Last night during the vice presidential debate, I held my breath during the answer to a question on Darfur. Because I have been working on divestment efforts over the past year, I was hoping that Governor Palin would discuss the Alaska divestment legislation that our partner organization the Sudan Divestment Task Force worked so diligently on with activists in Alaska during the last year’s legislative session.

Governor Palin did discuss the bill and came out publicly in support of it. She touted the bill as a law that must be passed “because all of us, as individuals, and as humanitarians and as elected officials should do all we can to end those atrocities in that region of the world”.

This coming year, we must work to hold her to her pledge to do all she can. While her words have yet to result in action, there is a new opportunity in the coming legislative year. (more…)

Last Wednesday, Governor Schwarzenegger signed The Darfur Contracting Act into law. This important move will bring pressure to bear directly companies that are very interested in California contracts that until today have not taken steps to stop their revenue from helping to fund the Sudanese military. We will be following through with them to make sure that they change those operations and confront the Sudanese government.

Thanks to the ideas, words, emails and the consistent support of activists across the state, the Sudanese government will have to face further economic consequences for its truly unconscionable behavior. California groups took the lead in passing this law, including Jewish World Watch, American Jewish Committee, San Francisco Bay Area Darfur Coalition, Armenian National Committee, Genocide Intervention Network, STAND: A Student Anti- Genocide Coalition, Sudan Divestment Task Force, Orange County for Darfur, Americans Against the Darfur Genocide, Genocide No More-Save Darfur, Sacramento Committee on Conscience and others.

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On August 31, the California contract prohibition law AB 498 passed both the Senate and the Assembly in California! The California legislature was in overtime session at the end of the month, so they were working late on Sunday when this bill passed both houses of the legislature.

Assembly Member Ed Hernandez authored The Darfur Contracting Act, A. B. 498, a law that will prohibit the state of California from doing business with the companies that help fund the genocide in Darfur. Through contract prohibition, this bill will ensure that the state of California does not enter into or renew contracts with companies that help fund the genocide.

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Save Darfur. It’s a concept that sends people running to action, willing to volunteer time and money to do what it takes to save the people of Darfur from rape, murder and displacement. We have taken action, we have sent the messages to world leaders, we have raised the issue in our communities and we have built a movement more than a million strong. So why haven’t we yet saved Darfur?

At times, the victories of this movement seem few and far between. The violence continues and the peacekeeping force has yet to be deployed. The problems are deep and complex.

But amid the frustration, there are real victories. There are triumphs that are difficult to gauge, such as the impact of country-wide awareness of the genocide or the personal impression left on someone after taking action to help another person half way around the world. These small victories are often hard to recognize or even pin down. But sometimes, we can see them.

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