Los Angeles News Observer 11.3.22

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Saluting California’s Native American Heritage: New Law “S-Word” Ban

Merged Art & Tech For A Night of Reflection & Empowerment

By Philtrina Farquharson Contributing Writer

Slauson & Co., an LA-based early-stage venture cap ital firm, welcomed creators, investors, leaders, and taste makers alike to experience the one-of-a-kind Kinsey Col lection this past week at a private event in SoFi Stadium. The Kinsey Collection is the first-of-its-kind arts and cul ture initiative curated in the stadium.

To further amplify their mission of an equitable fu ture, Slauson & Co. came together with The Kinsey Col lection to highlight American history through the lens of art. “We must understand how we got to where we are to day, and where to go from here,” said Brittany Crockett,Head of Platform at Slauson & Co.

Led by Austin Clements and Ajay Relan, Slauson & Co. works to provide equal access to entrepreneurs that are historically overlooked. Rooted in economic inclusion for all, their purpose is to provide the proper capital and re

sources required to create sustainable equity within diverse communities.

“It is super cool to have a Black fund like Slauson & Co. host this event and to be in Inglewood, a very Black city at a very beautiful establishment and having amazing Black art. I think it is super powerful and I feel like it is the beginning of a Black renaissance,” said Kameale C. Terry, CEO of ChargerHelp!

The Kinsey Collection is the world’s largest private

Black Candidates Running for Statewide Offices

There are four Black candidates running for statewide office in California. Three are contenders to win as they fight it out with their opponents in the final days of theelection.

Dr. Shirley Nash Weber (D), the incumbent Secretary of State (SOS), is the front-runner in her race against Robert Bernosky (R). Weber was appointed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in December 2020. She is California’s first Black Secretary of State and only the fifth African American to serve as a state constitutional officer in California’s 170year history.

Since her appointment, Weber has led successful public information campaigns resulting in more Californians going to go to the polls. She conducted a tour of state schools and local communities as part of an ongoing initiative by her office. SOS is the third highest office in California and is responsible for establishing and implementing voting rules as well as the logistics of bringing the vote to a little 20million voters.

In Weber’s race, she has a lengthy list of supporters and endorsements including: Gov. Gavin Newsom, Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis, State Treasurer Fiona Ma, Controller Betty Yee, Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, Attorney Gen. Rob Bonta, and Chair of the California State Board of Equalization Malia Cohen. In addition, several papers like the Los Angeles Sentinel, the Los Angeles Times and the San Diego Union Tribune have also endorsed her candidacy.

Her opponent has a bit of a different opinion on the vote, as per his platform which lists “cleaning up”California’s voter rolls as number three on his to-do list. Many claimed that illegal immigrants were scattered throughout the voting rolls of Western states, all of which has been debunked by fact checkers like PolitiFact.

Tony Thurmond, a student of the public education system and a graduate of the foster youth system, is running for a second term as Superintendent for Public Instruction

(SPI). Thurmond attributes the lag in the performance of Californian students to insufficient funding, an opinion which the teachers’ unions support.

“I’m honored to be supported by teachers. I’m in a race where I am supported by teachers and my opponent is supported by billionaires,” Thurmond said.

Although Thurmond is a favorite to retain his office, he has gotten some criticisms about how he handled public schools during the pandemic. Those angry about theschool closures blame Thurmond and some studies show that children may have been held back academically by the shutdowns, particularly children of color.

Thurmond’s opponent, Lance Christensen, works for a California Policy Center, a right-leaning think tank. Christensen’s push for more control for parents and local communities is in line with Republican policies. SPI is a non-partisan elected position.

Christensen has called out teachers for “indoctrinating” children and has endorsed many right-wing views. “I’m a

New York to Pay $25 Million to Two Men Falsely Convicted of Killing Malcolm X

By Lauren Victoria Burke NNPA Newswire Contributor

In 1965, Muhammad Aziz and Khalil Islam were wrongfully convicted of killing Malcolm X and spent over 20 years behind bars after being wrongfully convicted.

Even though the February 21, 1965 murder of Malcolm X at the Audubon Ballroom in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan was one of the most reported on assassinations of the 1960s, the trial of his assailants was botched because of racism, expediency and political considerations.

The documentary Who Killed Malcolm X, which premiered on Netflix in 2020, revealed in detail that there was something wrong with the convictions. The investigative journalism of Washington, D.C. journalist Abdur-Rahman Muhammad spent decades combing through documents and analyzing evidence from Malcolm X’s murder. He also tracked down those who knew what had really happened.

Muhammad is a journalist, tour guide and historian, documentary film makers revealed what he studied over 20 years investigating Malcolm X’s murder.

What was revealed was that Talmadge Hager, a convicted assassin of Malcolm X, stated that the two men convicted with him were in fact innocent. Hagan, who is now 81, (over the years he has changed his name to Talmadge X Hayer and then Mujahid Abdul Halim) was granted parole and released from prison in 2010.

In 2021, Hagan expressed support that the convictions of Muhammad Aziz and Khalil Islam would be overturned which matched his original claims that they were not involved in the murder of Malcolm X.

Decades earlier, the late journalist Les Payne and his daughter Tamara Payne, in their book, “The Dead Are Arising: The Life of Malcolm X,” asserted that Malcolm X’s killers were members of the Nation of Islam’s Newark, New Jersey mosque. The book claimed that William 25X

Kanye West Kicked Out of Skechers California Headquarters

MANHATTAN BEACH, Calif. (AP) – Kanye West was escorted out of the California-based headquarters of athletic shoemaker Skechers after he showed up unannounced Wednesday, a day after Adidas ended its partnership with the artist following his antisemitic remarks.

West, who legally changed his name to Ye, “arrived unannounced and without invitation” at Skechers corporate headquarters in Manhattan Beach, southwest of Los Angeles, the company said.

“Considering Ye was engaged in unauthorized filming, two Skechers executives escorted him and his party from the building after a brief conversation,”according to a company statement.

“Skechers is not considering and has no intention of working with West,” the company said. “We condemn his recent divisive remarks and do not tolerate antisemitism or any other form of hate speech.”

Email messages sent to representatives for West weren’t immediately returned.

For weeks, Ye has made antisemitic comments in interviews and social media, including a Twitter post earlier this month that he would soon go “death con 3 on JEWISH PEOPLE,” an apparent reference to the U.S. defense readiness condition scale known as DEFCON. He was suspended from both Twitter and Instagram.

He apologized for the tweet on Monday.

On Tuesday, sportswear manufacturer Adidas announced that it was ending a partnership with West that helped make him a billionaire, saying it doesn’t tolerate antisemitism and hate speech.

The German sneaker giant said it expected the decision to immediately stop production of its Yeezy products will cause a hit to its net income of up to 250 million euros ($246 million).

The company had stuck with Ye through other controversies after he suggested slavery was a choice and called the COVID-19 vaccine the “mark of the beast.”

Other companies also have announced they were cutting ties with West, including Foot Locker, Gap, TJ Maxx, JPMorgan Chase bank and Vogue magazine. An MRC documentary about him was also scrapped.

California Test Scores Decline; Racial Disparities Remain

LOS ANGELES (AP) – Most California students did not meet standards in math and English this year, state officials announced Monday in another example of test scores continuing to fall after the pandemic – including notable declines for Black and Latino children. Two out of three California students did not meet state math standards, and more than half did not meet English standards, the Los Angeles Times reported. The numbers were worse for students of color, as 84% of Black students and 79% of Latino students did not meet math standards in 2022.

The test scores highlighted the widespread impacts of the pandemic, with traditionally underserved students facing the biggest challenges.

Math and reading scores have dropped significantly across the country since the pandemic. For California, the numbers underscore what was already troubling trend before the pandemic, when 60% of students were testing below grade level in math and nearly half in English.

“It is fair for people to be concerned about the experience that kids have had,” California Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond told the newspaper in an interview. “But we also had 99,000 Californians who lost their lives to COVID. and we did the things that we felt we needed to do to save lives. ... Now is our time to focus on how we accelerate the students’ recovery.”

State officials said the latest data contained some “hopeful signs.” The Department of Education compared scores of students who took the tests in 202021 to those same students who took the tests this year and found “steeper-than-normal achievement gains at most grade levels.”

Thurmond noted the state is phasing-in a plan to send all 4-year-olds to public school and also spent $250 million on things like reading coaches and other specialists.

Still, Republicans lamented the lack of progress, blaming Democrats who control state government.

“These test scores reflect the current state of education in California. We are failing students in the most important subjects,” said James Gallagher, the Republican leader in the state Assembly. “This is just another example of Democrat mismanagement, and our kids are suffering for it.”

Results of a national assessment showed setbacks for most of the country, including California. But California’s scores did not decline as much as the national average.

“While California’s students experienced less learning loss than those in most other states during the pandemic, these results are not a celebration but a call to action – students are struggling academically and we need to keep getting them the resources they need to thrive,”

California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom said.

A few attendees viewing The Kinsey Collec tion, which is the world’s largest private col lection of African American art and historical facts that document the African American ex perience. (Photo: Philtrina Farquharson)

Ajay Relan (in photo) and Partner Austin Clem ents are Co-Founders for Slauson & Co. (Photo: Philtrina Farquharson)

Tony Thurmond (Courtesy Photo)

Dr. Shirley Nash Weber (D) (Courtesy Photo)

Solomon O. Smith

California Black media

In 1965, Muhammad Aziz and Khalil Islam were wrongfully convicted of killing Malcolm X in and spent over 20 years behind bars after being wrongfully convicted.

