08/30/2026
There is nothing I am prouder of than knowing that while others in those rooms were hard-pressed to prove they would fight for Brown, Latino, and other immigrant communities EVEN if it meant minimizing the story of their own people Atalaya Armstrong said:
I’ll be damned. I am a descendant of United States chattel slavery. That history remains unreconciled, and you will not use or distort our story without being corrected.
Whenever they discussed enslavement, the racial wealth gap, or reparations, I made sure our descendants were not manipulated.
And I didn’t need anybody’s vote, a title, an elected position, or permission. I simply went into those rooms and did it.
It took a while, but the rooms shifted. They talk about reparations now, don’t they?
I’m not the only one doing this work, but I have been one of Trenton’s strongest and most consistent voices. I salute every fellow descendant who had to “swing” on everybody in the damn room to stop our history from being used, abused, and weaponized against us.
We are not trapped in victimhood we are the resilient descendants of those who were victimized. Those of us who understand our history, articulate it, and refuse to let it be exploited are ABSOLUTELY a THREAT.
I could have kissed ass and gone along to get along. Conformity would have been easier.
But I said, 🗣Hell NO!
I stood firm, refused to bow, and watched the rooms shift.
That, to me, is leadership.
