From Washington D.C., to Louisville, to Seattle, to Sacramento, to Portland, political violence rocked the United States.
To many Americans, Gia and her husband (they requested we only use first names) live the American dream. Gia works as a substitute school teacher, and her husband is an international business consultant after a successful career at a Fortune 100. They own their home in a city that sits on numerous best places to live lists, and their children go to one of the top-rated public schools in the country. It seems so perfect, but Gia and her husband live a COVID nightmare and, like nine-million other American households, are on the brink of foreclosure.
When COVID related shutdowns swept the country in March of 2020, U6 unemployment skyrocketed to 18.1%. Even before the public health and financial disaster, 40% of American families didn’t have $2,000 in emergency savings, let alone the 60 to 90 days of living expenses financial planners recommend. COVID wiped out entire industries such as hospitality, travel, and theater and entertainment. For those in the service industry and gig economy, the slowdown has hit the hardest.
In response to the looming economic collapse, Congress passed the CARES Act, which included a one-time stimulus check of $1200 for some Americans, the Payroll Protection Program (PPP), and a moratorium on evictions and foreclosures. Despite trillions in aid, gaping holes remained that Main Street and American families have fallen through. Banks did not get guardrails on how to manage forbearances. Congress didn’t waive rent, only deferred it, and didn’t provide any financial support for small landlords. Twelve-million American households find themselves more than $5000 behind on rent, and six-million households face foreclosure.
Congressional leaders and the White House have agreed in principle that another stimulus package is needed, but hyper-partisan politics has destroyed any forward progress. In 20 days, the CARES Act and all of its protections evaporate. If Congress takes no action, the transfer of $2.5 trillion in wealth to large scale investors, private equity, and large corporations will begin.
At the start of 2020, private equity firms were sitting on $2.5 trillion in cash. They call it dry powder, money ready for investment where the quants feel the best ROI awaits. By some estimates, there is now as much as $4 trillion on the sidelines. Interestingly, savings have grown in the United States across all income brackets in 2020. However, for the 40% of Americans who live paycheck to paycheck, small business owners, and small landlords, dry powder is just a banking term.
Gia and her husband have a first and second mortgage on their suburban home. When COVID struck, and the region moved to remote learning, her work evaporated. As COVID ravaged the United States virtually unchecked, a U.S. Passport would get you into less than 25 nations. Her husband’s work came to a halt, and he became stuck in Italy for four months. Gia applied for unemployment in July but is stuck in administrative limbo with thousands of other Washingtonians, owed back payments.
Then a lifeline appeared, and Gia’s husband got a job opportunity through a friend in Italy. With travel restrictions easing, he traveled to his new job, and Gia was rehired as a substitute teacher. The light at the end of the tunnel flickered out quickly. A health crisis struck her husband, leaving him stranded, unable to work or travel.
Rick is a small property investor in Tacoma, Washington (Rick asked we do not use his last name). He was able to earn a living by flipping homes one at a time, but as he started to approach retirement age, he wanted to create a small passive income stream. In November of 2019, he bought a distressed fourplex on a nine-month loan. Part of the conditions was to rehab the property and secure four paying tenants by August 2020. Rick purchased the property with all the units rented, and he started to work with the tenants to end their leases equitably. Then COVID hit.
Part of the eviction moratorium requirements is renters need to prove they have no other place they can live. One tenant moved out in February, but the other three stayed on. In June, two more accepted cash for keys as a compromise, but Rick was already in trouble. Meeting his loan conditions was an impossibility.
“I believed they would work with me,” Rick said, “historically, these lenders will work with you. Now I’m being charged 25% interest, and it is impossible to make those payments.” One of the original tenants remains almost a year later. They are paying rent of $800 a month but claim they have no other place to live and have refused cash for keys offers. An attorney told Rick that for $10,000, he would get the renter evicted, moratorium or not, but Rick wants to be fair.
Rick’s lender moved to foreclose. His attorney was able to stop the action, but the lender filed a default, which prevents Rick from securing financing anywhere else. “My lawyer told me they are operating as a loan to own. They give me the loan, but they end up owning the property.”
