Black Lives Matter movement begins in Oakland, California.

(July) The phrase is part of a Facebook message posted by Alicia Garza after the man charged in the Florida shooting death of Trayvon Martin, 17, was acquitted. Garza’s friend, Patrisse Cullors, then creates the hashtag: #BlackLivesMatter. Opal Tometi of Brooklyn subsequently builds a social media platform on Facebook and Twitter with that name that gain popularity after Michael Brown, 18, is shot and killed by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, in August 2014.