After the Ku Klux Klan rally in Charlottesville, Virginia on July 8, 2017, a friend sent Regine Wright a photograph they found on social media. While we’ve been unable to identify the photographer, Wright (the officer on the left) remembers the scene. The counter-protester asked why she was helping the KKK. “I told him that I wasn’t there for the KKK, I was there to keep him safe and out of trouble,” Wright writes.
Credit: Courtesy of David McNair/The DTM
After the Ku Klux Klan rally in Charlottesville, Virginia on July 8, 2017, a friend sent Regine Wright a photograph they found on social media. While we’ve been unable to identify the photographer, Wright (the officer on the left) remembers the scene. The counter-protester asked why she was helping the KKK. “I told him that I wasn’t there for the KKK, I was there to keep him safe and out of trouble,” Wright writes. Credit: Courtesy of David McNair/The DTM
by Regine Wright |Regine Wright is a private investigator, Army veteran, and former police officer who lives in the Charlottesville Albemarle area with her husband and son. She is dedicated to helping others and enjoys all things true crime.
For Charlottesville, the Unite the Right Rally was traumatizing. For me, the Ku Klux Klan rally the month before, on July 8, 2017, was equally so. It reminds me of how my time as a Charlottesville police officer was complicated by the need to live between two worlds.
That Saturday, about 50 Klansmen and 1,000 counter-protesters came to Charlottesville. I was assigned to the investigations unit — the first Black female detective in department history. The investigations unit was tasked with escorting the KKK members to and from the Robert E. Lee statue. However, when the plan for the event was released, I was the only person from the investigation unit reassigned to a patrol unit for the day. >>Continue Reading on the Charlottesville Tomorrow Website
This story was published as a part of Charlottesville Inclusive Media’s First Person Charlottesville project. Have a story to tell? Here’s how.
Her words were a tribute to generations of Black Americans who she said paved the way for her elevation to the Supreme Court.
“In my family, it took just one generation to go from segregation to the Supreme Court of the United States.”
With those words, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson acknowledged both the struggles and progress of Black Americans in her lifetime.
Her words, delivered from the South Lawn of the White House on Friday, one day after her historic Senate confirmation, were a tribute to generations of Black Americans who she said paved the way for her elevation to the nation’s highest court.
Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, accompanied by President Joe Biden, and Vice President Kamala Harris, speaks during an event on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Friday, April 8, 2022, celebrating her confirmation to the Supreme Court. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
“I have now achieved something far beyond anything my grandparents could have possibly ever imagined,” Jackson said, noting they had gained only grade-school educations before starting their family and later sending their children to racially segregated schools.
“The path was cleared for me, so that I might rise to this occasion,” she said. “And in the poetic words of Dr. Maya Angelou, I do so now.”
Quoting Angelou’s famous poem, “And Still I Rise,” Jackson added: “I am the dream and the hope of the slave.”
Nina Turner, a former Ohio state senator who was a prominent surrogate for Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2020 Democratic presidential campaign, said Jackson’s speech was an awe-inspiring reminder of how far Black Americans have come amid their ongoing struggle.
“Expressing that realization out loud for all of the world to hear, as she is about to take her place as the first Black woman Supreme Court justice, was just magnificent,” said Turner.
“It is vitally important that we, as Black people, continue to remind this nation from whence we came,” she said. “The pain that it took to get to a ‘Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson’ could not be understated.”
Jackson, a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, said that she has been lucky on her path to the high court. Although her arrival breaks one of the remaining racial barriers in American democracy, many Black Americans still struggle to surmount systemic blocks.
She namechecked the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., the civil rights icon, as well as Black federal judicial trailblazers such as Justice Thurgood Marshall and Judge Constance Baker Motley, thanking them for their leadership and role modeling.
“For all of the talk of this historic nomination and now confirmation, I think of them as the true path breakers,” Jackson said. “I’m just the very lucky first inheritor of the dream of liberty and justice for all.”
Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s husband Dr. Patrick Jackson, right, and daughters Leila Jackson, second from right, and Talia Jackson, second from left, arrive on the South Lawn of the White House to celebrate the confirmation of Judge Jackson to the Supreme Court, Friday, April 8, 2022 in Washington. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
Melanie L. Campbell, president and CEO of the National Coalition on Black Civic Participation and convener of the Black Women’s Roundtable, watched Jackson’s speech from the White House lawn as an invited guest on Friday. With the sun shining through clouds over Washington, there was a palpable joy in the crowd over what Jackson symbolizes for the country, she said.
“It just felt like the ancestors were dancing.”
“I can see myself, in now-Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson,” Campbell added. “(Jackson) understands the significance of this moment for Black women, for women, for the nation. And it is a game changer.”
Others watching the speech also noted the diversity at the event and the image at the center — President Joe Biden flanked by the first Black female Supreme Court justice and the first Black and Asian American vice president.
Just before Vice President Kamala Harris introduced the president, she gushed over what Jackson’s confirmation will one day mean to her young, Black goddaughter.
“When I presided over the Senate confirmation vote yesterday, while I was sitting there, I drafted a note to my goddaughter,” Harris said. “I told her that I felt such a deep sense of pride and joy about what this moment means for our nation and for her future.”
Speaking directly to Jackson, Harris added: “And I will tell you, her braids are just a little longer than yours.”
Although the occasion will be noted in history books as a symbol of racial progress, Turner said Jackson’s elevation to the Supreme Court should be celebrated by Americans of all races and creeds.
