#NNPA BlackPress

Former Judge Tracie Hunter Released From Jail, Vows to Fight On

NNPA NEWSWIRE — “I committed no crime,” said Hunter. “All of this was a vindictive, vicious, and retaliatory attack against me because I had the audacity to run for one of the most powerful positions in Hamilton County. I had the audacity to win. I had the audacity to sue the board of elections to prove that I won. They were forced by a federal court to overturn the original elections results against my opponent, who was appointed by the governor.”

Published

6 years ago

October 16, 2019

Oakland Post

Former Hamilton County Juvenile Court Judge, Tracie Hunter, who earned her undergraduate degree from Miami University in 1988 and her Juris Doctorate from the University of Cincinnati College of Law in 1992, is released after serving three months of a six-month sentence.

By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia

Tracie Hunter, the first African American juvenile court judge in Hamilton County history, is free again after serving nearly three months of a six-month jail sentence following her conviction on charges of unlawful interest in a public contract. She was found guilty of helping her brother keep his county job by mishandling a confidential document.

In July, Hunter was dragged off to prison after going limp in the courtroom while demonstrators protested her incarceration.

As news broadcasts showed a sheriff’s deputy dragging the former judge away, Hunter told NNPA Newswire that she mostly blacked out.

“As I previously shared with [The Black Press], I had very extensive injuries from an accident. I had a metal rod in my back, and it limits my mobility,” Hunter explained.

“Then, after the judge imposed the sentence, there was so much commotion, and I and my attorney both were hit in the back of our heads. At that point, everything became a blur. The next thing I knew, I was being dragged across the courtroom floor,” Hunter stated.

Once behind bars, things only got worse.

Hunter said her health began to decline, guards mistreated her regularly, and regular showers were denied.

Guards also searched her small cell often, and without cause, Hunter stated.

“I was treated horribly by the guards. They talked to me in cruel and disrespectful ways,” she noted. “They searched my cell all of the time, and often I’d be the only person they’d search. On one occasion, they went to the room next to me and told the people there to pretend they were searching that room, but they were searching my room.”

During one of the searches, Hunter alleges that prison guards entered her cell and “absolutely tore it apart.”

“One time, they said they were searching for drugs, and what’s odd is that they know I have never done drugs, and I don’t drink. But there were others in there because of drugs, and they didn’t search them for drugs,” Hunter stated.

The only thing guards ever confiscated from Hunter were writing pens, which she believed was within her rights to possess.

Worse, Hunter stated that she would routinely be on lockdown, once for as long as 25 consecutive hours. Rarely did she eat because she feared guards might have poisoned her food.

“They’d bring me my food, but I wasn’t going to eat it because they had treated me so viciously. They were handling my food, so I thought it might have been poisoned,” Hunter stated.

Jail nurses would provide Hunter apples and Gatorade to help keep her from starvation and dehydration, she said.

“Mistreatment was going on daily. Most of the time, I was freezing cold, and I wore like five shirts every day, around the clock,” Hunter noted.

Hunter, who earned her undergraduate degree from Miami University in 1988 and her Juris Doctorate from the University of Cincinnati College of Law in 1992, won the election in 2010.

She stunned the Republican-heavy city by defeating GOP contender John Williams.

Williams and the GOP contested Hunter’s victory, and a heated court battle ensued.

After numerous appeals by the Hamilton County Board of Elections, officials refused to count more than 800 votes from majority Democrat and Black precincts.

Hunter then filed a federal lawsuit to have those votes counted.

While the court finally ordered the count, election officials still certified Williams as the victor.

Eventually, the election was overturned in Hunter’s favor.

The 18-month period proved pivotal because of then-Gov. John Kasich appointment of Williams to the bench.

The state Supreme Court changed the rules giving Williams administrative authority over the court.

As the senior judge and the only one elected, Hunter would have received the position of the administrative judge.

Still, Hunter worked behind the bench to protect the rights of children, including refusing to allow their names and faces to appear in news coverage.

Among other things, she instilled a system that focused on rehabilitation instead of incarceration.

Hunter mandated prosecutors turn over all critical evidence to defense lawyers.

She forced the juvenile court to change its entire reporting system and outlawed the routine shackling of juveniles in her courtroom.

Hunter also received credit for exposing juvenile case statistics, which were being inaccurately reported and falsified to the Ohio Supreme Court.

She hired African Americans in key positions, reduced default judgments, and spearheaded the change of state election laws, which paved the way for ex-felons to vote.

