Speaker Don Scott's Bday Bash Raises a Stunning $750,000; GOP Push to Erase Black Lives Matter Plaza and 26,000 Diverse U.S. Military Images
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Speaker Don Scott Raises $750,000 at 60th Birthday Bash
PORTSMOUTH, VA — A lively Friday night black tie gala celebrating the 60th birthday of Virginia’s historic House Speaker likely broke a fundraising record. The elegant 60th birthday bash honoring Speaker Don Scott raised $750,000. The evening at Rivers Casino was attended by a diverse group of politicos and members of the local Hampton Roads community.
Seen in the room were Governor L. Douglas Wilder, Congressman Bobby Scott, Senator L. Louise Lucas, Senator Aaron Rouse, gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger, Norfolk State President Javaune Adams-Gaston, Hampton University President Darrell Williams, Norfolk Mayor Kenny Alexander and many other prominent members of the community. Friday’s event was another Kim Wimbish produced fête.
Speaker Scott has emerged as one of the top fundraisers in Virginia and in the nation. Democrats in the Virginia House of Delegates are pushing hard to pick up seats in a Virginia House they control by only two seats. With President Trump’s mass firings of federal employees and Speaker Scott’s fundraising, Democrats are likely to have an advantage.
Below: 📸 Photos by Paulette Singleton
Currently, Democrats in Virginia have a candidate in 91 of 100 House of Delegate seats that will all be on the ballot in November. Republicans only have 62 candidates so far.
🏃🏽➡️ WHO IS RUNNING IN VIRGINIA? 🏃🏽➡️ 🏃🏽♀️➡️ For regular updates on candidates tossing their hat in the ring in 2025 for the Virginia House of Delegates read 90for90 by Fergie Reid, Jr. on BlueSky. Reid, who is the son of the first Black person elected to the Virginia House of Delegates (Dr. Ferguson Reid, Sr. in 1968) since Reconstruction is recruiting many of the candidates who are running.
Since 2025 is setting up to be 2017 part II, Democrats are hoping to gain more seats than what might usually be the case in a more normal cycle. In 2017, the first year of Trump’s first term, Democrats swept all three statewide offices and were defined as being “the spark that lit the wildfire of progressive change” as Virginia’s 41st Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax defined it in 2017.
After Push by Republicans to Remove Black Lives Matter Plaza, Construction Quickly Starts
By April Ryan for BlackPressUSA As this nation observes the 60th anniversary of Bloody Sunday in Selma, Alabama, the words of President Trump reverberate.
“This country will be WOKE no longer”, an emboldened Trump offered during his speech to a joint session of Congress Tuesday night. Since then, Alabama Congresswoman Terri Sewell posted on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter this morning that “Elon Musk and his DOGE bros have ordered GSA to sell off the site of the historic Freedom Riders Museum in Montgomery.” Her post of little words went on to say, “This is outrageous and we will not let it stand! I am demanding an immediate reversal. Our civil rights history is not for sale!”
Also, in the news today, the Associated Press is reporting they have a file of names and descriptions of more than 26,000 military images flagged for removal because of connections to women, minorities and and form of diversity.
In more attempts to downplay Blackness, a word that is interchanged with woke, Trump supporters have introduced another bill to take down the bright yellow letters of Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, D.C., in exchange for the name Liberty Plaza. D.C. Mayor Morial Bowser is allowing the name change to keep millions of federal dollars flowing there.
Black Lives Matter Plaza was named in 2020 after a tense exchange between President Trump and George Floyd protesters in front of the White House. There are more reports about cuts to equity initiatives that impact HBCU students. Programs that recruited top HBCU students into the military and the pipeline for Department of Defense contracts have been canceled. READ ENTIRE
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