DeSantis actions erasing black rights are overdue for action

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Attorney Ben Crump, left, stands with three Leon County high school students who are threatening to file a lawsuit against Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and his administration if they ban a proposed advanced job placement course on African American Studies in Florida Schools, Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2023, at the Capitol in Tallahassee, Fla. Alicia Devine Tallahassee Democrat via AP

It was time for black leaders in Florida to go crazy.

Really, really crazy.

Enough to descend on the Capitol Rotunda, hire a prominent lawyer, and vigorously advocate for the fight for African American rights, under threat from a hostile state government and its local politicians.

Too much at stake is the downgrading of educational programs and the removal of voting and civil rights to fit the ideals of a white, ultra-conservative, exclusively Christian prism, not only for Florida, but for the nation.

We are here to give Governor DeSantis notice, said civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who was surrounded by a cheering crowd that should have been much larger, as urgent times demand.

If he doesn’t negotiate with the College Board to allow AP African American studies to be taught in Florida state classrooms, he said, these three young people will be the main plaintiffs. .

Next to Crump stood a black woman, a white woman and a black man, all high school students from Leon County. They became eloquent visuals to underscore a point that hasn’t been emphasized enough: while DeSantis has sold his parental rights restrictions as only affecting younger students, that’s far from the truth.

And, as Florida teachers clean out their bookshelves and subject their classroom libraries to scrutiny, DeSantis is already foreshadowing that the hell will sign more anti-revival legislation into law to expand what he started.

READ MORE: Americans want to know what Governor DeSantis’s definition of revival is. He does not say | Notice

Late refusal

A vocal pushback of the kind we’ve seen this week, high optics, decisive action by African American leaders and allies is long overdue.

Floridians could have used a bunch of them in the last legislative session.

Certainly, state representatives and Democratic senators have worked hard within the system to mitigate DeSantis’ harmful initiatives. But with Republicans mastering every move with a solid majority, they were out of luck.

They needed a show of support from Floridians backing them beyond Twitter denunciations and eloquent letters to the editor and newspaper op-eds and didn’t get it.

As the election results show, DeSantis has won his anti-revival culture war.

What is happening with the African American Studies Review is the result of the DeSantis series of measures that have gone from cracking down on mail-in voting to educational reforms that whitewash black history and gross homosexuality.

All the laws intimidate, keeping many parents and mom educators, and voters at home instead of going to the polls beating it. They disproportionately affect minority communities, and that alone should have sent those voters to the polls in record numbers.

But the opposite happened.

People have crumbled under the weight of the power DeSantis unleashes to undo all opposition, from the anti-protest laws that ended Black Lives Matter protests in Florida to the arrests of black ex-criminals who believed their rights had been violated. recovered and received voter identification cards.

It is high time to fight harder and wiser.

If not with a 1960s-style march, then with a new modern visual take on widespread protest. Litigation is one way. Calling things by their proper name is another. Why didn’t lawmakers forcefully denounce DeSantis’ sanitization of the black experience for what it was throughout the legislative process?

Racism.

Then, when the worst of the worst happened, they seemed shocked.

Say the word and regroup.

DeSantis’ racist vision for Florida calls for the revival of a civil rights movement in the state. Enough waiting for him to turn into the moderate Republican he is not, the same way the Washington media was waiting for Donald Trump to become a decent, law-abiding human.

DeSantis will only get worse in his pursuit of the White House.

A two-time victor, DeSantis launched his career as governor by camouflaging his anti-black, anti-gay and anti-immigrant agenda with hissing language.

Now he has no qualms about defending his racist utopian state.

History of black homosexuals

Two days before Crump’s rally, the governor doubled down on his administration’s rejection of advanced placement African-American studies, lashing out at critical race theory he says embodied in the college prep course. university.

That course, when I heard it didn’t meet the standards, I thought, yeah, maybe they’re doing CRT, DeSantis said at a Monday event in Jacksonville. It’s much more than that. This course on black history, what [is] one of the lessons on? queer theory. Now, who would say this is an important part of black history, Queer Theory? He is someone who imposes a program on our children.

The Governor, unfortunately, does not watch NBC News or any other serious outlet that chronicles Black or LGBTQ+ history. Why shouldn’t there be black homosexuals and eminent ones too?

Someone has to direct him to the segment about queer black pioneers who made history.

The division works for DeSantis

Every week, evidence mounts that, despite his divisive politics, DeSantis is gaining traction (at least, on Fox News) as a serious GOP presidential candidate. On the one hand, there is talk of the US House of Representatives forming an anti-revival caucus to save America from the Democrats they insist on calling socialists and communists.

Our fight for an inclusive Florida is no longer a local fight.

Of course, DeSantis can welcome the return fire for the headlines he will generate.

But what is the alternative?

Let him belittle, diminish and erase communities on his way to the White House?

Related Stories by award-winning Miami Herald columnist Fabiola Santiago has been writing about all things Miami since 1980, when the Mariel Boat Lift became her first front-page story. A Cuban child refugee from the Freedom Flights, she is also the author of essays, short fiction films and the novel Reclaiming Paris. Support my work with a digital subscription

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