Jacksonville terror, The ultimate heist, Steve Harvey shuts down rumors
Friday, September 1, 2023. Happy Labor Day weekend!
What I’m Reading
It happened again. A white supremacist shot and killed three Black people at a Dollar General in Jacksonville, Florida.
A racist screed left by the 21-year-old shooter, Ryan Palmeter, made it clear that he had every intention to harm Black people — an attack frighteningly similar to the Buffalo, New York, supermarket shooting and the shooting at the Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina.
Dollar General employee Anolt "AJ" Laguerre Jr., 19, devoted father Jerrald De'Shaun Gallon, 29, and Uber driver Angela Michelle Carr, 52, were the victims of the shooting. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was booed while attending a prayer vigil for the victims.
For The Atlantic, Juliette Kayyem makes the point the Jacksonville shooter's actions should not be misunderstood as a one-off hate crime but rather as a production — white supremacists are organizing. “White supremacists, and in particular neo-Nazis, are not acting in isolation, and they like to put on a show,” she explained.
If you want to support the victims' families, I’ve confirmed these fundraisers to be legitimate. Angela Michelle Carr and Anolt "AJ" Laguerre Jr. Jerrald Gallon does not appear to have one.
The Jacksonville Killer Wanted Everyone to Know His Message of Hate, The Atlantic
Scalawag Magazine has a new project out called CONDEMNED, where they are publishing stories, personal experiences, and abolitionist analyses from people currently on Death Row. Their first stories are from Alim Braxton and Sabur Tyler, who have been friends for six of their combined 53 years on Death Row.
Finding friendship, innocence, and redemption on Death Row, Scalawag
I’m ready to see this story turned into a limited series on HBO. In one of the largest heists pulled off from inside an American prison, Arthur Lee Cofield Jr. impersonated billionaires using smuggled cell phones and a handful of accomplices, stole millions from large bank accounts, and bought houses, cars, clothes, and gold.
How a Man in Prison Stole Millions from Billionaires, The New Yorker
What’s In The News
Across America
Colorado: Denver approved a $4.7 million settlement to over 300 Black Lives Matter protesters arrested by police in 2020…
District of Columbia: The fatal stabbing of a 16-year-old girl after she left a McDonald’s stemmed from an argument over sweet and sour sauce, prosecutors said…
Florida: Florida's reviewers of an AP African American Studies course revealed how the state objected to a lesson about slavery, saying it “may lead to a viewpoint of an ‘oppressor vs. oppressed’ based solely on race or ethnicity"...
Georgia: The city council of Savannah has voted to rename a downtown square after Susie King Taylor, a Black woman who once taught slaves to read and write…
Illinois: In Black neighborhoods that are growing economically, Black population is on the decline. It’s almost like the only way to shatter the economic glass ceiling is for a neighborhood to shed its Blackness, Alden Loury writes for the Chicago Sun-Times…
Kansas: Nathan Louis Jackson, a Kansas City, Kansas-born playwright and screenwriter of extraordinary talent and national acclaim, has died. He was 44…
Michigan: A federal lawsuit arguing that Michigan's new state legislative districts illegally disenfranchise Black voters will proceed to trial…
Mississippi: The state will have its first-ever openly gay state legislator after a House candidate won his Democratic primary election runoff…
Missouri: A Missouri judge ruled that the 84-year-old white homeowner who shot Ralph Yarl after he mistakenly went to the man’s house must stand trial…
New York: Police plan to pilot drones to "monitor backyard parties" over Labor Day weekend, they announced during a security briefing focused on J’ouvert…
North Carolina: State Republicans are trying to remove the only Black woman on North Carolina’s Supreme Court after she spoke out about racial bias in her courtroom…
Ohio: This is a must-watch video. Former foster child Robert Carter adopted five siblings who were once separated in foster care and created the family he never had…
Pennsylvania: A white sculptor was invited to design a statue of Harriet Tubman in Philadelphia. After complaints, the city held an open call for submissions. Five semifinalist designs were chosen, all created by Black artists…
Tennessee: A special session of the Tennessee General Assembly descended into chaos after House Speaker Cameron Sexton bumped into state Rep. Justin Pearson…
Texas: Houston parents are pushing back against the state’s school takeover and engaging the community about the changes, which include converting at least 28 school libraries into discipline areas…
Features
Hammer & Hope, a new magazine on Black politics and culture, is out with its latest edition. In it, Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor wrote about class conflict and explained that “a new left will not just be willed into existence. We must organize and build it together on the basis of radical politics”...
The opioid crisis started among white people. But now that overdoses are surging in Black and Brown communities, the government is failing to invest in healthcare-based approaches that will save lives…
For Defector, Jason England writes that hip-hop has hit its midlife crisis. “It found new crowds and is still going out to the clubs, but no one has the heart to tell it that just maybe it isn’t the coolest motherfucker in the room anymore”...
