After Biden win, Black activists demand reparations for slavery, police reform
When President-elect Joe Biden addressed supporters last week to accept the highest office in the land, he took a moment to thank one specific group of Americans.
“When this campaign was at its lowest, the African American community stood up again for me,” Biden said. “They always have my back, and I’ll have yours.”
Leading Black Lives Matter activists plan to hold him and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris to that I.O.U. with a vengeance.
In a tumultuous election year, one that both gave rise to a new civil rights movement in response to the death of George Floyd and saw Black Americans suffer disproportionately from the COVID-19 pandemic and staggeringly high unemployment, Black Lives Matter activists are asking the new administration to make Black matters paramount.
“For decades, Black people have shown up time and time again for a country that consistently tells us that our lives don’t matter,” said Mary Hooks, a founding member of Black Lives Matter Atlanta and co-director of Southerners on New Ground, a social justice advocacy organization. “Beyond a cheap thank you, we need this administration to be bold and unapologetic about paying that debt through enacting policy changes.”
© Courtesy of Mary Hooks Mary Hooks, with black T-shirt, speaks in front of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia. Hooks is a key leader in the city's Black Lives Matter chapter.
After Biden accepted the presidency, Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullors wrote an open letter to Biden and Harris saying “we want something for our vote” and asked for an immediate meeting.
To date, no meeting has been set, which is concerning, said Melina Abdullah, co-founder of Black Lives Matter Los Angeles and co-director of Black Lives Matter Grassroots, a national organizing arm of the organization.
“Hopefully this is just a delay,” said Abdullah, who also is a professor of Pan-African studies at California State University, Los Angeles. “We need to be sure this administration realizes that Black people voted out Donald Trump. Because of us, we saw a massive turnout and a rejection of blatant racism.”
The degree to which the incoming administration works with groups such as Black Lives Matter will help answer a larger unresolved question: how much influence will the progressive arm of the Democratic party have over a career centrist such as Biden and Harris, a former California attorney general, during the biggest reckoning on civil rights and racism since the 1960s?
While the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a milestone achievement anchored by Martin Luther King, Jr., that landmark legislation far from erased the hurdles facing Black Americans, whose educational and economic opportunities continue to be stymied by legacies of slavery and systemic racism that surfaced in the form of redlining, redistricting and other restrictive measures
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© Amy Harris, Amy Harris/Invision/AP Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullors poses for a photo at the Summit LA18 in Los Angeles in 2018.
Biden has promised to assemble a cabinet that includes voices from across the Democratic spectrum. Despite charges by Trump and Vice President Mike Pence that Biden and Harris will "defund, dismantle, and dissolve police departments," the Democratic leaders do not support defunding the police. It remains to be seen how Biden and his team will handle other demands from Black leaders.
Biden should 'acknowledge' BLM
Biden’s acceptance speech nod to Black voters and his choice of vice presidents — Harris being the first woman and first Black and South Asian American in the position — suggest the incoming president is aware he has debts to pay, says Todd Boyd, the Katherine and Frank Price endowed chair for the study of race and popular culture at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.
“There seems to be a consciousness on Biden’s part that African Americans had a lot to do with him being victorious,” said Boyd. “As to whether Black Lives Matter in particular has leverage, well, they’re not a huge lobbying group like the National Rifle Association. But that doesn’t mean they don’t get acknowledged.”
It is not an overstatement to say that Biden's campaign was brought back from the dead by a March primary victory in South Carolina fueled by the work of South Carolina Congressman and House Majority Whip James Clyburn, who is Black and was an organizer during the 1960s civil rights movement. That endorsement soon had a snowball effect.
© Matt Rourke, AP Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden, right, and The Rev. Al Sharpton, left, listen to Rep. James Clyburn, D-S.C., speak Feb. 26, at the National Action Network South Carolina Ministers' Breakfast
Although Trump gained some ground with Black male voters this election, African Americans in crucial swing states such as Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania and recount-poised Georgia were instrumental in delivering the White House to Democrats.
In return, Black activists say, the winning ticket must take immediate action on matters such as health care, housing, education and, perhaps most paramount, police reform.
