Featured
Jonathan Kozol Fought School Inequality for Decades. Here’s One Final Plea. By Dana Goldstein / NYT
With his latest, and last, book, the 87-year-old writer refuses false optimism.
There are certain motifs in Jonathan Kozol’s half-century of writing about America’s failure to adequately educate poor Black and Hispanic children, which began with “Death at an Early Age,” a blistering account of his year teaching in the Boston Public Schools.
Now, at 87, he has published “An End to Inequality,” his 15th book — and his last, he says. It is an unapologetic cri de coeur about the shortcomings of the schools that serve poor Black and Hispanic children, and thus, the moral failure of the nation to end the inequality he has documented for decades. Read more
Political / Social
Don’t Think of It as a Contest Between Biden and Trump. By Jamelle Bouie / NYT
It’s official — we have a rematch.
Both Trump and Biden have far-reaching plans for the country, either one of which would transform the United States. Of course, one of those transformations would be for the worst, the other for the better. Read more
On Campaign Trail In Ohio, Trump Warns Of ‘Bloodbath’ If He Loses In November. By Meg Kinnard and Jill Colvin / HuffPost
Former President Donald Trump claimed that he — not President Joe Biden — will protect Social Security and warned of a “bloodbath” if he loses in November as he campaigned for Senate candidate Bernie Moreno in Ohio.
Trump, speaking on a wind-whipped airfield outside of Dayton Saturday, praised his chosen candidate in the race as an “America first champion” and “political outsider who has spent his entire life building up Ohio communities.” Read more
Unproven claims and ‘unprofessional’ witnesses: How judge arrived at DA Fani Willis ruling. By Josh Meyer / USA Today
Before the judge’s epic ruling Friday, there were nine weeks of contentious court battles and “he said-she said” legal motions over whether Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis could stay on the sweeping election fraud case against former President Donald Trump given her romantic relationship with her top prosecutor.
In the end, Judge Scott McAfee’s decision to allow Willis to stay − as long as she fired special prosecutor Nathan Wade − came down to what was said on the witness stand, including by Willis herself. Rather than vindicating her, the judge sharply criticized Willis for creating such a strong appearance of conflict of interest that either she and her entire office, or her former boyfriend, had to go. Read more
Related: Prosecutor Steps Down From Trump’s Georgia Case After Judge’s Ultimatum. By and
Related: Race is an ever present source of tension in Trump Georgia case. By Amy Gardner / Wash Post
Five Takeaways From Nikole Hannah-Jones’s Essay on the ‘Colorblindness’ Trap. By Nikole Hannah-Jones / NYT
How a 50-year campaign has undermined the progress of the civil rights movement.
Last June, the Supreme Court ruled that affirmative action in college admissions was not constitutional. After the decision, much of the discussion was about its impact on the complexions of college campuses. But in an essay in The Times Magazine, I argue that we were missing the much bigger and more frightening story: that the death of affirmative action marks the culmination of a radical 50-year strategy to subvert the goal of colorblindness put forth by civil rights activists, by transforming it into a means of undermining racial justice efforts in a way that will threaten our multiracial democracy. What do I mean by this? Here are the basic points of my essay: Read more
Gov. Ron DeSantis’ war on ‘woke’ may be waning in Florida. By Greg Allen / NPR
In Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis’ campaign against ideas he considers “woke” has run into some roadblocks.
A court settlement this week blunted his Parental Rights in Education Act, a law that critics call Don’t Say Gay. And earlier this month, a federal court blocked another key measure that DeSantis introduced in 2021 and called the Stop WOKE Act. It marked the beginning of DeSantis’ efforts to reshape how Floridians view and teach issues involving race and gender identity. Read more
Elon Musk Keeps Spreading a Very Specific Kind of Racism. By Arianna Coghill and Garrison Hayes / Mother Jones
Racist pseudo-science is making a comeback thanks to Elon Musk. Recently, the tech billionaire has been retweeting prominent race scientist adherents on his platform X (formally known as Twitter), spreading misinformation about racial minorities’ intelligence and physiology to his audience of 176.3 million followers—a dynamic my colleague Garrison Hayes analyzes in his latest video for Mother Jones.
