Politics and Current
California lawmakers pass groundbreaking bill to redress racism, but hold off on appropriating funding to take action

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California lawmakers this week passed a few of the most ambitious bills within the country aimed toward repairing a legacy of racist policies that created inequality for black people in the whole lot from housing to education to health care.
Neither bill would offer universal direct payments to African Americans. Instead, the state legislature approved proposals that might allow land restitution or compensation to families whose property was unjustly seized by the federal government and issued a proper apology for laws and practices that harmed blacks.
But lawmakers have omitted two bills that might create a fund and an agency to implement the cash, seen as key components of the trouble to take action. California Legislative Black Caucus Chairwoman Lori Wilson said Saturday that the Black Caucus had withdrawn the bills, adding that the proposals still needed work.
“We knew from the very beginning that this was going to be a tough fight. … And we also knew from the very beginning that this was going to be a multi-year effort,” Wilson told reporters.
Senator Steven Bradford, who authored the measures, said the bills weren’t passed out of fear that Gov. Gavin Newsom would veto them.
“We are at the finish line and we, as the Black Caucus, owe it to the descendants of slaves, to black Californians and black Americans to move this legislation forward,” Bradford said, urging his colleague to reconsider Saturday afternoon.
The Democratic governor has not commented on a lot of the bills, but a budget of $297.9 billion was signed in June, which included up to $12 million for reparations lawsBut the budget didn’t specify which proposals would receive the cash, and his administration has signaled opposition to a few of them. Newsom has until Sept. 30 to resolve whether to sign the bills into law.
Democratic Assemblyman Reggie Jones-Sawyer, who’s black, has called his bill to issue a proper apology for discrimination a “labor of love.” His uncle was amongst a bunch of black students who were escorted by federal troops past offended white mobs into Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, within the Nineteen Fifties, three years after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that college segregation was unconstitutional. The students became generally known as the “ Nine Little Rock.”
“I think my grandmother, my grandfather, would be incredibly proud of what we’re going to do today,” Jones-Sawyer said before the vote on the laws passed. “Because that’s why they fought in 1957, so that I could — and we could — move our people forward.”
Newsom approved laws in 2020 to create the nation’s first task force to study reparations proposals. New York and Illinois have since followed suit with similar laws. The California group the ultimate report was published last yr with greater than 100 recommendations to lawmakers.
Newsom signed laws last month that requires school districts receiving state funding for a profession education program to collect data on the performance of participating students by race and gender. The bill, a part of repair package supported by the California Legislative Black Caucus, goals to help address student achievement problems.
Return of seized property
The state Senate has overwhelmingly approved a bill to return land or compensate families whose property was unfairly taken through racial discrimination using the law of eminent domain.
The topic has once more attracted attention in California when Los Angeles-area officials returned the beach property in 2022 to a black couple, a long time after it was taken from their ancestors.
The Newsome administration’s Department of Finance opposes the bill. The agency says the associated fee of implementing it’s unknown but could “range from hundreds of thousands of dollars to several million dollars per year, depending on the workload required to receive, review, and investigate applications.”
It’s not immediately clear how the initiative can be implemented, even when Newsom signs it into law after lawmakers withdrew an initiative to create an agency to implement it. The proposal would create a genealogy office to help black Californians research their family lines and confirm their eligibility for any reparations that develop into law.
Formal apology
California would take responsibility and formally apologize for its role in perpetuating segregation, economic inequality and discrimination against black Americans under one other bill approved by the Legislature.
The regulations require the Secretary of State to send a final copy of the apology to the National Archives, where it might probably be viewed by the general public.
The apology said the state “reaffirms its role in protecting the descendants of slaves and all black residents of California, as well as their civil, political and sociocultural rights.”
California American Freedmen Affairs Agency and Fund
Two rejected bills would have established an agency that might be liable for implementing reparations programs if passed in California.
According to the California Government Operations Agency, the prices of operating a reparations agency could range from $3 million to $5 million per yr.
Another proposal would create a fund for reparations programs, which might develop into law in California. The money can be used to address state policies that harmed Californians descended from enslaved blacks or free blacks living within the U.S. before the late nineteenth century.
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Politics and Current
HegeSeth directs 20% cut to the highest military managerial positions

