MLGW’s Power Supply Advisory Team to meet virtually
MLGW’s Power Supply Advisory Team (PSAT) will meet virtually on Friday, May 29, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
The information needed to view the meeting will be posted to
mlgw.com/powersupplyinfo later this week. The public will be able to view the meeting live.
The IRP is a comprehensive, long-term plan designed to provide direction on how MLGW can meet the energy needs of its customers in the most cost-effective way over the next 20 years.
The PSAT includes 21 government, business and community leaders. The public will be able to view this meeting online.
For more information, visit mlgw.com/powersupplyinfo.
TENNESSEE BLACK CAUCUS To HOLD ROAD TO RECOVERY VIRTUAL TOWN HALL
The Tennessee Black Caucus of State Legislators will hold a virtual town hall meeting TONIGHT, May 26th, to discuss relief efforts for West Tennesseans.
Titled the Road to Recovery for the Most Vulnerable Populations, lawmakers and experts will present seminars focusing on Economics and Small Business, Elections and Universal Absentee Voting, Healthcare and Housing.
The Town Hall will be streamed on the Tennessee Black Caucus of State Legislators Facebook page beginning at 6:30pm.
A similar Town Hall for Middle and East Tennessee residents will be held Thursday evening.
Hollywood loves to make movies depicting “the black struggle.” But black audiences may be tired of the same stories of people who look like them trying to make it in America. While “All Day and a Night” won’t have box office receipts to offer an answer, the lukewarm reaction to its concept may suggest they are.
Many movies are a temporary escape from the real world issues. Three hours of giant monsters fighting each other in the Avengers franchise allows audiences to forget real life for a time. But fiction that depicts the viewer’s reality isn’t an escape.
“All Day and a Night,” the latest film from Netflix, tells the story of a young black man dealing with the reality of his circumstances.
Ashton Sanders plays the older Jahkor, called Jah, a young man who has just been convicted of double murder. Jalyn Hall plays a younger version of the character.
Jah is sentenced to life in prison where he begins to unravel his choices and reconciles with his father, J.D., played by Jeffrey Wright. J.D. is also a convict at the same county jail, to coming to terms with the fact that he may not be there for his child.
The movie uses an unusual storytelling technique, employing a series of flashbacks to move the story along and explain events that led to the moment Jah pulls the trigger on Malcolm, a rival drug kingpin. Growing up with a violent father and a hapless mother, Jah looked to the streets for answers on how to escape his reality only to take the exact same route as his father, a violent man who believed that brute strength in the neighborhood and beyond were the only answers to every problem—only much faster.
One flashback shows Jah decide not to play possum after being robbed, following his father chastising him for being weak. Jah’s situation is exacerbated by the fact that J.D. is addicted to drugs while his mother struggles to hold the family together.
But most black people did not have an upbringing that mirrors films such as “Menace II Society“ or “South Central.” As the film attempts to find a common ground with its audience, its storytelling destroys that bridge in the opening minutes.
Jah breaks into his victims’ home and murders a couple in front of of their teenage daughter. Typically in storytelling, a protagonist who commits a heinous act must have good justification for doing so. Otherwise, your audience sees the character as a villain and won’t connect with them. “All Day and a Night” suffers from this fatal flaw—Jah’s motivations never justifies the murders—and the film never recovers.
While anti-heroes typically do bad things for the right reasons, “Black Panther” cowriter Joe Robert Cole tells a story about American anti-villains, people who believe their cause is just while their methods remain inherently evil. The dream of escaping the hood is one that many in poorer neighborhoods have but few achieve by means that will not devastate those around them.
“All Day and a Night” displays great acting from up-and-comer Ashton Sanders as well as veteran Jeffrey Wright. Sanders, who has built a solid catalog of roles in the last few years is a strong standout. Sanders’ character is anything but redeemable, a story is sadly seen too many times in fiction and reality: A person who grew up with no moral compass and few options who ends up where society’s odds place him. A SoundCloud rapper with ties to the criminal underworld, his character looks for a way out for himself and his future son until he accepts that day will never come.
A brief appearance by Regina Taylor as Jah’s grandmother breathes life into the movie. She is the voice of reason while calling out Jah on the excesses that land him in trouble.
