Project 2025: The Death of Democracy
"Believe people when they tell you who they are. They know themselves better than you." Maya Angelou
Project 2025 is not just a policy proposal; it's a direct threat to our democracy. Designed to consolidate executive power if the Republican nominee wins the 2024 presidential election, this right-wing plan aims to reshape the federal government in an authoritarian, Christian nationalist image.
Here's what's at stake:
- Erosion of the Rule of Law: Project 2025 would undermine the separation of powers and civil liberties, erasing the checks and balances that protect our democracy.
- Rising Inequality: This plan seeks to normalize white supremacy and disproportionately harm Black Americans by slashing funding for education, healthcare, and social programs.
- Attack on Rights: A draconian abortion ban, elimination of affirmative action, and the rollback of diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts are just the beginning.
- Healthcare Access: Imposing work requirements on Medicaid would further racial inequality, burdening Black Americans who already face significant employment barriers.
What can you do?
Vote. This November, your vote is your voice. Reject any candidate that supports Project 2025 and its extremist principles.
Stay Informed. Understand the impacts of these policies on our communities and stand up for those who will be most affected.
Take Action. Mobilize, advocate, and speak out against this radical agenda.
The stakes have never been higher for Black Americans and our democracy. We must keep Republicans out of office until they shed their extremist ideologies.
They have shown us who they are—are we listening?
Act now. Protect our democracy. Vote against Project 2025.
They have told us who they are; the question is are we listening??!!
Public Lynchings and their Myriad Manifestations
In recent weeks, there has been a hostile maneuver by political activists, religious zealots, and conservatives to dictate who holds leadership roles in universities. Not even the nation’s most esteemed educational institutions are immune from the influence of public opinion and big money.
Despite last month’s vote of confidence from the Harvard Corporation, President Claudine Gay resigned from her position this week, ending a six-month tenure plagued by allegations of plagiarism and, more recently and visibly, backlash over her congressional testimony about antisemitism on campus. Her resignation came after personal attacks from politicians such as Rep. Elise Stefanik, a Harvard alumna, and Harvard donors such as Bill Ackman, a billionaire hedge fund manager.
Some of Gay's critics celebrated her Gay's resignation as a victory to dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion programs qualifications, arguing that her very appointment was a university strategy to promote diversity.
"It has been distressing to have doubt cast on my commitments to confronting hate and to upholding scholarly rigor - two bedrock values that are fundamental to who I am - and frightening to be subjected to personal attacks and threats fueled by racial animus," Gay said in her statement.
The Harvard Corporation echoed this sentiment and wrote that Gay had been subjected to "deeply personal and sustained attacks" that included "racist vitriol directed at her through disgraceful emails and phone calls."
While Gay’s writing included unintentional citation errors, the institution had resolved the issue and maintained pride and confidence in its leader. Moreover, we proposition the high likelihood that AI software would detect similar errors in works by other university presidents, professors, Congresswomen and even hedge fund executives. Rather, we suggest that the central issue here is the racism faced by Black women in leadership roles resulting from unrealistic standards and expectations than their White colleagues. This racism is exacerbated by a daily barrage of microaggressions, opposition and criticism, designed to dismantle the promise of greater equity in America.
Like many others, we are extremely concerned over the aggressive right-wing attacks on higher education that threatens academic freedom. Detractors have sought to reduce funding for public universities, challenge race and gender discourse in the classrooms, roll back tenure, and eliminate initiatives that make colleges more welcoming to students of color.
According to Rep. Stefanik, Gay’s resignation for plagiarism allegations was “just the beginning of the reckoning” and claimed House Republicans will carry out a “long overdue” cleansing of Ivy League higher education’s “institutional rot.”
It is heartbreaking to consider the lessons students who bear witness to these personal and political attacks. Dr. Gay has been deliberately and publicly lynched. Such malevolence is an affront to us all and demonstrate that none are exempt from the virulence of racism and white supremacy.
Let Justice Roll Down Like a River
This is part of our 2023 "Holiday Highlights" series to showcase some of the
partners and projects Chrysalis Lab has worked with this year.
“The Chrysalis Lab team is amazing! They delivered usable analysis in a timely and cost-effective manner. Their process was thoughtful, respectful, and thorough. They were able to glean relevant organizational needs and trends, while delivering suggestions steeped in sector wisdom and best practices. They were a joy to work with.” Doug Ammar, Executive Director, Georgia Justice Project
Chrysalis Lab understands the profound need for co-created social solutions that are adaptable and sustainable to help transform leaders, organizations, and communities for the greater good. Because of this, the Georgia Justice Project (GJP) invited Chrysalis Lab to assess the current and future needs of the organization to maximize impact and outcomes. The goal of our assessment was to determine the most effective organizational structure and systems that align with the way forward for GJP.
