Ya gotta be in it — to win it!
Commentary by Black Kos Editor Denise Oliver-Velez
I’m sick and tired of seeing the faces of white supremacist racists like TX Gov. Smegma Abbott, FL Gov. Ron De Satan, former POTUS Donald Dump, and Sen. Cancun Cruz — headlining stories and social media posts. Time to start pushing back and featuring Democrats, and supporting them in challenging the Republiklan wherever they are found.
So today’s story from me is about Texas Democratic Congressman Colin Allred, who it seems will be challenging rightwing Republican Ted Cruz for his senate seat in the upcoming election.
Allred set to launch Texas Senate run against Cruz
Democratic Rep. Colin Allred is planning to announce a run against Sen. Ted Cruz as soon as this week, according to two people familiar with his plans.
A former NFL player-turned-civil rights attorney, Allred has been quietly prepping for a run against Cruz for months. During his two successful reelection bids since ousting an entrenched incumbent in 2018, Allred has proven a prolific fundraiser. He’s well-liked within the Democratic Caucus and has also picked up positions in leadership, now serving as a member of House Minority Whip Katherine Clark’s (D-Mass.) team and as previously part of then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) expansive leadership team. Allred won his suburban Dallas House seat in 2018, unseating Rep. Pete Sessions — a former House Rules Committee and National Republican Congressional Committee chair who later returned to the House after running in a different district.
After 2020’s redistricting, Allred’s district became safely Democratic, meaning he could likely hold his current seat for as long as he chooses. His decision to give it up to run for Senate instead, in a state where his party has struggled to win statewide, sets up a potentially high-profile general election race next fall.
Rep. Allred is a fighter. Think back to this moment on Jan. 6th:
Rep. Hakeem Jeffries recounts the moment when the “jackets came off” on January 6: “Colin Allred is behind me, and he says to me, ‘I don’t know about you, Hakeem, but I’m not going down without a fight.’”
I realize that many journalists in the mainstream media, and the pompous punditry are not going to support Allred’s challenge to Cruz, and most, if not all of them will paint this effort as hopeless. This depresses turnout — and fundraising.
Back in 2018, Cruz narrowly defeated Democrat Beto O'Rourke by 2.6 percentage points. I was glad to see this story in the Texas Signal from Joe Bowen — “Musings: Cruz Can Lose”
There is one aspect to a potential Allred candidacy that shouldn’t go overlooked. Texas Democrats have developed a track record over the past twenty years for running white candidates at the top of the statewide ticket, filling out the ballot with a more diverse slate of candidates in down-ballot offices.
While the Texas Democratic Party has done a great job recruiting diverse slates of candidates in recent cycles, there hasn’t been a major Black candidate at or near the top of the ballot in Texas since Ron Kirk’s 2002 Senate race. Democrats consistently bemoan low turnout in Black communities across the state after subpar election results, while neglecting the hard work of recruiting strong Black candidates and giving them the support network they need to lead our tickets to success.
Allred could turn that tired formula on its head, and give Black voters throughout Texas a reason to be excited to cast a ballot in 2024. That could be a tremendous asset for a Democratic candidate, and to be frank, Texas Democrats won’t win in 2024 without dramatically increasing their investment in Black and Brown communities.
If for some reason — you have never heard of Colin Allred — here’s the brief bio from his Congressional website:
Born and raised in North Dallas by a single mom who was a Dallas public school teacher, Congressman Colin Allred was class president at Hillcrest High School and earned a full-ride football scholarship to Baylor University.
Diploma in hand and prepared to attend law school, Colin deferred his acceptance to play in the NFL. He was a linebacker for five seasons before sustaining a career-ending injury that opened the door for him to fulfill his other dream -- becoming a civil rights attorney.
Colin served in the General Counsel's office at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Colin later returned home to Dallas and decided to run for office to represent the district he grew up in.
As a Representative, Colin is dedicated to helping North Texas families gain the same opportunities he had to fulfill his dreams. Colin's top priorities in Congress are working to lower health care costs, protecting Medicare and Social Security, and creating an economy that works for everyone. Colin is passionate about expanding access to vocational and trade schools and lowering the cost of college so all North Texans have the shot at a middle-class job. He believes Congress must find common ground to rebuild our aging roads and bridges, pass comprehensive immigration reform and take care of our veterans.
You can follow him on Twitter here:
Will keep you posted — to let you know where you can donate as soon as he announces his run.
UPDATE: He announced
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News round up by dopper0189, Black Kos Managing Editor
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In honor National Library Week, The American Library Association’s Office of Intellectual Freedom just released some disturbing data around conservative’s ongoing efforts to ban books from libraries and schools around the country. According to their report, 2022 saw the highest number of appeals to ban books in the 20 years they’ve been keeping track.
And it should come as no surprise that most of the books in the conservatives’ crosshairs were written by writers of color or those who identify as LGBTQ. At the top of the ALA’s list of 13 Most Challenged Books of 2022 are frequent targets, “The Bluest Eye” by Toni Morrison and “All Boys Aren’t Blue” by George M. Johnson, a fact that is not lost on the American Library Association.
