Harriet's Wildest Dreams

Harriet’s Wildest Dreams is a Black-led community defense hub in the Greater Washington, D.C. area. Their work centers all Black lives most at risk for state-sanctioned violence and includes legal empowerment, political and civic education, mass protest, organizing campaigns, and community care that builds alternatives to oppressive systems.

HWD is working to put liberation and justice in the hands of Black people and communities, and to build transformational relationships with face-to-face conversations that lead to change. The work of HWD centers on three pillars of organizing, action, and defense:

Ella’s Emancipators is the political and community organizing pillar of HWD, which focuses on base-building, advocacy, and winning budget and policy campaigns to change living conditions for Black people.

Harriet’s Responders is the community defense pillar of HWD, focusing on building local power through transformational direct actions — including organizing, strategizing, and responding to oppressive systems.

Ida B. Free is the legal defense pillar of HWD, supporting participatory defense campaigns, court watching, and mobilization of lawyers to ensure those involved in the criminal legal system have the best possible outcomes.

As part of HWD's community defense pillar, they work with the DC Safety Team, a group of organizations and individuals who move in solidarity with the city’s most impacted communities, centering Black people: "Our curated ecosystem is made up of trainers, mobile crisis teams and responders, base-building groups, and service providers. Our DC Harm Reduction and Rapid Response Team will mobilize instead of calling the police. We will ensure within our capacity that Black people are met by responders who see us as human, meet our needs, respect our autonomy, and are invested in our direct happiness and joy. The Safety team brings together over a dozen organizations as well as trained, experienced individuals from across the city to respond to acute and emergent crises without involving the police. With the overall goal of 'we keep us safe,' we envision a world where folks in need of support receive compassionate care from these community-based groups and community members. Our goals and activities are centered around the intertwined problems of state violence, criminalization of poverty, and violence interruption."