Pop superstar Beyonce broke the record for most career wins at music’s Grammy awards on Sunday but lost again in the prestigious album of the year category, this time to British singer Harry Styles.

Beyonce added four Grammys to her collection, bringing her lifetime total to 32 and surpassing the tally of late classical conductor Georg Solti. She was nominated for nine awards this year.

Despite her success through the years, the 41-year-old “Break My Soul” singer has never claimed the best album trophy with any of her four nominations in the category. Styles took home that honor on Sunday for “Harry’s House.”

“I’ve been so inspired by every artist in this category,” a surprised Styles said as he accepted the award. “On nights like tonight, it’s obviously so important for us to remember that there is no such thing as best in music.”

Styles had thrilled the crowd with a performance of his hit single “As It Was,” sparkling in a silver fringe jumpsuit.

The former “One Direction” singer triumphed over a formidable list of album contenders that included Beyonce, Puerto Rican rapper Bad Bunny, singer and flutist Lizzo, British vocalist Adele and disco-era Swedish hitmaker ABBA.

Beyonce took the stage as she secured the all-time Grammy record with her award for best dance/electronic album for “Renaissance.”

“I am trying not to be too emotional. I am trying just to receive this night,” Beyonce said. “I want to thank God for protecting me. Thank you, God.”

She also thanked her family and “the queer community for your love and for inventing the genre.”

Earlier, Beyonce was absent when she was named the winner of best R&B song for “Cuff It.” Host Trevor Noah said the singer was stuck in traffic. He later handed her the trophy at her seat in the audience.

Grammy voters spread the top awards among several artists.

Lizzo’s upbeat “About Damn Time” won record of the year.

She dedicated the award to Prince, saying the late artist had inspired her to make positive music. Lizzo also saluted Beyonce and recalled how she skipped out of school in fifth grade to see the “Halo” singer in concert.

“You clearly are the artist of our lives,” Lizzo said.

Blues singer Bonnie Raitt’s “Just Like That,” about an organ donor, won song of the year, one of her three awards on Sunday.

BEYONCE FANS AGGRIEVED

Winners were chosen by roughly 11,000 members of the Recording Academy, which has faced complaints that it has failed to give proper recognition to Black artists. The group has taken steps in recent years to diversify its membership and overhaul voting procedures.

Fans of Beyonce flooded social media on Sunday, making the word “ROBBED” a trending topic on Twitter. “Beyonce has yet again been robbed,” Twitter user @coreynmarie wrote.

The ceremony aired live on the CBS television network and streaming service Paramount+.

In other categories, Bad Bunny took home the award for best música urbana album for “Un Verano Sin Ti.”

“I want to dedicate this award to Puerto Rico, the cradle of reggaeton,” Bad Bunny said in a mix of English and Spanish.

For best rap album, Kendrick Lamar triumphed with “Mr. Morale & the Big Steppers.” “I finally found imperfection with this album,” Lamar said.

The ceremony featured a tribute to 50 years of hip-hop with performances by an all-star linuep of artists ranging from Public Enemy to Busta Rhymes, Queen Latifah and Missy Elliott.

American jazz singer Samara Joy was named best new artist.

“Oh my gosh. I’ve been watching you all on TV for so long,” she said. “All of you are so inspiring to me.”

U.S. first lady Jill Biden presented a new honor for a song that tackles social issues. That accolade went to Iranian singer and songwriter Shervin Hajipour for “Baraye,” which Biden called a “powerful and poetic call for freedom and women’s rights.”

(Reporting by Lisa Richwine and Danielle Broadway; Editing by Mary Milliken and Stephen Coates)

BY AMANDA BREEN 

“The world was in shambles,” Prosperity Market co-founder Carmen Dianne says, recalling the pandemic and social unrest of 2020. “It was really hard to see everything that was happening, to know that 41% of Black-owned businesses were closing. The grocery store lines were so long, just getting food was even more difficult than it had been previously.”

Dianne and her friend Kara Still didn’t want to stand by amid the tumult — so they took action.

At the time, neither Dianne nor Still had experience in the food industry. Dianne was a makeup artist; Still worked as a fashion designer. Yet coming into the food space “with fresh eyes” has been advantageous for the co-founders, who’ve been ready to question and challenge things from the start.

