March 19, 2015

By Walter Fields 

NNPA Columnist 

Every morning, when I fix my teenage daughter breakfast and drop her off to school, she reminds me that #BlackGirlsMatter. Her journey has not been easy; made all the more difficult by an experience, beginning in middle school and persisting to high school, that threatened to crush her dreams by denying her access to classes education professionals deem critical to demonstrate college readiness. Had it not been for the advocacy of her parents, and the threat of litigation, my daughter would have been cast aside and surrendered to a curriculum that was not simply less challenging, but inadequate by the standards of competitive colleges and an increasingly analytical and technical workforce. Today, in her junior year, she remains one of only a handful of Black girls enrolled in advanced honors and advanced placement classes in her public high school, Columbia Senior High School in suburban Maplewood, N.J.

My daughter’s story is neither unique or an aberration. It is the reality facing Black girls in America. This is what the recently released report Black Girls Matter: Pushed Out, Overpoliced and Underprotected confirms. The Center for Intersectional and Social Policy Studies at Columbia University and the African American Policy Forum, authors of the report, have provided the nation with a powerful narrative of the dilemma of Black girls in our country. The report describes the disproportionate punishment meted out to Black girls in school, with data showing that they are suspended six times the rate of white girls as ‘zero tolerance’ policies hit with racial precision. Black girls also receive more severe sentences than other girls when they enter the juvenile justice system and are the fasting growing population in the criminal justice system. They are also victims of bullying, sexual harassment and violence in school. Our girls are being pushed out but there is little public alarm, policy focus or media attention to their marginalization. Unlike our understandable focus on Black boys, as seen in President Obama’s ‘My Brother’s Keeper’ initiative, our girls are being left to fend for themselves. And we are losing them.

Black girls suffer the discriminatory equivalent of hypertension. Racially based gender bias is a silent killer. It infests the spirits of girls with self-doubt and feelings of inadequacy, and early on narrows their possibilities. Black girls mostly suffer in silence, absorbing the blows, but incurring significant psychological damage along the way. Bright lights are extinguished early as Black girls encounter institutional bias in school buildings where their uniqueness, in everything from hair to dress to personality, is deemed anti-social and popular culture bombards them with stereotypes of Black females ranging from helpless to raging anger or hyper-sexualized. The intelligent, inquisitive, creative, caring and beautiful Black girl is virtually an urban myth in America when the imagery of them on the cultural landscape is surveyed.

Making matters worse is a nation that hides the suffering of Black girls from public view. Perhaps that is why I find President Obama’s recently announced ‘Let the Girls Learn’ initiative so disappointing. The White House looked beyond the shores of this nation to launch a global offensive for girls when if they simply Googled a zip code in Washington D.C., they would find Black girls deserving of its attention and policy focus. This might simply be the result of an African-American father who has not had to wrestle with his daughters feeling inadequate or experienced seeing pained expressions of silent suffering given that his children have been fortunate to be shielded by much, given the President’s privilege and position. It is, however, a glaring omission by the Obama administration that defies what we know to be the experiences of Black girls in America. We need not search the world for girls in need when our children stand before us broken, rejected and yearning for recognition.

What I desire for our community of Black girls is what I wish for my daughter. I want us to embrace their individuality and celebrate their expressiveness and cultural dynamism. We must recognize their intelligence and support their intellectual curiosity while also encouraging their socializing and affirming their right to be different from boys, yet equal in standing. It is our responsibility to root out gender bias and make certain that our institutions are not simply diverse but gender-inclusive, meaning opportunity is rooted in equity and not guided by male dominated definitions of worth and success. And, we must hold accountable those who trade in misogynist imagery that limits Black girls’ imaginations to the stripper pole, video vixen or reality TV villains. There is a ‘Black is Beautiful’ canvas for Black girlhood that we must paint so our daughters can see the full expression of God’s intent for their lives.

It is with this conviction that we must embrace the mantra #BlackGirlsMatter; because they do, and without the benefit of the full expression of their humanity we suffer as a people. There is no ‘better day’ for Black America if we persist on wearing gender blinders and if Black men, fathers or not, do not come to terms with the reality of shared suffering and become champions for gender equity. When I look in the mirror I have to see my daughter and make certain the reflection is one of strength, hope, faith and confidence that her life will have meaning and she will be given the opportunity to direct and fulfill her purpose in life.

