On my third day as Howard’s new editor-in-chief, I watched with the rest of the nation as an angry mob of Trump supporters marched down the National Mall towards the U.S. Capitol building, where a joint session of Congress convened to ceremoniously certify the results of the recent presidential election. It was January 6, 2021.
Now, it was not a regular habit of mine to watch television while working, especially at a new job, but on that day, nobody in the United States was focused on anything but the television. Someone in a Zoom meeting even asked, “are we supposed to be working right now while our government is imploding?” Because as we all know, this day would crash down in history, a stark sign of our breaking democracy.
Three-and-a-half years later, we are presented with a similar ballot with the same presidential candidate names and wonder if anything had even changed. In this issue of Howard Magazine, we examine the direction our democracy has taken, where our country is headed, and what Black voters need to know as they approach the polls to bring things back again.
However, here at Howard, things are changing. For one, we recently welcomed our new vice president of communications, Lydia Sermons. VP Sermons comes to us from Spelman College with an incredible line of knowledge and experience in Atlanta and here in Washington as well. She’s already set in motion a number of initiatives and completed several projects within weeks of joining us, including the president’s Bison Listening Tour report and more. We’re excited to see many great things to continue at Howard through her tenure here.
Thank you all for your readership and support.
Sincerely,
Rin-rin Yu
Editor-in-Chief
Executive Director, Editorial
Article ID: 2056