Entrepreneur sat down with Dianne and Still to learn how they built Prosperity Market while navigating an industry that was entirely new to them — and hear about the exciting initiative they have planned next.

Black business owners suffered the greatest earnings losses during the Covid-19 pandemic.

More than 800,000 Los Angeles County households (almost a quarter of the total), experienced food insecurity over the 12 months ending July 2022, up from 17% in 2021, according to a study released by Public Exchange.

And a report from the U.S. Small Business Administration found that Black business owners suffered the greatest earnings losses during the Covid-19 pandemic: They lost between 11% and 28% while white business owners saw decreases in the 2-15% range.

Dianne and Still came up with a two-pronged approach to tackle the problems of food insecurity and economic instability in the LA area. They’d take healthful and affordable food options directly into the communities that needed them — and partner with Black businesses and farmers to make it happen.

The co-founders’ vision was clear from the start: They wanted to launch a mobile trailer, largely inspired by Dianne’s days as a makeup artist on set, where snack trailers were common, to transport the products to local communities.

But as newcomers to the food space, they had to contend with unknowns along the way, and they soon realized that such an ambitious endeavor would require the kind of funding that would only come once they started to prove themselves. That’s when they landed on the idea for the pop-up markets.

The co-founders consider the required pivot a “blessing in disguise,” as it allowed them to familiarize themselves with the market, connect with vendors and build relationships with different communities.

“Because we hadn’t intended to start this, it wasn’t like we had a business savings fund.”

In the first six months after they came up with the idea for Prosperity Market, the co-founders had to learn how to do it all — from getting permits to finding funding.

“[Funding] took some figuring out,” Still says, “because we hadn’t intended to start this, it wasn’t like we had a business savings fund. So really what it looked like once we were getting started was friends and family outreach.”

The inaugural market opened in February 2021, and in the lead-up to launch, Dianne and Still prepared relentlessly, researching everything from farmers to food to economics.

Dianne and Still also crafted an aesthetic to help Prosperity Market stand apart from traditional farmers markets. “[Our creative backgrounds] informed our branding and the experience that we want to create, and the theme, continuity and way we show up,” Still explains.

But one thing the co-founders hadn’t banked on? Just how difficult it would be to find Black farmers.

“It was like, Okay, we need more Black-owned businesses,” Dianne says. “We need essential Black-owned businesses — we’ll find Black farmers. And then we had trouble doing that, and we had to learn about the history of Black farmers and why it was this way. So that added another layer to our work.”

“You can get your hot food and shop for your groceries and produce all at the same time.”

Through it all, the co-founders’ dedication, flexibility and creativity have helped Prosperity Market gain traction and find success.

As word about Prosperity Market spread, friends and family continued to support Dianne and Still’s venture — and so did their other fans. In 2022, the co-founders launched a crowdfunding campaign on the platform Fund Black Founders with the help of a grant from the JLH Social Impact Fund.

It was a triumph and allowed them to raise enough money to fund the mobile trailer they’d dreamed up at the beginning of their journey.

“That was such a transformational experience for us,” Dianne says. “It taught us a lot. It is not for the faint of heart, let me tell you, but we did it: We raised over $111,000 for our mobile trailer.”

The long-awaited trailer will be 48 feet long with a farmers market that’s set up to look like a produce aisle with shelves full of goods, and a kitchen in the back, which Prosperity Market will rent out to different chefs and food entrepreneurs.

“So it’s a pop-up food truck all in one trailer,” Dianne says. “You can get your hot food and shop for your groceries and produce all at the same time.”

“It takes something to be able to pull yourself up every day, no matter how things are going.”

As the co-founders look to Prosperity Market’s exciting future, they consider capacity one of the greatest hurdles they’ll have to overcome.

“We have all the ideas in the world,'” Dianne says. “There’s so much we want to do, but then [we] have to execute it, and we just need more operating capital.”

“Because everything takes time,” Still adds. “You write it down, plan it out, strategize and then [it takes] time to actually execute, and there’s always things that come up, and with such a small team, we can only do so much at once.”

The road to Prosperity Market has had its twists and turns, teaching the co-founders the value of practicing patience every day in all areas of their lives.