Founder of ComplYant and LA native Shiloh Johnson (Photo: Philtrina Farquharson)

Affirmative Action Activists Descend on U.S. Supreme Court

By Stacy M. Brown NNPA Newswire Senior National Correspondent

The Leadership Conference Education Fund, in collaboration with the African American Policy Forum, Asian Americans Advancing Justice – AAJC, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, and other civil rights groups, are rallying outside the U.S. Supreme Court in support of affirmative action.

The activists are demanding that there remains a need for colleges and universities to consider race as one of the factors in the holistic admissions process.

“What is happening on college campuses today is that applicants are treated differently because of their race and ethnicity,” said Edward Blum, a legal activist.

He founded Students for Fair Admissions and is against affirmative action.

“Some are given a thumbs up. Some are given a thumbs down,” Blum stated.

However, Harvard University and the University of North Carolina have countered a need for a demographically diverse student body.

The universities asserted that admissions committees need not ignore a candidate’s race “any more than it does a candidate’s home state, national origin, family background, or special achievements.”

As broken down by NPR, “because UNC is a state school, the question is whether its affirmative-action program violates the 14th Amendment’s guarantee to equal protection of the law.”

And even though Harvard is a private institution, it is still covered by federal anti-discrimination laws because it

accepts federal money for various programs.

Ultimately, NPR noted, at the heart of both cases is the same principle: what constitutes racial discrimination?

Further, NPR reported that this holistic approach to college admissions “is used by many colleges, large and small, including the U.S. military academies.”

Among the many academic institutions that have filed briefs supporting affirmative action are 57 Catholic colleges and universities, including Notre Dame, Georgetown, and Holy Cross. And there are more briefs filed by 68 of the largest corporations in the country and a brief filed by a long list of retired three- and four-star generals and admirals attesting to the need for racial diversity in the upper echelons of the military. For example, the lack of racial diversity in the officer corps during the Vietnam War led to enormous tensions and even violence between the predominantly white officer corps and the primarily Black and Hispanic enlisted men, sometimes compromising the war effort.

Many anticipate that justices on the politically compromised Supreme Court, who issued the controversial decision to overturn Roe v. Wade earlier this year, will overrule some or all the precedents in the affirmative action case.

“The baseline for permissible affirmative action programs in higher education was established in 1978,” NPR reported.

“Citing Harvard University as the model, Justice Lewis Powell said that in evaluating applicants for admission, race could not be the determinative factor, but the university could use race as one of many factors, just as it uses other

traits — special talents in music, science or athletics, and even the fact that the applicant’s parents attended the university.”

Federal Court Halts Biden’s Student Loan Debt Forgiveness for Now

By Brandon Patterson

A federal appellate judge on October 21 temporarily blocked the Biden Administration from cancelling student debt in response to a lawsuit filed by six conservative states alleging they could be hurt financially by the plan.

The court blocked the plan after the states appealed a lower court’s decision to throw out their suit due to failure to show they would be hurt by it. The court ruling does not prevent the administration from operating the debt forgiveness application or prevent people from applying, the White House said. But no debt can be waived until the court issues a final decision. It is not clear how long the temporary decision will last.

The administration had intended to start cancelling loans as soon as October 23, court records show, according

to USA Today. The plan, announced in August, would cancel $10,000 in debt for eligible applicants and $20,000 for Pell Grant recipients.

“Plaintiffs will suffer no irreparable injury from the provision of much-needed relief to millions of Americans, but the public interest would be greatly harmed by its denial,” the Biden Administration said in legal filings, adding that, if the court disagrees, any injunction should only apply to the states that filed the lawsuit, where about 2.8 million people are eligible for forgiveness, according to USA Today. Those states include Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and South Carolina.

Conservatives have attacked the debt forgiveness plan as expensive overreach of executive authority since the plan was announced. In this case, the six states argued that the debt forgiveness plan could incentivize student loan

borrowers with loans serviced by the states, which aren’t eligible for debt forgiveness, to swap those loans for federal loans that are eligible, costing the states money, according to USA Today.

The administration, however, says the Department of Education already changed its loan regulations to disallow the swaps, according to USA Today, rendering the issue moot. The states also argue, however, that the administration has no authority to cancel the debt at all. The administration has held that a 2003 law allows the executive branch to reduce or erase student loan debt.

The case is just one of many lawsuits over Biden’s debt cancellation plan. At least six different parties have challenged the plan in court. In most cases, however, the lawsuits have been quickly dismissed, according to USA Today..

Black Candidates Running

Continued from page A1

religious person, I’m a conservative, I don’t make any bones about that,” he said. “I don’t try to excuse it. I don’t hide it.”

Thurmond says that he wants to invest more in education, at least an amount that is commensurate with California’s standing as the fifth wealthiest economy in the world. His opponent is focused on removing bad teachers and giving parents more control.

Although Thurmond is the favorite and garnered a larger share of the vote during the June primary, Christensen appeals to some parents and his right-leaning language about school choice could make Thurmond’s racemore difficult in some conservative areas.

The race for state controller is a bit more complicated. The previous occupant of the position, Betty Yee, a Democrat has termed out of her position. Malia Cohen is the Democratic choice to replace Yee. Cohen has dedicated her career in public service focused on making public dollars work for all Californians, her campaign says.

Her opponent Lanhee Chen (R) is a self-described “conservative in the vein of Mitt Romney.”

In the primary, Cohen placed second, behind Republican Yee, 36.9% to 26.8%. However, the electorate

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Chen has been an aggressive underdog in the race attacking Cohen on several issues. To date, Cohen has yet to directly debate Chen, who taunted her on Twitter with images of herself, alone, on the debate stage.

Angela Underwood Jacobs is vying to be the firstBlack woman to serve as Lt. Gov of California. She is a Republican.

Underwood’s experience includes service as deputy mayor of Lancaster where she was the first Black woman on the city council. Jacobs received 19.9% of the vote in the primaries, a distant second to incumbent Eleni Kounalakis’ 52.7%. Her platform includes many of the conventional Republican issues like smaller government and less regulation, but there are also some differences.

Her brother Dave Patrick Underwood, a federal security officer in Oakland, was shot and killed by a member of a far-right extremist group called the Bugaloo Bois — some members of the organization reportedly participated in the January 6 riots at the U.S. Capitol. Jacobs sued Facebook for promoting and facilitating the activities of these types of groups.

Jacobs’ “Make California Gold Again” motto, is emblematic of her mildly Trumpian platform.

Slauson & Co. and The Kinsey Collection

Merged Art & Tech For A Night of Reflection & Empowerment

collection of African American art and historical facts that document the African American experience. The collection includes art, sculptures, photographs, rare books, and let ters from changemakers like Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. These pieces illuminate the untold stories of Black excellence throughout U.S. history.

The exhibition currently features more than 70 works of art collected over 50 years by Bernard and Shirley Kinsey, curated in collaboration with their son Khalil and historian Larry Earl. To elevate the movement, the Kinsey collection partnered with Inglewood-based Residence Art Gallery to launch a contemporary exhibit titled “Contin uum” which is displayed along with the Kinsey collectionat SoFi Stadium.

“Continuum” focuses on work with over 20 artists from Inglewood and greater Los Angeles with the goal of community uplift, contextualizing individuals’ experiences and progression within the scope of history, and collective consciousness. Artists include Genevieve Gaignard, Patrick Martinez, Jaimie Milner, and Samuel Levi Jones to name a few.

“It feels really heavy. I am feeling kind of emotional and I’m trying to really take the time to take in what the art is showing and what it is that we are doing as a people now compared to what they were doing back then, it is inspirational. “It feels really special to be here tonight,” said Mclaughlin Bynum, CEO of BLCK VC.

The Kinsey Collection is brought to SoFi Stadium by

the Kroenke Family Foundation, The Bernard and Shirley Kinsey Foundation for Arts and Education, and the Hol lywood Park Foundation in partnership with JPMorganChase.

“I think being here tonight is a testament to Slauson & Co. and when we first met them, we realized they were different. They are actually about the culture and business es they invested in,” said William Hayden, Co-founder of Bags, a Slauson & Co. backed company.

Slauson & Co. currently has a portfolio of close to 20 companies in major cities throughout the United States. Founder of ComplYant and LA native, Shiloh Johnson took to the stage to share her experience with Slauson & Co. as their first official company to be invested in. Com plYant is a digital business tax assistant that helps small businesses navigate business tax easier, cheaper, and faster.“I could not be more honored to be the investment choice. Support doesn’t even feel like the right word because it’s more than that working with Slauson & Co. I can talk to them about investment strategies and opportunities and so much more,” she said.

Slauson & Co. and The Kinsey Collection merged art and tech, empowering the community to shift their per spectives and change the world for the better.

The Kinsey Collection will be on display at SoFi Sta dium until March 2023 and is open to the

for view ing.

at https://www.sofistadium. com/kinsey/.

To learn more about Slauson & Co. and the next gen eration of inclusive businesses, you can visit https://www. slauson.co.

Los Angeles News Observer coverage of local news in Los Angeles County is supported by the Ethnic Media Sus tainability Initiative, a program created by California Black Media and Ethnic Media Services to support community newspapers across California.

The plan, announced in August, would cancel $10,000 in debt for eligible applicants and $20,000 for Pell Grant recipients. (Photo: iStockphoto)

Justice Powell stressed that “in choosing among thousands of academically qualified applicants,” a

university’s admissions committee may “with a number of criteria in mind,” pay “some attention to distribution that should be made among many types and categories of students.”

