Carolina Panthers Quarterback Bryce Young Partners With Bojangles
Rookie Carolina Panthers quarterback Bryce Young is making moves in the business world.
According to CBS Sports, the 21-year-old has signed a partnership with Bojangles, the popular fried chicken franchise know for its flavorful fried chicken and side biscuits.
Young’s fit with the company goes beyond geography; Bojangles is also headquartered in Charlotte. Young, who was listed at 204 pounds before he was selected first overall in this year’s NFL Draft, admitted that he plans to incorporate Bojangles into his diet.
“I’ve been able to trust the strength and conditioning staff and the training staff at the organization,” he told CBS Sports. “This was something that we had talked about—having sustainable meals that could help me in my training and still keep me active.
“Luckily, with how the food’s prepared and the quality of it, it’s able to fall into that category. I’m definitely excited for that,” he said.
Bojangles posted the announcement to its Instagram, sharing a photo of Bryce Young wearing a Panthers shirt and holding four Bojangles chicken boxes. The caption: “Somethings cooking…” and Bojangles tagged Young’s Instagram account.
Young has been making waves since he joined the Panthers, with veteran teammates having only good things to say about Young’s work ethic.
“For me, I try to do my best to carry myself as a professional in the building,” the former University of Alabama standout said. ” I try to do the things in the locker room and learn from those guys, talking and building relationships. At the end of the day, we’re all here to do a job, and we have a team goal.”
Young added, “I try to earn respect by showing how I can contribute to that, trying to carry myself as a pro. Know my stuff, try to make sure I show up every day and know what’s going on. Know the install that’s been put in to show the dedication that I have and that I want to be an asset to the team. So that’s an ongoing process, and that happens over time.”
Black Texas Mom Denied Maternity Leave After Having Stillborn Baby
Elena Andres of Austin, Texas, is living a nightmare after being denied maternity leave after giving birth to her stillborn daughter, the Texas Tribune reports.
After being in labor for 15 hours, the stillbirth took a toll on her body, and her grief was severe. Andres notified her employer, Austin Public Health, that she would take leave early, only to be told by human resources that her situation didn’t qualify for the city’s eight-week paid parental leave. Andres said she was crushed. “I felt so small, like they were saying my stillbirth pregnancy didn’t count,” Andres said. “Like my daughter didn’t count.”
Under company policy and the federal Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), employees can take eight weeks of paid parental leave after “the birth of a child or the placement of a child for adoption or foster care.” However, parents of stillbirths or babies who die soon after birth don’t qualify for paid parental leave. A City of Austin spokesperson said federal FMLA guidelines for parental leave do not include stillbirths, which is why the city’s policy doesn’t either.
“It was like a kick in the face,” said Andres. “Apparently our paid maternity leave is only for bonding with the newborn, it’s not for recovering from birth. … The whole pregnancy, physically, whatever it does to the body of the person, they don’t care about.”
She toldToday that the baby’s name was Maxine and she was born on May 7, weighing 8 pounds and 13 ounces.
Jenny LaCoste-Caputo, the deputy communications director for the city of Austin, offered other alternatives: accrued sick and vacation time, three days of bereavement, and a leaving bank where employees donate time off but that can only be used when all accrued leave is exhausted. In order get the time she deserved post-birth, Andres used up all her sick and vacation time and received short-term disability coverage for six more weeks off, thanks to a note from a doctor.
After Andres’ story broke, the HR department at her job offered her four more weeks of paid time off and urged a policy change from Austin city council members like Vanessa Fuentes, who said, “I stand with the new parents who have undergone horrific loss and urge they be provided the full eight weeks of paid parental leave.”
1,000 Black Entrepreneurs And Professionals To Unite At 23rd Annual ‘PowerNetworking’ Conference
Dr. George C. Fraser will once again facilitate the gathering of more than 1,000 Black entrepreneurs and professionals for the 23rd annual PowerNetworking Conference in Houston on August 2.
Started in Cleveland in 2002, the PNC gives entrepreneurs the opportunity to have one-on-one engagement with prominent national and global leaders, speakers, and other industry professionals. Attendees can expect fundamental lessons on how to cultivate effective relationships, build and scale 21st-century businesses, and manage wealth. The PowerNetworking Conference is recognized as the country’s largest continuously held conference for Black executives, business professionals and Black entrepreneurs, according to BlackNews.