“Not only should the entire Black community be proud, the entire country should be proud because this has certainly been a long time coming,” she said. “And from this victory, we certainly have an opportunity to continue to build and create more victories. We’re not done yet.”
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March 15, 2022; Nickole Hannah-Jones talks with Mark Sanders during the Red Smith Lecture at the Leighton Concert Hall in the Debartolo Performing Arts Center. (Photo by Peter Ringenberg/University of Notre Dame)
OPINION: Either CNN host Chris Wallace doesn’t know history, or he thinks Nikole Hannah-Jones shouldn’t discuss how America’s ‘greatest generation’ fought against democracy for Black people.
Editor’s note: The following article is an op-ed, and the views expressed are the author’s own.Read more opinions on theGrio.
One of the things that infuriates me about most Hollywood versions of Black history is how they cast crotchety, wrinkled white dudes as racists.
Think about it: Who were the men spitting on Black kids and yelling at protesters in the civil rights photos? (We’ve seen the pictures of the civil rights protests.) Who brought tiki torches in bulk to march at the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Va.? Who donned a Viking helmet and smeared feces inside the U.S. Capitol?
According to Chicago Project on Security & Threats, 78 percent of right-wing extremists arrested between 2015 and 2020 and 63 percent of the people arrested for the Capitol Hill insurrection were under 45 years old. George Stauber was 24 when he drowned Eugene Williams and sparked the Chicago Race Massacre during the Red Summer of 1919. James Earl Ray was 39 when he killed Martin Luther King Jr. Two of the four men who bombed the 16th Street Baptist Church in 1963 were under 40. Alabama teenagers shot and killed 13-year-old Virgil Ware minutes later. Kyle Rittenhouse was 19 when he took a long gun to a protest in Kenosha, Wisc. The reason why they call themselves Proud Boys and Boogaloo Boys is that old white people have stuff to do and people to oppress!
Far be it from me to write about the mistreatment of white men, but the notion that old white people are the most virulent kind of white supremacists is problematic in many ways. It’s why every generation seems to believe that their generation of white kids will magically disinherit themselves from the white supremacy perpetrated by their forefathers. Apparently, young white kids aren’t racist. Everyone knows racists are old.
Ask Chris Wallace.
On Thursday, the water-carrier-for-white-supremacy-turned-CNN+ host challenged Nikole Hannah-Jones, who has an actual degree in history and African-American studies, on actual history, African-Americans and her factual claims that the young white freedom fighters known as “the greatest generation” were responsible for withholding democracy from Black Americans.
CHRIS WALLACE: Here’s where I take some objection. If you say the country that we were fighting for democracy overseas, and we were not living in, walking the walk, talking the talk at home, I completely agree with you. But you specifically say the greatest generation brutally suppress it, many of this generation, brutally suppressing democracy for millions of Americans.
To me, and I think Tom Brokaw when he originally wrote the book, The Greatest Generation, was talking about 20-year-olds, 30-year-olds who came out of the farm fields of the Midwest, who came out of ethnic neighborhoods in Brooklyn and South Philly and storm the beaches of Normandy and and, you know, fought to defeat the most, the worst regime, I would argue in world history. And to say that they were 20, 30 year olds, the country was brutally suppressing Blacks, but the greatest generation wasn’t.
NIKOLE HANNAH-JONES: Well, they were.
CHRIS WALLACE: No, they weren’t, you don’t be telling me that a farm, that a kid coming off a farm in Indiana or a kid who came from Brooklyn, is was suppressing Black people?
NIKOLE HANNAH-JONES: Indiana has the largest population of the Klan in the United States. The Klan was raised, was reached first in Indiana.
CHRIS WALLACE: I understand but that wasn’t the 20-year-old kid who —
NIKOLE HANNAH-JONES: You don’t think 20-year olds were in the Klan?
CHRIS WALLACE: I didn’t think many of them were, no.
NIKOLE HANNAH-JONES: I mean, I don’t know what evidence you have of that.
CHRIS WALLACE: Well, what evidence do you have that they were, since you wrote it.
— Tommy moderna-vaX-Topher (@tommyxtopher) April 7, 2022
Nikole Hannah-Jones is right. Chris Wallace is wrong.
According to the actual facts, the greatest generation was racist AF.
Historians estimate that in 1925, the “second wave” of the Ku Klux Klan boasted between 3 and eight million official members, which means somewhere between 5 and 10 percent of white American males were members of the KKK. And it wasn’t just a Southern thing. Ohio, Pennsylvania and Indiana all had more than a quarter of a million Klansmen as citizens of their states.
Donald Trump’s father, Fred Trump, was actually arrested at a New York Klan rally when he was 21 years old. The greatest generation gave us America’s first blockbuster movie—Birth of a Nation—which was adapted from the book written by Thomas Dixon Jr., the “great-granddaddy of American white nationalism.” The New Negro movement, which birthed the civil rights movement, was inspired, in part, by Black World War II veterans returning home to inequality, discrimination and racial terrorism at the hands of the “greatest generation.”
But Chris Wallace is just a man who says things on television, and Nikole Hannah-Jones is a woman who knows things.
She knows that the murder that sparked the movement for democracy that we call the “civil rights era” began when 21-year-old Carolyn Bryant sicced her 24-year-old husband on Emmett Till. She knows that Robert Edward Chambliss, the man convicted for killing four little girls in a Birmingham, Ala., church bombing in 1963, was a member of the greatest generation. She knows that the record for the longest filibuster in American history is held by a member of the greatest generation, Strom Thurmond, who fought every effort for civil rights and true democracy and was repeatedly elected by the greatest generation. She knows that greatest generation member Edgar Ray Killen killed three civil rights workers who were fighting for democracy during the Freedom Summer of 1964. She knows that George Wallace, who vowed “segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever,” was part of the greatest generation. Jones probably knows that the men who murdered Medgar Evers, beat Fred Shuttlesworth and broke John Lewis’ skull were also part of the same great white dopes defended by Chris Wallace.
