Hambrick, et al. v. United States of America was filed by family attorneys Benjamin Crump, alongside co-counsels William H. Murphy Jr., Jason P. Foster, Carol D. Powell Lexing, Malcolm P. Ruff, Nabeha Shaer, and Brooke Cluse. 

They allege that nearly six decades ago, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) secretly enrolled the Black infants as test subjects in an experimental RSV vaccine trial conducted between 1965 and 1966—without the knowledge or consent of their families.

Both babies died in January 1967.

The lawsuit was filed on May 22 in the United States District Court for the District of Maryland, Southern Division. The federal government typically has 60 days to respond after service of the lawsuit, at which time they may answer or ask a judge to dismiss the case.

The Final Call has reached out to the Department of Justice for a response to the lawsuit and has not yet received a reply.

RSV (Respiratory Syncytial Virus) is a common respiratory virus that infects the nose, throat, and lungs, according to the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). It is transmitted when an infected person coughs or sneezes, through direct contact with an infected person, or by contact with a contaminated surface.

Further, while RSV usually does not pose serious health risks to healthy children and adults, older adults and children are at increased risk of severe adverse health consequences related to RSV. Symptoms include runny nose, cough, congestion, sneezing, fever, wheezing and/or loss of appetite, and in very young infants may be limited to irritability, lethargy and difficulty breathing.

“Ross Otto Hambrick and Victor Marcellus King were two Black babies who were used as guinea pigs, as lab rats, in a very targeted effort by the United States Government. 

This follows a long history of the medical society of the United States government experimenting on Black bodies—what we believe was an epidemic of medical racism,” stated Atty. Crump, during a press conference on May 28 in Washington, D.C.

During his sweeping condemnation, he situated the case within a lineage of documented atrocities, including the Tuskegee syphilis experiment in Alabama, in which Black men were withheld treatment for syphilis.

Also the exploitation of Henrietta Lacks by Johns Hopkins scientists. Ms. Lacks was a Black woman whose cervical cancer cells were taken without consent over 70 years ago during her treatment at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland.

This disturbing history also includes Black soldiers used in World War II who were given faulty gas masks and subjected to chemical exposure, and the forced sterilization of Black women in the South during routine medical procedures—known as the “Mississippi Appendectomy.”

“But today, we’re talking about these Black babies—Ross Otto Hambrick and Victor King—these innocent babies, these infants,” said Atty. Crump. “It was worst of all, because they were using babies who couldn’t talk, who couldn’t walk, who could not in any way give any type of consent.”

Specifically, the complaint alleged:

•   The United States government, through the NIH, selected the most vulnerable children it could find—Black infants from low-income families—to test a dangerous, highly concentrated experimental vaccine known as “Lot 100.”

•   Tissue samples harvested from their autopsies were preserved without the families’ knowledge.

•   Decades later, NIH researchers retrieved those samples to study what went wrong – knowledge that directly informed the development of RSV vaccines approved by the FDA in 2023, now generating billions in revenue.

•   The families of Ross Otto and Victor have never been compensated or acknowledged for the role the infants’ deaths played in that medical breakthrough.

“What I do remember vividly was the change in my mother,” said Sharlette Hambrick, Ross Otto’s sister. She was five years old when her baby brother died. Her mother was once funny and outgoing until the tragedy. She then became super religious and “barely let us out of her sight,” she said, reported New York Times columnist Charles Blow.

Mr. Blow reported that Victor’s older brother, Darius King, also five when his brother died, spent decades believing it was because of pneumonia. He quietly blamed his stepfather, who had taken the baby outside in the cold to show him off to friends. 

That impression stuck until journalist Michael Schulson of Undark magazine contacted him in 2023 and informed him that Victor’s death was most likely caused by the experimental RSV vaccine.

The report by Undark was highlighted by Mr. Blow in 2023.

He reported that the non-profit digital magazine affiliated with M.I.T., “found that in the 1960s, some of the first and youngest subjects to receive experimental shots, in a clinical trial of early attempts to develop R.S.V. vaccines, were Black and poor children, some in foster care.

And though questions remain about what parents knew, archival documents housed at the N.I.H. suggest that parents did not give informed consent—or in some cases, any consent at all—for their children to receive the largely untested shot.”

Mr. King also expressed the sorrowful resignation of a people—Black people—who have so often been mistreated, and he reflected on the country’s checkered history, including when it comes to medical ethics, explained Mr. Blow. “That was the way America was,” said Mr. King, adding that the children who were given the experimental vaccine “were probably thought of as disposable.”

Dr. Christina X Parks, a cellular and molecular biologist, described the core scientific failure of the 1960s RSV vaccine trial:

“When they processed the virus, they tried to kill it—they changed the conformation of it, they denatured it. And the body didn’t actually recognize the adulterated or denatured form of the virus and didn’t produce the right antibodies,” she told The Final Call.

The result, she said, was a catastrophic miseducation of the immune system.

“It actually disabled their own innate immune response. It skewed their immune system, it mis-trained their immune system,” Dr. Parks explained. “The antibodies kind of bound, but in fact they sort of mis-trained the immune system to ignore the virus—to actually help the virus infect the person.”

According to Dr. Parks, the RSV trial data devastatingly manifested this, explaining that vaccine recipients were getting more ill and dying with the vaccine than without it. “And so, they (scientists) did the right thing in this case and pulled the vaccine—but they should never have been experimenting,” she said.

“It’s time for accountability,” Dr. Parks told The Final Call. “The fact that they’ve been experimenting on Black populations and Black children—low income—and they experimented on special needs children. They basically always experimented on the children and people that they thought didn’t have anybody to protect them,” she said.

During the May 28 news conference, Atty. Lexing said, “The families knew for a long time that something wasn’t right with what happened to their baby brother … to their sons. 

They didn’t know that the babies had been used as infants. They did not know that the babies’ tissues had been preserved and that now the medical community is building a billion-dollar industry off the backs of these babies.”

Accountability transcends any single institution, including the federal government, said Atty. Murphy. “These families deserve honesty. They deserve the truth to be told. They deserve justice, instead of being just us.”

Houston-based attorney Pamela Muhammad said the case cuts to the heart of a long and documented history of racial exploitation in American medicine.

“History is so filled with this type of racial exploitation and experimentation and really just torture. I mean, our history is filled with this,” she told The Final Call. 

Central to the complaint is the total absence of informed consent, which must be completely free from financial or physical coercion, she said. But disproportionately, Black people are given experimental substances that they haven’t agreed to. “We have a whole history of this,” she said.

She drew a direct line from the NIH lawsuit to the founding abuses of American gynecology, in which Black women’s bodies were used without anesthesia for surgical experimentation, as well to the Tuskegee syphilis study and the Henrietta Lacks case.

On the legal claims themselves, she explained, “Battery is the legal term for somebody causing bodily harm to you. We’re talking about the destruction of human lives, with intent to do it.” 

