National Action Network Convention 2022
Release Date: April 8, 2022
https://www.dhs.gov/news/2022/04/08/national-action-network-convention-2022
On April 8, 2022, Secretary Mayorkas delivered the following remarks to
the National Action Network’s
annual convention:
Thank you very much, Dr. Richardson, for the very kind
introduction, and good morning. I'm very honored and pleased to be here with
you to share a few thoughts.
I had the pleasure of speaking with Reverend Sharpton
this morning, who, of course, is there to celebrate a momentous day in our
nation's history. And I shared with him that – I'm sorry, I will not be there
myself – but I'll be here speaking with all of you and certainly with him, and
our country in spirit as we recognize a long overdue milestone.
You know, I first heard Reverend Sharpton speak in person
at the memorial service for Johnnie Cochran in Los Angeles,
California.
I was the United States Attorney at the time, the lead
federal prosecutor in that jurisdiction, and I had had a case with Mr. Cochran.
And after our case, we built a very strong relationship. And I actually invited
him into the United States Attorney's Office to speak with all of the federal
prosecutors, not just about trial work – the arena in which he was so very
accomplished – but also to talk about how we were perceived in the community,
and he spoke very powerfully about that.
And I understood Mr. Cochran as a phenomenal trial
lawyer, and an incredible man of grace.
And the Reverend at the memorial service really elevated
my understanding of Mr. Cochran because the Reverend explained to me and
explained to the nearly 5,000 people there, what Mr. Cochran represented, what
he meant to the community.
Our legal system in America is a system of adversity. It
is based on the principle of two equal authorities, two equal capabilities,
taking different competing views, and then let the best view prevail through
the adversity of two equal advocates.
But we know very, very well that all too often there is
not equality in that system.
And what Mr. Cochran represented was, in fact, that those
who too often suffer from a lack of equal representation, had that equal
representation, if not better, in Mr. Cochran, and what he represented,
therefore, not only to a community, but to the system of justice and the
principles of our country.
And I want to speak for a few minutes about equality, the
principle of equality, equity, access, justice, and fairness.
I first encountered it as a federal prosecutor, when I
was an Assistant United States attorney. And I saw too many individuals who did
not have that access. And I learned about its importance.
And I also learned about the importance and preciousness
of opportunity, an opportunity in life, and how many who did not have it or did
not understand it to be accessible found themselves in a criminal justice
system – and too often, we find our society addressing its ails through a
criminal justice system, rather than a system of building our
youth.
Fast forward, if I may, to the time here at the
Department of Homeland Security, and let me take, for example, our Federal
Emergency Management Administration, FEMA.
For years, I now have learned, for years, we have had
policies that have led to inequitable results. Take the aftermath of Hurricane
Katrina. Take the aftermath of some of the natural disasters that have impacted
our nation.
We take a look at our policies, and I'll give you one
example. To access funds, our grant funds, to rebuild a home that has been
destroyed in a natural disaster, we used to require documentation of ownership
that this was indeed your home, and therefore, as a result of its destruction,
you are eligible for some of our funds to rebuild that home.
And yet in certain communities – predominantly African
American, Brown skin communities – houses are sometimes passed from generation
to generation without the deed of trust or the paperwork that others in more
privileged circumstances might have.
Because of that requirement of documentation, we all too
often left individuals and families deserving of relief – we left them
disenfranchised from the programs to which they had should have had equal
access and were no less deserving, and no less in need, and sometimes in
greater need.
And so, we have changed those policies. We have
recognized... (Applause). Thank you.
A quick personal note: I appreciate the applause very
much, but we do not deserve applause for that which we must do and that which
is long overdue.
And so, then when Hurricane Ida hit that very same
community, we were actually able to extend the hand to those who deserved and
needed the relief. And that is what it is all about – it is all about achieving
equity, which is really the core founding principle of our country.
And as we continue to review the policies and make the
changes that drive to achieve equity, we have to be very mindful of the
landscape on which we are working.
We are working at a time when we are seeing only an
increase in hate. Or I should say perhaps, only an increase in the hate that is
rising to the surface. And what we, in the Department of Homeland Security,
have assessed it that the greatest terrorism-related threat that we face in the
homeland is a threat of domestic violent extremism: individuals drawn to
violence because of ideologies of hate or false narratives propagated on social
media and other online platforms.
And the most prominent threat is the threat of white
supremacists. And that came quite clearly to the surface when we saw over the
past several months repeated and persistent bomb threats against Historically
Black Colleges and Universities.
