• Legal

by Nahlah Abdur-Rahman

May 11, 2025

Georgia Tax Preparer Gets 8 Years In Prison Over $3M Pandemic Unemployment Fraud

Jessica Crawford filed more than $3 million worth of fraudulent claims.

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A tax preparer in Georgia was sentenced to eight years in prison over phony tax returns connected to pandemic unemployment fraud.

Jessica Crawford pleaded guilty in November 2024 to wire fraud and aiding in preparing false tax returns. Her case is part of a multi-state federal investigation into false Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) claims.

According to Fox 5, Crawford filed false PUA claims for clients using forged information or fake businesses. Crawford would then receive a payout for her unusual services.

The FBI began uncovering Crawford’s involvement in the scheme through her text messages with willing clients. Catching onto her scheme, an undercover IRS criminal investigation agent met with Crawford in April 2022. The meeting revealed that Crawford helped set up a fake landscaping business for the agent. Filing a Schedule C loss of $19,373, the tax preparer’s claim resulted in a refund of over $12,000.

The 34-year-old falsified the business loss and created improper claims for child tax and earned income tax credits. The IRS later discovered that Crawford filed false credits in over 1,200 tax returns between 2020 and 2021. Her efforts led to more than $3 million in fraudulent claims.

“Jessica Crawford used her position as a tax preparer to defraud the U.S. government through a CARES Act program intended for those unemployed because of the COVID-19 pandemic,” said Assistant Special Agent in Charge of the IRS Criminal Investigation’s Atlanta Field Office Lisa Fontanette. “The sentencing Crawford received should serve notice to unscrupulous tax preparers.”

The Department of Justice continues to uncover multiple cases of PUA fraud. The program was meant to alleviate the struggles of self-employed individuals and others during the COVID-19 pandemic. A U.S. Department of Labor report also estimates that PUA funds had a 35.9% improper payment rate, signifying that over one-third of all PUA claims had fraudulent information or wrongful payouts.

Now, the U.S. government hopes to bring those who wrongly filed and their accomplices to justice for rigging the system.

“Federal law enforcement uncovered a large-scale tax return scheme during the pandemic that was costing taxpayers while benefiting fraudsters,” said Acting U.S. Attorney C. Shanelle Booker. “Alongside our law enforcement partners, federal prosecutors will continue to uphold the law and pursue justice in these cases.”

RELATED CONTENT: Florida Scammer Indicted For Alleged PPP Loan Fraud

• Business

by Daniel Johnson

May 11, 2025

Fenty Gets In The Game: Rihanna’s Beauty Empire Joins Forces With The New York Liberty

Ellie the Elephant, the Liberty's mascot, will be a big part of the in-arena activations and other promotions that will highlight the collaboration between the team and Rihanna's Fenty Beauty and Skin lines.

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Rihanna’s Fenty Beauty and Fenty Skin have taken their WNBA partnership to the next level, inking a new deal with the reigning champions, the New York Liberty, to become the team’s official makeup and beauty sponsor—an announcement made on May 7.

According to Allure, to whom Rihanna gave an exclusive interview after the partnership was announced, the deal marks Fenty’s first foray into business with the WNBA. It will entail the inclusion of Fenty logos on the team’s pregame warm-up jackets and shooting sleeves, as well as some in-arena activations and product discovery moments.

“I’ve always said that makeup is there to have fun with, to express yourself with. It should be reflective of a vibe, of a moment, of a personality—whatever you want it to be. I’m excited to see how these incredible women of the New York Liberty put their game faces on and am proud to have Fenty Beauty and Fenty Skin be a part of their story this season,” Rihanna told Allure.

The Liberty also feature arguably the best mascot in all of sports, and the WNBA’s most recognizable and marketable one, Ellie the Elephant, and the Black-woman coded pachyderm will be a big part of the in-arena activations and other promotions that will highlight the collaboration between the team and Rihanna’s Fenty Beauty and Skin lines.

As Shana Stevenson, the Liberty’s chief brand officer, told Fast Company about the mascot, Ellie represents the Liberty’s location in Brooklyn and the borough’s energy on a level that few other mascots do.