Angela Underwood Jacobs (Courtesy Photo)

favors Cohen in November. 46.8% of voters are registered Democrats while just 23.9 % of voters are registered Republican. The LA Times refers to this as the only open race this year.

Continued

Some of the nights guest admiring different parts of The Kinsey Collection. (Photo: Philtri na Farquharson)

‘Black Adam’ Takes Top Spot at Box Office Again

By LINDSEY BAHR AP Film Writer

“ Black Adam,” the Dwayne Johnson-fronted DC superhero film, kept its hold on the No. 1 spot at the North American box office in its second weekend in theaters. Down 59% from its launch, and facing little new competition, “Black Adam” added $27.7 million in ticket sales, bringing its domestic total to $111.1 million, according to studio estimates Sunday.

Johnson spent a decade trying to bring the character to the big screen and has visions for follow-ups involving Superman. But the future of “Black Adam” is not written quite yet, though it’s earned $250 million worldwide. The Warner Bros. film carried a hefty price tag of $200 million, not including marketing and promotion costs, and a sequel has not been officially greenlit.

But big changes are afoot at DC_the studio just announced a new leadership team of Peter Safran and James Gunn, whose love for propping up little-known comic book characters is well-documented. And on Sunday, Johnson posted a note to his 344 million Instagram followers about the end of the world press tour, thanking those who worked behind the scenes to launch “our NEW DC FRANCHISE known as BLACK ADAM.”

Bucking recent romantic comedy trends, moviegoers remained curious about “Ticket to Paradise,” Universal’s

Julia Roberts and George Clooney destination romp, which fell only 37% in weekend two to claim second place. The genre has not been the most reliable bet at the box office lately, with films like “Bros” stumbling in theaters, but the star power of Roberts and Clooney is proving hard to resist. “Ticket to Paradise” added $10 million from 3,692 North American theaters, bringing its domestic total to $33.7 million. Globally, it’s grossed $119.4 million to date.

Horror movies, meanwhile, claimed spots three through five on the weekend before Halloween on Monday. Lionsgate’s “Prey for the Devil” opened in third place with $7 million from 2,980 theaters. Notably, it is the only of the three horror films that carried a PG-13 rating. The others were R-rated.

Paramount’s “Smile” took fourth place in its fifth weekend with another $5.1 million, bringing its domestic total to $92.4 million (on a $17 million budget), while “Halloween Ends” landed in fifth place in its third weekend with $3.8 million. “Ends,” which has grossed $60.3 million in North America, was released simultaneously on NBC Universal’s streaming service Peacock.

“This is just another mandate in favor of horror,” said Paul Dergarabedian, Comscore’s senior media analyst. “It’s not just about being in October, horror movies have played well throughout the pandemic. It’s a genre that continues to kill it at the box office time and again.”

Chinonye Chukwu’s Mamie Till-Mobley film “Till” went wide this weekend, adding $2.8 million from 2,058 locations to take seventh place. Boasting a 98% on Rotten Tomatoes, the United Artists Releasing film has gotten good word of mouth with much of it centered on Danielle Deadwyler’s performance.

This weekend also saw the expansion of several notable films, like Todd Field’s “ Tar,” which expanded to 1,087 theaters nationwide where it grossed $1 million and landed in 10th place. Cate Blanchett’s performance as a renowned composer and conductor won her a top acting prize from the Venice Film Festival last month.

Another Venice-winner, “The Banshees of Inisherin” widened to 58 theaters and 12 new markets over the weekend. The Martin McDonagh film starring Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson earned $540,000. The Searchlight Pictures release will expand to around 800 locations next weekend.

Charlotte Wells’ “Aftersun” expanded to 17 locations where it earned $75,242, bringing its cumulative grosses to $166,030. The A24-released father-daughter film starring Paul Mescal and Frankie Corio will continue to expand throughout awards season.

James Gray’s “Armageddon Time” opened in six theaters in New York and Los Angeles, to $72,000. Gray mined his own childhood to tell the story about an

But as far as blockbusters are concerned, things will be somewhat slow-going until “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” arrives on Nov. 11.

“That’ll get the box office going again in a way that feels more like summer,” Dergarabedian said.

_-

Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Comscore. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.

1. “Black Adam,” $27.7 million.

2. “Ticket to Paradise,” $10 million.

3. “Prey for the Devil,” $7 million.

4. “Smile,” $5.1 million.

5. “Halloween Ends,” $3.8 million.

6. “Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile,” $2.8 million.

7. “Till,” $2.8 million.

8. “Terrifier 2,” $1.8 million.

9. “The Woman King,” $1.1 million.

10. “Tar,” $1 million.

_-

West Virginia Family’s Halloween Decorations Draw Attention

By KASSIDY BROWN Bluefield Daily Telegraph

PRINCETON, W.Va. (AP) _ A family home on Park Avenue in Princeton goes all out in Halloween decorations with a display of several full body mannequin horror icons, and they have been doing it since they first moved to their home six years ago.

Their decorations include characters such as Leatherface, Pennywise, Beetlejuice, Pinhead from the movie Hellraiser, Freddy Krueger, and Jason just to name a few, and the really unique thing is how the collection of these characters started.

“I basically had a 3-year-old daughter who wanted an “It” (Pennywise) for her bedroom,” said Kurt Rice, owner of the Princeton home. “That’s where it all started.”

Though his daughter is 12 years old now and has grown out of her horror fan phase, the family has continued the tradition of collecting a new character every year with this year’s being Beetlejuice.

“It’s just what we’ve done since we’ve lived here, and it’s really fun for us,” said Rice.

The family doesn’t set a budget for their displays because they collect what they need all year around.

“We shop thrift stores all year round,” said Rice. “Most of the costumes come from thrift stores, all their pants and boots, and clothing for the most part, though some of them are store bought.”

The money spent on the characters is not in vain as they keep them displayed in their house all year.

“We have a hot tub room that’s like a sunroom at the back of the house, and they just kind of hang out in there during the rest of the year,” said Rice.

He also said that it’s definitely a funny sight to see guest reactions to seeing them in that room during the year because they don’t expect to see that just in their house.

Rice said the family really enjoys the attention that the decorations bring to their house because they like knowing that they are doing something that the whole community can enjoy.

“We have people stop and look at the decorations all the time,” said Rice. “I would say that we’re the most photographed house in Princeton.”

He also said that Halloween night tends to be pretty busy for them and that they go through lots of candy throughout the night.

“Last year I’d say we had about 200 kids come by,” he said.

Rice added that they usually stock up on candy, so they know they won’t run out on Halloween night; although, this year they will be doing something a little different.

“This year though, we’re doing the little jug drinks instead of candy,” he said. “We’ve got two skeletons holding a coffin, and that will be in the driveway full of drinks.”

Rice said that his family decided that the drinks would be something fun and different for them to do, and it could give the kids an opportunity to get some refreshments during their walks throughout the night.

Rice said the family is not horror super-fans, but they like the tradition that they’ve created in getting the decorations .

“We do it more for the entertainment value of it, and we and the kids love it,” he said. “We also slow the speed limit down on Park Avenue quite a bit with it, so that’s a pretty good thing too.”

The family is still looking for ideas for next year’s new addition, but they have all year to think about it.

Rice finished by saying that he hopes people enjoy their Halloween decorations and to come by during Christmas as well because they have around 50 inflatable decorations for that holiday too.

11-year-old in Queens in the fall of 1980. The film, which premiered at Cannes earlier this year, stars Banks Repeta, Anne Hathaway, Jeremy Strong and Anthony Hopkins.

Follow AP Film Writer Lindsey Bahr on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ldbahr.

George Floyd’s Daughter to File $250 Million Lawsuit Against Kanye West

By Stacy M. Brown NNPA Newswire Senior National Correspondent

Calling comments by Kanye West repugnant, the family of George Floyd said they plan to file a $250 million lawsuit against the troubled superstar.

Filed by Roxie Washington, the mother of Floyd’s daughter, Gianna, the lawsuit includes West, his business partners, and associates for “harassment,” “misappropriation,” “defamation,” and “infliction of emotional distress.”

The suit comes after West’s controversial “Drink Champs” interview in which he stated that Floyd didn’t die from convicted police officer Derek Chauvin’s knee pressed against his neck for more than 9 minutes.

West falsely asserted that Floyd died from fentanyl use and pre-existing medical conditions.

Chauvin, 46, pleaded guilty in federal court earlier this year to charges of depriving Floyd of his constitutional rights.

He’s serving 252 months in prison.

In plea documents, Chauvin agreed that the sentencing for his crime should be based on second-degree murder because he acted willfully and in callous and

wanton disregard for the consequences of Floyd’s life.

Further, the Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s Office ruled Floyd’s death a homicide due to Chauvin kneeling on his neck.

“Kanye’s comments are a repugnant attempt to discount George Floyd’s life and to profit from his inhumane death,” Attorney Pat D. Dixon III said in a statement.

“We will hold Mr. West accountable for his flagrant remarks against Mr. Floyd’s legacy.”

Lee Merritt, the attorney for Floyd’s other family members, also issued a cease-and-desist letter to West for his comments.

While the law renders it virtually impossible to defame a dead individual, Merritt cautioned that the family might sue West for his false statements.

“Claiming Floyd died from fentanyl and not the brutality established criminally and civilly undermines and diminishes the Floyd family’s fight,” Merritt said.