The United States needs at least seven-million more affordable housing units than what is available today. Although rents in cities like Seattle have declined by 20% in 2020, property values have skyrocketed. Large investors have access to tax programs and incentives that aren’t available to small landlords.
Because rent is considered passive income, small landlords do not have access to PPP loans. The imminent foreclosure and eviction crisis will not only put millions of Americans on the street during a pandemic but will gut mom and pop landlords on Main Street.
For millions of Americans who are still paying rent, there is a hidden crisis in 2021. As small landlords lose their homes, these renters will get eviction notices from hedge funds and banks, with no interest in working with them to make sure they don’t end up homeless. For the remaining tenant at Rick’s quadplex, come January, they’ll face a forced eviction when the lender moves to foreclose.
The CARES Act and all of its provisions will expire on December 31, 2020. For the unemployed, the first blow will come between December 25 and 27, when it becomes the last day to collect extended unemployment benefits. The loss of unemployment for 12 million will put another three-million households in jeopardy of eviction or foreclosure. For another 18 million homes, back rent and forbearances will come due on January 1, 2021, and the courts will be open for evictions and foreclosures on January 4.
Gia’s husband’s job in Italy was helping shut down a hotel impacted by the COVID crisis. During his time off, he suffered a sports injury. What started as a headache evolved into blurry vision and searing pain. A doctor’s visit revealed he had a detached retina in one eye and an injury to the other. He needed immediate surgery to prevent losing his vision. His vision is still blurred, and he is required to spend most of his time supine. He cannot work, and he can’t fly back home due to the air pressure change. With only Gia’s limited income, the forbearance on their mortgage looms large.
Almost six-million Americans expect to lose their homes in the opening days of 2021. According to the Aspen Institute, 80% of those facing foreclosure and eviction are Black, Indigenous, or Persons of Color (BIPOC). For white households in America, the average net worth is $170,000, while for Black families, it is $17,000. This inequity can’t be explained away by education, income, or indebtedness. For white Americans, once they become homeowners, five-percent will fall back into renting. For Black Americans, the rate is double, at 10%. Black-owned small businesses had limited access to government aid programs, and by August, 40% of all Black-owned small companies had failed.
The BIPOC community has suffered the worst from COVID in near silence. Black, Indigenous, and Hispanic populations have higher rates of positivity, hospitalization, and death. This difference is driven by work in the service industries as “essential workers,” multigenerational households living under the same roof, and less access to quality healthcare. In Arizona, Doctors Without Borders have been operating on the Navajo Indian Reservation since April. When Indigenous peoples in Washington state appealed for PPE from the federal government, they were sent body bags.
BIPOC communities are more likely to be “needless delinquent.” Analysts estimate 400,000 American homeowners are eligible for forbearances on their mortgage but are not aware or have been given misinformation from their lender. For some of these struggling homeowners, the damage isn’t foreclosure but the destruction of their credit score. A lower credit score impacts interest rates, insurance premiums and can even be a barrier to getting a job.
Gia and her husband have a first and second mortgage, and both are in forbearance. Their first mortgage is with Chase. Chase has taken the payments and interest they are skipping and moving them to the end of the loan term. Their second mortgage is with a small area bank, Umpqua. Umpqua will require them to pay one-and-a-half payments come January for six months. “When I explained our situation, the person at Umpqua asked how my husband had money to go to Italy. It was a business trip,” Gia explained. “I told them that we wouldn’t be able to meet those terms, and they told us they would put a lien on the house.”
Court systems from Boston to Seattle are bracing for a flood of forclosure and eviction filings. Here too, banks and large corporate property holders will benefit. With more legal resources and free cash to act, their cases will move to the front of the line. Mom and pop landlords will have to track their court cases independently, without a management company to oversee activity. Already facing a cash crunch, they’ll still have to pay court costs and lawyers fees, but that will only be the start of their problems.
The average American house has a value of $284,000. If nine-million households get foreclosed in 2021, that represents $2.55 trillion in property dumped into the market. As we learned in the Great Recession, some of these properties will go into bank possession and be allowed to crumble, unoccupied. Other properties will face gentrification, with family homes replaced by luxury units built to the lot lines. For others, like Gia and her husband, they’ll sell before the foreclosure hammer comes down and move further away from Seattle, seeking lower housing costs. The transfer of wealth doesn’t stop there.
