VOL. 53, NO. 20 • MARCH 1 - 7, 2018
It’s Read Across America Day – Let’s Celebrate a Nation of Diverse Readers
Norton Faces Tough Challenger
America: A Nation Still ‘Separate and Unequal’
By Stacy M. Brown WI Senior Writer
In a democracy, voters alone decide who can best speak to their needs and produce results for them, said D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton. And although she came to Congress as a civil rights leader and her fight for D.C. statehood is legendary, Norton will have to overcome perhaps the biggest challenge to her seat. She’ll face off in the June 19 primary against Kim R. Ford, who served in the Obama’s administration and helped lead the implementation of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act — a vehicle that distributed more than $350 billion in recovery funds to jumpstart the economy.
NORTON Page 11
ASALH Luncheon Page 21
Kerner Commission’s Warning Confirmed: U.S. Marred by Divided Society By D. Kevin McNeir WI Editor @dkevinmcneir
5 The University of the District of Columbia hosts Advocates for History’s Black History Great Trailblazer program at the UDC Theater of the Arts in Northwest on Monday, Feb. 26. During singing of the Negro National Anthem, just a few of the characters pictured, Laurence Jones - portrayed by Elijah Barringtine, Fannie Lou Hamer – portrayed by Jourdyn Perkins, and Florence Griffith Joyner – portrayed by Laniyah Robinson, walk through time to take the audience on a journey acknowledging their accomplishments in Black history. /Photo by Shevry Lassiter
College Student Among Democrats Seeking to Unseat Muriel Bowser
In 1967, as riots raged across the U.S., President Lyndon B. Johnson assembled an erstwhile group of political leaders and policymakers and asked them to examine the multiple effects of segregation and to then provide recommendations on ways to effectively reduce racial and ethnic inequality – barriers to equality that threatened to unhinge the very core of America’s democratic foundation. And on Tuesday, Feb. 27, hundreds gathered at George Washington University in Northwest to dis-
KERNER Page 34
Gray Also ‘Weighing’ Run for D.C. Mayor By Stacy M. Brown WI Senior Writer
5 Michael Christian Woods /Courtesy photo
In the spring of 2014, D.C.’s mayoral race heated up. However, it wasn’t the voters stoking the flames, but none other than sitting U.S. Attorney Ronald Machen, who fired a proverbial cannon into the race. Machen told the world that then-Mayor Vincent Gray was about to be indicted. Gray had led most polls and was expected by
many to defeat his challengers, including Muriel Bowser, though she had been gaining on the incumbent even before Machen’s interference. In December 2015, long after the damage was done and Bowser was in office, new U.S. Attorney Channing Phillips announced finally that there would be no indictment of Gray, who would eventually return to District politics and unseat
STUDENT Page 24
5 ‘Healing Our Divided Society’ – the book cover for the new Kerner Report /Courtesy photo
Celebrating 53 Years of Service / Serving More Than 50,000 African American Readers Throughout The Metropolitan Area