However, the Cincinnati Enquirer and WCPO Television joined Republican county officials in the prosecutors’ and commissioners’ offices in lawsuits challenging Hunter.

“They filed 30 lawsuits in less than nine months that I was on the bench,” Hunter said.

After serving just 18 months, her enemies found a way to silence her and end her career.

Prosecutors alleged that Hunter used her judicial credit card to appeal the lawsuits filed against her by Deters, the prosecutor.

She was sentenced in July and began serving six months. The court reduced the sentence after she agreed to minister to inmates in the jail.

Hunter walked out of jail on Saturday, Oct. 5 but her legal and personal battles are far from over. “I’m continuing to fight this wrongful conviction until it’s overturned,” Hunter stated.

“I committed no crime. All of this was a vindictive, vicious, and retaliatory attack against me because I had the audacity to run for one of the most powerful positions in Hamilton County. I had the audacity to win. I had the audacity to sue the board of elections to prove that I won. They were forced by a federal court to overturn the original elections results against my opponent, who was appointed by the governor.”

Hunter continued:

“The first African American to serve on the juvenile court of Hamilton County, and you become a political prisoner who was treated horribly. Our community in Cincinnati has always been divided by race, politics, religion, and social economics. I will never apologize for something I did not do. They want me to apologize for dividing a community that was already divided. And, I’m certainly not going to apologize to a sheriff’s deputy who dragged me on the floor like a piece of trash for the entire world to see. That was demoralizing, dehumanizing, and degrading. And, on top of that, it was an African American woman whom they put up to doing that.”

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#NNPA BlackPress

Chavis and Bryant Lead Charge as Target Boycott Grows

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — Surrounded by civil rights leaders, economists, educators, and activists, Bryant declared the Black community’s power to hold corporations accountable for broken promises.

Published

4 days ago

April 23, 2025

Stacy M. Brown

By Stacy M. Brown
BlackPressUSA.com Senior National Correspondent

Calling for continued economic action and community solidarity, Dr. Jamal H. Bryant launched the second phase of the national boycott against retail giant Target this week at New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Atlanta. Surrounded by civil rights leaders, economists, educators, and activists, Bryant declared the Black community’s power to hold corporations accountable for broken promises. “They said they were going to invest in Black communities. They said it — not us,” Bryant told the packed sanctuary. “Now they want to break those promises quietly. That ends tonight.” The town hall marked the conclusion of Bryant’s 40-day “Target fast,” initiated on March 3 after Target pulled back its Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) commitments. Among those was a public pledge to spend $2 billion with Black-owned businesses by 2025—a pledge Bryant said was made voluntarily in the wake of George Floyd’s murder in 2020.“No company would dare do to the Jewish or Asian communities what they’ve done to us,” Bryant said. “They think they can get away with it. But not this time.”

The evening featured voices from national movements, including civil rights icon and National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) President & CEO Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis Jr., who reinforced the need for sustained consciousness and collective media engagement. The NNPA is the trade association of the 250 African American newspapers and media companies known as The Black Press of America. “On the front page of all of our papers this week will be the announcement that the boycott continues all over the United States,” said Chavis. “I would hope that everyone would subscribe to a Black newspaper, a Black-owned newspaper, subscribe to an economic development program — because the consciousness that we need has to be constantly fed.” Chavis warned against the bombardment of negativity and urged the community to stay engaged beyond single events. “You can come to an event and get that consciousness and then lose it tomorrow,” he said. “We’re bombarded with all of the disgust and hopelessness. But I believe that starting tonight, going forward, we should be more conscious about how we help one another.”

He added, “We can attain and gain a lot more ground even during this period if we turn to each other rather than turning on each other.” Other speakers included Tamika Mallory, Dr. David Johns, Dr. Rashad Richey, educator Dr. Karri Bryant, and U.S. Black Chambers President Ron Busby. Each speaker echoed Bryant’s demand that economic protests be paired with reinvestment in Black businesses and communities. “We are the moral consciousness of this country,” Bryant said. “When we move, the whole nation moves.” Sixteen-year-old William Moore Jr., the youngest attendee, captured the crowd with a challenge to reach younger generations through social media and direct engagement. “If we want to grow this movement, we have to push this narrative in a way that connects,” he said.