For the 12 million households facing eviction, the looming crisis is even worse. An eviction on a credit report is a barrier to permanent housing, requiring large deposits. They’re facing thousands in debt and potential judgments with interest they can’t pay. An eviction can be a scarlet letter for years, becoming a barrier to buying a car, getting a job, or buying a home.
Although it may appear to be a boom for landlords with 12 million families hitting a rental reset button, this isn’t the case. For many, the door to another rental will be closed. Landlords may evict a family who can’t pay the rent, only to find applications from families who were just evicted.
Millennials in high-paying office jobs are already leaving the rental market for the suburbs to escape COVID restrictions and get more space for a home office. For those with money, decreasing rents will be a boom. Large investors can amortize shrinking rents and use tax vehicles to lower their expenses. Mom and pop landlords will face a further reduction in their passive income, driving even more homes into sale and foreclosure.
A cycle where renters will face an uncertain future of eviction through foreclosure or the sale to large investors could continue well after 2021. Affordable rentals in need of rehab will be gentrified, putting accessible housing further out of reach.
Congress has no financial incentive to stop this nightmare. For both parties, lobbies, PACs, and dark money keep congresspersons and senators in their positions of power. For the 40% of Americans who live paycheck to paycheck, there is no lobby to bend representative ears and grease the palms.
The reality is if this financial disaster is not averted, the 18 million households on the brink could be the tip of the iceberg.
Ten-percent of the U.S. population is facing homelessness in 2021 if Congress does not act. Worse, an eviction moratorium extension only kicks the problem down the road, and the amount owed in back rent keeps growing.
The immediate need for the unhomed will be to get them homed as soon as possible. Families that end up on the streets for six or more months enter into chronic homelessness. The stress and anxiety of living on the streets take a psychological toll creating anxiety, depression, and PTSD. Long-term homelessness leads to self-medication, alcoholism, and drug addiction. In the middle of a pandemic crisis, there are fewer shelter beds available, and often families are broken up and have to give up their pets. Education for children is disrupted and made even more complicated in an era of remote learning, which requires a computer and access to reliable high-speed internet.
With up to 80% of those facing eviction and foreclosure being BIPOC, an entire generation faces the gutting of accumulated wealth. The barriers to creating generational wealth, particularly in the Black community, will fuel inequity for decades to come.
For Rick in Tacoma, he fell through a loophole created by the eviction moratorium. When he bought the property in November of 2019, he worked to do the right thing for his tenants. Although the one remaining tenant is employed, paying rent, and not impacted by COVID, they refuse to vacate the property using the moratorium as a barrier.
“The bad things about laws that are too broad; they don’t capture all the cases. In this case, COVID has nothing to do with this one tenant,” Rick lamented. “I contacted the state Attorney General office, but they said they had never heard of a situation like this and didn’t know how to proceed. I told them that just a letter or a phone call to the lender would help, or provide a help desk for basic assistance, but the government doesn’t work that way.” Rick’s end game appears to be the loss of a lifetime of work, destroyed credit, and no possible retirement.
Gia is waiting for the day when her husband can return from Italy, and they plan to put their home on the market. At the start of 2020, they were on a solid footing with a nine-month cushion. “How could you plan for this,” she asked.
An immigrant herself, Gia arrived in the United States as a child at the end of the Vietnam War. “The [United States] took them us in with open arms back then. You want to escape Communism? Sure!” she reflected.
“We grew up, and we were on food stamps for a while, and there were five brothers and sisters. They put us in low-income housing, but we got out. Mom and dad bought a home. He was a mechanic and put six children through college.”
“We have to care for our citizens. What are you going to do with these people who have nowhere to live? No transportation. No housing. No medical care. Where are people going to go?”