Jeffrey Wright’s performance as a drug addicted low-life and the father of the protagonist will have people talking the most. While it is hardly an Oscar-worthy performance, Wright displays a side to the actor we haven’t seen before in the persona of a hardcore California criminal. Similar to his son’s motivations, the character wants his son to live a better life than him. When the brutal realization hits him that all he provided was the path that led three generations, which includes him, his father and his son, to the same prison yard, the reality of failure stings and audiences are hit like a sack of bricks.
“All Day and a Night” is beautifully shot, with its cinematography making even the worst areas of Oakland look attractive. But its solid visual aesthetic and good acting can’t overcome its muddy narrative and poor storytelling choices.
See or Skip: “All Day and a Night” looks great for a Netflix film, but the two-hour runtime is too much for a film with no one to root for.
(Edited by Lenny Ruvaga and Allison Elyse Gualtieri.)
The testing positivity rate is the percentage of all tests conducted that are found to be positive. The chart below shows Shelby County’s testing positivity rates over time, as of May 22, 2020.
May 25, 2020 — It was Sunday, May 24, and a balmy 87 degrees on the grounds of the Durango Hills Golf Club in Las Vegas, Nevada. The city had an excessive heat warning in effect, however, this did not deter Granville Brown, as he aimed his shot at hole #10. The strike was perfect, hitting the ‘play it safe’ modified golf cup and bouncing about 2-feet away, to the left. “It’s a Covid-19 hole-in-one,” chuckled Granville on a telephone interview with this publication. He achieved it on a Par 3 at 157 yards. The retired former college professor used a ProV1 ball and a 6 iron Callaway Apex to get the job done.
Durango Hills is a Lee Schmidt/Brian Curley designed public 18-hole, par 58 golf course. The course offers undulating greens and scenic views of the Red Rock Mountains, measures 3,777 yards from the back tees, and consists of one par 4 on the front nine and three par 4’s on the back nine. During Covid-19, with social distancing in mind, the course has implemented safe-play rules which include a raised cup to prevent the ball from entering the hole. During play, if a golfer’s ball hits the raised cup, rebounds, and comes to rest within a few feet of the target, it is considered a made shot. “I was excited and so were my playing partners, David Washington and Byron Holmes,” said Granville. “It was a good day.”
Dr. Granville Brown and his wife, Ellen, relocated to Las Vegas several years ago from Grand Rapids, Mich. They both enjoy the game and spend much of their time involved in the sport and in just a few short weeks, Granville will be installed for his third term as President of the Western States Golf Association.
(THE ROOT) — If there’s one thing Jamaicans know how to do, it’s put on a show. And if anyone can put on a show it’s veteran dancehall artists Beenie Man and Bounty Killer, whose Verzuz battle on Instagram Live last night was reminiscent of a clash at a real life Jamaican concert. READ MORE
You meet the eyes of your grandchild, and you know you have a big job ahead of you. She expects you to love her as much as she loves you, and you do. He figures you’ll have fun together, and you will. They expect, quite frankly, to be spoiled a little, and that’ll happen, too. And with the new book “Grand” by Charles Johnson, a few lessons might be taught along the way…
Some years ago, when Charles Johnson helped design the elegant room that would be his home office, he had certain things in mind. Not one of them was that his grandson, Emery, would take the room as “his” office but that’s what happened, and that’s okay. The boy is an obvious delight.
Emery’s thoughts, his willingness to share his world, and his points of view make Johnson proud; their relationship is easy and solid. This gives Johnson a ease of comparison between Emory and his ancestors, and lesson-filled stories to tell: Emery loves books, though reading was denied to his forebears. At age eight, he doesn’t have to work like his great-granduncle did. He has nearly unlimited opportunities, unlike his great-grandfather.
And yet, as a Black man, Johnson knows that there are other lessons he needs to teach his grandson, lessons that go outside history and into the future.
Be yourself, he’ll tell Emery, and know that the world has never seen anyone exactly like you. Don’t chase perfection because nothing is ever perfect. Give dimension to your life by finding your purpose, take care of yourself, and care for others. Know that you’ll suffer, and that others will suffer, too. Look for beauty in life every day, even if it lies inside pain. Remember the “three gatekeepers” before you speak. Never be complacent with your skills, never stop learning, never stop being creative or curious.
And know that there are three kinds of love. If you’re lucky, you’ll experience each one.
When you found out that you were going to be a grandparent, do you remember how your mind raced with all the things you wanted to do with your grandbaby?
Add ten more to that list after you’ve read “Grand,” but take a deep breath first.
