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Tulsa Massacre Was a ‘Coordinated, Military-Style Attack,’ Federal Report Says
The Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921, in which a prosperous Black neighborhood in Oklahoma was destroyed and up to 300 people were killed, was not committed by an uncontrolled mob but was the result of “a coordinated, military-style attack” by white citizens, the Justice Department said in a report released Friday.
The report, stemming from an investigation announced in September, is the first time that the federal government has given an official, comprehensive account of the events of May 31 and June 1, 1921, in the Tulsa neighborhood of Greenwood. Although it formally concluded that, more than a century later, no person alive could be prosecuted, it underscored the brutality of the atrocities committed.
“The Tulsa Race Massacre stands out as a civil rights crime unique in its magnitude, barbarity, racist hostility and its utter annihilation of a thriving Black community,” Kristen Clarke, assistant attorney general for civil rights, said in a statement. “In 1921, white Tulsans murdered hundreds of residents of Greenwood, burned their homes and churches, looted their belongings and locked the survivors in internment camps.”
No one today could be held criminally responsible, she said, “but the historical reckoning for the massacre continues.”
The report’s legal findings noted that if contemporary civil rights laws were in effect in 1921, federal prosecutors could have pursued hate crime charges against both public officials and private citizens.
Though considered one of the worst episodes of racial terror in U.S. history, the massacre was relatively unknown for decades: City officials buried the story, and few survivors talked about the massacre.
The Justice Department began its investigation under the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act, which allows the agency to examine such crimes resulting in death that occurred before 1980. Investigators spoke with survivors and their descendants, looked at firsthand accounts and examined an informal review by the Justice Department’s Bureau of Investigation, the precursor to the F.B.I. In that 1921 report, the agency asserted that the riot was not the result of “racial feeling,” and suggested that Black men were responsible for the massacre.
The new 123-page report corrects the record, while detailing the scale of destruction and its aftermath. The massacre began with an unfounded accusation. A young Black man, Dick Rowland, was being held in custody by local authorities after being accused of assaulting a young white woman.
According to the report, after a local newspaper sensationalized the story, an angry crowd gathered at the courthouse demanding that Mr. Rowland be lynched. The local sheriff asked Black men from Greenwood, including some who had recently returned from military service, to come to the courthouse to try to prevent the lynching. Other reports suggest the Black neighbors offered to help but were turned away by the sheriff.
The white mob viewed attempts to protect Mr. Rowland as “an unacceptable challenge to the social order,” the report said. The crowd grew and soon there was a confrontation. Hundreds of residents (some of whom had been drinking) were deputized by the Tulsa Police. Law enforcement officers helped organize these special deputies who, along with other residents, eventually descended on Greenwood, a neighborhood whose success inspired the name Black Wall Street.
The report described the initial attack as “opportunistic,” but by daybreak on June 1, “a whistle blew, and the violence and arsons that had been chaotic became systematic.” According to the report, up to 10,000 white Tulsans participated in the attack, burning or looting 35 city blocks. It was so “systematic and coordinated that it transcended mere mob violence,” the report said.
In the aftermath, the survivors were left to rebuild their lives with little or no help from the city. The massacre’s impact, historians say, is still felt generations later.
In the years since the attack, survivors and their descendants and community activists have fought for justice. Most recently, a lawsuit seeking reparations filed on behalf of the last two known centenarian survivors was dismissed by Oklahoma justices in June. In recent years, Tulsa has excavated sections of a city cemetery in search of the graves of massacre victims. And in 2024, the city created a commission to study the harms of the atrocity and recommend solutions. The results are expected in the coming weeks.
new video loaded: G.O.P. May Bear The Cost of Trump’s Unpopularity
By Shane Goldmacher, Nour Idriss, Stephanie Swart and Rafaela Balster
May 20, 2026
The central committee of the Colorado Democratic Party on Wednesday voted 89.8% in favor of a measure to censure Gov. Jared Polis. A censure temporarily bars him from speaking or participating in party-sponsored events.
Polis said earlier that the petition by hundreds of Democrats that called for the action is politically motivated. The petition is in response to Polis’ decision to commute the sentence of former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters. The judge gave her nearly 9 years for her role in tampering with election equipment to prove unsubstantiated claims of fraud.
Polis cut the sentence in half. Peters could be paroled as early as June 1.
“My goal is to make the right decision with the information I have and that’s exactly what I did in this case,” Polis said. “I think the fact this has seemingly become so partisan shows the problem with this case, frankly. No case should be viewed from a partisan lens. Each case is about an individual and the crime they committed.”
The governor says he looked at other cases of corruption by public officials and none of them had sentences as steep as Peters.
“In nearly every case we saw probation, we saw 6 months,” he said.
Peters’ sentence, he says, was based too much on what she said rather than what she did. The appellate court raised the same concern.
“Clearly, her free speech — however much we disagree with it — was used as a factor in that sentencing,” Polis said.
Mesa County District Attorney Dan Rubenstein disagrees.
