Posted on November 15, 2011

White House Releases Report Outlining How It’s Helped Blacks

Jorge Rivas, Color Lines, November 14, 2011

The Obama administration recently unveiled a 44-page report called “The President’s Agenda and the African American Community” that highlights policies that the White House says have benefited black people. It is, in some respects, an answer to critics who’ve argued that the president hasn’t done enough to address the harsh economic realities in black communities.

The Root’s Cynthia Gordy points out that last week’s report highlights many of the same policies in “Creating Pathways to Opportunity,” the report released last month that outlined how the administration has helped low-income Americans. According to the new report, the Recovery Act and its later expansions kept 1.3 million African Americans above the poverty line in 2010 alone, while this year the administration’s Earned Income Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit has benefited 2.2 million black families and nearly half of all black children.

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Other efforts the report identifies as having a disproportionately positive impact on African Americans include subsidized jobs programs, increased funding for Pell Grants, mortgage-modification plans for distressed homeowners and health care reform, according to Gordy’s story at The Root.

The President’s Agenda and the African American Community