This special audio report from YES! and Public News Service explores the ways communities affected by police violence are organizing to keep each other safe, in Minneapolis and beyond.
is an independent journalist focusing on electoral justice, voting rights, politics, and culture. She covers South and BIPOC communities. She has been published in several outlets including NewsOne, Truthout, The
As WBBM Newsradio in Chicago reported, the city s mayor, Lori Lightfoot, is calling for more diversity among the news media who cover local government. She kicked off the discussion with a controversial move.
With Lightfoot’s two-year anniversary of mayor approaching, her office started offering one-on-one interviews, but only with reporters of color.
In a written statement, Lightfoot pointed out that the city has a Black, lesbian mayor, a Latino city clerk, a Black treasurer, and a majority Black and Latino City Council, yet almost all of the reporters covering City Hall are white.
The National Association of Black Journalists called it a bold move and praised Lightfoot’s sensitivity to the lack of diversity among the reporters covering city hall. But the organization added it cannot support the tactic because of its commitment to universal diversity, equity, and inclusion.
An array of prominent athletes, artists, entertainers, journalists and academics penned an open letter Tuesday, saying UNC-Chapel Hill’s Board of Trustees has “failed to uphold the first order values of academic freedom and the free exchange of ideas” in its inaction on the tenure of acclaimed journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones.
As Policy Watch first reported last week, the board of trustees failed to act on a recommendation of tenure for the Peabody, Polk and Pulitzer Prize winning journalist as the school’s Knight Chair in Race and Investigative Journalism. Board members said political objections to Hannah-Jones’s work led to the impasse and the school instead offering Hannah-Jones a non-tenured position under a five year contract.