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Other Links:

•  United for Equality & Affirmative Action Legal Defense Fund (UEAALDF)

•  AFSCME Local 207 (Detroit water workers)

•  Defending Public Education in Detroit (blog)

•  DREAM Act Facebook Page

•  Justice for Oscar Grant Facebook Page

•  Justice for Jesús Gutiérrez - Make UC-Berkeley a Sanctuary Campus Facebook Page

•  BAMN Myspace Page

•  BAMN Chávez Holiday Myspace Page

About BAMN

The Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, Integration, and Immigrant Rights and Fight for Equality By Any Means Necessary (BAMN) is building the new civil rights movement. We are a primarily student- and youth-based organization of leaders in our schools and communities, committed to making real the promises of American democracy and equality.

BAMN formed in 1995 in response to the University of California Regents' decision to ban affirmative action in the University of California system. BAMN succeeded at securing the reversal of the Regents' ban in 2001, and has grown to reverse the continuing attack on affirmative action, integration, and the gains of the Civil Rights Movement in California, Michigan, and nationwide.

BAMN spearheaded the pro-affirmative-action student legal intervention in Grutter v. Bollinger, and organized a national movement that culminated in a 50,000-person March on Washington on April 1, 2003. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled to uphold affirmative action.

BAMN is continuing the struggle to win full integration and equality in American society. We are fighting for full and equal rights for all immigrants, and fighting to build a united struggle of the black and Latina/o communities and all the disadvantaged and oppressed in American society.

→ Form a BAMN Chapter

→ Donate to BAMN

BAMN's Foundational Documents

Below are declarations and documents that were approved at national BAMN conferences. They express what BAMN is fighting for, as well as BAMN's understanding of history, our society, and the nature of our tasks. Look over these and contact us to form a BAMN chapter in your school, college, or city.

Some Current Campaigns

Currently, BAMN is:

  • Organizing to win the Federal Dream Act and statewide Dream Acts, so that undocumented immigrant students can win an equal right to college financial aid and attain legalization.
  • Organizing to stop the national effort to end public education, by building BAMN chapters and mobilizing in K-12 schools and fighting for militant policies within school unions to build a united mass civil rights struggle for equal, integrated, quality education.
  • Combating Ward Connerly's effort to get white-majority electorates to outlaw affirmative action through state ballot initiatives. In August 2008, BAMN succeeded at keeping Connerly's initiative out of Arizona, after having defeated him in Missouri and Oklahoma earlier that year. BAMN is conducting a federal challenge against Michigan's Proposal 2, to strike down as unconstitutional statewide affirmative action bans in Michigan and across the country.
  • Organizing community power to stop police murder and brutality and other racist attacks on our communities.
  • Organizing to make college campuses, schools, cities, and states into sanctuaries for all immigrants. No cooperation or collaboration with immigration enforcement.

Banner photo credit: Mike Rhodes