March 05, 2015

By Julianne Malveaux 

NNPA Columnist 

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel just got spanked. Despite a campaign war chest of more than $15 million and the support of President Barack Obama, the former Congressman and White House chief of staff could not avoid a run-off in the non-partisan election.

Garnering 45 percent of the vote to runner-up Jesus “Chuy” Garcia’s 34 percent, he did not clear the 50 percent bar for victory.  Emanuel, the darling of the mainstream Democratic Party, has earned the dubious distinction of being in the first Chicago mayoral runoff in nearly 20 years. He also runs the risk of being the first incumbent mayor ousted since Harold Washington beat Jane Byrne in 1983.

The man who delivered the Emanuel whipping, Chuy Garcia is a county commissioner and former alderman. His base is the poorer neighborhoods of Chicago, the Latino community, and the teachers’ union.  He pounded on the theme of income inequality and exploited the widespread perception that Emanuel is arrogant and removed from poor people. Indeed, most of Rahm Emanuel’s support came from wealthy White voters who helped raise his large campaign fund.  Garcia didn’t have a fraction of Emanuel’s money, but he had a large cadre of volunteers to help deliver his votes.

There were three other candidates in the race, and their combined 20 percent of the vote will likely determine the outcome of the April 7 election.  Just a day after the election, both Emanuel and Garcia were courting their competitors, seeking their endorsements.  So far, those opponents have been noncommittal.

Emanuel’s loss is a major setback to the Democratic establishment. Voters are tired of income inequality being acknowledged, with nothing being done about it. Their only recourse is the vote, and on February 24 in Chicago, they used it.

According to the Chicago Tribune, Emanuel rode to victory on the coats of Blacks four years ago with 58 percent of the votes in the six wars that are more than 90 percent Black. This time, he won 42 to 45 percent of those same wards. Blacks may determine the victor of the April 7 election.

Another possible Democratic setback is looming as Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) weighs the possibility of challenging former Secretary of State Hilary Rodham Clinton.

Warren has been portrayed as a champion of the people, especially where consumer protection and financial matters are concerned.  She has raised her voice against financial skullduggery by banking institutions, been a critic of attempts to weaken the Dodd Frank bill, and a defender of consumer rights.

The architect of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), Warren has been the darling of the left, and has enhanced that status with her travel to many progressive gatherings. While she has demurred when asked if she will run for president, her replies, if somewhat definite, also seem coy.  Additionally, there have been efforts to draft her into running, with online petitions and other efforts.

While Warren seems to have little baggage, Hilary Rodham Clinton seems less than invincible.  Questions have been raised about the Clinton Foundation and the sources of its money, especially when this money has come from foreign governments that have mixed relationships with the United States.

Other questions have been raised about the high six-figure speeches Clinton gives and the audiences she gives them to.  Certainly, she is entitled to earn what the market will bear, but some say those who foot the bill are the very Wall Street scions that Elizabeth Warren rails against.

Could Elizabeth Warren seriously challenge Clinton?  Is there a chance that she could win the Democratic nomination?  If she chooses to enter the presidential race in the next several months, she will be entering the race at about the time Barack Obama did eight years ago.  Like Obama, she has penned an autographical book that explains the origins of her populist views. And like Obama, she has the chance of “catching on” with voters.

After Clinton, the only competition Warren is likely to have for the Democratic nomination is Vice President Joe Biden. But Biden, at 73, may be considered too old to be considered a viable choice for president.  Biden also has a history of both oral and behavioral gaffes, most recently offering a rather intimate whisper into the ear of Defense Secretary Ashton Carter’s wife Stephanie at Carter’s swearing in.

Whether she enters the race or not, Warren’s very presence pushes Clinton to the left on populist economic issues. And if Warren enters the race and pulls three or four states, and about 20 percent of the popular vote, she offers Clinton a serious challenge. If these “draft Warren” petitions catch on and hundreds of thousands of signatures are gathered, that too, presents a challenge to Hilary Clinton.

Voters are looking for alternatives and Democrats aren’t providing them. Instead, they are offering a party line that inhibits discussion of issues and hews to the inevitability of party favorites.  Rahm Emanuel’s defeat and the Warren challenge to Hilary Clinton suggest that the party line is unsatisfactory.