Here’s what else Chris Wallace doesn’t know.
In 1913, John, a high school graduate nicknamed “Speed,” earned his first job at the Library of Congress, a few blocks away from the neighborhood of his youth. Speed displayed such a skill for organizing and cataloging the library’s massive amount of material that, by the time he earned his law degree in 1917, Speed had been tapped for a new position at the Bureau of Investigation’s War Emergency Division.
Speed’s boss was Woodrow Wilson, who had become president by radicalizing the American youth with a new form of populist, white nationalism. When Wilson held the first movie screening in the White House, he invited Speed’s frat brother Thomas Dixon Jr. because his book was the basis for the racist blockbuster Birth of a Nation, which Wilson screened at the White House. Meanwhile, Speed got a new job in the Justice Department’s “radical division,” where he would convict Marcus Josiah Garvey of mail fraud. Garvey was the first of many Black leaders who would be targeted by Speed over the next 50 years.
But over that time, all the names would change. The New Negro Movement began to use the phrase “civil rights.” The “radical division” became the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The Bureau’s director, Speed, was now called J. Edgar Hoover.
Instead of employing law enforcement agents, Hoover preferred to hire military veterans with experience in surveillance and counterintelligence. After World War II, the FBI agents came exclusively from the ranks of military veterans. According to the book Enemies: A History of the FBI, these young, dogged G-men formed the spine of the greatest generation of FBI agents because they targeted “enemies” like W.E.B. Du Bois, Martin Luther King Jr., Thurgood Marshall and the leader of every movement for freedom and justice for the next 50 years.
Too bad there isn’t a movie about this.
Chris Wallace could star in it.
Michael Harriot is a writer, cultural critic and championship-level Spades player. His book, Black AF History: The Unwhitewashed Story of America, will be released in 2022.
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WHO said 9 million cases were reported, a 16% weekly decline, and more than 26,000 new deaths from COVID-19.
GENEVA (AP) — The number of coronavirus cases reported globally has dropped for a second consecutive week and confirmed COVID-19 deaths also fell last week, according to a World Health Organization report issued Wednesday.
In its latest pandemic report, WHO said 9 million cases were reported, a 16% weekly decline, and more than 26,000 new deaths from COVID-19. The U.N. health agency said confirmed coronavirus infections were down in all regions of the world.
However, it warned that the reported numbers carry considerable uncertainty because many countries have stopped widespread testing for the coronavirus, meaning that many cases are likely going undetected.
Claudia Lopez tests residents for the COVID-19 virus at Roseland Community Hospital on December 14, 2020 in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)
WHO said it was also tracking an omicron variant that is a recombination of two versions: BA.1 and BA.2, which was first detected in Britain in January. WHO said early estimates suggest the recombined omicron could be about 10% more transmissible than previous mutations, but further evidence is needed.
The agency has continued to warn countries not to drop their COVID-19 protocols too quickly and predicted that future variants could spread easily if surveillance and testing systems are shelved.
Last week, the U.K. said COVID-19 had hit record levels across the country, with government statistics estimating that about 1 in 13 people were infected. Those figures came on the same day the British government abandoned its free testing program.
Meanwhile, Chinese authorities conducted more mass testing this week across Shanghai, which remains in lockdown following another jump in infections; the city has recorded more than 90,000 cases but no deaths during the pandemic.
Despite growing public frustration and concerns about economic effects, China says it is sticking to its hard-line “zero-tolerance” approach mandating lockdowns, mass testing and the compulsory isolation of all suspected cases and close contacts. Following a public uproar, Shanghai authorities said Wednesday they would allow at least some parents to stay with children infected with COVID-19, making an exception to a policy of isolating anyone who tests positive.
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OPINION: The comedy documentary delves into the less glamorous side of life as a comedian in an insightful fashion.
Editor’s note: The following article is an op-ed, and the views expressed are the author’s own.Read more opinions on theGrio.
There was a fairly brief era of my life where, because of the success we had with Very Smart Brothas (VSB), I decided to take a shot at being a stand-up comic. A vast majority of the things Damon Young and I wrote at VSB were intentionally insightful and intentionally funny. We both realized early that taking a comedic approach to societal issues, where appropriate, was our bread and butter.
With this new goal in mind, I started studying comics like Richard Pryor and Eddie Murphy, of course, but also the ones whose bits particularly tickled my fancy, like Gary Gulman, Mitch Hedberg and Patrice O’Neal, among others. I got religious about studying structure, timing, etc. I started looking into comedy open mics in Washington, D.C., where I could get up on stage and try out this killer three minutes I was working on. I never did get on stage as a comic, but that didn’t change my interest in and appreciation for the craft and study of comedians.
Such brings me to the documentary Dying Laughing (released in 2016), which is currently streaming on theGrio TV and theGrio’s streaming mobile app. Despite featuring a litany of your favorite comedians (from Chris Rock and Kevin Hart to Bob Saget, Tiffany Haddish, Sarah Silverman, etc.; everybody’s in this documentary), this 1 hour and 20 minutes isn’t very funny. But that’s almost the point; it’s a film about the life of comedy and what it looks like day-to-day and what kind of person it requires you to be to both participate in and succeed as a comedian, which includes dealing with hecklers (which was particularly enlightening) and most insightfully, bombing.