“This was not just a one act. This was a months-long pattern of deception to try to violate every security protocol we had as the person we entrusted specifically for that,” he said.
Rubenstein says Peters could have received 20 years. He notes even Polis’s own clemency board recommended against commutation.
Polis says he considered input from thousands of Coloradans and made his decision based on what he thought was right.
“I approach all these decisions with great humility and a very objective way looking at the data, of course,” he said.
Rubenstein says Polis ignored the advice of everyone closely involved in the case.
“That’s not humility, that’s arrogance — to believe that your judgment should substitute those others because you think they’re wrong and you think you’re smarter than them.”
The Democrats who asked the Colorado Democratic Party to censure the governor say his conduct is inconsistent with the party’s mission, which includes leading the battle for democracy. Polis insists he is doing exactly that.
“It’s caught up in the zeitgeist of the partisan divide which is a horrific thing that rips my heart apart, this divide that’s facing this country and our state. And I really hope that doesn’t impugn each individual sense of justice, whether they’re Democrat, Republican, liberal, conservative. We need to make sure that you’re punished based on the crime regardless of your beliefs,” Polis said.
Rubenstein says he wouldn’t have protested a four-and-a-half year sentence for Peters had it come from the judge, who presided over years of litigation, is from Mesa County, and understands the impact Peters actions have had on the community.
The governor says he didn’t talk to Peters before making his decision, but he noted she apologized for her actions and took accountability in her clemency request.
Rubenstein wonders how long her remorse will hold up. He says she has until Friday to appeal her conviction to the Colorado Supreme Court.
The following statement was released by the Colorado Democratic Party after their vote. It expands upon a statement state party chair Shad Murib released after Polis’ announcement last Friday that he was commuting the sentence of Tina Peters.
Tina Peters was convicted by a jury of her peers and sentenced by a judge who said she would do it all over again if she could. The Republican district attorney who prosecuted her called any sentence reduction ‘a gross injustice.’ He’s right.
Reducing her sentence now, under pressure from Donald Trump, is not justice. It sends a message to future bad actors that election tampering has consequences, unless you’re friends with the president. That’s a dangerous and disappointing precedent to set.
Colorado has spent years building trust in our elections and proving they are secure. At a time when democracy and voting rights are under attack across the nation, weakening accountability for someone convicted of undermining that trust is a mistake.
There are real cases that deserve the Governor’s attention and action. This is not one of them.
The State Central Committee finds that Governor Jared Polis’s decision to grant clemency to Tina Peters materially harmed the Colorado Democratic Party’s institutional credibility and efforts to defend democratic institutions and election integrity.
The State Central Committee formally condemns Governor Jared Polis’s clemency decision regarding Tina Peters and formally censures Governor Jared Polis for conduct inconsistent with the Colorado Democratic Party’s commitment to democratic institutions, election integrity, and public accountability.
The Colorado Democratic Party further clarifies that the clemency decision does not reflect the values, institutional positions, or democratic commitments of the Colorado Democratic Party.
The Colorado Democratic Party reaffirms its unwavering commitment to election workers, free and fair elections, and the rejection of election denialism and disinformation in all forms.
The State Central Committee recognizes the hundreds of Democrats who swiftly organized and raised their voices in defense of democracy and public trust in Colorado’s election system following the commutation decision.
Until further action by the State Central Committee or Executive Committee, Governor Jared Polis shall not participate as an honored guest, featured speaker, or officially recognized representative of the Colorado Democratic Party at Party-sponsored events and functions, including but not limited to the Obama Gala and DemFest.
Case 1:03-cr-20685-DPG Document 8 Entered on FLSD Docket 04/29/2026 Page 18 of 26
did willfully and unlawfully, with malice aforethought, kill P.M., a human being, with premeditation and during the perpetration of, and attempt to perpetrate, sabotage, that is, the destruction of an aircraft, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 32(a).
In violation of Title 18, United States Code, Sections 1111(a), 3238 and 2.
1.
COUNT 6 Murder
18 U.S.C. §§ 1111(a), 3238 and 2
Paragraphs 1 through 34 of the General Allegations section and paragraphs 4
through 31 of the Overt Acts section of Count 1 are incorporated herein by reference.
2.
On or about February 24, 1996, in the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction
of the United States, the defendants,
RAUL MODESTO CASTRO RUZ
and
LORENZO ALBERTO PEREZ-PEREZ,
did willfully and unlawfully, with malice aforethought, kill Md.1.P, a human being, with premeditation and during the perpetration of, and attempt to perpetrate, sabotage, that is, the destruction of an aircraft, in violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 32(a).
In violation of Title 18, United States Code, Sections 1111(a), 3238 and 2.
1.
COUNT 7 Murder
18 U.S.C. §§ 1111(a), 3238 and 2
Paragraphs 1 through 34 of the General Allegations section and paragraphs 4 through 31 of the Overt Acts section of Count 1 are incorporated herein by reference.
2.
On or about February 24, 1996, in the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction
of the United States, the defendants,
18
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