The Houston event will also mark the official announcement of the Black Business Legacy Hall of Fame, Museum & Metaverse to be built in Atlanta by 2030.
“For the first time in our history we will memorialize and celebrate with an iconic building the enormous contribution Black people have made globally to business development and capitalism within the African diaspora,” said Dr. Fraser.
More than 1,000 attendees are expected to descend upon the conference this year.
In 2015, Forbes recognized the PNC as one of America’s “Top 5 Conferences in America Not to Be Missed;” making it the first Black gathering to receive the recognition.
“I’m overjoyed to have been the first Black Conference to be selected for this prestigious annual recognition from the premier business magazine in the world. We have always felt this way, but now the world knows it,” Frasier said of the honor.
To date, the PowerNetworking Conference has raised over $1.7 billion in new funding for Black-owned businesses and Black entrepreneurs, and brought its one-of-a-kind experience to major cities like Dallas, Atlanta, and Baltimore.
Fraser has spent the better part of four decades as chairman of FraserNet, a company that solely focuses on teaching effective networking, mission-driven entrepreneurship, and building and managing wealth for business owners and Black entrepreneurs who face difficulty following traditional routes to success, according to BlackNews.
YouTuber JiDion Apparently Banned From All “NBA-Related Events” After Distasteful WNBA Stunt
YouTuber Jidon Adams, better known as JiDion, has allegedly been banned from all NBA-related events after disrupting WNBA games one too many times.
While attending a Los Angeles Sparks game this week, JiDion started pulling courtside shenanigans. In a video he shared on his YouTube channel on Thursday, July 20, 2023, Adams was dressed in cartoonish pajamas and a hat, lying across several seats with a pillow and blanket, pretending to sleep.
His YouTube video showed him being issued a warning by security guards. JiDion quickly lied about having a medical condition that forced him to fall asleep. Several guards approached him and removed him from the premises a few minutes later. As JiDion filmed the security guards outside, one of them told him, “You are not allowed on the premises.”
He asked to clarify if he meant only WNBA games, but the guard said he was banned from “all NBA-related events.”
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To make matters worse, his fans began to harass the WNBA on its Instagram account after the the bedtime prank made the rounds.
JDion’s substantial online fan base began commenting with sleeping emojis, gifs, and memes on all of the WNBA’s recent posts. Photos of animated characters taking a nap, dogs snoring, and people diving into bed began flooding the comment section underneath posts praising the players for their game performances.
The WNBA has limited its comments on their Instagram posts since Friday because of the extreme uptick in comments.
On July 19, 2023 JiDion posted another prank video at a Minnesota Lynx vs. Dallas Wings game. After complaining about the game to the referee, the ball bounced into the crowd. JiDion grabbed the ball, bypassed the ref, and attempted a shot. He missed and just disrupted the game.
Carlee Russell Reportedly Fired As Her Disappearance Is Questioned
Carlee Russell appears to have been fired from her job at an Alabama spa over concerns regarding her alleged abduction.
“It was really devastating for them thinking a co-worker was abducted,” Stewart Rome, owner of the Woodhouse Spa in Birmingham, told the New York Post. “As the information came out that there were some questionable things, we’ve been a little pissed off, mainly because so many people took so much time out to search.”
Russell’s story gained national attention and was picked up by outlets like CNN and ABC News after she allegedly saw a toddler on the side of an Alabama highway and disappeared.
Over the last several days, many have questioned her account of events, including the investigators assigned to her case. Russell’s account of being held by two captors and being fed Cheez-Its was met with suspicion.
“I do think it’s highly unusual the day that someone gets kidnapped that seven hours, eight hours before that, that they’re searching the internet, Googling the movie Taken about an abduction,” Hoover Police Chief Nick Derzis said in a press conference. “I find that very strange.”
Derzis hinted that there were other internet searches that glimpse at Russell’s state of mind, but the police are not releasing those due to respect for her privacy.
Social media has relentlessly mocked Russell since news broke that confirmed users’ suspicions that she may have fabricated the story. Most notable, however, is that the search for Russell involved the family of a local woman who was murdered, Aniah Blanchard.
