Latest Race and ethnicity News

Florida requires teaching Black history. Some don't trust schools to do it justice

Dec. 23, 2024 14:19 PM EST

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — Buried among Florida's manicured golf courses and sprawling suburbs are the artifacts of its slave-holding past: the long-lost cemeteries of enslaved people, the statues of Confederate soldiers that still stand watch over town squares, the old plantations turned into...

Marianne Jean-Baptiste tests our limits of empathy in 'Hard Truths'

Dec. 23, 2024 13:44 PM EST

Of all the movie protagonists you might have seen this year, none is quite like Marianne Jean-Baptiste’s Pansy in Mike Leigh’s “Hard Truths.” Pansy, a middle-aged woman in contemporary London, is foul-tempered from beginning to end. She spends her days in evident pain that...

The family of a teenager fatally shot by police during a no-knock raid sues Alabama city

Dec. 23, 2024 11:58 AM EST

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — The mother of a 16-year-old who was shot by SWAT police during a no-knock, predawn raid in Alabama, filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the police officers involved and the city of Mobile, alleging the teenager was “killed in cold blood.” Randall...

Civil rights icon James Meredith is honored in his Mississippi hometown

Dec. 23, 2024 11:52 AM EST

KOSCIUSKO, Miss. (AP) — A new historical marker has been unveiled in the hometown of James Meredith, honoring the Black man who fought white supremacy by integrating the University of Mississippi in 1962. Meredith, 91, wore a red Ole Miss baseball hat as he watched Friday's...

Takeaways from Trump's 1st rally speech as president-elect

Dec. 22, 2024 20:01 PM EST

PHOENIX (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump came to Arizona on Sunday for his first rally speech since winning the November election. He was greeted by thousands of adoring supporters who confirmed his popularity across the conservative base. Trump attempted in his 75-minutes on...

A Native American tribe is closer to acquiring more land in Arizona after decades of delay

Dec. 21, 2024 16:08 PM EST

Federal officials have joined with the state of Arizona to begin fulfilling a settlement agreement that was reached with the Hopi Tribe nearly three decades ago, marking what tribal officials described as a historic day. Government attorneys filed condemnation documents on Friday to...

In a calendar rarity, Hanukkah starts this year on Christmas Day

Dec. 21, 2024 11:17 AM EST

Hanukkah, Judaism’s eight-day Festival of Lights, begins this year on Christmas Day, which has only happened four times since 1900. For some rabbis, the intersection of the two religious holidays provides an auspicious occasion for interfaith engagement. “This can...

Missouri governor commutes sentence of white police officer convicted of fatally shooting Black man

Dec. 20, 2024 21:39 PM EST

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — A white former Kansas City police officer who was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in the fatal shooting of a Black man was released from prison Friday after Missouri’s governor commuted his sentence to parole. The decision by Republican Gov. Mike...

Oregon sheriff concerned about letters asking people to track possible immigrants

Dec. 20, 2024 19:58 PM EST

LINCOLN CITY, Ore. (AP) — A sheriff in Oregon says he has contacted the FBI and is increasingly concerned about a letter circulating in his rural, coastal community asking people to write down the license plate numbers of possible immigrants. The Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office...

Alabama profits off prisoners who work at McDonald’s but deems them too dangerous for parole

Dec. 20, 2024 17:10 PM EST

DADEVILLE, Ala. (AP) — A storm was looming when the inmate serving 20 years for armed robbery was assigned to transport fellow prisoners to their jobs at private manufacturers supplying goods to companies like Home Depot and Wayfair. It didn’t matter that Jake Jones once had escaped or that he...