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Black Unemployment Rate Jumped to 11.4 Percent in July by Frederick H. Lowe

August 3, 2014

Black Unemployment Rate Jumped to 11.4 Percent in July
By Frederick H. Lowe

chart-unemployment for july

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from TheNorthStarNews.com

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - July was a bad news month for African-American workers, although nonfarm payroll employment increased by 209,000.

The overall unemployment rate on a seasonally adjusted basis for Blacks climbed to 11.4 percent, up from 10.7 percent in June, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported this morning.

The jobless rate for Black men 20 years old and older was 11.1 percent in July compared to 10.9 percent in June. And the unemployment rate for Black women 20 years old and older was 10.1 percent in July, dramatically up from 9 percent in June.

The jobless rate for Black workers is twice as high or even higher than other racial or ethnic groups. The unemployment rate for Whites was 5.3 percent in July, the same as it was in June. The jobless rate in July for White men 20 years old and older was 4.8 percent, down from 4.9 percent in June.

The number of White women 20 years old and older who were out of work in July was 4.9 percent, up slightly from June, which was 4.8 percent.

Hispanics also fared better in the job market compared to African-Americans. The jobless rate for Hispanics was 7.8 percent in July, the same as June.

On a non-seasonally adjusted basis, the Asian unemployment rate was 4.5 percent in July, down from 5.1 percent in June.

BLS reported the overall unemployment rate in July was 6.2 percent. Businesses added jobs in professional and business services, manufacturing and construction.

Va. Gov. McAuliffe Restores Rights to a Record 2,500 Felons

August 3, 2014

Va. Gov. McAuliffe Restores Voting Rights to a Record 2,500 Felons
By Jeremy M. Lazarus

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from the Richmond Free Press

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - A record 2,500 ex-convicts have had their voting rights restored in Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s first six months in office. In announcing the figure, Gov. McAuliffe made history in restoring the rights of so many people so early in his term, records show — putting himself far ahead of even his predecessor, BobMcDonnell, who streamlined the process in order to provide a second chance to more felons who had served their time and paid court-imposed fines, fees and restitution.

If the pace continues, Gov. McAuliffe is on track to restore the rights of 20,000 people before he leaves office in January 2018, or more than double the record 8,000 people that McDonnell restored to full citizenship before his term endedearlier this year. Under state law, the governor is the only official empowered to restore the rights of felons to vote, serve on juries and run for office.

Virginia is one of just four states that strip felons of those rights for life, unless the governor intervenes — a policy that dates back to the segregation era and White supremacy efforts to limit the Black vote. As a candidate last year, now Gov. McAuliffe promised to build on the McDonnell reforms. Soon after taking office, he announced changes to make the process more transparent and reduce the time violent offenders had to wait to apply for restoration from five to three years. He also expanded the list of ex-offenders who could be considered for expedited action as nonviolent felons to include those convicted of drug crimes.

“Virginians who have served their time deserve a second chance to become productive members of society again,” Gov.McAuliffe stated in his announcement. “I am proud of the work my team is doing to expand and expedite the process of restoring rights.”

Secretary of the Commonwealth Levar Stoney, who has led the effort for the governor, described restoration of rights as “a key step for people who have paid their debts to society and want to build new lives for themselves.”

Study: African-American Homeownership Increasingly Less Stable, More Risky

July 27 2014

Study: African-American Homeownership Increasingly Less Stable, More Risky

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from The Seattle Medium

(TriceEdneyWire.com) – While historical barriers that excluded Black America from the homeowner market for decades have crumbled, there are signs that emerging types of racial inequality are making homeownership an increasingly risky investment for African-American home seekers. A new study from sociologists at Rice University and Cornell University found that African-Americans are 45 percent more likely than Whites to switch from owning their homes to renting them.

The study, “Emerging Forms of Racial Inequality in Homeownership Exit, 1968-2009,” examines racial inequality in transitions out of homeownership over the last four decades. The authors used data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics for the period 1968 to 2009, with a study sample of 6,994 non-Hispanic Whites and 3,158 Black homeowners.

The research revealed that despite modest gains in attaining homeownership over time, the racial gap in the likelihood of changing from ownership to renting began to widen in the 1990s. During the next two decades, African-American homebuyers were consistently over 45 percent more likely than Whites to transition out of homeownership. The authors claim that their findings point to a historical shift in racial stratification in American housing markets, from a system of overt market exclusion to, more recently, one of market exploitation.

