Black ladies have saved democracy, led actions and carried total communities solely to be thanked with silence, sidelining and burnout.
Sasha Legette was completed with that.
What started as a lingering thought within the aftermath of Breonna Taylor’s loss of life and the 2024 election cycle that felt like a slap within the face to Black ladies’s political labor has grown right into a thriving group referred to as Black Woman Caucus.
“It wasn’t simply disappointing,” mentioned Legette, the founder and govt director of Black Woman Caucus (BGC). “We confirmed up. We turned out. However when the selections have been made, our voices have been ignored. I used to be bored with watching Black ladies pour into everybody else and don’t have anything poured again into us.”
BGC is an unapologetic area the place Black ladies can lead freely, construct energy collectively and transfer with pleasure and readability. From its management lab, “We Lead,” to its “empowerHer Community” and speaker sequence, BGC presents instruments for political affect, profession progress and neighborhood transformation.
Legette was raised in a union-rooted family in Flint, Michigan. As a toddler, she marched on picket strains. After graduating from Clark Atlanta College and the College of Georgia Faculty of Regulation, she taught highschool social research in Atlanta.
She shortly grew to become an advocate for her college students, organizing mother and father and demanding fundamental sources like textbooks. Her ardour for advocacy adopted her into legislation faculty, the place she routinely referred to as out racial disparities and inequities on campus, even when it meant standing alone.
“I didn’t comprehend it was organizing then,” she mentioned. “I simply knew I couldn’t keep silent.”
After transferring to Houston, Legette co-founded Pure Justice, an area nonprofit targeted on grassroots felony justice reform. She later helped increase the Staff Protection Undertaking in Houston, advocating for staff’ rights and pushing coverage reforms. All of that work laid the inspiration for what would change into BGC.
That imaginative and prescient drew Genesis Draper, the Harris County Chief Public Defender, to the group. Draper is the primary Black girl to carry the position and the primary girl, interval. BGC represents one thing lengthy overdue for her. It’s an intentional area for collaboration, restoration and management growth.
“I actually couldn’t even conceptualize what the group was till I stepped into that room,” Draper mentioned. “We’re so used to not centering our wants that it was nearly international to really feel that type of area, susceptible, joyful, highly effective.”
Draper, a local of Longview, comes from a household of public servants. Her father was a preacher and educator and her mom was an entrepreneur and metropolis worker.
“It was instilled in us early to make use of your expertise to serve others,” she mentioned.
In the present day, her sisters work in training and social work, persevering with the household’s legacy.
However even with a long time of expertise and goal, Draper admits the work can really feel heavy, particularly when Black ladies are always navigating management as “firsts.”
“There’s a fatigue that comes with breaking obstacles,” she mentioned. “However being in that BGC area jogged my memory we’re not alone. We’re nonetheless within the combat and we’re combating for one another this time.”
The group combines coverage technique with emotional restoration, neighborhood constructing and cultural affirmation. Its upcoming “We Select Us” marketing campaign will collect knowledge from Black ladies throughout Houston to outline the highest points they need political candidates to handle.
“We’re not right here to be tokenized or exploited,” Legette mentioned. “We are able to’t sit round ready for individuals to acknowledge our management. We lead. We all the time have. Now, we’re simply doing it out loud.”
