The Skinny on COVID
The latest in numbers: 28M total cases & 486K deaths (+700K & +26K from last week)
Some headlines:
Per the CDC, now’s the time to start doubling up on masks.
The CDC also says schools can reopen safely. According to their guidelines, however, only 11% of students nationwide are eligible to return to the classroom right away.
NY Governor Andrew Cuomo is under fire for allegedly undercounting the deaths of nursing home residents. Remember when he was the hot boy of the pandemic last spring?
Cases around the nation are dropping, but it’s not because of the vaccine. Simply put, people finally decided to listen to the recommended health protocols. What a concept.
It’s Enrollment Season
For Obamacare. If you don’t have medical insurance, check their site out to see what options they have available. The deadline is May 15.
Keeping Up with Biden & Harris
Black immigrants face deportations at a disproportionate rate and their stories are often lost in discussions around immigration. What will the Biden administration do about it?
A nonpartisan, nonprofit think tank says Biden’s stimmy plan would boost the income of the poorest 20% of the country by 33%. Sadly, this group makes less than $11K annually and the proposed plan would only give them an additional $3.5K.
Once a Trump-era rule is overturned, states will no longer be able to require “able-bodied” Medicaid recipients to work.
Will the POTUS let Louis DeJoy, a Trump ally, keep his top spot at the USPS? DeJoy caught a lot of flack last year for making major changes to post office operations ahead of the 2020 elections.
Congress, What’s Good?
Everyone saw that lil impeachment trial play out last week. It was at times bizarre and frightening, but it still ended in a Trump acquittal. Are Democrats to blame as much as Republicans? Some critics think so.
Oh yeah. Here are the 43 Republican Senators’ reasons for why they voted against convicting Trump.
On the committee schedule this week:
GameStop and the chaos that occurs when hedge funds and retail investors clash
The child care crisis brought on by the Coronavirus
Criminal Justice Round Up
Alton Sterling’s family gets a $4.5M settlement from Baton Rouge after he was murdered by police in July 2016.
Despite the pandemic raging inside of prisons & jails, NYC appears to be back to its old tricks. After a drop in the spring, the city’s jails are slowly increasing detentions for technical parole violations. 60% of those impacted by this practice are Black.
America’s oldest juvenile offender was just released from prison after 68 years. He went to jail at just 15 years old and yup, you guessed it. He is Black.
Some in Maryland’s House of Delegates want to keep police accountable for the use of excessive force.
Around the Diaspora
Black residents of Alberta, Canada want some respect put on their names.
Barbados and Dominica recently received 100K and 72K doses of the COVID vaccine from India. Belize hopes to be next, but in the meantime, Bim has agreed to give them 1K from their allotment.
An #ENDSARS protest that occurred over the weekend was swiftly muffled by Nigerian police.
Guinea has recorded 7 new cases of Ebola, but they say they are better prepared to fight the virus this time around.
Getting to the Money
TBS wants to help 3 recent HBCU grads pay off their student loan debts. Participants must have graduated after December 1, 2015 and the deadline to enter is March 8.
Got an e-commerce business in need of help? Make your online store pop with this $30 Shopify training.
Buying Black
Heard of Proud Puffs? It’s a breakfast cereal that was inspired by last year’s wave of protests for George Floyd. The cereal is chocolate-flavored (duh), vegan, and shaped like a fist. The product isn’t available just yet, but you can pre-order here.
Culture that Pops
The Best Man is coming to Peacock as a limited series. You watching?
If you’ve already seen Judas & the Black Messiah, did you realize the similarities between the government’s perspective on the Panthers then and BLM today? This author makes the parallels clear.
Speaking of the Panthers, peep the mural a homeowner commissioned on the side of her home to honor the contribution of women to the movement.