While the lawsuit is a civil matter, the underlying conduct raises serious criminal questions, Atty. Muhammad explained. But it’s both significant and chilling that the defendant itself is the U.S. Government, she added.

“To actually see a suit being waged against your own country, your own ‘government’ because of their abuse of private citizens’ lives, that’s just huge. It is just horrible,” stated Atty. Muhammad.

The post Families of infants sue federal government, alleging medical abuse appeared first on Final Call News.

[Editor’s note: The following article was first published in The Final Call newspaper, Vol. 10, No. 18, September 9, 1999, as the fourth installation of a special five-part series on health penned by the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan. This is the first excerpt from that article.]

In The Name of Allah, The Beneficent, The Merciful.

A good diet and daily exercise must be accompanied with the right thoughts in order to work for the long life of the individual. Thinking properly is the most difficult part of the health equation to achieve, so we are asking the Black Nation to attack that which appears most difficult, which is to develop the Will to be completely wholesome in mind, body and spirit.

Why do I say that development of the Will “appears” to be the most difficult thing to do in achieving complete health? We live in a world where scientists have developed all manner of artificial methods to eliminate the effects of wrong habits:

Pills to stop smoking; pills to curtail the appetite; surgery to staple the stomach, forcing a reduction in the intake of food; plastic surgery to mask the effects of living in rebellion against Divine Law.

In a society such as this, where pill pushers advertise that we can “eat all you want and still lose weight,” development of the Will of the individual to overcome all impediments to good eating habits “appears” to be the most difficult approach, but in the long run, it is actually the easiest and most simple path to follow.

To develop the Will of the American people (Black people in particular) to live good, wholesome lives, is to make it easier to change behavioral patterns that have led or are leading to the general destruction of the health and well-being of the overall population.

The approach of government and scientists—spending inordinate sums of money on health problems—has not worked. We, the followers of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, are proving, with very little money, that we have the ability to change the destructive behavioral patterns of our people, not only as individuals but as a society.

The stigma of hate, bigotry, intolerance, anti-Semitism and violence that the United States government, its agencies and others have deliberately attached to the Nation of Islam is causing the cure for America’s social ills to be obscured while the effects of these ills multiply in diametric proportion to America’s own efforts to suppress the Truth.

If President Bush and the United States government would see (as Pharaoh in the time of Joseph saw) the value of a Divinely guided group of people in her midst, then steps could be taken to take the Revealed Message of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad and solve 100 percent of America’s social, spiritual and health problems.

I am trying with the Help of Allah (God) and the few persons working with me, to produce a healthy community of strong, able-bodied men, women and children who are willing to shoulder the responsibility of self-reliance, self-determination and self-independence.

The American food industry has gone a long way in destroying the health and well-being of the American people by its misuse of the knowledge of chemistry. The addition of coloring to change the appearance of food; preservatives to lengthen shelf life;

Injection of hormones into livestock to produce speedy growth and a fatter animal—the sum of these profit-seeking actions brings in its wake an unprecedented growth of cancer and heart disease, both of which have increased more than 250 percent since the beginning of the century and are now the leading causes of death in this country.

The American Cancer Society reports that more than 35 percent of all cancers directly result from “bad diet,” defining a “bad diet” as one that is high in fat and low in fiber.

The American Heart Association also points to “bad diet” as the “greatest single factor in heart disease” and blames poor eating habits for at least 50 percent of all cases of heart ailments that plague an estimated 60 million Americans.

There are safer and better ways to grow food and raise livestock. These methods may be slower and less profitable, but “What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul (the health and well-being of a Nation)?”

The post THE WAR AGAINST OBESITY (FAT), Part 4 appeared first on Final Call News.

by Stacy Malkan U.S. Right to Know Published on The Defender

This article was originally published by The Defender—Childrens Health Defense News & Views Website on May 26, 2026.

Neonicotinoids are the most widely used class of insecticides in the world. They are often used as seed coatings on crops such as corn and soybeans, as well as on turf, ornamental plants and pets as flea and tick treatments.

A growing body of scientific evidence raises concerns about the human health risks of neonicotinoid exposure. Studies in animals and humans link neonicotinoid exposure to neurotoxicity and reproductive toxicity. Some studies also report ties to breast and liver cancer and Type 1 diabetes.

Human exposure to neonicotinoids is widespread and begins before birth. Neonics are commonly detected in food, drinking water and household dust. A study of American women found neonicotinoids or their metabolites in more than 95% of pregnant women tested.

A 2025 review of evidence reports that neonicotinoids or their metabolites are routinely found in urine, breast milk, placental tissues and infant cord blood.

Children may have higher exposures, and they are especially vulnerable to toxic exposures during early critical periods of brain development.

In addition, extensive research shows that neonicotinoids can harm bees and other beneficial insects, particularly through chronic and sublethal effects.

In the European Union, several neonicotinoids have been banned or severely restricted due to confirmed risks to bees. Their use remains common in the U.S. and elsewhere.

What are neonicotinoids?

Neonicotinoids are part of a family of synthetic chemicals structurally similar to the addictive tobacco alkaloid nicotine. Frequently used neonicotinoids include acetamiprid, clothianidin, dinotefuran, imidacloprid and thiamethoxam. Imidacloprid, the first neonicotinoid to be commercialized, entered markets in the early 1990s.

Neonicotinoids are systemic insecticides. After plants absorb them, the chemicals can travel throughout plant tissues, including leaves, roots, stems, pollen and nectar.

Some neonicotinoids are highly persistent; they can move through waterways, accumulate with repeated use and remain in soil for months or years.

The chemicals kill insects by binding to nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs), overstimulating the insect nervous system and eventually causing paralysis and death. These receptors also exist in humans and other mammals.

Although neonicotinoids were designed to bind more strongly to insect nerve receptors, recent studies show that some neonicotinoids and their metabolites also bind to mammalian nAChRs.

Bayer, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of neonicotinoid insecticides, says that neonicotinoids were designed to selectively target insect nervous system receptors and that risks to mammals are minimal when the products are used as directed.

“Neonicotinoids, like all pesticides, are highly regulated, and all Bayer products undergo extensive testing to ensure they don’t have unacceptable adverse effects on non-target insects and the environment,” states the company’s annual risk mitigation report.

What are the health risks of neonicotinoids?

A substantial and growing body of research raises concerns that neonicotinoids harm multiple biological systems in humans and animals.

The National Toxicology Program’s 2020 review identified 191 publicly available studies relevant to human health, including evidence on neurological, developmental, reproductive, immune and respiratory outcomes. Neurological effects were the most commonly reported problem.

Recent reviews linking human health impacts to neonicotinoid exposures:

A review article on neonicotinoids’ effect on human health found “increasing evidence” that “neonicotinoids may induce toxicity in the gastrointestinal, hepatic, respiratory, and nervous systems through various mechanisms.”

