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COMMENTARY: Our Disappearing Rights

NNPA NEWSWIRE — Just as our voting rights are disappearing, so also are women’s rights to comprehensive health care. Someone leaked a draft opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. In 2018 Mississippi passed the Gestational Age Act, which banned abortion after 15 weeks. The Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the only licensed abortion clinic in Mississippi, filed a lawsuit in federal court and requested a temporary restraining order to prevent lawmakers from enforcing the law. The restraining order was granted, so the State Health Officer, Thomas Dobbs, took the case to the Supreme Court. The Court is likely to overturn Roe v. Wade and decide that Mississippi’s abortion restriction is constitutional.
The post COMMENTARY: Our Disappearing Rights first appeared on BlackPressUSA.

Published

4 years ago

May 17, 2022

Julianne Malveaux

By Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Newswire Contributor

When the Supreme Court overturned Section Five of the Voting Rights Act, it struck a blow to voting rights. No longer did states with a history of discrimination have to submit their plans to make electoral changes to the department of Justice. Instead, voters and advocacy organizations that experienced limitations of their rights had to go to court to prove that discrimination.

Though this placed a burden on voting rights advocates, litigators, and the Transformative Justice Coalition, Barbara Arnwine has gone from state-to-state fighting unequal, discriminatory voting laws and voter suppression.

TJC first produced its Map of Shame in 2016, focusing on ways states change voting laws to keep voter turnout down. The 45th President’s narrow victory over Hilary Rodham Clinton was partly a function of low voter turnout and a flawed Clinton campaign, and it was also a function of voter suppression. Voting rights activists and volunteers ensured President Biden’s victory in 2020, and the result has been a more aggressive attempt to curtail voting rights. In Georgia, it is even illegal to offer a bottle of water to someone standing in line for hours on a hot day! The effects of these curtailed rights will be seen in the 2022 midterm and 2024 Presidential elections unless people push back with the same intensity as they did in 2020.

Just as our voting rights are disappearing, so also are women’s rights to comprehensive health care. Someone leaked a draft opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. In 2018 Mississippi passed the Gestational Age Act, which banned abortion after 15 weeks. The Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the only licensed abortion clinic in Mississippi, filed a lawsuit in federal court and requested a temporary restraining order to prevent lawmakers from enforcing the law. The restraining order was granted, so the State Health Officer, Thomas Dobbs, took the case to the Supreme Court. The Court is likely to overturn Roe v. Wade and decide that Mississippi’s abortion restriction is constitutional.

The court wants to go even further than that. In the leaked opinion, Justice Alito wrote, “We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled.” He and four other conservative justices – Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett- have been planning this moment since the 45th President appointed them to the court. Arguably, Gorsuch and Kavanaugh could be charged with perjury and tried for lying under oath to the United States Senate as both of them acknowledged the precedent of Roe and pledged to honor its precedent. n reacting to the May 1 leak, Chief Justice John Roberts described it as a “singular and egregious breach of trust that is an effort to the Court and the community of public servants who work here.” The first breach of trust came when Gorsuch and Kavanaugh lied under oath. It is profoundly hypocritical for Roberts to speak of trust when defending liars.

Poor women and women of color are most likely to be impacted if Roe is overturned. Women outside Jackson now have to drive hundreds of miles to get to Mississippi’s only abortion provider. In addition to the fee for abortion services, women may need to finance transportation, an overnight stay, and more. Wealthy women will get what they want, no matter what the law. Before Roe, these women went to Mexico or found their way around the law. Poor women have no such options.

Restricting the right to comprehensive health care also constrains women’s economic self-sufficiency. Research shows that the availability of contraception increases women’s labor force participation, which is good for the economy.

Now some conservatives are considering restricting access to contraception. But contraception makes women’s investment in education and employment more likely.

Emboldened by the many ways legislators have chipped away rights guaranteed by Roe and Casey, legislators in Mississippi are proposing laws to declare that life begins at conception, outlawing abortions after “life.”

In Louisiana, legislators are proposing laws to define abortion as murder. All of this anti-abortion legislation is an attack on women’s rights.

Most Americans support abortion rights, in many cases with some restrictions. The Supreme Court is tone-deaf to the people’s sentiments and, more importantly, to 50-year precedents. Roe was decided based on privacy rights, which keep the courts out of the bedroom and away from people’s health status. Reversing Roe removes privacy rights, not just the right to choose.

What’s next? Marriage equality? Further erosion of voting rights? Interracial marriage? What else?

The difference between Democrats and Republicans is that Democrats plan by Presidential cycle, while Republicans plan for decades. This triumph of conservatism has been planned since Ronald Reagan was elected President in 1980. Forty years later, hard-fought gains are being lost, and our rights are disappearing. We are moving back to the 1950s or, given our economic situation, perhaps the 1930s; moving backwards as surely as we did when parts of the Voting Rights Act were overturned. People are taking their anger and disappointment to the streets, but maybe a decade too late.