“The person that we know as Ellie today auditioned during that open audition, and just blew us away with their talent and with their interpretation of Ellie,” Stephenson recalled to the outlet. “It was so different, so fresh, so raw. And we were like, ‘This is our person.’ And it also felt very New York, very Brooklyn in a way that we hadn’t seen before.”

Keia Clarke, the CEO of the New York Liberty, expressed the team’s excitement at the sponsorship with Rihanna’s beauty brands. Clarke believes that Fenty and the team share values like championing women and celebrating individuality.

“The New York Liberty are thrilled to team up with Fenty Beauty—a trailblazing brand that shares our values of championing women and celebrating individuality, authenticity and confidence. Aligning with like-minded brands allows us to deliver meaningful connections and experiences that truly resonate with our fan base. Together, we will embrace empowerment, boldness, and a commitment to creativity,” Clarke said in a statement.

On the heels of the Met Gala, which some Liberty players like Jonquel Jones, Breanna Stewart, and Sabrina Ionescu attended in addition to Rihanna herself, Rihanna alluded to her belief that New York is perfectly embodied by the Liberty squad in a press release.

“There is no energy and spirit like New York City’s,” Rihanna said in a statement. “The women of the New York Liberty exemplify such beauty, power, and strength, so to have Fenty Beauty and Fenty Skin become a part of their journey this season is incredible. We’re excited to partner with them to get their game faces on.”

RELATED CONTENT: Let Her Cook: GloRilla Is Now Ambassador For All Of Rihanna’s Fenty Brands

• Politics

by Daniel Johnson

May 11, 2025

Biden Blames Racism And Sexism For Kamala Harris Losing To Trump

Biden said he 'wasn’t surprised' that Kamala Harris lost the election and blamed politics that embraced racism and sexism.

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In a May 8 interview on “The View,” former President Joe Biden defended his mental sharpness, while pointing to sexism, racism, and the inability to provide Americans with short-term relief during the opening stages of the pandemic as reasons that Donald Trump returned to power as the 47th president of the United States.

According to The New York Times, Biden flatly said that the reports of his declining mental faculties were inaccurate. “They are wrong,” Biden said. “There’s nothing to sustain that.”

He added, “The only reason I got out of the race is because I didn’t want to have a divided Democratic Party.”

Biden also said during the interview that he “wasn’t surprised” that his vice president, Kamala Harris, lost the election or that she was subjected to criticism that he felt was more based on her identity than her politics.

“They (the Trump campaign and the Republican Party) went the route of the sexist route. I’ve never seen quite as successful and a consistent campaign undercutting the notion that a woman couldn’t lead the country, and a woman of mixed race,” Biden said.

While he didn’t directly address the speculation that Harris is potentially eyeing a run for the governor of California, he did offer a tepid endorsement of Harris’ prospects were she to decide to run for the presidency in 2028.

“She’s got a difficult decision to make about what she’s going to do. I hope she stays fully engaged. I think she’s first-rate, but we have a lot of really good candidates as well. So, I’m optimistic. I’m not pessimistic,” Biden said regarding the former vice president.

He also indicated that a “pandemic hangover” changed the relationship of everyday Americans with the federal government, in ways that are still being defined, and acknowledged that his administration did not do well enough at delivering immediate results or communicating what the administration had delivered on.

“I think we underestimate the phenomenal negative impact that COVID had and the pandemic had on people, on attitudes, on optimism, on a whole range of things. Well, we made a lot of commitments and we — you know, billion-dollar tunnels going through for Amtrak, bridges, so on, but we weren’t quite as good as he was about advertising it,” Biden said, a reference to Donald Trump’s constant sales pitches, regardless of whether or not his deliverables are beneficial to all of the country’s residents.

He concluded, “It doesn’t say, ‘Biden brought you this.’ There’s nothing saying, ‘The Democrats brought you this.’ And we knew none of this would occur for another six months to two years. It takes time to do all that.”

