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Educate, Organize and Mobilize: Since November of 2013 I’ve been writing about voter suppression and addressing the subject from many different angles. We’re now in the mobilization phase of defeating voter suppression and I’ve been encouraged to outline an effective, understandable
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: Last week we shifted our focus to voter mobilization for November 2014. This week, as we look back we’ll also take a look at the current state of affairs in the fight to protect the voting rights
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: Since November of 2013 I’ve been writing about voter suppression and an appropriate response that needs to be made by those threatened by wide-spread, aggressive voter suppression. I’ve spent a lot of time trying to create an
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: It's fifty years since the passage of the Civil Rights of 1964 (The Voting Rights Act was passed in 1965) and this is turning out to be quite a political season. There are many unforeseeable and unpredictable
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: I confess that I’m amazed. The Republican National Committee and the Republican Party of North Carolina announced last week that they have launched the North Carolina Black Advisory Board (BRAB) to strengthen the party’s ties with diverse
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: Last week I analyzed an article written by Dan Russo of the Roanoke Times. My point of interest in his article was his conclusion that, in order for democrats to win in November they would have to
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: In commentaries that I wrote several months ago I likened efforts to defeat voter suppression to battling a hydra and noted that it was impossible to defeat voter suppression if you don’t know it when you see
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: From time to time it helps to survey the landscape and make an assessment of your project in order to help keep it on track or to correct your course. With the Campaign to Defeat Voter Suppression
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Educate, Organize and Mobilize: Frequently, in going forward it is imperative to examine your history. In 1638 the Maryland Colony issued a public edict encouraging the separation of the races that became the public policy of America. The edict became known
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: Last week Jaymes Powell Jr. wrote for the African American Caucus of the North Carolina Democratic Party (AAC-NCDP) a very uplifting and accurate account of how Black candidates fared in the recent primaries. I spoke with him
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: On June 6, 2014, at its annual Education Scholarship Event, the North Carolina Legislative Black Caucus Foundation will provide a briefing on the new rules for voting in North Carolina. These new rules are the product of
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: Last week the North Carolina Alliance of Black Elected Officials (The Alliance) presented a panel discussion on the state of voter suppression in North Carolina. The Alliance and its supporters is an audience critical to the success
Read MoreThis week the Campaign to Defeat Voter Suppression will reach an audience critical to its success. The 2014 Black Summit of the Alliance of North Carolina Black Elected Officials will host a panel presentation by leaders representing organizations that are
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize By Peter Grear This week the Campaign to Defeat Voter Suppression will reach an audience critical to its success. The 2014 Black Summit of the Alliance of North Carolina Black Elected Officials will host a
Read MoreBy attending this 2 1/2 HR training you are committing to give your time and your energy to monitor polls on election day. Vote Defenders will provide voters with information about changing voting laws, document any cases of intimidation or suppression,
Read MoreRecently, Kathleen Parker, a widely read, conservative columnist challenged Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid’s characterization of the Koch Brothers as un-American and suggested that Reid owed the Koch Brothers and the American people an apology. She attributes such characterization as
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: Each week over the past several months I’ve written about various aspects of voter suppression with the purpose of explaining its concepts, strategies and objectives to move voters to action against voter suppression. I’ve addressed various individuals
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: I’m a supporter of President Obama and write this as my first response to an attack on him by someone I presume to be a Republican, right winger suffering from “Obama Derangement Syndrome.” On March 22, 2014
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: Over the past several months I’ve been writing about various aspects of voter suppression with the purpose of explaining its concepts, strategies and objectives to move voters to action against voter suppression. Last week we published a
Read MoreAfter 246 years of slavery, Americans fought a brutal Civil War — the bloodiest in our history — to end slavery and preserve the union. Three amendments were added to the Constitution: the 13th abolished slavery; the 14th guaranteed equal
Read MoreThroughout my coverage of voter suppression, I’ve tried to identify and define what a successful campaign to defeat voter suppression looks like. Throughout the time that I’ve been writing about voter suppression (November 2013 – to date), I’ve addressed targets
Read MoreEducate, Organize and Mobilize: This past Saturday, March 8, 2014, I was invited to present and overview on voter suppression to the Pitt County African American Caucus of the Democratic Party. I was pleased to accept the invitation and make a
Read MoreEducate, organize and mobilize: This past Saturday I attended a meeting entitled Operation Jumpstart the Vote Leadership Training. I found it very compelling and informative. You should have been there. In my column last week I noted that since August 2013 I've
Read MorePlease understand that proclaiming ourselves – that is our Facebook page and website – “number one” in the campaign to defeat voter suppression is necessary to lay the groundwork for the conversation necessary to identify the component parts of an