Neonicotinoids have “raised significant concern regarding their potential impact on human health,” and the “widespread use and environmental persistence of neonicotinoids present serious concerns regarding their potential effects on human health.”

Neonicotinoids and human health: Environmental fate, toxicity mechanisms, and future directions. Pesticide Biochemistry and Physiology, December 2025.

A systematic review of human health studies found that “Four general population studies reported associations between chronic neonic exposure and adverse developmental or neurological outcomes.

Including tetralogy of Fallot … anencephaly … autism spectrum disorder … and a symptom cluster including memory loss and finger tremor … . All four case-control studies reported an association between chronic (i.e., nonacute) neonic exposure and an adverse human health effect.”

Effects of Neonicotinoid Pesticide Exposure on Human Health: A Systematic Review. Environmental Health Perspectives, February 2017.

Another review article found that “Available toxicological data from animal studies indicate possible genotoxicity, cytotoxicity, impaired immune function, and reduced growth and reproductive success at low concentrations.

While limited data from ecological or cross-sectional epidemiological studies have identified acute and chronic health effects ranging from acute respiratory, cardiovascular, and neurological symptoms to oxidative genetic damage and birth defects.”

A critical review on the potential impacts of neonicotinoid insecticide use: current knowledge of environmental fate, toxicity, and implications for human health. Environmental Science: Processes and Impacts, 2020.

Neurotoxicity, developmental, learning and behavioral problems 

Growing scientific evidence suggests neonicotinoids can interfere with brain development and nervous system function, with research reporting associations with learning and memory deficits, altered behavior, neuroinflammation and developmental delays.

Recent studies and reviews include:

Researchers measured umbilical cord plasma concentrations for neonicotinoids (NEOs) and assessed neurocognitive development in Chinese preschool children. “Prenatal exposure to several NEOs was associated with lower neurocognitive scores.”

Specifically, the study found associations between exposures to dinotefuran and clothianidin and lower Full-Scale Intelligence Quotient, thiacloprid and poorer communication performance, imidacloprid and thiacloprid and reduced gross motor function, and thiamethoxam and reduced fine motor development.

Prenatal Exposure to Neonicotinoid Insecticides and Neurological and Cognitive Development in Preschool Children: Evidence from a Birth Cohort in Guangxi, China. Toxics, May 2026. 

In a cross-sectional study, researchers found that “exposure to neonicotinoid insecticides may be associated with neurobehavioral problems in preschool-aged children.

Among the compounds examined, IMI [imidacloprid], NTHM [N-desmethyl-thiamethoxam], and NACE [N-desmethyl-acetamiprid] emerged as the primary contributors and showed significant positive associations with neurobehavioral problems.”

Association Between Neonicotinoids and Neurobehavioral Development in Preschool Children from South China: A Biomonitoring-Based Study. Toxics, October 2025.

A review of biochemical and behavioral effects of neonicotinoids on the mammalian nervous system found that “exposure to neonicotinoids at an early age alters the correct neuronal development, with decreases in neurogenesis and alterations in migration, and induces neuroinflammation.

In adulthood, neonicotinoids induce neurobehavioral toxicity, these effects being associated with their modulating action on nAChRs, with consequent neurochemical alterations.”

The effects found “can lead to the activation of a series of intracellular signaling pathways that generate oxidative stress, neuroinflammation and, finally, neuronal death.”

Neurotoxic Effects of Neonicotinoids on Mammals: What Is There beyond the Activation of Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptors?—A Systematic Review. International Journal of Molecular Sciences, July 2021.

Researchers conducted the first comprehensive independent assessment of unpublished rodent developmental neurotoxicity studies on five neonicotinoid pesticides that were submitted to the EPA by neonicotinoid manufacturers.

In these studies, groups of female rats were administered three different doses of a neonicotinoid during pregnancy and lactation, and their offspring were subjected to various neurological tests and brain measurements.

The review concludes that “perinatal exposure to neonicotinoids and their metabolites induces adverse, nicotine-like neurotoxic effects in rodent bioassays and that the exposure limits set by EPA for human exposure are either not protective or not supported by available neurotoxicity data.”

Neonicotinoid pesticides: evidence of developmental neurotoxicity from regulatory rodent studies, Frontiers in Toxicology, October 2024.

Reproductive health impacts

A review of the reproductive toxicity of neonicotinoids found that “exposures to various neonicotinoids … have been shown to adversely affect reproductive outcomes in both male and female mammals. Further, exposures to mixtures of neonicotinoids have been associated with negative male and female reproductive outcomes in epidemiological studies.”

The impact of neonicotinoid pesticides on reproductive health. Toxicological Sciences, February 2025. 

Preterm birth, birth defects and smaller birth size

A study of neonicotinoid levels in first urine from newborns, both full-term and preterm, found “a significant increase in the odds of preterm outcomes in the unadjusted model” when comparing newborns with higher imidaclothiz concentrations. “These results suggest that exposure to elevated concentrations of imidaclothiz may be associated with preterm birth.”

Neonicotinoid insecticides and metabolites levels in neonatal first urine from southern China: Exploring links to preterm birth. Journal of Hazardous Materials, May 2024.

In a prospective birth cohort study in China, researchers found that “higher maternal NNIs [neonicotinoid insecticides] concentrations were associated with disrupted levels of fetal endocrine hormones.”

The researchers reported that prenatal neonicotinoid exposure was “negatively associated with neonatal birth size, particularly both individual and mixture of NNIs exposure and reduced head circumference.”

Prenatal exposure to neonicotinoid insecticides, fetal endocrine hormones and birth size: Findings from SMBCS. Environment International, November 2024.

A population-based case-control study in California found that an increased risk of the congenital heart defect tetralogy of Fallot was associated with exposure to imidacloprid.

Residential agricultural pesticide exposures and risk of selected congenital heart defects among offspring in the San Joaquin Valley of California. Environmental Research, November 2014.

A population-based case-control study in California found that an increased risk of anencephaly was associated with gestational exposure to imidacloprid.

Residential Agricultural Pesticide Exposures and Risk of Neural Tube Defects and Orofacial Clefts Among Offspring in the San Joaquin Valley of California. American Journal of Epidemiology, February 2014.

Endocrine disruption

A study of the relationship between urinary neonicotinoids and serum testosterone in a nationally representative sample of the U.S. population showed “that urinary detection and levels of neonicotinoids are associated with significant reductions of serum total testosterone and/or free androgen index in both males and females.”

Exposure to neonicotinoids and serum testosterone in men, women, and children. Environmental Toxicology, February 2022.

This study exposed the breast cancer cell line Hs578t cells to neonicotinoids for 24 hours, finding “in vitro that neonicotinoids may stimulate a change in CYP19 promoter usage similar to that observed in patients with hormone-dependent breast cancer.”

