Category Archives: Racism

Islamophobic Smear Campaign Against ‘Historic’ Judicial Nominee Condemned

“We urge senators to assess Mr. Mangi’s nomination based on his credentials and qualifications for the job, not his religion, race, or ethnicity.”

By Jessica Corbett. Published 4-2-2024 by Common Dreams

Adeel Mangi speaks at his U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on December 13, 2023. (Photo: Graeme Sloan/Sipa USA/via Wikipedia/CC BY-SA 4.0)

A coalition of over 125 rights groups on Tuesday urged the U.S. Senate to vanquish an onslaught of Islamophobic attacks and confirm Adeel Mangi, who would be the first Muslim American to serve on a federal appeals court.

As some right-wing Democrats consider joining with Republicans to block his nomination to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit, the groups explained in a letter to senators that they came together to support the Oxford- and Harvard-educated attorney, “highlight Mr. Mangi’s tremendous qualifications, and condemn the baseless and bigoted attacks being waged against this exceptional and historic nominee.”

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Montana Supreme Court Strikes Down 4 ‘Unconstitutional’ Voting Laws Passed by GOP

The laws disproportionately impacted the ability of Native people to participate in voting, the court noted.

By Julia Conley. Published 3-28-2024 by Common Dreams

Image: Democracy Chronicles/flickr

Native rights groups were among those applauding a decision by the Montana Supreme Court late Wednesday as four voting restrictions, passed by the Republican-controlled state legislature in the wake of former President Donald Trump’s 2020 election loss, were struck down as “unconstitutional.”

The sweeping 2021 laws had ended same-day voter registration, eliminated the use of student ID cards as a form of identification for voters, banned the distribution of absentee ballots to teenagers who would turn 18 by Election Day, and prohibited third parties from collecting ballots and returning them on behalf of voters.

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Legislative inaction and dissatisfaction with one-party control lead to more issues going directly to voters in ballot initiatives, with 60% of them in six states

By Thom Reilly, Arizona State University. Published 3-21-2024 by The Conversation

Photo: Stewart Butterfield/flickr/CC

Recent polls show Americans are increasingly dissatisfied with their system of representative democracy, in which they choose candidates to represent their interests once in office.

When available, voters have bypassed their elected representatives and enacted laws by using direct democracy tools such as ballot initiatives and veto referendums. Ballot initiatives allow citizens or legislatures to propose policies for voter approval, while veto referendums permit challenges to legislative action.

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US Supreme Court Lets Texas Enforce ‘Unconstitutional and Extreme’ Border Law

“Allowing this law to be implemented as the case makes its way through the legal process needlessly puts people’s lives at risk,” said one campaigner. “We remain committed to the fight to permanently overturn S.B. 4.”

By Jessica Corbett. Published 3-19-2024 by Common Dreams

Migrants who crossed the border illegally, surrender near El Paso, TX U.S. Customs and Border Protection photo by Mani Albrecht

Rights advocates on Tuesday blasted the conservative majority of the U.S. Supreme Court for allowing Texas to enforce Senate Bill 4, a contested law empowering local and state authorities to arrest and deport undocumented immigrants.

“Today’s decision is disappointing and threatens the integrity of our nation’s immigration laws and bedrock principles of due process,” said Anand Balakrishnan, senior staff attorney at the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project. “But it is only preliminary and turned on the specific posture of the case. We’ll continue to fight against S.B. 4 until it is struck down once and for all.”

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Deepfakes of Black Trump ‘Supporters’ Spark Fresh Calls to Ban AI in Political Ads

“The spread of misinformation and targeted intimidation of Black voters will continue without the proper safeguards,” said Color of Change.

By Brett Wilkins. Published 3-4-2024 by Common Dreams

This deepfake image of former President Donald Trump with Black “supporters” shows misformed and missing fingers, as well as unintelligble lettering on attire. (Photo: Mark Kaye/X)

Racial justice defenders on Monday renewed calls for banning artificial intelligence in political advertisements after backers of former U.S. President Donald Trump published fake AI-generated images of the presumptive Republican nominee with Black “supporters.”

BBC highlighted numerous deepfakes, including one created by right-wing Florida radio host Mark Kaye showing a smiling Trump embracing happy Black women. On closer inspection, missing or misformed fingers and unintelligible lettering on attire expose the images as fake.