“The 1968 passage of the Fair Housing Act outlawed housing market discrimination based on race,” said Gregory Sharp, a postdoctoral fellow in Rice’s Department of Sociology and the study’s lead author. “African-American homeowners who purchased their homes in the late 1960s or 1970s were no more or less likely to become renters than were White owners. However, emerging racial disparities over the next three decades resulted in Black owners who bought their homes in the 2000s being 50 percent more likely to lose their homeowner status than similar white owners.”

Sharp noted that these inequalities in homeownership exit held even after adjusting for an extensive set of life-cycle traits, socioeconomic characteristics, characteristics of housing units and debt loads, as well as events that prompt giving up homeownership, such as going through a divorce or losing a job.

Sharp said the deregulation of the mortgage markets in the 1980s – when Congress removed interest rate caps on first-lien home mortgages and permitted banks to offer loans with variable interest rate schedules – and subsequent emergence of the subprime market are likely reasons Blacks were at an elevated risk of losing their homeowner status. In 2000, African-Americans were more than twice as likely as Whites with similar incomes to sign subprime loans; among lower-income Blacks, more than half of home refinance loans were subprime.

“African-American homeowners’ heightened subprime rates were not only due to their relatively weaker socioeconomic position, but also because lenders specifically targeted minority neighborhoods,” Sharp said.

Sharp and his coauthor hope the research will prompt further analysis of additional factors that potentially contribute to racial disparities in homeownership exit, such as household wealth and residential location.

The study will appear in the August edition of Social Problems and was co-authored by Matthew Hall, a demographer and assistant professor of public policy at Cornell University.

Holder is Correct: Racial Animus Plays Role in Obama Opposition by Morris Dees

July 27, 2014

Holder is Correct: Racial Animus Plays Role in Obama Opposition
By Morris Dees
NEWS ANALYSIS
ag and pres speaking
President Obama and Attorney General Holder spoke last year
during reception honoring lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. 
PHOTO: White House

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from the Southern Poverty Law Center

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - Right-wing pundits have jumped all over Attorney General Eric Holder for daring to suggest  that “racial animus” plays a role in the “level of vehemence” that’s been directed at President Obama. They've denounced him for “playing the race card” and “stoking racial divisions.”
 

But who do they think they’re fooling? The rhetoric is what’s hateful. Calling people out for it is not.

The racism Holder described has been obvious since the 2008 campaign, when Obama was portrayed as someone who was not a “real American” – a Muslim, a Kenyan, a communist, even a terrorist sympathizer. Since then, an entire movement has been built around the thoroughly discredited notion that the president’s birth certificate is a fake. And that’s just the beginning.

Newt Gingrich has called Obama the “food stamp president” and referred to his “Kenyan, anti-colonial behavior.”

Rush Limbaugh has said Obama – and Oprah Winfrey, too, by the way – have reached the pinnacle of their professions only because they’re black. He added this week that “so-called conservative media types” praised Holder’s nomination only because he’s Black.

Glenn Beck has said the president, whose mother was White, has a “deep-seated hatred for White people, or White culture.” Conservative hero and former rock star Ted Nugent, who was invited to campaign with the GOP nominee for Texas governor, called the president a “subhuman mongrel.”

A Confederate flag was waved in front of the White House during last year’s “Million Vet March.” U.S. Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina screamed “You lie!” during the president’s address to Congress in September 2009. When has that happened to a president before?

All manner of overtly racist posters have been seen at Tea Party rallies, including one depicting the president as a “witch doctor.”

We’ve repeatedly seen stories about conservative politicians sharing racist jokes about Obama.
And, we’ve seen an explosive growth of radical-right groups, including armed militias, since Obama was elected, and repeated threats that violence is needed to “take our country back” from the “tyranny” of Obama. This is part of a backlash to the growing diversity in our country, as symbolized by the presence of a Black man in the White House.

I grew up in rural Alabama during the Jim Crow years and lived through the civil rights movement, when White supremacists did everything they could, including committing violent atrocities, to turn back the tide of progress. And I’ve stared across the courtroom at some of America’s most vicious hatemongers – men like neo-Nazi Frazier Glenn Cross, who recently killed three people and once targeted me. I know racism when I see it.

No one, of course, is suggesting that merely disagreeing with Obama is evidence of racism. That’s clearly not true.

 But we have a political party and a right-wing media machine that pander incessantly to the racist reactionaries in our society, often through code words. It’s been going on since Nixon implemented his “Southern strategy” of appealing to White resentment in the wake of the civil rights movement. I wish it weren’t so. But it is simply undeniable. We should call it what it is.

