The 44 Percent: Solidarity, Florida’s new voting laws and Andrew Brown
Happy Friday y’all! Sorry I’m running a little late — just been one of those weeks. Appreciate y’all patience though. Hopefully it’s worth the wait.
In honor of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, I just wanted to say a few things about “solidarity.” It’s a word that has been used a lot over the past year amid Black Lives Matter protests and the rise of anti-Asian hate yet few actually know what it means. Wikipedia defines solidarity as “an awareness of shared interests, objectives, standards, and sympathies creating a psychological sense of unity of groups or classes. It refers to the ties in a society that bind people together as one.”
I know that you’re probably silently judging me for using Wikipedia (like you haven’t used it before) but that definition truly stuck out, especially that last part about “the ties in a society that bind people together.” It immediately made me think of a passage in Assata Shakur’s autobiography “Assata” when she took a trip to California. There, the future Black Panther would discuss the logistics of liberation with Native Americans, Chicanos and Chinese individuals. It was her meeting with the Chinese that stood out the most considering the pushback she received:
I told him that i thought there were a whole lot of us in the same predicament and that the only way we were going to get out of it was to come together and break the chains. The brother looked at me as if i was spouting empty rhetoric. Some of the laws of revolution are so simple they seem impossible. People think that in order for something to work, it has to be complicated, but a lot of times the opposite is true. We usually reach success by putting the simple truths that we know into practice. The basis of any struggle is people coming together to fight against a common enemy.
As if to make sure the reader understood the importance of unity in the fight for equality, Shakur used some of her last pages to reiterate that last sentence:
Any community seriously concerned with its own freedom has to be concerned about other peoples’ freedom as well. The victory of oppressed people anywhere in the world is a victory for Black people.
INSIDE THE 305
Get right, Floridians, there’s a host of new voting laws:
With the subtle swift of a pen Thursday in front a pro-Trump audience, Gov. Ron DeSantis tightened Florida’s voting laws. Courtesy of reporter Lawrence Mower, here’s what you need to know:
Floridians now have to give a driver’s license number, state ID number or the last four digits of their Social Security number to request a vote by mail ballot.
Requests for mail ballots also don’t last as long. Instead of requesting a ballot through the next two general elections — the next four years — requests are limited to the next general election — or two years. (Current requests are grandfathered in.)
Drop boxes are limited to early voting days and hours, unless it’s a drop box at the supervisor’s office, and the boxes must be physically manned while in use. Relying on remote video surveillance isn’t allowed.
And although the bill doesn’t outright ban handing out food, water and other items to voters, it further defines “solicitation” as “engaging in any activity with the intent to influence or effect of influencing a voter” plus expands the “no-solicitation zone” to 150 feet from ballot drop boxes.
It’s unclear how many Floridians will be impacted by these changes. Yet critics like Brad Ashwell, All Voting is Local’s Florida state director, left little room for interpretation.
“Study after study have shown [such voting restrictions] have a disproportionate impact on Black voters and other minority voters,” Ashwell told Mowery.
Related Coverage:
Mail ballots, drop boxes targeted in voting bill passed by Legislature
Election supervisors say new Florida law makes it harder to use mail ballots, drop boxes
FOX News says it didn’t know Florida governor would bar other press from bill signing
West Little River apartment tenants accuse leasing manager of racial discrimination:
Illegal eviction filings. Ignored repair requests. Denied rent payments.
These were just a handful of the claims levied by residents towards Regency Pointe Apartments leasing manager Suri Osorio. In a press conference Thursday, tenants, many of whom were Black women, called for Osorio’s immediate removal due to her inappropriate conduct which they believed to be racially motivated.
“It is our firm belief that her behavior has shown she is a direct threat to the safety and well-being of ourselves and our families,” read the letter sent Tuesday to Cornerstone Group, the property owner, and several elected officials.
In one instance, Osorio denied a domestic violence survivor’s application despite having several vacancies, according to tenants. The woman has since lived in the same home she was trying to escape.
Cornerstone Group president Leon Wolfe responded to the tenants’ letter on Wednesday, saying that an “internal investigation into these allegations” will be conducted. The company released a statement Thursday that confirmed Osorio has been reassigned.
OUTSIDE THE 305
Photographer attempts to change perception of Black gun owners:
Texas-based photographer Christian K. Lee traversed the state capturing Black gun owners in a way that I’ve never seen before. Words can barely do it justice. Just take a look and thank me later.
Andrew Brown Jr.’s funeral attracts relatives of other Black men killed by police:
The fraternity of families who’ve suffered the pain of losing a relative at the hands of police grew April 21 with the killing of Andrew Brown in Elizabeth City, N.C. Some of those very relatives, including Eric Garner’s grandmother and George Floyd’s sister, attended Brown’s funeral Monday, a sign of support for the difficult journey ahead. Other guests included Rev. Al Sharpton and the family’s lawyer Ben Crump.
“Here we are again,” said Bakari Sellers, former South Carolina state representative. “To many people this is just another Black body, but to us it’s a brother, a father, a nephew, a loved one.”
Brown was killed just one day after a jury convicted ex-police officer Derek Chauvin of murdering Floyd. The full body cam footage has yet to be released – the family saw a 20 second clip – and this perceived lack of transparency was condemned throughout the funeral.
“I know a con game when I see it,” Sharpton said. “Release the whole tape and let the folks see what happened to Andrew Brown.”
HIGH CULTURE
Rep. Frederica Wilson explains her drip:
It’s hard to miss Rep. Frederica Wilson when she’s in the room. And that’s by design.
“When you stand out in a crowd of policymakers, people pay attention to what you have to say,” Wilson quipped in “Worn Stories, a new Netflix docuseries that explores why individuals wear what they do. “It helps you get shit done.”
Known for her vibrant hats and unabashed advocacy, Wilson appears in the “Uniform” episode where she explains not only the genesis of her fashion-sense but also her social consciousness. The congresswoman even recounts a story when she challenged a white bus driver as a little girl living in the Jim Crow South (Surprise, surprise – even Miami wasn’t and still isn’t immune to racism).
Many of you probably already know where I’m going with this but for those who don’t, J. Cole announced Tuesday that his highly-anticipated sixth studio album entitled “The Fall Off” will drop May 14. It’s been three long years since we’ve got a solo Cole project so I, for one, am excited. Let’s just hope he has picked up a book in the last year.
Where does “The 44 Percent” name come from? Click here to find out how Miami history influenced the newsletter’s title.