And we reached out in the Department to the presidents of
the HBCUs and requested that we be allowed to sit around the table with them to
listen to what they were confronting, to understand the gravity of the threat
that they faced, its impact on their communities of students, faculties,
families, neighbors and like, and to be able to respond as they needed us to do
– to have them around the table.
Just a few weeks ago, I was in Detroit, Michigan, meeting
with faith leaders, predominantly African-American faith leaders, talking about
our grant program, our Nonprofit Security Grant Program, which is designed to
protect houses of worship, places of faith, other nonprofit organizations, to
enable them to secure themselves against an increasing threat landscape.
What I learned was that our grant program is very
complicated. It is very difficult in some respects to access. And some of these
organizations, also, just as much in need, and perhaps in greater need of the
funds that we have to distribute, don't have the resources to have a grant
applicant professional; don't have the luxury of capacity to understand our
processes, work through them, and know how to access the funds.
And so that voice, by sitting around the table, was heard
loud and clear. And then becomes the directive that we must follow.
How can we break down those barriers? How can we deliver
to these houses of worship in need, these faith-based organizations, these
community organizations? How can we build for them the capacity that they might
not otherwise have, so that they can access the resources of the United States
government equally and with equity?
And that is the ethic that defines this Department of
Homeland Security, at this time and hopefully for the future to come. It is all
about partnership. It is all about being at the table with you in understanding
the needs, the challenges, and defining the opportunities together and working
to realize them together.
Because the question – and I harken back to the time that
I spoke with Mr. Cochran – and I asked of him, you know, “what is the
perception in the community of us? Because when I am the United States Attorney
in the Central District of California, I am the United States Attorney for
everyone, not just some.”
And so, we, as a Department of Homeland Security, are
your Department of Homeland Security as much as anyone else's and we need to
live that in the equity that we demonstrate and the equity that we live for a
better world.
Thank you so much for giving me the opportunity.
National Action Network
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Action_Network
The National Action Network (NAN) is a not-for-profit, civil rights organization founded by the Reverend Al Sharpton in New York City, New York, in early 1991.[1] In a 2016 profile, Vanity Fair called Sharpton "arguably the country's most influential civil rights leader".
Connecting the Dots:
Al
Sharpton is the president & founder of the National Action Network (NAN), a member
of Phi Beta Sigma and the host
for PoliticsNation.
Huey P. Newton was
a member of Phi Beta Sigma and a
co-founder for the Black Panthers.
Stokely
Carmichael was the leader of the Black
Panthers and the leader of the Student
Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.
Julian
Bond was a co-founder for the Student
Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, is a director at the Center for Economic and Policy Research and a
director at People for the American Way.
Open Society Foundations was a
funder for the Center for Economic and
Policy Research.
George Soros is the founder & Chairman
for the Open Society Foundations
and was the chairman for the Foundation to
Promote Open Society.
Foundation to Promote Open Society was
a funder for the People for the American
Way, the International Rescue
Committee and the Brookings
Institution (think tank).
Harold E. Ford Jr.
was an overseer at the International Rescue
Committee and is a political commentator at MSNBC.
PoliticsNation is a MSNBC program.
Al
Sharpton is the host for PoliticsNation, a member of Phi Beta Sigma and the president & founder
of the National Action Network (NAN).
Arthur B.
Culvahouse Jr. is a trustee at the Brookings
Institution (think tank) and a partner at O'Melveny & Myers LLP.
Zoe
Baird is an honorary trustee at the Brookings
Institution (think tank) and was
a partner at O'Melveny & Myers LLP.
William T.
Coleman Jr. is an honorary trustee at the Brookings Institution (think tank) and a
senior partner at O'Melveny & Myers LLP.
Alejandro N. Mayorkas was an attorney at O'Melveny & Myers LLP and is the secretary at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for the Joe Biden administration.
Resources: Past Research
All Bias All Bull (Past Research on Al Sharpton and the National Action
Network (NAN))
SUNDAY, APRIL 6, 2014
https://thesteadydrip.blogspot.com/2014/04/all-bias-all-bull.html
MSNBC Scolds Brian
Williams for ‘Patronizing’ Rachel Maddow (Past
Research on MSNBC)
SATURDAY, MAY 6, 2017
https://thesteadydrip.blogspot.com/2017/05/msnbc-scolds-brian-williams-for.html
Backers Push Jerry
Brown to Run for President in 2016 (Past Research
on O'Melveny & Myers LLP)
THURSDAY, DECEMBER 26, 2013
https://thesteadydrip.blogspot.com/2013/12/backers-push-jerry-brown-to-run-for.html
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