Author Charles Johnson writes with a quiet reserve here that borders on gravity in the lessons he has – and that you can offer – to a grandchild. That seriousness is often further weighed heavily with Buddhist teachings and philosophy that can turn downright sombre sometimes and the text, though certainly filled with love and wisdom that ultimately leads to joy, can feel as though it begs for a lighter hand. Beware, too, that these sentiments aren’t meant for sudden talks: they’re lessons that start early and continue for decades.
Even so, there are lessons here for elders as much as for their littles and despite its occasional excess depth, you should easily be able to proceed as you need. With the right mindset and “Grand,” you can expect good things.
(Terri Schlichenmeyer is the creative force behind The Bookworm Sez, LLC. Reach her at bookwormsez@yahoo.com; bookwormsez@gmail.com.)
The novel coronavirus’ freeze-frame effects have forced individuals to take immediate stock of how they were making a living and to adjust accordingly. That includes those who attach their livelihoods to the underground economy.
Many small business owners have suffered financial devastation beyond their imaginings. And while Memphis and Shelby County are inching beyond safer-at-home restrictions, the road to recovery still is fuzzy and uncertain.
For non-taxpaying business owners living by their wits, conditions have been crippling as well. While federal stimulus funds offer the promise of some relief for some registered businesses, that’s not so for entrepreneurs who have lived unincorporated and untaxed for years.
And, so goes the work force, so goes the fate of cash-only entrepreneurs.
“I make a lot of money as long as people are working,” said a mechanic, who calls himself, Mario, not wanting to be identified for this story.
“Almost 20 years ago, I found a way to eliminate all the overhead of actually running a mechanic shop. I didn’t have any money. My mobile mechanic service has been extremely lucrative over the years. But people don’t call me to repair their cars while they are at work because they aren’t working now,” he said.
“I went from making thousands a week to almost nothing. There is no stimulus for me because I stay just under the radar. The government won’t help me because they don’t know about me.”
There is no telling how many businesses are operating within the underground economy, said Mark Yates, president/CEO of the Black Business Association of Memphis. “We call it the ‘side hustle.’
“There’s the lady with the one beauty shop chair in the back of the house, and you go through the back door to get there. Or whether, it’s the entrepreneur selling items out of the trunk, we have always had an underground economy. Our neighbor had a detail shop before it was even called ‘detail.’”
COVID-19 could care less whether a business is legitimate. Its effects, including death in the most severe scenarios, warrant safety precautions.
When interacting with clients, including those who are friends he has known for years, Mario said he wears a mask “because I want to keep myself safe, and I want to keep my children safe.
“Also, it’s good to go ahead and do what is recommended so we can keep coronavirus infections down. The sooner we get this under control, then the sooner people can get back to work. That means I can get back to making money.”
The needs to be safe and pay the bills hit home for an in-home hairdresser identified as “Janice” for this story.
“I install weaves, do all kinds of braids and sell different types of hair in my apartment,” said Janice. “Although it’s just a really small business, my regular clients pay a lot of money for my services.
“The stimulus checks for my customers is not being spent on their hair because rent and car notes have to be paid. I’m the last one on the list. My savings are almost gone. After this month, I really don’t know what’s going to happen.”
Since the coronavirus outbreak, Janice said she has had only one client in at a time.
“Whether they are shopping for hair bundles, getting their hair braided, coming in for eyebrow-shaping or some other beauty service, I will only have one person in my home at one time,” she said. “I keep sanitizer, wipes and even extra masks, if they don’t have one. During all transactions, I wear a mask and I require the client to wear one also.”
Mario’s ‘side hustle’
Mario and his brother grew up with a crack-addicted mother in North Memphis. He dropped out of Bolton High School at 18.
“When I was in the eighth grade at Snowden, I was on the honor roll, in the Chess Club and participated in CLUE,” he said. “In the ninth grade, I went to East High School. When I got thrown out the city schools for selling drugs, we moved out to Raleigh.
“I was bussed to Bolton High School up in Arlington. The city had free lunch, but county schools had reduced lunch. I didn’t have $.35 a day for lunch, so I had to hustle. I sold cigarettes, gambled in the bathroom – did whatever I had to do.”
At 19, he fathered his first child. At the time, selling drugs was all he “knew how to do.”
“When I caught a serious case in ’05, I got off with probation,” Mario said. “But one condition of my probation was that I had to go back to school for my GED. I went to Vo-Tech for auto mechanics, but we didn’t do too much but work on the motor of a lawn mower. I didn’t stay in there long.