“You’ll need patience with that vision, patience with all of the different types of people that you’ll be working with and patience with yourself,” Still explains, “because it is not an easy process. It takes something to be able to pull yourself up every day, no matter how things are going, because no one makes your schedule but you.”

It also underscored the importance of having a solid support system along the way.

“We have great mentors and advisors and people we can go to when we get stumped with something,” Dianne says. “We have a supportive community of people who want to see us win. And if it was not for that, I don’t know that we would be continuing this.”

• News

by reuters

January 30, 2023

Memphis Disbands Police Unit After Fatal Beating as Protesters Take to Streets

---

By Maria Cardona and Diane Bartz

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (Reuters) -The specialized police unit that included the five Memphis officers charged with the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols was disbanded on Saturday as more protests took place in U.S. cities a day after a harrowing video of the attack was released.

The police department said in a statement it was permanently deactivating the SCORPION unit after the police chief spoke with members of Nichols’ family, community leaders, and other officers. A police spokesperson confirmed all five officers were members of the unit.

Video recordings from police body-worn cameras and a camera mounted on a utility pole showed Nichols, a 29-year-old Black man, repeatedly screaming “Mom!” as officers kicked, punched and struck him with a baton in his mother’s neighborhood after a Jan. 7 traffic stop. He was hospitalized and died of his injuries three days later.

Five officers involved in the beating, all Black, were charged on Thursday with murder, assault, kidnapping and other charges. All have been dismissed from the department.

Nichols’ family and officials expressed outrage and sorrow but urged protesters to remain peaceful. That request was largely heeded on Friday when scattered protests broke out in Memphis – where marchers briefly blocked an interstate highway – and elsewhere.

Cities across the United States saw renewed nonviolent demonstrations on Saturday. In Memphis, protesters chanting, “Whose streets? Our streets!” angrily catcalled a police car that was monitoring the march, with several making obscene gestures. Some cheered loudly when they learned of the disbandment of SCORPION.

Hundreds of protesters gathered in New York’s Washington Square Park before marching through Manhattan, as columns of police officers walked alongside them.

Taken together, the four video clips released Friday showed police pummeling Nichols even though he appeared to pose no threat. The initial traffic stop was for reckless driving, though the police chief has said the cause for the stop has not been substantiated.

The SCORPION unit, short for the Street Crimes Operation to Restore Peace in our Neighborhoods, was formed in October 2021 to concentrate on crime hot spots. Critics say such specialized teams can be prone to abusive tactics.

Friends and family say Nichols was an affable, talented skateboarder who grew up in Sacramento, California, and moved to Memphis before the coronavirus pandemic. The father of a 4-year-old child, Nichols worked at FedEx and had recently enrolled in a photography class.

Nate Spates Jr., 42, was part of a circle of friends, including Nichols, who met up at a Starbucks in the area.

“He liked what he liked, and he marched to the beat of his own drum,” Spates said, remembering that Nichols would go to a park called Shelby Farms to watch the sunset when he wasn’t working a late shift.

Nichols’ death is the latest high-profile instance of police using excessive force against Black people and other minorities. The 2020 murder of George Floyd, a Black man who died after a white Minneapolis officer knelt on his neck for more than nine minutes, galvanized worldwide protests over racial injustice.

(Reporting by Maria Cardona in Memphis, Tennessee, and Diane Bartz in Washington; Writing by Joseph Ax; Editing by Cynthia Osterman, Robert Birsel)

By Jarrett Renshaw and Jeff Mason

(Reuters) -U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan is considering stepping down, according to four sources familiar with the matter.

Regan has been thinking seriously about departing and has been exploring options outside the Biden administration but has not made any decisions, one source said.

“No plans imminently, but I do know it’s been on the radar screen for the past few weeks,” the source said.

The EPA said Regan had no plans to depart.

“The administrator doesn’t have any plans to step down. He’s committed to continuing to advance President Biden’s historic climate and environmental agenda,” said Maria Michalos, an EPA spokesperson and one of Regan’s top aides.

The EPA is the main agency responsible for environmental regulation, and Regan has been leading it at a crucial time in President Joe Biden’s agenda to curb climate change.