Another of Gianna’s attorneys, Kay Harper Williams, also scolded West.

“Free Speech Rights do not include harassment, lies,

misrepresentation, and the misappropriation of George Floyd’s legacy,” Williams asserted.

“Some words have consequences, and Mr. West will be made to understand that.”

Meanwhile, West’s episode of Drink Champs was pulled.

“Drink Champs prides itself on its ability to allow a free flow of ideas within the hip-hop community,” a representative for the program told The Hollywood Reporter.

“That being said, unfortunately, the recent interview with Kanye West contained false and hurtful information regarding the circumstances surrounding the murder of George Floyd.”

According to NPR, Drink Champs host N.O.R.E called into Hot 97’s Ebro in the Morning to talk about the episode and issued an apology.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I can sit there and say, ‘That’s only Kanye West. It’s only what he said.’ But I have a responsibility when I have an audience. When I watched myself, I was embarrassed. I was like, ‘Wait a minute? You just let him say that?’ I’m irresponsible for letting it go.”

Saluting California’s Native American Heritage: New Laws, “S-Word” Ban Lift Up Celebrations

Antonio Ray Harvey California Black Media

Assemblymember James Ramos (D-Highland), the only Native American elected official in the California Legislature, has been working diligently to get rid of the racist and derogatory word, “squaw,” which derisively referenced Native American women since the 1600s.

Ramos says the “S-Word” is a slur, which has been used to name public places like “Squaw Valley,” the popular Lake Tahoe ski resort. It is hurtful and offensive to Native Americans, he says, particularly Indigenous women.

On Sept. 23, California Native American Day -which is now a paid holiday in the state -- Gov. Gavin Newsom signed several bills to support California Native communities, including Assembly Bill (AB) 2022, which will remove the “racist and sexist slur S-Word,” from all geographic features and place names in California, the governor’s office stated.

The negative connotation in reference to Native Americans is as disturbing as directing the N-word at the Black community but it’s been used more commonly in

naming public and commercial spaces.

“It is an idiom that came into use during the westward expansion of America, and it is not a tribal word,” Ramos said in a statement. “For decades, Native Americans have argued against the designation’s use because behind that expression is the disparagement of Native women that contributes to the crisis of missing and murdered people in our community.”

According to the U.S. Census, California is home to more Native Americans with a population of 757,628 (1.94% of the state’s total population) than any other state. Oklahoma is the second highest with a Native population of 523,360.

AB 2022 was introduced by Ramos and Cristina Garcia (D-Bell Gardens), chair of the California Legislative Women’s Caucus.

The bill was sponsored by the American Civil Liberties Union CA (ACLU), Restorative Justice for Indigenous Peoples and Renaming S-valley Coalition, and Alliance for Boys and Men of Color (ABMoC).

ABMoC is a national network of more than 200

advocacy and community organizations that banded together to advance race and gender justice by working to transform policies that are failing boys and men of color and their families.

AB 2022 requires every state agency, local governing body, or political subdivisions in this state to identify all geographic sites, public lands, waters, and structures under its jurisdiction containing the S-word.

Leaders of Native American tribes from across California, joined Newsom when he signed AB 2022 and four other bills in an effort to build on his Administration’s work to promote equity, inclusion, and accountability throughout the state.

“As we lift up the rich history and contributions of California’s diverse tribal communities today, the state recommits to building on the strides we have made to redress historical wrongs and help empower Native communities,” Newsom stated after signing AB 2022. “I thank all the legislators and tribal partners whose leadership and advocacy help light the path forward in our work to build a better, stronger and more just state together.”

Born on the San Manuel Indian Reservation, where he still resides, Ramos is a member of the Serrano/ Cahuilla Tribe. He represents the 40th Assembly district which includes Highland, Loma Linda, Mentone, Rancho Cucamonga, Redlands, and San Bernardino.

Ramos chairs the California Native American Legislative Caucus and Assembly Military and Veterans Affairs Committee.

Two years ago, Newsom signed AB 3121, the California Task Force to Study and Develop Reparations Proposals for African Americans. The bill was authored by Secretary of State Shirley Weber when she was a member of the Assembly.

Similar to the harm many Black Californians have suffered, Ramos spoke of the “atrocities and genocide” Native Americans in the state have endured at the 2022

Third Annual California, Indian Cultural Awareness Event held on the grounds of the State Capitol in Sacramento.

Ramos and other speakers acknowledged that the property the State Capitol sits on is Miwok tribe’s land.

“We’re trying to educate the legislature of the true history and culture of California Indian people,” Ramos told California Black Media. “It’s that important for us to talk about our culture to explain who we are. If we don’t come out to speak to these issues, those in the state of California will make assumptions about our way of life.”

Ramos added that more than 100 places in California contain the S-word. The United States Department of the Interior earlier this month renamed about 650 sites that have been using the slur on federal lands. The states of Montana, Oregon, Maine, and Minnesota have already banned the word’s use.

“The sad reality is that this term has been used for generations and normalized, even though it is a misogynistic and racist term rooted in the oppression and

belittling of Indigenous women,” Garcia stated. “AB 2022 begins to correct an ugly and painful part of our history by removing it from California’s landmarks; it’s the least we can do to help our indigenous women heal.”

The Governor also signed four more tribal measures presented by Ramos, including AB 923. The bill requires state agency leaders to undertake training in properly communicating and interacting with tribes on governmentto-government issues that affect them.

The second measure, AB 1314 creates a statewide emergency “Feather Alert” – similar to those used in abducted children’s cases – to enlist public assistance to quickly find Native Americans missing under suspicious circumstances. Native Americans face disproportionate numbers of missing and murdered people in their communities.

“California is ranked No. 7 in the country in terms of unsolved murders and missing people,” Ramos said.

AB 1703, the California Indian Education Act, encourages school districts, charter schools, and county offices of education to engage with the tribes in their area to provide the accurate and complete instruction about the tribes’ culture and history and share instructional materials with the California Department of Education.

AB 1936 authorizes the University of California Hastings Law College to remove the name of its founder, Serranus C. Hastings, from the school’s name. The bill specifies restorative justice measures for the Yuki and Round Valley Native Americans in Northern California whose ancestors suffered mass homicides orchestrated by the college’s founder in the 1850s.

In 2021, Newsom signed six wide-ranging tribal bills introduced by Ramos. Among other provisions, they aid tribal foster youth, create a new monument to Sacramentoarea tribes on state Capitol grounds, and bolster students’ right to wear tribal regalia at graduation ceremonies,

In addition, the new laws allow a paid holiday for state court personnel on California Native American Day and streamline access to emergency response vehicles on tribal lands.

Raven Cass, a youth advocate for the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians, said Ramos and the legislators who worked with him to pass the bills, “made great strides” in the past year “to protect sovereignty and safety in Indian country.”

They were encouraged by the Native Americans’ concerns and strongly took them into consideration, she said.

“This is the power of community, the power of unity, and the power of voice when it is determined to make a change,” Cass said at the California Indian Cultural Awareness event in August. “The more we work together the more we can get done. I hope (the legislators) continue to stand with us. Our lives matter and the world should know that.”

“California Black Media was supported in whole or in part by funding provided by the State of California, administered by the California State Library.”

Features

Pricey Medicaid Reforms Leave Most Patients Behind

to Dr. Elaine Batchlor, the hospital’s CEO, who said her facility is drowning under a surge of patients who are sicker than those in surrounding communities. For instance, the death rate from diabetes is 76% higher in the community than in Los Angeles County as a whole, 77% higher for high blood pressure — an early indicator of heart disease — and 50% higher for liver disease.

But dramatic changes are afoot that could herald improvements in care — or cement the stark health disparities that persist between rich and poor communities.

Gov. Gavin Newsom is spearheading a massive experiment in Medi-Cal, pouring nearly $9 billion into a five-year initiative that targets the sickest and costliest patients and provides them with nonmedical benefits such as home-delivered meals, money for housing move-in costs, and home repairs to make living environments safer for people with asthma.

The concept — which is being tested in California on a larger scale than anywhere else in the country — is to improve patient health by funneling money into social programs and keeping patients out of costly institutions such as emergency departments, jails, nursing homes, and mental health crisis centers.

The initiative, known as CalAIM, sounds like an antidote to some of the ills that plague MLK. Yet only a sliver of its patients will receive the new and expensive benefits.

Just 108 patients — the hospital treats about 113,000 people annually — have enrolled since January. Statewide, health insurers have signed up more than 97,200 patients out of roughly 14.7 million Californians with Medi-Cal, according to state officials. And while a growing number of Medi-Cal enrollees are expected to receive the new benefits in the coming years, most will not.

Top state health officials argue that the broader MediCal population will benefit from other components of CalAIM, which is a multipronged, multiyear effort to boost patients’ overall physical and mental health. But doctors, hospital leaders, and health insurance executives are skeptical that the program will fundamentally improve the quality of care for those not enrolled — including access to doctors, one of the biggest challenges for MediCal patients in South Los Angeles.

One benefit all plans must offer is intensive care management, in which certain patients are assigned to case managers who help them navigate their health and social service needs, get to appointments, take their medications regularly, and eat healthy foods.

Plans can also provide benefits from among 14 broad categories of social services, such as six months of free housing for some homeless patients discharged from the hospital, beds in sobering centers that allow patients to recover and get clean outside the emergency room, and assistance with daily tasks such as grocery shopping.

