Juneteenth in a Time of Crisis

MAGA follows an old pattern in US history — every time Black people make progress, a group of angry white people come along to try to tear it down.

As America celebrates Juneteenth, we all know the Criminal in the White House is responsible for the recent surge in anti-Black policies, but if we’re being honest, we’ve been here before. He’s just the current face of a trend that has been going on for centuries. 

Today it’s MAGA, but throughout history, every time Black people made progress, a group of angry white people came along to try to tear it down.

Sometimes they used violence, as when they drove out the Black residents of Wilmington, North Carolina and Forsyth County, Georgia, or when they bombed “Black Wall Street” in Tulsa, Oklahoma and destroyed Rosewood, Florida.

Sometimes they used eminent domain to tear down Black communities. Seneca Village became New York’s Central Park. Willard, Virginia became Dulles Airport. LA’s Sugar Hill became the Santa Monica Freeway. Parts of Overtown, Miami became Interstate 95. And Mill Creek Valley in St. Louis became Energizer Park.

And just when we started to catch up, they used acts of policy to push us back down. The civil rights laws of the 1960s led to mass incarceration in the 1970s. And the Obama election in 2008 led to the gutting of the Voting Rights Act in 2013.

Historian Carol Anderson calls it “white rage.” And we’re seeing it now as affirmative action, DEI, and programs for Black businesses, Black farmers, and Black students are being dismantled. Talented Black officials are being removed and replaced by less qualified white candidates. And Black history is being erased from classrooms and government platforms.

But as governments and businesses backtrack on their promises, what is there to celebrate on Juneteenth? Resilience. To paraphrase the poet Maya Angelou, you may write us down in history with your twisted jealous lies, but still, like air, we’ll rise.