July 08,2021

By Congressman James E. Clyburn

(D-SC), House Majority Whip

Persistent poverty is a scourge on our nation.  The Covid-19 pandemic exposed the struggle those living in poverty face every day, and their plight was exacerbated by the economic impacts of the virus.

It has been my mission since coming to Congress to do everything I can to address persistent poverty.  Those efforts often feel a little like the Greek myth of Sisyphus, who kept rolling the rock up the mountain only to have it roll back down when he approached the top.

This month, we are again making progress on one significant front in the fight against poverty. American families will begin receiving monthly Child Tax Credit checks on July 15; thanks to an expansion of the popular program in the American Rescue Plan (ARP), that was signed into law by President Biden in March with only Democratic support.  The Center for Poverty and Social Policy at Columbia University projects that this provision will cut the child poverty rate in half this year.

Previously the Child Tax Credit was capped at $2,000 and not fully available to the lowest-income families.

Thanks to the ARP, the full amount of the expanded credit—now available for all households filing jointly with incomes up to $150,000 and single parents with incomes up to $112,500—is $3,600 for every child under 6 years old and $3,000 for every child ages 6-17.  Starting July 15 and continuing through the end of the year, these households will receive $300 for every child or $250 every month for each child in those respective age ranges.  The remainder of the credit can be claimed when filing 2021 tax returns early next year.

Families who filed tax returns for 2019 or 2020, or who filled out the IRS Non-filers tool last year to receive an Economic Impact Payment, will get this tax relief automatically.  Families who neither filed a tax return for 2019 or 2020 nor used the IRS Non-Filers tool should go online and use the IRS Child Tax Credit Non-filer Sign-up Tool to sign up today.

Eligible families who get their refunds from the IRS through direct deposit will see these payments in their bank account; those who don’t use direct deposit will receive their payments by mail.

The challenge we face with this life-changing benefit is that it is set to expire after one year.  It was a temporary fix to immediately address the economic impacts of the pandemic. We know, however, that persistent poverty existed well before Covid-19, and it will continue well beyond the recovery if we don’t take permanent action.

To keep this huge rock from falling back down the mountain and plunge millions of American children back into poverty, Congress must make the expanded Child Tax Credit permanent.  Doing so would be a dramatic, positive change in the life of American families and a real solution to addressing persistent poverty.

Unfortunately, just as Republicans opposed the American Rescue Plan, they also oppose extending this key provision.  They don’t seem to understand that stronger families produce a stronger, more productive nation. Whether or not they are persuaded to join the effort to address persistent poverty and strengthen American families, Democrats are working hard to make the expansion of the Child Tax Credit permanent.

Now is the time to break out of this Sisyphean struggle and sustain and build on the progress we have made lifting a significant number of families out of poverty.  The public supports these efforts.

In addition to the expanded Child Tax Credit, we must permanently extend other economic lifelines in the American Rescue Plan like the expanded Earned Income Tax Credit, Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit, and nutrition assistance for children.

We must also provide the benefits of the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion to those in the 12 states, including my home state of South Carolina, that have refused to participate.  Democrats won’t stop moving this boulder until we reach the top—and stay there.

July 01,2021

By Ben Jealous

During the civil rights movement’s struggle against discrimination and voter suppression in Jim Crow America, the Black Church was a source of refuge and resolve. Today, a new wave of voter suppression laws is targeting Black voters, and new generations of Black clergy are bringing their moral authority to a campaign to defend the Black vote.  

We need these prophetic voices. The new Jim Crow doesn’t look exactly like the old Jim Crow, but it is grounded in the same assault on the dignity, humanity, and citizenship rights of Black Americans. We need our communities’ truth-tellers to speak out. Because the new Jim Crow is grounded in layers of lies.

The Big Lie told by former President Donald Trump and his supporters is that he won the 2020 election, but had his victory stolen by corrupt election officials and Black and brown people casting fraudulent votes.   

The existence of widespread voter fraud is itself a lie. It has been debunked over and over again. But Republicans in dozens of states are using that lie to justify new restrictive voting rules. They claim to be protecting “election integrity” but they are really trying to make it harder for some Black and brown people to cast a ballot and have it counted.  

Right-wing lawmakers feel free to impose discriminatory voting rules thanks to another lie—this one told by John Roberts, the Chief Justice of the United States. He justified the decision of a conservative majority of the Court in 2013 to abolish a key enforcement mechanism of the Voting Rights Act by saying in effect that racial discrimination in voting was a thing of the past.  

States from across the old Confederacy proved him wrong, by acting to impose new restrictions on registration and voting. Some went into effect just hours after the Supreme Court gave them the green light.  

That was bad enough. But the right wing’s voter suppression machinery really kicked into high gear after the 2020 election. Republican lawmakers saw that Black voter turnout helped President Joe Biden win key battleground states. And they vowed not to let that happen again.  

Republican lawmakers’ strategy for holding onto power is not to reach out to Black voters, but to shut them out. But we won’t be shut out. We will push Congress to pass the For the People Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Act, two laws that are needed to overturn the new Jim Crow laws and prevent future restrictions on voting.  

The late Rep. John Lewis told us in his farewell message last year that if we don’t use our right to vote, it can be taken from us. This year we are seeing new efforts to take the vote from us because we voted. 