The agency is expected to roll out complex regulations on power plant emissions of greenhouse gases and toxic pollutants in March. The agency must race to finish them in about 18 months, before the next general election.

The EPA, which has about 17,500 employees, is still suffering from the exit of many scientists and policy workers during the administration of Donald Trump.

Billions of dollars are flowing to the agency after last year’s passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, for programs including the $27 billion green bank, which will offer grants to disadvantaged communities to deploy solar and other programs to cut emissions and provide jobs.

Regan, the first Black man to run EPA began designing the green bank in October.

The White House has been preparing for departures of senior staff, including at the cabinet level. White House chief of staff Ron Klain is expected to leave after Biden’s State of the Union address in February, to be replaced by Jeff Zients, Biden’s former COVID-19 response coordinator.

(Reporting by Jarrett Renshaw and Jeff Mason; additional reporting by Timothy Gardner, Editing by Gerry Doyle)

• News

by reuters

January 24, 2023

Fatal Memphis Traffic Stop Reminiscent of Rodney King Assault, Attorney Crump Says

---

By Daniel Trotta and Tyler Clifford

(Reuters) – The video of Memphis police beating a Black man who died after a traffic stop on Jan. 7 reminded civil rights attorney Ben Crump of the assault on Rodney King, Crump said after viewing the police bodycam recording with the man’s family on Monday.

Tyre Nichols, a 29-year-old father of a 4-year-old boy, died in the hospital on Jan. 10 of injuries he sustained during his arrest by five officers, all of whom have been fired.

“He was defenseless the entire time. He was a human pinata for those police officers,” attorney Antonio Romanucci, Crump’s co-counsel, told reporters.

“It was an unadulterated, unabashed, nonstop beating of this young boy for three minutes. That is what we saw in that video,” he said, adding, “There were multiple uses of force against him.”

The attorneys said local, state and federal investigators promised to release the bodycam video to the public within a week or two. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigations, FBI and Justice Department are investigating the incident in addition to Memphis police and the Shelby County District attorney.

The police department determined after its investigation that the officers violated multiple policies, including using excessive force, failing to intervene and failing to render aid.

Crump said the video reminded him of the landmark video of Los Angeles police beating King in 1991, sparking violent protests and reforms in the department.

“Regrettably, it reminded us of (the) Rodney King video,” said Crump, who previously represented the families of George Floyd and Trayvon Martin. “Regrettably, unlike Rodney King, Tyre didn’t survive.”

The last words heard on the video were Nichols calling for his mother three times, Crump said.

“He was less than 80 yards (73 meters) away when they murdered him. Yes, I say murder,” said Nichols’ mother, RowVaughn Wells.

People who knew Nichols said he was an accomplished skateboarder who had recently enrolled in a photography class and came home to his mother during his lunch break from his job at FedEx.

“My son didn’t do no drugs. He didn’t carry no guns. He didn’t like confrontation. None of that. That’s why this is so hard,” she said.

Memphis police are cooperating, said Chief Cerelyn Davis.

“Transparency remains a priority in this incident, and a premature release (of the video) could adversely impact the criminal investigation and the judicial process,” she said.

Relatives told WREG television it was especially hurtful because all the officers involved were Black.

Crump said he has found that the race of the citizen in these cases tends to the determining factor in the amount of excessive force exerted, not that of the officers involved.

Memphis police on Friday identified the former officers as Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Emmitt Martin III, Desmond Mills, Jr., and Justin Smith. Each had served with the department about 2-1/2 to 5 years.

A photo of a bloodied, intubated Nichols released to the public helped fuel multiple days of protests and calls of “Justice for Tyre” in Memphis, a city of 630,000 that is 65% Black.

(Reporting by Tyler Clifford in New York and Daniel Trotta in Carlsbad, Calif.; Editing by Lisa Shumaker and Bill Berkrot)

By Jonathan Stempel

(Reuters) -A federal judge on Monday dismissed a lawsuit by three former Whole Foods employees who said they had been illegally fired for opposing the upscale grocery chain’s alleged discriminatory discipline of workers who wore “Black Lives Matter” masks.

U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs in Boston found little evidence to refute Whole Foods’ “legitimate business explanations” for strictly enforcing the dress code, and no significant evidence it had targeted the plaintiffs by firing them in the summer of 2020.