“I still don’t have a GED. As long as I was showing up to probation every month and paying my money, nobody said anything about it. I learned how to fix cars from a guy named ‘Boo’ who lived across the street.”
Now the father of six, Mario, who lives in Orange Mound, said most of his business is with people who were working. Major repair jobs were done at their residences, and other minor work at their places of business.
“But now, people aren’t calling for repairs. Since they are not working right now, the car doesn’t have to be fixed right away. I have six children and a mother and grandmother who depends on me. Nobody is working but me.”
All of his friends have a “hustle” or undocumented business to pay the bills, he said.
“Everybody I know got a record, and it’s hard to find a job that pays enough. I got a partner that sells purses out of his trunk.
“Another partner of mine sells women’s lingerie. He used to do a lot a business in the beauty shops when they were open. Perfume, mace, CDs and DVDs – you can make a business out of selling anything. That’s how we been doing it for years, right or wrong.”
Janice’s ‘side hustle’
After graduating from college with intentions of being a teacher, Janice had trouble finding a job. She liked doing hair and decided to supplement her employment at a day care by doing hair in her home.
“My business just grew from there,” she said.
“I make real good money doing hair. For black women, hair is big business. But there are so many good businesses to go into.”
She has girlfriend whose mother makes cakes in her home.
“Most of the time, they sell as many as 100 cakes a week at $30-40 a cake. Another one of my friends makes jewelry and sells it at home. The Internet makes it easy to advertise what you do.
“We are always looking for something to sell to pay bills. We can’t wait for people to get back to work. We’re all broke right about now.”
Going forward
The BBA’s Yates notes that there are 39,000 registered African-American businesses.
“When you consider that we can’t just walk into a corporation and get a middle management job making $87,000, for 30 years, and retire with a 401K and a pension, yeah, we have to open our own businesses,” he said.
“We still make 75 percent, if not, 65 percent, of what whites make. We have to make up that money somehow. …
“What I need now is for people in the underground economy to let me help them get legitimized,” said Yates. “We can place a $20 ad on Facebook and hit their demographic, expanding the business. People can pay with Cash App, Bitcoin, Pay Pal, Google Pay, Apple Pay, Square, and all sorts of means.
“These are still cashless modes of commerce, still unregulated by the government. There are people making seven figures on Instagram. Black people need to be a part of that online economy.”
(theconversation.com) — The claim that COVID-19 and its associated medical and social responses do not discriminate belies the history of how pandemics work and who is most impacted by them. States of emergency show that citizenship privileges some, is partial for others and disappears others.
In our early analysis of national media coverage, those experts sharing the grim statistics of infections and deaths, those front-line workers seen as risking their lives and those who have lost loved ones are predominantly white. Black, Indigenous and racialized people, and many whose lives have been further imperilled by this pandemic, remain virtually disappeared from the Canadian landscape.
That makes collective care for members across our communities untenable. We take pause and reflect on how this will impact Black people across economy, health and policing, to name three areas of concern.
Black people tend to be employed in low-paying and highly feminized jobs: these include clerical jobs, janitorial staff, orderlies and nursing assistants who are now determined as essential services. Black people are also more likely to work in the grey and underground economy, which are forms of labour that might involve payments outside the regular labour force and taxation system, and not counted in GDP.
Effectively, anti-Black racism has already ensured that Black people and undocumented residents are less than citizens in late modern capitalist Canada. Yet, the people who are likely most at risk are the ones who are being asked to sacrifice their lives. Collectively, Black people in Canada find themselves among the most disadvantaged in all indicators of what is considered a “good life.”
Policing the pandemic
The attempt to interrupt the spread of the virus has brought together policing and public health. Since at least the post-emancipation period in the Americas — and this period includes Canada — public health and policing have been launched against Black communities. Both public health and policing depend on assessing Black people as wayward.
On CBC radio’s The Current, Simon Fraser University marketing professor June Francis recapped a conversation she had with a senior federal official in which she raised concerns regarding Black people’s health. Instead of acknowledging this need for data, Francis said the senior federal official told her: “Canada is a colour-blind society and [she] shouldn’t expect that race-based data is necessary.”
On April 9, during a public conversation with the Preston Community COVID-19 Response team and African Nova Scotian communities, Nova Scotia’s Chief Medical Officer, Robert Strang, said now was not the time to focus on how the social determinants of health and “longstanding issues” are impacting Black communities during this pandemic. He said: “We can focus on these issues later.”