X, and before it Twitter, has a long-held reputation for being a breeding ground for white supremacy. Dating as far back as the 2016 election, these extremists have used the app to sow seeds of misinformation and spread racism. Read more
Related: Tesla Settles Discrimination Suit With Former Factory Worker. By Jack Ewing / NYT
$1 billion donation for free medical school may increase racial diversity – and save lives. By Jessica Faiz and Utibe R. Essien / USA Today
When we saw recently that former Einstein professor Ruth Gottesman had committed $1 billion to help provide free tuition in perpetuity for all students, we immediately began to imagine what this gift would mean for training doctors of diverse backgrounds – doctors who could represent the Bronx, a county whose residents are 44.3% Black and 56.6% Hispanic, and provide the best care for patient populations most in need.
Regrettably, the latest data on medical school diversity is dismal: 5.7% of all doctors in the United States are Black while 7% are Hispanic, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges. Read more
Related: More Diversity Needed Among Health Care Board Members. By Steven Ross Johnson / US News
World News
America Owes a Historical Debt to Haiti. By Lydia Polgreen / NYT
Despite the violence and political turmoil in Haiti, New York Times Opinion columnist Lydia Polgreen argues that this might be the tipping point that finally brings peace to that island nation. Image SFBV
U.S. interference in Haiti has long been criticized, and in this audio essay, she says we finally have a chance to repair the damage we’ve done and help set the country back on a course toward dignity and democracy: “Just because there is this long history of failure doesn’t mean that success is not possible.” Listen here
Related: Washington Is Leaving Haiti in Limbo. By Grace Segers / TNR
Related: Haitians know how to persevere through deep crisis, often with humor. By Harold Isaac / NPR
Why Young Voters Aren’t With Biden on Israel. By Stephen Zunes / The Progressive
They’re progressive, more aware of racism, and have only known a rightwing Israel.
Young people are increasingly turning away from President Joe Biden as his administration refuses to budge in its support for Israel despite its assault on Gaza killing tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians. Older Americans, in contrast, largely remain in support of Biden’s stance. This generational gap could cost him the election. Read more
Related: Schumer Urges New Leadership in Israel, Calling Netanyahu an Obstacle to Peace. By Annie Karni / NYT
Ethics / Morality / Religion
At National Prayer Breakfast, Biden speaks of praying, working for peace. By Adelle M. Banks / RNS
We’re all blessed to live in a nation where we can practice our many faiths and practice them freely,’ Biden said at the U.S. Capitol’s Statuary Hall.
President Joe Biden vowed to keep working and praying for resolutions to global conflicts as he addressed the National Prayer Breakfast. He also urged congressional leaders not to treat those with whom they disagree as enemies. Read more
‘Interspiritual’ former pastor talks faith beyond church in new book. By Kathryn Post / RNS
Felicia Murrell’s ‘And: The Restorative Power of Love in an Either/Or World,’ is an invitation to explore an untethered spirituality where God doesn’t belong to any one institution.
A life coach and former pastor, Murrell has decades of experience in religious leadership. But after spending most of her life in churches that spanned the theological spectrum — and experiencing seasons of what she calls “church hurt” — she currently considers herself “interspiritual,” and her version of church often comes in the form of a spiritually hybrid group of women who gather over glasses of wine. Read more
The Terrifying Christian Nationalist Crusade to Conquer America. By Chris Lehman / The Nation
An extremist evangelical movement has set itself up to formulate the governing priorities of a second Trump administration.