A Biden administration could provide a swift change in how law enforcement tactics are discussed across the nation. Trump has repeatedly voiced support for officers while calling those protesting for change "left-wing mobs," a stark contrast to the previous Obama administration where Biden served as vice president.
After the officer-involved deaths in 2014 of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and Eric Garner in New York City, President Barack Obama established the President's Task Force on 21st Century Policing, which pushed for such killings to be investigated by independent prosecutors.
Since Obama left office, Black Lives Matter, which was founded in 2013 after the acquittal of Trayvon Martin's killer, has become a leading voice on civil rights issues. The loosely organized movement gathered renewed momentum following the death of Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers on Memorial Day.
Despite social distancing mandates spurred by COVID-19, protests attended by diverse groups of Americans spread across the nation. The movement soon began calling for an outright defunding of police departments. Although some Democrats bristle at the slogan — including Clyburn, who recently warned that the defund battle cry “is killing our party” — activists are resolute.
“Our clarion call was defund the police,” said Abdullah, the Los Angeles organizer. “That might not resonate within the core of the Democratic party, but it resonates with people on the streets.” 
© VALERIE MACON, AFP via Getty Images
Civic leader and co-founder of the Black Lives Matter Los Angeles chapter, Melina Abdullah, poses for a photo after voting at the Staples Center early on November 3.
In Abdullah’s hometown, voters just approved Measure J, also known as “Reimagine LA County,” which requires that 10% of the city’s unrestricted general funds be invested in social services and alternatives to incarceration.
“That slogan means what it means, we can’t keep investing in a system that harms people of color and expect a different result,” said Angela Waters Austin, co-founder of Black Lives Matter Michigan, based in Lansing, and CEO of the activist non-profit One Love Global.
Like many activists of color, Waters Austin supports the national passage of The Breathe Act, a project of the non-profit Movement for Black Lives that proposes sweeping changes to the way tax dollars are allocated, emphasizing social programs over incarceration and providing grants to promote environmental health and social justice.
Education, housing also pressing for Black activists
Other social issues also need attention, said Marcus McDonald, founder of an independent chapter of Black Lives Matter in Charleston, South Carolina.
“Trump set us back in so many ways, so I’m hoping this new administration will quickly take action on things such as funding public education and embracing the Fair Housing Act,” said McDonald, CEO of Adesso Entertainment. “Biden has a chance to once again make things non-partisan. Affordable health care, wearing a mask, things like that there’s no middle ground on.”
© Courtesy Marcus McDonald
Marcus McDonald is founder of an independent chapter of Black Lives Matter in Charleston, South Carolina.
Atlanta activist Hooks does not shy away from a defund the police demand — “It is a lifeline we need to save ourselves and future generations,” she said. But she also is keen to push for a range of other changes from a Biden-Harris presidency.
With COVID-19 disproportionately hospitalizing and killing people of color, Biden “must prioritize a stimulus package that halts evictions,” she said. What’s more, beyond implementing the federal Breathe Act, the new president must expand Medicaid, expand rights for the LGBTQ community, and set a “dignified” federal minimum wage.
“Lastly,” Hooks added, “we need reparations for the descendants of Africans both here and abroad, period.”
In many ways, Black Lives Matter activists pushing a progressive agenda on mainstream politicians is part of a time-honored approach to achieving incremental societal change, said Omar Wasow, assistant professor of political science at Princeton University in New Jersey and an expert on protest movements.
“There’s always been a classic tension between insiders and outsiders, where popular movements are purposefully more extreme in their views than those of officials in power,” said Wasow. “Now we’re starting to see more subtle arguments, such as a rethinking of how much funding goes to armed officers and how much maybe should go to people who help those with mental health issues, many of whom are killed by police officers.”
Tanya Faison, founder of Black Lives Matter Sacramento, has been in the streets for years fighting for social justice. The city came to a boil in 2018 after Stephon Clark, a 22-year-old Black man, was killed by two police officers who shot him in the back after mistaking his cell phone for a gun.
More recently, flag-waving Trump truck caravans rumbled through the state capital, which made her cast doubts on the possibility of a Democratic win.
