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As Hampton rises to power in Chicago and continues to disrupt the racial status quo, he becomes even more of a target for the FBI. In the summer of 1969, Sheens Hoover delivers another lecture to a packed auditorium, instructing his agents to get Hamptons Black ass off the street. Later, Hoover tells Plemonss Mitchell that your GI [ghetto informant, referring to ONeal,] is our best chance at neutralizing Hampton. Under increasing pressure from Mitchell, who threatens to expose him to the Panthers, ONeal eventually provides the FBI with the floorplan of Hamptons apartmentcrucial intelligence that made possible the chairmans brutal assassination.

The Black Lives Matter movement rose to national prominence during the protests in Ferguson, Missouri, after the August 2014 killing of the Black teenager Michael Brown by a white police officer. Similar to its response to the BPP, the FBI almost immediately began monitoring activists associated with the BLM movement and used Black informants to gather information on their activities. On August 3, 2017, the FBIs counterterrorism division released a report declaring that Black Identity Extremists were a new threat to national security. Even thoughas numerous lawmakers, civil-rights advocates, law-enforcement executives, and scholars have pointed outBlack identity extremism doesnt exist, the FBI used the BIE concept to instruct agents on how to police young Black activists. (The agency has since discontinued use of the term.)

Less than a week after the 2017 report was released, a new violent social movement emerged. Beginning on August 11, militia groups and neo-Nazis marched through the streets of Charlottesville, Virginia. One white supremacist at the rally rammed his car into a group of counterprotesters, injuring 19 people and killing a 32-year-old white woman named Heather Heyer. At a press conference in the aftermath of Heyers killing, former President Donald Trump declared that there were very fine people, on both sides. White-nationalist, militia, and extremist movements have grown substantially in the United States over the past two decades, but have not experienced the same relentless pursuit by the FBI as groups designated Black and radical.

Read: The inaction of Capitol police was by design

Like the false equivalencies that FBI agents in Judas draw between the Black Panthers and the KKK, the government responses to Black activists in contrast to white supremacists today are lopsided and misguided. When Black groups agitate for better living conditions and an end to systemic racism and police brutality, they are quickly labeled a threat to national security. Whether violent or nonviolent, many Black movements are criminalized, and law enforcement tends to become consumed with eliminating groups challenging white supremacy. The white supremacists, however, have managed to avoid the same level of surveillance, infiltration, and deadly outcomes. The states refusal to take serious action against the very real threat of white extremism helped culminate in the storming of the Capitol on January 6.

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The Unsettling Message of 'Judas and the Black Messiah' - The Atlantic

BLM influencersProvided

Celebrities and scholars, best-selling authors and everyday people are using their social media presence to lead the conversation on racial justice. Here are just a few of them spreading the word on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok and other platforms.

TikTok culture changer

With more than 562,000 followers and nearly 40 million likes, Erynn Chambers has become one of the most popular creators raising awareness of the Black experience and anti-Black racism on TikTok.Provided

In June, Erynn Chamberswatched a TikTok video from drag queen Online Kyne, talking about how statistics are manipulated to make it appear that Black Americans are more violent.

So the 28-year-old elementary school music teacher from North Carolina opened up TikTok and addedher own commentary, in song form.

Black neighborhoods are overpoliced, so of course they have higher rates of crime. And white perpetrators are undercharged, so of course they have lower rates of crime, she sang. And all those stupid stats that you keep using are operating offa small sample size. So shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up.

The video, labeled About yalls favorite statistics, blew up overnight. It was reposted again and again and has 2 million views.

It wasnt her only hit. Why is Rosa Parks the only black activist we learn about? also brought her attention as she examined how Parks came to be the face of the 1955-56 Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott.

With more than 600,000 followers and 48million likes, Chambers has become one of the most important creators raising awareness of the Black experience and racism on TikTok, which has been criticized for promoting white voices over Black voices.

Chambers says shed been on TikTok for five years but spent more time watching videos than making them until the pandemic. The death of George Floyd got her to do more research into racial equity.

I never really set out for it to be this big thing, Chambers told USA TODAY. I certainly didnt expect to have a half million followers at any point in time.