Kesha Rodgers started The Ally League with her friend Sara So to help promote and support Black businesses and dismantle systemic racism. The events of 2020, including the resurgent Black Lives Matter movement and the disproportionate impact of COVID on the BIPOC community, created opportunity and hardship. As working moms, Rodgers and So realized that people wanted to support the Black community but didn’t have the time or resources to engage actively. The mission of The Ally League is to promote and support Black-owned businesses while enabling allies to learn about the available products. In this second part of our interview, Kesha and Sara talk about cancel culture and the need for patience.
Since the September 7, 2020, SPOG Rally, where Seattle Police used flashbangs, blast balls, pepper spray, and sponge-tipped rounds almost indiscriminately, the department has shifted tactics. By early October, they have modified how they use bike officers and have virtually eliminated the use of explosives. This shift in tactics has resulted in targeted arrests.
Previously, when engaged with protesters, officers would standoff, then move in force at an entire group due to a single protester’s action. Officers on bicycles would typically lead these charges supported by officers on foot. These tactics created a stronger response from protesters and injured more people. Sweeping arrests occurred with suspects misidentified, credential press and medics arrested, and charges filed with no supporting evidence.
Local news affiliate KOMO reported that Mayor Durkan praised police officials for their change in tactics. “The Seattle Police Department is getting better now at being able to target arrests, to isolate people in the crowd that are [sic] doing the destructive things. We will continue to arrest people for that [criminal acts during demonstrations],” Durkan said.
November 30, 2020, the 21st anniversary of the WTO riots protest, highlights how SPD has changed tactics. Protesters broke windows at a Starbucks on 12th Avenue while SPD officers observed at a distance. As recently as October, this kind of action would have created an immediate response by police. Instead, officers followed protesters for a half-mile while controlling their route through a residential neighborhood. When the protesters tried to move off of 16th, SPD blocked their direction and kept them northbound using a dispersal order.
As the protesters continued to march, Seattle Police moved to within arms reach at times. Bike officers stayed on the street, and officers on foot walked on the sidewalk. Tactical support was provided by a vehicle equipped with LRAD, additional officers in two vans, and a SWAT unit in the Bearcat.
Radio communications and discussion from officers indicated they were planning a targeted arrest. SPD moved protesters toward the intersection of 16th Ave, E Madison Street, and E Pine Street. This intersection provided a broad paved area, bright lighting, and multiple routes of access. Additionally, it is a pocket of commercial businesses.
When the protesters reached East Pike Street, SPD moved back while confirming their target for arrest. They started to clear the street of medics and press, who usually follow behind direct action groups, to create an exact route. The officers on foot moved ahead of bike officers while staying on the sidewalk. When the protest group entered the intersection, Seattle Police moved quickly.
Officers ran on foot into the group of protesters, tackling three individuals. Officers on bicycles operated in a supporting role and created a protective circle. While making the bike barricade, they separated the protesters into two groups. Although officers have frequently used bikes as barricades, this appeared to be a secondary action.
After the arrests and another dispersal order to move up 16th, Seattle police bike officers made several false charges, stopping short just inches from the protesters. Police used a small amount of pepper spray, with a couple of protesters impacted, but made no additional arrests.
Two tactics that haven’t changed? First, Seattle police continue to give dispersal orders while not allowing protesters to disperse. Second, dispersal orders continue to drive protesters back to the protest starting point, where officers disengage.
These changes started to form almost immediately after the retirement of Chief Carmen Best. Under Best’s leadership, Seattle Police seemed to use tactics that inflamed protesters and the public. The actions have resulted in multiple civil lawsuits for injuries and property damage at the hand of SPD.
Back on June 1, protesters were met with OC, tear gas, and flashbang grenades when the Seattle Police department erected the Western Barricade in Capitol Hill. The asymmetrical tactics by the Seattle Police resulted in more protesters assembling at the Western Barricade daily. An estimated 2,000 on June 2 swelled to 60,000 by June 6. Protesters faced escalating violence each day, reaching an apex on June 7. The Seattle Police Department controversially abandoned the East Precinct on June 8.
The Seattle City Council stepped in and banned tear gas use. Additionally, a federal judge also established a protection order on August 10. These orders didn’t stop the general use of force against protesters by the Seattle Police. According to the ACLU, there was disproportionate use of force on August 16, August 25, and September 7. The federal courts issued an order on August 10 as a result of SPDs actions on July 25. Those tactics now seem to be part of the past, even with large groups of protesters.