Dr. Julianne Malveaux is an economist, author, and Dean of the College of Ethnic Studies at Cal State LA. Juliannemalveaux.com.

The post COMMENTARY: Our Disappearing Rights first appeared on BlackPressUSA.

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Poll Shows Support for Policies That Help Families Afford Child Care

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — New national polling shows persistent voter concern about the affordability and availability of child care for working parents, alongside broad support across key demographic groups for federal child care policies that help families afford care.

Published

3 days ago

March 2, 2026

Oakland Post

By First Five Years Fund

New national polling shows persistent voter concern about the affordability and availability of child care for working parents, alongside broad support across key demographic groups for federal child care policies that help families afford care.

The national survey was conducted by UpOne Insight on behalf of the First Five Years Fund from January 13–18, 2026.

Key findings include:

• Parents need help: 80% of voters say the ability of working parents to find and afford child care is either in a state of crisis or a major problem.

• This is an affordability issue: 82% believe federal child care funding will help lower costs for working families — including 69% of Republicans, 84% of Independents, and 94% of Democrats.

• And there continues to be strong support (62%) for the Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG), a federal program that makes it possible for hundreds of thousands of families to afford safe, quality care for their children while parents work or go to school, including a majority of Republicans, 63% of Independents and 72% of Democrats.

• Support for funding child care programs remains strong: 75% believe child care funding should be increased or kept at current levels — including 75% of Republicans, 85% of Independents, and 97% of Democrats.

• 74% say funding for child care is an important and good use of tax dollars, including a majority of Republicans, three-quarters of Independents, and nine in ten Democrats.

FFYF Executive Director Sarah Rittling said, “Voters across the country are sending a clear message: federal child care and early learning programs work. These investments help parents stay in the workforce, strengthen families, and support healthy child development. They have also long had strong bipartisan support in Congress. At a time when affordability is top of mind for families, continued federal funding is essential to ensure child care remains accessible and within reach.”

First Five Years Fund works to protect, prioritize, and build bipartisan support for quality child care and early learning programs at the federal level. Reliable, affordable, and high-quality early learning and child care can be transformative, not only enhancing a child’s prospects for a brighter future but also bolstering working parents and fostering economic stability nationwide.

We work with Congress and the Administration to identify federal solutions that work for families with young children, as well as states and communities. We work with policymakers to identify ways to increase access to affordable, high-quality child care and early learning programs for children. And we collaborate with advocacy groups to help align best practices with the best possible policies. http://www.ffyf.org

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Trump’s MAGA Allies are Creating Executive Order Plan to Steal the 2026 Midterms

NNPA NEWSWIRE — The document that could lead to an executive order proposes using the claim that China interfered with the 2020 elections as grounds to “declare a national emergency.” The move would be an unprecedented step that would grant Trump new authority over the voting systems in the U.S.

Published

6 days ago

February 27, 2026

Oakland Post

By Lauren Victoria Burke, NNPA Newswire Correspondent

A group of MAGA pro-Trump activists, who say they are working in coordination with the White House, are circulating a 17-page draft executive order that would claim without evidence that China interfered with the 2020 presidential election. Donald Trump lost the 2020 presidential to President Joe Biden by over 7 million votes. Since Trump lost to Biden in 2020, he has repeatedly claimed that the election was “stolen” without evidence. The report of a group of “Trump allies” preparing an executive order to give Trump power over elections was first reported by The Washington Post.

The lies around the right-wing campaign that pushed falsehoods that the 2020 election was stolen was trafficked through right-wing media, particularly Fox News. Fox News was then sued for defamation for the claims by Dominion Voting Systems. Fox lost the case and had to settle for the largest defamation amount on record of $787.5 million in April 2023.

The document that could lead to an executive order proposes using the claim that China interfered with the 2020 elections as grounds to “declare a national emergency.” The move would be an unprecedented step that would grant Trump new authority over the voting systems in the U.S.

The story in The Washington Post arrives as Trump increasingly signals that he may take actions that would alter the result of the 2026 midterms. The Republicans are widely expected to lose as their approval ratings plummet as a result of a failing economy under Trump. Over 50 members of Congress have announced they will retire this year and not return in 2027.

The Trump Department of Justice, which now has a large image of Trump on the side of it, “sued five new states Thursday [Feb. 26, 2026] demanding access to their unredacted voter rolls — escalating a campaign that has been rejected by multiple federal courts and faces resistance from Republican-led states as well,” according to Democracy Docket, a group that works to protect voting rights.

Trump claimed back in late 2020, the last year of his first term, that he had the authority to issue an executive order related to mail-in voting for the 2020 elections — which he would then lose. But the Constitution states that control of elections lies with the states. As the GOP works to place hurdles in front of voting, Democrats worked to make voting easier.