L.A. Care Health Plan, the largest Medi-Cal managedcare insurer in Los Angeles County, with more than 2.5 million enrollees, is contracting with the hospital, which will provide housing and case management services under the initiative. For now, the hospital is targeting patients who are homeless and repeat emergency room visitors, said Fernando Lopez Rico, who helps homeless patients get services.

So far, the hospital has referred 78 patients to case managers and enrolled 30 other patients in housing programs. Only one has been placed in permanent housing, and about 17 have received help getting temporary shelter.

“It is very difficult to place people,” Lopez Rico said. “There’s almost nothing available, and we get a lot of hesitancy and pushback from private property owners not wanting to let these individuals or families live there.”

Patrick Alvarez, 57, has diabetes and was living in a shed without running water until July, when an infection in his feet grew so bad that he had several toes amputated.

The hospital sent him to a rehabilitation and recovery center, where he is learning to walk again, receiving counseling, and looking for permanent housing.

If he finds a place he can afford, CalAIM will pay his first month’s and last month’s rent, the security deposit, and perhaps even utility hookup fees.

But the hunt for housing, even with the help of new benefits, is arduous. A one-bedroom apartment he saw in September was going for $1,600 a month and required a deposit of $1,600. “It’s horrible, I can’t afford that,” he said.

By Angela Hart California Healthline

LOS ANGELES — It wasn’t exactly an emergency, but Michael Reed, a security guard who lives in Watts, had back pain and ran out of his blood pressure medication. Unsure where else to turn, he went to his local emergency room for a refill.

Around the same time, James Woodard, a homeless man, appeared for his third visit that week. He wasn’t in medical distress. Nurses said he was likely high on meth and just looking for a place to rest.

In an overflow tent outside, Edward Green, a restaurant cook, described hearing voices and needing medication for his bipolar disorder.

The three patients were among dozens who packed the emergency room at MLK Community Hospital, a bustling health care complex in South Los Angeles reincarnated from the old hospital known as “Killer King” for its horrific patient care. The new campus serves the 1.3 million residents of Willowbrook, Compton, Watts, and other neighborhoods — a heavily Black and Latino

population that suffers disproportionately high rates of devastating chronic conditions like diabetes, liver disease, and high blood pressure.

Arguably, none of the three men should have gone, on this warm April afternoon, to the emergency room, a place intended to address severe and life-threatening cases — and where care is extremely expensive.

But patients and doctors say it is nearly impossible to find a timely medical appointment or receive adequate care in the impoverished community, where fast food is easy to come by and fresh fruits and vegetables are not. Liquor stores outnumber grocery stores, and homeless encampments are overflowing. A staggering 72% of patients who receive care at the hospital rely on Medi-Cal, the state’s Medicaid program for low-income people.

“For some people, the emergency room is a last resort. But for so many people who live here, it’s literally all there is,” said Dr. Oscar Casillas, who runs the department. “Most of what I see is preventable — preventable with normal access to health care. But we don’t have that here.”

The community is short 1,400 doctors, according

“The state is now saying it will allow Medicaid dollars to be spent on things like housing and nutritious food — and those things are really important — but they’re still not willing to pay for medical care,” Batchlor said.

Batchlor has been lobbying the Newsom administration and state lawmakers to fix basic health care for the state’s poorest residents. She believes that increasing payments for doctors and hospitals that treat Medi-Cal patients could lead to improvements in both quality and access. The state and the 25 managed-care insurance plans it pays to provide health benefits to most Medi-Cal enrollees reimburse providers so little for care that it perpetuates “racism and discrimination,” she said.

Batchlor said the hospital gets about $150, on average, to treat a Medi-Cal patient in its emergency room. But it would receive about $650 if that patient had Medicare, she said, while a patient with commercial health insurance would trigger a payment of about $2,000.

The hospital brought in $344 million in revenue in 2020 and spent roughly $330 million on operations and patient care. It loses more than $30 million a year on the emergency room alone, Batchlor said.

Medicaid is generally the lowest payer in health care, and California is among the lowest-paying states in the country, experts say.

“The rates are not high enough for providers to practice. Go to Beverly Hills and those people are overdosing on health care, but here in Compton, patients are dying 10 years earlier because they can’t get health care,” Batchlor said. “That’s why I call it separate and unequal.”

Newsom in September vetoed a bill that would have boosted Medi-Cal payment rates for the hospital, saying the state can’t afford it. But Batchlor isn’t giving up. Nor are other hospitals, patient advocates, Medi-Cal health insurers, and the state’s influential doctors’ lobby, which are working to persuade Newsom and state lawmakers to pony up more money for Medi-Cal.

It’ll be a tough sell. Newsom’s top health officials defend California’s rates, saying the state has boosted pay for participating providers by offering bonus and incentive payments for improvements in health care quality and equity — even as the state adds Medi-Cal recipients to the system.

“We’ve been the most aggressive state in expanding Medi-Cal, especially with the addition of undocumented immigrants,” said Dustin Corcoran, CEO of the California Medical Association, which represents doctors and is spearheading a campaign to lobby officials. “But we have done nothing to address the patient access side to health care.”

The hospital previously known as Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center was forced to shut down in 2007 after a Los Angeles Times investigation revealed the county-run hospital’s “long history of harming, or even killing, those it was meant to serve.” In one well-publicized case, a homeless woman was writhing in pain and vomiting blood while janitors mopped around her. She later died.

MLK Community Hospital rose from its ashes in 2015 as a private, nonprofit safety-net hospital that runs largely on public insurance and philanthropy. Its stateof-the-art facilities include a center to treat people with diabetes and prevent their limbs from being amputated — and the hospital is trying to reach homeless patients with a new street medicine team.

Still, decades after the deadly 1965 Watts riots spurred construction of the original hospital — which was supposed to bring high-quality health care to poor neighborhoods in South Los Angeles — many disparities persist.

Less than a mile from the hospital, 60-year-old Sonny Hawthorne rattled through some trash cans on the sidewalk. He was raised in Watts and has been homeless for most of his adult life, other than stints in jail for burglary.

He hustles on his bike doing odd jobs for cash, such as cleaning yards and recycling, but said he has trouble filling out job applications because he can’t read. Most of his day is spent just surviving, searching for food and shelter.

Hawthorne is one of California’s estimated 173,800 homeless residents, most of whom are enrolled in MediCal or qualify for the program. He has diabetes and high blood pressure. He had been on psychotropic medicine for depression and paranoia but hasn’t taken it in months or years. He can’t remember.

“They wanted me to come back in two weeks, but I didn’t go,” he said of an emergency room visit this year for chronic foot pain associated with diabetes. “It’s too much responsibility sometimes.”

Hawthorne’s chronic health conditions and homelessness should qualify him for the CalAIM initiative, which would give him access to a case manager to help him find a primary care doctor, address untreated medical conditions, and navigate the new social services that may be available to him under the program.

But it’s not up to him whether he receives the new benefits.

The state has yielded tremendous power to Medi-Cal’s managed-care insurance companies to decide which social services they will offer. They also decide which of their sickest and most vulnerable enrollees get them.

Hawthorne needs help just as badly. But he’s unlikely to get it since he doesn’t have a phone or permanent address — and wouldn’t be easy for the hospital to find. The homeless encampments where he lives are routinely cleared by law enforcement officials.

“We have so many more people who need help than are able to get it,” Lopez Rico said. “There aren’t enough resources to help everyone, so only some people get in.”

L.A. Care has referred about 28,400 members to CalAIM case managers, roughly 1% of its total enrollees, according to its CEO, John Baackes. It is offering housing, food, and other social services to even fewer: about 12,600 people.

CalAIM has the potential to dramatically improve the health of patients who are lucky enough to receive new benefits, Baackes said. But he isn’t convinced it will save the health care system money and believes it will leave behind millions of other patients — without greater investment in the broader Medi-Cal program.

“Access is not as good for Medi-Cal patients as it is for people with means, and that is a fundamental problem that has not changed with CalAIM,” Baackes said.

Evidence shows that basic Medi-Cal patient care is often subpar.

Year-over-year analyses published by the state Department of Health Care Services, which administers Medi-Cal, have found that, by some measures, Medi-Cal health plans are getting worse at caring for patients, not better. Among the most recent findings: The rates of breast and cervical cancer screenings for women were worse in 2020 than 2019, even when the demands that covid-19 placed on the health care system were factored into the analysis. Hospital readmissions increased, and diabetes care declined.

“The impact of covid is real — providers shut down — but we also know we need a lot of improvement in access and quality,” said State Medicaid Director Jacey Cooper. “We don’t feel we are where we should be in California.” Cooper said her agency is cracking down on MediCal insurance plans that are failing to provide adequate care and is strengthening oversight and enforcement of insurers, which are required by state law to provide timely access to care and enough network doctors to serve all their members.

The state is also requiring participating health plans to sign new contracts with stricter quality-of-care measures.

Cooper argues CalAIM will improve the quality of care for all Medi-Cal patients, describing aspects of the initiative that require health plans to hook patients up with primary care doctors, connect them with specialty care, and develop detailed plans to keep them out of expensive treatment zones like the emergency room.

She denied that CalAIM will leave millions of MediCal patients behind and said the state has increased incentive and bonus payments so health care providers will focus on improving care while implementing the initiative.

“CalAIM targets people who are homeless and extremely high-need, but we’re also focusing on wellness and prevention,” she told KHN. “It really is a wholesale reform of the entire Medicaid system in California.”