If you are ever involved in creative endeavors, the idea of bombing (in your particular arena) isn’t foreign. When I write articles, especially ones where I am taking a stance where there is a significant division or creating an entirely new stance, I think about how it might be received. And because of social media, the negative responses come quick, fast and in a hurry. I imagine it’s like that with artists of all stripes; nobody hits on all cylinders at all times. But from listening to the comedians, there’s something especially deep about bombing as a comedian. One comedian, in particular, pointed out that it’s almost as if the audience hates YOU as a person. They don’t just hate the jokes or what you have on; they hate you. They’ve decided at that moment that you, as a person, are not worth listening to.
Consider that comedians are the masters of their own destiny. You live or die by the jokes you tell, and because it’s literally “thinking out loud for a living” and the validation of those thoughts either comes back immediately in the form of laughter (or desired interaction, i.e., gasps, groans, etc.) or silence, the pain or pleasure is swift. Several comedians interviewed spoke about how a bad set and being booed or heckled off stage would often sit in their psyche; the loneliness of a bad show takes up rent in their heads. It’s the kind of stuff that could make you quit. It’s truly fascinating hearing these successful people talk about the fears and downsides of the job.
Which brings me to the Royale Watkins, who isn’t a name that immediately rings a bell, but who I recognized (after a few rewinds) as Telly from Deliver Us From Eva, the 2003 movie starring Gabrielle Union, LL Cool J, Duane Martin, Essence Atkins and Megan Good, among others. Royale shares about a time on stage when he bombed so badly (in front of Michael Jordan, Bo Jackson and Richard Dent) and how in a fit of not knowing what else to do, he just put the microphone back on the stand and walked off the stage.
Now, that doesn’t sound that evocative on its own, but when you realize he’s telling this story through literal tears, you can feel the pain he felt. This man’s recollection of that evening brought him to tears during the filming of his segment. I had to stop it because it was drawing emotions in me. You think of comedians getting up on stage, people laugh, and all is well, but there is a significant emotional toll to getting up on a stage and sharing and then people effectively telling you that you suck and don’t belong there.
He mentions how Bernie Mac graciously got up there and brought him back out, and the crowd applauded, but that one memory was so painful for him, it’s amazing he continued in the profession. He’s quite successful, mind you; he’s even currently a writer on the show A Million Little Things and has done plenty, but the three minutes where he talks about bombing was powerful. I rewound it several times to really zero in and appreciate what he was sharing.
So yeah, check out Dying Laughing if you haven’t. I had never heard of it, and now I’m glad I watched it. Come for Chris Rock, Jerry Seinfeld and Kevin Hart and stay for the honesty, realness and insights on what it’s like to be a traveling comedian.
Panama Jackson is a columnist at theGrio. He writes very Black things and drinks very brown liquors, and is pretty fly for a light guy. His biggest accomplishment to date coincides with his Blackest accomplishment to date in that he received a phone call from Oprah Winfrey after she read one of his pieces (biggest) but he didn’t answer the phone because the caller ID said “Unknown” (Blackest).
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Marcus D. Boykin also gets 36 years for various weapons offenses, other charges
A man convicted of shooting at a Decatur police officer last year, setting off a police pursuit and standoff, has been sentenced to 50 years in prison.
A Macon County judge sentenced Marcus D. Boykin, 40, on Friday to 50 years for his attempted murder conviction and another 36 years for various weapons offenses and other charges. Those sentences will run concurrently with Boykin’s 50-year prison term.
Marcus D. Boykin (via: WAND-TV)
A jury had convicted Boykin in February of attempted murder for firing a shot in June 2021 at Decatur Police Officer Chris Snyder, the (Decatur) Herald & Reviewreported.
During his trial, jurors were told that Boykin drove right up to Snyder’s parked squad car and fired a single shot at him from almost point blank range.
Boykin was arrested following a police pursuit and a standoff with officers.
More than 20 police officers filled the public gallery for Friday’s hearing, including Snyder, Decatur Police Chief Shane Brandel and Macon County Sheriff Jim Root.
“When something like this happens to one of us, we all feel it, we suffer from it, we all suffer from the emotional aspects of a situation like this,” Brandel said after Friday’s hearing.
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The limp from his surgically repaired right leg grew more pronounced with each deliberate, cautious step.
AUGUSTA, Ga. (AP) — Tiger Woods used to turn weekends at Augusta National into gripping theatre, relentlessly charging up the leaderboard one fearless drive, one feathery iron, one nervy putt at a time.
Not now. Maybe not ever again.
The magic the five-time Masters champion summoned so easily for so long was nowhere to be found during another labored four-plus hour journey underneath the Georgia pines on Saturday. His 6-over 78 marked his worst in 93 career rounds at the tournament he has come to define and left him at 7-over.
The limp from his surgically repaired right leg growing more pronounced with each deliberate, cautious step, the 46-year-old slipped further down the leaderboard to end whatever chance — however unlikely — of being a factor come late Sunday afternoon.
Tiger Woods waves after a birdie putt on the second hole during the third round at the Masters golf tournament on Saturday, April 9, 2022, in Augusta, Ga. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)
There was no familiar charge in the early April chill. Just the reality that 14 months removed from a serious car accident that threatened to end his career, Woods can still play golf. He just can’t do it — at least not at the moment — at the level needed to compete in a field consisting of younger players, many who grew up idolizing him but have long outgrown standing in awe of him.