RELATED CONTENT: Kamala Harris Put Her ‘Boots On The Ground’ And On Trump’s Neck

• HBCU

by Daniel Johnson

May 11, 2025

Shaquille O’Neal Reps Alabama State, Announces Plans To Become College Professor

O'Neal recently opened up about his personal connection to HBCUs during an episode of his podcast, 'The Big Podcast with Shaq.'

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NBA Hall of Famer and “Inside The NBA” television personality Shaquille O’Neal showed love to Alabama State University through a wardrobe choice and an announcement of his future plans on the May 8 broadcast of the show.

According to Sports Illustrated, in addition to wearing the bold black and gold of Alabama State University and flashing a “Que Dawg” salute, O’Neal hinted that he would leave the studio in two years after he becomes a college professor after concluding his studies at Alabama State University.

After Ernie Johnson asked O’Neal why he was wearing the ASU gear, he replied, “From now (on) I would like to be addressed as Professor O’Neal, because when I graduate in two years, I will leave you and become a college professor on mentorship and business administration. I love you.”

O’Neal recently opened up about his connection to HBCUs more broadly during an episode of his podcast, “The Big Podcast with Shaq,” after an HBCU student asked him what he does to support HBCUs.

“I always supported. It was an HBCU that helped me graduate from LSU. A lot of people don’t know the story, but I had to transfer to Southern for summer school. So it, I mean, I’ve always been a big supporter,” O’Neal said.

He continued, “Going there, the flavor, the feeling—like, sometimes I sit and I say, ‘Man, I wish I would’ve went to an HBCU. Because I went to the HBCU tournament when it was in Atlanta a couple weeks ago. And the DJs, the culture, the band, the cheerleaders—it’s just fun. And I’m a really big supporter of HBCUs.”

O’Neal’s son, Shaqir, has been intentional about playing at HBCUs, first enrolling at Texas Southern University out of high school in 2021, intending to “change the narrative” regarding the basketball programs at HBCUs.

Shaqir would later transfer to Florida A&M University for the 2024-2025 basketball season, where he recorded his first double-double as a collegiate athlete. Shaqir recently transferred to Sacramento State, where he will join a basketball program that employs former Sacramento Kings guard Mike Bibby as its head coach and his father as its general manager.

According to The Athletic, O’Neal’s position is on a voluntary, unpaid basis, and he follows other NBA luminaries like Stephen Curry and Trae Young into the position, albeit the latter pair have a more personal connection to their positions, Davidson and the University of Oklahoma are the alma maters of Curry and Young, respectively.

The Bibby/O’Neal era is already paying dividends. Just one day after O’Neal was officially announced as the general manager, the program signed former four-star prospect Mikey Williams. Despite Williams’ troubled past, which included nine felony gun charges stemming from a 2023 shooting near his home in San Diego, he is still a big splash for the university.

As O’Neal said in a statement to The Athletic, he sees his job as preparing young men to face life more than he sees it as raising championship banners and trophies. “This is about more than banners and trophies, but preparing these student-athletes for life on and off the court,” O’Neal said.

RELATED CONTENT: Shaquille ‘Secure-The- Bag’ O’Neal Launches New Spiked Lemonade

• Celebrity News

by Daniel Johnson

May 11, 2025

Jalen Green’s Wingstop Ad Called ‘Most Racist’ By Controversial Comedian Shane Gillis

Shane Gillis, the comedian who was fired from Saturday Night Live in 2019 for making racist and homophobic jokes, recently called Jalen Green's Wingstop advertisement 'the most racist' he has ever seen.

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Shane Gillis, the comedian who was fired from “Saturday Night Live” in 2019 for making racist and homophobic jokes, recently called Jalen Green’s Wingstop advertisement “the most racist” he has ever seen on an episode of his podcast, and criticized the NBA for running it often during the playoffs.

Gillis said at one point during the podcast that “They (presumably, the NBA) are targeting the African American community with intensity. Every single commercial is catered to Black people…It’s not race war stuff, but Wingstop’s taking up a bunch of ad space….It’s like every chicken place. You’re watching it going, ‘Dude, chill, spread it out, dude. Put one on the PGA tour to throw it off a little.’”