A chorus of doctors, hospital leaders, health insurance executives, and health care advocates point to Medi-Cal reimbursement rates as the core of the problem. “The chronic condition in Medi-Cal is underfunding,” said Linnea Koopmans, CEO of the Local Health Plans of California.

Although the state has restored some previous MediCal rate cuts, there’s no move to increase base payments for doctors and hospitals. Cooper said the state is using tobacco tax dollars and other state money to attract more providers to the system and to entice doctors who already participate to accept more Medi-Cal patients.

When Newsom vetoed the bill to provide higher reimbursements primarily for emergency room care at MLK, he said the state cannot afford the “tens of millions” of dollars it would cost.

MLK leaders vow to continue pushing, while other hospitals and the powerful California Medical Association plot a larger campaign to draw attention to the low payment rates.

“Californians who rely on Medi-Cal — two-thirds of whom are people of color — have a harder time finding providers who are willing to care for them,” said Jan Emerson-Shea, a spokesperson for the California Hospital Association.

For Dr. Oscar Casillas at MLK, the issue is critical. Although he’s a highly trained emergency physician, most days he practices routine primary care, addressing fevers, chronic foot and back pain, and missed medications.

“If you put yourself in the shoes of our patients, what would you do?” asked Casillas, who previously worked as an ER doctor in the affluent coastal city of Santa Monica. “There’s no reasonable access if you’re on Medi-Cal. Most of the providers are by the beach, so emergency departments like ours are left holding the bag.”

KHN (Kaiser Health News) is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues. Together with Policy Analysis and Polling, KHN is one of the three major operating programs at KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation). KFF is an endowed nonprofit organization providing information on health issues to the nation.

Edward Green, who is in his late 20s, sought emergency room care at MLK Community Hospital in South Los Angeles in April after running out of his medication for bipolar disorder. The voices in his head “start being angry with me and tell me negative things and make me feel bad,” he says. (Angela Hart / KHN)

Local

Charles R. Drew Univ. Launches MD Program as Newsom Announces COVID Emergency End

Aldon Thomas Stiles California Black Media

On Monday, Oct. 17, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced that the COVID-19 emergency in California will end Feb. 28, 2023

The governor’s powers to suspend constitutional laws and procedures in the event of eminent danger - authority that has been criticized as overreaching by critics – willcome to an end.

The pandemic highlighted racial disparities in the health care delivery system for Black people and the lack of representation in health care occupations – considering Black people only made up about 3% of California’s active patient care physicians in 2020 despite making up roughly 6.5% of the state’s overall population.

The Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science (CDU) has taken a huge step toward a remedy for this issue by launching an independent, 4-year medical degree (MD) program.

This is the first and only program of its kind in a historically Black institution west of the Mississippi. It is one of four U.S. historically Black medical colleges.

CDU is located in South Los Angeles. It was foundedon the heels of the Watts Rebellion in the mid-60s. LA’s

Black population is about 9% of its residents, totaling about 1 million people.

“Our community, and in fact the entire Western United States, has for too long been deprived of an MD program built from the ground up with diversity, equity, and inclusion fused into its very bones. No more,” said David M. Carlisle, CDU President and CEO, in an address to the campus. “It is a great honor and achievement to announce to you today that CDU will finally remedy this once and for all.”

After a turbulent couple of years, California now has a 7-day average of 562 for COVID-19 hospitalizations per 100,000 people and a 7-day average death rate of 29.

Up until recently, the Black community was more likely to suffer more severe symptoms due to COVID.

CDU – a nonprofit institution committed to cultivating future health professionals and leaders “who are dedicated to social justice and health equity” – is partnering with UCLA by educating medical students through a joint MD program.

Funds for the program came from the University’s five year, $75 million CDU Rising Campaign.

According to the Dean of CDU’s College of Medicine, Dr. Deborah Prothrow-Stith, the MD program is designed

to aid underserved communities.

“The benefits of having more doctors of color in the mix are abundantly clear and supported by research. Doctors of color are more likely to practice in underserved communities, and patients of color have better health outcomes when attended to by a physician of the same ethnicity,” said Prothrow-Stith.

Prothrow-Stith noted that because the program encourages more doctor of color to practice in communities of need, it could help solve the “root cause of many inequities in healthcare” across California that were exposed during the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the end of the pandemic emergency status has an expiration date, officials with California Health and Human Services (CalHHS) assure citizens that this does not mean the State will be abandoning them.

“California’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic has prepared us for whatever comes next. As we move into this next phase, the infrastructure and processes we’ve invested in and built up will provide us the tools to manage any ups and downs in the future,” said Secretary of CalHHS Dr. Mark Ghaly in a statement. “While the threat of this virus is still real, our preparedness and collective work have helped turn this once crisis emergency into a manageable situation.”

As state officials and community members tackle these issues, they hope that the state will have the infrastructure and personnel to provide an adequate response should another public health crisis arise.

In Deciding the Midterm Elections,

Black Voters Again Hold the Power

By Stacy M. Brown NNPA Newswire Senior National Correspondent

In-depth new research examining the priorities and concerns of Black voters over the age of 50 offers optimism and concern for Democrats and Republicans alike as America heads to the polls on Nov. 8.

Individuals aged 50 and over, which includes millions of Black men and women, comprise the largest voting bloc in America and are considered the nation’s most potent voters.

In detailed research conducted shortly before the elections, AARP-sponsored data revealed how older Black voters plan to cast their ballots, their significant concerns, and their likely influence.

“Black voters 50-plus are going to be decisive in key elections across the country. That’s going to be especially true in the importance of determining control of the Senate,” said Matt Hogan, a partner at Impact Research.

“Data does show Republicans are doing a lot better with Black voters 50-plus than they have historically,” Hogan reported from the extensive research.

“I think both parties have a real opportunity to boost their margins by protecting social security and Medicare and lowering the cost of prescription drugs.”

Hogan counted as part of the AARP and NNPA Pollster Roundtable that included a particular focus on Black women, a critical cohort often overlooked by political candidates.

“Black women say they are less secure than they expected,” said Margie Omero, a principal at GBAO Strategies, who participated in the poll.

“While women over 50 are motivated to vote by dislike of a candidate, Black women are motivated by civic participation to make their voice heard or because it’s their duty to vote,” Omero noted.

Omero further noted that many Black women over 50 are changing to respond to higher living costs. And similar to other women in the same age bracket, Black women believe that lowering the cost of food, reducing the cost of prescriptions, and protecting Social Security from cuts will help them the most.

In a “She’s the Difference” poll of likely voters, eight in ten said they support a Democrat on a generic congressionalballot.

Most Black women 50 and older said they are still making up their minds about how they will vote inNovember.

“This cohort is strongly motivated to vote, and making their voices heard is the biggest motivating factor,” Omeroadded.

The poll outlined that the most important issues determining their vote in November are division in the country, voting rights, and racism.

The poll revealed that two-thirds of Black women 50 and older said the U.S. economy is working well for them, a significantly higher percentage than women in that agebracket overall.

At the same time, a plurality said they feel less financially secure than expected at this stage.

In a survey taken in targeted election districts, Black voters 50-plus in the most competitive House districts for this November’s election currently back a generic Democrat by a 65% – 16% margin over a generic Republican with asubstantial 19% undecided.

While 49-points is a significant lead, it represents

prioritizing economic issues for their vote in November.

In Florida, former Gov. Charlie Crist leads Gov. Ron DeSantis by a 78% – 18% margin among Black voters 50and over.

Crist wins women and men significantly but is upmore with Black women 50 and older.

About one-quarter of Black voters 50 and over call themselves conservatives, and with this group, DeSantis has a narrow 5-point lead.

Crist dominates DeSantis among Black voters whoare self-described liberals and moderates. Crist’s lead is 22points bigger among Black voters with college degrees thanthose without them.

Congresswoman Val Demings is ahead of Senator Marco Rubio by 79% – 17% with Black voters 50 and over.

Like Crist, Demings’ lead is larger with Black womenthan men.

Demings is the choice of nearly every Black voter 50plus who is a liberal and has a big lead with moderates, while the two candidates are competitive among conservatives.

Just as in the governor’s race, Demings does a net 22-points better with Black voters 50-plus who are college graduates.

In Georgia, Stacey Abrams leads Gov. Brian Kemp 74% – 21% among Black voters 50-plus, an enormous advantage, but this 53-point margin is a significant dropoff from 2018, when she won Black voters 45-plus by 91-points over Kemp (95% – 4%), according to the AP VoteCast exit poll.

The pollsters didn’t find much of a gender gap among Black voters 50 and over in the governor’s race, and Abrams has substantial advantages among liberals (35% of Black voters 50+) and moderates (31%).

However, Kemp has a 9-point lead among the 27% of Black voters 50-plus who call themselves conservatives.

Sen. Raphael Warnock has a more significant lead among Black voters 50-plus, ahead of Herschel Walker by

Continued on page A2

1981

Boxer Muhammad Ali was walking past a Skyscraper when he realized that a man was about to commit suicide.

Then he decided to go up to the apartment next door and talk to the man trying to convince him not to jump.

Finally the man gave up jumping and was later helped financially by the fighter.

underperformance by Democrats among Black voters 50plus compared to recent elections.

Black women 50-plus are more supportive of the generic Democrat at 69% – 13%, with men preferring the Democrat at 60% – 20%.

Liberals (37% of Black voters 50+) back the Democrat by 87-points, while conservatives (21% of voters) favor the Republican by 15.