Anti-racism teacher

Anti-racism activist Rachel CargleRachel Cargle

In 2017 at the Womens March in Washington, Rachel Cargle posed holdingprotest signs with friend and activist Dana Suchow in front of the U.S. Capitol. Cargles read: If You Dont Fight for All Women You Fight for No Women.

The photo went viral and so did Cargle.

An anti-racism activist and author of the upcoming book on feminism through the lens of race, I Dont Want Your Love and Light with The Dial, Cargle works outside academia as a public academic." Shetours the nation to give sold-outlectures. "The Start," for example, is a three-hour workshop on how to be an anti-racist.

"I teach from a platform from a frame of knowledge plus empathy plus action," Cargle told Cleveland 19'sSia Nyorkor."You have to have each of these things to be actively anti-racist."

Cargle also educates her followers, many of them white, on structural racism from a virtual public classroom on Instagram. Coursework includes understanding the intersecting inequalities of race, gender, class and other identities. In heronline learning collective, The Great Unlearn, supported through Patreon, students learn about race and history from historians and academicsof color.

"It's not enough to say, 'Oh, I know it's happening and I hope it gets better,'"Cargle told InStyle. "It's saying, 'I see you and I feel you and I understand, and I'm going to hold myself accountable.' That is what will move someone into action to say, 'I can no longer be complacent. I can no longer be silent. It's not enough to be not racist. I have to be actively anti-racist.'"

In her hometown of Akron, Ohio, Cargle is making a difference in the physical world witha pop-up,Elizabeths Bookshop & Writing Centre, to amplify literature"that has been written away from the pen of the white, cis, hetero man and gives us a new way to understand the world. And she's founderof the Loveland Foundation which offers free therapy to Black women and girls.

A voice ofsocial justice

John Legend plays the piano during a drive-in get out the vote rally in Philadelphia on Nov. 2.MICHAEL PEREZ, AP

Following the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and others at the hands of law enforcement, singer-songwriter and longtime social activist John Legend lent his soulful voice to the anti-racist struggle, offering a Twitter primer on the defund the police movement and campaigning for Florida voting rights with Camila Cabello.

And Legends Oscar-winning civil rights anthem Glory from the 2014 film Selma became part of the 2020 soundtrack when he performed it with Common in August at the virtual Democratic National Convention. For the inauguration of President Joe Biden, he gave his rendition of the Nina Simone classic"Feeling Good"in front of the Lincoln Memorial.

These killings made clear to the general public what Black folks already knew: Racism is real, it is ugly, and it is woven into the systems that govern our everyday lives, Legend said at the virtual FN Achievement Awards the Shoe Oscars in December.

With his organization #FreeAmerica, Legend is working to reform the criminal justice system and end mass incarceration.

As a teenager growing up in Ohio, I watched my mother deal with depression and drug abuse after my maternal grandmother a person who filled our whole family with lovepassed away, Legend told PEOPLE in 2016. My mothers addiction didnt just tear her life apart. It tore me and the rest of our family apart, too.

By amplifying the voices of those affected by the criminal justice system and those working to change it, #FreeAmerica is working to build thriving, just, and equitable communities, Legend says.

Artists have a rich tradition of activism. We have a unique opportunity to reach people where they are, beyond political divisions, borders, and silos, Legend said in a video recently after being recognized by the United Nations human rights agency for his social justice advocacy work. Its been my privilege to use my voice and my platform to advance the cause of equity and justice.

Actress, singer, trans lives activist

Peppermint emerged in 2020 as one of the most important voices in the Black Trans Lives Matter movement.

Tapping her following on social media, she brought greater awareness to violence against Black trans women and the broader Black trans community and to the relentless toll of racism, homophobia, misogyny and transphobia.

I think were on the precipice of some really great change, Peppermint told Entertainment Tonight. Were able to speak about race and misogyny and sexuality in a mainstream way that weve not been able to do in years past without being shunned or canceled.

Peppermint attending the 2019 MTV Video Music Awards in Newark, New Jersey.JEFF KRAVITZ, FILMMAGIC

The first trans woman to originate a leading role on Broadway in Head Over Heels, Peppermint rose to fame on RuPauls Drag Race, followed by performances on Pose, God Friended Me and Deputy.