Dr. Johns stressed reclaiming cultural identity and resisting systems designed to keep communities uninformed and divided. “We don’t need validation from corporations. We need to teach our children who they are and support each other with love,” he said. Busby directed attendees to platforms like ByBlack.us, a digital directory of over 150,000 Black-owned businesses, encouraging them to shift their dollars from corporations like Target to Black enterprises. Bryant closed by urging the audience to register at targetfast.org, which will soon be renamed to reflect the expanding boycott movement. “They played on our sympathies in 2020. But now we know better,” Bryant said. “And now, we move.”

Stacy M. Brown

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#NNPA BlackPress

The Department of Education is Collecting Delinquent Student Loan Debt

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — the Department of Education will withhold money from tax refunds and Social Security benefits, garnish federal employee wages, and withhold federal pensions from people who have defaulted on their student loan debt.

Published

4 days ago

April 23, 2025

Oakland Post

By April Ryan

Trump Targets Wages for Forgiven Student Debt

The Department of Education, which the Trump administration is working to abolish, will now serve as the collection agency for delinquent student loan debt for 5.3 million people who the administration says are delinquent and owe at least a year’s worth of student loan payments. “It is a liability to taxpayers,” says White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt at Tuesday’s White House Press briefing. She also emphasized the student loan federal government portfolio is “worth nearly $1.6 trillion.” The Trump administration says borrowers must repay their loans, and those in “default will face involuntary collections.” Next month, the Department of Education will withhold money from tax refunds and Social Security benefits, garnish federal employee wages, and withhold federal pensions from people who have defaulted on their student loan debt. Leavitt says “we can not “kick the can down the road” any longer.”

Much of this delinquent debt is said to have resulted from the grace period the Biden administration gave for student loan repayment. The grace period initially was set for 12 months but extended into three years, ending September 30, 2024. The Trump administration will begin collecting the delinquent payments starting May 5. Dr. Walter M. Kimbrough, president of Talladega College, told Black Press USA, “We can have that conversation about people paying their loans as long as we talk about the broader income inequality. Put everything on the table, put it on the table, and we can have a conversation.” Kimbrough asserts, “The big picture is that Black people have a fraction of wealth of white so you’re… already starting with a gap and then when you look at higher education, for example, no one talks about Black G.I.’s that didn’t get the G.I. Bill. A lot of people go to school and build wealth for their family…Black people have a fraction of wealth, so you already start with a wide gap.”

According to the Education Data Initiative, https://educationdata.org/average-time-to-repay-student-loans It takes the average borrower 20 years to pay their student loan debt. It also highlights how some professional graduates take over 45 years to repay student loans. A high-profile example of the timeline of student loan repayment is the former president and former First Lady Barack and Michelle Obama, who paid off their student loans by 2005 while in their 40s. On a related note, then-president Joe Biden spent much time haggling with progressives and Democratic leaders like Senators Elizabeth Warren and Chuck Schumer on Capitol Hill about whether and how student loan forgiveness would even happen.

Oakland Post

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VIDEO: The Rev. Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr. at United Nations Permanent Forum on People of African Descent

https://youtu.be/Uy_BMKVtRVQ Excellencies: With all protocol noted and respected, I am speaking today on behalf of the Black Press of America and on behalf of the Press of People of African Descent throughout the world. I thank the Proctor Conference that helped to ensure our presence here at the Fourth Session of the […]

Published

4 days ago

April 23, 2025

Oakland Post

https://youtu.be/Uy_BMKVtRVQ

Excellencies:

With all protocol noted and respected, I am speaking today on behalf of the Black Press of America and on behalf of the Press of People of African Descent throughout the world. I thank the Proctor Conference that helped to ensure our presence here at the Fourth Session of the UN Permanent Forum on People of African Descent.

The focus on AI and digital equity is urgent within the real time realities today where there continues to be what is referred to as the so called mainstream national and international media companies that systematically undergird racism and imperialism against the interests of People of African Descent.

We therefore call on this distinguished gathering of leaders and experts to challenge member states to cite and to prevent the institutionalization of racism in all forms of media including social media, AI and any form of digital bias and algorithmic discrimination.

We cannot trust nor entertains the notion that former and contemporary enslavers will now use AI and digital transformation to respect our humanity and fundamental rights.

Lastly we recommend that a priority should be given to the convening of an international collective of multimedia organizations and digital associations that are owned and developed by Africans and People of African Descent.

Basta the crimes against our humanity!

Basta Racism!

Basta Imperialism!

A Luta Continua!

Victory is certain!