Ordered to Prison Sept. 8, Ray Nagin Files Appeal Notice

July 27, 2014

Ordered to Prison Sept. 8, Ray Nagin Files Appeal Notice

c.raynagin

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from the Louisiana Weekly

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - Former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin last week filed a formal notice of appeal  in the corruption case that resulted in a guilty verdict on 20 of 21 criminal counts and a 10-year prison sentence, The Associated Press reported.

Nagin, a Democrat and businessman who campaigned for mayor on an anti-corruption platform, was convicted in February on charges including conspiracy, bribery, money laundering, wire fraud and filing false tax returns. The charges stem from his two terms as mayor from 2002 to 2010 — including the Hurricane Katrina disaster in 2005.

During his first term in office, Nagin often referred to himself as a “change agent” who was committed to rooting out public corruption.

With the support and backing of the New Orleans business community, Nagin was able to move up from the back of a crowded field of mayoral candidates to defeat former NOPD Supt. Richard Pennington in the 2002 mayoral race.

Three years later, the mayor’s woes began to mount with the colossal challenge of rebuilding New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina flooded 80 percent of the city. With the pressures growing to make it possible for displaced New Orleanians to return home and get the city back up and running, Nagin tried to reassure displaced Black residents that they would always be welcome in post-Katrina New Orleans by uttering his now-infamous comments about New Orleans always being a “Chocolate City.”

The brief notice said the appeal will cover the verdict, the sentence and an order that Nagin forfeit over $500,000 acquired illegally, as well as court rulings prior to the verdict.

The notice was filed in U.S. District Court, and the appeal will be considered by the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

According to court papers, the appeal is “including but not limited to the court’s judgment on the jury’s verdict, sentencing, fine, assessment and forfeiture, as well as all other prejudgment interlocutory orders and rulings in this case.”

Nagin, 58, has been ordered to report to the federal prison in Oakdale, La. on September 8.

A defiant Nagin continues to insist he is innocent and that he is paying the price for standing up to powerful people in New Orleans. On the local WBOK radio station, Nagin has talked often about a “shadow government” that controls everything that happens in the Crescent City.

His remarks puzzled some residents who disapproved after Nagin huddled with wealthy White business owners from New Orleans in Dallas, Texas shortly after Hurricane Katrina to devise a blueprint for post-Katrina New Orleans, When criticized by some residents and questioned by the media, Nagin said he saw nothing wrong with Blacks not being a part of that meeting because Blacks don’t participate in New Orleans’ economy in a meaningful way.

Until his indictment in 2013, Nagin was perhaps best known for a widely heard, profanity-laced radio interview in which he angrily blasted the federal response in the days after levee breaches flooded most of the city during Katrina.

He had been elected as a reformer, but prosecutors said graft in his administration pre-dated Hurricane Katrina and flourished afterward. The bribes came in the form of money, free vacations and truckloads of free granite for his family business, Stone Age, LLC.

While Nagin appeals his case, prosecutors may appeal as well. They had pushed for a sentence of about 20 years, pointing out that the former convicted mayor has shown no remorse. Federal prosecutors objected when U.S. District Judge Helen Berrigan departed from federal guidelines with the 10-year sentence.

Robert Jenkins, Nagin’s lead attorney, had argued that Nagin should be spared a stiffer sentence because he was a first-time offender for whom a 20-year sentence would be a “virtual life sentence.”

Judge Berrigan seemed to agree, explaining that she didn’t believe Nagin was a criminal ringleader and perhaps made questionable decisions because of his desire to help those around him.

A decision on whether to appeal will be made by the U.S. Solicitor General in Washington, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office.

“It’s interesting that Ray Nagin has been painted like some kind of champion of Black people’s rights in New Orleans because his record as mayor does not reflect that,” Ramessu Merriamen Aha, a New Orleans businessman and former congressional candidate, told The Louisiana Weekly. “During his tenure, cops were killing Black people like we were going out of style, the Road Home program was methodically shortchanging many Black homeowners in New Orleans, thousands of Black teachers, administrators and school staffers were fired by the state and the city’s housing projects were torn down without any input from the people who lived there.

“White people are now disappointed that Nagin just received a 10-year prison sentence, but that vendetta was sparked by the ‘Chocolate City’ remark,” Aha added. “Many people seem to forget that it was the white business community that went out and found Ray Nagin, recruited him to run for mayor and threw its support behind him to catapult him to victory. Those same people in the business community now take no responsibility for putting Ray Nagin in the driver’s seat at City Hall.”

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