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GOP Congressman Suggests ‘Pinochet Air’ Death Flights for Migrants

“We wonder why the right-wingers aren’t freaking out about Trump’s dictator talk but we shouldn’t,” said one local Democratic leader in Georgia.

By Brett Wilkins. Published 2-2-2024 by Common Dreams

U.S. Rep. Mike Collins (R-Ga.) is seen here in a December 6, 2023 photo. 
(Photo: Mike Collins/Facebook)

A Republican congressman from Georgia on Thursday suggested a novel way to stem the influx of migrants at the southern border: throw them from helicopters into the sea.

Responding to a photo showing a migrant flipping off the camera following his release without bail from a New York City court, Rep. Mike Collins took to social media to reply to a post by Rep. Anthony D’Esposito (R-N.Y.) advising the young man to “holla at the cartels and have them escort you back.”

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‘Death Sentence’: Reports Call for End to Big Oil’s US Sacrifice Zones

“People’s lives and the environment are being devastated at the hands of big business,” one human rights researcher said.

By Olivia Rosane. Published 1-25-2024 by Common Dreams

Cancer Alley. Photo: Gines A. Sanchez/flickr/CC

Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch both published reports on Thursday detailing how the fossil fuel industry has harmed the health and environment of communities in Texas and Louisiana, and how state and federal regulators have failed to protect them.

The Amnesty report, The Cost of Doing Business? The Petrochemical Industry’s Toxic Pollution in the USA, focused on the Houston Ship Channel, which has some of the worst air pollution measurements in the U.S. The HRW report, “We’re Dying Here”: The Fight for Life in a Louisiana Fossil Fuel Sacrifice Zone, looked at the state’s Cancer Alley, an 85-mile zone along the Mississippi that reportedly has the highest concentration of fossil fuel and petrochemical plants in the Western Hemisphere.

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‘Don’t Just Quote Him’: US Agencies, Politicians Under Fire on MLK Day

“It’s that day of the year where people who don’t know anything about MLK, and would hate him if he were alive today, post the one or two MLK quotes they know.”

By Jessica Corbett. Published 1-15-2024 by Common Dreams

Martin Luther King, Jr., speaking against the Vietnam War, St. Paul Campus, University of Minnesota on April 27 1967 Photo: Minnesota Historical Society/CC

U.S. politicians, agencies, and departments provoked intense criticism on Monday—Martin Luther King Jr. Day in the United States—for sharing select quotes from the civil rights icon while ignoring his messages about important issues including militarism, poverty, and racism.

King—who was assassinated on April 4, 1968, in Memphis, Tennessee—would have celebrated his 95th birthday on Monday.

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‘No, This Is Not a Parody’: Florida School District Bans Dictionaries Under DeSantis Law

Webster’s Dictionary & Thesaurus and The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank are among the books that the Escambia County School District has yanked from library shelves.

By Jake Johnson Published 1-10-2024 by Common Dreams

A photo of a Florida K-8 school’s dumpster, filled to the brim with history and civics textbooks. As part of a new policy, schools must destroy all material not allowed by the state government. Photo: Yamasztuka/Wikimedia Commons/CC

Dictionaries and encyclopedias are among the more than 2,800 books that a Florida school district has pulled from library shelves in an effort to comply with a law that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed last year.

Judd Legum, author of the Popular Information newsletter, reported Wednesday that the Escambia County School District said the books that have been banned pending further investigation “may violate H.B. 1069,” which “gives residents the right to demand the removal of any library book that ‘depicts or describes sexual conduct,’ as defined under Florida law, whether or not the book is pornographic.”

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Minimum Wage Hikes Will Boost Pay of Nearly 10 Million US Workers in 2024

“These raises are the outcome of over a decade of workers organizing with Fight for $15,” said the National Employment Law Project.

By Julia Conley. Published 12-27-2023 by Common Dreams

Workers and activists march in support of a higher minimum wage. ) (Photo: Steve Rhodes/Flickr/cc)

Tireless campaigning by economic justice advocates helped to secure minimum wage hikes for nearly 10 million U.S. workers starting in 2024, and one think tank noted on Wednesday that further successes at the state and local levels are expected in the coming year—but experts said the federal government must catch up with state legislators to deliver fair wages to all workers.

January 1 will see 22 states increase their minimum wages, providing affected workers with an additional $6.95 billion.

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