Pancakes and Politics 2021 kicks off Featuring one-on-one with
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Michigan Chronicle
Vol. 84 – No. 28 | March 17-23, 2021
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American Rescue Plan By Brenda Lawrence and Scott Benson The American Rescue Plan, passed by the House and Senate in the past week and signed into law by President Joe Biden on Thursday, is a historic and unprecedented relief package that will help countless Americans, including low- and middle-income families, small business owners, students, parents, and workers. There is no doubt the $1.9 trillion federal stimulus will have a massive impact on the families within our cities, especially those that have been devastated by the coronavirus pandemic.
Brenda Lawrence Scott Benson The rescue package offers another stimulus check, $1,400 in direct-cash relief, to some Michiganders—or a smaller amount for higher-income earners—and a critical extension of unemployment benefits. It also makes the Child Tax Credit fully refundable and increases the amount to up to $3,600, depending on the child’s age. This transformational action will significantly improve the lives of families across the country and help cut child poverty in half. This is a huge deal. The stimulus package is also the direct, urgent response that Michigan and our cities need by scaling up resources for testing, vaccines, and public healthcare. It will also rescue small businesses and restaurants with much-needed support, as well as help families keep a roof over their heads by providing rental and mortgage assistance. We cannot underscore enough the critical fiscal aid that provides a bridge over troubled waters allowing our municipalities, counties, and state to re-hire workers, avoid additional layoffs, and prevent further reductions of public services. While we understand that the work is not finished, we believe some of these provisions can become permanent. We need to build on the $500 million that’s being allocated so that we can ensure no one in this nation will go without clean, safe, and affordable water. This funding puts us on a much-needed path to improve America’s residential and municipal water pipe infrastructure. We are especially hopeful this relief package moves us a step closer
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WHAT’S INSIDE
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HOMEFRONT
Part One of a Three-Part Series on COVID-19
One Year Later COVID-19: The Pandemic, the Pathways, the Politics
By Donald James Special to the Chronicle
On January 21, 2020, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) headquartered in Atlanta, Ga., announced that a 35-year-old man in Snohomish County, Wash., just outside Seattle, tested positive for COVID-19. It was the first confirmed case in the United States after the virus’ origin, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), started in Wuhan, China in late-December of 2019. After spreading through Washington and zigzagging state to state across America, on March 10, 2020, Michigan confirmed its first two cases of the coronavirus. The following day, March 11, WHO reclassified the coronavirus from an epidemic to a full-blown pandemic. Six days later, CDC reported that all 50 states had at least one case of coronavirus accounting for 100 deaths. The CDC, as of March 10, 2021, reported more than 527,000 U.S. deaths attributed to COVID19. The death count in Michigan, one year after its first confirmed two cases, is almost 16,000. In Michigan, like most other states, COVID-19 has wreaked havoc, severely impacting every sector of society inclusive of the hospitality industry, schools, large and small businesses, churches, sports and entertainment venues. In essence, America’s economy had not experienced such a dismantlement since the Great Depression. Across the 50 states, governors, county executives, mayors and other stakeholders looked to the federal government for help in confronting and fighting the pandemic. President Donald J. Trump’s administration was slow to respond, after showing no response at one point. In many ways he was in denial, believing at the infancy of the pandemic, the virus was “their new hoax.”
Comerica Bank Relocates to Orchestra Place on Woodward Avenue
“The Democrats are politicizing the coronavirus,” Trump said at a campaign rally in North Charleston, S.C. in late February of 2020. “It is their new hoax to damage me and my administration.”
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Ultimately, the Trump Administration realized COVID-19 wasn’t a hoax. Yet, his administration, even with a Task Force headed by then-Vice President Mike Pence, basically put the onus on each state to fend for themselves. States in some cases were in competition with each other to acquire ventilators and Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) for
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healthcare professionals to handle the massive hospitalizations. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer drew the ire of Trump early in the Pandemic, when she said on MSNBC that “the federal government did not take this serious early enough. To hear the leader of the federal government tell us to work around the federal government because it’s too slow is kind of mind-boggling.” Whitmer’s comments came on the heels of Trump’s conference call to numerous governors, telling them they are basically on their own in stocking respirators and ventilators. Of course Trump, a Republican, fired back at the Democrat governor of Michigan, who was said to be a possible choice for VP for Joe Biden’s run for president. The verbal exchang-
es between Trump and Whitmer would last through much of 2020. In many ways, the rhetoric was the same between Trump and other “Blue State” elected officials. Nevertheless, Whitmer, through the power of Executive Orders, sought to slow down the spread of the deadly virus. Her first Executive Order aimed at the pandemic was issued on March 10, 2020, the same day that two people in Michigan were confirmed to have COVID-19. Over the ensuing days, weeks and months, she signed many more, including the “Stay Home, Stay Safe,” order which required all Michigan residents to stay in their respective homes unless they are essential workers or getting necessities like food, gas or medicine. Her stayat-home Executive Order was reported by many media outlets to be one of the strictest of its type in the nation. Through 2020, and into the first quarter of 2021, Whitmer’s Executive Orders have had a profound impact on just about every sector of life in Michigan. There were orders that called for the temporary prohibition on large assemblies and events which impacted restaurants,
bars, sporting events, casinos, schools and even houses of worship. As a result, Michigan’s unemployment rate shot to unprecedented levels. While Gov. Whitmer’s many Executive Orders were aimed at keeping Michiganders safe from the raging pandemic, not everyone saw it that way. In October of 2020, after months of litigation pertaining to the governor’s Executive Orders, the Michigan Supreme Court ruled that Whitmer violated her constitutional authority by continuing to issue Executive Orders to fight COVID-19 without state lawmakers’ approval. “The Supreme Court ruling, handed down by a narrow majority of Republican justices, is deeply disappointing,” Whitmer said in a statement following the ruling. “And I vehemently disagree with the court’s interpretation of the Michigan Constitution, Right now, every state and the federal government have some form of declared emergency. With this decision, Michigan will become the sole outlier.” The governor said that even after the Supreme Court ruling takes effect, her directives will remain in place through “alternative sources of authority.” Whitmer’s fight against COVID-19 received a boost when Joe Biden was sworn in as America’s 46th President on January 20, 2021. Whitmer now has an ally in the White House who takes the pandemic seriously and is guided by science and other tools needed to bring the pandemic to a halt. With stopping the pandemic as his No. 1 priority, Biden formed the COVID19 Health Equity Task Force, quickly picking Michigan’s Dr. Joneigh Khaldun, an African American woman, to serve on his team. Khaldun, the chief medical advisor for Whitmer’s Michigan Coronavirus Task Force, was instrumental in compiling and making public COVID-19 case data by race, which showed African Americans representing high numbers of cases and deaths caused by coronavirus. In addition, Michigan Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist, who is African American, heads Michigan’s COVID-19 Taskforce on Racial Disparities which was created by Whitmer in April of 2020. The Taskforce, under Gilchrist’s leadership, addresses fears, distrusts, concerns and questions of systemic inequities and racism in the healthcare system that traditionally overlook African Americans. Gilchrist is encouraging African Ameri-
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