(GAITHERSBURG, MD) –

This week I crossed paths with two of my good friends from my college days at Howard University: one I hadn’t seen in ten years, another I hadn’t seen in 15 years. The basic respect was still there and in those two instances we were able to make time with each other (at least 15 minutes each) without neither of us feeling that there was a need to rush off. I was even able to exchange phone numbers with both.

After 15 years there can be some level of angst about exchanging personal contact information with another that you have not seen in years. Questions CAN begin to arise: what do they want from me; I hope they don’t ask for money; is this bum gonna ask me out on a date (one of my encounters was a female, lol), etc., questions that can lead to this angst. But that was not the case with my encounters.

The purpose of this short article is to remind readers of this: keep good character and keep good reputation. Also, wear clean clothes and keep good hygiene. When people from your past encounter you, in the future, those former memories of the positive times that they had with you should be on the forefront of their minds when they interact with you.

(WASHINGTON, D.C.) – There is always a new low for Trump Republicans. And that is pretty frightening.

Take the latest exercise in lawlessness, dishonesty, and cruelty from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. He chartered a plane to send dozens of mostly Venezuelan asylum seekers from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard, an island community off the coast of Cape Cod in Massachusetts. He clearly was gleeful about the idea of sticking it to liberals and gloating about it on right-wing media.

It wasn’t even an original idea. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott had already been putting migrants on buses to cities like Washington, D.C., where they have been dropped off in front of Fox News and outside the Vice President’s residence—a giveaway that the purpose is publicity.

The news of the DeSantis flight made it clear that he was exploiting vulnerable people for his own political advantage. And the more we learn, the worse it gets.

A lawsuit filed on behalf of people deceived into taking the flight says the migrants were approached in San Antonio by people pretending to offer humanitarian assistance. They were promised that jobs, housing, and other assistance were waiting for them if they were willing to get on a plane.

None of it was true. These vulnerable people were reportedly told lies about where they were going, and given brochures with false information about help that would be waiting for them. Even worse, they may have unknowingly threatened their asylum claims by making it likely that they would miss court appointments scheduled far from where they had been flown.

DeSantis and his henchmen hadn’t contacted government officials or nonprofit organizations in Massachusetts. It was a photo op. It was definitely political. And it was possibly illegal. The sheriff in Bexar County, Texas, has opened a criminal investigation into the false pretenses under which people were lured onto the planes. A lawsuit has been filed on the migrants’ behalf.

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre slammed DeSantis for “alerting Fox News and not city or state officials about a plan to abandon children fleeing communism,” calling it “a cruel, premeditated political stunt.”

Of course, it’s not the first time that dishonorable politicians have exploited vulnerable people. In fact, racist white southerners who were resisting segregation in the early 1960s did almost the same thing to Black Americans 60 years ago.

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The Washington Post recently highlighted that history. A group of segregationists organized “Reverse Freedom Rides” in 1962 as retaliation for the Freedom Rides that carried civil rights activists throughout the South in 1961. According to the Post, “The plot was organized by white supremacist Citizens’ Councils in Arkansas, who bought radio ads and made fliers advertising the ‘opportunity’ to African Americans.” One Arkansas woman and nine of her children were dropped off on Cape Cod near the Kennedy family’s compound because she had been falsely told that Kennedy was going to greet them.

Sounds awfully familiar, doesn’t it?

Last year, journalist Adam Serwer published a book called “The Cruelty is the Point: The Past, Present, and Future of Trump’s America.” Serwer has made the point that Trump is a symptom, not the cause, of a cruel streak in American politics. There is a long history of backlash against progress, going back to the post-Reconstruction period in which white supremacists used violence to reverse the enfranchisement of Black people.

DeSantis’s scheme to deceive, manipulate, and harm vulnerable people seeking asylum in our country is evidence that the cruelty wielded by Trump and embraced by so many of his followers will continue to poison our politics if Trump or DeSantis or someone of their ilk is the Republican presidential nominee in 2024.

Recognizing this truth is important to understanding the work we have ahead of us. We must also recognize that the cruelty in our past and our present is not our whole story.

Our story also includes good people in Hyannis in the 1960s and in Martha’s Vineyard this year who responded by mobilizing to welcome and support the arrivals. It includes the people of all colors and faiths who have repeatedly built movements to expand civil rights and promote human dignity, and who have given their time and treasure to elect political leaders who appeal to our national ideals rather than trash them.

We should be outraged at the cruelty displayed by some of our leaders. Let us also be motivated, and optimistic, that we can out-organize and overcome them.

Ben Jealous serves as president of People For the American Way and Professor of the Practice at the University of Pennsylvania. A New York Times best-selling author, his next book “Never Forget Our People Were Always Free” will be published by Harper Collins in December 2022.

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By Doni Glover

(WASHINGTON, DC) – All eyes are on Georgia. The US Senate and the state gubernatorial races have political junkies on the edge of their seats. And even though Donald Trump insists on being influential, history could be made … finally.

First, there’s a Senate race that has everybody scratching their head. Okay, let’s get into it: I agree with Herschel Walker that politicians are messing up this country. That’s certainly a part of our political challenges.

What I do not believe, however, is that Herschel Walker would better serve Georgia than incumbent US Senator Rafael Warnock.

Walker says he is not a politician. Well, I sure as hell can’t tell. By the looks of it, he has politics down pat like a running play. The challenge, though, is who Walker is running for.

I heard Walker say that Donald Trump is not a racist. Walker said Trump didn’t have a racist bone in his body. That really threw me, I must say, because for many Blacks, Trump represents the most racist people in this country; the worst of the worst.

Images of people scaling the walls of the US Capital still send shrieks up my spine. The sight of Capital Police being chased. And then Trump sicked the crowd on his own Vice-President? You got to admit, that’s some sick shit.

Now, maybe I’m just a bit too steeped in history. Maybe, Walker does not, in fact, reflect the stereotype of a happy slave poorly reading a teleprompter on behalf of his masters but instead signifies the wondrous manifestation of the American dream: a star football player who is now running for office.

But, I don’t think so.

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His comments about Warnock are elementary, at best, yet he has raised more money than ever imagined. This is frightening: That America would raise all of this money for a man who is applying for a job that is beyond his skill set. Why? For the good ol’ boys in Georgia.

Thank God Warnock has raised more money. Thank God, too, for gladiators like Stacey Abrams. She’s running for Governor and has more than a shot at winning. The architect of Georgia’s Democratic revolution, Abrams is closer than ever.

I pray for both of them. They have both fought the good fight and deserve the highest honors.
Running for office is no easy thing to do, especially for Blacks, but both Warnock and Abrams are making strides many of us have waited a long time to witness.

Most recently, Abrams highlighted Democratic voters’ stance (vs. Republicans) on abortion and she has also released a plan for Georgia’s fiscal future.