Social media pages are making FOIA requests for footage of rappers in police custody in hopes to go viral. Andre Gee investigates this trend for Rolling Stone…
The historically Black, and now rapidly-gentrified neighborhood of Bed-Stuy has New York City’s highest concentration of active Airbnb listings. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg…
The Chicago Black Dance Legacy Project helps sustain Black dancemakers in the city by addressing funding disparities and “offering a vision of Black dance as a form whose categories refuse to be static”…
Black women are less likely than women from other racial groups to carry a pregnancy to term, and experts have attributed it to systemic racial disparities. These deaths are “completely preventable”...
Read about Coco Gauff’s glorious progress and how she has been “the imposing presence that the tennis world has been waiting for her to become"...
What’s Happening
For Bloomberg, Akayla Gardner took a look inside Vice President Kamala Harris’s fundraising blitz. She also recently announced a new $125 million federal initiative designed to help underserved entrepreneurs launch and scale small businesses…
Harrison Floyd, the only one of the 19 people charged in the Fulton County election probe to spend time in jail, has been given a $100,000 bond…
Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison says Latino and Black men won’t be “taken for granted’ in 2024…
A wealthy, white owner of a predominantly Black talk radio station in metro Detroit is replacing its Black programming with right-wing voices like Glenn Beck and Clay Travis…
Léa Garcia, a pioneering actress who brought new visibility and respect to Black actors in Brazil, has died. She was 90…
A federal judge has determined that Rudy Giuliani has lost a defamation lawsuit from two Black Georgia election workers…
Atlanta Public Schools has launched an investigation into the conduct of Benjamin E. Mays High School football coaches after a viral video showed a coach punching a player…
Flight attendants at American Airlines have voted overwhelmingly to authorize their union to call a strike against the carrier…
Florida school district officials apologized for an elementary school assembly in which Black students were singled out for a presentation on low test scores…
Edward Blum, the right-wing activist who got Harvard to change its affirmative action policies and is currently suing law firms over diversity fellowships, says he has more lawsuits planned against diversity programs…
When track and field star Noah Lyles questioned why people refer to NBA title winners as "world champions," everyone had something to say. You probably did as well…
Police in Louisiana have arrested Eugene Louis-Jocques, who is accused of killing his girlfriend, Beauty Couch, the social media star found dead near a burned car…
Entertainment
Steve Harvey has addressed the rumors about troubles in his marriage with his wife Marjorie…
R. Kelly and his longtime publisher Universal Music Group will have to pay over $500,000 in music royalties to his victims…
Bronny James' cardiac arrest during a workout was caused by a congenital heart defect that can be treated and won't keep him from basketball, a spokesperson said…
From my colleague Taryn Finley: The best thing about Beyoncé’s world tour isn't the superstar's stunning vocals, the epic stage design, or the stellar outfits. It's Blue Ivy Carter…
Dash Harris wrote about how realty TV star Erica Mena and others use their proximity to Blackness as a ruse to gain success while harboring anti-Black values…
Cord Jefferson talked with Vanity Fair about his directorial debut, “American Fiction,” which boasts an incredible, all-star cast — Tracee Ellis Ross, Sterling K. Brown, Leslie Uggams, Erika Alexander…
Diddy has donated $1 million to Jackson State University, one year after promising to do so at the 2022 BET Awards…
Method Man is the cover star for Cassius Life…
She’s the GOAT: Simone Biles won a record eighth national all-around title at the US Gymnastics Championships…
Speaking of superstar athletes, Sha'Carri Richardson stormed to victory in the women's 100 meters at the Weltklasse Diamond League meeting this week…
A federal judge refused to end Rudolph Isley's lawsuit that claimed Ronald Isley unfairly tried to lock up exclusive rights to “The Isley Brothers," a name that's supposed to be jointly owned…
Safety Damar Hamlin, who suffered a cardiac arrest during a game earlier this year, has made the Buffalo Bills' initial 53-man roster…
Don’t Miss
Can you beat my time on Black Crossword? 1 minute and 15 seconds…
The trailer for “Rustin,” starring Colman Domingo as key civil rights organizer Bayard Rustin, is out…
LaKeith Stanfield stars in the biblical-themed film “The Book Of Clarence;” the trailer is out now…
Bolts Magazine has a comprehensive guide to every state supreme court that you need to read and share with others as election season approaches...
BET has announced that a “Rap City” documentary is set to debut in October…
“Maxine’s Baby: The Tyler Perry Story,” a documentary about the film titan’s life, is set to debut on Prime Video in November…
The Los Angeles Lakers announced it will unveil a statue of Kobe Bryant in February…
Couldn’t find a tips / story idea email for you. Thought of you when I read this Report: New York Banks Treated White Small Business Owners Better Than Non-Whites
By NCRC / August 30, 2023 / Press Releases / 2 minutes of reading
White small business owners in New York City received significantly better treatment from bank employees than Black and Latino business owners while inquiring about loans, a new report from the National Community Reinvestment Coalition (NCRC) found.