Category: US

CNN
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Another day of harsh winter weather brought continued air travel misery across the United States on Thursday with more than 1,100 flights canceled and thousands more delayed by snow storms and plunging temperatures.

As of 6 p.m. ET, 1,110 airplane departures had been scrapped and more than 5,000 delayed within the US, according to flight tracking site FlightAware. The schedule disruptions come a day after more than 1,700 flights were dropped and more than 7,000 delayed.

Blizzards, snow dumps and ice have hit a huge swath of the western and northern US stretching from California to New York and New England, with much of the upper Midwest experiencing particularly heavy snowfalls. More than 60 million people were under winter weather alerts early Thursday.

Minneapolis-St. Paul International airport was the worst affected with more than 130 departures and about 100 arrivals struck off. Delta was the worst affected carrier, accounting for more than 200 of the overall cancellations and more than 550 delays.

Boston Logan International, Portland International and Toronto Pearson International were also showing significant impact.

Southwest Airlines has issued winter weather waivers for about a dozen airports. Delta Air Lines has issued waivers for Upper Midwest winter weather and Rockies and Mountain regions winter weather. American Airlines and United have also issued winter weather waivers for travel this week.

CNN
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Brutal winter storms are expected to deliver snow, blizzard conditions or icing across strips of the US from California to the Northeast on Thursday, part of a multiday event that has already closed roads and caused numerous power outages – even as the Southeast basks in unseasonably high temperatures.

More than 60 million people were under winter weather alerts Thursday morning from the West into the northern Plains, Great Lakes region and New York and New England. That’s part of storms that already have left nearly one million homes and businesses without power, mainly in Michigan – struck partly by freezing rain and ice that’s damaged utility lines and trees – and other parts of the Midwest, according to tracker PowerOutage.us.

Heavy snow already hit some of these areas over the past two days – including, as of early Thursday, more than 40 inches in parts of southern Wyoming; up to 32 inches in northwestern Montana; and generally 3-6 inches across Nebraska and the Dakotas.

Search and rescue operations were underway Wednesday evening in several counties across Wyoming to recover motorists that become trapped in heavy snow, the state highway patrol said.

In Minnesota, swaths of which saw 3-7 inches with locally higher amounts as of early Thursday, more than 160 vehicle crashes were reported and dozens of cars spun off roads Wednesday, Minnesota State Patrol spokesperson Lt. Gordon Shank said in a series of tweets.

In Wisconsin – similarly hit by snow since Tuesday in the north and freezing rain Wednesday in the south – Gov. Tony Evers declared a statewide energy emergency Wednesday, saying it will “allow for a more swift and efficient restoration of any electric power outages throughout the state,” a news release from his office said.

Perilous travel conditions are expected to continue in many of these areas Thursday. Snowfall of up to 1 to 2 inches per hour could hit parts of the West, the northern Plains and Great Lakes on Thursday, joined by winds as high as 40 to 50 mph, according to the National Weather Service. The combination will cause “significant impacts that will include major disruptions to travel, infrastructure, livestock and recreation,” the service said.

The upper Midwest and Northeast could see an additional 6 to 12 inches of snowfall, with locally higher amounts, through Thursday, the service said.

And an ice storm warning stretched Thursday morning from central Iowa to the Wisconsin-Illinois line and through southern Michigan – with freezing rain threatening ice accumulations that could make morning travel “nearly impossible” in places, the service said.

Out west, in an extremely rare event, California’s Los Angeles and Ventura Counties will be under blizzard warnings from Friday morning through Saturday afternoon, the weather said. That will be the first blizzard warning issued by the weather service’s Los Angeles office since 1989, it said.

“Nearly (the) entire population of California will be able to see snow from some vantage point later this week if they look in the right direction,” according to Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the University of California, Los Angeles. “Snow remains very unlikely in California’s major cities, but it’ll fall quite nearby.”

The National Weather Service in San Diego has issued a blizzard warning for the San Bernardino County mountains from 4 a.m. local time Friday to 4 p.m. Saturday. It’s the first blizzard warning ever issued by the San Diego office, the weather service tweeted.

In the San Bernardino mountains, total snow accumulations of 3 to 5 feet are likely above 5,000 feet. Snow totals of 1 to 3 feet are possible between 4,000 and 5,000 feet. The snow combined with wind gusts of 50 to 60 mph will create visibilities near zero.