We know differently. The HIV and AIDS responses in Canada show that public health and policing result in criminalization and incarceration for Black people. To ask us to suspend our understanding of these intimate links is to ask us to contend with the possibility of our own demise.
Pandemics do discriminate
Claims of colour-blind health care and approaches to the COVID-19 pandemic are concerning. The data from elsewhere, including the United States and the United Kingdom, sounds an alarm for Canada.
Emerging American data reveal that Black people are contracting the virus at higher rates and also are dying in higher numbers.
While some provincial public health officers in Canada claim to be concerned about all citizens and committed to everyone’s health, they simultaneously declare that now is not the time to address the social determinants of health nor to begin the collection of disaggregated race-based data. In other words, they refuse to address how racial discrimination negatively impacts the health of Black people.
The absence of such plans, however, are indeed evidence of Black people’s partial citizenship and not-yet-quite citizenship.
Since the pandemic, we have heard of many Black women and their families in Toronto being evicted and made homeless. We have come to know that many are dealing with increased violence in the narrowly confined spaces they now live in, and are unable to access income support. Despite successful efforts to open health care to all, regardless of immigration status, the Toronto Star reported that some people in Toronto seeking emergency treatment had to pay $500 or risk not being treated.
Racism, poverty, incarceration, limited literacy, over-crowded living conditions, lack of social supports and limited access to health services are chronic conditions that must be considered during this pandemic.
Black lives are further in peril in a time of COVID-19. Subject to death on both the public health and policing fronts, we will not be silent. Even as state public officials choose to ignore our lives and livability by insisting that race and class do not matter, the historical and contemporary evidence in this country demonstrates more than otherwise.
(The Associated Press distributes The Conversation US articles daily to thousands of newsrooms.)
Former Vice President Joe Biden’s recent foot-in-mouth moment with host Charlamagne Tha God on a segment of “The Breakfast Club” is addressed by two posts on BlackPressUSA.
Democratic Presidential Candidate Joe Biden Clarifies Message to Black America
NNPA NEWSWIRE — “The comments made at the end of the Breakfast Club interview were in jest, but let’s be clear about what the VP was saying: he was making the distinction that he would put his record with the African American community up against Trump’s any day. Period,” Biden’s senior advisor Symone D. Sanders wrote on Twitter. READ MORE
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OP-ED: Joe Biden Attacks Freethinking Black Americans while President Trump Empowers Them
NNPA NEWSWIRE — “I was born Black, still live the Black experience as a Black man in America every single day. My family comes from the South, and we have experienced discrimination, racism, bigotry, and survived Jim Crow. My Papa was a proud member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, founded by Dr. King, and still knowing my history, I am a Black man voting Trump.” READ MORE
Gov. Lee offers National Guard to test at businesses
by Kimberlee Kruesi and Jonathan Mattise —
NASHVILLE — Gov. Bill Lee on Friday promised business leaders that he would send the National Guard to help their companies with COVID-19 testing should they ask for it.
Lee made the announcement while speaking on a livestream for a Tennessee Chamber of Commerce and Industry event, where the Republican touted the state’s high testing rate while repeatedly pointing out that Tennessee was one of the first states in the country to reopen during the coronavirus outbreak.
The event was not included on Lee’s weekly public schedule. During the middle of his remarks, he urged businesses to “engage in testing” as Tennessee continues to lift restrictions that were implemented to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
“We will have the National Guard show up at your place and do testing with large sections of your employees,” Lee said. “It’s not only important for your employees to feel safe, but for your customers to feel safe and for Tennessee to continue to have a very good picture of the state of the virus in our general population and that can come from the private sector.”
It is unclear if businesses are already requesting and receiving testing support from the National Guard. Lee’s spokesman did not immediately return a request for comment. READ MORE
Limited COVID-19 Testing Available on Memorial Day, May 25, 2020
The Shelby County Health Department notes that free testing for COVID-19 will be available over the Memorial Day holiday weekend.
Anyone who has any COVID-like respiratory symptoms, even mild symptoms, including fever, cough, headache or body aches, may be tested for the virus.
Additionally, anyone who has been in contact with someone who has tested positive or anyone employed in essential occupations, including healthcare, first responder roles (police, fire fighter, EMT, etc.), corrections, and frontline roles working with the public: grocery, fast food, retail, may be tested at no cost at one of the community testing sites listed here: https://covid19.memphistn.gov/resources/covid-19-testing-sites-in-shelby-county/.