Following a gritty back-nine push on Friday that helped him stay on the fringe of contention, Woods walked to the first tee Saturday two hours before the leaders. Looking to send a jolt through the gallery that stood five-deep in places hoping for a glimpse and a chance to roar, Woods instead spent most of the afternoon silently glaring at the hole or his putter — or both.
He three-putted the par-4 first from 54 feet for a bogey, a sign of things to come. On the par-4 fifth, he slung his club in disgust after his approach drifted to the right, far away from a back left hole location. His lag attempt from 60-feet over a ridge was well short. His 9-foot par putt rolled his 3-feet by and his comebacker for bogey hit the hole and bounced out. It was Woods’ first four-putt at the Masters — ever.
Things never really got better. Three more three-putts followed on an afternoon where nothing really felt right. And it wasn’t just his leg. It was his back. His hands. His posture. Everything.
Even worse, there seemed to be no way to compensate. He tinkered, the kind of searching usually reserved for the practice range, not in the middle of a major.
“As many putts as I had, you’d think I’d have figured it out somewhere along the line, but it just didn’t happen,” he said.
While Woods was slowly making his way up the 18th fairway, leader Scottie Scheffler — just 25 and the world’s top-ranked golfer — was making the turn doing at the Masters what Woods has done so often over the last quarter-century: imposing his will on the course and the tournament.
“We all wish we had that two, three-month window when we get hot, and hopefully majors fall somewhere along in that window,” Woods said. “We take care of it in those windows. Scottie seems to be in that window right now.”
Tiger Woods watches his tee shot on the fourth tee during the third round at the Masters golf tournament on Saturday, April 9, 2022, in Augusta, Ga. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
A window that is currently closed for Woods. While it would be easy to call his mere presence in northeast Georgia this weekend a victory in itself considering last fall he wondered if he’d ever play competitively again, Woods isn’t in this to be a feel-good story. He has no interest in being a ceremonial field filler.
His steely 1-under 71 during the first round on Thursday only seemed to embolden him. Following a shaky front-nine 39 on Friday, he recovered to shoot 74 and easily get in under the cutline.
He opened with another sloppy 39 on the front Saturday. And for a few fleeting minutes shortly after he made the turn, it appeared another rally was in store.
A crisp iron to 14 feet on No. 12 and a two-putt birdie at the par-5 13th provided a spark that never became a flame. He bogeyed the 16th and 17th and his approach up the hill to the 18th sailed into the gallery. His bump-and-run caught the slope and kept rolling, with Woods gingerly chasing after it long before it came to a stop nearly 60 feet away from the pin.
Three more putts and his worst round at Augusta was finally over. His 78 was one more than the 77 he put together in the third round of his first trip to Augusta in 1995.
He was an amateur back then, a 19-year-old phenom. Two years later, he was a champion. Two-plus decades later, he is a Hall of Famer and one of the greatest in the history of his sport. He’s also a middle-aged father of two trying to recapture something far more elusive than it used to be.
“Each and every day is a challenge,” he said. “Each and every day presents its own different challenges for all of us. I wake up and start the fight all over again.”
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Many have questioned why Smith was allowed to remain seated front row at the Academy Awards
The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences said that Will Smith was asked to leave to Sunday’s Oscars after hitting Chris Rock but refused.
Many have questioned why Smith was allowed to remain seated front row at the Academy Awards after the incident. On Wednesday, the academy suggested that it attempted to remove the actor from the audience.
Will Smith accepts the award for Best Actor in a Leading Role for “King Richard” onstage during the 94th Oscars at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, California on March 27, 2022. (Photo by Robyn Beck / AFP) (Photo by ROBYN BECK/AFP via Getty Images)
“Things unfolded in a way we could not have anticipated,” the academy said. “While we would like to clarify that Mr. Smith was asked to leave the ceremony and refused, we also recognize we could have handled the situation differently.”
The academy’s board of governors met Wednesday to initiate disciplinary proceedings against Smith for violations against the group’s standards of conduct. The academy said Smith has the opportunity to defend himself in a written response before the board meets again on April 18. The academy said disciplinary action for Smith could include suspension, expulsion or other sanctions.
The film academy earlier condemned Smith’s onstage assault of Rock. But it used stronger language Wednesday.
Chris Rock and Will Smith onstage during the show at the 94th Academy Awards at the Dolby Theatre at Ovation Hollywood on Sunday, March 27, 2022. (Myung Chun / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
“Mr. Smith’s actions at the 94th Oscars were a deeply shocking, traumatic event to witness in-person and on television,” the academy said.
“Mr. Rock, we apologize to you for what you experienced on our stage and thank you for your resilience in that moment. We also apologize to our nominees, guests and viewers for what transpired during what should have been a celebratory event.”
On Monday, Smith issued an apology to Rock, the academy and to viewers, saying “I was out of line and I was wrong.”
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Opinion: Consider this a friendly reminder that players aren’t compensated for the labor that produces ginormous bags of money for everyone else.
March Madness is back, signaling a return of office pools, watch parties, and—if we’re lucky—a bunch of buzzer-beating baskets throughout the tournaments.
It’s also a fine time to recall a dirty detail about this vast enterprise, a little fact that big-time college hoops shares with big-time college football. Recent relaxations of NCAA rules might have obscured the truth and pushed it out of mind, but the reality remains unchanged, so don’t get it twisted.
Consider this a friendly reminder: Players aren’t compensated for the labor that produces ginormous bags for everyone else, from coaches making eight figures, athletic directors making seven figures and down the line.
