Special programs we ran for minorities at the firm were often counterproductive. That may be a provocation to other people. But I think if you brand something a remedial program, you're kind of also branding the people who go into that program.
Tharpe, a veteran of the gospel scene, has picked Knight out of a backing quartet the previous evening. Now she intends to teach her partner how to 'swing', to infuse Knight's religious repertoire with some nightclub rhythm and blues. Knight, the younger, more restrained church singer, is awestruck by Tharpe's musical adventurousness.
If you know anything about the basic origins of Black History Month then you know that we weren't given' anything. The question of who owns and authorizes Black History Month holds particular relevance now, in its centennial year, and at a time when efforts to celebrate, preserve, and acknowledge Black people's past in this country are under attack.
The next "Dying to Stay Here" podcast will feature a panel discussing what we call our criminal justice system. The panel reflected on a recent election in California, where voters were asked, in plain language, whether they wanted to remove slavery from our constitution, where it's still allowed "as punishment for a crime," and voted to keep it. As we celebrate another Black History Month, I reflect on the disproportionate number of Black people behind bars.
In his "Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination," Robin D.G. Kelley explains that "a map to the new world is in the imagination." There are so many emergencies right now-ICE abductions, decriminalization of anti-Black racism, the political hijack of the struggle against antisemitism and anti-Blackness, unauthorized military aggression abroad, a climate crisis accelerated-that it's hard to know where to direct our resistance.
Take their neighbors, classmates, and community members? Not on their watch. Moms around the country dedicated much of their year to protecting children and families in their communities from unlawful deportation. There was the group of over a dozen moms arrested while protesting outside Broadview Detention Center in Chicago. There was t he mom group who organized a "walking school bus" to get children to school safely if their parents feared being targeted by ICE.
As 2026 approaches, journalism finds itself in a dangerous kind of forgetfulness. Hard-won truths grow quieter by the day; the racial reckoning that once roared through newsrooms now echoes faintly beneath a tightening political silence. In that hush, the future of news hinges upon one assignment - remembering what power hopes we forget. And so we enter a moment of transformation.
In 2020, Ms. Wanda Cooper-Jones made a promise no mother should ever have to make - a vow to fight for justice for her son, no matter how long or how painful the road ahead would be. Her youngest, Ahmaud Arbery, was only 25 when he was murdered for being a Black man jogging in a suburban Georgia neighborhood. Even with a cell phone recording of the murder taking place, it would be months before anyone was even arrested.
We are scapegoating asylum seekers for the failures and political divisions caused by successive governments in the last 15 years the failures of successive governments to address wealth inequality, funding for education, the cost of living and primary healthcare and infrastructure. Every day I meet homeless people who have fallen through the cracks in our system. And yet in singling out asylum seekers we are laying the burden of society's problems on less than 1% of the UK population
New Yorkers sent a resounding message on Election Day: they want a city that fights back against President Trump and protects all New Yorkers, including our immigrant neighbors. Since Trump took office in January, New Yorkers have seen Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) ramp up its operations , disappearing our loved ones and engaging in brutal deportation tactics at federal immigration court , at workplaces and in homes.
He recalled how one day he did a home visit with a child who was born addicted to cocaine. I was never born addicted to anything, D'Souza said. The challenges that those folks have to deal with in order to overcome and become somebody that they dream about becoming is such a huge difference between what I had to go through. It awakened my thinking about what I want to do with my life. From that moment on, D'Souza said he knew he was going to dedicate his career to public service.
Geeta Gandbhir's The Perfect Neighbor, which premiered in the US Documentary section of this year's Sundance, is likely one of the first feature docs primarily composed of police body camera footage. Sifting through footage with editor Viridiana Liberman ( The Sentence), Gandbhir builds out a suspenseful and heartbreaking portrait of neighborly violence in a close-knit Central Florida community, after white woman Susan Lorincz fatally shot Ajike Owens-Gandbhir's sister-in-law's best friend, though Gandbhir didn't know Owens personally.
"You know, when you do a celebrity bio there's a certain kind of format," he says on a recent afternoon in a downtown Los Angeles bookstore, where outside at one point gunshots and police sirens interrupted the calm inside. "The mission is to dig up all the dirt you can. The essential narrative is, 'This person wasn't an angel.'"
When New York legalized cannabis, it was hailed as a historic shift. Headlines celebrated an overdue end to prohibition and the chance to repair decades of criminalization that devastated Black and Brown communities. Yet for those who lived through the era of the "War on Drugs," legalization is not simply a victory. It sparks a deeper, more pressing question: what does justice look like in a legal cannabis economy, and who is truly benefiting?
The streets of Washington DC, are unmistakable. In addition to noting the city's signature architecture and public monuments, one will know they are in the nation's capital when they can barely go half a city block without spotting a US flag. Two weeks ago, those flags were flying at half-staff, but not in recognition of the passing of a high-ranking public official, as would be customary.
Since George Floyd's murder, calls have grown louder for accountability-essential but incomplete. Yes, we absolutely need to hold officers accountable and ensure that officers are punished for wrongdoing. But accountability is reactive-it comes only after a tragedy. Rarely does it drive prevention of the next tragedy. In fact, the threat of being sanctioned often creates perverse incentives-driving employees to cover up misconduct that helps explain why punishment alone fails to prevent the excessive use of force.
The Skadden Fellowships have historically improved legal services for the poor; however, recent changes in application criteria display a disconcerting shift toward perceived political neutrality.