To observers and experts on civil unrest, the broad targeting of all protesters creates a vicious cycle. For every peaceful protester exposed to police violence, several more take their place. It also reinforces the Black Lives Matter message of police violence against people who aren’t breaking any laws.
No other city demonstrated this better than Portland, Oregon. When federal officers arrived and escalated the situation, the number of protesters swelled from around 100 to as many as 10,000. The area around the federal courthouse became a hotbed of civil unrest, receiving international news coverage. When federal officers left the city, the number of protesters dropped off quickly.
Whether these changes are due to the direction of Chief Diaz or the result of pressure from court orders, OPA investigations, and lawsuits, public interest in protests is declining. Unfortunately, the racial inequality that impacts the BIPOC community has not changed.
Eleven years ago, French-born Khalid Kaskou had a dream of bringing authentic French pastries to the Pacific Northwest. With his wife, Andrea Yao, Kaskou founded Belle Pastry nine years ago, and it has grown into a successful small business in old town Bellevue. The year brought COVID-related shutdowns, civil unrest, and economic hard times, but Kaskou met those challenges head-on. Going beyond keeping the doors open, he has kept his staff employed, aided other small businesses, and honored the first responder community.
When the first round of lockdowns happened, business dropped 70%. “To be honest, we were terrified and panicked a little bit,” said Yao, “but like any challenges in life, we wanted to meet the crisis head-on.” To date, the bakery has not closed a single day, not even during the civil unrest in Bellevue on May 31, and they have not had to reduce staff.
“A couple of our customers reached out to us pretty early on during COVID, saying they wanted to buy pastries. They would like for us to deliver them to hospitals and clinics. That gave me the idea, why don’t we make it easier for people to participate in a pastry donation like this,” Yao explained. Since they started the program, over 3,300 pastries have flowed into the hands of hospitals and clinics throughout Puget Sound.
Open from 7 AM to 6 PM, Belle Pastry is more than baked goods, offering a full-service menu with lunch and dinner items. They recently started a program where individuals can donate to fight local food insecurity. In less than a week, they raised over $3,700 – enough to feed more than 200 people.
Kaskou’s support of the community goes beyond feeding tired and hungry mouths and includes feeding wearing souls. In May, Yao learned about the plight of Hmong flower growers, displaced from Pike Place Market due to COVID business restrictions. She had an idea. With her husband’s support, they opened up the area in front of their bakery to the Hmong Association of Washington to use as a pick-up point and a place to collect donations. Kaskou also helped Homemake Gardens of Carnation, Washington, expand their business to the eastside by allowing customers to pick up their purchases at Belle Pastry.
Another way Kaskou is helping is breaking down the barriers of social distancing for businesses and familes. Belle Pastry offers virtual parties, where each participant gets a cake or pastry delivered to their location. That way, in a virtual meeting, everyone can have their cake and literally eat it too.
You can order for yourself, make a donation for first responders and those in need via their website, or visit Belle Pastry at 10373 Main Street, Bellevue.
Kesha Rodgers started The Ally League with her friend Sara So to help promote and support Black businesses and dismantle systemic racism. The events of 2020, including the resurgent Black Lives Matter movement and the disproportionate impact of COVID on the BIPOC community, created opportunity and hardship. As working moms, Rodgers and So realized that people wanted to support the Black community but didn’t have the time or resources to engage actively. The mission of The Ally League is to promote and support Black-owned businesses while enabling allies to learn about the available products.
![The Ally League creates Black Box to support local Black-owned businesses [short version]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/2vvmiU6Jfb4/hqdefault.jpg)
“We wanted to move people from performative things like changing your square black on Instagram,” said Rodgers. “What are things that can actively and meaningfully make a difference? [Things] that will engage people who are less likely, and maybe unable to protest so that anyone can be actively anti-racist.”