“It does open up wounds because our daughter was taken,” Blanchard’s father, Elijah, told WVTM 13 News. “And as a father, you know, your daughter is your pride and joy. I mean, really that’s your baby girl, and it touched home a lot, and you know, to kind of find out later that, you know, Carlee returns home with really no justification of what happened.”
McDonald’s Workers in East Los Angeles and Houston Strike, Claiming Terrible Work Conditions
In June, two McDonald’s locations went on strike within a day of each other, alleging that the franchise locations would rather let the employees work in temperatures over 100 degrees than provide them with air conditioning.
McDonald’s employees in East Los Angeles went on strike and filed an OSHA complaint following a co-worker’s death, according to ABC 7.
In Houston, McDonald’s workers walked out after the air conditioning unit at their restaurant broke. Texas is suffering from temperatures above 100 degrees, and according to the Houston Chronicle, employees at the Almeda-Genoa location were working in that heat before they walked out.
“I didn’t want to suffer the consequences from the heat, which would be worse,” employee Gloria Machuca said in Spanish. “I told my co-worker not to be afraid because our health comes first.”
That point was underscored by what happened to Bertha Montes, a worker at the East LA McDonald’s location who died days after her employer would not let her go home after she got sick, according to a filed OSHA complaint.
“On April 13, 2023 Bertha was visibly sick at work, with bulging red, glossy eyes,” according to the report. “Bertha told Vicky the manager that she was sick and needed to go home, but Vicky told Bertha she could not leave work and forced her to continue working for 3 hours before she was allowed to leave.”
In Houston, unlike East Los Angeles, all of the employees did not go on strike. In addition to Machuca, five other employees left while four stayed in the establishment, allowing the location to remain open.
According to Porfirio Villareal, a spokesperson for the city of Houston’s Health Department, the law is on Machucha’s side: “Houston law requires food establishments to have air conditioning during the summer and heat during the winter,” Villareal said. “Without it, workers could suffer from heat exhaustion or heat stroke, which can be deadly,”
Machuca said that she would return by Friday, July 21 provided the air conditioning unit had been repaired.
BREAKING: Workers at @McDonalds in LA have walked off the job ON STRIKE due to inside heat of nearly 100 degrees.
Workers at this store helped launch a strike wave that spread to over 350 stores statewide in 2020 through 2022.
— California Fast Food Workers Union (@CAFastFoodUnion) July 21, 2023
These labor disputes come amid a wave of strikes and labor-related conversations that are embroiling the national consciousness in debates around the value of labor.
California in particular is the epicenter of these debates as we are updated on the dispute between writers and actors and the Hollywood studios via social media. Amazon delivery drivers joined the Teamsters strike of UPS over similar work conditions. Teachers are on strike across the country, seeking benefits for themselves and their students; experts warned that it would be a summer of strikes and so far, that caution appears to be justified.
Cardi B is still making moves to get her money back from vlogger Tasha K. According to court documents obtained by HipHopDX, Cardi B issued a subpoena duces tecum for the woman’s husband.
On Tuesday, June 18, the “Money” rapper got the subpoena issued to Cheickna Kebe, Tasha K’s husband. Following a roadblock in getting her defamation payout from the vlogger, Cardi now has the ability to have her attorneys take a microscope at all the assets in the couple’s name.
The examination is set to be conducted on August 7, 2023, and it will be documented on video and entered into Tasha K’s bankruptcy filing.
The order reads, “The examination may continue from day to day until completed. If the examinee receives this notice less than 14 days prior to the scheduled examination date, the examination will be rescheduled upon timely request to a mutually agreeable time.”
The question of the validity of Cardi’s subpoena was answered shortly after its filing. Tasha K filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy just last month in the face of her court order to pay Cardi B almost $4 million in defamation damages. Cardi—whose real name is Belcalis Marlenis Almánzar Cephus—was ordered to stop attempting to collect the money Tasha owed her.
However, this new subpoena doesn’t violate the collection halt order because “it was issued pursuant to Federal Bankruptcy Rule 2004.”
As previously reported, the 30-year-old “Bodak Yellow” rapper sued Tasha back in 2019. Cardi was awarded $4 million in defamation damages because Tasha publicly talked back about Cardi. She made several salacious false allegations about the rapper: saying she had herpes, had worked as a prostitute, and was using cocaine.