In Politico, Alexander Ward and Heidi Przybyla chronicle the aims of a think tank called the Center for Renewing America (CRA), headed by Trump’s former director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russell Vought. The CRA is among the 100-plus conservative groups collaborating on Project 2025, a detailed and far-ranging blueprint for the Trump White House’s complete takeover of the administrative state. Vought’s policy shop brings a distinctly prophetic worldview to bear on such plans. Ward and Przybyla write: Read more
Related: White Evangelicals Want Christian Influence, Not a ‘Christian Nation.’ By Harvest Prude / CT
Related: New combative faith group to host ‘Catholic prayer’ for Trump at Mar-a-Lago. By Brian Fraga / NCR
My calling as a Christian minister: Stand up against evangelical hypocrisy. By Nathaniel Manderson / Salon
Right-wing evangelicals have perverted the Christian faith. As a follower of Jesus, I can’t stay silent
Some time ago, when I was working as a chaplain at a secular university, I had an article published condemning the hypocrisy of evangelical leadership. I was asked to stop writing things like that, or face the potential of losing my job. My answer to that was easy: I’ll keep writing what I write, and they can keep firing me. It is not my business to keep my job by sacrificing my integrity. Read more
Historical / Cultural
6 Side-By-Side Portraits Of Black Civil War Heroes And Their Direct Descendants. By Rokas Laurinavičius and Indrė Lukošiūtė / Boredpanda
The photographer and his researcher, Ottawa Goodman, found the descendants of the black American Civil War heroes and used his project to tell people, “These are the people you should really know about.”
David Miles Moore Jnr, a drummer boy in the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry and Neikoye Flowers, the direct descendant of David Miles Moore. David Miles Moore’s 1863 Army enlistment record lists him as a 5-foot 16-year-old. He stayed in the service until 1870. The descendant of David Miles Moore whom Gardner photographed is Neikoye Flowers, an elementary school student in Atlanta. Read more
Why a Native American Nation Is Challenging the U.S. Over a 1794 Treaty. By Grace Ashford / NYT
The Onondaga have asked an international commission to find that the United States violated a treaty guaranteeing the nation 2.5 million acres of land. Sidney Hill serves as Tadodaho, the spiritual leader of the Onondaga Nation.Credit…Lauren Petracca for The New York Times
Four or five years ago, Sidney Hill’s young son came to him with a question that Mr. Hill didn’t know how to answer. The boy had learned that day about the millions of acres of land that his people, the Onondaga, had once called home, and the way that their homeland had been taken parcel by parcel by the State of New York, until all that was left was 11 square miles south of Syracuse. “We lost all this land,” Mr. Hill recalled his son saying. “How can that be?” Read more
The Black Box of Race. By Henry Louis Gates Jr. / The Atlantic
In a circumscribed universe, Black Americans have ceaselessly reinvented themselves.
“Did you check the box?” Without missing a beat, my good son‑in‑law responded, “Yes, sir. I did.” “Very good,” I responded, as I poured a second shot. Aaron, a young white man, had checked the “Black” box on the form that Americans are required to complete at the time of the birth of a child. Now, my daughter’s father’s admixture—in other words, mine—is 50 percent sub‑Saharan African and 50 percent European, according to DNA tests. My son‑in‑law is 100 percent European. Because Maggie is 75 percent European, Ellie will test about 87.5 percent European when she spits in the test tube. Eleanor Margaret Gates‑Hatley, who looks like an adorable little white girl, will live her life as a “Black” person, because her father and mother checked the “Black” box. Read more
The Harlem Renaissance wasn’t just nightclubs. It was about ideas. By Phillip Kennicott / Wash Post
“Couple, Harlem,” by James Van Der Zee. (James Van Der Zee Archive, Metropolitan Museum of Art) The Met takes a look at a volatile, exuberant, contested moment in Black history
The word “new” is also central to the exhibition, which not only captures a vivid sense of cultural flowering in Harlem between the First and Second world wars but also traces the ideological fault lines that dominated so much of the discourse about the period. The word appears in the title of Alain Locke’s anthology “The New Negro: An Interpretation,” and it recurs in myriad conversations about a new identity, or new consciousness rising among Black people who had migrated to cities in the North, including to Harlem in New York. Read more