Read MoreSince August 2013 I've continued to ask myself "what would an effective campaign to defeat voter suppression look like?” Well, on Friday, February 14, 2014, Valentine's Day, I got my answer from Richard Hooker, President of the North Carolina Alliance
Read MoreI am very, very pleased with the broad-based response and support that has grown up around the HK on J (Historic Thousands on Jones Street) and Moral Monday Movement. The declared objectives, of course, and the leadership of both initiatives
Read MoreWhile planning to address issues of concern and writing vision statements, the single most important question is what your particular issue or concern will look like at a given point in time. Of course this is important because when you
Read MoreEDUCATE, ORGANIZE AND MOBILIZE: Voter ID laws require voters to present in most instances, some type of state issued photo identification in order to vote. It is important to note that most voter ID legislation is coming from Republican controlled states
Read MoreThe bad back that awakened me at 6:00 a.m. on this birthday morning and that spurred unpleasant thoughts of growing old dissipated in an instant with an email alert that our long-awaited decision in the voter ID had issued. I didn’t have
Read MoreReaders will have to pardon me this week as I confess to the sin of pride. But proud I am and so should be the millions around the country threatened by and fighting against voter suppression. Last week the Commonwealth
Read MoreOver the past few months we’ve covered many aspects of voter suppression, its targets and the threat it poses to our democracy. This week we’ll take a look at voter ID and the way voter suppression is being viewed in
Read MoreWith current references to the modern voter suppression and the disproportionate impact of Voter ID laws on women, the League of Women Voters are continuing their historic fight to ensure the voting rights of all people. Rooted in the movement
Read MoreThe N.C. Model campaign to defeat voter suppression is designed to help create a blueprint that highlights the various parts, participants and processes of our statewide effort to protect democracy and promote our constitutionally guaranteed right to "one man one
Read MoreThe American Dream lives! It’s the current American reality that’s become a nightmare for millions upon millions whose lives, occupations and economic stability once seemed to embody it. A new survey released Thanksgiving week by the Washington Post and the Miller Center,
Read MoreSince September, Patricia Ferguson and I have participated in town hall meetings across the state, sponsored by the NC Legislative Black Caucus and the NC Democratic Caucus. Our topic is and has been the defeat of voter suppression. In the
Read MoreWe can’t create a better world if we haven’t yet imagined it. How much better then, if we are able to touch such a world, experience it directly, even live in it—if only to a partial degree and for
Read MoreLike millions around the world, I’m still numb after learning a jury of six women – five Whites, one Hispanic – found George Zimmerman “not guilty” of murdering Trayvon Martin.
Read MoreRacial profiling and Trayvon Martin’s right to “stand his ground” to defend himself from a creepy man who was following him, despite being told by the 911 Police Dispatcher not to do so, should have been the heart of the
Read MorePresident Obama kicked off the summer with a high-profile environmental speech at Georgetown University.
Read MoreCongregation – Pastor John R. Jenkins preaches about the Zimmerman verdict to congregation at First Baptist of Glenarden in Upper Marlboro. (AFRO Photo/Avis Thomas-Lester)Rev. John R. Jenkins, Jr. looked out at the congregation of First Baptist Church of Glendarden and
Read MoreWASHINGTON (NNPA) – Demonstrations are planned for 100 cities this Saturday, July 20, to protest George Zimmerman’s acquittal for murder and manslaughter in connection with the fatal shooting of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Fla. and to urge the Justice
Read MoreWhen it comes to looking good, staying on top of your game, and making sure your pursuit of beauty is on point, you know the African-American community has that covered. Nielsen’s latest insights highlight hair and skin beauty purchases and
Read MoreDear Editor: Sponsors of House Bill 944, the school voucher bill, proposed certain changes during the bill’s first committee hearing this week. Changes include lowering the income required for eligibility, decreasing the total amount of money awarded, and increasing public
Read MoreShelby County, Ala. is suing the Justice Department because they think that Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (and its reauthorization in 1982 and 2006) is unfair. The facts: The small city of Calera redistricted its boundaries
Read MoreToday,best-selling author George Fraser, Chairman of FraserNet, Inc. and founder of The PowerNetworking Conference, the #1 Black Business Conference in America, join the ranks with talk show hosts Lawrence O’Donnell and Bill Maher, popular liberal blog Daily Kos, Andy Ostroy,
Read MoreIf anyone tells you that ending the Bush tax cuts for the richest 2 percent would hurt job creation tell them to talk with me. We founded our business, TS Designs, in 1977 as a small manual screen printing company
Read MoreAnother Groupon GRPN naysayer, not soothsayer. I can’t figure out all this hatred of Groupon – sounds like a bunch of old men talking about the young people of today and how they will never make it with those fancy
Read MoreA growing group of individuals and organizations has designated Saturday, February 4, as a “National Day of Action” aimed at preventing a war against Iran. The manifesto is simple: “No War, No Sanctions, No Intervention, No Assassinations.”
Read MoreWe deserve a country where our elected officials are not bought and paid for by big corporations. But the Citizens United vs. FEC Supreme Court decision, issued two years ago this week, overturned over a century of precedent and opened the floodgates
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Voter Suppression: The Countdown to Showdown
Educate, Organize and Mobilize: It’s a little more than a year since the US Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the countdown to the November General Election is underway. As of August 8, 2014 there were 86
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