Julianne Malveaux is a Washington, D.C.-based economist and writer.

March 12, 2015

By Julianne Malveaux 

NNPA Columnist 

Congressman Jeff Denham (R-Calif.) couldn’t bring his French bulldog, Lily, on an Amtrak train. So when Amtrak funding came up for a vote, he inserted a provision that required one car on an Amtrak train to be designated a “pet car.” Pet owners will pay a fee to bring their furry companions on the train, and there are size restrictions to the pets that can travel. Still, this new provision is seen as a victory for pet owners who ride trains.

Would this new provision have been proposed had Rep. Denham’s dog not been rejected from an Amtrak train? Republican members of Congress were warned by the Club for Growth and Heritage Action, fiscally conservative groups, that they should not vote to subsidize Amtrak. Would they have joined Democrats in voting $1.4 billion a year for the next four years had their Republican colleague made his pitch about pet travel?

All too often, good legislation is only supported when someone with a personal agenda is able to add an amendment to further that agenda. Perhaps the pet cars make sense, but there might not be a pet car had not Rep. Denham pushed the agenda for his Lily. I’m not perturbed that he made the personal political. I’m just wondering what might happen if more members of Congress had to experience the same things as the rest of us.

What if members of Congress were routinely rejected from receiving bank loans (unlikely given their average net worth of more than a million dollars and rising, compared to the $81,000 median wealth of a U.S. family)? Might they then not look at some of the rules that banks use to restrict access to capital? What if members of Congress were stopped and frisked occasionally? Might that not provoke examination of stop and frisk laws?

What if members of Congress had to sleep on the street for just one night? Might they not consider the way our nation deals with the homeless? What if they had to travel hundreds of miles to obtain an essential medical service? Might they not, then, reconsider restrictions against abortion, a medical service many women consider essential? What if members of Congress had to survive on food stamps for even a week? Would that increase their empathy for those, some employed full time, who rely on food stamps in order to eat?

Let’s not stop there.

What if members of Congress were required to spend a week, without staff and handlers, in a strange community? Take House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and leave him in East Oakland, Calif. wearing a hoodie and some jeans. Take Small Business Committee Chair Steve Chabot (R-Ohio) and leave him in Fifth Ward Houston with just a few dollars in his wallet. Let Financial Services Chair Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) hang with a homie as his BFF in Ferguson, Mo. Put Darrel Issa (R-Calif.) in a housing project in Los Angeles. Let Homeland Security Chair Michael McCaul (R-Texas) spend a little time in New York’s Riker’s where civilization sometimes takes a break. Let Budget Chair Tom Price (R-Ga.) stand in line for a couple of hours to learn about unemployment benefits.

Will these legislators then be able to put their humanity on leave as they process their experiences?

The provision to fund Amtrak passed 316-101, and it wasn’t a perfect piece of legislation. Members of Congress ride the high-revenue Northeast corridor (Washington to Boston), so despite the warning from their influential fiscal conservative groups, they choose to continue to support Amtrak. Still, they didn’t support using revenues from the heavily traveled Northeast corridor to subsidize less-traveled routes in cities that are distant from airports.

This may mean that service in some smaller cities may be cut. Why not drop members of Congress into some of these cities and let them figure out how to get from one place to another? If we believe in the notion of a nation, we ought to have as strong an interest in the citizen in Washington as the citizen in a much smaller city. Those members of Congress who would privatize Amtrak have rejected the notion of national connections and equal access to transportation in favor of profligate profit seeking.

Members of Congress live a privileged existence. Some say they deserve it because of the service they render to our nation. But if their health care access were the same as ours, if their access to transportation were the same as ours, if their access to financial services were the same as ours, might they behave differently? If they spent just a minute with a gun pointed at their head because they had the temerity to jaywalk, if they were beaten because they dared ask questions of a police officer, if their 5-year-old child was handcuffed because she had a tantrum, would our laws be different?

Thanks to Congressman Jeff Denham, whose dog could not ride Amtrak, we know how personal inconvenience can turn into transformative legislation. If members of Congress spent a week living in a constituent’s shoes, how might our laws change?