Meanwhile, the Southeast will continue to see unusually high temperatures Thursday – as high as 30 to 40 degrees above normal – after more than 30 daily record highs were recorded there and parts of the Appalachians and lower Midwest on Wednesday. More than 80 such records could be broken Thursday.

The dueling winter storm and southern heat wave created a stark 100-degree temperature difference between the Northern Rockies and the South earlier this week.

The treacherous winter storm conditions across wide swaths of the western and northern US have caused major disruptions to daily life in some areas, and prompted local officials to issue warnings against venturing out onto the roads.

More than 680 flights within, into or out of the US scheduled have been canceled Thursday, according to the tracking site FlightAware. That’s following more than 1,600 flight cancellations Wednesday.

Since the storm began Monday evening, cumulative snowfall has reached dozens of inches in some cities, including 48 inches in Battle Lake, Wyoming, 32 inches in Dupuyer, Montana, and 29 inches in Park City, Utah.

Areas of California that rarely see snow could get significant snowfall beginning Thursday, as heavy rain and mountain snow begin to develop in parts of the state, the weather service said. Additionally, flood watches have been issued for lower-elevation areas, including Los Angeles.

Hazardous conditions have led to safety measures being implemented in multiple states.

• Wisconsin airport preemptively closed: Green Bay’s international airport canceled the remainder of its daily flights Wednesday evening and most of its flights Thursday morning.

• Road closures in several states: Perilous conditions triggered highway closures on several states Wednesday, including South Dakota, Wyoming, Arizona, North Dakota and Minnesota.

• Maine government offices closed: Gov. Janet Mills announced that state offices would be closed Thursday as the storm “is expected to bring significant snowfall to most of the state,” her office said in a release.

After Wednesday brought warmer than usual winter air across the Southeast on Wednesday, Thursday will offer some of the same.

Dozens of record highs are expected on Thursday from Ohio to Florida. Highs could be as much as 35 degrees above normal for parts of the Southeast, Mid-Atlantic and Ohio Valley.

Dozens of record daily highs were reached or tied Wednesday, including 98 degrees in McAllen, Texas, and 87 degrees in Naples, Florida. In Atlanta, Georgia, a record was set for the month of February with 81 degrees, which is the city’s typical average high in mid-May.

By the end of the week, more than 100 record highs are possible stretching from the Gulf of Mexico up to the Great Lakes.

The region also experienced severe storms throughout the Mississippi River Valley on Wednesday, with over 30 storms reported across the region.

Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated which city reached 87 degrees Wednesday. It was Naples, Florida.

CNN
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When Marguerite Richards made a TikTok bragging about her father’s decade-old thriller novel, she was hoping to rouse a little interest. A few dozen new readers, maybe. As the first few positive comments started rolling in, she was pleased to have done something nice for a dad who definitely deserved it.

She had no idea that, within a matter of days, millions of people would see her video, and her father’s book would rocket to the top of Amazon’s Best Seller list.

Lloyd Devereux Richards first published “Stone Maidens” in 2012. It’s a thriller about an FBI agent following a killer in Indiana and, by his daughter’s account, it’s quite good. However, the publishing industry is a fickle mistress, and the original release failed to drum up excitement.

It’s a different world now, with TikTok and other tight-knit book communities rocketing titles to fame overnight. Richards, the daughter, decided to try her luck.

“I saw how much time and effort and passion my dad put into his book. I know what a lovely storyteller he is,” she told CNN. “He never stopped writing, and he always stayed positive.”

Whether it was the gripping thriller, the author’s unassuming Vermont mien, or the efforts of a proud, tech-savvy daughter, the story of Lloyd Devereux Richards and “Stone Maidens” struck a chord.

Marguerite Richards posted the first TikTok about “Stone Maidens” about two weeks ago. It has since received 48 million views and innumerable positive responses. As every good story needs a sequel, Richards posted more videos of her father, the author of the hour, delighting in his unexpected success.

This particular episode falls under a social media genre best described as “Young people giving their elders love and recognition on a platform the latter doesn’t understand.” It’s a fruitful one, full of parents just like Lloyd Devereux Richards who wake up one morning to find their talents, hobbies or peculiar habits have been broadcast to the world – and won them legions of admirers.

“My dad wasn’t really sure what TikTok is, but he has been so pleased and grateful,” Richards says. “I love how people are appreciating him. Even some brands have commented. A few weeks ago, these people didn’t know who he was. And now the Tootsie Roll account is cheering him on.”

