Featured
A California panel has called for billions in reparations for black residents. By AP and NPR
People listen to the California reparations task force, a nine-member committee studying restitution proposals for African Americans, at a meeting at Lesser Hall in Mills College at Northeastern University in Oakland, Calif., on Saturday, May 6, 2023.
California’s reparations task force voted Saturday to approve recommendations on how the state may compensate and apologize to Black residents for generations of harm caused by discriminatory policies. The nine-member committee, which first convened nearly two years ago, gave final approval at a meeting in Oakland to a hefty list of proposals that now go to state lawmakers to consider for reparations legislation.
U.S. Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Oakland, who is cosponsoring a bill in Congress to study restitution proposals for African Americans, at the meeting called on states and the federal government to pass reparations legislation. “Reparations are not only morally justifiable, but they have the potential to address longstanding racial disparities and inequalities,” Lee said. Read more
Political / Social
Grand jury may review NYC subway chokehold killing. By Josh Margolin, Kiara Alfonseca, and Aaron Katersky / ABC News
Jordan Neely is pictured before going to see the Michael Jackson movie.
The case involving the death of a homeless man on a New York City subway is likely headed to a grand jury next week, law enforcement sources said. The investigation into Neely’s death is ongoing. A grand jury would determine whether criminal charges are warranted, according to the sources. Detectives have interviewed more than six witnesses and are still looking to talk to several more. Read more
Related: An Eyewitness to Jordan Neely’s Death. Eric Lach / The New Yorker
Tucker Carlson, ‘White Men’ and the Lynch Mob Mentality. By Charles M. Blow / NYT
I have always been interested in the psychology of lynch mobs.
How did the people in these mobs — made up mostly of white men in the American accounts I’ve read — rev themselves up to peak barbarity? At what point did their humanity go dormant and bloodlust consume their beings? The sentiments expressed in one of Tucker Carlson’s text messages may offer a window. The incident Carlson was describing was a street fight, not a lynching in the classical sense, but by his own account, at least briefly, he wanted the attackers to take their attack to the ultimate end. In that moment, Carlson wanted the taking of the life of someone he described as an “Antifa creep.” Read more
Related: Tucker Carlson’s Code of Whiteness. By A.O. Scott / NYT
Related: “It’s not how white men fight”: Tucker Carlson and the death of Jordan Neely. By Chauncey Devega
A Cordial Invitation to Justice Clarence Thomas to Join Our Summer Vacation. By Terri Gerstein / The Progressive
My family doesn’t have an Adirondacks resort, private airplane, or superyacht, so I propose a road trip.
Dear Justice Thomas,
Summer’s almost here! I’m writing to invite you on a vacation. I realize we’ve never met, but you’re a lawyer and I’m a lawyer, so we have a lot in common. I’m hoping we could get to know each other, and perhaps become the dearest of friends. While we’re traveling, I’ll take care to avoid talking about workers’ rights or unions or labor issues, even though that’s what I think about most of my waking hours. I’ll also steer clear of voting rights or Black Lives Matter. And we should just enjoy the climate, not talk about whether it’s changing. Carpe diem, right? Read more
Related: Clarence Thomas Is How the Conservative Legal Movement Works. By Tim Murphy / Mother Jones
Related: Mob Justice at the Supreme Court. By Brooke Harrington / The Atlantic
Herschel Walker was joke candidate but now center of campaign scandal. By Mike Freeman / USA Today
Walker was never a viable candidate, and a new report shows what it would have been like had Walker won.
“According to the legal experts who spoke to The Daily Beast for this article, this scheme appears to not just be illegal—it appears to be unparalleled in its audacity and scope. The transactions raise questions about a slew of possible violations. In fact, these experts all said, the scheme was so brazen that it appears to defy explanation, ranking it among the most egregious campaign finance violations in modern history.” Read more
Andrew Gillum, Ex-Candidate For Florida Governor, Acquitted Of Lying To FBI. By Anthony Izaguirre / HuffPost
Former Florida Democratic candidate for governor Andrew Gillum, who came within a whisker of defeating Republican Ron DeSantis in 2018, was acquitted Thursday of lying to the FBI in a corruption case that also involved illegal use of campaign contributions.