Effects of Neonicotinoid Pesticides on Promoter-Specific Aromatase (CYP19) Expression in Hs578t Breast Cancer Cells and the Role of the VEGF Pathway. Environmental Health Perspectives, April 2018. See also Promotional Consideration: A Potential Mechanistic Link between Neonicotinoid Insecticides and Hormone-Dependent Breast Cancer.

“‘This provides in vitro evidence that neonicotinoids can be endocrine disruptors and that aromatase may be one of their targets,’ says first author Élyse Caron-Beaudoin.” Environmental Health Perspectives, November 2018.

A co-culture model of fetoplacental steroidogenesis “found thiacloprid, thiamethoxam and imidacloprid to induce aromatase activity … . The neonicotinoids increased estrone and estradiol production, while strongly inhibiting estriol production … . This study contributes to growing evidence of the endocrine-disrupting potential of neonicotinoid insecticides.”

The use of a unique co-culture model of fetoplacental steroidogenesis as a screening tool for endocrine disruptors: The effects of neonicotinoids on aromatase activity and hormone production. Toxicology and Applied Pharmacology, October 2017.

Male reproductive toxicity

A review of studies on the reproductive toxicity of neonicotinoids in male rodents “identified 21 toxicologic studies evaluating the impacts of neonic insecticide exposure from January 2010 to August 2025.

Where all studies reported concerning health effects on male reproductive parameters … the collective evidence demonstrates that neonicotinoids consistently impair testicular function, disrupt spermatogenesis, and compromise sperm parameters such as count, motility, viability, and morphology.”

Reproductive risk of Neonicotinoids: A review of male rodent studies. Environmental Research, December 2025.

A study to assess the effects of low-dose imidacloprid on the sperm quality of male rats found that “low-dose IMI [imidacloprid] exposure caused sperm abnormalities through affecting on the spermiogenesis in testis.

Inhibition of CYP3A4 [cytochrome P450 3A4] activity by IMI largely contributed to its sperm toxicity. Thus, IMI exposure at doses close to real-world settings resulted in sperm toxicity on rats, which might be a potential risk factor for human reproductive diseases.”

Spermiogenesis toxicity of imidacloprid in rats, possible role of CYP3A4. Chemosphere, November 2021.

A study to assess the reproductive toxicity of acetamiprid in male rats found that “sperm concentration and plasma testosterone levels decreased in dose dependent manner.

Gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH), follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH), luteinizing hormone (LH) levels increased at low and medium dose groups and acetamiprid caused lipid peroxidation and glutathione (GSH) depletion in the testes.

Histologic examinations revealed that acetamiprid induced apoptosis in medium and high dose groups and proliferation index dramatically decreased in high dose group. In conclusion, acetamiprid caused toxicity on male reproductive system in the high dose. The mechanism of the toxic effect may be associated with oxidative stress, hormonal disruptions and apoptosis.”

Reproductive effects of subchronic exposure to acetamiprid in male rats. Scientific Reports, June 2020.

An oral toxicity study found that exposing developing male rats to imidacloprid “affects the reproductive organ of male rats by decreasing the mass of accessory sex organs, testosterone level, sperm concentration, by increasing the rate of abnormal sperm morphology, by changing the lipid composition of testicular tissue, by fragmenting seminal DNA and by increasing apoptosis of spermatogenic cells.”

Insecticide imidacloprid induces morphological and DNA damage through oxidative toxicity on the reproductive organs of developing male rats. Cell Biochemistry & Function, April 2012.

A study in male rats of the toxicity of imidacloprid and the benefits of curcumin found that “oxidative stress appears to be the mechanism of testicular damage mediated by IM [imidacloprid] which leads to reproductive toxicity. CMN [Circumin] was found to be effective in counteracting oxidative stress and testicular damage induced by IM.”

Evaluation of ameliorative effect of curcumin on imidacloprid-induced male reproductive toxicity in wistar rats. Environmental Toxicology, March 2015.

Female reproductive toxicity

In a study of the impacts of imidacloprid on mice ovaries, the data “suggest that IMI [imidacloprid] is toxic to the female reproductive system in mice,” and “indicate that IMI reaches the ovaries and affects some female reproductive outcomes such as ovarian follicle numbers, LH levels, and ovarian expression of enzymes.”

The researchers concluded, “Given the presence of IMI and IMI metabolites in various human samples, namely breast milk and ovarian follicular fluid, the outcomes of ovarian exposure to IMI and IMI metabolites have public health implications for humans around the world.

The adverse reproductive outcomes characterized in this study add to growing evidence that neonicotinoids may be a contributing factor to the rising incidence of female reproductive disorders over the past 50 years.”

The effects of imidacloprid exposure on the mouse ovary in vivo. Reproductive Toxicology, October 2025. 

Breast cancer

In a study to uncover a potential mechanism for neonicotinoids promoting breast cancer progression, researchers found that “our in vitro, in vivo and in silico studies demonstrated that NIs [neonicotinoid insecticides] could promote breast cancer progression at human related exposure levels.

Which was owing to the activation and up-regulation of GPER [G protein-coupled estrogen receptor]. We found a novel estrogenic disruption molecular mechanism of NIs and revealed NIs’ potential female adverse effects via GPER pathway.”

Neonicotinoid insecticides promote breast cancer progression via G protein-coupled estrogen receptor: In vivo, in vitro and in silico studies. Environment International, December 2022.

Liver cancer

In a study of the concentrations of neonicotinoids and their metabolites both in the general population and in liver cancer patients, “significant positive correlations between NEO [neonicotinoid] exposure and liver cancer were found…which revealed that NEOs concentrations were associated with increased odds of liver cancer prevalence.”

Exposure to neonicotinoid insecticides and their characteristic metabolites: Association with human liver cancer. Environmental Research, May 2022.

Type 1 diabetes

A cross-sectional study found that “High antibiotics and neonicotinoids exposures were found in T1D [type 1 diabetes] children, and they were associated with changes in gut microbiota featured with lower abundance of butyrate-producing genera, which might increase the risk of T1D.”

Association between new onset type 1 diabetes and real-world antibiotics and neonicotinoids’ exposure-related gut microbiota perturbation. World Journal of Pediatrics, July 2022.

Other health impacts

A review of 842 non-occupational human poisoning incidents associated with neonics from 2018-2022 finds four human fatality reports and several cases of major illnesses such as seizures.

“Common reported symptoms classified as moderate often included two or more of the following: headaches; dizziness; lethargy; eye or throat irritation; skin itching and rash; chemical burns and skin peeling; face swelling; muscle weakness or tremors; vomiting; diarrhea; pain and tightness in chest; open sores; and general pain.

These incidents stem mainly from residential uses, such as lawn and garden insect repellents, home pest treatments for bed bugs or roaches, and products used to treat pets for fleas and ticks.”