The experience has breathed new life into a labor of love. It’s also driven home some lessons about inspiration and determination.

“A lot of people who are struggling with a project, who thought they were way off track, this has given them the inspiration to recharge,” Richards says. “Everyone can relate to the feeling of being a late bloomer.”

At the same time, the duo has been overwhelmed by the kindness and open-mindedness of millions of strangers.

“We can see the analytics of who’s following and watching us. We read as many comments as we can,” Richards says. “There are young people who have said they’ve never bought a book for pleasure, or they don’t read a lot. And now they’re sitting down, they’re reading and they’re loving it.”

“My dad is thrilled that young people are reading.”

Now, Lloyd Devereux Richards has more than 360,000 TikTok followers and a brand new story to tell. He has plans for the future, too, though it would be very un-authorly of him to give them all away at once.

CNN
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House Republicans had hoped to pass a narrow border security bill within the first two weeks of their new majority, notching an easy win and delivering on a key campaign promise in the process.

But a three-page bill from conservative Texas Rep. Chip Roy has run into fierce opposition from moderates, forcing GOP leaders back to the drawing board and exposing deep divisions in the party along the way.

The party’s struggles to pass a messaging bill that’s dead on arrival in the Democratic-controlled Senate — and on an issue that uniformly excites the GOP’s base, no less — underscores the challenges of governing in a razor-thin majority, and dashes whatever hopes there were for a bipartisan package to address border security and reform the nation’s broken immigration system.

For his part, Speaker Kevin McCarthy has defended the House GOP’s inaction on border security thus far, arguing it’s still early in their new majority and reiterating that Republicans are committed to addressing the issue. The California Republican made his first trip to the southern border last week as speaker, while Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee are slated to hold a field hearing Thursday afternoon in Yuma, Arizona, on what they describe as “the Biden border crisis.”

“Committees have just now been constituted, not all of them have even been constituted. So I don’t think it’s really an opportunity to say you haven’t acted,” McCarthy said during a news conference in the Tucson Sector, near a stretch of border wall. “This isn’t my first trip. This is my sixth trip. … So no, Republicans have been taking action. We’ve got a lot of ideas inside Congress.”

But the GOP’s early internal disagreement over the issue of border security has inflamed tensions between the party’s moderates and conservatives, even as Republicans are united in their belief that the record level of migrant encounters along the border amounts to a crisis.

In a sign of how tense things have become, a staffer for Roy recently blasted out an op-ed to other congressional offices that was critical of GOP Rep. Tony Gonzales, a moderate who represents a Texas border district and has been an outspoken opponent of Roy’s border bill, according to a screenshot of the email shared with CNN. The op-ed, written by a conservative advocacy group, dubbed Gonzales a “RINO” and accused him of “helping Joe Biden undermine our border.” One senior GOP source said the email was “just pouring gasoline on the fire.”

Asked for comment, Gonzales told CNN: “Anyone who thinks a 3 page anti-immigration bill with 0% chance of getting signed into law is going to solve the border crisis should be buying beach front property in AZ.”

Roy had some choice words for the critics of his bill, though he didn’t name names.

“If someone is calling a bill ‘anti-immigrant,’ that carries out the very policies that that same someone has supported in the past,” Roy told CNN, “then that someone should do a long, hard look in the mirror at what they’re trying to sell their constituents and the rest of the American people.”

As House Republicans struggle to unite behind a border bill, Democrats have their own internal disagreements over immigration policy. The Biden administration released a new rule Tuesday that largely bars migrants who traveled through other countries on their way to the US-Mexico border from applying for asylum in the United States, marking a departure from decadeslong protocol. The Biden policy has garnered wide condemnation from Democratic lawmakers and immigrant advocates.

As part of his bid to win the speaker’s gavel, McCarthy promised to pass a border security plan. His top deputy, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, outlined a dozen bills and resolutions in December that were supposed to come straight to the floor within the first two weeks of the new Congress, while committees were still being organized.

That included a three-page measure from Roy, dubbed the “Border Safety and Security Act,” which would allow the Homeland Security secretary to turn away migrants at the border if it was deemed necessary to maintain “operational control” of the border.

But the bill — which was initially seen as a straightforward measure that could be quickly moved on the floor — rankled the party’s moderate and Hispanic lawmakers, who worry it would block legitimate asylum claims. Republican leaders, who can only afford to lose four votes on any partisan bills, yanked the bill from tentative floor consideration and instead promised to move it through the normal committee process, hoping to assuage those members’ concerns that way.

