Producer host Julia Dudley Najieb reflects on the confirmation of Judge Brown Jackson who is making history as first Black woman to serve
By ONME Newswire
News Too Real April 7, 2022: In episode 8 of season 4, producer host Julia Dudley Najieb reflects on the breaking news of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson confirmed by the US Senate to become the Supreme Court Justice, replacing Justice Stephen Breyer upon his retirement. Judge Brown Jackson went through three days of testimony, answering questions from senators in late March. Jackson was nominated by President Joe Biden in February to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Breyer.
Brown received Senate confirmation on April 7, 2022, with all 50 members of the Democratic caucus and three Republicans voting in favor of the nomination, and 47 Republicans voting against.
Born in Washington, D.C., and raised in Miami, Florida, Jackson attended Harvard University for college and law school, where she served as an editor of the Harvard Law Review. She began her legal career with three clerkships, including one with U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Stephen Breyer. Prior to her elevation to an appellate court, from 2013 to 2021, she served as a district judge for the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. Jackson was also vice chair of the United States Sentencing Commission from 2010 to 2014. Since 2016, she has been a member of the Harvard Board of Overseers.
News Too Real Podcast 4-7-22 Headlines:
World
The intersection of racist policing and harmful drug laws led to the shameful treatment of the 15-year-old schoolgirl.
In March 2022, the revelation that a 15-year-old Black pupil had been strip-searched by police in a London school after being wrongly accused of having drugs in her possession sent shockwaves across the United Kingdom – and for good reason.
Everything about the 2020 incident is absolutely harrowing. An independent child safeguarding report found that her own teachers called the police on the young girl after suspecting she may be carrying cannabis. Once they arrived at the school, Metropolitan police officers took the girl into a medical room and strip-searched her without appropriate supervision, despite being aware that she was menstruating. After the invasive and traumatizing search, she was asked to “go back into the exam” she had been sitting, with no teacher asking about her welfare.
The safeguarding report concluded that the treatment of the child was unjustified, and racism was “likely” a reason why she was strip-searched in the first place.
While the trauma inflicted on Child Q understandably shocked the nation, the actions of the police in this case can hardly be considered an anomaly. It is well known that communities of color are disproportionately policed in the UK, and British police commonly respond to alleged drug offenses – especially when the suspect is a person of color – with violence.
National
Black Americans have largely positive views of medical researchers’ competence; majority concerned about the potential for misconduct
A new Pew Research Center survey takes a wide-ranging look at Black Americans’ views and experiences with science, spanning medical and health care settings, educational settings, and as consumers of science-related news and information in daily life.
The COVID-19 pandemic is a prominent reminder of the disparate health impacts Black Americans face, and of long-standing concerns about levels of trust or mistrust between scientists and Black communities.
Against this backdrop, there are ongoing concerns that the segments of the public most engaged with science – people who attend science-related events, participate in medical research studies, and fill science, technology, engineering and math classrooms and the professional ranks of these fields – do not adequately reflect the racial and ethnic diversity of the nation.
The new survey, along with a series of focus groups, highlight the multifaceted views Black Americans hold when it comes to trust in medical research scientists. The findings speak to how contemporary experiences with the health care system, as well as past injustices, inform the range of attitudes Black adults express. In this and other topics addressed in the survey, there are important differences in how Black Americans see these issues depending on their education, age, gender and other characteristics.
California
Assembly Bill 979 (the Bill), signed into law by Gov. Newsom on September 30, 2020, required all public companies with a principal executive office in California to have at least one director from an underrepresented community on their board of directors by December 31, 2021, and, depending on the total number of directors on the company’s board, up to three directors from underrepresented communities by the end of 2022.
The Bill defined “director from an underrepresented community” as a director who self-identifies as Black, African American, Asian, Hispanic or Latino, Pacific Islander, Native American, Alaskan Native, Native Hawaiian, gay, lesbian, transgender, or bisexual.
Failure to comply with the Bill subjected companies to up to $100,000 for the first violation and $300,000 for subsequent violations.
The lawsuit, filed by Judicial Watch, a conservative legal advocacy group (Robin Crest, et al. v. Alex Padilla, in his official capacity as Secretary of State of the State of California (No. 20ST-CV-37513)), claimed the California Secretary of State violated California’s constitutional equal protection clause by expending taxpayers’ money and public officials’ time and resources to engage in discrimination based on classifications of race, ethnicity, sexual preference and other status.
The California Constitution requires equal treatment and application of laws to all persons who are similarly situated. If a law discriminates based on race, ethnicity, sexual preference or other classifications, the law is subject to a showing by the government that the law is necessary for a compelling governmental interest and that the class distinctions are necessary to accomplish the law’s purpose. Although the Bill was aimed at promoting diversity and opportunity, by specifying certain classifications of persons to be appointed to board seats, the law necessarily required discrimination based on these classes. The court found the Bill failed to be narrowly tailored to a compelling governmental interest and the class distinction violated California’s constitution. The court granted an injunction striking down the Bill.
Implications: Public companies with principal offices in California are no longer required to appoint directors from underrepresented communities to comply with the Bill. Whether the state will appeal the ruling is yet to be known. Regardless of the court’s decision, public companies may still be subject to Nasdaq’s board diversity rules and similar appointment of directors or disclosure requirements promulgated by the Securities and Exchange Commission.
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