In March 2021, President Biden signed an executive order calling on federal agencies to expand voting access as part of the Biden Administration’s effort “to promote and defend the right to vote for all Americans who are legally entitled to participate in elections.”

Trump’s focus is clearly on altering the November 2026 midterm elections. Trump’s polling numbers and the elections and special elections that have taken place around the U.S. over the last year clearly indicate that Republicans are about to be hit by a blue wave of Democratic victories.

Lauren Victoria Burke is an independent investigative journalist and the founder of Black Virginia News. She is a political analyst who appears on #RolandMartinUnfiltered and hosts the show LAUREN LIVE on YouTube @LaurenVictoriaBurke. She can be contacted at LBurke007@gmail.com and on twitter at @LVBurke

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PRESS ROOM: NBA Hall of Fame Nominee Terry Cummings Joins 100 Black Men of DeKalb County to Launch Victory & Values Initiative

NNPA NEWSWIRE — NBA Hall of Fame nominee and Basketball Legend Terry Cummings was administered the official member’s oath and ceremonially pinned during a special induction ceremony held on Friday, February 20th.

Published

6 days ago

February 27, 2026

admin

Cummings becomes an honorary member, joining other role model sports stars

NBA Hall of Fame nominee and Basketball Legend Terry Cummings has officially become an honorary member of the 100 Black Men of DeKalb County, marking a powerful new chapter for the 100 Black Men and youth development across the region.

Cummings was administered the official member’s oath and ceremonially pinned during a special induction ceremony held on Friday, February 20th. The moment signified more than membership — it marked the launch of the organization’s transformative new platform, the Victory & Values Initiative.

The Victory & Values Initiative is a groundbreaking youth development program designed to empower elementary and middle school students through a dynamic blend of sports, mentorship, and STEM exposure. The initiative focuses on building health, discipline, character, leadership, and access to opportunity — creating pathways for long-term academic and personal success.

“This is about more than sports,” said Cummings during the ceremony. “It’s about using the platform of athletics to teach life lessons, create access, and build the next generation of leaders.”

The induction ceremony also featured notable guests including NASCAR’s newest Star Driver, Lavar Scott and NASCAR Director of Athletic Performance, Phil Horton, who joined Cummings for a powerful Victory & Values Town Hall discussion. The Town Hall was moderated by renowned Sports Emcee John Hollins and focused on leadership, resilience, discipline, and the importance of mentorship in shaping young lives.

A “Day at NASCAR” for 75+ Youth

Cummings wasted no time getting to work. On his first full day as an honorary member, he joined his new brothers of the 100 Black Men of DeKalb County to host a “Day at NASCAR,” escorting more than 75 youth to a once-in-a-lifetime experience at EchoPark Motor Speedway (formerly Atlanta Motor Speedway).

The youth participants received behind-the-scenes access including: an exclusive tour of Pit Row, access to the Garage Area and exploration of the interactive Fan Zone.

The experience culminated with a surprise meet-and-greet and Q&A session with NASCAR Superstar Bubba Wallace, who shared insights on perseverance, preparation, and breaking barriers in professional sports.

The day served as a living example of the ‘Victory & Values’ Initiative in action — exposing youth to new industries, expanding their vision for the future, and connecting them directly with high- level mentors and role models.

Building Leaders Through Access and Mentorship

The 100 Black Men of DeKalb County – a chapter of the largest, national mentoring organization in the county – continues to expand its footprint with programs focused on academic excellence, economic empowerment, leadership development, and health & wellness.

The launch of ‘Victory & Values’ represents a strategic expansion of the organization’s impact

intentionally integrating athletics and STEM to engage youth at an early age while reinforcing core principles such as integrity, accountability, teamwork, and perseverance.

“Our mission has always been to mentor the next generation,” said Vaughn Irons, President-Elect of the 100 Black Men of DeKalb County. “With Terry Cummings joining the brotherhood, along with partners in NASCAR and professional sports, we are creating unprecedented access and exposure for our youth. Victory & Values is about turning inspiration into structured opportunity.”

By connecting elementary and middle school students to professional athletes, executives, STEM professionals, and community leaders, the initiative aims to:

Increase youth exposure to careers in sports business, engineering, and performance science
Strengthen mentorship pipelines
Promote physical wellness and mental resilience
Build character-driven leadership at an early age

Open Invitation to Youth and Families

All youth are invited to participate in the Victory & Values Initiative, along with the other countless, impactful programs offered by the 100 Black Men of DeKalb County.

Parents and guardians seeking mentorship, leadership development, academic enrichment, and transformative exposure opportunities for their children are encouraged to connect with the organization.

As NBA Legend Terry Cummings’ induction demonstrates, Victory & Values is more than a program — it is a movement designed to build champions in life, not just in sports.

For more information about the Victory & Values Initiative or to enroll a student, contact: 100 Black Men of DeKalb County at Phone at 404.241.1338, info@100bmod.org or Tee Foxx at 404.791.6525,