Decarceration During COVID-19: A Messaging Toolkit for Campaigns for Mass Release

Incarcerated people in the United States’ jails, prisons, and immigration detention centers are at an unacceptable risk of serious illness or death from COVID-19. This document provides some guidance and tools for families, organizers, and advocates who are demanding their decarceration and health equity while pushing back against the false narratives that invoke public health in order to uphold mass criminalization and incarceration during COVID-19. Included is a set of core organizing principles to support calls for both mass release public health and a set of answers to common questions and push-back organizers may be facing in their local campaigns.