By TRAMON LUCAS, The Associated Press Several prominent members of the Black clergy on June 15 criticized United States Attorney General Jeff Sessions for using the Bible to justify separating immigrant children from parents. The Council of Bishops of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, along with the Revs. Jesse Jackson and William Barber, in separate statements, called […]
Author Archives: Associated Press
Posted inNational News, NEWS, POLITICS, U.S. Government
Lawsuits: Congressional Maps Dilute Black Voters in 3 States
By MICHAEL KUNZELMAN and DAVID A. LIEB, The Associated Press A Democratic political group launched a legal campaign June 13 to create additional majority-minority congressional districts in three Southern states, claiming the current maps discriminate against Black voters. Attorneys filed separate federal lawsuits in Alabama, Georgia and Louisiana, challenging congressional maps lawmakers in each state approved in […]
Posted inAfro Briefs, National News, NEWS, POLITICS, U.S. Government
San Francisco’s First Black Female Mayor Went from Projects to City Hall
By JANIE HAR, The Associated Press San Francisco’s incoming mayor knows the yawning gap between rich and poor firsthand, having been raised by her grandmother in the city’s drug- and violence-riddled projects. It is now the job of London Breed — the first Black woman elected mayor of the city — to unite a wealthy but conflicted […]
Posted inAfro Briefs, National News, POLITICS
San Francisco Set to Get First Black Woman Mayor
By The Associated Press London Breed was poised to become the first African-American woman elected to lead San Francisco following a hard-fought campaign when a former state senator conceded and congratulated her June 13, more than a week after the election. Breed, president of the Board of Supervisors, was leading Leno by fewer than 1,900 […]
Posted inAfro Briefs, Baltimore News, NEWS
Lawsuit Seeks $40 million for GTTF False Arrests
By The Associated Press Two men who spent years behind bars after being targeted by corrupt Baltimore police are seeking more than $40 million in damages. The lawsuit against the Baltimore Police Department and the state of Maryland was filed Wednesday by Umar Burley and Brent Matthews. Members of the notorious Gun Trace Task Force. […]
Posted inAfro Briefs, National News
Illinois School to Drop Woodrow Wilson from Name
By The Associated Press School officials in central Illinois have decided to remove Woodrow Wilson’s name from an elementary school and instead honor the area’s first Black female doctor. The Peoria Public Schools board voted Monday to rename Woodrow Wilson Primary School after Peoria-native Dr. Maude Sanders. Woodrow Wilson Primary School in Illinois is now […]
Posted inAfro Briefs, National News
Fraternity Members Suspended for Video with Racist Slurs
By The Associated Press Syracuse University suspended 15 members of a fraternity following the release of a video showing pledges using racial slurs and simulating a sexual assault of a disabled person, lawyers for the students said June 8. Theta Tau fraternity members were informed by the school Tuesday that they faced indefinite suspensions of […]
Posted inAfro Briefs, National News
Dorothy Cotton, Civil Rights Pioneer and MLK Colleague, Dies
By The Associated Press Dorothy Cotton, who worked closely with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., taught nonviolence to demonstrators before marches and sometimes calmed tensions by singing church hymns, has died. She was 88. Cotton died June 10 at the Kendal at Ithaca retirement community in New York, said Jared Harrison, a close friend […]
Posted inAfro Briefs, National News
Supreme Court Allows Ohio, Other State Voter Purges; Civil Rights Groups Alarmed
By The Associated Press States can target people who haven’t cast ballots in a while in efforts to purge their voting rolls, the Supreme Court ruled Monday in a case that has drawn wide attention amid stark partisan divisions and the approach of the 2018 elections. By a 5-4 vote that split the conservative and […]
Posted inAfro Briefs, National News, NEWS
Maurice Granton, Jr. Shot by Chicago Police had Been Shot Days Earlier
By The Associated Press CHICAGO (AP) — A 24-year-old Black man who was fatally shot this week by a Chicago police officer had suffered a gunshot wound just days earlier. The Chicago Tribune reports that Maurice Granton Jr. had refused to cooperate with police after he was treated at an area hospital for a graze […]
Posted inINTERNATIONAL
Meghan Markle and Prince Harry to visit Australia, Fiji
By The Associated Press LONDON (AP) — Kensington Palace says Prince Harry, and his wife, the former actress Meghan Markle, will be touring Australia, Fiji, the Kingdom of Tonga and New Zealand this fall. The royal couple, now known as the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, will be making the tour around the time of […]
Posted inAfro Briefs, National News, NEWS
Chicago Police Investigate Officers’ Handcuffing of Boy, 10
By The Associated Press CHICAGO (AP) — Chicago police are investigating an incident in which officers handcuffed a 10-year-old boy while he was being questioned about a gun, and the child’s family says it was a case of mistaken identity. Cellphone video recorded last Friday shows the boy in front of a patrol car with […]