Allyn Brooks-LaSure

Income, Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2024 The U.S. Census Bureau today announced that real median household income was $83,730 in 2024.

The Census Bureau released the 2024 data on health coverage, poverty and income. This release will be a snap shot, the “before” picture to compare to after the coming cuts and changes take effect.

Check out the data for yourself: www.census.gov/newsroom/pre...

State leaders are battening down the hatches to prepare for the storm that is about to hit our health system, namely major cuts to Medicaid. This is a helpful resource to understand where this storm will hit the hardest. Spread the word! 🔁

Thanks for passing me this positivity chain, @1mabl.bsky.social!

What gives me hope are programs like Rx Kids that have delivered over $13M in cash support to more than 3K families. Parents say it helps them make ends meet! rxkids.org/rx-kids-part...

Passing to @mona-shah.bsky.social!

The so-called Big Beautiful Bill passed this summer, but the damage will be felt for years. @rwjf.org created a chart to help explain what to expect.

Share this in your feed, pin it up in your community, email it to your local government. People must know how they’ll be affected by these policies.

Thanks for starting the positivity chain, @draveneljoseph.bsky.social

RWJF grantees like @wordinblacknews.bsky.social give me hope because they are telling powerful health equity stories, when doing so isn’t popular or easy.

Passing to @jenniferngandu.bsky.social

Black-and-white photo of Morgan Lasher, smiling in front of a concrete wall. Text reads “ComNet Denver Learning Lab: Comms as Community Building – Morgan Lasher, Unify America,” with illustrated green and blue foliage at the bottom.

Join us at ComNet25 Denver for a Learning Lab from Unify America! Attendees will learn:

- Four ingredients of community building (impact, learning, purpose, & belonging)

- How comms drives those pillars to create & support community building

- The comms role in collaboration

RWJF Statement on the Firing of CDC Director Susan Monarez Richard Besser, MD makes an official public statement on the ousting of CDC Director Dr. Susan Monarez.

Pushing Dr. Susan Monarez out from CDC will cost lives.

A sign at the museum with the title “Slavery and Freedom,” which describes how the institution of slavery was integral to our nation’s founding.

Visited the National Museum of African American History and Culture this past weekend. And this is the first sign you see when starting the timeline of Blacks in America.

Dr. John Hope Franklin was right: "We've got to tell the unvarnished truth."

So now museums can’t talk about how “bad” slavery was? My thoughts on that.

YouTube video by The Contrarian What happened to American generosity?

“They’re burning it all down, but they don’t realize they’re going to need the very things they’re burning down.”

Partisanship begets blind hubris. Allyn Brooks-LaSure warns that dismantling public services undermines America’s values, and capacity to address health and environmental challenges.

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health Policy Fellows The RWJF Health Policy Fellows program provides the nation’s most comprehensive learning experience at the intersection of health, science, and policy in Washington, D.C.

Don’t miss this year’s call for applications for the RWJF Health Policy Fellows program - applications are due November 3.

Share this with your feed and others you think should apply:
www.rwjf.org/en/grants/ac...

We cannot build a future where health is no longer a privilege but a right, if we cannot tell the truth about our nation and ourselves. Since the administration is suppressing our nation's history, we all have to tell the truth everywhere. All the time. To everyone.

White House announces more aggressive review of Smithsonian museums In a letter to the Smithsonian’s leader, White House officials said they would review exhibition text, curation, exhibition planning and collections starting with eight museums.

What is a “constructive description" of the Trail of Tears, Jim Crow, slavery, or the real cause of the Civil War? What is "unifying" language for Japanese internment camps, the KKK, and January 6th?

wapo.st/3UWNQtE

If Venus Williams, a world-renowned athlete with an incredible career, is worried about health insurance, imagine how all the people struggling to make ends meet feel, especially after the administration gutted Medicaid.

www.newsweek.com/venus-willia...

RWJF has long stood with other individual and institutional funders in supporting public broadcasting. That support will not change. In addition to our resources, we all must also raise our voices to denounce these punitive cuts and proclaim the value of public broadcasting to our society.

These same communities, particularly in rural areas that rely heavily on CPB-supported stations, will feel the brunt of this loss. In some cases, these areas disproportionately represent the very regions that this administration claims to champion.

In the process, they are also pulling the plug on valued community news sources that broadcast critically important evacuation orders, offer ground-breaking educational programs, and produce impartial news that showcases how American communities are thriving together.

This action follows recent Administration cuts to everything from food security to Medicaid to our public health and research institutions. With this track record, it’s clear what the Administration is doing to America’s highest ideals and trusted institutions: stripping them for parts.

Corporation for Public Broadcasting says it's shutting down The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funnels federal money to public media stations, says it's winding down operations after President Trump signed a law rescinding all funding.

Congress and the Trump administration have once again abandoned the American people. Their decision to slash CPB’s funding will leave American communities less informed, less engaged, less connected, and less safe. It definitely won’t make us great.

www.npr.org/2025/08/01/n...

Black Reproductive Justice Policy Agenda - In Our Own Voice

Data on the dire state of maternal health in the U.S. is not enough. People need solutions.

Thankfully, in Our Own Voice put together a policy agenda for Black Reproductive Justice that points to a path forward.

Please share this with your circle.

blackrj.org/blackrjpolic...

This is a fascinating look into how far SNAP dollars get people depending on where they live in the U.S.

Spoiler alert - they don’t get people far enough, and this gap will only get worse with the looming SNAP cuts.

Americans are hitting our limit watching profit be prioritized over people. Our health system hasn’t worked well for a long time, and now we’ve watched it be stripped for parts to pad the one percent’s pockets.

Healthcare is not a luxury; it should be a right. Our system needs to recognize that.

My take on Public Media and Public Health. @contrariannews.org

Thank you to The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and The Center for Cooperative Media at Montclair State for your support that enabled two of us from The Jersey Vindicator team to attend the annual Investigative Reporters and Editors conference in New Orleans. We learned so much this week!

KFF bar chart titled “Across partisanship, half or fewer are confident in government health agencies to carry out key responsibilities.” The chart shows the percent of total adults, Democrats, Independents and Republicans who say they currently have a lot or some confidence in federal government health agencies like the CDC and FDA to ensure the safety and effectiveness of prescription drugs sold in the U.S.; ensure the safety and effectiveness of vaccines approved for use in the U.S.; respond to outbreaks of infectious diseases like measles and bird flu; act independently, without interference from outside interests.

Less than half the public has confidence in federal health agencies to carry out some of their core functions, such as ensuring the safety of drugs and vaccines and responding to infectious disease outbreaks.

Our new poll has the details: on.kff.org/3Z2MaRG

Kasey Cordell is featured as a ComNet25 Denver Host Committee member. The image includes her smiling outdoor portrait, the LOR Foundation logo, and ComNet25 branding with leafy, nature-inspired accents at the bottom.

Thank you to @kcnmi.bsky.social, Communications Officer at LOR Foundation, for helping guide the program and making ComNet25 Denver extra special! We are grateful for your partnership and collaboration.

Learn more and register for #ComNet25 here: www.comnet25.org/what-to-expe...

#Philanthropy

While today may be their day, every person and institution has an assigned seat on this bus trip to dictatorship. If we don’t speak out now – if we don’t speak out together – who knows where we’ll be 100 days from now.

As you wait, our neighbors are being outed, outlawed, and even outcast. All while you wait.

As you wait, keys that once unlocked the doors of opportunity in America are not working anymore – because the Administration is furiously changing the locks. As you wait, in the pursuit of reliving a past that never was, officials are putting the nation on a course for a future that should never be