The researchers concluded that “Given the evidence of neurotoxicity, EPA should use its legal authority to cancel unsafe products and unnecessary uses–including from seed treatments, and residential pet and lawn care products–to prevent further human suffering.”

Human acute poisoning incidents associated with neonicotinoid pesticides in the U.S. Incident Data System (IDS) database from 2018–2022—frequency and severity show public health risks, regulatory failures. Environmental Health, November 2024.

In a study of the impacts of prenatal exposure of imidacloprid in mice, researchers found that “spatial memory and procedural memory were impacted by prenatal IMI [ [imidacloprid] in both males and females” and that “anxiety-like behavior was impacted by prenatal IMI exposure, but only in males.”

They concluded that “This study provides additional evidence that prenatal exposure to IMI at relatively low doses can impact anxiety-like behavior and cognition.”

Prenatal Exposure to Imidacloprid Affects Cognition and Anxiety-Related Behaviors in Male and Female CD-1 Mice. Toxics, October 2025.

Originally published by U.S. Right to Know. This article was originally published by The Defender Childrens Health Defense News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BYNCND 4.0.

Stacy Malkan is co-founder and managing editor at U.S. Right to Know, a nonprofit newsroom and public health research group.

The post Widely used pesticides linked to preterm birth, birth defects, male infertility—and more appeared first on Final Call News.

The video of Shelby Officer Karson Hyder pummeling Cherrie Moore on May 29 has circulated widely on social media.

Hyder, 22, turned himself in to the Cleveland County Detention Center June 1 morning and was released on a $10,000 secured bond. Court records do not list an attorney for him, and a phone number associated with his name was out of service.

Hyder, who was suspended May 29 and fired on May 30, was responding to a breaking-and-entering call when the scuffle ensued.

According to a warrant, Moore, 34, fled the residence on foot and resisted arrest, assaulting Hyder by “grabbing and ripping (his) uniform.”

A separate warrant filed June 1 alleged Hyder “unlawfully and willfully did assault and strike Cherrie Moore” by grabbing Moore “by the arm, pushing her to the ground and striking her in the face with a closed fist, thereby inflicting serious injury possible broken nose and busted lip.”

The State Bureau of Investigation had announced May 30 it had opened an investigation into Hyder.

Moore was initially charged with breaking and entering, resisting arrest and assault on a public officer, but the latter two charges have since been dismissed. She was freed on an unsecured bond. A phone number associated with Moore was disconnected.

Her attorney, Ronald Haynes, told The Associated Press in an email that Moore “is recovering and receiving treatment for her mental health.”

“The heinous actions of former Officer Karson Hyder will forever negatively impact Ms. Cherrie Moore and her family,” Haynes continued. “It’s a small relief that city officials responded so promptly to terminate and charge Mr. Hyder.” (AP)

The post Former North Carolina officer charged in beating caught on doorbell camera video appeared first on Final Call News.

A Sign of the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan,” which was recently released. It is the next book from the “In the Volume of the Book,” series on the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad and the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan.

Brother Sa’ad visited Baltimore on May 31 to speak and present his book. “This book offers for consideration that the scriptural account of David contain numerous signs of the Man Who would serve as the prophetic fulfillment of David, the Prince,

And that the prophetic fulfillment was not a man who lived and walked among the people 2,000 years ago in the City of Bethlehem, but is a Man Who was born on May 11, 1933, in the City of New York.” For more information, visit, inthevolumeofthebook.com

The post Student National Secretary Sa’ad Alim Muhammad debuts new book in Baltimore appeared first on Final Call News.

Records from the House Ethics Committee show that AIEF has sponsored at least 15 congressional delegations involving 78 lawmakers and staff members from Democrats and Republicans.

Participants received all-expenses-paid trips that included stays at luxury hotels, meetings with senior Israeli officials, and briefings focused largely on Israel’s so-called security concerns and regional policy.

The travels took place as Israel expanded its military offensives in Gaza and elsewhere in the region, drawing criticism from human rights organizations, international institutions, and a growing number of political figures in the United States.

According to congressional filings, lawmakers met with senior Israeli politicians, including prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and attended sessions with the regime’s military commanders, military contractors, and settlers advocating for settlement expansion in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Several delegations also visited locations in the occupied West Bank, including settlements that the international community regards as illegal.

During several of the visits, Israeli military attacks were ongoing while aid organizations warned of severe shortages of food, medicine, and essential services for Palestinian civilians.

AIEF-sponsored travel continued into 2026, including in the period immediately preceding the U.S. and Israeli military aggression against Iran.

One AIEF trip, scheduled for February 2026 and concluding less than a week before the initial attacks on Iran, included five Democratic staff members and seven Republicans.

AIEF is not the only organization sponsoring lawmakers’ travel to Israel. The Zionist group J Street has funded trips primarily for Democrats, while organizations such as the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA) and the Atlantic Council have sponsored visits for members of both parties.

AIEF, however, has maintained a steady schedule of congressional trips to occupied Palestine despite growing international criticism of Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

Israel’s genocide in Gaza has killed approximately 72,938 Palestinians and wounded over 172,919, the majority of them women and children.

According to figures released by the Palestinian Health Ministry, 935 Palestinians have been killed and 2,860 injured since the ceasefire took effect on October 10, 2025. (PressTV.ir)

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KSU students, alumni and prospective students filed a federal lawsuit on May 11. An additional group of anonymous KSU students filed a state lawsuit on May 21.

Both lawsuits challenge Kentucky Senate Bill 185, which was signed into law on April 13. The bill places the university in a state of financial emergency for up to five years and restructures the university into a polytechnic institution focused on technical, workforce-oriented applied learning programs.

It also reduces academic program offerings to no more than 10 and allows for faculty terminations. In addition, the state would have increased control and oversight over KSU and would have authority over admission policies.

James Morris, of the Kentucky law firm Morris & Morris, P.S.C., serves as counsel for plaintiffs in both lawsuits. The federal lawsuit focuses on civil rights law and the issue of historic underfunding while the state lawsuit focuses on Kentucky’s constitution. Both ask the courts to halt enforcement of the bill as the lawsuits move forward.

“The state action is alleging a constitutional violation under Kentucky state law,” Atty. Morris said to The Final Call. “Our state constitution requires that in order for a legislature to pass a bill, it has to be read in both House and Senate three times.”

He alleged that SB 185 started as a four-line branch budget recommendation bill that was sent to the Senate floor three times, but on the third read, the committee substituted the previous branch budget text with a seven-page bill related to Kentucky State University.

“They never said ‘wait, guys, we just changed everything.’ They literally said, ‘We want to read for the third time. All right, reading for the third time, Senate Bill 185, an act related to branch budget recommendation.’ Then they said, ‘We’d like to do a committee substitute number one.

All right, committee substitute number one to branch budget recommendation. All in favor?’ They voted. It passed,” Atty. Morris said. “The substitute was the seven-page new text that never got read to anything because they’re using the old title.

