For The Panthers
The Black Panther Party (B.P.P.) needs no introduction. Since its founding in 1966, few organizations have captured the imaginations of the world like the B.P.P.. From the constant references to their legacy in Black pop culture, to groups on the other side of the world like India’s Dalit Panthers taking up the name in their own liberation struggle, the B.P.P. has had timeless influence that most groups could only dream of. Truly, the group once termed “the greatest threat to [U.S.] security” has lived on long after the FBI’s COINTELPRO used misinformation, harassment, and assassinations to force the B.P.P.’s dissolution in 1982.
But what made the Panthers so special? How could an organization that was only around for sixteen years leave such an impact? The answer to these questions lies within their political philosophy. As a revolutionary socialist organization, the Panthers’ radical vision of Black liberation was shaped by an understanding of the power of everyday people to make change for themselves. The party’s rallying cry, “All power to the people!” is the simplest way to sum up their organizing ideology. Through legendary projects like Policing the Police and the Free Breakfast for Children program, the B.P.P. took the initiative to build a better world for the Black community at a time when the president of the United States was calling Black people “monkeys”.
Furthermore, they understood that the liberation of Black people in the U.S. could only be realized through the liberation of all people globally. As we see today, with the notoriously brutal U.S. police training with settler forces in occupied Palestine, the B.P.P. knew even back then that the plight of Black people in America was intimately linked to the struggles of all the world’s oppressed. As put by the B.P.P.’s co-founder, Huey P. Newton in a 1970 letter to the freedom fighters of Vietnam, when “one nation is liberated elsewhere it gives us a better chance to be free here,” and as such, the party was “interested in the people of any territory where the crack of the oppressor's whip may be heard.”
It is perhaps in this spirit that the recent reemergence of the Black Panther Party can be understood. During nationwide protests over the executions of Keith Porter Jr., Renee Good, and Alex Pretti by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (I.C.E.), Philadelphia saw the rise of a group taking up the B.P.P. mantle. Its national chairman, Paul Birdsong, calls for the abolition of I.C.E. and had the organization march armed in Philly’s streets to prevent brutality by immigration agents. Having organized since the murder of George Floyd in 2020, this new B.P.P. includes some former members of the original, and engages in some of the same practice, such as weekly free food and clothing distribution programs. While this current version of the B.P.P. hasn’t offered its ideology quite as clearly as the original, their continuing commitment to practical community work and solidarity are commendable.
However, some say otherwise. They argue that Birdsong’s Black Panther Party is betraying the original B.P.P.'s vision by supporting community members without documents. In an absurd twist, the calls against Birdsong’s B.P.P. were perhaps most loudly made by Myesha Newton, the Trump-supporting niece of the original party’s co-founder. As per a video uploaded to TikTok, Ms. Newton threatened to sue the new B.P.P. for “defam[ing] [her] uncle’s name” by “protesting with these Somalians.” Joining her, other commentators weighed in with a similar tenor, appearing to suggest that I.C.E. brutalizing and killing people shouldn't be a concern for the Black American community. Furthermore, a petition calling for the new B.P.P. to stop using the Black Panther name garnered hundreds of signatures, as well as comments like “this immigrantion [sic] & ICE issues is not our problem.”
While many would be quick to dismiss this criticism, these lines of thinking didn’t come out of thin air. The persistent economic neglect of the Black community, as well as the lack of any meaningful changes following the 2020 Uprisings, has rightfully caused frustration and disillusionment towards politics among many Black people, especially those descended from the survivors of genocidal chattel slavery. In this view, crucial Black issues like reparations aren’t taken seriously by other communities, so Black people should respond in kind.
This sentiment is understandable, but falls short under scrutiny. Given the fact that I.C.E. agents often work closely with (and sometimes as) local police, it is difficult to separate the organization’s issues from the wider problems in U.S. policing which plague Black America. The shamefully overlooked murder of Keith Porter Jr. shows that I.C.E. is just as willing to engage in brutality against Black people as any police precinct, regardless of its proclaimed purpose of immigration enforcement.
Past this immediate concern, a second issue arises. You can’t claim to truly oppose the system that oppresses Black people if you ignore that same system’s other arms. Regardless of the reason, aligning yourself with I.C.E. is aligning yourself with the ruling order. The ethnocentrism of a Myesha Newton runs completely counter to the intercommunal solidarity that the original B.P.P. stood for. As said by the B.P.P’s other co-founder, Bobby Seale, in What Does the Black Panther Party Stand For?, “racism and ethnic differences allow the power structure to exploit the masses… to divide the people and conquer them.” Getting oppressed groups to fight each other instead of their oppressor weakens any challenge to the status quo.
While this tendency towards ethnocentrism is neither exclusive to, or even dominant in, the Black community, it has managed to have an outsized impact like many vocal minorities. In fact, these voices were able to force big shifts for Birdsong and his B.P.P.. Due to the previously mentioned social media firestorm, fueled further by backlash to aggressive statements from the chair, some original Panthers who initially supported the new B.P.P. withdrew their backing. After this, the pressure on Birdsong’s B.P.P. was enough to force a name change. In a video from late January 2026, a disappointed Birdsong pledged the party would keep going, but announced that it would now be called the Black Lion Party for International Solidarity. Time will tell what becomes of the organization, but I hope that the Black Lions find their own way to write their name in progressive history.
This disappointing news reveals something very worrying about our current moment: COINTELPRO’s mission to “discredit, disrupt, and destroy” the Black Panther Party and its ideology has been somewhat successful. Through the US government’s unprecedented repression of the Panthers, what the party actually believed has fallen into obscurity. We can see this in the “defense” of their legacy through attacking their ideals talked about in this article, and through the adoption of their aesthetics without their ambitions. I think J. Edgar Hoover would be smiling ear-to-ear if he found out that a segment of the Black community has not only aligned itself with the U.S. government, but has actively worked to hinder a group aiming to revive the Black Panther Party.
For the Panthers, Black liberation meant liberation for all.
Anything else is a disgrace to their legacy.