How Black women won the election
Host Brittany Packnett Cunningham speaks with LaTosha Brown, one of the organizers who made it happen
America has emerged from Election Week, and two things are clear: One, we saw massive, record, historic turnout with more people voting in this election than in any in over 100 years. (You did that.) And two, the victory for the Biden-Harris ticket—a ticket that breaks a 231-year run of white male Vice Presidents—was won in part through the advocacy, and the voting, of BIPOC women. In the South, Black-woman-led organizations helped make Georgia a swing state—one of the reasons Vice President-elect Kamala Harris (that sounds nice, doesn’t it?) called Black women the “backbone of our democracy.”
THIS WEEK ON UNDISTRACTED
On this week’s episode of UNDISTRACTED, Brittany Packnett Cunningham sits down with one of the women who made the Biden-Harris victory possible: LaTosha Brown, co-founder of the Black Voters Matter Fund, which works to increase Black voter turnout in the U.S.
Brown, a Georgia native, tells Packnett Cunningham why she’s expecting some “poetic justice” in the state’s two Senate run-off races come January.
- Some of the other not-to-miss points in their conversation:
Brown on why Black women show up: “I really believe that we sit at this unique intersection of both race and gender, and we’ve had to navigate those things ever since we came to the shores of this nation.” - Brown on VP-elect Harris: “She’s put a crack in the ceiling—and whenever there is a crack in glass, the light enters the room…I am hoping that we will start seeing more progressive women take the reins of leadership and really be able to lead this country in a new direction.”
- Brown on what comes next: “This can’t be just a transactional moment about acknowledging what Black women have done…I hope that this administration is listening. I hope that President-elect Biden actually recognizes that his role…is to serve the people. That his agenda is actually the people’s agenda.”
Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher or wherever you get your podcasts.
WHAT OUR COLLECTIVE IS INTO RIGHT NOW
The Meteor is guided by our collective: an advisory group of filmmakers, writers and artists doing great feminist-minded work. Here’s what one founding member is up to this week!
Hola! I'm Paola Mendoza and this is what is giving me strength, joy and clarity now:
WATCHING Pen15 It makes me laugh out loud and I need that right now!
LISTENING This Joy, The Resistance Revival Chorus. If you haven’t listened, do yourself a favor and do it!
READING Sontag: Her Life and Work
FOLLOWING @LasAmericasIAC This immigrant rights organization based in Texas provides legal services to asylum seekers, migrants and families that have been separated.
DOING MORE OF Sleeping
DOING LESS OF Doom scrolling
GETTING MY JOY FROM Winning the election!
Paola Mendoza is a director, activist, author and artist whose work focuses on human rights. A co-founder of The Women’s March, she served as its artistic director. Paola’s most recent book is the critically acclaimed YA novel Sanctuary.
MARIANE PEARL: LOVE, LIFE AND WHY I VOTED
In the month before the election, artists, filmmakers and writers spoke out about what was at stake in The Meteor’s series 30 Days Till Tomorrow. You can see their work on our Instagram now—and don’t miss journalist Mariane Pearl’s intensely personal story of her own vote, with beautiful illustrations by Debbie Millman.
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