The Secretary of Defense Pete HegeSeth on Monday ordered the military lively service to lose 20% of 4 -star general officers, when the Trump administration moves forward with deep cuts, which he thinks will promote performance, but critics that worry may cause more politicized strength.
HegeSeth also told the National Guard to lose 20% of his highest positions and recommend the military to reduce an extra 10% of his general and flagship officers of their forces, which can include one star or official with an equivalent rank of navy.
The cuts are at the top of over half a dozen of the best general officers that President Donald Trump or HegeSeth released from January, including the chairman of the joint heads of the staff, Gen. CQ Brown Jr. They also released only two women serving as 4 -star officers, in addition to a disproportionate variety of other older officers.
In earlier rounds of shooting, HegeSth said that the eliminations were “a reflection of the president who wants the right people around him to perform the approach to national security that we want to take.”
As the head of the Pentagon, HegeSeth advertised his efforts to upload any programming or leadership, which support diversity in ranks, tried to end members of transgender services and commenced sweeping changes to implement a uniform fitness standard for the fight position.
In the note announcing the cuts on Monday, HegSeth said that they might remove “unnecessary forces to optimize and improve leadership.” He said that the goal was to free the army from “unnecessary bureaucratic layers.”
Rep. Seth Moulton, D-Mass. Marine, who served in Iraq and is now in the Armed Service Committee, said he perceived HegeSetha as trying to politicize the army.
“He creates a formal framework to slow down all generals who disagree with him – and president,” said Multon AP in Capitol.
He said that actually every organization can search for performance, but HegeSeth has been clearly clearly expressing its program. “He wrote a book about it. He wants to politicize the army,” said Multon. “So it’s hard to see these cuts in any other context.”
Multon warned against the fall of the soldiers. “It is necessary for our soldiers to understand that they receive constitutional orders, not political orders,” he said, “otherwise you have no democracy, otherwise you have an army that works well for one or another political party.”
Adding to the confusion in the Pentagon, HegeSeth in recent weeks I actually have released or moved many close advisersstrongly narrowing his inner circle. He also handled questions from each Democrats and Republicans about coping with sensitive information and the use of applications for sending signal messages.
There are about 800 general officers in the army, but only 44 of them are 4 -star general or flag officials. The army has the largest variety of general officers, from 219, including eight 4 -star generals.

The variety of positions of the general officer in the army is set by law. Congress members didn’t receive a notification upfront, which they might normally receive in cuts, but in the afternoon they received a “very short warning”, according to a congress worker, which spoke on the condition of anonymity to provide details that weren’t made public.
The cuts were first reported by CNN.
The Pentagon is under pressure to reduce expenses and staff as a part of wider cuts of the federal government pushed by the Department of the Government of Trump and Ally Elon Musk.
HegeSeth last week ordered a sweeping transformation Army to “build a slim, more deadly force”, including connecting or closing the headquarters, shedding outdated vehicles and aircraft, cutting up to 1,000 employees of the headquarters in the Pentagon and transfer of staff to units in the field.
Also last week, the army confirmed that it could be Military Parade for Trump’s birthday In June, as a part of the celebration of the 250th birthday of the service. Officials say it would cost tens of tens of millions of dollars.
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Associated Press Writers Lisa Mascaro and Lolita C. Baldor contributed to this report.

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Politics and Current
Metro Atlanta City of Decatur to start the compensation task group

