Every day, we fight to achieve our end goal—a Virginia where every community member matters and has an opportunity to thrive. We will continue to work to disrupt racism in all its forms, hidden and in plain view, across the Commonwealth
racism
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Community Grateful for Accountability in Unite the Right Verdict
Charlottesville, Virginia—A verdict in the trial related to the Unite the Right Rally in 2017 has been reached. A jury has found the defendants in the federal lawsuit liable for four of the six claims against them. For the biggest claims (claims one and two), the jury cannot reach a verdict. Claim one sought evidence […]
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If You Don’t Hate Me, Act Like It
by Kimberly Nario Sometimes it feels like I grew up in a hospital. When I was a kid, my mom and several aunties worked at hospitals across Hampton Roads. It was common for my dad to drop me off in the middle of my mom’s shift so I could spend an afternoon bouncing between the […]
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So Much Love for the 2021 Sesh
General Assembly Legislative Session Roundup Part 2 We’re sending our compliments to the chefs in the General Assembly who’ve been cooking up all sorts of progress for the Commonwealth! Our mouths are watering as we’re waiting for the Governor to put his pen on progressive bills so they can become law. There’s just so much […]
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ICYMI: COVID-19 Leads to Massive Job Loss in Black Community Largely Due to Systemic Racism
Virginia—Black workers in Virginia are being laid off or furloughed disproportionately in Virginia due to COVID-19. Because of gaps in education, discrimination in hiring, racist zoning, and many other factors based in systemic racism and white supremacy, Black people are over-represented in jobs that have been hit the hardest by the pandemic. “It’s already more […]
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Progress Virginia Calls on Senator Chap Petersen to Apologize For Racist Comments
Fairfax, Virginia—Progress Virginia is calling for Senator Chap Petersen (D-Fairfax City) to immediately apologize for the racist comments made on the John Fredericks Show yesterday. Senator Petersen said the atrocities committed during the Jim Crow era, segregation, and Massive Resistance were “bad decisions…but at least they had a school system, ok, at least they had […]
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Progress Now Statement on White Supremacy
The undersigned state affiliates of ProgressNow released the following statement today regarding last week’s murder of George Floyd and the ongoing murder of Black people at the hands of police in this country. “George Floyd. Jamar Clark. Philando Castile. Thurman Blevins. Ahmaud Aubrey. Breonna Taylor. Marcus-David Peters. Freddie Gray. Patrick Harmon. Darrien Hunt. Damon Grimes. […]
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A Lot of Great Virginians Weren’t Traitors—Let’s Build Statues of Them
After passing a bill allowing localities to remove Confederate monuments, the General Assembly voted to create a commission to consider removing the statue of Robert E. Lee from the U.S. Capitol. Every state has a statue representing it in the U.S. Capitol—it’s time for Virginia’s statue to represent someone of whom we can all be […]
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It’s easy to call out Nazis. It’s hard to call out our neighbors.
In the wake of violent demonstrations and domestic terrorism by the New Klan in Charlottesville this weekend, a chorus of voices have demanded that elected leaders condemn white supremacy and Nazi ideology. Some figures (Donald Trump, Corey Stewart) have fallen far short of the mark. But calling out Nazis is not enough. It is the […]
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Charlottesville’s Struggle to Right the Wrongs of its Past
This blog was co-authored by Ashleigh Crocker and Jennifer Lawhorne On Saturday night, my husband and I were walking around the downtown mall in Charlottesville. I noticed a lot of people walking around carrying tiki torches, laughing and chatting with their friends like everyone else. I asked my husband what they could possibly be for, […]