She recently joined the national board of directors of advocacy group GLAAD and was nominated as outstanding music artist for"A Girl Like Me: Letters to My Lovers" inthe GLAAD Media Awards, which honors LGBTQ representation in media.

Im so thankful that the Black Lives Matter movement began after the murder of Trayvon Martin and continued with George Floyd, but what were not seeing is the same sort of energy when it comes to the women who have been killed: Breonna Taylor, Sandra Bland and many others, Peppermint told the Guardian.

Author, activist, internet yeller

Writer Ijeoma Oluo attends the 2018 The Root 100 gala at Pier Sixty at Chelsea Piers on November 8, 2018, in New York City.JIM SPELLMAN, GETTY IMAGES

Ijeoma Oluo, who for years has been writing and speaking on race, saw interest in her work soar after Floyds death.Her 2018 book, So You Want to Talk about Race, catapulted her onto must-read lists.

The latest from this Seattle-based author, activist and self-described Internet yeller is a sign ofthe nations growing racial consciousness. "Mediocre: The Dangerous Legacy of White Male America" is about white male supremacy, which Oluocalls one of the most evil and insidious social constructs in Western history, from the violent takeover of indigenous lands and the genocide of native people to generations of trauma and loss from anti-Black racism.

The book title refers to the plea by writer Sarah Hagi in 2015: "Lord, give me the confidence of a mediocre white man.

This book illustrates clearly how this country must sustain the exploitation and oppression of Black people in order to protect white male power and white male mediocrity, Oluo told NBC News.

I want everyone who reads this book to see that we aren't just talking about a few bad dudes, we are talking about deliberately constructed identities and systems of power, she said. I want everyone to see what this costs us and to investigate how we each support these harmful norms and systems.

Writer, editor, cultural critic

Roxane Gay speaks onstage during the Hammer Museum's 17th Annual Gala In The Garden on October 12, 2019 in Los Angeles, California.PRESLEY ANN, GETTY IMAGES FOR HAMMER MUSEUM

Im a writer, editor, cultural critic, and sometimes podcaster, Roxane Gaytells USA TODAY.

And then some. Her trenchant insights on feminism, gender, race, sexuality and sexual violence have won her a large and loyal social media audience.

This year she launched a Substack newsletter, The Audacity, as well as The Audacious Book Club. Among the book clubs first picks from underrepresented American writers: Black Futures, edited by Jenna Wortham and Kimberly Drew; Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters; and The Removed by Brandon Hobson.

What makes her so popular is not just her searing memoir Hunger, or her best-selling nonfiction collection of essays, Bad Feminist, or her podcast, Hear to Slay. Or even that she was the first Black woman to write for Marvel Comicswith the Black Panther spinoff comic series World of Wakanda.

Shes an irresistible social media personality who also thinks and writes about fun things, as she puts it. Lighter fare includes her pop-culture likes and dislikes and adorable photos of her puppy in tiny clothing.

Then theres her inimitably good-natured shredding of critics. When one person tweeted at her Who cares what you think? she replied sweetly, You seem to care, dear heart.

Racial and economic justice activist

In June 2015, Bree Newsome Bass climbed a flagpole to remove the Confederate battle flag at a Confederate monument in front of the Statehouse in Columbia, S.C.BRUCE SMITH, AP

In June 2015, long before today's protests toppled monuments to Confederates, Bree Newsome Bassscaled a30-foot pole on the grounds of theSouth Carolina State House and removed the Confederate flag.

This nonviolent act of protest followed the massacreat Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, North Carolina. Eight Black parishioners and their pastor were killed by a white supremacist who posed with the Confederate flag.

When police ordered her down, she replied: "You come against me with hatred and oppression and violence. I come against you in the name of God."

In the following weeks, South Carolina removed the flag from the statehouse grounds andsome Southern states began taking down other symbols of racial oppression and terror.

Today Newsome Bass is a major figure in the struggle for racial and economic justice as an activist who organizes for housing rights. And her Twitter account is a one-woman racial injustice megaphone.

Everybody who didn't know is seeing America as it truly is right now. Can't provide resources for the pandemic but has all the resources at the ready to murder civilians in the street and teargas anyone who objects, she tweeted in May.