The Georgia Justice Project has been extremely successful in fulfilling its mission of breaking down barriers to opportunity for Georgians impacted by the criminal justice system. GJP has won numerous awards and has been recognized for its innovative and transformative work in criminal justice reform. The holistic approach - casework, advocacy, and social services - to reducing recidivism and supporting the families of their clients makes GJP perfectly positioned to demonstrate the type of disruptive impact needed to tackle the issues within the judicial system. As GJP prepared to set its path for future growth, they acknowledged a need to assess and re-tool aspects of its core infrastructure critical to sustaining impact.
Our assessment process included reviewing key documents – annual reports, job descriptions, organizational charts, the previous strategic plan, and other key resources - to help us gain useful context on the organization. We also surveyed key internal stakeholders to distill assumptions, old and new perspectives, and helpful insights. In addition, we interviewed GJP board members and senior leadership. This data set allowed us to provide recommendations that addressed GJP’s operational structure, new or re-tooled systems, and key performance indicators that aligned with desired operational excellence.
The Chrysalis Lab team acknowledged the work that GJP had done to establish a strong reputation and culture. But with such influence comes a deep responsibility to build an organization that can continue to foster and nurture organizational growth. Now that our recommendations are fully implemented, GJP will be perfectly positioned for sustained success for many more years. We look forward to even greater enhancements in program outcomes and organizational culture, operations that improve delivery of impactful services and information to key stakeholders, and a brand that will be worthy of sizeable strategic investments in the future. More importantly, GJP is clearly poised to continue to be successful and impactful in the lives of its constituents.
Kendeda at the Forefront of Equity in Atlanta
This is part of our 2023 "Holiday Highlights" series to showcase some of the
partners and projects Chrysalis Lab has worked with this year.
Over the last few years Chrysalis Lab has been honored to work with the Kendeda Fund which has been at the forefront of reimagining a more equitable Atlanta. In 2016, several years before 2020, the infamous “year of racial reckoning”, Kendeda launched its ‘Atlanta Equity’ portfolio to support the sustainability of Black and Brown communities through investments in its leaders. Kendeda long realized it couldn’t tackle all the issues confronting Atlanta’s most vulnerable populations. Accordingly, the Fund strategically decided to engage and uplift a group of “changemakers and pacesetters” – emerging community leaders who could leverage their individual and institutional skills to disrupt the status quo by influencing policy makers and funders, challenge long-held assumptions, and incubate bold, innovative ideas.
“We resolved that by the time we completed our spend out, we would have helped establish a series of substantive community-wide conversations wherein grantee partners have defined seats at the tables of power, and institutional voices that are clear, convincing, and resonant”, said Trene Taylor, Kendeda’s Program Officer who led and managed its Atlanta Equity portfolio.
As part of the Atlanta Equity portfolio, Chrysalis Lab facilitated a series of retreats for the portfolio’s nonprofit leaders. In 2023, concurrent with Kendeda’s plans to sunset and desire to capture its work with its grantee partners, Chrysalis Lab conducted individual interviews with the Fund’s Atlanta Equity leaders. The focus of these discussions was to capture their reflections of their work over the last few years and its impact on the community and the systems they sought to change.
The final product culminated in the publication of a book that creatively captured their ruminations - from inequity in education to tackling affordable housing, and everything in between. It is hoped that documenting the journeys of these pivotal leaders will inspire other leaders and community members to collaborate to create a more equitable city and region. The book can be downloaded here: https://kendedafund.org/reports/pathmakers )
When a group of dedicated leaders work together to imagine a shared vision for an equitable Atlanta, we believe, like Kendeda, that a groundswell will form that leads to the ‘good trouble’ necessary to realize a better Atlanta. That’s why we applaud Kendeda’s investment in existing and emerging social justice leaders as they continue to grow their influence and organizations to steward positive change.
We are grateful for Kendeda Fund’s unwavering commitment to paving the way to make “equity” a philanthropic conversation in Atlanta. Through its Atlanta Equity portfolio, The Fund equipped leaders and organizations with new tools to fight for justice. That’s the sort of “dismantling of structures” that’s essential to affect the long-term social change and racial justice we dream of and strive for.
Moving Beyond Hope by Casting More Black Votes
“We have to build our own power. We have to win every single political office we can, where we have a majority of Black people…”
-- Fannie Lou Hamer
This month, another election cycle ensues. Voting is unequivocally the most essential civic duty and holds particular importance for Black people in the United States. Voting provides Black people with the power to influence the direction of our communities. By participating in elections, we can elect representatives who share our values and address our concerns.