But the federal jury hung on charges that Gillum funneled tens of thousands of dollars in campaign money to personal accounts. Prosecutors said they will retry him on those counts. They had claimed Gillum was struggling financially after quitting his $120,000-a-year job with the People for the American Way group to run for governor. Read more
Battle for Feinstein seat splits top Democrats. By Hanna Trudo and Caroline Vakil.
California’s Senate primary has put some of the most powerful figures in the Democratic Party on opposing sides in what is becoming one of the most closely monitored and unpredictable races of the 2024 cycle.
Progressive Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) got a big boost this week after Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.), a prominent establishment Democrat on Capitol Hill, threw his support behind her, crossing an ideological divide. That came after a leading voice on the left, Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), also offered her support, merging top figures from the Congressional Black and Progressive Caucuses. Read more
A Spirited Governor’s Race Brings Hope in Mississippi. By David Firestone / NYT
Brandon Presley is a Democrat running for governor in Mississippi. Credit…Damon Winter/The New York Times
It’s been 23 years since a Democrat was elected governor of Mississippi and 41 years since a Democrat was elected one of the state’s U.S. senators. The Republican lock on the state — along with the policies and noxious traditions that have kept it in the basement among U.S. states for most indicators of social health — sometimes seems impenetrable. Brandon Presley who has been polling fairly well and is making a strong case that the state desperately needs a change, advocating a series of popular policies that could make a real difference in the lives of Mississippians, particularly those on the lower economic rungs. The contest is already turning into one of the most interesting races of 2023. Read more
The Gospel of Candace Owens. By Clare Malone / The New Yorker
The Daily Wire host is waging a far-right fight for the soul of pop culture.
Owens, who is thirty-three, Black, conservative, and undeniably striking, with high cheekbones and almond-shaped eyes, moved to Tennessee two years ago to join the Daily Wire’s staff. Though she rose to prominence as a Trump supporter, much of her attention these days is on pop culture and life style, not electoral politics. “In my opinion, a huge reason that conservatives have ceded so much ground to the left is because we stuck up our nose to culture,” she said. Read more
Kentucky governor’s race: Daniel Cameron and Kelly Craft turn GOP primary into a knife fight. By Ben Jacobs / Vox
The wild primary in the most important election of 2023 pits a future GOP star against a megadonor. Shown is Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron speaks to the press at the Supreme Court on October 12, 2021, in Washington, DC. Alex Wong/Getty Images
The race has boiled down to a fiercely contested battle between Daniel Cameron, the state attorney general, and Kelly Craft, a Republican megadonor who served in the Trump administration, first as ambassador to Canada and then to the United Nations. The state’s agricultural commissioner, Ryan Quarles, is also in the mix as well but running a consistent third in public polls behind Cameron and Craft. Read more
How Rep. James Clyburn Protected His District at a Cost to Black Democrats. By Propublica and Daily Kos
The state legislature had begun the crucial task of redrawing voting district lines after the 2020 census. Even small changes in the lines can mean the difference between who wins office, who loses and which party holds power.
As the process commenced, Clyburn had a problem: His once majority Black district had suffered a daunting exodus of residents since the last count. He wanted his seat to be made as safe as possible. Republicans understood the powerful Black Democrat could not be ignored, even though he came from the opposing party and had no official role in the state-level process. Fortunately for them, Clyburn, who is 82 and was recently reelected to his 16th term, had long ago made peace with the art of bartering. Read more
Statehouses’ Targeting of Diversity and Tenure Is Starting to Scare Away Faculty Job Candidates. By Megan Zalneis / Chronicle of Higher Ed
Recently proposed and passed legislation that targets tenure and diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts are having a chilling effect on the recruitment of faculty members and administrators to Florida and Texas, where some of the highest profile of such laws and bills have been undertaken.