Then, after the Senate passed the bill, they said I’d like to move to change the title to an act related to Kentucky State University and declaring an emergency.”

He pointed out several things wrong with the passage of the bill: one, by Kentucky law, “you can’t substitute a different bill and say, ‘oh, we read it three times’”; two, “you can’t have a statute that is related to a single individual or a single entity when a general statute would suffice,” and three, every bill that impacts a person’s retirement must have a financial report attached.

“The entire statute relates to Kentucky State University; not one reference to the other land grant, not one reference to the other universities. There wasn’t something that said if any university has the following problem, then we would declare a financial emergency. It’s literally written solely for the HBCU. Our constitution says that’s illegal under Kentucky law,” Atty. Morris said.

Supporters of the bill, including state lawmakers and some university officials, have presented it as a rescue plan for KSU that will stabilize the school financially.

Located in Frankfort, Ky., KSU is one of 19 HBCUs established as a land-grant institution under the Second Morrill Act of 1890, and it is Kentucky’s only public HBCU. Like most land-grant HBCUs, KSU has been a victim of severe underfunding by the state. 

As early as 1981, Kentucky was found engaging in intentional segregation and discrimination by underfunding KSU, and the state entered agreements with the federal government to fix the issue, according to Atty. Morris. “They didn’t do that,” he said.

In September 2023, then U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona and then U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Thomas Vilsack sent letters to 16 governors highlighting the more than $12 billion disparity in funding between land-grant HBCUs and White land-grant institutions. Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear, a Democrat, received one of those letters.

Land-grant institutions were first established under the Morrill Act of 1862, but the first wave of institutions, including the University of Kentucky, did not allow Black students to enroll.

When states opened a second land-grant institution to serve Black students in 1890, they did so with the requirement to provide an equitable distribution of funds between their 1862 White institutions and 1890 Black institutions, according to the letter. 

KSU, while “producing extraordinary graduates that contribute greatly” to Kentucky’s economy, “has not been able to advance in ways that are on par with [the] University of Kentucky, … in large part due to unbalanced funding,” the former secretaries wrote to Gov. Beshear.

If KSU received funding equal to the University of Kentucky from 1987 to 2020, the school would have had more than $172 million in additional funds. That $172 million could have supported infrastructure and student services and would have better positioned the university to compete for research grants, the former secretaries said.

The former U.S. secretaries also sent letters to the governors of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and West Virginia. Of the 18 states that have land-grant HBCUs, only Delaware and Ohio equitably funded their universities between 1987 and 2020, according to the federal review

In 2022, due to financial issues, the state of Kentucky loaned KSU $23 million with the expectation that the school would repay the loan.

“We’ll loan you $23 million but we want you to pay us back, and if you can’t pay us back, then there are consequences. Well, wait, why is this a loan? Here you are $200 million in the hole, and you couldn’t find a way to give Kentucky State University $23 million?” Atty. Morris questioned.

Despite the bill’s claims that KSU will still retain its status as an HBCU and as a land-grant institution, the lawsuits argue that the bill narrows KSU’s academic and historic missions.

The lawsuits also raise concern that the bill threatens traditional degree programs, gives the state excessive control over the university and could lead to reduced educational opportunities for students, along with faculty layoffs, staffing reductions and enrollment restrictions.

“They’re literally trying to avoid decades and decades of segregation and intentional discrimination by adopting a bill that would allow them to escape the responsibility for their neglect,” Atty. Morris said. Now, with the state’s plan to transform the university, students are leaving and scrambling to find a different school, leaving “nobody left” for the state to fund, he added.

“Right now, from what we understand, there’s less than 200 students now enrolling in the fall. That means that the system’s going to shut down. So, by the legislature doing what they did at the time they did in the spring and forcing it as an emergency bill, they’re basically going to choke out K-State and make it so that it self-implodes,” he said.

KSU enrolled more than 2,800 students in Fall 2025 but has not yet released enrollment statistics for Fall 2026.

The university’s board of regents approved a new academic plan on May 28 with the deadline to submit the plan to the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education by June 1.

Atty. Morris said while the new plan hasn’t been fully explained, the university has shut down its political science program and some of its music programs. Other programs, such as nursing, have been impacted, and still others, such as criminal justice, have not been listed at all.

“The board of regents has selected programs, but we have not gotten the final list. Some of the plaintiffs are directly impacted. Some of them already received letters saying their program is gone,” Atty. Morris said.

The first court date for the state lawsuit was June 1, with a full hearing scheduled for June 10.

Historically, HBCUs provided Black students an opportunity for higher learning at a time when they were locked out of White institutions due to discrimination and segregation. Today, they are still major drivers of economic success for Black people.

Though most HBCUs both public and private are underfunded compared to White institutions, Brookings Institution, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank, published an article on how HBCUs “do more with less.”

HBCUs serve only about 3% of college students in the U.S., but they produce nearly 16% of all Black U.S. graduates and are responsible for 18% of graduates in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics, according to an article by Dr. Michael L. Lomax, president and chief executive officer of the United Negro College Fund,

On “Why HBCUs Still Matter.” In addition, he wrote that HBCUs generate $16.5 billion annually in economic impact and provide more than 136,000 jobs a year nationwide. 

Dr. Denise A. Smith, former deputy director of higher education policy and senior fellow at The Century Foundation, a public policy think tank headquartered in New York City, has done extensive research into educational equity and government funding of HBCUs. She wrote an article in 2021 on funding disparities.

“No longer should we be focused on questions about” the relevance of HBCUs, “but rather we should be highlighting their significant contributions—and making substantial public investment so that HBCUs’ future can be actualized,” she wrote.

“The present moment is an opportunity for this country to atone for decades of discrimination and restore what is rightfully owed to the Black community and Black colleges.”

The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, National Representative of the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad, is a longtime advocate for the success of HBCUs. In a 2014 address to Morgan State University students, he warned that all HBCUs are “under attack,” because of their history of producing great leaders for Black people.

“Brothers and sisters, we have [99] Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) that are just scraping by,” he said in another message titled, “Muhammad’s Economic Blueprint: Ending Poverty & Want,” which served as Part 31 of his 58-week lecture series, “The Time and What Must be Done.”

Minister Farrakhan noted that if Black people followed the economic program of the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad, Eternal Leader of the Nation of Islam, and if 16 million Black wage earners contributed one nickel a day to a national Black treasury, the resulting $291 million from the first year could be used to match the endowment figures for 37 HBCUs.

This would make “these institutions free to determine one, the direction, two, curricula and three, staffs to provide our children with an education which will surpass any on our planet,” he said.

“The HBCUs must become a part of a system where they are functioning for a bigger purpose than just to confer degrees. We want our HBCUs to be ours, and they can never be that unless they are financially independent,” he added. “Do you know our schools [and the curricula] are controlled?

