Pictured are the late Maryland Democratic Congressman Elijah Cummings (wearing blue suit and tie), and President Donald Trump
Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, Ohio's most read Black digital newspaper and Black blog. Tel: (216) 659-0473 and Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com
CLEVELANDURBNNEWS.COM-BALTIMORE, Maryland- Maryland Congressman Elijah Cummings, a Baltimore Democrat and sharecropper's son who rose from humble beginnings to become a respected and seasoned member of the U.S. House of Representatives, has died at 68, and amid a political fallout with President Donald Trump.
His death comes as the 2020 election nears and Trump faces an impeachment inquiry in the House, impeachment proceedings motivated by his quid pro quo demand for Ukraine leaders to dig up dirt on Democratic front-runner Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden, and relative to an associated complaint from a whistleblower regarding the foreign relations fiasco.
A former member of the Maryland House of Representative and Black federal lawmaker and member of the U.S. House of Representatives since 1996 who led Maryland's largely Black 7th congressional district until his death on Oct 17 at John Hopkins Hospital, and who was passionate in particular about his hometown city of Baltimore, an impoverished city that is roughly is 64 percent Black, Cummings had served as the chair of the Committee on Oversight and Reform since January 2019 at the appointment of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
He had been sick with health problems for a while, sources said.
He was so well respected nationwide that he received 12 honorary doctoral degrees from universities across the United States, most recently an honorary doctorate of public service from the University of Maryland, College Park in 2017
He was also a Civil Rights activist who, as a lawmaker, introduced bills in Congress such as the Presidential and Federal Records Act Amendments of 2014, a bipartisan bill signed into law by President Barack Obama in December 2014, and the All Circuit Review Extension Act, a bill that would extend for three years the authority for federal employees who appeal a judgment of the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) to file their appeal at any U.S. circuit court of appeals, instead of only the U.S. Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit
He supported the Smart Savings Act, a bill that would make the default investment in the Thrift Savings Plan (TSP) an age-appropriate target date asset allocation investment fund (L Fund) instead of the Government Securities Investment Fund (G Fund)
Speaking at the 2016 Democratic National Convention, Cummings said "our party does not just believe, but understands, that Black Lives Matter. But we also recognize that our community and our law enforcement work best when they work together.
Though Cummings was one of the few Black Democrats who attended the president's inauguration in January of 2017, the two were repeatedly at odds since that time, the conflict intensifying after the Dems won back control of the House during the November 2018 midterm elections.
But it was in his role as chairman of the powerful Committee on Oversight and Reform, one of the committee's leading the impeachment inquiry, that he drew the wrath of President Trump earlier this year, Trump a billionaire media personality and real estate mogul who succeeded Obama into office in 2017.
The conflict grew even further as Cummings tightened oversight of the president, including berating a Homeland Security official at a Congressional hearing on its administrative policy of separating migrant families at the southern border.
And after the congressman began probing Trump's reporting of his finances and potential conflicts of interest, the president's disdain for Cummings escalated, Trump publicly tweeting that the respected Black member of Congress was a "racist," and a "brutal bully."
The petty president then heightened the controversy by saying Baltimore is no place where anybody would want to live, a slap in the face at Black people, his critics say.
Black leaders, including Congressional Democrats, quickly came to Cummings' defense, Cummings himself telling Trump that he has turned his back on the city of Baltimore and other predominantly Black major American cities.
Civil Rights leader the Rev Al Sharpton, whom Trump also verbally attacked and called a conman and slickster, said during an associated press conference in response to his aggression against Cummings and the president's criticism of him in particular, that the president is a racism peddler who "attacks everybody."
Sharpton said that the president is not mature enough to take constructive criticism.
"He's thin-skinned and not really matured that well, but he has a particular venom for Blacks and people of color," said Sharpton of the president.
The president's attacks on Cummings and Sharpton came after he picked a fight with four freshman congresswomen, all of them women of color.
Specifically, he created a fury by demanding that U.S. Reps Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan go home to the countries they came from, all but Omar, who is a naturalized U.S. citizen who came to America with her U.S. born parents as a child refugee, born in the U.S.
Democratic members of congress, 2020 presidential candidates and world leaders have also lashed out at the president for his flagrant attacks on the four congresswomen of color, longtime Congressman John Lewis of Georgia calling Trump racist and an outright embarrassment to the American people.
Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, Ohio's most read Black digital newspaper and Black blog. Tel: (216) 659-0473 and Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com. Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief, and who trained for 17 years at the Call and Post Newspaper in Cleveland, Ohio. We interviewed former president Barack Obama one-on-one when he was campaigning for president. As to the Obama interview, CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE AT CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, OHIO'S LEADER IN BLACK DIGITAL NEWS.
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