Politics

Thousands Gather at Lincoln Memorial for the 60th Anniversary March on Washington by Hamil R. Harris

August 29, 2023

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Martin Luther King III speaks as his wife, Andrea Waters King, and daughter, Yolanda King, prepare to march alongside him. PHOTO: Roy Lewis/Trice Edney News Wire

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Rev. Al Sharpton gives the last speech before leading the march from the Lincoln Memorial to the King Memorial. PHOTO: Roy Lewis/Trice Edney News Wire

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March on Washington 2023. PHOTO: Roy Lewis/Trice Edney News Wire

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - Sixty years after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. stood at Lincoln Memorial and offered his dream for a racially diverse America, his 15-year-old granddaughter, Yolanda Renee King, said her generation is ready to carry MLK’s unfinished legacy in new ways.

While the size of the crowd on Saturday was a fraction of the 250,000 people who gathered in Washington on August 28, 1963, the gathering was more diverse and those who spoke said racial and economic challenges were more daunting than ever before.

“If I could speak to my grandfather today, I would say I’m sorry we still have to be here to rededicate ourselves to finishing your work and ultimately realizing your dream,” she said. “Today, racism is still with us. Poverty is still with us. And now, gun violence has come for places of worship, our schools, and our shopping centers.”

Miss King’s speech came before her father, Martin Luther King III, and Rev. Al Sharpton spoke. They, along with her mother Andrea Waters King, organized the event that brought thousands to the nation’s capital to essentially continue the 1963 fight for freedom, justice and equality.

Martin Luther King III said, “I’m very concerned about the direction our country is going in. And it is because instead of moving forward, it feels as if we’re moving back. The question is, what are we going to do?”

In his speech, Sharpton said it is time to push back against racial and social injustices at a time when conservatives are fighting more than ever to turn back the clock.

“Sixty years ago Martin Luther King talked about a dream. Sixty years later we’re the dreamers. The problem is we’re facing the schemers,” Sharpton said. “The dreamers are fighting for voting rights. The schemers are changing voter regulations in states. The dreamers are standing up for women’s right to choose. The schemers are arguing whether they are going to make you stop at six weeks or 15 weeks...They are trying to tell gays to go back in the closet but we are not going back in the closet,” said Sharpton. "We are going to stand up for who we are and where we are and what we are and we are going to make changes. They are not going to turn back the clock. “

Like at the August 28th, 1963 March on Washington, busloads of people rolled into DC from Detroit, Cleveland, and Atlanta while others drove in or flew in from cities across the country.

Dr. Ben Chavis, President and CEO of the National Newspaper Publishers Association didn't speak at the March but had a special moment when he ran into Larry Hirsh, a Jewish man who recognized him.

“We were here 60 years ago and we were both 15,” Chavis said. “As I reflect on the last 60 years there is a tendency to underestimate the progress we have made,” Chavis said. We still have problems, racism is still alive, antisemitism is still alive and hatred is still alive however we have made significant progress.”

In her speech, young Yolanda King challenged veterans of the movement.

“All my life we have worried about environmental Justice for communities of color and under-resourced people but this summer we will be worried about global boiling,” she said. “We need to do more than to end racism on our planet, we need to do more than to end poverty on our planet, we need to save our planet.”

On Sunday, Rev. Sharpton told students at Howard University’s Rankin Chapel that African-Americans have come far since the 1963 March on Washington but often they can't believe what is being said about people of color.

Sharpton, who quoted from the 13th chapter of Numbers in the Old Testament, said the problem with the children of Israel was not the size of their enemies but they were reading a bad report.

“And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, who come of the giants. And we were in our sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight,” he quoted Numbers 13:33.

“The problem we had in America is that we were getting a bad report, we had a grasshopper complex,” Sharpton said. “Sixty years ago we came to Washington in the back of the bus because they couldn't ride in the front, they came with paper bags because they couldn't stop in the road to eat in a restaurant. It was against the law. They had to go into the woods to relax and release their bodies because they couldn't use the toilet.”

Sharpton said after the March he learned about the fatal shooting of three Blacks by a white man with an AK-47 at a Family Dollar in Jacksonville Florida.

“This shooting was racially motivated, and he hated Black people," Jacksonville Sheriff T.K. Waters told reporters at a press conference. Reports say that the assailant attempted to enter Edward Waters College, an HBCU, but was turned away.

“Before we could rest, hate jumped back up again to remind us,” said Sharpton who reminded the students that despite the oppression African Americans have endured there were “some folks who didn't have a grasshopper complex.”