At its core, voting equates to exercising power and allocating resources. Elected officials determine how our tax dollars are spent, which directly affects our daily lives. By electing individuals who prioritize our interests and champion initiatives that support our well-being, we ensure our tax dollars benefit our families and communities. Abstaining from voting essentially endorses those who may not share our values.
It’s not enough for Black people to say we care about our communities. We must prepare ourselves to fight for and advocate in all ways possible for the issues that impact our well-being, especially those associated with ensuring fairness in our voting rights. Ultimately, our vote is the arbiter of whether our interests are genuinely valued and respected in this country.
Participating in the electoral process is just as important today as it was prior to and during the Civil Rights era. The recent and widespread changes to voting practices, redistricting, and voter identification laws are designed to suppress voters of color and silence our collective voices The number of eligible Black voters in the United States, now nearly 33 million, has been growing. Yet, racism remains a persistent thread in American culture, consistently working to deny and dilute the influence and power of Black people.
No one gets the right to vote because they ask for it. People get the right to vote because they organize themselves, one community at a time. The struggle is ongoing, as the structures of power continually attempt to deny Black Americans their right to vote, all under the guise of the law. As Frederick Douglass said, “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never has and it never will.”
Efforts to deny Black people the right to vote and/or to steal their votes is constant and pervading. A recent study by the Democratic Party of Virginia reveals a concerning trend: mail-in ballots from Black voters are flagged for rejection at a significantly higher rate than those from white voters. Presently, 4.8% of Black voters' ballots are flagged, while only 2.8% of white voters' ballots face the same fate. In Richmond, city officials flag more than 11% of ballots from Black voters, compared to about 5.5% of those from white voters. The rejection rate for Black voters remains more than twice as high as that for white voters.
In the face of pervasive white supremacy, Black Americans are in for a long and arduous struggle. Our unwavering commitment to constituting a genuine democracy in America has remained a constant throughout our history in this country. Now more than ever, African Americans must use every means at our disposal to avenge our enslaved ancestors, including exercising our right to vote. We must vote for people who have our best interests in mind. We must vote for issues that advance the well-being of our families and communities. We must vote because we’re empowered to do so as full American citizens. We can’t expect to win every election, but if we don’t vote, we will most assuredly lose.
Constructing the Post-Virus World: Thoughts for the Sector
In these uncertain times of COVID-19, as humanity navigates anxiety, distance, sickness and financial insecurity, our work in the social sector is needed more than ever. Even as I seek ways to be helpful, I am traversing, (in my mind, while maintaining social distance), both the now and the next of the crisis…and considering the conditions that will equip us for what lies ahead.
Connection
Amidst drastically reduced capacity and financing, the post COVID-19 reality will demand more vital and creative alliances.
Even before COVID-19, many nonprofit leaders, particularly groundbreakers focused on driving social justice and equity, craved genuine connection – authentic, sustained opportunities to talk, plan and partner together. These leaders too often find themselves in environments of isolation and competition, consumed by the tactical work of running a nonprofit business and its ceaseless mandates of fundraising, operations, talent management and donor cultivation. They know that strategic alliances and collaborative innovation are essential to addressing the complex social problems that are the impetus of their work. Yet the mental, physical and intellectual demands of their obligations leave them scant time for all but superficial and competitive relationships (and unfortunately philanthropy helps to fuel this competition-more on that in my next post).
Calibration
Post Covid19 times will demand a recalibration of social impact. Seeking to present themselves worthy of attention and investment, nonprofits have for some time now attempted to adopt corporate principles and buzz words – “Strategic”, “Outcomes”, “Deliverables” among others. To be clear, I believe that it is essential for our sector to employ data-driven strategy and operations and to be able to articulate results. Yet for nonprofits, these “borrowed” terms and their implied connotations cannot be the only and most important drivers; and the search for acceptance and value cannot be stripped from an unrelenting stance of equity and fairness. When engaging in community, work will not neatly conform to business metrics: action will just as oft be intuitive as strategic; implementation about the process as much as the outcome; results revealed rather than delivered. As we move through this pandemic, we must honestly and boldly demand the entire sector, including funders and nonprofit boards, to appreciate this duality.
Compassion
To do well, we must be well. Moving forward, I believe the first commitment we must make is to require compassion and empathy for ourselves and others. The work of building strong, equitable communities is hard. We can force it, fake it and make it for a while, but the sector must also become skilled at creating nurturing, holistic environments that affirm our role and value. Only in this environment can we establish the basis for the novel world before us…one which requires us to be fully authentic, honest and straightforward.
Nonprofits will be the lamp that lights community’s path beyond COVID-19 to our nation’s collective metamorphosis. Now is our time to get this right.
(Originally published April 4, 2020, edgeofopportunity.blogspot.com)