© BOB STRONG Tanya Faison, in white shirt, confronts police officers during a Black Lives Matter protest. Faison is founder of the Black Lives Matter Sacramento chapter in California.
Biden and Harris’s victory “was surprising and is positive,” but it is not a cause for unguarded celebration, she said.
She pointed out that for many in the Black community, Biden's missteps include his 1994 Crime Bill, a “tough on crime” law signed by President Bill Clinton that led to a surge in incarcerations, as well as his defense of Clarence Thomas during his Supreme Court nomination hearing when Anita Hill’s charges of sexual assault were questioned.
As for Harris, who served as California’s attorney general and the district attorney of San Francisco, Faison said she has come under fire by activists for a track record that includes refusing to prosecute police officers.
“This election was about getting Trump out, but I don’t see a lot of enthusiasm behind Biden,” she said. “We have to move away from believing police without questioning anything."
Black Lives Matter Sacramento, like many other Black Lives Matter chapters, did not endorse a candidate during this election. Rather, Faison and other activists simply urged voters to get informed and get to the polls.
“If you know what you’re talking about, it makes it easier to then hold people’s feet to the fire,” she said.
Faison plans to keep doing just that. While she hopes the power of the Black vote brought to bear on Biden’s win makes the Democratic party take the demands of the African American community seriously, she assumes her activist work is far from over.
“Asking for equity is not a radical position,” Faison said. “The fight for Black liberation needs to keep going.”
Young voters helped propel Biden to victory. Now they're pushing for a more progressive Democratic Party
Hannah Miao CNBC
© Provided by CNBC Members of the Georgia Tech Women's basketball team hold voting signs outside of McCamish Pavillion which serves as a polling place on Election Day in Atlanta, Ga., on Tuesday, November 3, 2020.
Young voters turned out in high numbers to help deliver Joe Biden the presidency.
Youth organizers are pushing the Democratic Party to embrace a more progressive platform.
The movement comes as tension grows between the Democratic Party's moderate and liberal factions.
President-elect Joe Biden was not Sam Weinberg's first or even second choice for the White House. Like many young progressives, the 19-year-old Illinois native had supported Sens. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren during the Democratic primaries.
But in April, when Biden became the last man standing in the Democratic primary, Weinberg decided to back the centrist candidate.
Fearing his peers might not follow suit, he created "Settle for Biden," an Instagram account using what he describes as "sardonic millennial and Gen Z humor" to convince young people to, well, settle for Biden.
With catchphrases such as "Because a C+ is better than an F," the campaign focused on mobilizing young people to vote President Donald Trump out of office. After more than 290,000 followers and millions of likes, comments and shares on the account, Settle for Biden has become an advocacy group and its name has proven to be an effective rallying cry for young voters.
Other progressive groups have also been organizing young people for political action, including the climate-focused Sunrise Movement, anti-gun violence group March for Our Lives, immigrant advocacy group United We Dream and other movements.
Their efforts may have had an impact on Biden's victory. Turnout among voting-eligible Americans ages 18-29 increased significantly from 2016 to 2020 and a majority of them supported Biden, according to preliminary analysis from Tufts University.
Now, youth organizers are pushing the Democratic Party to embrace a more progressive platform.
"Progressive voters are the future of this country, progressive policies are the future of politics, and we are going to keep fighting to make sure that Biden's administration is as progressive as possible," Weinberg said.
Young voters' electoral impact
Voters ages 18-29, particularly young people of color, supported Biden at a greater rate than any other age group, NBC News exit polls show. Between 73% and 87% of Latino, Asian and Black youth supported Biden, compared with 51% of White youth, according to data from the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement, or CIRCLE, at Tufts University.
In key swing states such as Arizona, Michigan and Pennsylvania, where NBC News has projected a Biden win, preliminary data shows young people's support helped push Biden over the margin of victory. Biden made gains in Michigan and Pennsylvania counties with large college student populations.
© Provided by CNBC
Young Black voters played a crucial role in flipping Georgia, a traditionally Republican stronghold, where Biden currently holds a narrow lead. Voters ages 18-29 made up 21% of the state's voter share — 5% higher than the youth voter share nationwide. About 90% of young Black voters supported Biden, compared with 34% of White youth and 57% of all youth voters in Georgia.