The court awarded Cardi around $2.5 million in damages and another $1.3 million for her legal fees. Tasha claimed that she only had “$95 in her Chase Bank account” and then filed for bankruptcy.
Magic Johnson Details Importance Of Commanders Ownership In Interview
“Breaking these barriers and opening these doors as a proud Black man— ” Earvin “Magic” Johnson began answering a question posed by the Today Show’s Craig Melvin before taking a moment to compose himself and wipe away his tears.
“This is a…there’s a great opportunity, I don’t know why God blessed me with these opportunities, but I want to excel not only for myself and my family but for all African Americans making sure we can see ourselves in these seats.”
Johnson is part of an ownership group taking over the NFL’s Washington Commanders that is led by Philadelphia 76ers owner and billionaire Josh Harris.
As co-owner, Johnson stressed his desire for the employees to be valued as people, as human beings, telling Melvin: “So if we respect them, they will respect us and go to the wall for us. And so — I’ve been in so many different sports teams…and we know how valuable these employees are, because they make it run every single day.
The NFL’s Washington Commanders has been sold to a group led by billionaire Josh Harris and a group that includes NBA legend @MagicJohnson. @CraigMelvin sat down for an exclusive interview with Johnson to talk about ushering in a new era for the team. pic.twitter.com/Y3NvWjU9j9
These two statements from Johnson seem to summarize as someone who despite having a lot of money has not forgotten how to genuinely care about the well-being of others. Decades after his NBA career as ended, he still wears his emotions on his sleeve.
The 63-year-old sees his responsibility clearly and knows that he is also following two Black women into the ownership space in the NFL. Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Ariel Investments CEO Melody Hobson are already part of the Denver Broncos ownership group.
Johnson understands he is one of the first Black male owners in the NFL and he knows that if he does his job well, that could lead to not only more Black people being put in ownership positions like him but it could trickle all the way down to the coaching ranks as well.
A stark contrast to the former ownership under Daniel Snyder, Johnson, and his group seek not only to make Washington a great place to work, but they also seem to want the players to enjoy their experiences.
The culture during Snyder’s regime was awful even before the sexual harassment and the exploitation of the team’s cheerleaders was made public a few years ago. Johnson also indicated that the team’s nickname was one of the things that the group would place “on the table” of discussion once they get a feel for everything. The public was not in favor of the name or the slur for Native Americans that preceded it.
Johnson is bringing a new era to the NFL, a new era to Washington. Both are in dire need of change.
Tech Companies Agree To White House AI Security Safeguards
According to a press release by the White House, several leading technology companies and firms have agreed to voluntary safety, security, and trust commitments.
Google, Meta, Amazon, Microsoft, OpenAI, Anthropic, and Inflection met with the Biden Administration to discuss how companies can responsibly develop artificial intelligence. This meeting is part of a more significant effort by the administration to ensure that the public is protected from the dangers of emerging artificial intelligence, and is an extension of the AI Bill of Rights framework the administration laid out in 2022.
The press release stated, “Today’s announcement is part of a broader commitment by the Biden-Harris Administration to ensure AI is developed safely and responsibly, and to protect Americans from harm and discrimination.”
Last month, President Biden had a meeting with experts and leaders in the field of artificial intelligence to discuss the promise and risks associated with the field in San Francisco. And Vice President Harris had a meeting with consumer protection, labor, and civil rights leaders to discuss how to leverage the power of artificial intelligence while still protecting people from harm and bias. The White House seems to be taking artificial intelligence and the potential risks it poses very seriously, but some say that even this is not enough.
AI Now Institute’s executive director Amba Kak told the Associated Press that “A closed-door deliberation with corporate actors resulting in voluntary safeguards isn’t enough.” Kak explained, “We need a much more wide-ranging public deliberation, and that’s going to bring up issues that companies almost certainly won’t voluntarily commit to because it would lead to substantively different results, ones that may more directly impact their business models.”
Kak’s organization is dedicated to creating a policy strategy that addresses the lack of public accountability, consolidation of power by a few companies, and unfettered commercial surveillance in the technology industry. Therefore, it makes sense that her organization would not be in favor of closed-door meetings with companies and firms, but push for more public oversight.