Gillis continued, “The Wingstop commercial is the most racist commercial I’ve ever seen,” Gillis said. “I can’t even describe the Wingstop commercial without sounding racist. I think it’s supposed to be an NBA player, and he’s doing the whole fashion walk-through that they do, and then he hops in a limo and just crushes chicken. And every white guy on Earth goes, ‘I knew that’s what they’re doing. I knew that’s what was going on in those cool limos.’”

According to Little Black Book, Green’s spot with Wingstop is the Houston Rockets’ rising star’s first collaboration with the brand, which is the Official Wing & Chicken partner of the NBA, and was unveiled in February as part of the league’s advertising rollout for the NBA All-Star Game.

As NBC News reported, Gillis’ entire schtick is based around “pushing boundaries,” according to his now deleted tweet, which apologized for the firestorm of controversy, which led to his ouster at SNL. However, people from marginalized communities, the butts of some of his more controversial jokes, would most likely describe those boundaries as punching down.

According to Life And Thyme, fried chicken is a staple of the American South, where Wingstop hails from, it began as a small operation in Garland, Texas, and the relationship of Black people to fried chicken is not as straightforward as Gillis makes it out to be, just because a Black person is eating chicken on camera does not make it racist. Fried chicken, in particular, helped Black people in the South achieve a form of financial freedom.

“If you look at the historical roots of entrepreneurship of people of African descent, since they became enslaved people, [fried chicken] was one of the few things that one could multiply and sell. It’s really a part of what I call African American subsistence of culinary freedom, that the fried chicken evolves out of entrepreneurship,” Babson College professor of history and foodways, Frederick Douglass Opie, told the outlet.

Similarly, associate professor and chair of American studies at the University of Maryland, and the author of “Building Houses Out of Chicken Legs: Black Women, Food and Power,” Psyche Williams-Forson, described the tense relationship between Black people and negative stereotypes associated with eating fried chicken in mixed company.

“By virtue of what people think you look like, you’re subjected to whatever crazy stereotype is circulating at the moment. You can be the most intelligent, the most brilliant, and you will get reduced to a stereotype. I think it’s important that we celebrate, but I also think it’s short-sighted to celebrate without pointing out the other side of this narrative, which gives rise to why we need to celebrate on some level,” Williams-Forson said. “It’s not just because we’re celebrating our innovation level. It’s also because if we don’t continue to remind people of our economic, social, political empowerment vis-à-vis foods, it is very likely that we will fall prey to the stereotypes by regurgitating them.”

RELATED CONTENT: Rick Ross Offers Don Lemon a Job and Brand Sponsorship Opportunity

• Events

by Ahsan Washington

May 11, 2025

Mother’s Day Events Are Going Down In A Major City Near You

Events range from brunches and cruises

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This year you can find special ways to honor Mother’s Day through BLACK ENTERPRISE‘s selection of nine major city events that celebrate mothers in exceptional ways. Events range from brunches and cruises to wellness experiences and cultural gatherings that provide unique celebrations for mothers with different interests. These events serve as ideal choices for creating enduring memories.

Atlanta

Atlanta moms, you can celebrate yourselves at Throwedoffjuan’s “That’s Just My BabyMama” Mother’s Day Comedy Show. It boasts to be one crazy night filled with honest humor, laughs, and jokes you won’t forget. 

Baltimore

Baltimore mommas looking for a fun way to celebrate Mother’s Day? We’ve got you covered! Go to Body Butter Making Workshop and treat yourself or that special mother in your life to some well-deserved pampering. You’ll get your hands messy in the best way, creating your own luscious, personalized body butters that smell divine. Keep your concoction as a little self-care treat or wrap it up as a heartfelt gift. 

Charlotte

Got a mom in Charlotte? Why not make her day extra special with The Sunday Groove’s Mother’s Day Edition at Marquee Live Music. It’s the perfect chance to kick back and enjoy live music, soak up the atmosphere, and give Mom some good entertainment. 