Yet the Roy bill, which has over 60 co-sponsors, has remained stalled, with skeptics unmoved in their opposition to the measure. Now the House Judiciary Committee is exploring a broader package focused on border security and protecting border communities, senior GOP sources tell CNN, which they hope can win wider consensus in the conference. But even if Republicans are able to move it through the House, such a measure is unlikely to be considered in the Senate.

Roy said there’s a lot of “misinformation” about his border plan, and rebutted the notion it would ban legitimate asylum seekers – though he did acknowledge it would make it more difficult to claim asylum and get quickly released into the United States. He also said he’d be willing to make some tweaks to the bill, but not if the end result is watered down.

“I’m open to words that will clear up that which I don’t think needs to be cleared up,” Roy said, in reference to the claims that his bill would ban asylum seekers. “So long as it doesn’t change the purpose of the bill: which is to ensure that people are not being released into the United States until they’ve been processed and adjudicated as having an actual, credible fear of persecution.”

Some moderates said they still harbor some resentment toward the 20 House GOP rebels – a group Roy was a part of – who initially opposed McCarthy’s speakership, forcing him to make a number of concessions, many of which benefited the holdouts.

“There’s deep anger across the conference on the 20 who hurt the team in early January. Deep resentment,” one GOP lawmaker told CNN. “Folks don’t want to lift a finger for them.”

Perhaps the GOP’s best opportunity to address the border will be in upcoming spending fights, since House Republicans will actually have leverage now that they are in power. But it could also take the government to the brink of a shutdown — and some conservatives are already agitating for a fight.

“Don’t think for a minute that I’m all that inclined to fund a government that isn’t securing the border,” Roy said.

In the absence of legislative momentum, House Republicans have continued to move ahead with their messaging efforts to call attention to problems at the southern border.

The field hearing in Yuma hosted by House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan, marks the third Republican-led trip to the border so far this year. The House committee on Energy and Commerce and McCarthy both led trips to the border last week, just a day apart. The House committee on Homeland Security also has an upcoming trip, billed a “border bootcamp” for Republican freshman members, while the House committee on Oversight and Accountability is also planning something for the near future as well, a source familiar with the plans tells CNN.

In a sign of the intense focus on trips, House Judiciary Republicans have requested $262,400 for travel this Congress, compared to the $7,986 the committee spent on travel in 2022 in the last Congress when the House was under Democratic control, a Democratic committee source tells CNN.

Back in Washington, DC, both the House Oversight and Judiciary committees have held hearings on the border. And both committees have sent a flurry of requests for documents and interviews to the Department of Homeland Security. The House Homeland Security panel will dedicate its first full committee hearing to the border next week.

In preparation for a slew of field hearings, the House Administration committee put together a field hearing guide, in consultation with various House offices, which was provided to Republican committee staff, a senior aide told CNN. Titled “Running an Effective Committee Field Hearing,” the purpose of the memo was to sync House Republicans on a variety of fronts including technical specifics about livestreaming, best practices for communication strategy, and what to consider when choosing a location site.

House Republicans contend that multiple committee hearings and border trips reflect an aggressive strategy in their effort to build a public case against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who according to a department spokesperson has already testified before Congress more than any other Biden administration cabinet secretary, and the Biden administration at large.

GOP Rep. Kelly Armstrong, who serves on both the Energy and Commerce and Oversight panels, told CNN that “the only way we have a chance to break through is by coordinating and keeping the pressure constant.”

“Nobody overlapped. Everybody is working hard to make sure we are communicating with each other” Armstrong said. “And we are forcing the Democrats to respond.”

House Democrats and the Biden administration, however, view the multitude of trips and hearings as political stunts.

The top Democrat on the House Homeland Security committee, Rep. Bennie Thompson, said in a statement to CNN, “it’s clear that House Republicans have gotten ahead of themselves with their proposed anti-immigrant legislation and so-called border oversight. Republicans are eager to make trips to the southwest border, but seem unwilling to do the actual work necessary to address the challenges we face.”

Democratic Rep. Henry Cuellar, who hosted House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries in his Texas border town last week, told CNN, “For me, being from the border, I wonder how much all of this border activity at the end of the day that the Republicans are doing will actually become law? Or is it more trying to get publicity?”

But, Cuellar is not surprised by the numerous trips.