The Enemy does not want you to learn what will make you free from dependency on others! But with money in our pocket, we tell them, ‘No!  This is the curriculum that has to be in here: The Curriculum that will make students that will build not only a nation but a world!’”

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With distrust rising among warring parties and fractures appearing in President Donald Trump’s grip on Republican legislators, the war could explode into all-out battle again, particularly due to Israel’s attacks and expansion into Lebanon. 

Iran has said continued attacks into Lebanon is a red line to peace talks.

Such attacks moved President Trump to launch an expletive-laced scolding of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a June 1 conversation.

“You’re f***ing crazy. You’d be in prison if it weren’t for me,” axios.com reported based on conversations with its sources familiar with the tense conversation. “I’m saving your a**. Everybody hates you now. Everybody hates Israel because of this.”

The goal of Israel’s attacks in Lebanon “is to destroy even the slightest possibility for the ongoing diplomatic processes to lead to improvements in the situation,” Iranian Foreign Minister Esmaeil Baghaei said in a statement,” adding, “We can’t consider the U.S. and the Zionist regime as two separate agents.”

Critics are further concerned that legislation before the U.S. Congress could deepen U.S.-Israel cooperation on weapons technology, research and production.

The United States-Israel Defense Technology Cooperation Initiative appears in Section 224 of the House Armed Services Committee’s version of the fiscal year 2027 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the annual U.S. defense policy bill, Al Jazeera news reported.

Passage would join America and Israel even more than they already are in technology, critics warn, noting Israel’s “iron dome” technology.

Paying $3.8 billion a year in taxpayer dollars for Israel’s defense has become very unpopular, said Phyllis Bennis, director of the Institute for Policy Studies. The funding is based on a memorandum of understanding (MO) and the prospect of negotiating another MO that lasts 10-20 years “was not looking very hopeful,” she said.

So, some members of Congress decided to include it in the NDAA, she said.

“They won’t get direct military aide. Instead, they would get a partnership of production of weapons that would make the U.S. even more complicit in Israeli war crimes,” Ms. Bennis said.

President Trump, by many accounts, was persuaded to attack Iran by Prime Minister Natanyahu, who advised that Iran would surrender within days of a U.S.-Israel joint attack. Ms. Bennis disagrees.

Trump was a war-making president already, she said, adding, now, there are significant differences between the two leaders.

“Netanyahu’s goal from the beginning is to maintain a war against Iran until he can claim that the Iranian regime has been completely defeated. … Without that, he is nothing. Now that puts him in direct contradiction with Trump, who just wants to get out from under this war. He’s bored with it, as he says himself,” Ms.  Bennis explained.

The ultimate pressure point to bring Prime Minister Netanyahu in line may be to threaten to stop arming Israel, she concluded.

Pressure from criminal charges Mr. Netanyahu faces once he’s no longer prime minister and criticism from Israel’s far-right national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir may give the prime minister fuel to persist in war.

“You said that a strong prime minister tells the President of the United States ‘yes’ when possible, and ‘no’ when necessary. Now is the time to say to our friend, President Trump, ‘no,’” Mr. Gvir wrote on his Telegram channel, according to newarab.com, a London-based English language news site.

The Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad, Eternal Leader of the Nation of Islam, spoke of America’s current predicament in chapter 69 of His phenomenal book “Fall of America.”

“With nations rejecting peace offers and nations laughing and making mock of you forever seeking peace and friendship—as it is written, ‘Peace is desired more than fine gold!’ …

“We did not know that we would see such a Goliath—such a giant—falling. Goliath! who has defied the nations of the earth to come out and fight with them, as Goliath did before Israel. Now, nations make mock of the great giant of the earth, America.”

The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, National Representative of the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad, during Saviours’ Day 2024, warned President Trump of being pulled into a war due to Mr. Netanyahu’s blood thirst.

Speaking of the genocide on Palestinians, Minister Farrakhan explained that in the night hours, the Honorable Elijah Muhammad had shown him in a vision the wicked King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon.

“And that man, Nebuchadnezzar: Allah turned him from a human to a beast,” Minister Farrakhan said. “And when I looked at what was happening to our Palestinian brothers and sisters, I saw why Allah showed me Nebuchadnezzar; because Netanyahu was becoming a beast in human form, with no feeling at all for the Palestinian people and for what they were causing the Palestinian people to suffer.”

The long game

Analysts speculate that the U.S. and Iran are playing a long game of who can hold out, as President Trump is banking on Iran’s economy to totally collapse and Tehran gambles that global economies will put pressure on Mr. Trump.

Politico recently reported that executives have warned the White House that U.S. oil reserves are “hitting rock bottom” due to Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz, the Islamic nation’s strongest strategy and position in the war. Trump officials denied any conversation.

Meanwhile, the UN World Food Program (WFP) announced millions of people are being pushed further into hunger, even as President Trump did a June 5 midterm election campaign visit to Wisconsin to tout his agenda for farmers.

“The situation is being compounded by a lack of funding for humanitarian operations. … If the crisis continues for another six months, an additional 9 million people could lose access to aid,” WFP announced.

Oil and fertilizer are impacted by closure of the Strait.

With deaths rising above 3,500, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry since early March, Jordan Esparza-Kelley, a communications spokesperson for CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations), told The Final Call that Israel’s goal is to achieve their “greater Israel project,” which includes taking  Palestine and land from Lebanon, Syria and Iraq.

“For over 30 years Netanyahu has aimed for this to happen and finally there was a U.S. President gullible enough to do it. The concern is always when attention drifts from Gaza that the genocide committed by Israel intensifies,” he said regarding lack of media attention to the continued bombing, killing and land grabs in Gaza and the West Bank.

He said CAIR, the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy group, is focusing on domestic issues like the NDAA weapons legislation.

“Parallel to these global issues is the use of inflammatory anti-Muslim rhetoric by local, state, and federal elected officials, which stoke the flames for terror attacks” on Muslims, he said.

Anti-Muslim rhetoric is used as a vehicle to bolster defense budgets and create a state of paranoia in the U.S. by manufacturing an enemy abroad and at home, he concluded.

Four Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives joined Democrats June 3 to pass a War Powers resolution that calls on President Trump to either pull out of the war or get approval from Congress to continue. The resolution is mostly symbolic as it can be vetoed by the president, which then Congress would have to override.

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NEW YORK—“The fact that my mother did not die in chains in a space unworthy of her humanity, not cowering, or dispirited, or uncommitted, or acquiescent, is a testament to the fortitude of the human spirit and this is indeed triumphant,” Kakuya Shakur said of her mom, Assata Olugbala Shakur, who died with her freedom and legacy intact.

The Queens, New York-born, Cuban-exiled  Black Panther Party activist had been living in Cuba since her escape from New Jersey’s Clinton Correctional Facility in 1979.