Chicago

This Mother’s Day, ditch the flowers and chocolates and treat yourself or the amazing moms in your life to a blissful yoga session. Nothing says “I appreciate you” quite like an hour of stretching, breathing. It’s the perfect chance to unwind. Every mom deserves a moment of peace and wellness. 

D.C.

Calling all DC mamas! Go crack up at the MOTHER of All Comedy Shows featuring the hilarious Liz Barlow. Perfect opportunity to ditch the mom-duties for the night. Bring your friends or just treat yourself. 

Detroit

Go celebrate your moms awesomeness at the BSG! & Friends Mother’s Day celebration with dinner and a concert! This night will be one for the books with tons of laughs, amazing live music, and food that’ll make your taste buds dance. There will be a whole lot of soul, heaps of style, and music that’ll feed the spirit.

Houston

The Art Studio is hosting an amazing Paint N’ Sip event that’s next-level. We’re talking about a super fun painting session, a photoshoot to remember the day, a comedy show, and plenty of wine. 

Los Angeles

Give the incredible mothers in your life the night out they deserve this Mother’s Day. We’re talking indulgent food, cocktails mixed with flair, jaw-dropping performances, and every mom gets her own rose. Right in the heart of Hollywood, it’s the perfect spot to create those “remember when” moments she’ll treasure.

New York

Come aboard our Mother’s Day Cruise New York City where you’ll soak up the jaw-dropping city skyline views. There will be great music, delicious food, and it beats another gifted candle. 

RELATED CONTENT: Two Therapists Launch Mother’s Day Event For Black Mothers Mental Health Awareness

• News

by Cedric 'BIG CED' Thornton

May 10, 2025

Pope Leo XIV Has Haitian, Black Roots As Family Ties Traced Back To New Orleans

The new pope has Haitian blood, and his great-grandparents were listed through census records as 'free people of color' living in Louisiana.

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Research has led to reports that the new pontiff, Pope Leo XIV, has Black family roots that trace back to New Orleans.

According to The Associated Press, the first pope born in America is a person of color, based on records discovered by a New Orleans genealogist. Jari Honora, who looked up Pope Leo’s given name because he has a French-sounding last name, Prevost. She found out that his lineage comes from a family that had roots in the Louisiana city.

“It was special for me because I share that heritage and so do many of my friends who are Catholic here in New Orleans,” said Honora, who works as a historian at the Historic New Orleans Collection, a museum in the French Quarter.

Through her research, she found that his great-grandparents, Jacques Martínez and Marie Rosa Ramos, were listed through census records as “free people of color” living in Louisiana. His other set of great-grandparents, Fernandid Baquié, and Eugenie Grandbois, were found to be “Mulatto.” Although his mother, Mildred Martinez Prevost, is listed as white on her birth certificate, her father, Joseph Martinez, was listed as Haitian, while her mother, Louise Baquié, was described as Black and “Mulatto.”

ABC News reports that photos of their grandparents were shown to Pope Leo XIV’s brother, John Prevost, and he confirmed it was them to the media outlet. Prevost did admit that they knew that their grandparents were Haitian and about their ties to New Orleans, but the family never discussed racial matters with them.

“In that intervening period, they not only migrated from New Orleans to Chicago in the period between 1910 and 1912, but they also changed their racial identifiers, which is very common,” Honora said. “Many families did this as a question of their livelihoods as an economic decision, they passed for white.”

New Orleans Mayor Latoya Cantrell said, “The City of New Orleans is a melting pot of different religions and beliefs. We are thrilled to welcome Pope Leo XIV, who embodies morality, unity, and inclusivity.”

RELATED CONTENT: Catholic Africans Hope For A Black Pope, But See It As A Distant Possibility

• News

by Daniel Johnson

May 10, 2025

NY AG Letitia James Targeted In Federal Probe Sparked By Trump Ally

New York Attorney General Letitia James has emerged as a strident critic of the Trump administration.

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Federal prosecutors have opened an investigation into New York Attorney General Letitia James following allegations contained in a referral from the Trump administration that she be investigated for potentially falsifying paperwork regarding properties that she owns in Virginia and New York, sources familiar with the matter revealed to The Guardian.