All previously scheduled testing sites will be open on Saturday and Sunday, May 22 and 23, 2020.
On Memorial Day, Monday, May 25, 2020, the following sites will be offering testing:
Walgreens – 3502 Summer Avenue, Memphis, 38122, from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Schedule online at walgreens.com/coronavirus.
MedPost CareSpot Urgent Care Centers – five locations in Shelby County. Find the location near you at MedPost.com.
The Shelby County Health Department’s COVID-19 hotline (833-943-1658) will be taking calls over the Memorial Day weekend, Saturday, Sunday and Monday, 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. After-hours calls are returned as soon as possible on the next day. More information about COVID-19 is available on the Health Department’s COVID-19 webpage: shelbytnhealth.com/coronavirus.
Shelby County Health Department COVID-19 Daily Update: May 23, 2020
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TODAY’S TSD MUSIC VIBE: “Your Life is King” — Sade
Margaret Cowan, founder of I Am My Sister’s Keeper, spent Wednesday (May 20) distributing food boxes, in partnership with the Mid-South Food Bank, at Longview Heights Seventh-Day Adventist Church at 685 East Mallory.
The give-away, Feeding the Community of 38106, distributed 108 boxes of fresh produce to 65 families. The effort also was helped by $1,000 from the Community Foundation of Greater Memphis to Cowan’s nonprofit.
I Am My Sister’s Keeper works with single, working mothers to increase their earning potential.
One of the women, who is the mother of a two-year-old, lives with her mother, who recently learned she has contracted the COVID-19 virus, Cowan said.
Now, the young woman is concerned about herself and her child contracting the virus. Cowan said she is helping the young woman find temporary housing until her mother recovers.
Schooling customers
Barber William Gandy Jr. went back to work May 11 after a health directive for Shelby County allowed hair salons and barbershops to open under strict guidelines in the first phase of the Back to Business plan for Memphis and Shelby County.
He was behind his barber chair at 6 a.m. because so many of his customers were eager – some desperate – to get a haircut.
He quaffed 21 customers that day and 13 the following Tuesday. Since then, he has been averaging nine to 11 customers a day.
He is scheduling his appointments 30-minutes apart to give himself time to serve a customer and to sanitize his equipment before his next appointment.
“My appointment system right now works for me,” but not so much for some of his customers, he said Wednesday (May 20).
He still has customers who think they can just drop in without an appointment and some of them are not happy when he turns them away.
People arriving late for their appointments are “another issue” because it impacts his schedule and the schedules of those who made an appointment.
A settlement and another car
James Cook, whose beloved – and paid for – Mercedes-Benz S500 was totaled May 8 when a careless driver rammed into its rear end, reached a settlement with his insurance company and has replaced the car.
He found a 2011Mercedes S550 in Dallas, although the settlement did not cover the full cost of the car.
The accident caused him to miss time from work, but he said he will be back on the job Thursday (May 21).
Cook had to close his two businesses at Memphis International Airport – Runway 901 Bar & Grill and Lenny’s Grill and Subs – in March because of sparse airport passenger traffic.
Since then, he has been working with his father’s landscaping business and working for another Lenny’s franchisee.
On the air travel front, Americans are booking more flights than they are canceling for the first time in weeks, and U.S. airlines is adding flights to its schedules, CNN reported Wednesday (May 20).
The semi-good news, however, is tempered by the fact commercial flights were down 73.7 percent in April, compared to 2019, according to Flightradar24, a global flight tracking service.
Cook said he cannot think about reopening his airport businesses until there is improvement in those numbers.
Until family and leisure travel make a big jump, there is “not enough business to keep us open,” Cook said.
ATLANTA — Joe Biden says he “should not have been so cavalier” after he told a prominent black radio host that African Americans who back President Donald Trump “ain’t black.”
The presumptive Democratic presidential nominee quickly moved to address the fallout from his Friday remark, which was interpreted by some as presuming black Americans would vote for him. In a call with the U.S. Black Chamber of Commerce that was added to his public schedule, Biden said he would never “take the African American community for granted.”
“I shouldn’t have been such a wise guy,” Biden said. “No one should have to vote for any party based on their race or religion or background.”
That was an acknowledgement of the stinging criticism he received in response to his comments, which he made earlier in the day on “The Breakfast Club,” a radio program that is popular in the black community.