Anti-police brutality activist, writer, educator

Brittany Packnett Cunningham speaks onstage as Audible presents: "In Love and Struggle" at Audible's Minetta Lane Theater on February 29, 2020 in New York City.CRAIG BARRITT, GETTY IMAGES FOR AUDIBLE

In March 2015, President Barack Obama told Brittany Packnett Cunningham in a handwritten note that her voice would make a difference for years to come.

The elementary school teacher became a Ferguson Uprising activist and a member of Obamas policing task force after a white police officer killed 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, outside her hometown of St. Louis, in 2014.

Packnett Cunningham went on to co-found the anti-police-brutality platform Campaign Zero and the feminist media platform The Meteor and co-hosted the Pod Save The People podcast.

Whats your biggest flex of 2020? she recently asked her followers.

She had many of her own. Shes a cable news contributor, host of a new podcast, Undistracted, and a 2020 Fellow at Harvards Institute of Politics. Shes also writing a book and was on the cover of Vogue.

We want to build a group of people who are relentlessly undistracted who are focused on matters of intersectional justice, who are focused on leveraging all of their power toward that end, and who are committed to doing the work necessary, even when its difficult, Packnett Cunninghamtold W Magazine about her podcast.

Scholar, racist systems dismantler

Ibram X. Kendi visits Build to discuss the book Stamped: Racism, Antiracism and You at Build Studio on March 10, 2020 in New York City.MICHAEL LOCCISANO, GETTY IMAGES

Less than a week after the 2016 election, Ibram X.Kendi,a 34-year-old assistant professor at the University of Florida, became the youngest author to win the National Book Award in nonfiction for Stamped From the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America.

Fast forward and today hes talked antiracism with Oprah Winfrey on her Apple TV+ show The Oprah Conversation and is considered one of the foremost anti-racism scholars.

The author of three New York Times bestsellers including 2019s How to be an Antiracist is not just writing about racism. As a Boston University humanities professor and founding director of that universitys Center for Antiracist Research, hes developing programs to dismantle it.

Coming out in February is Four Hundred Souls: A Community History of African America, 1619-2019, which he co-edited with historian Keisha Blain.

The heartbeat of racism itself has always been denial, and the sound of that heartbeat has always been Im not racist, Kendi, a contributing writer at The Atlantic and a CBS News racial justice contributor, said in a recent TED interview. What I am trying to do with my work is to really get Americans to eliminate the concept of not racist from their vocabulary and realize, were either being racist or antiracist.

Best-selling author andProject Runway judge

Elaine Welteroth speaking at the Ms. Foundation 30th Annual Gloria Awards in 2018.MONICA SCHIPPER

George Floyd died 15 days after Elaine Welteroths wedding. She married musician Jonathan Singletary on their Brooklyn stoop, then threw a virtual block party.

It felt like one week we were dancing in the streets with our neighbors, many of whom are Black families that have been on our block for decades, and the next we were in the streets protesting, the bestselling author, Project Runway producer and judge andhost of "The Talk" on CBSsaid in People magazine.

When the first protest broke out in Brooklyn I remember saying immediately, I have to be out there. There wasn't even a question, said Welteroth, author of More Than Enough: Claiming Space for Who You Are No Matter What They Say. I needed to channel my outrage and my anger and my sadness with a community of people who were in mourning and ready to fight.

A former editor-in-chief of Teen Vogue, the youngest ever appointed at a Cond Nast publication in 2017, Welterothused her fashion industry influence to create "The 15 Percent Pledge." It calls on major retailers to devote a minimum of 15% of their shelf space to Black-owned businesses and to increase representation in their workforces.

"Right now, we are at an inflection point in this country, shewrote on Instagram. What you say and do in this moment will be remembered as a reflection of the value you place on human life. Let the energy and focus of your fight be directed at a system that has enabled terrorism against Black people on our soil for generations. Times Up. This is a war for human life. Which side are you on?"

