Justice & The Next 250: Building Collective Power to Advance Justice

By Mark Rice (Leading with Conviction™ 2017 / Leading with Conviction+™ 2026)

I first started learning about the groundbreaking work that JustLeadershipUSA was doing when I met JLUSA’s founder Glenn Martin at a “Ban the Box” rally at the White House in 2015. We were joined by hundreds of formerly incarcerated leaders from across the country to call on former President Barack Obama to ban the box on job applications for federal jobs. After the rally at the White House, a smaller group of leaders met with Roy Austin, who was serving as the Deputy Assistant to President Obama for the Office of Urban Affairs, Justice, and Opportunity at the time.

Shortly after these actions, President Obama issued an executive order to ban the box for federal jobs. This was a pivotal moment in my development as an organizer and campaign strategist. I saw that when formerly incarcerated people all across the nation come together to build collective power, we have the potential to move the President of the United States to take action. Many people who participated in this national campaign went on to build powerful campaigns led by directly impacted people that shifted the ground at the state and local levels.

Investing in the leadership of directly impacted people will be a key component in advancing true liberation and true economic justice in the future.

In 2017, I participated in JLUSA’s Leading with Conviction™ program. During this training, I had the opportunity to learn from some of the strategists and organizers who built the #CLOSErikers Campaign. The architects of this campaign invested heavily in the development of systems-impacted leaders and developed a very strategic inside and outside strategy that prompted former New York Mayor Bill de Blasio—less than a year after the launch of the campaign—to commit to closing Rikers.

The #CLOSErikers Campaign inspired directly impacted people across the U.S. to launch similar campaigns. I had the opportunity to contribute significantly to building a national movement while I served as the lead national organizer of JLUSA. During this time period, campaigns that we invested in produced historic results. The results included closing a jail in Philadelphia, producing the largest amount of decarceration in any adult prison in Wisconsin in over 30 years, and halting the construction of jails and prisons in Los Angeles and Wisconsin. I learned that when we center the voices and the strategies of impacted people and invest in them, we can achieve results that were previously thought to be impossible.

Today, much of my work focuses on building the power of organizations and campaigns led by systems-impacted people in Wisconsin. Wisconsin has been one of the most hostile environments to do this work in over the last 15 years, but even here we have begun to turn a corner in recent months. Wisconsin policymakers recently enacted a bill to expand health care for incarcerated people, and Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers restored the commutations process in the state after a 25-year pause.

These are important steps forward, but much work remains to be done. Wisconsin is still ground zero in this fight. Wisconsin incarcerates Black people and Indigenous people at a higher rate than any other state by some measures. This is not acceptable.

Wisconsin is still ground zero in this fight.

We are currently fighting to turn things around in the state by advancing a Justice Reinvestment Campaign. This campaign has four main demands:

• no new prisons;
• cut the state’s prison population in half by advancing common sense decarceration policies, such as
• expanding community-based alternatives to incarceration,
• commuting unreasonable and excessive sentences,
• overhauling the state’s sentencing policies,
• expanding opportunities for early release, and
• ending the practice of incarcerating people for convictionless revocations;
• close at least three prisons; and
• redirect resources to build communities.

We are calling for the resources saved to be invested in programs to help currently incarcerated people flourish. In addition, we are calling for resources saved to be invested in the communities that have been the most harmed by incarceration. Investing resources in good jobs; safe, stable, and affordable housing; treatment programs; health care; child care; violence prevention programs; and public education will contribute to building the type of safer, stronger, and healthier communities that we all want to live in.

In 2023, I decided to become a founding member of the JustUS Coordinating Council (JCC), because I realize how important it is for this work to be led by directly impacted people. The JCC is now a powerful national collective of systems-impacted leaders who are enhancing the quality of life of impacted individuals and their communities by dismantling policies that uphold systemic oppression.

I have built many campaigns at the local, state, and federal levels. The campaigns that consistently produced the best results centered the voices and the strategies of impacted people. Investing in the leadership of directly impacted people will be a key component in advancing true liberation and true economic justice in the future. The JCC and directly impacted-led organizations across the nation will play a crucial role in advancing this work.

As we continue to build power in the coming years, it will be imperative for impacted leaders, advocates, organizers, strategists, civil rights leaders, and clergy to unite and demand a fundamental transformation of how resources are allocated in the United States. This nation will never be able to build healthier and stronger communities by putting more police officers on the streets, by building more prisons, and by incarcerating more people. This punitive approach has torn families apart, created instability in communities, and drained resources that could have instead been used on common-sense solutions.

It is time for a bold new approach that addresses the root causes of problems such as homelessness, hunger, untreated health issues, poverty, unemployment, and educational inequity. The JustUS Coordinating Council has created several reports that lay out a blueprint for how we can make this happen in the future. Visit the JCC website at JustUSCC.org today to learn more and sign on to our demands to stand in solidarity with us.

Mark Rice currently serves as the Transformational Justice Campaign Coordinator at WISDOM Wisconsin. Much of his work over the last 13 years has focused on the building the power of organizations and campaigns led by systems-impacted people. Mark is a JLUSA Leading with Conviction™ 2017 alum and a JLUSA Leading with Conviction+™ 2026 alum.

Published in partnership with the Justice & The Next 250 campaign