Sharpton’s message was proceeded by musical selection by the student choir that included one of Martin Luther King’s favorite songs: “If I Could Help Somebody. Then my living shall not be in vain.”

Sharpton reminded the students that their parents, and grandparents sacrificed so they could come to Howard, which just completed its first week of classes. "Don’t forget that people paid a price for you."

Sharpton reminded the students that in their lifetime, “We have elected the first Black President, one of your alumni is the Vice President, and if you have faith over few things you can be rulers over much.”

'No Labels' Just More Political Nonsense

July 30, 2023

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(TriceEdneyWire.com) - People attend the launch of the unaffiliated political organization known as No Labels Dec. 13, 2010, at Columbia University in New York City. The group looks to find solutions to problems partly by getting politicians to put aside their partisan behavior in order to find common ground. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images/TNS)

Labels, as all consumers discover, are just packaging. And truth in packaging is almost a contradiction in terms. The purpose of packaging is to make a sale, not admit the truth.

The political group that calls itself “No Labels” is a perfect example. Its name, game, and claim all are poll driven and message centered. The billionaire-funded group praises bipartisanship as an end in itself. Now it is toying with running a Third Party candidate for president – peddling West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin as a “centrist,” running on a manifesto entitled, inevitably, “Common Sense.” The manifesto offers up a series of poll-driven, carefully crafted policy positions, wrapped in pretty paper and designed to sell.

If there were truth in packaging, “No Labels” would call itself “No Clue.” It seems perversely blind to the reality we face.

America faces severe, simultaneous challenges – what academics call a “polycrisis.”

They are pressing and apparent. Climate change threatens existence itself, with severe weather already savaging lives and communities. Extreme inequality corrupts elections and subverts decent government. The million plus lives lost to Covid have exposed our broken public health system. Our infrastructure is dangerously decrepit. Our healthcare system is simply unaffordable. Systemic racism continues to mock the promise of equal justice under the law. We’re taking on both China and Russia, while fighting endless wars trying to police the world, a mission even our military, the most expensive and powerful in the world, can’t afford.

We have guided missiles but misguided leadership.

How does “No Labels’ Common Sense” address these challenges? Mostly by ignoring them. On climate change, they worry not about the extreme weather but about the price of oil, wanting an “all of the above” energy policy that polls well but utterly fails to address the crisis.

On extreme inequality, they say nothing. On infrastructure, they praise Joe Biden’s infrastructure act (while preposterously trying to take credit for it), without talking about how it is but a first step to what is needed. On health care, they offer traditional nostrums that won’t offend insurance companies and Big Pharma – and won’t take us any closer to affordable and comprehensive health care for all. Systemic racism or even the Supreme Court’s assault on civil rights goes unmentioned.

They embrace the impossible mission of policing the world, calling for even more money for the military while demanding deficit reductions. That puts Social Security and Medicare on the chopping block, which they imply but don’t admit, promising not to cut the benefits of those already or near retirement. Fifty-five and under look out.

Their remedy is not new ideas, but “bipartisanship.” Bipartisanship polls well, but consider dealing with a Republican Party that overwhelmingly believes that the election in 2020 was stolen, that Donald Trump is innocent, that “wokeness” is the greatest threat to America, that taxes should never be raised, that we spend too much on education and too little on the military, that voter suppression and political gerrymandering is an imperative, that guns should be free and women’s bodies should be regulated.

We already suffer from the overwhelming bipartisan support for giving more money to the Pentagon, despite the fact that it is the greatest source of waste, fraud and abuse in the federal government. There is a bipartisan consensus not to move to Medicare for All, which is the only way for Americans to have good health care they can afford. There’s bipartisan support for the “all of the above” energy policy that is contributing directly to accelerating and catastrophic climate change.

Their prospective presidential candidate offers not new leadership but business as usual.

Joe Manchin, who grew rich in the coal business, primarily uses his Senate seat to protect subsidies to coal and big oil, and to impede investment in renewable energy. He embraced the filibuster to block electoral reform to limit big money in politics.

“Common sense?” No, just more political nonsense. “No Labels?” No, just no clue and no way out. Billionaires have the money to create a party. Pollsters and message gurus can figure out how to package it. Venal politicians can test to see how they can profit from it. But don’t fall for it. This is just another beltway bandit con job that the country can’t afford.

U. S. Black Chambers Ends Convention on High Note with Renewed Support from the White House by Hamil Harris

July 25, 2023

USBC Inc. President Ron Busby and President Biden during a recent visit to the White House.