Published11:37 am UTC Feb. 2, 2021Updated7:23 pm UTC Feb. 2, 2021

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BLM influencers: 10 Black Lives Matter activists on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and Twitter you should follow - USA TODAY

INDIANAPOLIS Following a summer of Black Lives Matter protests, Republicans at the Statehouse introduced a slew of bills aimed at relieving the strife and civil unrest of business owners and law enforcement.

We had businesses that were destroyed in downtown Indianapolis and those owners really were helpless, Sen. Michael Young, who chairs the Corrections and Criminal Law committee, said Tuesday.

The committee discussed and heard testimony for Senate Bills 187, 198 and 199 that seek to create a policy statement on historic monuments, enhance rioting penalties and expanded self-defense protections, respectively. Bills 198 and 199, both authored by Young, R-Indianapolis, were held back for further amendments but had testimony.

Senate Bill 187, by Sen. Eric Koch, R-Bedford, passed unanimously with no opposition.

Guy Relford, founder of the gun rights group 2A Project, spoke on SB 199, which expands the definition of reasonable force in relation to self-defense. Under the bill, business owners can defend their properties from threats of violence with reasonable force which includes pointing a loaded or unloaded firearm.

Under Indiana code its a crime to point a firearm at someone unless youre justified in using reasonable force, Relford, an attorney, said. The problem what (is) when one is defending their property, theyre not only talking about their home. Were talking about property other than their home (which) could be a business.

Relford said that current law would make protecting your business with a loaded firearm a felony or a misdemeanor if using an unloaded firearm.

Michael Moore, the assistant executive director of the Indiana Public Defender Council, worried the bill would encourage citizens to act as law enforcement officers.

Young said the above issue would be examined and possibly addressed by amendment next week.

Youngs other bill, SB 198, had over an hour of testimony and opposition from both public defenders and prosecutors. He said he crafted the bill to protect the rights of peaceful protesters but wanted to send a message to those who destroyed property.

But other committee members worried about how the lengthy bill would impact Hoosiers without foreknowledge of any crimes.

The unlawful assembly definition as we discussed here is kind of confusing and its very broad, Sen. Karen Tallian, D-Portage, said. You may have a group that comes to peacefully demonstrate something and all of the sudden somebody in that group spontaneously committed some(thing) that turned into a melee. Now all of the other people who come to this demonstration can be charged.

Taillian noted that, under this law, everyone at the D.C. riots on Jan. 6 would be held responsible for the five deaths that occurred, possibly even law enforcement officers who underestimated the crowd.

Moore said his organization had serious concerns about the bill, its impact on the right to assemble and its denial of bail to those charged with crimes.

The bill essentially ignores the root causes of why people protest; it goes to the aftereffects of when some people turn and riot its important to understand that riots dont happen first, protests do, Moore said.

Moore said that looting, vandalism, battery and criminal mischief already had penalties under criminal code. Requiring people to leave a rally turned violent or report the crimes was unprecedented and could be used to criminalize bystanders and observers.

We have concerns that this is a wide net that could encompass a lot of people and make them a criminal when in fact they were a bystander, Moore said.

Tallian wondered if the bill could be used to prosecute journalists reporting on riots and other legal observers.

David Powell, the executive director of the Indiana Prosecuting Attorneys Council, similarly opposed the bill and its limits on prosecutorial discretion by allowing the attorney general to step in and press charges if local prosecutors refused to do so.

We just dont see a need for this, Powell said. We can live with a lot of it, but there are things that need to be cleaned up.

Young said amendments to both of his bills would be considered in the upcoming weeks.

The bills authors, Young and Koch, both said the summers events inspired the bills, though a report found that 93% of Black Lives Matter protests were peaceful and just 7% qualified as riots.

The Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, which conducted the analysis, found that counterforces against protesters, such as armed military officers or militia groups, played a role in escalating the violence seen at protests.

The IndyStar wrote that Indianapolis businesses reported more than $2 million in damage and Marion County Prosecutor Ryan Mears charged 27 people out of the 100-plus arrested.

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Bills filed to counter Black Lives Matter protests - The Herald Bulletin

ELLSWORTH A nonprofit that helps inmates recover from substance abuse could be allowed back in the Hancock County Jail starting Friday, seven months after the agency lost access over its support for Black Lives Matter.