Not all of the proposed bills have become law yet, and the full extent to which candidates are being dissuaded from pursuing opportunities in both states is difficult to calculate. But faculty and union leaders there say would-be faculty members are questioning whether it’s wise to accept jobs where their research or teaching could be subject to political interference, public institutions’ DEI work is being curtailed, and the job security tenure has traditionally afforded is being undermined. Read more
Black mothers trapped in unsafe neighborhoods signal the stressful health toll of gun violence in the U.S. By Loren Henderson and Ruby Mendenhall / The Conversation
Black mothers are the canaries in the coal mine when it comes to the mental and physical harms of stress from living with gun violence in America.
We are Black women and public policy and sociology professors who study health inequities and sustainable policy solutions. Our research has found that Black mothers who feel trapped in neighborhoods they perceived as unsafe because of high levels of community violence are more likely to report elevated PTSD and depression symptoms, as well as elevated stress hormone levels. Read more
Related: Unwanted Epidurals, Untreated Pain: Black Women Tell Their Birth Stories. Claire Cain Miller and
I was young, Black, gay … and angry. By Darren Walker / Andscape
Darren Walker is president of the Ford Foundation.
Lessons Learned and Cherished: The Teacher Who Changed My Life, by ABC correspondent Deborah Roberts, is available now from Andscape Books. It includes essays from dozens of well-known people, including media mogul Oprah Winfrey, film director Spike Lee, ballet dancer Misty Copeland and Oscar award-winning actress Octavia Spencer, each recalling teachers who were important in shaping their lives. In the excerpt below, Ford Foundation president Darren Walker recalls a pivotal moment from elementary school. Read more
Ethics / Morality / Religion
On Tucker Carlson and the Fear of Being Replaced. By Russell Moore / Christianity Today
After his firing by the network, Tucker Carlson no longer has five hours a week. But his legacy ought to tell us just how much the church has secularized. Nowhere is this clearer than in the kind of replacement theory embraced by so many Christians.
Originating on the white nationalist fringes, the “great replacement theory” holds that “globalist” elites are seeking to replace white Americans with Black and brown immigrants from around the world. At the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, for instance, the alt-right crowd chanted, “You will not replace us; Jews will not replace us.” Read more
Related: Tucker Carlson’s Dark and Malign Influence Over the Christian Right. By David French / NYT
Latino faith leaders continue pressure against Gov. Ron DeSantis’ immigration bill. By Alejandra Molina / RNS
People demonstrate outside the Florida Statehouse in February 2022 to protest Gov. Ron DeSantis’ executive order that jeopardizes foster care licenses to those sheltering unaccompanied migrant children.
This legislation, if adopted, would incite fear and create barriers of needed care that our church immigrant and refugee ministries engage,’ reads a letter signed by hundreds of Latino pastors, faith leaders and congregants. Read more
12 modern disciples follow the subversiveness of Jesus in ‘People Get Ready.’ By Shannon Wimp / NCR
People Get Ready calls for disciples who are so imbued with a love for God and God’s Word that they cannot help but run into even the most desperate situations in order to be Christ’s hands and feet in the midst of it. (Dreamstime/Bernardo Ramonfaur)
The book argues that our time calls not for more preaching and teaching, but for disciples who follow “the example of Jesus into spaces marked by oppression and the tyranny of death, and there [make] manifest God’s love of all that God made” and “stand unapologetically on the side of the stranger, the outcast … against the present profanations.” In addition to O’Connor and Quiñónes, People Get Ready features two other well-known Catholics: author Toni Morrison and Msgr. Jack Egan, a priest of the Chicago Archdiocese active in the Civil Rights Movement during the 1960s. Read more
Historical / Cultural
Slavery and Disability in Antebellum America. By Christopher D.E. Willoughby / AAIHS
Harriet Tubman and formerly enslaved people, c. 1875
In 1794, U.S. inventor Eli Whitney patented a new type of cotton gin that could remove seeds from short staple cotton, the transformative crop that enslaved workers would plant across the Southern Blackbelt. This invention has often been characterized as a critical turning point in the history of U.S. slavery, when suddenly the institution went from seemingly dying to thriving, almost overnight. This was only a part of that history. The gin and other features of antebellum slavery would influence how disability was understood in the United States, as revealed in Jennifer Barclay’s new book The Mark of Slavery: Disability, Race, and Gender in Antebellum America. Read more
White power movements in US history have often relied on veterans — and not on lone wolves. By Kathleen Belew / The Conversation
In March 2023, Belew spoke at the Imagine Solutions Conference in Naples, Florida, about how the narrative of the “lone wolf” actor distracts from the broader threat of the white power movement in America. The Conversation asked Belew about her work. Her edited answers are below.