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - The members of the U.S Black Chambers Inc. recently concluded their national convention in Washington, DC, bolstered by a meeting with President Biden and strengthened ties forged between business, Civil Rights, and Faith leaders.

The White House Office of Public Engagement and National Economic Council also held a June 21st meeting with the leaders of the USBC to discuss the President’s plan to expand economic access to African-American businesses across the US.

But then President Biden walked into the room and greeted Ron Busby Sr. President and CEO of the Black Chambers Inc and other leaders in the organization that represents 120 Chamber of Commerce chapters across the country.

“This is an exciting time for the US Black Chamber and for our members across the country,” said Busby in an interview on the eve of the White House visit. “The US Black Chamber is about advocacy, access to capital. contracting opportunities and chamber development.”

The White House statement talked about the meeting between Biden and the African-American business leaders, which comes at a time when Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris has been rallying the party’s African-American base as the 2024 Presidential election heats up.

“The President emphasized that, despite the progress being made, there is still work to be done to ensure equitable growth and wealth creation for communities of color,” the statement read.

President Donald Trump said this week that people who help people get into this country should get the death penalty and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis spent the last week talking about the merits of slavery.

But at the White House, Biden announced on Tuesday that monuments will be erected to remember Emmett Till, murdered by White supremacists at the age of 14. Today, July 25, would've been Till's 82nd birthday.

In April, Carolyn Bryant Donham, the white woman whose allegations resulted in Tills brutal death, died of cancer in a Louisiana hospice. She was 88.

During the USBC National Conference, Donald R. Cravins, Jr., the first African-American to serve as Under Secretary of the Department of Commerce for Minority Business Development signed a historic Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) designed to enhance economic opportunities for African-American-owned businesses through capital and contracting opportunities.

On July 20, Rev. Frederick Haynes, the new President of the Rainbow-Push Coalition, spoke at the US Black Chambers convention where he said the Montgomery Bus Boycott was effective because of Civil Rights activist “tree shakers,” and business leaders, “Jelly makers,” who work together for 381 days.

“The tree shaking changes the system, but have you forgotten about the jelly-making,” Haynes asked during his keynote speech. “While they did tree shaking in boycotting the buses they did some jelly making. They refused to ride the buses so they organized a carpooling system. The carpool system was over before it was Uber.”

In an interview, Haynes said, “If we can build a Black Wall Street back then (In Tulsa) we can build a Black Wall Street from San Francisco to DC and from Harlem to Houston as a sign of the future of Black Business.”

Earlier this month, the USBC honored two of the three living survivors of the Tulsa Race Massacre in 1921. In the wake of a decision by a Donald Trump-appointed judge to dismiss a lawsuit seeking reparations for the Tulsa Race Massacre.

Judge Caroline Wall threw out the lawsuit that would have required the city and others to pay for the destruction of the Black business District named Greenwood. One of the survivors was Ms. Viola Fletcher, who was seven on the day of the attack. Today she is 109.

"The dismissal of the lawsuit seeking reparations for the Tulsa Race Massacre is a disappointing setback in the ongoing fight for justice and equity.,” Busby said in a statement after the judge's ruling. “ The events of that tragic day in 1921 continue to reverberate through generations, and the denial of reparations further compounds the deep-rooted wounds suffered by the Black community.”

Busby said the USBC has established the Women's Business Center in partnership with the U.S. Small Business Administration, in the heart of The Greenwood District, which serves as a vital resource for small businesses in the area.

Busby said, "Our Women's Business Center in The Greenwood District stands as a testament to our unwavering commitment to fostering economic development and empowerment.”

As the new head of Rainbow Push, Haynes said one of his major efforts will be to organize a protest in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where a Donald Trump-appointed judge blocked payments to descendants of the 1921 Tulsa race massacre.

Dr. Ben Chavis, a Civil Rights veteran and president/CEO of the National Newspaper Association, said in an interview, “We should learn from our history and not necessarily repeat our history. When we find points that we can work together with, we should do it so we can be much more effective.”

A Deep South Governor’s Race to Watch By Ben Jealous

July 2, 2023

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(TriceEdneyWire.com) - A year in which there are only three races for governor’s seats, all in the Deep South, wouldn’t normally create a lot of political speculation. Kentucky’s popular Democratic incumbent may have a tough race, and chalking up Louisiana and its neighbor to the east to a Republican would be typical conventional wisdom.

