California’s reparations task force has descended into chaos as activists blasted music and wild accusations – a day after it was revealed they want $800 billion.
One of the first to speak was Reggie Romain, belting out James Brown’s “I’m Black & I’m Proud” through his phone and into the mic.
Romain, along with members of the audience, danced to the 1968 track and, after cutting the song, promoted his social media channels before sitting down.
Later, on the panel, a San Francisco-based activist described the US as a country “born in the name of evil,” saying, “Evil cannot do justice.” nothing. It’s ours!’
Day two began amid controversy over the absence of senior committee member Rev Amos Brown, who is in West Africa as part of Kamala Harris’ official trip to the continent. On Thursday, an activist called for Brown to “stay in Africa.”
During her speech, one activist yelled that the United States was “born in the name of evil” and that, “We ask you nothing. It’s ours!’
This unnamed activist attended controversial committee member Rev. Amos Brown and told him to stay in Africa.
Activist Reggie Romain played James Brown’s hymn “I’m Black & I’m Proud” into the microphone in 1968
Unlike Wednesday’s meeting, Rev. Brown did not zoom in to comment on the meeting.
Brown zoomed in on Wednesday’s meeting in Sacramento, where he complained that reports that black residents in the Bay Area would receive $5 million in reparations were part of a “smear campaign.”
Brown, 82, said the San Francisco board of directors, on which he serves, paid lip service to reparations and noted that the city was facing a massive deficit.
A member of the public, who came to the meeting to comment, addressed Brown’s absence, saying: “Shame on you.”
The reverend’s absence came on the same day that it emerged that the bill for California’s reparations law had skyrocketed to at least $800 billion.
During the Vice President’s historic visit to Africa, Harris pledged billions of dollars in investment to the continent as she toured historic sites related to slavery.
It later emerged that Brown attended a lavish state banquet in Ghana this week while in West Africa as part of the vice president’s delegation.
‘DR. Brown, shame on you…absolute shame on you. They give us these fiery speeches only to turn around like Judas and betray us… That he’s in Ghana with Kamala Harris, whose government has done nothing to help black people, is a symbolic gesture,” one member of the public said at Wednesday’s meeting.
On Thursday, Rev. Brown was again in the line of fire.
“I’m here to collect the dead body of Amos Brown. We all know Amos Brown the c***, the buffoon, the disrespectful, lying pimp of poverty that he is. He sits in the pulpit and sweats in the house of God, you want to know why? Because he’s the walking devil,” said one activist.
“He can stay in Africa, wear his dashiki or whatever he’s doing? There he can stay. You can keep him,’ he continued.
Brown, who has served as the Vice President’s pastor since the 1990s, was listed with his wife Jane as guests of Ghana’s President Akufo-Addo at a March 27 dinner.
The Browns were joined at the state dinner by Second Gentleman Douglas Emhoff, movie stars Idris Elba, Rosaria Dawson, Sheryl Lee Ralph and Oscar winner Spike Lee.
Rev. Brown, the head of the San Francisco chapter of the NAACP, pictured with Vice President Harris in 2008
Since 2022, Rev. Brown has operated the Amos C. Brown Student Fellowship in Ghana in partnership with the NAACP and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
According to the NAACP website, the scholarship offers students the opportunity to be “social and racial justice ambassadors” and gain “experience on the Atlantic slave trade” in Ghana.
Public opposition to the offered reparations packages came in the form of telephone comments.
‘Who will pay? And how will they pay?” said one person. Another argued that reparations would deepen divisions in America. “I don’t know who funded you in the first place,” ranted another caller.
Speaking of racism, a white caller said: “The woman who called me Karen yesterday is racist.”
Task force chair Kamilah Moore has said she plans to be as “radical as possible” when it comes to deciding who gets reparations and how much
California Senator Steven Bradford (left) and Dr. Cheryl Grills (right) are also part of the task force
Taskforce members Lisa Holder (left) and Donald K. Tamaki (right)
Members of Task Force Councilor Monica Montgomery Steppe (left) and Jovan Scott Lewis (right)
Reginald Jones Sawyer (left) and Reparations Task Force Vice Chair Dr. Amos C Brown
The $800 billion estimate is more than 2.5 times California’s annual budget of $300 billion and does not include the recommended $1 million per older Black resident for health disparities that have shortened their average lifespan .
The number also doesn’t count compensating people for property wrongfully taken by the government or devaluing black businesses, two other damages the state has perpetuated, according to the task force.
“We need to have an open mind and find creative ways to deal with this,” Assembly member Reggie Jones-Sawyer, one of two lawmakers on the task force responsible for gathering support from state legislatures and governors, said Reggie Jones-Sawyer said. before reparations could become a reality.
In an interview ahead of the meeting, Jones-Sawyer said he needed to consult with budget analysts, other lawmakers and the governor’s office before deciding whether the payment scale was feasible.
The statewide estimate includes $246 billion to compensate eligible black Californians whose neighborhoods were subjected to aggressive policing and black prosecution during the 1970-2020 “war on drugs.”
That would mean nearly $125,000 for each person who qualifies.
Demonstrators from the Reparationist Collective gather at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC to demand slavery reparations in February 2021
Numbers are approximate, based on modeling and population estimates. The economists also included $569 billion to offset the discriminatory practice of redlining home loans.
Redlining officially began in the 1930s when the federal government began supporting mortgages to help homebuyers, but excluded majority black neighborhoods by marking them red on internal maps.
Such compensation would amount to approximately $223,000 per eligible resident residing in California from 1933 to 1977. The total is considered a maximum and assumes that every 2.5 million people who identify as Black in California would be eligible.
Earlier this month, Lisa Holder, a member of the California Reparations Task Force and president of the Equal Justice Society, suggested in a letter that a reasonable number of claimants would be $360,000.
Discussing the new figures for the total cost of reparations, legal counsel Richard Weaver told the California Globe that the task force’s recommendations could face legal problems.
“Giving money right off the bat or making big home loans, well, they’ve got to prove how it benefits people, and again, they’ve got to do it legally … if any kind of redress bill gets passed, and that’s a big if, it’ll be dragged through the courts for years and probably never see the light of day,” Weaver said.
“Reparations are, on average, a very unpopular policy. The fact that the task force isn’t even trying to come up with a number now kinda shows that.’
Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation in 2020 creating the Task Force for Redress following national protests over the death of George Floyd, a black man, at the hands of Minneapolis police.
While federal initiatives have stalled, cities, counties and other institutions have stepped in.
A San Francisco advisory committee has reportedly recommended payouts of $5 million, along with a guaranteed income of at least $97,000 and personal debt relief for eligible individuals.
Regulators expressed general support but refrained from backing specific proposals. They will take up the subject later this year.