County Commissioner Bill Clark, Healthy Acadia Executive Director Elsie Flemings and Sheriff Scott Kane met Monday morning.

Clark said Monday afternoon that as a result of Monday mornings meeting, a memorandum agreement is being drafted and should be finalized by Friday.

Sheriff Kane canceled the contract after Healthy Acadia issued a June 10, 2020, statement in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. Kane disagreed with allowing an organization in the jail that supports a movement that he says wants to harm law enforcement.

The Hancock County Commissioners met Saturday evening via Zoom, an online meeting platform.

Fleming reached out to me and weve set a date 9 oclock on Monday morning, that if we can get an agreement, she can start recovery coaching immediately, Clark said Saturday. Im confident we will have recovery coaching by the end of the day [Monday].

Commissioner Paul Paradis said he had talked to the sheriff earlier Saturday. He was a perfect gentleman, Paradis said.

Kane will be making a public statement at beginning of the commissioners meeting, on Tuesday [Feb. 2], said Paradis.Iview this as very positive and I want to thank the sheriff, Elsie Flemings and Chairman Clark for the work in re-establishing recovery coaching.

Recovery coaches, according to Flemings, provide an opportunity for inmates to develop an action plan for their release as well as work on their recovery.

The organization posted statements last summer supporting Black Lives Matter and the racial justice movement and criticizing racism and police brutality. Kane characterized the movement as seeking to harm police.

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Nonprofit barred for supporting Black Lives Matter may be allowed back in Maine jail - Press Herald

Nearly ayear after Breonna Taylors death, manypeopleare remembering her as an iconic symbol of the BlackLives Matter movement: a youngfirst-responderinnocent of any crimewho lost her lifein a hail ofpolicebullets in her own home. Photos and illustrations of her have been on magazine covers, spotlightingher as a victim ofoverzealouspolicing, with accompanyingarticles demanding justice and change.

But when JuNiyah Palmer thinks about Breonna Taylor, she calls her sister. She remembers her sister as a confidante and friend.

She was lovely, she was caring, said Palmer.

In a December interviewwithUSATODAY, Palmer, 21,recalled the summers she and Taylor spentwith their grandmother in Grand Rapids, Michigan.One moment etched in her memory is the car ride back home to Kentuckyone year.Theydusually taken the ride with their mother, Tamika Palmer, but thistimethey were driving the route by themselves.

It started to pour down rain. Taylor, who was driving,couldntsee.The carinched along in the middle of the highway.It was just really funny, because she really stopped and started crying because she couldnt see, and called my mama, Palmer said.

Their mothertold them to pull over to the side of the highway and put the hazardlights on, but theydidntmove.They stayed in the middle of the highway for about 20 minutes, until the rainpassedandTaylorfelt fine to drive again.

To Palmer,Taylor was playful, yet vulnerable in otherwordsvery much like any otheryoung Black woman.

Tamika Palmer, left, embraced her daughter Juniyah Palmer during a vigil for her other daughter, Breonna Taylor, outside the Judicial Center in downtown Louisville, Ky. on Mar. 19, 2020. Taylor was killed during an officer-involved shooting last week. The family chose the vigil site because it is across the street from the Louisville Metro Police Department.1-Vigil01 Sam [Via MerlinFTP Drop](Photo: Sam Upshaw Jr., Courier Journal/ USA TODAY Network)

Astheanniversary of her deathapproaches,Palmer andsocial justiceactivists areworking to keep her legacy aliveby pushing for police reforms and public policies that would prevent more needless deaths like hers.

Breonnas life mattered,saidBrittany Packnett Cunningham, founder ofthe social impact firmLove & Power Works and host ofaMeteor/Pineapple Street Studiospodcast,Undistracted.We have to wake up every day and ask ourselves what we owe her.

Taylor, 26, was killed in her home at about 1 a.m. March 13, by Louisville Police who had a "no knock" search warrant for her apartment. Taylor and her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker III, were in the apartment that morning when they heard loud pounding at the door. According to Walker, the police did not announce themselves before breaking down the door. Fearing a home invasion, Walker fired one shot, hittingSgt. Jonathan Mattingly in the leg.