The city of Decatur in Metro Atlanta unanimously approved the creation of a compensation task group.
According to Decatur City Commission adopted a resolution On May 5, the 11-person task group will publish a report in three years, including recommendations regarding policy for black city residents.
The message appears a yr after the city leaders signed a contract with Beacon Hill Black Alliance for Human Rights to “discover the heritage of racial damage” in Decatur. The alliance managed research work in the field of compensation, organizing community meetings and listening sessions about how racial injustice has financially and systematically hurt these residents.
Their research described the role of decatur in slavery and segregation, in addition to red and real estate against the black community. Decatur also showed many monuments of the confederation, especially one earlier in the court of Dekalb.
The city not only recognized its oppressive tactics towards its black inhabitants, but additionally apologized for the actions that suppressed their progress.
“The city of Decatur formally recognizes its earlier role in the systemic oppression of people of African origin through enslavement, trafficking in human beings, conviction, discriminatory zones and development, underestimation in African -American communities, school segregation, racist police operation, destruction of African American estate, business and institutions and erosion and erosion and erosion and erosion, population, population population, population, population, population, population and culture – we read in resolution.
The city goals to designate 11 members, with the help of Beacon Hill Black Alliance, in the next 60 days. They will bring a various specialist knowledge group, and members consist of historians, legal experts and youth supporters. Over the next three years, the Task group will develop records regarding the loss of black land and real estate, being attentive to economic resettlement, while interviewing the descendants of those to which these oppressive tactics affected.
City officials added: “The city is expanding the full and public apology to the black residents of Decatur – Past and Present – and their descendants for its role in consolidating discrimination, pressure, subordination and the resulting damage, drawing on the principles rooted in the white supremacy system.”
The Compensation Task Group may even propose the commemorative projects sponsored by the city, economic tools and other investment strategies and community initiatives to treatment its racist past. This move will happen from other communities, even in the Atlanta Metro, which introduced initiatives regarding the repair of black residents. In the neighboring Fulton, his task group will resume the meeting this yr.
While the plan appears amongst the domestic shuffle of anti-dei attributable to the Trump administration, local leaders remain involved in the same efforts of the judiciary that began before taking office by Trump.
(Tagstranslate) compensation Task group
Politics and Current
Social media reacts to a series of funny faces of George W. Bush during the inauguration of Trump, when Barack Obama jokes that “he could barely behave

Former President Barack Obama jokingly told the reporter that former President George W. Bush “barely” behaved during the inauguration of President Donald Trump on Monday.
When there have been presidents and other noteworthy VIP guests waited for the USA ceremony to sit in the US Capitol, a member of the staff asked 78-year-old Bush if he “behaved” and 63-year-old Obama at the back to answer on behalf of Bush with “No”.

A brief, viral clip shows briefly looking around the Capitol and smiling at the members of the audience during the inauguration, which the viewers considered funny.
When Obama left the American Capitol Rotunda after the ceremony, the same post reporter quickly asked Obama if Bush behaved and Obama replied: “barely” during a smile.
The viewers had a day in the field with many Bush faces. One person joked: “Bro was beyond his mind”
The secular behavior of former presidents was, unlike incorrect boos imposed on Obama by Trump’s supporters watching the ceremony from the rally at the Capital One Arena in the center of Washington. Bill and Hillary Clinton and former Vice President Trump Mike Pence was also not spared heavy Boos.
The first lady Michelle Obama was noticeably missing amongst the chosen group of former residents of the White House, who confirmed that she wouldn’t participate on the days before the inauguration.
About her absence, unidentified source he said People: “There is no exaggeration of her feelings about (Trump). She is not one of the plasters on a pleasant face and she pretended that the Michelle protocol does nothing, because she is expected, protocol or its tradition.”
The source said that Michelle “no longer feels the need to be public” and added that the verbal attacks of Trump on Obama and his offensive rhetoric addressed to colourful people could even be a factor wherein she decided to skip.
In addition to Michelle, every living former president and the first lady was present, including former President Joe Biden and his wife Dr. Jill Biden, George W. Bush and Laura Bush, in addition to Bill and Hillary Clinton.
Trump’s swearing in the US Capitol for the first time in 40 years, the presidential inauguration took place, ignoring the customary configuration outside the Capitol, wherein 1000’s normally observe from the national shopping mall.
Officials stated that the polar vortex, which brought dangerously low temperatures to the part of the eastern coast, was the most important reason why the ceremony was moved inside.
The last time the inauguration was moved in the room, when former President Ronald Reagan was sworn in for his second term in 1985.
(Tagstranslate) Barack Obama
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