Per their reporting, the investigation marks a significant shift toward retaliation against James, whose pursuit of charges against Donald Trump ended in more than $450 million in penalties for him after he was found guilty of inflating his net worth to secure financial benefits.

According to their sources, the status of the investigation seems to be in its early stages as prosecutors have designated a federal grand jury to hear evidence in the Eastern District of Virginia, following the recommendation from William Pulte for the Justice Department to bring charges against James in April.

As Reuters reports, James has emerged as a strident critic of the Trump administration’s clashes with the judicial branch and has joined other Democratic attorneys general in mounting legal challenges to Trump’s orders regarding election overhauls, cuts to education, health, and numerous moves, including the targeting of judges and law firms.

Notably, the criminal referral contains the same allegations raised by Trump allies online that in 2023, James potentially committed fraud by making a house in Norfolk, Virginia, a home she was helping a relative to buy, as her primary residence while James was the attorney general of New York.

Whether or not the allegations raised by the investigation will stick is yet to be determined, but what is accomplished by this investigation, regardless of the veracity of the claims from the Trump administration, is showcasing that it is willing to go after Trump’s adversaries using the weight of the federal government’s legal system.

Per USA Today, Trump, of course, couldn’t resist attacking James when given the opportunity during his May 6 media availability, saying that James is a “disaster for New York” and a “horrible, horrible human being” as well as a “total crook.”

He continued, “That’s just my opinion. Pam is going to have to do what she wants. She’s a very bad person. She’s a very, very bad, a very bad person who campaigned solely on, I’m going to get Donald Trump, over and over again.”

James has responded to the allegations. On May 8, two days after Trump’s statement, the referral for James to be charged was brought by Pulte.

James has referred to the allegations from the Trump administration as falsehoods and characterized the allegations as politically motivated retribution. In a letter she sent to the Justice Department in April, James said that the director made a cherry-picked argument in his recommendation.

“Director Pulte cherry-picked an August 17, 2023, power of attorney that mistakenly stated the property to be Ms James’ principal residence,” James’s lawyer, Abbe Lowell, wrote in the letter. “The broker understood this, and that Ms James was not a Virginia resident.”

Lowell explained their view of the allegations to The Guardian, “This appears to be the political retribution President Trump threatened to exact that AG Bondi assured the Senate would not occur on her watch. If prosecutors are genuinely interested in the truth, we are prepared to meet false claims with facts.”

RELATED CONTENT: Letitia James Going After Trump Administration With Insider Trading Inquiry

• News

by Mary Spiller

May 10, 2025

Edda Fields-Black Wins Pulitzer For Groundbreaking Book On Harriet Tubman’s Combahee River Raid

Edda Fields-Black won the prize for her book 'COMBEE: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom during the Civil War.'

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Edda Fields-Black was announced as the winner of a Pulitzer Prize for her book “COMBEE: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom during the Civil War.” For her work in history, Fields-Black accounted with firsthand records on how Tubman led what Fields-Black called the largest “slave rebellion in U.S history.”

Fields-Black was awarded the Pulitzer on May 5 in history. The prize is shared between Combee and “Native Nations: A Millennium in North America” by Kathleen DuVal. The pieces are “distinguished and appropriately documented books on the history of the United States.”

Fields-Black opened up to the Miami Herald about her win, describing getting more phone calls and emails with congratulations than she expected. However, the event feels monumental for Black historians.

Fields-Black told the outlet, “It’s a form of validation, almost, that these stories are important and that they must be told with the backing of the Pulitzer Prize, even under these very difficult circumstances.”

She is just one of two women who have won the Pulitzer Prize in history, alongside the trailblazing author Annette Gordon-Reed.

Fields-Black’s book details the Combahee River Raid of 1863, and the Miami native historian spent 10 years researching and writing the book. Utilizing Civil War pension files to accurately identify the men involved in the raid, it was important to Fields-Black to tell the story with as many firsthand accounts as possible.

According to the Miami Herald, she began her journey researching the Combahee River Raid after learning about a man named Linus Hamilton.

Hamilton is an 88-year-old man who recounted what happened to him and his wife on the morning of the raid.

