Support John "Mac" Gaskins’ Return Home & Continued Legal Organizing Work

After years of unjust incarceration, John “Mac” Gaskins is finally coming home on July 1st, 2025— and we’re calling on our communities to help him land on his feet and continue the transformative legal education and organizing work he has been doing even behind bars.

Mac’s journey has reflected deep injustices in the American carceral system—trumped-up charges, prosecutorial misconduct, and Orwellian bureaucratic processes caused him to be incarcerated during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. He was one of the first people to contract the virus while detained at the Prince George’s County Jail, and he suffered horrific and inhumane isolation conditions.

Rather than give in to despair, Mac organized. He joined lawyers, community advocates, and others inside to expose what was happening—not for any benefit to himself, but because he wanted to ensure that conditions improved for those who came next. Despite the risk of retaliation by the jail, Mac persisted in advocating for the health and dignity of others. This work helped launch the Gasping for Justice advocacy campaign (https://www.gaspingforjustice.org) and resulted in a civil rights lawsuit that drastically improved conditions at the jail.

Meanwhile, the State of Maryland continued to delay Mac’s trial, citing the pandemic as its excuse. When his day in court finally came more than a year and a half later, the State was finally forced to acknowledge that it had no case and his charges were dismissed. But not before the State had taken its pound of flesh—Mac had been detained for that time while he waited and waited for a trial date. And in the meantime, Virginia issued a warrant for his arrest (further ensuring he could not be released pretrial from Maryland). Adding insult to injury, when Mac was finally released from Maryland, Virginia refused to give him credit for the time he had been detained there. It is hard to overstate the unfairness of Mac being wrongfully detained in Maryland for more than a year and a half, ineligible for pretrial release due to the Virginia warrant, only for Virginia to refuse to give him credit for that time.

In response to this unfairness—his inhumane treatment when he contracted COVID-19 at the jail, his extended period of pretrial detention on charges which were dismissed, and the refusal of Virginia to give him credit for time served in Maryland—most people would be defeated. They would be jaded, hardened to the world. But not Mac. Mac responded not with bitterness, but with resolve and purpose.

Despite every obstacle, Mac has remained committed to helping others and doing good in the world. While detained in Virginia, he has earned a paralegal certification, worked in the prison law library, and mentored others, using his hard-won legal knowledge to fight back against the same system that tried to silence him. Mac is a gifted legal thinker, a humble teacher, and a visionary leader with a deep commitment to justice and liberation. His legal education and organizing on the inside has been hugely successful—at least one of the people he worked with on the inside won an early release due to Mac’s peer-to-peer legal education and mentorship.

Mac is someone who gives so much of himself to others. Now, as he prepares to return to his family and community, it is time for us to support him.

Your donation will help Mac meet his basic needs—including housing, food, clothing, transportation—and support his continued ability to do the much-needed work of community-based legal education and organizing. This is a chance to invest in someone who has never stopped fighting for others, even when he had every reason to give up.

Let’s welcome Mac home with the love, resources, and solidarity he deserves.