Former Ole Miss basketball player Kylia Carter—mother of Orlando Magic forward and former Duke star Wendell Carter Jr.—nailed it during remarks to the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics in 2018. She said the NCAA is a system “where the laborers are the only people that are not being compensated for the work they do while those in charge receive mighty compensation. The only two systems where I’ve known that to be in place are slavery and the prison system.”
I know you’re thinking, “That’s changed. What about players’ deals for their name, image, and likeness? The NCAA allowed them to start making loot on NIL last summer. Doesn’t that count?”
Yes, it does.
But that does not cover the money-making sweat athletes break on their schools’ behalf.
Imagine we’re talking about the car industry, with Power 5 conferences as automakers and individual schools as models. Let’s say the Atlantic Coast Conference is Toyota and Duke represents Camrys; the Southeastern Conference is Chevrolet and Alabama represents Impalas; the Big Ten is Ford and Michigan represents Explorers; etc.
The assembly-line workers put in long hours and gain a measure of celebrity for their skill, expertise, and artistry. Toyota and particularly Camry builders are stars among basketball fans. Chevy and especially Impala builders draw a massive following among football fans. Ford and, notably, Explorer builders enjoy wide crossover appeal within both circles.
Businesses take note and decide some workers could be useful in advertising campaigns locally and perhaps nationally. Deals are made, and workers begin appearing on billboards, commercials, and promotions. Nice side-hustle for the workers, right?
Until you learn they toil on the assembly lines for free.
Critics complained about the arrangement for years, but the national association of automakers (the NCAA) always said its workers were paid in other ways—just not with money. Even worse, the companies threatened to fire workers who made any dough. Finally, with pressure mounting from politicians and workers’ rights groups, the automakers relented.
But only to the point of greenlighting side gigs!
Withholding athletes’ NIL rights should’ve been illegal from the jump. How are you gonna tell some students (athletes) that they can’t profit off their own name, image and likeness, yet other students (non-athletes) are free to stack paper as high as possible?
Now, just because the NCAA has ended one jacked-up practice, we’re supposed to forget about the other one, the free labor on the assembly line? No.
It’s still a rip-off.
The workers can’t even get comfy with their new rights because the bosses are mad. Accustomed to controlling every aspect of their student-athletes, the NCAA is looking to dial it back on NIL. Athletes making money and enjoying the freedom to easily switch schools—just like coaches—is too much to swallow. “We expect that all members and their representatives are abiding by current NCAA rules regarding recruiting and pay-for-play, which are in place to support student-athletes,” NCAA President Mark Emmert said.
If he really wants to support the athletes responsible for a multi-billion-dollar industry built on basketball and football, there’s an easy solution.
Stop the madness and pay them.
An award-winning columnist and a principal of BlackDoor Ventures, Inc., Deron Snyder is a veteran journalist, stratcomm professional, author, and adjunct professor. A native of Brooklyn and an Alpha from H.U.-You Know, he resides in metropolitan DC with his wife, Vanessa, mother of their daughters, Sierra and Sequoia. To learn more, please visit blackdoorventures.com/deron.
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The percentage of people overlooked during the 2020 census was much higher for some minority groups.
The 2020 census missed an unexpectedly small percentage of the total U.S. population given the unprecedented challenges it faced, according to a report released Thursday, but civil rights leaders were outraged that Black, Hispanic and American Indian residents were overlooked at higher rates than a decade ago.
Protesters gather outside the U.S. Supreme Court as the court hears oral arguments in the Commerce vs. New York case April 23, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
The percentage of people overlooked during the 2020 census was much higher for some minority groups, with the Asian population being an exception, the Census Bureau said in a report that measured how well the once-a-decade head count tallied every U.S. resident and whether certain populations were undercounted or overrepresented in the count. Overcounts take place, for example, if someone owns a vacation home and is counted there as well as at a home address.
Marc Morial, president and CEO of the National Urban League, blamed political interference by the Trump administration, which tried unsuccessfully to add a citizenship question to the census form and cut field operations short.
“These numbers are devastating. Once again, we see an overcount of white Americans and an undercount of Black and Hispanic Americans,” Morial said on a call with reporters. “I want to express in the strongest possible terms our outrage.”
The Black population in the 2020 census had a net undercount of 3.3%, while it was almost 5% for Hispanics and 5.6% for American Indians and Native Alaskans living on reservations. The non-Hispanic white population had a net overcount of 1.6%, and Asians had a net overcount of 2.6%, according to one of the reports.
In the 2010 census, by comparison, the Black population had a net undercount of more than 2%, while it was 1.5% for the Hispanic population. There was almost a 4.9% undercount for American Indian and Alaskan Natives living on reservations, and it was 0.08% for Asians. The non-Hispanic white population had a net overcount of 0.8%.
The 2020 census missed 0.24% of the entire U.S. population, a rate that wasn’t statistically significant, while it missed 0.01% in the 2010 census.
The U.S. Census logo appears on census materials received in the mail with an invitation to fill out census information online on March 19, 2020 in San Anselmo, California.(Photo Illustration by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
The census figures help determine the distribution of $1.5 trillion in federal spending each year as well as how many congressional seats each state gets. Any undercounts in various populations can shortchange the amount of funding and political representation they get over the next decade.
In the years leading up to the 2020 census, advocates worried that a failed attempt by the Trump administration to add a citizenship question to the census questionnaire would scare off Hispanics and immigrants from participating, whether they were in the country legally or not. The Trump administration also unsuccessfully tried to get the Census Bureau to exclude people in the country illegally from numbers used for divvying up congressional seats among the states and cut short the schedule for field operations that had been extended because of the pandemic.