“We had so many ideas on how to help,” Rodgers continued, “but the fact that so many businesses are failing, a lot of it has to do with exposure. There is an assumption that if a product has a Black person on the front of it, it is only for Black people. There are so many products that if they were in someone’s hands, they would buy them over and over again.“
On November 29, The Ally League launched Black Box, two different priced boxes filled with products created by Black-owned businesses. Some featured items include Hunni Water, sparkling water infused with honey, AH Lip & Body Butter skincare products, Sukie’s Candles, and Boon Boona Coffee sourced from Africa. All boxes come with a “compassionist” key chain, so allies are reminded to be compassionate and open-minded. “We really want people to put the compassionist mindset front and center,” said So.
You can place your order for a $25 Mini Black Box or a $75 Premier Black Box at The Ally League. Although supplies are limited, So indicated they would do a second run in early 2021. As an additional service that supports the Black community, The Ally League can create custom and co-branded boxes with items from Black-owned companies for corporate giving and events.
On November 17, South Dakota earned the distinction of being the only state left without some form of a mask mandate for their citizens. Kristi Noem (R), state governor, has refused to implement any COVID-based restrictions. Many believe the staunch Trump ally has aspirations to run for President in 2024 or 2028.
In South Dakota, the seven-day moving average positivity rate for COVID-19 is 57.5%. Anything over 5% is problematic, and over 20% is considered a public health crisis. Only Wyoming has a higher rate of 62.9%. Of the top ten states in the country for positive results, only one, Pennsylvania, voted for Joe Biden in the 2020 election.
Jodi Doering, a Sioux Falls emergency room nurse, wrote in a Twitter thread that has gone viral that patients deny they are infected with COVID-19 to their dying breath. “I can’t stop thinking about it. These people really [sic] think this isn’t going to happen to them. And then they stop yelling at you when they get intubated. It’s like a fucking horror movie that never ends. There’s [sic] no credits that roll. You just go back and do it all over again.”
According to Forbes, in May of 2020, the rural state of South Dakota had 159 ICU beds to support the state. Governor Noem claimed that capacity had been expanded to 607 beds but later admitted that it included pediatric and NICU beds. ICU utilization in South Dakota is up to 87%, with staffing a major issue. A COVID patient in ICU typically requires a team of 3 or 4 caregivers to keep them stabilized.
But in western South Dakota, there is a different story on the Cheyenne River Reservation. Earlier this year, tribal officials implemented roadblocks into the reservation, including on state highways. At the checkpoints, tribal officials prevented leisure travel and non-essential visitation. In May, Governor Noem threatened to sue the tribe in court (along with tribal leaders of the Pineridge Indian Reservation). In June, she made good on the threat, with federal officials refusing to intervene. Tribal land is considered sovereign.
Tribal leaders decided to lockdown the reservation because they believed the federal government would provide ineffective assistance, and they lacked medical resources to deal with widespread COVID transmission. Additionally, they had long prepared for supply chain disruptions due to the centuries-long history of dealing with the federal government.
Their actions appear to be paying dividends, but the efforts are showing cracks. While South Dakota has a positivity rate of 57.5%, the Cheyenne River Reservation rate is 17.9%. The percentage indicates significant under testing but is well below the catastrophic rate of infection ravaging South Dakota.
In Indigenous culture, the respect and care of the elderly is a core value. Tribal members have set up support networks to assist families who have to quarantine and care for sick relatives. The tribe supports each other by providing meal and supply deliveries, adequate fuel for heating, and check-ins multiple times a day. Creating a system and safety net to help families dealing with infection can further isolate the sick and asymptomatic carriers.
With neighboring North Dakota issuing a mask mandate and Iowa taking further steps to curb infections, governor Noem is under increasing pressure to do something to curb the infection rates in her rural state.
Frank Sensabaugh, a Milwaukee activist and central figure in the 2020 Black Lives Matter movement, was arrested yesterday on a sexual assault warrant by Milwaukee police. In a series of live stream videos posted on November 16, 2020, Nitty stated, “Police knocked on my door and said I sexually assaulted this young lady.” The videos show that Nitty was taken into custody without incident and was cooperative with the police.
