The Green Party of the United States National Women’s Caucus released a statement today calling for a national task force to focus on solving the disappearances of black women and girls.

National Green Party Women's Caucus
www.gp.org

For Immediate Release:
Wednesday, January 20, 2021

Contact:
Monica James, [email protected], National Green Party Women’s Caucus Spokesperson

Caucus spokesperson Monica James said, “As Black women and girls go missing, and the media hardly gives coverage and the police do very little to solve their cases, the GPUS Women’s Caucus believes a national task force is required to address this issue. As the Caucus spokesperson, this topic of the invisible, unknown numbers of missing Black women and girls has touched me personally and many of us the hardest. Some have never heard these stories, but in the Black communities, it’s the silent wishes of family and friends, exhausted, crying for help, that these women be acknowledged and found.” 

The task force would accurately collect and share data on missing Black women and girls and provide financial and logistical support to local government agencies in solving the disappearances, among other goals.

Green Party 2020 vice-presidential nominee Angela Walker said, “The epidemic of missing Black girls and women (both cisgender and transgender) in the United States has been underreported for far too long. It is unacceptable that these disappearances are not prioritized, and this disregard only highlights the fact that this country does not protect or respect Black girls and women. It is past time for a task force that focuses on this national tragedy and brings aid to the families affected. As a Black woman, parent and grandparent, this is personal to me.” 

The statement highlights research demonstrating that Black people make up a disproportionate number of missing persons. However, when Black women and girls are reported missing, they are frequently inappropriately classified as runaways, which removes the sense of urgency in the response. Public knowledge of the missing is limited because many of the stories never make it to the media, and few are prioritized or solved by the police, but the numbers are estimated to be in the tens of thousands. Except for primarily Black journalists and publications that have covered the issue, few of the stories are reported or ever resolved. 

STATEMENT 

As Black Women and Girls Go Missing, and the Media and the Police Do Little, a National Task Force is Required to Address the Issue 

The Green Party of the United States National Women’s Caucus calls for a national task force to focus on solving the disappearances of Black women and girls that includes the following: 

• Accurately collect and share data on missing Black women and girls
• Provide financial and logistical support to local government agencies in solving disappearances of Black women and girls
• Review cold cases involving missing Black women and girls
• Provide education to local government agencies on stereotypes that prevent officials from taking disappearances of Black women and girls seriously
• Seek input from the families of the missing Black women and girls to better understand the issue

Black people make up a disproportionate number of missing persons, both adults and children. Yet their cases get less attention from the media and the police. Black women and girls in particular get few resources. The National Women's Caucus of the Green Party would like to shine a spotlight on this disparity and we call for a national task force to focus on solving the disappearances of Black women and girls. 

Nearly all people reported missing are found. Per the NCIC, of 609,275 reports made in 2019, only 2171 remained active at the end of the year. But active cases stay in the system indefinitely. According to the FBI, “As of December 31, 2019, the NCIC had nearly 87,500 active missing person records. Youth under the age of 18 account for 35 percent of the records, and 44 percent of the missing person records are people under 21.” The records have accrued since 1983. 

Blacks make up 13.4% of the American population (per Census estimates for 2019) yet the NCIC statistics show that 33.8% of reports in 2019 were for missing Black people. The percentage of Blacks in the 37 years of active cases is even higher.

A PLOS ONE study by van de Rijt, et. al., of New York State 2017 data, found that Black children were twice as likely as non-Black children to be still missing at the end of their observation period. This disparity persisted even after controlling for things like age at disappearance.

Min & Feaster, in their landmark 2010 study, found that missing Black children got 19.5% of news coverage about missing children despite accounting for 33.2% of cases. Other studies report the same results: white missing persons of all ages proportionately get far more media coverage than do Black missing persons.

Surprisingly, Min & Feaster found that missing boys got more news coverage than missing girls. While more recent studies by other authors have found no gender difference or a small one in favor of girls, Min & Feaster state that missing girls got 37.8% of news coverage despite accounting for 57.4% of the cases in the same time period. 

Black people go missing about three times more often than might be expected based on population. Higher rates of poverty, homelessness, and incarceration all stem from systemic racism, decades of imposed housing and job segregation, and inequity in education and health services and these all contribute to a variety of factors that make someone more likely to disappear. But once a Black child or adult is missing, they are also a lot less likely to be found.

A 2019 study by Jada L. Moss showed that “in 2016, African-American missing persons cases appeared amongst the remaining older and open cases four times as often as the cases of White and Hispanic missing persons.”

When Black people go missing, their disappearance is often framed in a way you don’t see when white people go missing. Black children are usually classified as runaways, even when they are young or it’s out of character. While running away is in fact the most common reason why an older child goes missing, it’s used as a way to dismiss cases for Black children. Police may not bother investigating and the media rarely profiles the case. Amber Alerts only go out for suspected abductions.

The task force would provide education to local government agencies on stereotypes that prevent officials from taking disappearances of Black women and girls seriously and seek input from the families of the missing Black women to better understand the issue.

REFERENCES

Why the Crisis of Missing Black Girls Needs More Attention Than It’s Getting
La’Tasha D. Mayes
Ebony, March 24, 2017

Missing Children in National News Coverage: Racial and Gender Representations of Missing Children Cases
Seong-Jae Min & John C. Feaster
Communication Research Reports, Vol. 27, No. 3, July–September 2010, pp. 207–216

Black kids go missing at a higher rate than white kids. Here's why we don't hear about them
Harmeet Kaur
CNN, November 3, 2019

The Forgotten Victims of Missing White Woman Syndrome: An Examination of Legal Measures That Contribute to the Lack of Search and Recovery of Missing Black Girls and Women
Jada L. Moss
William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice. Volume 25 (2018-2019) Issue 3
Article 9 April 2019

The urgent crisis of missing Black women and girls
Treva Lindsey
Women’s Media Center (WMC), February 20, 2020

There Are 64,000 Missing Black Women in The USA. So Why Aren’t We Seeing Their Cases Reported in The Media?
Samantha Clarke
Medium, Nov 23, 2019

There Are 64,000 Missing Black Women and Girls in the United States and No One Seems to Care
BlackNews.com, February 15, 2019

Missing black women's cases are often unsolved, underreported. Here are 7 from Montgomery
Safiya Charles
Montgomery Advertiser, November 15, 2019

2019 NCIC Missing Person and Unidentified Person Statistics

FBI Releases 2019 Missing Person Statistics

Racial and gender differences in missing children’s recovery chances
Arnout van de Rijt, Hyang-Gi Song, Eran Shor, Rebekah Burroway
PLOS ONE, December 31, 2018

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