For decades, the white power movement has gained steady momentum in the U.S. Kathleen Belew is an expert on the history of the white power movement and its current impact on American society and politics. Her book “Bring the War Home: The White Power Movement and Paramilitary America” examines how the aftermath of the Vietnam War led to the birth of the white power movement. Read more
Tennessee Has Two White Faces. I’ve Seen Both of Them. By Ishmel Reed / Politico
The effort to silence the “two Justins” shows that my home state is still struggling to bury its Confederate past. Just ask my family.
Black Alabamians endured poor sewage for decades. Now they may see justice. By Brady Dennis / Wash Post
‘The fact this has gone on so long without action is significant,’ one top HHS official said over the problems endured by residents of Lowndes County
Officials in Alabama discriminated against Black residents in a rural county by denying them access to adequate sanitation systems, imposing burdensome fines and liens, and ignoring the serious health risks plaguing the community, according to a landmark environmental justice agreement announced Thursday by the Biden administration. Read more
Opera Ebony turns 50 this year, but its future is uncertain. By Brandon Gates / NPR
For half a century, Opera Ebony has been one of the guiding lights for Black performers looking to make their mark on the opera world. Born out of a necessity to develop talent often overlooked, the company gave many of its singers a much-needed break in the industry.
“Opera Ebony started in this living room, literally,” the company’s 81-year-old co-founder, Wayne Sanders (shown), told NPR as he settled back into a vintage loveseat. His Upper West Side apartment, filled with heavy antiques, was where he started the company in 1973, along with a white nun named Sister Mary Elise Sisson and his long-term roommate, friend and fellow musician Benjamin Mathews. The trio was concerned about the lack of opportunities for Black performers and helping young musicians to experience opera early. Read more
Black Music Sunday: ‘Spring has sprung, the grass has riz,’ and jazz is ‘where the flowers is.’ By Denise Oliver Velez / Daily Kos
American jazz musician Freddie Hubbard performs in New York City in 1985.
It’s spring here in New York, and May is usually filled with flowers, but few of mine are blooming yet. I walked out into my garden this week, looking at the winter damage which I’ve not yet repaired. A version of an old refrain, often incorrectly attributed to Ogden Nash, echoed in my head: “Spring has sprung and the grass has riz, I wonder where the flowers is?” I decided I’d have to celebrate my spring and the not-yet-blossomed flowers with music. I waltzed around to the sound of Freddie Hubbard’s “Up Jumped Spring,” which brightened a gray and cloudy day, and went digging through my music collection to find more tunes on spring, and flowers to lift my spirits. Read and Listen here
Kylie Jenner invites Kardashians to talk beauty standards. That’s big. By Hannah Yasharoff / USA Today
The Kardashians have served as the standard for beauty and body image for most of the past decade. Are they finally going to have a real discussion about the unrealistic ideals they’ve perpetuated?