Julianne Malveaux is a Washington, D.C.-based economist and writer.  She is President Emerita of Bennett College for Women in Greensboro, N.C.

February 26, 2015

By Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr. 

NNPA Columnist 

There are two related violent phenomena in that are now getting renewed public attention and research around the world, as well as considerable debate and denial. The twin evils are terrorism and racism.

President Barack Obama’s recent White House Summit on “Countering Violent Extremism” reminded many of us in Black America that violent acts of “extremism” have not been isolated just to the Middle East or to the perversion of one religion. At the conclusion of the White House meeting on extremism, President Obama affirmed the national resolve and resilience of the United States in surmounting and overcoming terrific challenges in the past.

The president said, “For more than 238 years, the United States of America has not just endured, but we have thrived and surmounted challenges that might have broken a lesser nation. After a terrible civil war, we repaired our union. We weathered a Great Depression, became the world’s most dynamic economy.”

It is undeniable that the United States has made progress for more than two centuries toward a “more perfect union” with promises of liberty, equality and justice for all. But for millions of Black Americans, however, the contradictions of racial inequality, racially motivation violence, disproportionate mass incarceration, and numerous other forms of institutionalized racism and extremism are all still realities that we face daily. That, too, is undeniable.

After the White House summit, a larger gathering of international governmental leaders, civil society groups, diplomats, religious leaders and others convened at the State Department. Again, President Obama reiterated his call to action for a more coordinated global effort to courter violent extremism.

He stated, “We come together from more than 60 countries from every continent. We speak different languages, born of different races and ethnic groups, belong to different religions. We are here today because we are united against the scourge of violent extremism and terrorism.”

It was a welcomed display of a growing, diverse international coalition of governments and organizations emerging to make public their collective intention to work together to confront violent extremism wherever it exists. Given the changing demographics fueled by the “browning of America,” the extremist violence attacking Black Americans and other people of color should be on a decline. On the contrary, there appears to be a national resurgence of racial violence against people of color inside.

Black America has had to challenge and endure centuries of violent acts of extremism in the forms of domestic terrorism and racism. The Ku Klux Klan (KKK) even to this day claims to be a Christian organization. But no one refers to the KKK as Christian extremists or terrorists. Within a week, there will be the 50th anniversary recognition of “Bloody Sunday” in Selma, Ala., where violent law enforcement “extremists” attacked unarmed civil rights marchers who were nonviolently demanding voting rights for Black Americans in 1965.

It is ironic that a new study concerning the systematic lynching of Black Americans was recently released. The study, produced by the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI), was titled, “Lynching in America: Confronting the Legacy of Racial Terror.” The findings of the EJI report documented that there were at least 3,959 lynchings of Black Americans in 12 Southern states between the Reconstruction Era and World War II: Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee, Kentucky, Arkansas, Florida, and Texas.

And those were just the documented cases. There were many others that were never documented or reported in the news media because during that period, racist lynchings were the socially accepted norm and not the exception in the South. That type of extremist terrorism against Black America was commonplace. Yet, there were no international commissions or conferences by major powers to end the practice.

Lynching was the impetus for the creation of the NAACP. As it states on its Website, “The NAACP was formed partly in response to the continuing horrific practice of lynching and the 1908 race riot in Springfield, the capital of Illinois and resting place of President Abraham Lincoln.”

Among the founders were W. E. B. Du Bois, Ida B. Wells-Barnett and Mary Church Terrell along with a group of White liberals, including Mary White Ovington and Oswald Garrison Villard. The founding of the NAACP was predated by the DuBois-led Niagara Movement of 1905.

The “Lynching in America” report concluded that “lynching of African Americans was terrorism, a widely supported phenomenon used to enforce racial subordination and segregation. Lynchings were violent and public events that traumatized black people throughout the country and were largely tolerated by state and federal officials.”

Today, the lynching and terrorizing of Black America is also done via the rope of the so-called criminal justice system. Prosecutorial misconduct in the cases of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo. and Eric Garner in New York are contemporary manifestations of lynching. Racially-motivated lethal violence by police officers is another form of extremist terror and violence against Black America that must be stopped – now!

Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr. is the President and CEO of the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) and can be reached for national advertisement sales and partnership proposals at: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ; and for lectures and other professional consultations at: http://drbenjaminfchavisjr.wix.com/drbfc