But “Mississippi Miracle” may well become the catchphrase of this election season. Brandon Presley is making a strong bid to become the first Democratic elected governor in the Magnolia State this century.

Presley (yes, Elvis from Tupelo is a cousin) has won a seat on the state’s Public Service Commission four times, where he’s opposed a huge coal-fired power plant and a proposal to dump nuclear waste in Mississippi and fought to expand internet access in rural areas.

He’s hard to pin as a typical Democrat. He lowered taxes and balanced budgets as a mayor, endorsed George W. Bush in the 2004 presidential election and describes himself as a pro-life Christian (which he is quick to note demands supporting health care, education, and seniors as well).

Presley has a powerful personal story that reaches well beyond his kinship with the King of Rock and Roll. He was raised by a single mom who worked in a garment factory after his father was murdered. He’s told poor and working-class voters that they should see their own names on the ballot when they see his.

Nettleton, the town of about 2,000 people in the northeastern Mississippi that Presley hails from and he first became mayor at age 23, is split about 60% White and 40% Black like the state as a whole but has a median income $10,000 below the median in one of the poorest states in the country.

It’s no surprise that Presley is campaigning on issues that matter most to those voters. He responded to Gov. Tate Reeves’ state of the state address outside a shuttered rural hospital to highlight his $1 billion Medicaid expansion plan, which he says will improve health care to low-income residents and save nearly 40 Mississippi hospitals at risk of closing.

Reeves is unpopular even among his party’s voters. Six in 10 voters in a recent poll, including a third of Republicans and two thirds of independents, said they want “someone else” to be governor. While he’s campaigning on a raise he gave educators, the teachers union has endorsed Presley.

The incumbent has been tied to a scandal in which up to $94 million in welfare funds were diverted to pet projects of the state’s most powerful while many families in need were being denied $170 a month in assistance. It's a particularly salient issue at this moment when Mississippi and other states are beginning to seek and spend hundreds of billions in federal dollars to build infrastructure and create clean energy jobs.

Presley will need a big turnout from the 38 percent of Mississippi voters who are Black. He’s not well known in Jackson and the southern end of the state where most of them live. He had the endorsement of Rep. Bennie Thompson, the state’s only Black member of Congress, almost immediately after announcing his campaign (the last Democrat who ran did not).

Black and low-income voters would gain much from Medicaid expansion and Presley’s plan to cut Mississippi’s regressive 7 percent grocery tax. Having suffered with a Republican leading the state a decade ago, they’d have a champion as governor as legislative and Congressional districts are redrawn in response to the census this time around.

Even more broadly, a Presley victory and his economic proposals might begin to shift what’s been a historical migration pattern for Blacks out of the state up the Mississippi River and westward to California. When I was a young organizer in Mississippi in the 1990s, a mentor who had helped build the state’s public health clinics during the Kennedy and Johnson years told me that there were more Black doctors who’d been born in Mississippi living in Los Angeles County than in the entire state of Mississippi.

No state can thrive indefinitely letting its best and brightest look for opportunity elsewhere. Mississippi may decide to turn off that spigot in November.

Ben Jealous is executive director of the Sierra Club, the nation’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization. He is a professor of practice at the University of Pennsylvania and author of “Never Forget Our People Were Always Free,” published in January.

Yusef Salaam of the Central Park Five is Running for the New York City Council

June 27, 2023

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Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from BlackMansStreet.Today

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - When Yusef Salaam and the other four members of the Central Park Five were cleared after another man confessed to the 1980 brutal rape and beating of Trisha Meili, the Central Park jogger, Donald Trump didn't like it one bit.

Trump took out a full-page ad in four New York newspapers, calling for the boys to die in custody, and declaring that New York should bring back the death penalty.

Salaam is now running for New York City Council, and Trump, who is running for again president for the second time, may be headed to prison.

Salaam is now 49. He was 15 when he went to prison. He spent seven years in prison for a crime he and other boys, all Black or Hispanic, did not commit.

Matias Reyes admitted that he raped Meili. "The cops and the press did not give the presumption of innocence," Salaam said during an interview.

He says he is now ready to change things from the inside.

Salaam is running against three other candidates for the coveted Harlem district on the New York City Council.

He faces Al Taylor, of the New York State Assembly, and Inez Dickens, a former city council member. Early voting will be held from June 17 to June 25. The primary election is set for June 27, 2023, and the general election will be held on November 7, 2023.

His opponents claim he does not have experience. He said, "I have a great record in the 34 years since I fought to clear my name in the Central Park Jogger case."