The rebukes included allies of Trump’s reelection campaign — anxious to go on the offense after weeks of defending the Republican president’s response to the coronavirus pandemic — and some activists who warned that Biden must still court black voters, even if African Americans overwhelmingly oppose the president.
“None of us can afford for the party or for this campaign to mess this election up, and comments like these are the kinds that frankly either make black voters feel like we’re not really valued and people don’t care if we show up or not,” said Alicia Garza, a Black Lives Matter co-founder and principal of Black Futures Lab.
Near the end of Biden’s appearance on the radio program, host Charlamagne Tha God pressed him on reports that he is considering Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, who is white, to be his vice presidential running mate. The host told Biden that black voters “saved your political life in the primaries” and “have things they want from you.”
Biden said that “I guarantee you there are multiple black women being considered. Multiple.”
A Biden aide then sought to end the interview, prompting the host to say, “You can’t do that to black media.”
Biden responded, “I do that to black media and white media,” and said his wife needed to use the television studio.
He then added: “If you’ve got a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or for Trump, then you ain’t black.”
Trump’s campaign and his allies immediately seized on Biden’s comments. South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, a Trump supporter and the Senate’s sole black Republican, said he was “shocked and surprised” by Biden’s remarks.
“I was struck by the condescension and the arrogance in his comments,” Scott said in a conference call arranged by the Trump campaign. “I could not believe my ears that he would stoop so low to tell folks what they should do, how they should think and what it means to be black.”
Charlamagne Tha God later said on CNN, “A black woman running mate is necessary, especially after today.” He added that the question of “what makes somebody black” is a discussion for black people, not for “a white man.”
Trump himself has a history of incendiary rhetoric related to race.
When he launched his presidential campaign in 2015, Trump called many Mexican immigrants “rapists.” Campaigning in 2016, he asked black voters, “What the hell do you have to lose?”
In 2017, he said there are good people on “both sides” of the clash in Charlottesville, Virginia, between white supremacists and anti-racist demonstrators that left one counterprotester dead.
In 2018, during a private White House meeting on immigration, Trump wondered why the United States was admitting so many immigrants from “shithole countries” like African nations. He also blasted four Democratic congresswomen of color, saying they hate America and should “go back” to where they come from, even though all are U.S. citizens and three were born in the U.S.
Black voters helped resurrect Biden’s campaign in this year’s primaries with a second-place finish in the Nevada caucuses and a resounding win in the South Carolina primary after he’d started with embarrassing finishes in overwhelmingly white Iowa and New Hampshire. Sixty-one percent of black voters supported Biden during the primary season, according to AP VoteCast surveys across 17 states that voted in February and March.
Biden is now seeking to maintain his standing with black voters while building the type of multiracial and multigenerational coalition that twice elected Barack Obama, whom he served as vice president. He has already committed to picking a woman as his running mate and is considering several African American contenders who could energize black voters. But Biden is also considering candidates such as Klobuchar, who could appeal to white moderates.
There is little chance of a sudden shift in support for Trump among black voters. A recent Fox News poll shows just 14% of African Americans who are registered to vote have a favorable opinion of Trump, compared with 84% who view him unfavorably.
Seventy-five percent of African American registered voters say they have a favorable view of Biden; 21% hold an unfavorable opinion.
There is a risk, however, of black voters, especially those who are younger, staying home in November, which could complicate Biden’s path to victory in a tight election. The Breakfast Club is a particularly notable venue for Biden’s comments because the program is popular among younger African Americans.
Adrianne Shropshire, executive director of BlackPAC, a national organization that works to mobilize black voters, said many black Americans are loyal Biden supporters. But she said his comments make it harder to attract people who are on the fence about voting.
“The first thing I thought about was to what degree did this just turn off those voters and how much more work the rest of us are going to have to do to convince people that it is worth their time and their efforts,” she said.
Biden’s selection of a running mate, along with his pledge to appoint the first black female Supreme Court justice, could help motivate voters. He’s begun vetting vice presidential contenders, a process he’s said will likely last through July.
Several black women are among those under consideration, including California Sen. Kamala Harris, Georgia voting rights advocate Stacey Abrams, Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, Florida Rep. Val Demings, Ohio Rep. Marcia Fudge and Susan Rice, Obama’s former U.S. ambassador to the U.N.
(Stafford reported from Detroit. Associated Press writers Jill Colvin, Hannah Fingerhut and Will Weissert in Washington contributed to this report.)