Race

Dear President Biden and Vice President Harris, 

During the campaign, I saw your signs touting the phrase, “Our best days still lie ahead.” 

But what do “best days” look like for our children and families? 

Calls to dismantle child welfare systems that disproportionately impact Black families grew this week, as a group of roughly 100 parents, lawyers and even city social workers gathered on Martin Luther King Jr.

The traditional flurry of last-minute child welfare policy work from the Administration for Children and Families continued yesterday, with two memoranda on civil legal advocacy, and the lessons of and opportunities created by the coronavirus pandemic. 

The killing of George Floyd, and the summer of protests that followed this tragedy, spurred new conversations about the appropriate role of law enforcement. Child welfare systems, which lack the lethal force component of law enforcement but do police communities with the ability to break up families, got no amnesty from the discussion. 

Since the nation witnessed the murder of George Floyd at the hands of members of law enforcement, it has been hard to contain the sorrow and  anger. As he called out for his deceased mother, he spoke to every mother across this nation who has struggled to keep her child safe.

Black foster youth are caught in a nexus of incarceration which is formed by their engagement with child welfare, education and policing. Our recent brief published by UCLA’s Black Male Institute on Los Angeles County public schools serves to elucidate these grim realities.

I have been thinking a lot lately about James Baldwin’s wise assertion that “People are trapped in history and history is trapped in them.” 

History is deeply embedded in the child welfare system.

New York City’s Commission on Human Rights has launched an investigation into whether hospitals are targeting Black and Latino pregnant mothers and newborns for drug testing, an inquiry that will assess whether they are being subject to racial bias and discrimination.