Massachusetts Peace Action (MPA) is the Massachusetts branch of Peace Action, a nonprofit which supports a nonintervention foreign policy and nuclear disarmament. The MPA trains activists, organizes protests, and lobbies elected officials and political candidates to advocate for its goals. 1
MPA represents itself as a “nonpartisan” organization, but has ties to the Women’s March and other left-of-center nonprofits. MPA also has a 501(c)(3) component for research purposes, the Massachusetts Peace Action Education Fund. 1
History
Massachusetts Peace Action originated in the 1980s as “Massachusetts Freeze,” an anti-nuclear-weapons protest group. In the late 1980s, the national Freeze organization merged with the Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy. In 1993, the Massachusetts chapter of the merged organizations was renamed Massachusetts Peace Action and its focus was broadened beyond nuclear weapons to global peace and non-violent diplomatic policies for specific countries throughout the world. 1
Activities
Affiliation with Women’s March
Women’s March is a network of protests throughout the United States inspired by the 2017 Women’s March on Washington, D.C. against the first inauguration of President Donald Trump. Since then, the movement’s goals have expanded to a variety of broadly left-of-center policies, including LGBT-interest advocacy, abortion rights, and increased labor regulations. 2
Despite Massachusetts Peace Action’s ostensibly nonpartisan identity and focus on foreign policy, the MPA was a co-organizer of the 2018 Women’s March in Cambridge. Women’s March’s “unity principles,” the ideological foundation of the movement, contain no mention of foreign policy goals. 2 The MPA’s listed “issues” have no apparent overlap with the unity principles. 3
By 2019, the Women’s March in Cambridge was co-organized by several left-of-center nonprofits including the ACLU Massachusetts, Amplify Latinx/Latina Circle, Boston Women’s Fund, Chelsea Collaborative, Mass NOW, Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, NAACP – Boston, and NARAL Pro-Choice Massachusetts. 4
Massachusetts Peace Action v. City of Cambridge
In 2017, Massachusetts Peace Action began planning to hold the Women’s March on the Cambridge Common in Cambridge, Massachusetts. After the completion of the event in March 2018, MPA received a bill for thousands of dollars from the city government charging the MPA for the security the city provided during the event. 5
Later in the year, in cooperation with ACLU Massachusetts, the MPA and MPA Education Fund sued the municipal government of Cambridge on the grounds that requiring organizers to pay for security services to attain a public event permit was a violation of the First Amendment. 5
In July 2018, Cambridge settled the case out of court. The MPA was refunded for its security charge, the city struck the security financing fee from its laws. 6
Vote By Mail
In June 2020, Massachusetts Peace Action was one of several dozen left-of-center organizations that signed a petition in favor of transforming Massachusetts election laws in the name of COVID-19 pandemic protections. The letter, organized by the Election Modernization Coalition, was sent to the state Senate in support of bill S.2755 and three amendments that would create an “online portal for requesting ballots,” ensure that all ballots cast before the general election would be counted toward it, and to expand the deadline for absentee ballot requests. 7
The letter celebrated a previously passed House bill which equipped the state’s election processing system for a “tsunami of mail ballots,” but argued the system had to be further strengthened. The Coalition was mainly controlled by the ACLU of Massachusetts, Common Cause Massachusetts, the League of Women Voters of Massachusetts, Lawyers for Civil Rights, MASSPIRG, MassVOTE, and the Massachusetts Voter Table. 7
Anti-Israel Views
In April 2024, Massachusetts Peace Action updated its “Palestine-Israel” page (which the group listed as one of its “priority campaign[s]”) with new material concerning the attacks by the terrorist group Hamas against the country of Israel perpetrated on October 7, 2023. Arguing that Israel has operated a “military occupation” of the Palestinian territories “since 1967,” the group went on to assert that Israel had been waging “an all out genocidal campaign against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip” since the attacks, that Gazans had been enduring “life under a medieval siege” since 2007, and that Israel’s military strategy against Hamas was a “campaign of terror” which “has left no line uncrossed.” MPA underscored that its mission is to “alter the course of U.S. policy” from “unconditional” support of Israeli “apartheid” to one where “Palestinians and Israeli Jews have equal political and human rights.” 8
MPA further called for the restoration of all homes from which Palestinians may have been expelled and wrote off Zionism as a “project” founded on imperialism and colonialism. The group attacked the U.S. government’s domestic anti-terrorist policies, saying that “any form of solidarity” with Palestinian causes is branded as “terrorist activity.” It welcomed supporters to join its Palestine-Israel campaigns’ meetings, which it said were held every Wednesday on the internet videoconference platform Zoom. The meetings involved discussions on the war in Gaza, information about new demonstrations against the war, plans for future demonstrations, and commentary from guest speakers whom it described as “experts on the topic.” The page for the campaign was later deleted and was not available as of June 2025. 9
However, at that time, the “Palestine-Israel” page campaign page had been replaced with the new “Gaza Israel Mideast Peace Campaign,” which again claimed that Israel was carrying out “horrific genocide, ethnic cleansing, and apartheid” against Gaza. This time, though, the organization called U.S. politicians to support actions targeting Israel by the UN, the International Court of Justice, and the International Criminal Court; support sanctions against the state of Israel; and ultimately depose its current regime in the same way that the apartheid regime of South Africa was. It endorsed the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel and accused the U.S. government of being complicit with war crimes. It again advertised its Wednesday meetings on Zoom, and said the cohort would be discussing the “Genocide in Gaza” news series made by MPA’s Jeff Klein. 10 11