The Black liberation fighter was celebrated with hundreds in attendance at a memorial at Riverside Church, on Saturday, May 30, in New York, called, “Carry It On—A Celebration of the Life and Legacy of Assata Shakur.” 

The tributes were powerful and heartfelt. None more so than the loving presentation by Kakuya Shakur, who grew up mainly in Cuba with her mother.  “I want to thank you mommy for being my mother, for loving me in a tradition rooted in liberation,” she shared with those gathered in attendance for the tribute and memorial.

“For teaching me to question the status quo of human cruelty … to question who we are if we never realize that we have nothing to lose but the weighty degradation of our chains,” Kakuya Shakur added.

Assata Shakur passed away on September 25, 2025,  in Havana, Cuba.  She was 78.

Fresh fruits, mood lights and long-stemmed sunflowers surrounded Assata’s multi-layered art work at the front of the main hall, packed by hundreds of people from the grassroot political panorama of the New York area.

There was the “Free the land!” and “Free ‘em all,” call and response, and reminding the crowd that it is there that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his historic speech, “Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence.” Dr. Adriene Thorne opened the program. Activists Dara Cooper and Monifa Bandele emceed the event.

National Assistant to the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, Student Minister Ishmael R. Muhammad also attended the program. In comments to The Final Call from Mosque No. 7 in New York, about the gathering he said, “It was a most beautiful, dignified service to honor our sister who was charged with a crime that she is innocent of. 

And not only was she lifted and honored so beautifully by those who spoke, but I enjoy hearing us thank the Cuban government and the Cuban people, and Comandante Fidel Castro and his brother Raul Castro.”  He added, “They (Cuba) made good on their promise to care for her and to keep her safe.  So, that was beautiful that everybody gave thanks to the Cuban people.”

Asked about the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan’s position, Student Minister Ishmael Muhammad replied that the Minister also felt “extreme gratitude and thanks for her (Assata Shakur’s) sacrifice and what she contributed to the cause of freedom and justice.”

“They arranged to meet every time the Minister went to Cuba—maybe with the exception of one time for security reasons, he saw our sister,” Student Minister Ishmael Muhammad added.

On May 2, 1973, state troopers stopped Black Panther Party member Assata Shakur and two other members on the New Jersey Turnpike. There was a shootout, and Black Liberation Army (BLA) member Zayd Malik Shakur was killed, along with a state trooper.

Despite sustaining two gunshot wounds, Assata Shakur was charged with the murder of the slain state trooper.  She was convicted of the 1973 first-degree murder of New Jersey State Trooper Werner Foerster.  Her supporters have always campaigned that she was unfairly charged and was innocent.

On Nov. 2, 1979, Shakur escaped from New Jersey’s Clinton Correctional Facility and remained in Cuba until her passing last year.  In 2005, classified erroneously as a “domestic terrorist” by the FBI, the government put a $1 million reward for her capture.  Placing her on the Most Wanted Terrorist List, the feds raised the reward to $2 million in 2013. 

Assata Shakur was the godmother to hip hop legend Tupac Shakur, and on his birthday June 16, 2017, President Donald Trump during his first term in office in his Cuba policy speech, made his extradition demand. President Fidel Castro, and next his brother Raul, refused to give her up.

Riverside is the church where Fidel Castro delivered an historic four-hour speech on September 8, 2000, to an audience of an estimated 4,000 people.

Political and cultural commentator Marc Lamont Hill also presented alongside political activist Angela Davis at the event. 

Ms. Davis reminded folk that Assata Shakur did indeed call herself, “A reluctant warrior, a reluctant struggler,” adding that, “She embraced that role, she said, as the only viable response to the prevailing conditions of oppression.”

Ms. Davis added that Assata Shakur could have been an artist, a gardener, or a sculptor, but the freedom fighter was the “paragon of revolutionary commitment.”

She said that people should, “Make a collective commitment to ‘Carry it on,’” when it comes to what Assata Shakur fought for.

Saying that, “Freedom is always a collective project,” quoting Assata herself, Dr. Hill said, “We must resist our oppressors … we must organize.” He suggested that everyone should embrace the autobiographical author, poet, and organizer and see the “beautiful complexity of Assata’s work,” which ultimately illustrates the “power and the possibility of collective struggle.”

“After more than 50 years of isolation,” Kakuya Shakur said gently, “after 50 years of quietly counteracting the mainstream narrative amongst ourselves, this is a liberating moment that allows my family to affirm the truth of who my mother was.” 

She added, “I want to give thanks to all of the people who kept my mother free, a modern-day underground railroad of people that cherished her, and ensured her safety.”

Kakuya Shakur revealed, “My mother is my most influential shero. My mother understood that she was born into resistance … she willingly accepted the inevitability of struggle … and the commitment of winning this struggle … for Black and all subjugated people.”

Assata Shakur’s longtime lawyer Lennox Hinds, Professor Rosemari Mealy, Lisa Brock, and Tracey A. Matthews, were also among the speakers.

Remote tributes came as a call from the still-incarcerated political prisoner Black Panther journalist Mumia Abu Jamal, and a video sent by Indigenous activist Leonard Peltier. 

Monifa Bandele greeted the Panther Cubs, BLA cubs, Republic of New Afrika cubs, MOVE members stating, “We see you and we salute you.”

The names of elder political activists and currently and formerly incarcerated “political prisoners” like Sekou Odinga, Mutulu Shakur, Sundiata Acoli, Kamau Sadiki were called.

Beloved by hip hop artists in Havana and in the U.S., with Tupac as her godson, Assata Shakur understood the artistry, and Angela Davis shouted out rappers like Common, Killer Mike, and Rapsody.

There were several cultural offerings throughout the evening tribute, including, Sweet Honey in the Rock, Asase Yaa African Dance Theater, Oma Yesa, Mumu Fresh, Sharp Radway, and Common.

Kakuya Shakur said of her mother, “She loved being a woman revolutionary steeped in the strength that gave me life barreling through the stony walls of a United States prison … she loved being my mom. So, mommy on this day, I hope that you are coiled in the rapture of love … and are sun swept and dripping in the fold of loving arms.” 

Monifa Bandele said, “Assata lives y’all, no movement can survive unless it’s constantly growing and changing with the times. … That’s why political work and organizing is so important.” Nayaba Arinde is a freelance Editor-at-Large and award-winning reporter and activist. Follow her on Instagram @NayabaArinde1

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The role of the F.O.I. is to be little “saviours,” explained Minister Farrakhan during a historical message called, “The Meaning of F.O.I.”

The Final Call newspaper and the books of the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad are tools in this effort, he explained. “In the F.O.I., we must teach every brother how to handle himself as a soldier and how to handle the word of God as an instrument by which the people can be saved,” said Minister Farrakhan.

We thank the F.O.I. for being helpers and for their commitment to this mighty and important mission.

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