Dorie Ladner, Unheralded Civil Rights Heroine, Dies at 81. By Sam Roberts / NYT
She risked arrest and worse in pursuit of her goals of integration and voting rights from the time she was a teenager. Dorie Ladner, left, and her sister Joyce at the March on Washington in 1963. Ms. Ladner participated in virtually every major civil rights march of the 1960s.Credit…Danny Lyon Magnum Photos
Born and raised in racially segregated Mississippi by a mother who taught her to take no guff, Ms. Ladner joined the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee as a teenager; left college three times to organize voter-registration campaigns and promote integration; packed a gun on occasion, as some of her prominent colleagues were shot or blown up; befriended the movement’s most celebrated figures; and participated in virtually every major civil rights march of the decade. Read more
Retired FAMU prof barred from conference hotel during segregation. Now, he’s being honored. By Alaijah Brown / Tallahassee Democrat
Brodie, a retired Florida A&M University math professor, is known in the Tallahassee community for his 27-year run as treasurer of the Tallahassee branch of the NAACP, and his incredible story of sharing a jail cell with civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr. in Atlanta after a peaceful protest in 1960.
“I wanted to be a professional student,” Brodie told the Tallahassee Democrat about his decade long time in graduate school. “To sit in class and study and learn more about something I enjoy, that’s all I wanted to do.” One of his professors was a keynote speaker for the event and Brodie was excited for the opportunity to network with other mathematicians. But when they arrived, the head of the math department at the University of South Carolina told them their reservation at the host hotel could not be honored. “So, we could present the papers, but we couldn’t eat at the banquet, and we couldn’t stay at the hotel, so of course we objected to that and left,” Brodie said. Read more
“I tried on the American dream”: CNN analyst Natasha Alford on finding success without assimilating. By D. Watkins / Salon
The journalist on her memoir “American Negra,” multiracial identity, Black newsrooms, Trump, book bans and more
Existing in different spaces is not new to Alford, which she explains in her new book “American Negra,” a deep dive into Alford’s personal life as she came of age as a biracial brown girl in Syracuse, New York, learning to understand the beauty, the love and the difficulties that came with existing in both Black and Puerto Rican spaces. Read the Q&A of our conversation below to learn more about “American Negra,” colorism in the Latin community and to learn the life lesson Oprah shared with Alford that ultimately changed her life. Read more
NAACP Image Awards 2024: Here Are All The Winners. By
A-listers hit the red carpet for the 55th NAACP Image Awards on Saturday night.
This year’s show, hosted by Queen Latifah, took place at the Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall in Los Angeles. The show aired live on CBS and BET and followed a two-hour red carpet event that streamed live on the app Spill. The Image Awards recognized winners in several categories in non-televised virtual events leading up to Saturday’s two-hour special, from March 11 to 14. Read more
‘American Society of Magical Negroes’ cast and director say not to judge the film by its trailer. By
Justice Smith stars as Aren and David Alan Grier stars as Roger in “The American Society of Magical Negroes.”Courtesy of Focus Features. In Theaters
Libii’s film is a satire examining the “magical negro” trope, a term Spike Lee is credited with coining decades ago to call out Hollywood’s tendency to spotlight Black characters in supporting roles that cater to white main characters. Actor Justice Smith (“Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves,” “Jurassic World Dominion”) stars as Aren, a young visual artist who shrinks in the presence of white people and is recruited into the American Society of Magical Negroes by Roger, played by David Alan Grier, to hone his ability to make white people comfortable in order to keep Black people from being harmed. The happier they are, the safer we are,” Roger reasons to Aren. Read more
Caribbean musician Sherwin Gardner’s viral hit song surpasses 1 billion TikTok views. By Adelle M. Banks / RNS
It’s like a prayer,’ Gardner said of his hit song. ‘God already kind of answered that — within the first two weeks of the year.’
