reparations
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Breaking: Something Bad Is Happening in Virginia [Updated]
To commemorate the quadricentennial anniversary of the arrival of enslaved Africans in America, we imagined what it would be like to cover that late August day when the first slave ship landed on the shores of the place now known as Hampton, Va. 8/20/1619 2:27 P.M. Earlier: A few hours ago, The Root received several…
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Nearly 1 in 3 Young Black People Say the Democratic Party Doesn’t Care About Them
Young black people are more likely than their peers to consider themselves Democrats—and “strong Democrats” at that—but nearly a third of them believe the Democratic Party doesn’t care about them, according to a recent poll. A new study from Gen Forward, a University of Chicago-based polling initiative, takes a deeper look at the political attitudes…
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Democratic Hopeful Marianne Williamson Asked White Audience Members to Apologize to Black Guests for Slavery
I don’t know if 2020 Democratic presidential hopeful Marianne Williamson believes that she can win, but she’s certainly entertaining in her losing effort. To put it lightly, the spiritual guru, aka “girlfriend,” is kooky AF and while other Democratic nominees are vying for the black vote by offering reparations for slavery and student loan elimination,…
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Nothing but the Truth: A Q&A With Bryan Stevenson, Subject of HBO’s True Justice
Montgomery, Alabama, exists as a paradox. It is here that slavers sold other human beings at market, and where a young Rosa Parks set off a campaign that eventually desegregated a nation. In Montgomery, in the shadow of the state capitol building, there is a haggard monument to Robert E. Lee sitting directly across the…
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For Some Reason I Can’t Put My Finger On, Donald Trump Doesn’t Support Reparations
I don’t mean to shock you. After all, here you were, minding your business, reading a blog and thinking about all the things you could eat for lunch (Burrito bowl? Salad, out of respect for the summer body that will get here…maybe in 2021? Steak-Umms?) or the places you could travel if you weren’t in…
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Ta-Nehisi Coates Clapped Back at Mitch McConnell for Saying ‘No One Alive’ Is Liable for Reparations. So We Came Up With a List
On Wednesday, the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties held a hearing about H.R. 40, a proposal from Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) that would authorize a national apology and study reparations for slavery and racial discrimination against black people in America. Among those testifying before the subcommittee was…
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'An Idea Whose Time Has Come': Congress Hears the Case for Reparations on Juneteenth
The contributions of African Americans to this country—and the matter of what the federal government still owes them for those contributions—will take center stage on Capitol Hill today as the House hears H.R. 40, a bill that proposes a commission on reparations be formed. “We know that it’s not just white men that built build…
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Mitch McConnell on Reparations: 'We’ve Elected an African-American President'
The topic of reparations has been on the tip of everyone’s tongues as of late, culminating in a House hearing on Wednesday that will explore the subject and “examine, through open and constructive discourse, the legacy of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, its continuing impact on the community and the path to restorative justice.” The latest…
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Cory Booker Secures 12 Co-Sponsors for Reparations Bill
Presidential candidate and U.S. Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) has secured 12 co-sponsors for his reparations bill, according to an announcement the senator’s office released exclusively to The Root. The bill, officially titled, “HR 40 Commission to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African-Americans Act (pdf),” would establish a commission to study the impact of slavery…
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Danny Glover, Ta-Nehisi Coates to Finally Discuss Reparations During House Hearing on Juneteenth
Anyone else tired of waiting for their 40 acres and a mule? While Holocaust victims, survivors of Japanese internment and other victims of genocide or injustice have been compensated for the unspeakable horrors they endured, America built a multi-billion dollar economy by brutalizing our ancestors and somehow refuses to cut the check. The subject has…