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President Biden took strides toward advancing racial equality on Tuesday with the signing of four new executive orders.The directives come on the heels of more than two dozen signed since he took office just a week ago and cover a wide breadth of issues: better enforcement of federal housing laws, increased communication with and support for Native American tribes, criminal justice reform and the condemnation of xenophobia.Here are five things.
Douglas Andrews
âEvery agency will place equity at the core of their public engagement, their policy design, and program delivery to ensure that government resources are reaching Americans of color and all marginalized communities â rural, urban, disabled, LGBTQ+, religious minorities, and so many others.â
So said White House Domestic Policy Advisor Susan Rice during a press briefing yesterday, lending further evidence to the Biden administrationâs seemingly pathological fixation on a single word: equity. Not equality. Equity.
And to be clear: Equality and equity arenât the same things. Not even close. The root of the former word is one of the self-evident truths embedded in our Declaration of Independence. It refers to the state of being equal, especially in status, rights, and opportunities. The latter word, however, refers to systems and institutions that are âfairâ and âjust.â
âEvery agency will place equity at the core of their public engagement, their policy design, and program delivery to ensure that government resources are reaching Americans of color and all marginalized communities â rural, urban, disabled, LGBTQ+, religious minorities, and so many others.â
So said White House Domestic Policy Advisor Susan Rice during a press briefing yesterday, lending further evidence to the Biden administrationâs seemingly pathological fixation on a single word: equity. Not equality. Equity.
And to be clear: Equality and equity arenât the same things. Not even close. The root of the former word is one of the self-evident truths embedded in our Declaration of Independence. It refers to the state of being equal, especially in status, rights, and opportunities. The latter word, however, refers to systems and institutions that are âfairâ and âjust.â
Biden Seeks to Define His Presidency by an Early Emphasis on Equity
Only two presidents before him have used their first weeks in office to push for equality with the same force, according to one historian.
President Biden made a pledge to defeat “white supremacy” during his Inaugural Address.Credit.Chang W. Lee/The New York Times
Jan. 23, 2021
WASHINGTON In his first days in office, President Biden has devoted more attention to issues of racial equity than any new president since Lyndon B. Johnson, a focus that has cheered civil rights activists and drawn early criticism from conservatives.
In his inauguration speech, the president pledged to defeat “white supremacy,” using a burst of executive orders on Day 1 to declare that “advancing equity, civil rights, racial justice and equal opportunity is the responsibility of the whole of our government.”