“The evidence demonstrates only that Whole Foods did not strenuously enforce the dress code policy until mid-2020, and that when it increased enforcement, it did so uniformly,” Burroughs wrote in a 28-page decision.

“This holding is not about the importance of the Black Lives Matter message, the value of plaintiffs’ advocacy in wearing the masks, the valor of their speaking out against what they perceived to be discrimination in their workplace, or the quality of Whole Foods’ decision-making,” the judge added.

Whole Foods, part of Amazon.com Inc, has long maintained that it adopted its dress code–which also covered visible slogans, logos and ads–to foster a welcoming, safe and inclusive shopping environment.

Burroughs said the former employees Haley Evans, Savannah Kinzer and Christopher Michno could not claim protection from retaliation under Title VII of the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Lawyers for the plaintiffs did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Whole Foods said it was pleased with the lawsuit’s dismissal.

In June, the federal appeals court in Boston upheld Burroughs’ February 2021 dismissal of a proposed class action over the dress code, though on somewhat different legal grounds than hers.

The Black Lives Matter movement started after police killed several Black people in the United States.

A video showing the May 2020 killing of George Floyd by a police officer sparked nationwide protests about racial injustice.

Whole Foods had employed Evans in a Marlton, New Jersey, store, while Kinzer worked in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Michno in Berkeley, California.

The case is Kinzer et al v Whole Foods Market Inc, U.S. District Court, District of Massachusetts, No. 20-11358.

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Leslie Adler and Bradley Perrett)

By Sharon Bernstein

(Reuters) – Florida will not allow high school students to take a new Advanced Placement (AP) class in African American Studies, saying in a letter to College Board, the nonprofit that develops the courses, that the pilot version “lacks educational value.”

The letter to the educational nonprofit – which runs the Advanced Placement Program – was the latest move by the conservative administration of Republican Governor Ron DeSantis to criticize and even outlaw some educational efforts about racism and slavery.

The College Board administers the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) and Advanced Placement tests that help students gain college credit while in high school. It is developing its first African American Studies course through a pilot program at 60 high schools.

“As presented, the content of this course is inexplicably contrary to Florida law and significantly lacks educational value,” reads the Jan. 12 letter by Florida’s Office of Articulation and posted on Twitter by an ABC News journalist.

Florida is one of several states that have banned public schools from teaching “Critical Race Theory,” an academic framework that teaches “racism is more than the result of individual bias and prejudice. It is embedded in laws, policies and institutions that uphold and reproduce racial inequalities,” according to the NAACP. Some conservatives view teaching this as inaccurate and harmful.

In its letter, the Florida Department of Education (FDOE) did not indicate how the interdisciplinary course, which draws on literature, the arts, political science and other disciplines, broke state law or lacked educational value.

However, the letter went on to say that the state might reconsider its stance should the content of the course change.

“In the future, should College Board be willing to come back to the table with lawful, historically accurate content, FDOE will always be willing to reopen the discussion,” the letter said.

The move sparked swift backlash among some civil rights activists and Democratic lawmakers who said it was discriminatory.

“Ron DeSantis wants to pretend that Black history isn’t American history. Leaders like him are the reason why Florida has seen a huge surge in hate crimes and acts of racism over the last two years,” said newly elected Florida congressman Maxwell Alejandro Frost.

“The State of Florida will allow AP European and American studies — but AP African-American studies is ‘contrary to Florida law’?” posted Martin Luther King Jr. III on Twitter. “Please explain how this isn’t blatantly racist. Floridians deserve a clear answer.”

The College Board said in a statement to Reuters that the course aims to “explore the vital contributions and experiences of African Americans.” It is a humanities course and as such does not teach theory, the statement said.

The Florida Department of Education did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Reuters on Thursday, or confirm that it had sent the letter rejecting the course.

The College Board did not directly address Florida’s letter. But the nonprofit said in a separate statement to Reuters that the course was still under development.

In a separate move this week, the presidents of Florida’s state college system said they would not provide funding for course or activities that “compel” a belief in Critical Race Theory, without pointing to any specific programs that did.

(Reporting by Sharon Bernstein in Sacramento, California; Editing by Paul Thomasch and Aurora Ellis)

By Nikia White