"We won this election for Joe Biden," said Nikayla Jefferson, a 24-year-old organizer for the Sunrise Movement. "We're not going to let that go. He definitely owes his administration to us."
The Biden campaign did not immediately respond to CNBC's request for comment.
A divided party
In April, a coalition of progressive youth groups including the Sunrise Movement, the March for Our Lives Action Fund, United We Dream Action and Justice Democrats penned a letter to Biden asking him to earn the support of young people. The coalition urged Biden to support policies such as "Medicare for All," canceling student debt, a wealth tax and the Green New Deal commitment to clean energy.
"We need you to champion the bold ideas that have galvanized our generation and given us hope in the political process," the letter read.
On Wednesday, the Sunrise Movement and Justice Democrats released a list of recommendations for Biden's Cabinet, including Warren as Treasury secretary and Sanders as labor secretary.
The move comes as tension grows between the Democratic Party's moderate and liberal factions. As Democrats' House majority is projected to shrink following the 2020 election, centrist Democrats have blamed progressive policies for costing the party seats, including "Medicare for All" and the Green New Deal.
Meanwhile, progressive Democrats have criticized moderate Democrats for catering more to center-right voters than those who consistently vote blue. Prominent figures such as Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib are urging the party to "
My residents walked by blighted homes, closed schools and breathed in polluted air, to vote for President-elect @JoeBiden & VP-elect @KamalaHarris. They don't deserve to be silenced. We must honor our communities that showed up. #EmbracetheBase NEW: Progressives strikes back at centrist Dems
Rep. Tlaib choked up in interview as she said people in her district walked past blighted homes to vote for Biden/Harris. “I can’t believe that people are asking them to be quiet.”
More w/@hollyotterbein
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"It's important to not ignore who supports you the most," said Mary-Pat Hector, a 22-year-old youth voting advocate based in Atlanta. "Young people are now officially a huge part of their base, so it's important to talk to them."
Hector points to Black female leaders who have rallied youth voters in Georgia for years, including Tamieka Atkins, Helen Butler, Nse Ufot, Deborah Scott and 2018 Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams.
"We really need to be thinking about how to be in conversation with young people, not just in the two to three months before an election like we're cramming for a test," said Abby Kiesa, deputy director of CIRCLE.
"If we don't have politicians in there that seem like they care about young people, then we're not going to want to get involved," said 20-year-old Emily Zanieski, co-leader of Students for Ossoff, a youth-led initiative to elect Georgia Democratic Senate candidate Jon Ossoff.
'We are the future of the party'
For many young people, Biden's campaign promise of a return to "normalcy" is not enough.
"This sense of uncertainty about the future is something we've been feeling for a long time, and that comes down to issues such as health care, education affordability and climate change," said Royce Mann, 19, legislative director for March for Our Lives' Georgia chapter.
"The party needs to start listening to its progressive wing and start understanding that a progressive platform aligns with folks who I don't think a centrist could ever reach," said Isabella Guinigundo, an 18-year-old organizer with Ohio Progressive Asian Women's Leadership. "Progressive policies are good policies for anyone interested in good paying jobs and a future that is for all of us."
The Democratic Party's first test? Biden's Cabinet appointees.
In addition to the Sunrise Movement and Justice Democrats, Settle for Biden has also released a slate of recommendations for top government posts. With the fate of the Senate still unknown, youth organizers are urging Biden to use his executive powers in key areas such as the Covid-19 pandemic, climate change and the economy.
"The work starts now. We have to hold these people accountable to support the policies that we want to see happen in the future," said Marcia Lacopo, 21, a North Carolina-based organizer with progressive youth voting initiative NextGen America.
After propelling Biden to the White House, young progressives expect the president-elect to deliver on the mandate they've given him.
"We are the future of the party," Sunrise Movement's Jefferson said. "We've made it very clear that the party is changing and either they come with us or we kick them out of office."
Tamara Ross waits in line on the first day of early voting for the general election at the C.T. Martin Natatorium and Recreation Center on Oct. 12, 2020 in Atlanta, Ga.. Early voting in Georgia runs from Oct.12 to Oct. 30.