“It’s really a byproduct of their political campaign that they ran this last November in many ways,” he said.

White House spokesperson for oversight Ian Sams told CNN that instead of working with President Joe Biden on the immigration reform bill he proposed, “House Republicans driven by their most extreme MAGA members are wasting time on politically motivated stunts.”

The messaging battle has left each side to dig in with their respective camps. House Judiciary Democrats are not attending Jordan’s Thursday field hearing, over scheduling disagreements. Instead, an outside Democratic messaging group, the Congressional Integrity Project, will station a mobile billboard ad outside of Jordan’s field hearing in Yuma attempting to discredit Judiciary Republican efforts.

CNN
 — 

These are the surprising and personal stories, lost and hidden in America’s past, hosted by CNN’s Abby Phillip, Suzanne Malveaux, Omar Jimenez, Athena Jones, Ryan Young, John Avlon and more. Knowing these stories might reshape your understanding of the disparities the country faces today.

150 years ago, Republicans fought hard for Black voter turnout

By Channon Hodge, Ken Borland and Frank Fenimore, CNN

On April 11, 1865, President Abraham Lincoln delivered what would be his last speech from a window at the White House to the crowd below. They had gathered there expecting a celebratory speech on Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee’s surrender to Ulysses S. Grant just two days earlier.

But that evening, Lincoln’s speech was about Reconstruction, readmitting Louisiana into the Union and a proposal for “giving the benefit of public schools equally to Black and White, and empowering the Legislature to confer the elective franchise upon the colored man.”

Plantation-owning elites, Southern Democrats and White supremacists, however, would not easily concede political power to those who had so recently been their slaves. That evening among the crowd of listeners was an enraged John Wilkes Booth, who would go on to assassinate the President just three days later at Ford’s Theatre.

For decades after Lincoln’s death, White supremacists would wage a war of intimidation, murder and massacre on anyone, Black or White, who dared covet a share of their power. Yet, Black people persisted.

And between 1865 and 1880, over 1,500 Black men took political office; most not for long, as their efforts were cut down by mobs of violent White men.

1868 Louisiana – African Americans participated in Constitutional Conventions like this across the South where delegates argued over Union demands, drew up new laws and elected new leadership.

Oscar James Dunn was one of those determined men. He became the country’s first Black lieutenant governor in Louisiana in 1868 serving under Henry Clay Warmoth on the Republican ticket. Dunn’s first legislative address showed hope and restraint:

“As to myself and my people, we are not seeking social equality. That is a thing no law can govern,” said Dunn. “We simply ask to be allowed an equal chance in the race of life.”

Oscar Dunn died mysteriously in office only four years later…

The story continues…

By Channon Hodge, Breeanna Hare, Tami Luhby and CNN Staff

As the Civil War neared its end, Union General William Sherman had been convinced that newly emancipated slaves needed their own land to secure their freedom. He issued Special Field Order No. 15, setting aside 400,000 coastal acres of land for Black families and stating that, “…no white person whatever, unless military officers and soldiers detailed for duty, will be permitted to reside.” A provision was added later for mules.

In three months, the potential of Sherman’s order vanished with a single shot. That April, President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated, and in the fall President Andrew Johnson reversed Sherman’s order, allowing Confederate planters to regain the land. It demonstrated a ruthless appropriation that would be repeated for decades to come.

Still, Black Americans created pockets of wealth during the Reconstruction years and into the early 20th century. Yet where Black Americans created a refuge, White Americans pushed back through political maneuvering and violence.

“We estimate that there were upwards of 100 massacres that took place between the end of the Civil War and the 1940s,” says William Darity Jr., a Duke University economist who co-authored “From Here to Equality: Reparations for Black Americans in the Twenty-First Century,” with writer and folklorist A. Kirsten Mullen. “And they take place North and South, East and West.”

We looked back through research and news clippings, paying particular attention to around 50 racially charged incidents between 1863 and 1923 when people of color lost property or economic opportunity. The events highlighted here reveal how acts of racial violence of different scope played out across the country and targeted various ethnicities. Historians then helped us examine how and why they had occurred and where we still see the impact today…

The story continues here…

This one act locked Black students out of school in a county for 5 years

By Shawna Mizelle, Channon Hodge, Maya Blackstone, John General, Frank Fenimore and Demetrius Pipkin, CNN

Everett R. Berryman Jr. was 11 years old when the Supreme Court handed down the landmark ruling in Brown v. Board of Education, which made racial segregation in public schools illegal.