During a conference call Thursday, Census Bureau Director Robert Santos said many Latino communities throughout the U.S. suffered during the pandemic from joblessness and housing insecurity, and that played a role in the undercount. But he added that the Trump administration’s actions also may have had an impact.
“I’m personally not surprised to see the results we see today,” said Santos, who was sworn into the position at the beginning of the year.
Arturo Vargas, CEO of NALEO Educational Fund, said he had never seen such a large undercount in the Hispanic population during 35 years of following the census.
“As you can imagine, we are just terribly — I can’t even find the word right now — upset about the extent of the Latino undercount,” Vargas said on the conference call.
About 70% of Native Americans live on reservations. James Tucker, the chairman of a Census Bureau advisory committee, estimated the undercount translates to at least 100,000 Native Americans on reservations not counted and more than a $300 million loss in federal funding for Indian Country annually.
“The substantial resources and efforts that tribes and national and local organizers made to get a complete count in Indian Country made a difference,” Tucker said. “Without those efforts, the undercount undoubtedly would have been much greater than it was.”
The pandemic disrupted census operations and schedules, and it made residents wary of opening their doors to answer questions from census takers. Wildfires in the West and hurricanes in the Gulf Coast during the door-knocking phase of the head count sent residents fleeing from their homes.
In the first report released Thursday, the Post-Enumeration Survey, a sample of households was re-interviewed by census takers and those responses were matched with their 2020 census results. The second report, the Demographic Analysis, used immigration data and birth and death records to calculate the population, which was compared to the 2020 census results.
OPINION: Moderates don’t want the Michigan representative to mention their role in creating gridlock on the president’s agenda, but Tlaib will stay focused on fighting for Biden’s policies and everything the American people need.
Did y’all catch all of the headlines, pre-emptive messaging attacks and alarm bells centrist Democrats recently hurled at The Squad and progressive Democrats? You know, the repeated stories about how Squad politics will sink Democrats in the midterm elections and how Rep. Rashida Tlaib’s (D-Mich.) response to President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address tonight is the equivalent of “keying your own car and slashing your own tires.”
When I tell you centrist Democrats are pressed, that is an understatement. But while they are all up in arms, Rep. Tlaib is staying focused on progressive Democrats’ mission of fighting to deliver on President Biden’s agenda and everything that the American people desperately need. Honestly, this has been their goal for years. So, it’s unclear why anyone is shocked or scared of what the congresswoman from Michigan will say tonight.
In an interview with the Nation, Rep. Tlaib makes it plain that she will remind President Biden of the same energy that he had on the 2020 campaign trail when he set a positive, inspiring vision for the country and how he didn’t hesitate to enact it when he took office, especially his swift action to pass the American Rescue Plan. “In particular, she will argue that Democrats need to refocus attention on the Build Back Better agenda as the 2022 midterm elections approach,” the Nation’s John Nichols writes. “‘I’ll literally say, ‘Mr. President, it’s unfinished. We’re here to help. Let’s get it done,’” Tlaib said.
This sounds 100 percent rational and factual to me. The Congressional Progressive Caucus has been front and center working to advance President Biden’s agenda, and Rep. Tlaib will celebrate achievements like the effectiveness of the child tax credit that Biden included in the American Rescue Plan and how it pulled millions of children out of poverty, how critical investments were throughout this pandemic in historically excluded communities as well as the president’s historic nomination of the first Black woman to the Supreme Court with Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson. Rep. Tlaib will also likely push Biden on critical issues like canceling student loan debt and expanding benefits and support for people experiencing poverty.
U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) speaks as Reps. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) listen during a press conference at the U.S. Capitol on July 15, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Alex Wroblewski/Getty Images)
But the fact remains that the president’s agenda is unfinished, and the president and Democrats must use their majorities in Congress to refocus on delivering their campaign commitments as we approach the November midterm elections. Truly, this is the most basic of election strategies—help as many people as you can by delivering on what you promised.
The cornerstone of Rep. Tlaib’s speech tonight is that “It doesn’t have to be this way,” and her response is, quite frankly, a well-timed push for President Biden and Democrats to get to work. It’s not divisive to say that there is still a window of time where Democrats can pass components of the Build Back Better legislation that will help people right now. It’s not divisive to outline progressives’ continued support for President Biden’s vision and 2020 campaign promises. It’s not divisive to express the frustration and the urgency that people who are struggling across the nation are feeling in real time. It’s not divisive to tell the nation that progressives are fighting to deliver an agenda that is still overwhelmingly popular.
If only centrists saw things the same way.
In their minds, by calling out the reality that President Biden’s agenda is unfinished, centrist Democrats feel that tinge of stress in their chests because of their role in obstructing portions of his agenda alongside Republicans. I’m talking about those threats from centrist Democrats that prompted the decoupling of the bipartisan infrastructure deal from the Build Back Better Act, all but dooming the latter. And remember how centrists dragged out the negotiations for Build Back Better by repeatedly moving targets and forcing false choices between key provisions like lowering prescription drug costs or expanding Medicare benefits to include vision and dental coverage and extending the child tax credit or offering paid family leave.
Centrist Democrats don’t want Rep. Tlaib to mention their role in creating the conditions for the gridlock and inaction on President Biden’s agenda. So, instead, they introduce diversions—cue the flurry of headlines over the past two weeks. Then, they talk about how it’s irregular for members of the president’s party to offer a response to the State of the Union address—though it’s not. Rep. Jamaal Bowman offered remarks in 2021, also on behalf of the Working Families Party. So, this is not the first time remarks will be made while a Democratic occupies the White House.
