The claim that Black voters are bolting to President Donald Trump’s Republican Party seems premature — and fuels a narrative that places the responsibility for the presidential election outcome on Black voters. This notion of realignment has gotten more attention in recent months, as political observers try to make sense of polls showing that some […]
Donald Trump
Posted inElections, Politics & Policy
Why Super Tuesday Is a ‘Dress Rehearsal’ for the General Election
Kristin Powell vividly remembers watching the Super Tuesday returns in February 2008 and being consumed by a single question: Can he actually make it? A college student spending a semester in Italy at the time, Powell was referring to Barack Obama, the youthful U.S. senator from Illinois who was challenging the establishment darling Hillary Clinton […]
Posted inCriminal Justice
Judge in Trump’s Jan. 6 Trial Is No Stranger to Tackling Tough Cases
The judge presiding over the case in which former President Donald Trump has been criminally charged in his alleged efforts to block the results of the 2020 presidential election doesn’t shy away from challenges. U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan is no stranger when it comes to handing down tough sentences related to the violent […]
Posted inPolitics & Policy
A Roundup of Cases Against Trump
Former President Donald Trump faces a slew of state and federal charges, including most recently charges brought against him by a federal grand jury in Washington, D.C., relating to the 2020 election. In the run-up to the contest and in its aftermath, when it was clear that Joe Biden would win the White House, Trump’s […]
Posted inCourts, Criminal Justice
The Courthouse Where Trump Surrendered Conjures an Ugly History
Donald Trump on Tuesday entered the same Manhattan courthouse where five Black and Latino teenage boys were wrongfully convicted of raping a white female jogger more than 30 years ago — a case he attached himself to by taking out a full-page ad in the city’s major newspapers to “bring back” the death penalty in New […]
Posted inPolitics & Policy
What This Historic Moment Reveals About Trump, the GOP, and Accountability
Some Republican lawmakers are calling a Manhattan grand jury’s decision to indict Donald Trump a politically motivated witch hunt. But, really, the move is a measure of accountability that could return legitimacy to a justice system that unfairly punishes Black people. “The question,” explained Marcia Chatelain, a professor of history and African American studies at […]
Posted inPolitics & Policy
Trump Called for His Execution. Now This Exoneree Has One Thing to Say: ‘Karma.’
Yusef Salaam spent nearly seven years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit — one of the five Black and brown teenagers Donald Trump targeted after the 1989 assault of a Central Park jogger. Decades later, after a Manhattan grand jury on Thursday indicted the former president on charges related to business fraud, Salaam […]
Posted inPolitics & Policy
What Trump’s Legal Woes Mean to Black Americans
The wait is over: A Manhattan grand jury has voted to indict Donald Trump. It’s a historic move that caps off years of anxiety and uncertainty about whether Trump’s Teflon coating of white privilege would ever lose its power. Details of the felony indictment are expected to be announced in the coming days, The New […]
Posted inPolitics & Policy
Alvin Bragg Isn’t the Only Black Prosecutor Taking on Trump
A Manhattan grand jury voted to indict Donald Trump on Thursday, according to multiple news sources — the first time a current or former U.S. president has faced criminal charges. Last week, when Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office was poised to issue an indictment against the former president, Trump called for Bragg’s arrest and […]