According to Nitty’s videos, he took in a woman who had marched with him to Washington D.C. who was unhomed. The woman was using a rental car, rented in his name. When the car was supposed to be returned, the woman and the rental car were missing. After three days, the rental agency indicated to Nitty they would take further action. Nitty says he sent texts to the woman that he would have to go to the police if the car was not returned. Nitty denies the allegations of sexual assault calling them, “bullshit,” saying that phone calls and text messages will exonerate him.
Nitty became a central BLM figure this summer when he, and a group of supporters, marched from Milwaukee to Washington D.C. The walk was documented on social media and in the news. He was arrested in Indiana, shot at in Pennsylvania, and suffered multiple racially motivated incidents during his journey.
Nitty and his group arrived in Washington D.C. for the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s, I Had a Dream speech. While there, he was embroiled in another controversy over statements he made that some deemed homophobic.
Although the woman has been identified by other sources, Malcontent News has a policy of not publishing the name of individuals who make claims of or are victims of sexual assault.
Sprawling across Arizona, Nevada, and Utah, the 173,000 member Navajo Nation suffers from “Dikos Ntsaaígíí-19” – COVID-19. Over seven-percent of the Navajo have tested positive for COVID-19, with 591 deaths. If the Navajo Nation was an independent country, the mortality rate of 4.7% would be third-worst globally, behind Iran and Mexico.
Tribal officials called the outbreak out of control this week. In this sprawling desert region, where one-third of the population has no access to running water, officials declared a 56-hour curfew in an attempt to curb case growth. The curfew is on top of an existing daily curfew from 9 PM to 5 AM.
Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) has been working with the Navajo and Pueblo Nations since April. In neighboring New Mexico, almost 50% of all COVID-19 deaths are Indigenous peoples who make up 10% of the state population. Reservations across the United States have reported a complete lack of support from the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the federal government, and state officials. In Washington state a request for PPE from the federal government resulted in the shipment of body bags.
In South Dakota, where governor Kirsti Noem, R, has refused to have a mask mandate and permitted events such as the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, Cheyenne River Sioux, and Oglala Sioux tribes established COVID-19 checkpoints to enter their reservations. Governor Noem sued in federal court to remove the checkpoints, but the courts supported tribal autonomy, and the checkpoints have persisted. Tribal leaders in South Dakota stated they had established the checkpoints to protect tribal members due to a lack of medical resources and PPE.
Inequality isn’t limited to Indigenous peoples. The respected medical journal The Lancet published a study on July 14, 2020, comparing the Bronx Montefiore Health System’s mortality rate before and after COVID-19. The study included over 505,000 patients in the system and concluded that the mortality rate of Blacks due to COVID was higher. Factors such as age and comorbidities could not explain the higher rate in the population.
Closer to home in Washington state, six percent of all COVID deaths are Black while making up four percent of the people. For Hispanics, the numbers are far worse, with 38% of state fatalities coming from the ethnic group, which makes up 13% of the population. COVID tore through Yakima County earlier this year, where state farmers fought against guidelines to protect farmworkers from the disease. County leaders took a strong anti-mask position, and the county sheriff refused to enforce regulations. When it was time for the early summer harvest in the agricultural county, officials had to fly patients to Seattle, Portland, and Spokane to relieve overloaded hospitals.
APM Research Labs has been compiling mortality statistics based on race for COVID since March, and it paints a grim picture. Only Asian Americans have a lower mortality rate for Coronavirus. For Black Americans, the mortality rate is double for whites. Despite the higher infection and mortality rates, the Kaiser Family Foundation concluded that minorities as a group were less likely to be tested for COVID-19, be sicker when tested, and require more treatment due to the delay in identifying patients. The study also stated about Black households, “they are more likely to be working in low-income jobs that cannot be done from home, to be living in larger households in densely populated areas, and to utilize public or shared modes of transportation.“
With the United States setting national and world records for the most positive tests in a day three days last week, the disparity is only getting worse. The IHME estimates that as many as 400,000 Americans could be dead from COVID by February 1, 2021, without drastic steps taken to lower infection rates. Back in Navajo County, Dikos Ntsaaígíí-19 may have impacted the national election. According to the Navajo Times, members of the nation voted in record numbers in Arizona, with 97% of the tribe voting for Joe Biden.