Police responded by firing 32 shots. Taylor was hit multiple times and died on the floor of her hallway whileMattingly, whowas wounded, was rushed to surgery.

In September, a grandjury charged Sgt. Brett Hankison with wanton endangerment because some of the 10 shots her firedwent into a neighboring apartment. But none of the three white officers involved were charged with Taylor's death.

This undated file photo provided by Taylor family attorney Sam Aguiar shows Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Ky. In news reported on Tuesday, Dec. 29, 2020, Louisville police have taken steps that could result in the firing of an officer who sought the no-knock search warrant that led detectives to the apartment where Taylor was fatally shot.(Photo: Taylor Family attorney Sam Aguiar via AP)

"Breonnas Law," legislation banningno-knock search warrants, was adopted in June by the city of Louisville. Similar measures were passed laterin Florida, Oregon andVirginia., But such laws haven't been universally adopted, not even inKentucky.Soactivists worry thissame scenario could play out elsewhere.

You owe it toher tosee Breonna in every Black woman you encounter at work, schoolor delivering your groceries, andtreather like her life is worth living before she dies, Packnett Cunningham said.

Activists in Louisville and beyond arepushing for police reforms and accountability for police officers. They continue to demandcharges against the officers involved in Taylors death despitethe refusal of the Kentucky Prosecutors Advisory Council last December to appoint someone to pursue the case.

Imani Smith, a native of Kentucky and sophomore at Centre College, said she owes her activism to Taylor. After learning about her, Smith formed her own organization called the Youth Resistance Collective.

She is also collaborating with organizations like Change Today, Change Tomorrow;Play Cousins Collective and The Louisville Urban League, and pushing forward in social justice work by bringing awareness toTaylors story. The work involves changing policies, creating strategies that sustainthe Black dollarand teaching Black history.

Right now we are still in that process of still pushing, but also being conscious that we have to heal too because this was traumatic for a lot us, Smith said.

Protesters demonstrate on the steps of the Tennessee Capitol on Sept. 26, 2020, in Nashville in response to a Louisville grand jury decision about the fatal shooting of Breonna Taylor.(Photo: Mark Zaleski, The Tennessean/ USA TODAY Network)

During last yearsBreonnaConevent in Louisville,convenedto inspire activism in the wake of Taylors death, young Black women like Jaida Hampton,22, Youth & College President of the Kentucky NAACP State Conference, heldvoter education and registration sessions and legal roundtables.

Being a Black woman myself, living in Kentucky alone, (I know) that could potentially happen to me, and I have older sisters as well that are the same age as Breonna Taylor, Hampton said.

Black women are not safe at all in this country(if)you can innocently be sleeping in your own home and all it takes is for someone to make a life decision for you. That is just scary, Hampton said.

If Palmer could have told Taylor one thing on March 12last year,she would have told her to go to their moms housethat night, or to work some overtime. If this was adream,I would literally tell hertogo to pick up that shift at work that you planned on picking up, or go to moms house, and go out like you planned,Palmer said.

The days are longer than normal for Palmer, who shared the apartment with Taylor just as she had shared a room with her growing up.She wasused to coming home and seeing Taylor getting ready to leave for work. Taylor workedeveningsas an emergency room technician at the University of Louisville HealthJewish Hospital and Norton Hospital,and wanted to become a nurse.

Rosie Henderson tries to protect a Breonna Taylor memorial from rain Sept. 27, 2020, in downtown Louisville, Ky.(Photo: Max Gersh, Courier Journal/ USA TODAY Network)

Other times Palmer would come home and gointo Taylors room toplayfully bother her sister as she watched TV.Little memories like this,ormundane tasks like cleaning her room or washing her car, make Palmer miss Taylor the most.My outlook of the future has changed, any day could be really anybodys last day, Palmer said.

When Palmerseesimagesof her sisterpainted on muralsin brighthues or printed on the cover of magazines it makes her feel joyful.

It makes me feel like people are still thinking about her, were no longer lonely about the whole situation, Palmersaid.

Walker talked about protests in Breonna Taylor's name, and how his life has changed since her death. Louisville Courier Journal

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Breonna Taylor: A beloved sister becomes a symbol of pain, an icon of hope - USA TODAY