Ultimately, their efforts are all for naught, and I fully expect that Rep. Tlaib will still call out the centrist Democrats as part of the problem, as she should.
Juanita Tolliver is a veteran political strategist and MSNBC Political Analyst who previously served as National Political Director at Supermajority and Director of Campaigns at the Center for American Progress. Follow her on Twitter: @juanitatolliver.
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The British YouTuber who helped musicians gain exposure has died, his family confirmed
Jamal Edwards, a British music entrepreneur who championed U.K. rap and grime and helped launch the careers of artists including Ed Sheeran, Jessie J and Stormzy, has died. He was 31.
His mother, broadcaster Brenda Edwards, said Monday that her son died the day before after a sudden illness. She said the family was “completely devastated. He was the center of our world.”
Edwards founded the online music channel SBTV as a teenager in 2006. Frustrated that he could not find the music he loved online, he began filming performances by friends in his west London neighborhood. SBTV now has more than 1.2 million subscribers on YouTube and has helped a generation of performers, including rappers like Stormzy, Skepta and Dave, gain national and international attention.
Jamal Edwards holds his Member of the British Empire (MBE) after it was awarded to him by the Prince of Wales at an Investiture Ceremony at Buckingham Palace in London on March 26, 2015. (John Stillwell/PA via AP, File)
“It was a frustration of going to school and everyone talking about ‘How do we get our videos on MTV,’” Edwards later recalled. “YouTube was like a year old. I was like ‘I’ve got a camera for Christmas, I’m going to start filming people and uploading it.’
“Everyone was looking at me like ‘what are you doing, like you can compete with these major corporations.’ But I think I was early enough to believe that I could make a change.”
Prince Charles with Jamal Edwards at the launch of the Prince’s Trust Summer Sessions in Chatham, England, July 7, 2013.(Chris Jackson/PA via AP, File)
Edwards was given an MBE, an honor from the queen, in 2014 for services to music and was an ambassador for Prince Charles‘ charity, the Prince’s Trust.
Prince Charles’ Clarence House office tweeted: “Thinking of the family of Jamal Edwards today. His work in music but also as an ambassador for a new generation, including his work for The Prince’s Trust, were an inspiration to so many.”
Edwards’ sudden death shocked Britain’s entertainment business.
Virgin boss Richard Branson and Music entrepreneur Jamal Edwards, right, pose for a photo, at the Impatience is a Virture Festival at the Royal Opera House, London, Sept. 7, 2012. (Lewis Whyld/ PA via AP, File)
“My first ever interview was with you. Jamal,” singer Rita Ora wrote on Instagram. “Our endless talks on music and the belief you had in me and so many of us before we even believed in ourselves. I’m devastated.”
Actor Adam Deacon said he was “heartbroken.”
“Jamal was one of the nicest, most down to earth and humble men I’ve met in this industry. He always gave me time even when no one else would. He was an inspiration and what he achieved in life was truly remarkable.”
Rapper and producer Example, whose full name is Elliot Gleave, said: “Can’t believe you’re gone. 31 years old. Can’t find the words right now.”
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Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, accompanied by President Joe Biden, and Vice President Kamala Harris, speaks during an event on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Friday, April 8, 2022, celebrating her confirmation to the Supreme Court. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s husband Dr. Patrick Jackson, right, and daughters Leila Jackson, second from right, and Talia Jackson, second from left, arrive on the South Lawn of the White House to celebrate the confirmation of Judge Jackson to the Supreme Court, Friday, April 8, 2022 in Washington. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
Claudia Lopez tests residents for the COVID-19 virus at Roseland Community Hospital on December 14, 2020 in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)
Marcus D. Boykin (via: WAND-TV)
Tiger Woods waves after a birdie putt on the second hole during the third round at the Masters golf tournament on Saturday, April 9, 2022, in Augusta, Ga. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)
Tiger Woods watches his tee shot on the fourth tee during the third round at the Masters golf tournament on Saturday, April 9, 2022, in Augusta, Ga. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
Will Smith accepts the award for Best Actor in a Leading Role for “King Richard” onstage during the 94th Oscars at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, California on March 27, 2022. (Photo by Robyn Beck / AFP) (Photo by ROBYN BECK/AFP via Getty Images)
Chris Rock and Will Smith onstage during the show at the 94th Academy Awards at the Dolby Theatre at Ovation Hollywood on Sunday, March 27, 2022. (Myung Chun / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
Protesters gather outside the U.S. Supreme Court as the court hears oral arguments in the Commerce vs. New York case April 23, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
The U.S. Census logo appears on census materials received in the mail with an invitation to fill out census information online on March 19, 2020 in San Anselmo, California.(Photo Illustration by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) speaks as Reps. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) listen during a press conference at the U.S. Capitol on July 15, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Alex Wroblewski/Getty Images)
Jamal Edwards holds his Member of the British Empire (MBE) after it was awarded to him by the Prince of Wales at an Investiture Ceremony at Buckingham Palace in London on March 26, 2015. (John Stillwell/PA via AP, File)
Prince Charles with Jamal Edwards at the launch of the Prince’s Trust Summer Sessions in Chatham, England, July 7, 2013.(Chris Jackson/PA via AP, File)
Virgin boss Richard Branson and Music entrepreneur Jamal Edwards, right, pose for a photo, at the Impatience is a Virture Festival at the Royal Opera House, London, Sept. 7, 2012. (Lewis Whyld/ PA via AP, File)