“Books Not Bombs” Webinar
In October 2024, the MPA hosted a webinar titled “Books Not Bombs 2024: Increasing Federal Investment in Public Education” which claimed to “assess the impact of limited federal funding and the growing push for privatization [and] explore how the November 5th election and political battles over education could shape the future of classrooms across the nation.” 12
Speakers at the event included staff with Cambridge Public Schools, the National Education Association (NEA), Coalition for Human Needs, Chicago Area Peace Action, and New York Performance Standards Consortium; a leader from the Harvard Graduate Students Unions (HGSU-UAW); journalist Doug Selwyn; Reverend Savina Martin of the Massachusetts chapter of the Poor People’s Campaign; and leaders of the Massachusetts Teachers Association (MTA) (which also co-sponsored the webinar). Other co-sponsors of the webinar included American Federation of Teachers (AFT) Massachusetts, Cambridge Retired Educators United, Citizens for Public Schools, and Our Revolution. 12
Our Revolution national chair Larry Cohen, the former president of the Communications Workers of America labor union, spoke about “Federal Battleground Elections.” Other notable lecture titles included “Imbalance of Civilian versus Military Budgets,” “Release Tens of $Billions by Canceling the Sentinel ICBM Replacement Contracts,” “Releasing Tax Dollars by Pulling Back from Gaza, Ukraine and other Foreign Wars,” “Getting out the Public Education vote in November,” “Poor People’s Campaign to Mobilize Low Income and Low Frequency Voters,” “the Continuing Struggle for Equal Access to Quality Public Education,” “Right-Wing efforts to Suppress Truthful Curriculum Across the Nation,” and “Promoting increased Public School funding.” 12
Members of the program committee at the time included chair Jonathan King, Quanta Dawn-Light, Rep. Carol Doherty (D-MA), Cole Harrison, Andrew King, Doug Selwyn, and Susan Siegel. Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) was invited to deliver the closing keynote speech, but it is not clear if he was present. 12
According to Parents Defending Education (PDE), which received a recorded video of the webinar, several speakers expressed anti-Israel opinions, with one part of the webinar being titled “the Human and Financial Cost of Israel’s Genocide of the Palestinian People.” A speaker from Massachusetts Peace Action, who was introduced using “they/them/their” pronouns, was unambiguous in condemning Israel. In addition, several speakers claimed to support “having young children learn about sexuality and gender identity.” One speaker “thanked” then-Vice President Kamala Harris for “introducing the word “fascist” into everyday language,” seemed to label then-former President Donald Trump a “fascist,” criticized “crypto dark money,” and criticized AIPAC for spending money against left-wing “progressive” candidates for political office. 12
The event page for the webinar featured commentary on the state of education in the United States, with MPA arguing that Congress must “sharply increase” the federal education budget and criticizing some Republicans for wanting to close the Department of Education. It also claimed that education in the U.S. was underfunded due to the “excessive” military budget and criticized private schooling. 12
Allied Organizations
In addition to its parent group Peace Action, Massachusetts Peace Action’s allied organizations as of 2025 included United for Justice with Peace; Mass Alliance; Budget For All; Fund Our Communities, Not War; Campaign for a Nuclear Weapons Free World; RaiseUp Massachusetts!; United for Peace and Justice; 2020 Action; and the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation. 13
Leadership
Brian Garvey was the executive director of both Massachusetts Peace Action and Massachusetts Peace Action Education Fund as of 2025. At that time, Garvey was also working as an activist organizer with the Raytheon Antiwar Campaign. His MPA biography states that he is particularly committed to MPA’s climate and nuclear disarmament united campaign as well as its peace economy campaign. 14
Cole Harrison was the administrative director of both Massachusetts Peace Action and Massachusetts Peace Action Education Fund as of 2025. He was the executive director of both groups from 2012 to 2024. He previously worked with Massachusetts People’s Budget Campaign, Massachusetts Poor People’s Campaign, Our Revolution Massachusetts, the Indigenous Legislative Agenda, United for Justice with Peace, and United for Peace and Justice (UFPJ). 15
As of 2025, MPA’s board of directors included co-chair Jonathan King, professor of Molecular Biology at MIT; co-chair Rosemary Kean, also a co-chair of Social Justice Committee of First Church Boston as well as a member of Dorchester People for Peace (DPP); Rosalie Anders, board member of Green Cambridge; Merri Ansara, founder of the Resistance Center; Harris Gruman, the executive director of the SEIU Massachusetts State Council; Keith Harvey, the regional director of the Northeast Region of the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC); Jackie King, former staffer at Fair and Opening Testing (FairTest); Valentine M. Moghadam, professor and director of the International Affairs Program at Northeastern University; Prasannan Parthasarathi, professor of history at Boston College; Kevin C. Peterson, founder and executive director of the New Democracy Coalition; Steve Powell, Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES); and Tony Van Der Meer, senior lecturer in the Africana Studies Department at the University of Massachusetts Boston. 16
References
- “History.” Massachusetts Peace Action. Accessed April 27, 2020. https://masspeaceaction.org/about/history/.