We can’t let politicians turn us around. At People For the American Way, we are investing more resources in our Defend the Black Vote project. We are sounding the alarm about disenfranchisement. And we are building our capacity to reach, educate, and mobilize even more Black voters than we did in 2020 through digital media, paid advertising, and an ambitious peer-to-peer texting program.   

And we will continue to be inspired by the vision and leadership of Black clergy like the Rev. Timothy McDonald, who launched the African American Ministers Leadership Council and its Souls to the Polls movement more than 20 years ago. When Georgia Republicans tried to shut down Souls to the Polls by banning early voting on Sundays, Rev. McDonald called them out as “the Klan in three-piece suits.”   

Rev. McDonald’s righteous truth-telling shamed Georgia Republicans into dropping that part of their voter suppression plan. But the rest of it became law—including the infamous ban on groups providing water to people forced to wait in long voting lines. Voting rights activists have gone to court to challenge the Georgia law and others like it. Organizers will do everything possible to help Black voters overcome any new obstacles that have been put between them and the ballot box.  

And the Black church will once again give voice to the aspirations of our people, drawing on a long tradition of prophetic witness against injustice combined with strategic organizing on behalf of freedom and equality.  

“We endured slavery, Jim Crow and lynching by being creative and strategic,” Rev. McDonald told CNN. “We’re going to use their own tools and throw them back at them. We have to beat them at their own game.”  

Preach!  

Ben Jealous serves as president of People For the American Way and People For the American Way Foundation. Jealous has decades of experience as a leader, coalition builder, campaigner for social justice and seasoned nonprofit executive. In 2008, he was chosen as the youngest-ever president and CEO of the NAACP. He is a graduate of Columbia University and Oxford, where he was a Rhodes Scholar, and he has taught at Princeton and the University of Pennsylvania.

July 01,2021

By Marcela Howell

President and CEO of In Our Own Voice:

National Black Women’s Reproductive Justice Agenda

As the U.S. Supreme Court reviews abortion cases that could overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that legalized abortion, there is a lot of attention being paid to abortion rights — but not enough emphasis on the full range of reproductive health and rights issues. Every pregnant Black person faces systemic racism that makes us “three times more likely to die from a pregnancy-related cause than white women.” When our children are born, we face the everyday reality of battling racism and the toll it takes on Black lives. This past year, the deadly impact of racial discrimination couldn’t have been more evident as the pandemic devastated our communities, with Black and Latinx people accounting for nearly 43 percent of COVID-19 deaths. As if that’s not bad enough, Black and Latinx women have paid the economic price for the pandemic, bearing the brunt of the “shecession.”

That’s why more than 30 Black women’s organizations and Reproductive Justice activists created the “Black Reproductive Justice Policy Agenda” — innovative, proactive solutions to address the disparities and discrimination faced by Black women, femmes, girls and gender-expansive individuals. The “Black Reproductive Policy Agenda” is a comprehensive policy approach to the systemic racism that threatens our lives.

Now, a lot of people hear “Reproductive Justice” and think birth control and abortion.

But nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, Reproductive Justice (RJ) is a collective framework grounded in human rights, social justice and Black Feminist theory that centers the intersectional impact of race, class and gender in one’s ability to live free from oppression — so we can create and nurture the family of our own choosing and achieve optimum mental, physical, community and economic health.

Reproductive Justice was birthed by 12 Black women in 1994, as the U.S. contemplated universal health care without acknowledging or rectifying the health care system in place, which was — and continues to be — riddled with deadly racism.

 Since then, RJ has grown into a full-fledged movement that fights not only for the right to health care — including full access to birth control and abortion — but also equity in housing, education and employment. RJ doesn’t leave anything — or anyone — behind. It is the comprehensive movement we need to disrupt and dismantle the deeply ingrained, systemic racism that plagues this country.

Black women, femmes, girls and gender-expansive individuals have been marginalized for far too long. We have been fighting for our survival while others stood by and watched — or worse, while they actively participated in our oppression for their own gain. No more!

We are tired of seeing our children, brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers and loved ones senselessly killed by the very people who are sworn to protect us. We are fed up with not being safe in our homes, neighborhoods and churches. We demand more than one moment of reckoning.

The Black RJ movement has a policy agenda that will hold law enforcement, politicians, corporations, voters and all people living in the U.S. to account. It is an expertly informed compendium of 25 issue areas, each with effective policy recommendations. We believe that the Agenda addresses the social, economic, political and health needs of Black women, femmes, girls and gender-expansive people — so we can live our lives fully and decide for ourselves if, when and how to have and raise our families.

We hope that Congress will embrace the Black RJ Policy Agenda and work with us to pass it so that Black women, femmes, girls, and gender-expansive people can live in full autonomy, with equality and justice for all. But we know that will only happen if every Black and Brown person demands it. For white people — especially white feminists — who want to be good allies, this is their chance; they too should make implementing the Black RJ Policy Agenda a priority.

The Black RJ movement has a plan to dismantle white supremacy. I challenge and encourage you to join us in demanding that elected officials and policymakers embrace and implement the Black RJ Policy Agenda now.

Marcela Howell is president and CEO of In Our Own Voice: National Black Women’s Reproductive Justice Agenda. To learn more about the Black RJ Policy agenda, visit blackrj.org.