Congresswoman Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee began her fight to pass legislation that would create a team to explore reparations options for Black Americans back in 2019 and again in the fall of 2020 with Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA). This week, the Texas representative reintroduced the legislation to Congress as the new Biden-Harris administration transitions into the White House.
Jackson’s H.R.40 bill will allow and fund a formal commission to study and develop reparation proposals for the African American Act. While the bill has received support from House Democrats, many Republicans including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) have shown strong opposition to the legislation. Jackson’s move comes at a time when the Senate narrowly obtained victory in Georgia yesterday in the Senate run-offs elections, paving the way for a Democratic majority in the Senate.
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One of the winners was Rev. Raphael Warnock, the senior pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, who will soon become the first Black senator from Georgia.
“In short, the commission aims to study the impact of slavery and continuing discrimination against African-Americans, resulting directly and indirectly from slavery to segregation to the desegregation process and the present day,” Jackson Lee said in a statement regarding the legislation, according to the Washington Informer.
Source: Rep. Jackson Lee Reintroduces Legislation To Explore Reparations For Black Americans
