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The Real Black Panthers (2021)

The Black Panthers march in protest of the trial of co-founder Huey P. Newton in Oakland, California. Bettmann/Getty Images hide caption

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Throughline

The Real Black Panthers (2021)

February 2, 2023 • In 1968, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover said the Black Panther Party "without question, represents the greatest threat to the internal security of the country." And with that declaration he used United States federal law enforcement to wage war on the group. But why did Hoover's FBI target the Black Panther Party more severely than any other Black power organization? Historian Donna Murch says the answer lies in the Panthers' political agenda: not their brash, gun-toting public image, but in their capacity to organize across racial and class lines. It was a strategy that challenged the very foundations of American society. And it was working.

The Real Black Panthers (2021)

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Black Campaign School Seeks To Build Black Political Power

Jessica Byrd, the founder of Three Point Strategies, leads a session on stump speeches at the second annual Black Campaign School in Atlanta, Ga. Asma Khalid/NPR hide caption

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Asma Khalid/NPR

Politics

Black Campaign School Seeks To Build Black Political Power

August 6, 2018 • Roughly 90 percent of elected officials in the United States are white. The Black Campaign School is trying to change those statistics by investing in a new generation of black politicians.

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