“It is such an extraordinary story and historical document,” Fields-Black said. “It is extremely rare to know an enslaved person’s name, first and last name. It’s extremely rare to hear their voice, and it’s almost unheard of to hear them tell in their own words how they felt at any point in their lives.”

“In reading the literature about the raid, I began to connect it to Linus Hamilton. It had not been connected before, and I began to think maybe there’s a story here that hasn’t been told.”

Fields-Black identified dozens of people that Harriet Tubman helped to liberate, and the rice plantations in which the raids took place.

Fields-Black’s mother and founder of the Miami Black Archives, Dorothy Jenkin Fields, is more excited than anyone else for her daughter.

Fields is no stranger to Black history work, as the founder of Miami’s Black Archives, she is committed to preserving the history of people of African descent who reside in South Florida. Fields told the Herald that [Fields-Black]’s achievements “are a testament to her strength and perseverance. Her hard work and dedication paid off, and I couldn’t be more proud.”

She continued, “Once-difficult-to-access records are now digitized, giving African American families opportunities to recover more of our lost past.”

When Fields-Black’s Pulitzer Prize win comes at such a time when Black History is being policed in curricula, it is even more important to acknowledge the importance of her work.

Fields-Black told the Miami Herald that she just wants people to take away two things from her work on her book, and that is that Tubman was an integral part of the Civil War leading the Combahee River Raids, and also that Civil War pension files are a useful point of contact in connecting Black people to the stories of their ancestors.

RELATED CONTENT: Novelist Percival Everett Wins 2025 Pulitzer Prize For ‘James’

• Celebrity News

by Cedric 'BIG CED' Thornton

May 10, 2025

BET Awards’ 25th Anniversary Will Reunite ‘106 & Park’ Hosts

AJ Calloway, Free, Julissa Bermudez, Keshia Chanté, Rocsi Diaz, Terrence J, and Mr. '106 & Park' himself, Bow Wow will be there

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As the BET Awards celebrates 25 years, it is bringing back its iconic hosts from the music video show, “106 & Park.”

The network announced that on June 9, during the live ceremony, the hosts from the countdown show will all reunite on stage. Those participating include AJ Calloway, Free, Julissa Bermudez, Keshia Chanté, Rocsi Diaz, Terrence J, and Mr. “106 & Park” himself, Bow Wow.

106 & Park is making a grand return at the #BETAwards2025 🎤 Get ready for iconic hosts, throwback legends, and unforgettable moments. https://t.co/NzCcpLbg8n

— BET (@BET) May 6, 2025

Along with the reunion, a tribute will include performances by Bow Wow, Amerie, B2K, Jim Jones, Mya, T.I., and more.

“’106 & Park’ was more than just a music countdown show; it was the heartbeat of Black youth culture and one of the highest-rated BET programs for over a decade,” stated Scott Mills, president and CEO at BET, in a written statement. “From Freestyle Friday to unforgettable live performances, it launched careers, influenced fashion, and became a platform where voices, style, and sound converged. 106 & Park both celebrated and fueled many of the most important musical and culture evolutions that occurred during its two-and-a-half-decade tenure.”

The network recently announced that Compton lyricist Kendrick Lamar has been nominated for 10 awards. The most-talked-about diss record in history has been nominated multiple times this year.

“Not Like Us” has been nominated for Video of the Year and a Viewer’s Choice Award.

Following Lamar’s 10 nominations, his real-life nemesis, Drake, is behind him again with six nominations. Including the Canadian artist, rappers GloRilla, Future, and Doechii also have six chances to win an award.

Metro Boomin has earned himself five nominations, and SZA and The Weeknd have received four nominations apiece, while Arya Starr, Chris Brown, Lil Wayne, Maverick City Music, Playboi Carti, Teddy Swims, and Tyler, the Creator each have garnered three nominations.

The main event, the BET Awards, will air live on BET on June 9 at 8 p.m. ET/PT from the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles.

RELATED CONTENT: BET Awards Brings On Star-Studded Performances As Taraji P. Henson Returns As Host