“By releasing the list of Top 10 Most Challenged Books each year, ALA recognizes all of the brave authors whose work challenges readers with stories that disrupt the status quo and offer fresh perspectives on tough issues,” said ALA President Lessa Kanani’opua Pelayo-Lozada in a statement. “The list also illustrates how frequently stories by or about LGBTQ+ persons, people of color, and lived experiences are being targeted by censors. Closing our eyes to the reality portrayed in these stories will not make life’s challenges disappear. Books give us courage and help us understand each other.”
But while conservatives are ramping up their efforts to take books off shelves, the ALA’s Office of Intellectual Freedom provides support for libraries facing censorship, including workshops and programs around the First Amendment.
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Race still is a big issue with this domination While the Southern Baptist Committee elected its first Black president in 2012, no African Americans have led any of the denomination's powerful agencies or seminaries. The Grio: Black clergy question Southern Baptist selection process
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A powerful Southern Baptist committee was looking to appoint a new leader Monday who could navigate controversies over its handling of sexual-abuse reforms and the ousting of churcheswith women serving as pastors.
Instead, the Executive Committee found itself tangled in yet another dispute, voting down a recommendation to make its own former chairman its president in what had become a racially fraught decision.
That 50-31 vote came after some of the denomination’s prominent Black clergy questioned the selection process, which they saw as bypassing an African American pastor who has led the committee as interim president for more than a year.
The selection process hit a nerve in a denomination that has lost some Black clergy in recent years over what they have seen as a failure of the mostly white-led denomination to make good on its pledges to reform after its history of supporting slavery and segregation. While the SBC elected its first Black president in 2012, no African Americans have led any of the denomination’s powerful agencies or seminaries.
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State Sen. Shevrin Jones can often be seen at the Florida Capitol greeting staff and colleagues with a smile or laugh, but when he’s alone it’s a different story.
“The outward expression is to show God’s love. That’s what I was taught,” said Jones, a Democrat. But, he said, “I have enough tears in my car to fill a lake.”
For Jones, who is gay, the past two years have been emotionally draining as Florida passed a flurry of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation.
More than 200 LGBTQ+ lawmakers across the country feel just like Jones, at a time when anti-gay and anti-transgender legislation is flourishing — as if they are under personal attack, and that they need to continually defend their community’s right to exist. The issue exploded into the national spotlight last week when Montana Republicans voted to bar Democratic Rep. Zooey Zephyr, who is transgender, from the House floor after a standoff over gender-affirming medical care for minors.
The ACLU is tracking nearly 470 anti-LGBTQ+ bills in 16 states, most with Republican-controlled Legislatures. Texas, Missouri and Tennessee alone account for more than 125 such bills; Florida has ten.
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Saturday's White House Correspondents' Dinner brought Ke Huy Quan, Gayle King, Winnie Harlow, Justin Hartley and Brittney Griner together in one massive dining room, but host Roy Wood Jr. had his sights on two media figures that were absent from one of the district's biggest nights: Don Lemon and Tucker Carlson.
The comedian, who plays a reporter on "The Daily Show," reminded journalists, politicians and celebrities of what bonds them.
"Tonight, we are all unified by one thing, and that's scandal," Wood quipped. "Scandals have been devouring careers this year. The untouchable Tucker Carlson is out of a job."
On April 24, Fox News and Carlson, the top-rated cable news host, announced they were "parting ways."
Wood, who also has recently served as a guest host for "The Daily Show," wanted Carlson's colleagues to know that he relates to how they must be feeling.
"I work at 'The Daily Show' so I, too, have been blindsided by the sudden departure of the host of a fake news program," Wood joked, referencing Trevor Noah's departure from Comedy Central late last year after a seven-year stint as host.
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Renowned vegan chef Bryant Terry is on the forefront of leading the fight for food justice. An award-winning author and speaker, he is known for his advocacy of sustainable food systems and access to healthy food for all.
Having grown up an omnivore, his family owned farms in rural Mississippi and kept gardens in Memphis, allowing him to appreciate and learn firsthand the benefits of access to fresh local food. Terry began moving towards what he calls “a more compassionate diet” as a 10th grader, after hearing the hip-hop song Beef by Boogie Down Productions.
Learning more about the ethical, health and environmental reasons for maintaining a vegan diet from Rastafarians and other Black elders in Memphis also played a role in him becoming the food ethicist he is today.
EBONY: When did you begin advocating for a healthy and sustainable food system, and what inspired you to champion this cause?
Bryant Terry: When I was a doctoral student in history at NYU, I was deeply inspired by programs of the Black Panther Party in the late 1960s and 70s that addressed the intersection of poverty, malnutrition, and institutional racism—specifically their Grocery Giveaways and Free Breakfast for Children Program. I felt compelled to get involved in the food justice movement because so many Black communities had the worst health outcomes which are directly related to the food that is readily available to folks. I enrolled in culinary school to gain the skills to found an organization that used cooking to empower and politicize young people from historically marginalized communities to fight food apartheid.
What issues are you working to combat through your food justice activism?
I certainly want to work towards a world where we all have the basic human right to healthy, fresh, affordable, and culturally appropriate food. That being said, the food justice movement has to ensure that social and economic justice are central to this project and recognize that lack of access to healthy, fresh, affordable, and culturally appropriate food is simply one indicator of material deprivation. Most often, the most food-insecure communities are dealing with environmental racism, crumbling infrastructure, underfunded segregated public schools, and lack of safe green space. We have to take a holistic view to healing our communities.
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