While very few moderates (35% of voters) say they would vote for the Republican, 33% are currently undecided. Pollsters found little differences by education, with Republicans doing somewhat better among voters

an 80% – 17% margin, but is still underperforming typical Democratic performance with these voters.

Warnock’s lead is 10-points more significant among Black women 50-plus than Black men. The pollsters found that Warnock leads Walker with each ideological group, but the race is tight among conservatives.

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer leads Tudor Dixon by a 79% – 16% margin among Black voters 50 and over, where polls found a gender gap, with Black women 50-plus giving the governor an even bigger lead.

Whitmer holds considerable advantages among liberals and moderates, while Dixon narrowly leads Whitmer among the 18% of Black voters 50-plus who call

themselves conservatives.

Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers (D) holds a 78% – 18% lead over Tim Michels (R) among Black voters 50 and over.

However, it still stands underperforming compared to recent Democratic candidate performance among Black voters 50-plus in Wisconsin.

Evers is up by 64-points among Black men 50+ and 57-points among Black women 50-plus.

The governor wins nearly every self-identified liberal and 81% of moderates, but among the 1-in-5 Wisconsin Black voters 50-plus who identify as conservative, Michels is up 58% – 39%.

Pollsters found the Senate race to be like the contest for governor at the topline level.

Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes (D) leads Sen. Ron Johnson (R) by a 78% – 19% margin.

Barnes’ lead is a bit larger over Johnson’s among Black men 50-plus than Black women 50 and over.

Barnes has a slightly smaller lead among Black moderates 50-plus than Evers, but he keeps the race against Johnson closer among Black conservatives 50-plus.

Meanwhile, in Pennsylvania, polling shows Josh Shapiro with a substantial 85% – 9% lead over Doug Mastriano among Black voters 50-plus in the race for governor.That’s an improvement from his 78% – 17% advantage in June.

Shapiro leads among both Black women and men 50plus, with an immense advantage among women.

He wins more than 90% of self-described liberals and moderates and 62% of conservatives, with considerable improvement among both moderates and conservatives since June.

Like the governor’s race, John Fetterman has expanded his lead over Mehmet Oz among Black voters 50 and over.

His edge now stands at 84% – 8% vs. 76% – 16% four months ago.

Black women 50-plus favor Fetterman by an 80-point margin, while men back him by 68-points.

Fetterman remains up by huge margins among liberals and moderates while doubling Oz’s vote total among the 21% of Black voters 50-plus in Pennsylvania who call themselves politically conservative.

“One of the things that will be interesting to see after the election is just what was the final movement,” said Tony Fabrizio, partner at Fabrizio Ward.

”If we continue to see a drift toward Republicans, that’s good news for the Republican Party,” Fabrizio stated.

“One of the things we’ve seen is that Republicans are status quo with white voters, but their growth is particularlywith Black voters and other voters of color.”

Williams (USC) and Tuimoloau (OSU), Walter Camp Winners

By Earl Heath Contributing Sports Writer

Caleb Williams of USC and JT Tuimoloau of Ohio State were named this week’s Walter Camp Offensive and Defensive National Players of the week.   Williams completed 31-of-45 passes for 411 yards and five touchdowns as 10th ranked USC defeated Arizona, 45-37.  Williams completed passes to 10 different Trojan receivers in the victory.  With the victory, USC improved to 7-1, 5-1 in the Pac-12.

The sophomore from Washington D.C. is the seventh USC player to earn Walter Camp National Player of Week

honors since the award started in 2004, and the first since defensive back Talanoa Hufanga (Dec. 13, 2020).

On the defensive side Tuimoloau recorded six tack les (3 for losses), including two quarterback sacks, forced and recovered a fumble and intercepted two passes (one of which he returned 14 yards for a touchdown) as sec ond-ranked Ohio State improved to 8-0 with a 44-31 vic tory over 13th-ranked Penn State. The Buckeyes are ranked number 2 by the College Football Committee first poll this season behind Tennessee and in front of Georgia and Clemson in the top four.

The Edgewood, Washington native also broke up one

pass in the win.

The 6-4, 270 pounder is the 14th Ohio State player to earn Walter Camp National Player of Week honors (since 2004), and the first since current Buckeye quarterback C.J. Stroud (November 20, 2021).

This is the 19th season that the Walter Camp Foot ball Foundation will honor one offensive and one defensive player as its national Football Bowl Subdivision player of the week during the regular season. Recipients are selected by a panel of national media members and administered by the Foundation. They are presented  by 777 Partners.

Walter Camp is known as  “The Father of Ameri

can football,” first selected an All-America team in 1889. Camp – a former Yale University athlete and football coach – is also credited with developing play from scrimmage, set plays, the numerical assessment of goals and tries and the restriction of play to eleven men per side. The Wal ter Camp Football Foundation (www.waltercamp.org,@ WalterCampFF) – a New Haven-based all-volunteer group – was founded in 1967 to perpetuate the ideals of Camp and to continue the tradition of selecting annually an All-America team.

Big “Friday Night” for this Crew

Putting the Focus on Both Golf and DEI at PGA TOUR’s World Wide Technology Championship in Mexico

This week’s World Wide Technology Championship at Mayakoba on the PGA TOUR will not only showcase some of the world’s top golf talent, but Jim Kavanaugh, CEO of sponsor WWT, and his team will also this unique opportunity as a platform to promote and educate the im portance of “a diverse, equitable and inclusive organization that fosters a sense of belonging.”

World Wide Technology (WWT) is in its second year as title sponsor of the World Wide Technology Champi onship at Mayakoba, and the organization has dedicated atremendous amount of their resources this week to Diver sity, Equity & Inclusion initiatives that they will share to its hundreds of attending partners, clients, staff and guests.

As one of the largest minority-owned companies in the United States, its mission of enforcing diversity, equity and inclusion is rooted in the company’s makeup.

“As a global organization, it is critical for WWT to look at the world through a different view,” Kavanaughsaid.

“As we continue to focus on the landscape of our glob al business, it is extremely important to understand the different cultures and experiences of all of our employees at WWT. Building DEI into the DNA of our company and our core values supports these efforts, but it requires vigilance.

“WWT is an organization that’s growing quickly. As a result, we must be very intentional about ensuring that DEI is embraced at every level of the organization and that we have buy-in from both leadership and employees. A true DEI strategy will aim to ensure that everyone is given equitable access to opportunity.”

WWT serves as title sponsor of the Advocates Pro Golf Association (APGA) Player Development Program.

Established in 2010, the APGA Tour is a non-profit organization with the mission to prepare African Ameri cans and other minority golfers to compete and win at the highest level of professional golf, both on tour and in the golf industry.

Tour Championship at TPC San Antonio in August. He has earned a full exemption on to the PGA TOUR Latinoamerica. Following Tuesday’s Pro-Am, the participants and PGA TOUR pros will be treated to a short panel discus sion with two of the APGA Players, Kamaiu Jonson and Andrew Walker, as well as APGA CEO Ken Bentley. The Q&A is hosted by Bob Ferrell, Executive Vice President, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion and Public Sector Strategy at World Wide Technology. Ferrell is a retired Army Lt. General, who joined WWT in 2017 after 38 years of ser vice, culminated by his position at the Pentagon as Chief Information Officer for the Army.

On Friday morning, WWT will host a Diversity, Eq uity & Inclusion Panel, hosted by Michael Bush, CEO at Great Place to Work and a global chief executive with over 25 years of experience leading small and mid-sized organi zations through transformational growth.

The panel will consist of Dan Soto (Chief Compli ance Officer, Ally Financial), Tanya Van Court (Founder & CEO, Goalsetter), Erik Moore (Managing Director, Base Ventures), and Chris Womack (President, Chairman & CEO, Georgia Power).

“Much of our DEI journey has been led in large part by our workforce and their desire for a diverse, equitable and inclusive organization that fosters a sense of belong ing,” Kavanaugh emphasized.

On the golf course, the World Wide Technology Championship at Mayakoba will feature a marquee field that includes two-time defending champion Viktor Hov land of Norway; reigning Masters Tournament winner and PGA TOUR Player of the Year Scottie Scheffler; twotime major champion Collin Morikawa; last week’s PGA TOUR winner Seamus Power of Ireland; and a significant contingent of top players throughout Latin America.

By Earl Heath Contributing Sports Writer

“Friday Night Lights” our big for big for So Cal and the rest of the Country. Recently there was a very special game as Marquez High took on Maywood CES in the Huntington Park section of Los Angeles.

LaQuica “Lady Hawk” Hawkins, Kim C. Bly, Crystal Nichols, Zina Jones and Connie Foster-Wells made history as thee became the first all-female crew to officiate a varsity high school football game is L.A. and So Cal.   Huntington Park Mayor Eduardo Martinez, gave them commendations as they received cheers from the stands that brought the house down. Each member of the crew was   given flowers, balloons and a gift box by the Marquez cheer squad, with pink pins affixed to their uni forms in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

Maria Granados, mother of  Marquez cheerleader Ki ana  told the L A Times “That we got them, it just rep resents a lot. So that’s why I’m like, ‘No, we’re doing some thing for them, so they can feel special.”

The contest was one sided as Marquez ran away with a 61-20 win. The crew members have earned their place on this platform.

Bly was line judge has been a football official for 4 years also has worked playoffs three different seasons in cluding two second  round play-off games. She’ s a proud member of the SCCFOA (College Football).