- “Unity Principles.” Women’s March. Accessed April 27, 2020. https://womensmarch.com/mission-and-principles.
- “Issues.” Massachusetts Peace Action. Accessed April 28, 2020. https://masspeaceaction.org/issues/.
- “2019 Boston Women’s March: Until All Voices Are Heard.” Mass Peace Action, January 19, 2019. Accessed June 28, 2025. Archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20230202104915/https://masspeaceaction.org/event/2019-boston-womens-march-until-all-voices-are-heard/
- “Massachusetts Peace Action V. City of Cambridge.” ACLU Massachusetts. Accessed April 27, 2020. https://www.aclum.org/en/cases/massachusetts-peace-action-v-city-cambridge.
- “Settlement Reached In Cambridge ‘Speech and Assembly Public Safety Charges’ Case.” ACLU Massachusetts. Accessed April 27, 2020. https://www.aclum.org/en/news/settlement-reached-cambridge-speech-and-assembly-public-safety-charges-case.
- “80+ Massachusetts Organizations Urge Adoption of Three Election Bill Amendments Ahead of Tuesday Vote.” Common Cause Massachusetts, June 12, 2020. Accessed June 29, 2025. https://www.commoncause.org/massachusetts/press/80-massachusetts-organizations-urge-adoption-of-three-election-bill-amendments-ahead-of-tuesday-vote/. Archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20250629133737/https://www.commoncause.org/web/20250629133737/https://www.commoncause.org/massachusetts/press/80-massachusetts-organizations-urge-adoption-of-three-election-bill-amendments-ahead-of-tuesday-vote/.
- “Palestine-Israel.” Massachusetts Peace Action, October 24, 2024. Accessed June 28, 2025. https://web.archive.org/web/20241024033055/https://masspeaceaction.org/our-issues/palestine-israel/.
- “Palestine-Israel.” Massachusetts Peace Action, October 24, 2024. Accessed June 28, 2025. https://masspeaceaction.org/our-issues/palestine-israel/. Archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20241024033055/https://masspeaceaction.org/our-issues/palestine-israel/.
- “Gaza Israel Mideast Peace Campaign.” Massachusetts Peace Action. Accessed June 29, 2025. https://masspeaceaction.org/our-issues/gaza-israel-mideast/. Archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20250629141107/https://masspeaceaction.org/our-issues/gaza-israel-mideast/.
- “Gaza genocide: Jeff Klein reports.” YouTube. Accessed June 29, 2025. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLmd7Hgtj_DpoazbKRdErTnriKgkiqR2zV.
- “Books Not Bombs 2024: Increasing Federal Investment in Public Education.” Mass Peace Action, October 26, 2024. Accessed June 28, 2025. Archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20241014174603/https://masspeaceaction.org/event/books-not-bombs-increasing-federal-investment-in-public-education/
- “Allies.” Massachusetts Peace Action. Accessed April 28, 2020. https://masspeaceaction.org/about/allies/.
- [1] “Staff.” Massachusetts Peace Action. Accessed June 29, 2025. https://masspeaceaction.org/about/staff/.
- “Staff.” Massachusetts Peace Action. Accessed June 29, 2025. https://masspeaceaction.org/about/staff/.
- “Board of Directors (Mass. Peace Action).” Massachusetts Peace Action. Accessed June 29, 2025. https://masspeaceaction.org/about/mapa-board/.