Washington, D.C. January 7, 2021 The National Black Caucus of State Legislators (NBCSL)
With ninety-eight percent of Georgians’ votes now counted, major news outlets project that Reverend Raphael Warnock, a healthcare and Medicaid expansion advocate, will serve as one of Georgia’s United States Senators. Warnock is the first African-American Democrat in history to represent a former Confederate state in the United States Senate. A native of Savannah, Georgia, Senator-elect Warnock grew up in public housing as the eleventh of twelve children. He would eventually follow the same path as that of his parents into ministry and begin a career in social justice. We congratulate our friend, Senator-elect Warnock and greet this moment in our country’s history with a sober head, knowing that the change we seek for communities of color will not occur overnight, nor without our continued cooperation on the local, state, and federal level, remarked, Georgia State Representative Billy Mitchell, NBCSL President.
During his time in ministry, Senator-elect Warnock earned his social justice bona fides by protesting programs that discriminated against poor people, protecting juvenile rights in the criminal justice system, and advocating for criminal justice reform. An alum of Morehouse College in Atlanta, Warnock became the youngest person to serve as Pastor of the storied Ebenezer Baptist Church where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once preached. As we begin to outline and further define our policy agenda this year, it remains clear that the social disparities between white and black communities must change so that all Americans, regardless of their zip code, ethnicity, status, or faith can lay hold of the new American Dream. We need more leaders like Senator-elect Warnock who can identify and empathize with the plights of marginalized Americans, continued NBCSL President Mitchell.
On behalf of more than 700 members representing more than 60 million Americans, we congratulate your history making election and wish you every success.
Click here for a copy of the statement.
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