Inflection CEO Mustafa Suleyman pushed back on that idea a bit, as he told the Associated Press, “It’s a big deal to bring all the labs together, all the companies.” Suleyman added, “This is supercompetitive and we wouldn’t come together under other circumstances.”
Suleyman also said that the “red-team” tests that the companies agreed to, represent a significant commitment, even though they are voluntary. Essentially, “red-team” tests are hackers that the company invites in to try and exploit their systems, not unlike the ones that banks use to test their security systems.
As AI is used for more things across more industries, ensuring that it is used in an equitable and fair manner is going to be something that the public talks about, as evidenced by efforts aimed at the journalism and movie industries to employ AI in ways that could erode worker rights and employment opportunities.
The only way to know if the White House’s initiative on artificial intelligence and, more broadly, the technology industry, will work in the ways that it wants it to, will be to see what comes out of these agreements.
Mom of 5 Tells Congress How She ‘Almost Lost Her Life’ Taking Abortion Medication
When St. Louis activist and pro-choice storyteller Rev. Dr. Love Holt attempted a self-managed abortion, she nearly lost her life. Now, she will never stop telling her story.
On July 17, 2023, Holt stood before the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, determined to speak up for individuals who face life-threatening struggles due to abortion bans, HuffPost reported. The mother of five gave a chilling account of Jan. 20, when she took a medication abortion pill and was rushed to the hospital for severe blood loss. She told committee members that she was more worried about going to jail than about her own survival.
“I nodded in and out of consciousness in the lobby for several minutes as blood began dripping down my legs,” Holt said. “I told myself to make sure you tell the staff that you’re having a miscarriage, but I knew I was having one.”
In Missouri there is a united front that is fighting for all right of all state residents to choose abortion. Missouri became the first state in the country to make providing abortion a criminal offense in June 2022, minutes after the Supreme Court overturnedRoe v. Wade. As a result, many residents may have no choice but to employ riskier measures to gain access to abortion.
“Forcing people to carry unwanted pregnancies drives people into further positions of poverty, and poverty gives birth to violence and survival modes that make people unpredictable, and they do things that they would normally not do, like me,” Holt said Monday.
Born and raised in Berkeley, North County St. Louis, Holt is an abortion doula, an herbal womb practitioner, and a cultural competency consultant. She currently serves as a community engagement manager at Abortion Action Missouri, an organization working toward stigma-free abortion access and reproductive freedom.
“They understand that there has to be somebody on the adverse side. And they want it to be everyone but them,” she said. “But that will never stop me from telling my story until the day I die.”
On Jan. 20, Holt was about 13 weeks and six days pregnant. Medication abortion is generally considered to be a safe option for those who want to end their pregnancies outside of a medical setting. Planned Parenthood, however, recommends that an in-clinic abortion should be performed if it has been more than 12 weeks since the first day of a woman’s last period.
Before taking the abortion pill, Holt experienced some delays. The first order was stolen in the mail, and she had to reorder them to complete the set of two pills. She described experiencing heavy bleeding, cramping and blood clots within the first 45 minutes. Those harrowing symptoms caused her to become lightheaded. She’d been hiding away in her car so that her children wouldn’t witness her trauma. Eventually, the kids called their grandmother, who would be the one to find her daughter unresponsive and drenched in blood.
Holt was rushed to a nearby Catholic-led hospital, where she underwent a “dilatation-and-curettage surgical procedure” and witnessed events that she said “sickened” her. She was not only offered a “death certificate” but can also attest to being “forced to participate in having my tissues in a mass grave with a headstone.”
“I almost lost my life that day,” she told congress. “I would have left my children, my Black children, alone in this cruel, cold world to navigate it alone. Nobody to protect them, nobody to support them.”
Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.), a member of the oversight committee, was in attendance at the meeting and spoke of the importance of Holt’s account.
“These are the stories that we need to hear more of in hearings in Congress, because the reality is that Rev. Dr. Holt’s story is not an anomaly,” Bush told HuffPost. “Rather, it represents the reality of so many people struggling to terminate their pregnancies in states that have banned or severely limited access to abortion care.”
