Civil and legal rights groups are urging solidarity, courage and action as months of organizing are about to culminate in midterm elections Nov. 3. In webinars, church gatherings, bus tours and public rallies, voting rights advocates say Americans can stand…
Civil rights groups sued to stop DHS voter intimidation
Civil rights and voting rights organizations have sued the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to stop its “secretive and unlawful effort” to gather and use sensitive voter information to help sabotage next month’s midterm elections. “DHS claims that it needs…
Supreme Court sides with Trump on voter database
The Trump administration can use a controversial database to initiate state voter roll purges in the run-up to the midterm elections, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Sept. 25. The 6-3 emergency stay follows a recent federal appeals court decision that…
CBF and Alliance join others in promoting safe and fair elections
Religious groups are pulling out all the stops with training and strategy-sharing events to promote and defend the right to vote in the coming midterm elections. “We’re all looking at how can we be authentic to our faith and still…
Trump appeals to Supreme Court to control voter database
The Trump administration appealed directly to the U.S. Supreme Court Sept. 8 seeking clearance to implement a database it wants to use to purge voter rolls leading into the midterm elections. The move came just four days after a federal…
16th judge blocks Trump’s voter intimidation efforts
A federal judge said he had plenty of help figuring out how to deny the Trump administration’s bid for access to sensitive voter information from Washington, D.C. “At this time, 20 district courts and the Sixth Circuit have denied the…
PCBC, Rainbow Push and AFL-CIO join to fight voter suppression
A predominantly Black denomination, a faith-based civil rights group and the nation’s largest union have joined forces to fight systemic racism and voter suppression. “We decided we’re stronger and better together and so today we thought it would be appropriate…
Interfaith coalition launches 100-day ‘vision voting’ action
An interfaith coalition has embarked on a 100-day “vision voting” mobilization against President Donald Trump’s SAVE America Act and other voter intimidation and suppression efforts. “We’re standing together as faith leaders, as moral leaders, as activists — we are standing…
Courts disagree on states’ access to national voter database
A federal judge in Washington, D.C., has rejected the Trump administration’s request to lift a previous ruling barring use of a voter database designed to investigate and potentially purge U.S. citizens from voter rolls across the country. However, the ruling…
NBCUSA opens advocacy center in DC
A historically Black denomination has opened an advocacy center in the heart of Washington, D.C., to protect civil rights, champion religious freedom and to be a voice for the poor and marginalized. The National Baptist Convention USA Inc., announced the…
The end of white liberal Christian optimism
When Donald Trump was elected president a second time, something in me broke and has stayed broken. I now realize what broke was the version of white liberal Christian optimism I had unconsciously imbibed from my teachers and milieu. It’s…
Black Churches Urge Congregants to Mobilize After Supreme Court Ruling
In the hours after the Supreme Court struck down a Louisiana congressional map and weakened protections given to minority voters under the Voting Rights Act, a bishop overseeing historically Black African Methodist Episcopal (AME) churches in Louisiana wrote a message…