Kylie Jenner‘s comments in the first trailer for season 3 of “The Kardashians” promises some discourse from the famous family: “All of us need to have a bigger conversation about the beauty standards we’re setting,” she says. “I don’t want my daughter to do the things I did.” The Kardashian empire’s influence is further complicated by the fact that they’ve been accused of appropriating beauty styles and body features associated with Black women, usually without giving them credit. And now those features are being dropped in favor of more white-centric features. “People like to see Black features on non-Black bodies,” Ima says. “For Black women, it’s the only time in history that our body types have been ‘in,’ so to speak. But then it also puts additional pressure on the Black women who don’t look like that.” Read more
Sports
Born into slavery, a Kentucky Derby champ became an American superstar. By Sydney Trent / Wash Post
Isaac Murphy was once called ‘The Prince of Jockeys’ during the fleeting era when African Americans reigned on the nation’s racetracks. Shown is jockey Isaac Murphy on the thoroughbred Tenny, c. 1890. (Keeneland Library photo collection, Hemment Collection) (Keeneland Library photo collection, Hemment Collection)
During the roughly 40-year post-Civil War period bound by the start of Reconstruction and Jim Crow, African Americans were among the sport’s biggest superstars. They drew legions of fans, an eager press and fat purses that were unthinkable for the overwhelming majority of Black men at the time. Isaac Murphy, who was born into slavery in 1861 and went on to shatter records and earn millions, outraced almost all of them, Black and White. Read more
Lamar Jackson became the highest-paid player in NFL history his way. By Adam Kilgore / Wash Post
Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson arrives for a news conference at the team’s facility on Thursday. (Julia Nikhinson/AP)
Earlier on Thursday, Jackson signed the contract that made him the highest-paid player in NFL history, a deal agreed to after stretches of acrimony that included his March trade request and the Ravens granting him the ability to seek offers from other teams. It ended with a $260 million contract, $185 million of it guaranteed, and the Ravens knowing their iconic quarterback will remain at the center of the franchise for five more years. Read more
Related: Lamar Jackson, Baltimore Ravens revel in record-setting NFL contract. By Chris Bumbaca / USA Today
How ‘Big George Foreman’ tells the story of two of America’s greatest boxers. By Malik Peay / Andscape
Khris Davis portrays the title character in Big George Foreman. Sony Pictures Entertainment/Everett Collection
Big George Foreman, in theaters now, begins by throwing viewers inside the eye of a tornado — a jam-packed stadium in 1974 in Kinshasa, Zaire, with thousands of people fixated on the boxing ring. In the center stood two giants of the sport: George Foreman and Muhammad Ali. Directed by George Tillman Jr., Big George Foreman: The Miraculous Story of the Once and Future Heavyweight Champion of the World follows Foreman as he navigates a childhood full of struggle and solitude to eventually become one of boxing’s biggest stars. Read more
Nothing Is Bigger Than Stephen Curry vs. LeBron James. By Sopan Deb / NYT
Curry and James are meeting in the playoffs, perhaps for the last time. Together and apart, they have redefined a generation of basketball.
James, with the Los Angeles Lakers, and Curry, with the Golden State Warriors, have the attention of the basketball world in the Western Conference semifinals. It’s not the biggest stage, like when they faced off in four straight N.B.A. finals from 2015 to 2018, as James played for Cleveland. But in the N.B.A., any stage they are on is the biggest one. Together and apart, they have for a generation defined a league whose individual stars can determine a team’s fate and shift the broader culture more than stars in other team sports can. Read more
F1 star Lewis Hamilton to wear rainbow helmet for LGBTQ rights. By Dustin Long and David K. Li. / NBC News
Famed Formula One driver Lewis Hamilton will wear a rainbow-adorned helmet this weekend in support of the LGBTQ community’s battle against legislation it has deemed as hostile.
“I really do continue to stand with the LGBTQ community and I’m wearing a rainbow flag on my helmet this weekend,” he continued. “I just really want to continue to support the community here and let them know I stand with them and I hope they continue to fight against it.” Hamilton made a clear distinction between residents of Miami and the lawmakers in Tallahassee. The world-famous British racer made his comments ahead of Formula One action in South Florida this weekend. Read more
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