As Caribbean musician and minister Sherwin Gardner readied for the new year, he decided to share a snippet of music about blessings he hoped others would receive in 2024. That snippet turned into a viral sensation and led to the song “Find Me Here (Blessings Find Me),” which has reached American and international airwaves and a broad sweep of social media — to the tune of a billion views on TikTok. Read more
Sports
The NAACP is right. The state of Florida is hostile to Black athletes. By Mike Freeman / USA Today
Dear Black athlete: Congratulations to you! You’re a senior. You have a bright future. The colleges are knocking on your door. Southern Cal called. So did Alabama. Jim Harbaugh left Michigan but he called, too. Once a Wolverine, always a Wolverine.
Coaches at the University of Florida are recruiting you. Same with Florida State. You’re interested. But before deciding to attend a predominantly white institution in the state, please consider the words of the NAACP, written recently in a letter responding to Gov. Ron DeSantis’ attempts to weaken diversity, equity and inclusion efforts statewide. You need to sit down for this. Read more
How did Juwan Howard and Michigan basketball fall so far? By Brendan Quinn and Katie Strang / The Athletic
The University of Michigan announced Friday afternoon that Juwan Howard will not return as head basketball coach next season.
When Howard, then 46, was hired by his alma mater in May 2019, he had never before coached college basketball. But he returned to Ann Arbor with a quarter-century of NBA experience, infinite respect in the game, and Fab Five roots that the program had long needed to reconnect with. At his introductory news conference, Howard brushed away what he called “tears of joy” and told the gathered crowd, “My heart is with Michigan and will always be that way.” Read more
How the Black-led Jordan Brand steers Nike’s landmark $140 million Black Community Commitment initiative. By Aaron Dodson / Andscape
After the 2020 murder of George Floyd, Michael Jordan and his brand stepped up with $100 million in grants and the goal of changing the narrative of African Americans
Behind the closed doors of the Oprah Winfrey Theater, Sarah Mensah stepped onstage in a pair of Cherry Air Jordan 11s, set to speak on one of the most impactful philanthropic pledges in sportswear industry history. Mensah, a Black woman who became the first female president of Jordan Brand last year, delivered closing remarks for Nike’s Path to Progress ceremony, which the company hosted at the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington. The moment served as a check-in for Nike’s 10-year, $140 million initiative known as the Black Community Commitment. Nike and its two subdivisions, Jordan and Converse, launched the project in 2020 as a direct response to the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police. Read more
Deion Sanders has an unusual recruiting style: No home visits. By Brent Schrotenboer / USA Today
Colorado coach has been landing some top recruits but hasn’t visited them off-campus or used the private air travel service budgeted for him in his contract
In his first 14 months on the job as head football coach at Colorado, Deion Sanders has reeled in some of the top recruiting prospects in the nation, including offensive lineman Jordan Seaton and cornerback Cormani McClain. Records obtained by USA TODAY Sports also show he never even had to leave campus to seal the deal with them or any others. The university confirmed that “Coach Prime” has made no off-campus contacts with recruiting prospects since he was hired there in early December 2022. Zero. None. Read more
Malik Mack a star guard at Harvard was offered a lot except big NIL money. By Jesse Dougherty / Wash Post
BACK ON JAN. 20, before Harvard faced Penn in Philadelphia, an NBA scout stopped by press row and asked: “Are you here to figure out if Malik Mack will transfer? I mean, do you take $250,000 to go play somewhere else, or do you stay for the Harvard degree?”
That number, what Mack could earn from a name, image and likeness (NIL) collective at a school outside the Ivy League, was a semi-educated guess. The questions surrounding Mack — a very talented 19-year-old from Oxon Hill, Md. — run the full range from practical to philosophical: Should he leave behind one of the best educations on the planet, and should Harvard and the Ivy League care that, unless they embrace NIL payments like the rest of the country, their top players will face a lucrative crossroads every spring? Read more
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