But supervisors in Prince Edward County, Virginia, where Berryman was attending public school, had no intention of complying. Five years later, in 1959, as Berryman was looking ahead to attending 7th grade, the county shuttered all public schools and opened a private school – for White children only. It would take five years, an intervention by the Department of Justice and another Supreme Court order, before integrated public schooling in Prince Edward County proceeded.

Around the same time, in North Carolina, Dr. E.B. Palmer was working as the executive secretary of state for the North Carolina Teachers Association, advocating for Black teachers after Brown was decided.

“When the school system said ‘separate but equal,’ that was fine,” Palmer recalled to CNN. “But when we moved a little further, they tried to say, ‘We don’t want Black teachers teaching White students.’”

Nearly 40,000 teaching positions held by Black teachers in 17 southern and border states would be lost in the ensuring years, according to Samuel B. Ethridge, a National Education Association official who was a leader in the movement to integrate teacher organizations during the civil rights movement.

The story continues here…

This 15-year-old was the original Rosa Parks

By Brandon Tensley, Skylar Mitchell, Deborah Brunswick, Janelle Gonzalez, Abby Phillip, Jeff Simon and Cassie Spodak, CNN

Claudette Colvin did a revolutionary act nearly 10 months before Rosa Parks.

In March 1955, the 15-year-old was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a White person on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama.

The teenager and others challenged the law in court. But civil rights leaders, pointing to circumstances in Colvin’s personal life, thought that Parks would be the better representative of the movement.

“People said I was crazy,” Colvin recently told CNN’s Abby Phillip. “Because I was 15 years old and defiant and shouting, ‘It’s my constitutional right!’ “

The story continues here…

90-year-old former Senator: Fighting racism relies on White people

By Amir Vera, Bryce Urbany and Cassie Spodak, CNN

In 1968, President Lyndon B. Johnson’s National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders – better known as the Kerner Commission – put out a report that attempted to address systemic racism in the US, including police violence against Black people.

A Michigan State police officer searches a youth on Detroit’s 12th Street where looting took place in the 1960s.

A Michigan State police officer searches a youth on Detroit’s 12th Street where looting took place in the 1960s.

The report stated that racism was a major cause of economic and social inequality for Black people and that it was moving the nation toward two societies: “One Black, one White, separate and unequal.” That, coupled with the brutal police treatment of people of color and poverty, helped spark the race riots of the 1960s.

At the time, the commission’s findings shocked many Americans because for the first time, “White racism” was noted as a major cause for the unequal status and living conditions of Black Americans, said the commission’s last surviving member, former Oklahoma Sen. Fred Harris. But the report’s findings and proposed solutions led nowhere.

More than 50 years after the report, Harris, historians and policy experts tell CNN that change will only come when the people have the will and the government is truly honest about what must be done politically, socially and economically to address racial inequality.

Jelani Cobb, historian and co-editor of “The Essential Kerner Commission Report,” tells CNN that people and institutions already know what the problem is and that the only action that needs to be taken now is actually following the recommendations of the commission, and pay the price that comes with it.

“The actions are laid out, you really don’t need more recommendations,” Cobb said. “The fundamental observations (of the commission) have never been acted on.”

The story continues…

Can a formula be racist? She says one put her health at risk

By Jacque Smith, Cassie Spodak, Jessi Esparza and Natalia V. Osipova, CNN

When she first learned about race correction, Naomi Nkinsi was one of five Black medical students in her class at the University of Washington.

Nkinsi remembers the professor talking about an equation doctors use to measure kidney function. The professor said eGFR equations adjust for several variables, including the patient’s age, sex and race. When it comes to race, doctors have only two options: Black or “Other.”

Nkinsi was dumbfounded.

“It was really shocking to me,” says Nkinsi, now a third-year medical and masters of public health student, “to come into school and see that not only is there interpersonal racism between patients and physicians … there’s actually racism built into the very algorithms that we use.”

At the heart of a controversy brewing in America’s hospitals is a simple belief, medical students say: Math shouldn’t be racist.

The argument over race correction has raised questions about the scientific data doctors rely on to treat people of color. It’s attracted the attention of Congress and led to a big lawsuit against the NFL.

What happens next could affect how millions of Americans are treated…

The story continues…

How the KKK’s failures became lessons for White power

How an 1800s surgeon experimenting on enslaved Black women affects the anti-abortion movement