportive housing? "That's not something we're supposed to do" but it is actually though. We can house everyone but anything that resembles a "housing is a human right" initiative is not a notion the billionaire developer class that run New York will allow Mamdani or any electeds to entertain. Sweeps are about disappearing homeless people. Sweep defense is about supporting each other so we are seen and heard until all our needs are met by any fucking means.

So that's enough about money! Now more on a fast and inexpensive way to put a new phone that's ready to go in someone's hand. We don't know a lot about free government phones but we do know that ID is required and for a lot of unhoused folks that is a challenge. There is also the option of being donated or buying an inactive used phone. Again we don't know a lot about that process, possibly you would need to buy a SIM card and get a prepaid plan. What we have been doing lately is picking up a brand new $30 Android TracFone from Best Buy (Target and some big chain pharmacies may have them as well) and also getting a $20 Tracfone prepaid minutes card for month to month service. There are different plans for different prices but for $20 you get unlimited calls and texts but very limited data so it's important that the recipient uses wifi as much as possible. There is a $45 card that has unlimited data but that does up the total cost significantly. If you do get them a higher priced plan initially, that doesn't mean they have to pay the same amount the following month. They can always purchase a less expensive card when payment is due if that's all they can afford to continue service. Maintaining service is something you need to consider when you offer someone a phone. You should be clear with your friend whether you can help them with their monthly bill or not. Most folks will accept the free phone and figure out how to keep it on when the bill is due. Now don't forget this step! A phone case and screen protector are vital. Some of them are ridiculously priced but there are very cheap ($8-$12) options available. Don't skimp out on this expense! We have made the mistake of not getting it and our friend dropped it a few days later (like we all have!) and the screen shattered. They felt so awful about it they didn't tell us for awhile but that was entirely our bad! Some stores will offer to set up service on the new phone but if they don't it's a pretty simple process that will only take you a few minutes to complete if your friend is not that tech savvy. If you want to look out for an unhoused neighbor in this way DM us and we'll try to connect you!

Mamdani's big plan to save NYC? Same as Adams', BUILD MORE BUILDINGS aka give more money and power to developers. Trump loves it too. Is anybody impressed by this shit? Zohran fans please stay out the comments with excuses. We give no space for bullshit just facts. Mamdani continues to bow to the ruling class. He first took the knee when he kept Tisch on. That's a fact. He ran on taxing the rich yet he endorsed Hochul who has been very clear that she will never do that. Instead he's planning to cut services while committing to keep the police budget at the same outrageous level. The new mayor is following the old mayor's lead by refusing to implement the City FHEPS expansion law that would make hundreds of thousands of struggling New Yorkers eligible for this program that helps unhoused folks get into new apartments and keeps at risk tenants from being evicted. More facts. Then there's his reversal on sweeps. As Mayor-elect he repeatedly condemned Adams for this policy failure BUT last week the City resumed posting sidewalk eviction notices on homeless encampments. All it took was some bad press from trash media like the New York Post and whining from city council members to reinstate this policy that displaces unhoused folks, trashes their belongings and has been repeatedly proven to fail to get people inside! Mamdani knows this because he said that shit himself but he understands that while the sweeps do not house the homeless it does make them less visible. He is going back on his word to resume a harmful and ineffective practice purely for political expediency. This is not a surprise or a disappointment. This is expected. We have no faith in anybody that is part of a political system that solely exists to benefit the ruling class at the expense of 8 billion humans. We have faith in people in community and that's fuckin' it. Look for upcoming posts on locations and dates of sweep defense and homeless solidarity organizing sign-up events coming to your borough! Have faith in your neighbors and your community, period. And please, please, please stop fanning electeds. That is some privileged shit that has caused incalculable harm, another sad fact.

We love you. We miss you. We will keep fighting for you.

Brandy has been separated from her children for some time due to circumstances that only poor people experience. When the family lost their home her kids had to go stay with a relative while Brandy and her partner had nowhere to go but the street. They traveled for a while trying to find stability and a place to live so they could send for their kids but everywhere they went they found homelessness and the harassment of police. Brandy is autistic so the hardships of living outside have been especially traumatizing. Police aggression dysregulates her and puts her at risk of arrest or forced hospitalization. The police threat became so severe in the last town they were at that when cops offered them bus tickets up north to NYC they took them and got out of there. They arrived and settled on West 14th St but the pattern of police harassment began again as their encampment got in the crosshairs of Eric Adams and the NYPD's sweeps campaign. Several months ago Brandy and her partner first connected with local mutual aid and a few sweep defenses later they quickly became embedded with the @anarchy_9_9 and @wspmutualaid communities. Brandy and her partner know how to be in community. After getting sheltered way uptown they can still be found most Fridays and Sundays at these downtown mutual aid spaces, helping out and bringing their unique working class Ohioness that is a vibe we never knew we needed. A shelter is not a home so they endure the hardships of that awful system while they wait for an apartment that will be adequate for her kids. The food there is inedible, theft is common and the atmosphere can be tense. Brandy's nose was recently broken by another resident and then on New Year's Eve she was attacked and her coat was ripped to shreds. Then a little over a week ago she suffered a stroke. She was released from the hospital but still experiences difficulty using her right arm. The recent assaults and the stress of her living situation may have been contributing factors that led to her stroke. We ask community to help us give her the break she needs. The GoFundMe link is in our stories to raise funds for travel and a bday gift for her daughter.

Update- Goals been raised to $300! $225 currently in. Link in stories. We met Brandy over the summer and quickly came to love her infectious personality and incredible crip walking skills. Last week she had a stroke due to a blood clot on the right side of her brain. Doctors discovered this came from a hole in her heart. Please share the post & contribute what you can to help our friend & community member recover at home with her family. It would be truly amazing if we could blow past her $200 goal & give her the peace of mind to rest knowing she & her family will be ok.