She also officiates basketball and was recently named Los Angeles Coaches Association Female Coach of the Year.

“What motivates me with this cause in the loss of Women in my family,” said Bly. “I do this in their honor and countless others in their family. I will be wearing some form of pink to represent Breast Cancer Awareness.”

“For one game, we’re queens among queens, no lon ger having to prove ourselves in a “gentlemen’s club,” Bly said after the game.

“In this scenario, we’re all each other’s keeper, so it’s this sisterhood,” Bly added.

Foster-Wells is one of the most athletic of the group. Throughout her career she has officiated Volleyball, Track and Basketball and will be returning to La Crosse next sea son. She has a great strength in rule knowledge and excels in game mechanics. She has done championship games in Football, Volleyball and Basketball.

“It’s an honor and a blessing to be chosen to represent our unit, our gender, and our race in this way,” Foster-Wells said.  “It shows the commitment by that of the assignor and the CIF-LA office to show diversity in the officiating community. It has taken some time to get here.  We’ve putin the work.”

“It shows the commitment by that of the assignor and the CIF-LA office to show diversity in the officiating com munity. It has taken some time to get here.  We’ve put in the work.  I’m excited for us to get out there and show what we can do.  I hope that this sparks an interest in both young men and women to become officials in the sport that they are excited about.”

Zina Jones the head linesman on the crew has offici ated volleyball and was an educator and High School bas ketball coach for several years before becoming an official.  Hawkins the Umpire has also worked a champion ship game in football, basketball, and volleyball. The single mom has found ways to mix family with work. “I would sometimes take my son, Quintyn, with me on long Satur days,” said Hawkins. He understood Mommy had to work, so instead of leaving him with my Mom or a babysitter I’d bring him along. It taught him about hard work and what a good work ethic entail.”

Her mentor is Alvin Rambo, who was a member of the LA Football Unit for 50 years. “He was very patient in my rookie years”, Hawkins said. “But he still set high expectations which pushed my to learn more It’s pretty ex citing to be on a crew as special as this.

“The best thing about officiating is being able to be around great student athletes from all around the city.  It’s exciting to see an athlete in high school that recalls you being a ref when they were in elementary . Seeing  them compete at different stages of their lives, from Rec and Park leagues to travel ball, and AAU. “

Nichols the game referee is currently is currently in her 31st season which is likely the longest female football official working in the USA.,

She was the first woman to officiate international men’s & women’s at the highest level in in Finland, she has officiated basketball for more than 35 years. That included international men’s and semi pro basketball in New York City and Las Vegas, which was an amazing journey.

She has officiated officiate it track and field for 19 years.

Nichols mother Dorothy supported her during her lengthy career and even flew from the Midwest to Cali fornia to watch her do her first Pop Warner championship football game (All American). She has 3 high school foot ball championships rings. And three international champi onships medals.

She is currently writing a memoir in writing about all of the male positive figures that have been in my life I’ve been so blessed at a young age to have amazing men men tor me to act like a lady at all times.

“It’s about time they put a crew like this together.

As part of WWT’s support, the top five eligible play ers from the final APGA Tour standings were brought to Mexico for the Monday Qualifier, including Trey Valen tine, Kamaiu Johnson, Andrew Walker, Ryan Alford, and Marcus Byrd.

These five players are also playing in Tuesday’s ProAm. In addition, former PGA TOUR pro Brad Adamo nis earned an exemption into Mayakoba by winning last month’s APGA Tour’s inaugural Ascension Classic at Glen Echo Country Club in St. Louis.

Kamaiu Johnson became the first player to win the World Wide Technology Player Development Program bo nus pool reward with his victory in the Mastercard APGA

Off the course, WWT executives will be in the com munity for such events as “Career Discovery Day” for 10th and 11th graders at local K’iin Beh School, participating in a “Career Readiness Workshop” for at least 20 local univer sity students, and they are taking PGA TOUR players to K’iin Beh School, so the children can meet some of golf’s rising stars.

The week will be punctuated by a CEO Beachside Chat with Jim Kavanaugh that will include a number of CEO and business leaders, including PGA TOUR Com missioner Jay Monahan; Jeff Holzschuh (Chairman, Insti tutional Securities Group for Morgan Stanley); Joseph Im picciche (CEO, Ascension); Ron Kruszewski (CEO, Stifel Financial Corporation); and Mike Descheneaux (CEO, Silicon Valley Bank). NBC Sports’ Steve Sands will also serve as a moderator for portions of this all-star gathering of global business voices.

PGA TOUR Special to NNPA Newswire

Caleb Williams of USC (Photo: DailyTrojan.com)

JT Tuimoloau of Ohio State (Photo: SI.com)

World Wide Technology (WWT) is in its second year as title sponsor of the World Wide Technology Championship at Mayakoba, and the organization has dedicated a tremendous amount of their resources this week to Diversity, Equity & Inclusion initiatives that they will share to its hundreds of attending partners, clients, staff and guests.

Pres. Obama Endorses Rep.Bass to be LA’s Next Mayor

Antonio Ray Harvey California Black Media

Gov. Gavin Newsom has not yet endorsed a candidate for mayor of Los Angeles, but former President Barack Obama did 10 days before the General Election on Nov. 8.

Citing her “proven leadership, integrity, and record of getting things done,” Obama’s endorsement of Congresswoman Karen Bass (D-CA-13) for mayor of Los Angeles can be seen on a video released by her campaign.

Bass was an early supporter of Obama’s presidential run and campaigned for him in 2007.

“I am asking Los Angeles to vote for Karen Bass for mayor. I know Karen. She was with me in supporting my campaign from the beginning, and Karen Bass will deliver results,” Obama stated when making his endorsement official. “Make no mistake, there is only one proven prochoice Democrat in this race. Karen has always been on the right side of the issues we care so deeply about.”

President Obama’s support of Bass follows endorsements from President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Sen. Alex Padilla, Sen. Bernie Sanders and more than 250 other endorsements from community leaders, labor unions and elected officials since the June primary.

Bass is the only candidate endorsed by the Democratic Party and Planned Parenthood Advocacy Project Los Angeles County Action Fund. Her leadership has also earned her the endorsements of the Los Angeles Times and La Opinión.

“I am humbled and honored to have the support of President Barack Obama,” Bass said in a letter. “President Obama brought us faith in our government and hope for the future of our country. It is impossible to overstate the

impact of his work leading this country for eight scandalfree years advancing social and economic justice in thenation and the world.”

While Gov. Newsom has yet to endorse a candidate running for mayor of Los Angeles, he has endorsed other state and local Democrats running for office.

Statewide, Newsom is endorsing Dr. Shirley Weber, California’s first Black Secretary of State. In a local Los Angeles race, he is endorsing Black educator and community organizer Lola Smallwood-Cuevas (D-Los Angeles) who is running for State Senate District 28 against fellow Democrat and Black civil rights attorney Cheryl C. Turner.

Bass is in a tight race with billionaire and Republican-turned-Democrat Rick Caruso.

Responding to a question on Fox 11’s “The Issue Is” show, Newsom said “I have deep respect for the both of them and have not gotten involved in this race.”

Newsom’s political advisers, a firm called Bearstar Strategies, are also chief consultants for the Caruso’s campaign.

In the 2018 gubernatorial primary, Bass endorsed former L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa over Newsom. But, August 2021, Bass, members of the group calling itself Women Against the Recall (WAR), and Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-CA-37), held a news conference to openly support Newsom in the recall election held Sept. 14, 2021.

The Black Women Organized for Political Action PAC (BWOPA-PAC), California Black Women’s Collective PAC and Black women leaders throughout the state called out Gov. Newsom’s reluctance in declaring support for Bass.

“He stated that he supports Black Women, but his

NY to Pay $25 Million to Two Men Falsely Convicted of Killing Malcolm X

Continued from page A1

(also known as William Bradley) fired a shotgun at Malcolm X and were joined by Leon Davis and Thomas Hagen.  Both Muhammad Aziz and Khalil Islam, who died in 2009, were exonerated last year. When the allegations were tossed out as the result of a two-year investigation by the Manhattan district attorney’s office. Lawsuits were filed against the City of New York by Aziz and the familyof Islam. The settlements arrive three months after the suits were filed in the U.S. District Court in Brooklyn.

The case of the wrongful convictions on such a notorious high-profile murder prompts many to ask how

many other false convictions could be out there. Several studies have been conducted that note that Black men are falsely accused at a much higher level than other groupsfor crimes.

In 2020, The Innocence Project released the report, “From Emmett Till to Pervis Payne — Black Men in America Are Still Killed for Crimes They Didn’t Commit.” Lauren Victoria Burke is an independent journalist and the host of the podcast BURKEFILE. She is a political analyst who appears regularly on #RolandMartinUnfiltered. She may be contacted at LBurke007@gmail.com and on twitter at @LVBurke

administration doesn’t demonstrate that he wants us at his decision-making table. He selectively supports Black women candidates even when they have overwhelming support from the party leaders and our community like in the case of Congressmember Bass,” the coalition said in a “open letter” in October.

Bass is running to be the first Black woman mayor of the second-largest city in the country. She stated that “President Obama’s support underscores the contrast

in this race and inspires” her campaign. She has stated her plans are to solve homelessness, make the city of Los Angeles safer, and create affordable housing.

“She has devoted her life to serving her community, from working in the emergency room to saving California from a budget crisis to delivering relief during the COVID pandemic as a member of Congress,” Obama stated.