People of virtually every nation on earth had an opportunity to view the ceremonies, on the ironic 6th day of January, this year, as Donald J. Trump was inaugurated as the 47th U.S. president of the United States of America*.

Few of the millions who were able to attend the event, or to watch, in real-time, on broadcast news coverage, or online platforms, could have had any idea that they were viewing the first official day of what turned out to be the first day of a rapid-fire, historically disruptive process that would encompass executive orders to initiate mass deportations of immigrants who happened, also, to be people of color; for abrupt mass firings of tens of thousands of federal employees, including those at the FBI, the CIA, the IRS, the FAA, the country's nuclear defense agency, and the dissolution of the Federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Also targeted for immediate dismissal has been the African-American four-star general who headed the military's Joint Chiefs of Staff, among numerous other federal agency heads.

Even in the midst of the sweeping, Trump-generated, chaos that impacts Americans at every level of the country, we believe the following information carries the potential for creating a meaningful, grassroots, resistance to those plans. 

We are convinced that, with the support of everyday Americans, especially those from the nation's Black, Hispanic and Asian communities, we can be successful in implementing a national campaign that can dramatically reduce the financial capacity of the president's corporate and wealthy enablers to further implement his self-destructive agenda for this nation.

We also feel, very strongly, that the proposed initiative may very well be the last meaningful, amicable, citizen-driven, opportunity to prevent the further dismantling of what has been the world's leading democracy, and its primary protector of global human rights. 

If this effort, designed to be driven by strategic changes in consumer spending patterns by America's Black, Hispanic and Asian communities, is not successfully carried out, we believe the country's people might be drawn into a series of more severe, confrontational tactics, in their defense.

Without minimizing the negative impacts that the new administration's illegal actions have had on other communities, we are, at the same time, making an unvarnished call to have Black, Hispanic and Asian consumers join the nationally organized boycott against businesses that have withdrawn from their Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) commitments.

Indeed, we will be inviting Americans of conscience, from every other community, to join with us, and to increase our impact, if they so choose.

It appears, now, that Donald Trump, and his minions, have begun to believe, mistakenly, that millions of beleaguered, frustrated, americans have no options available to them, other than to cave in, obediently, to the President's ongoing, illegal and insulting campaign to subvert the country's national electoral processes and to systematically lessen the quality of the government services that the world's most respected democracy has provided, without meaningful disruption, since its establishment in 1787.
On the contrary, many of us believe that there is no better time, at all, to finally inject an emphatic, course-changing, action into the "mad dash to racist autocracy" that Trump's illegally-managed second term is proving itself to be.

Time to bring emphatic, course-changing action

That "emphatic course-changing action," we believe, could certainly be a plan that would include the organized encouragement of our consumers, nationwide, in a strategic, "selective patronage" campaign.

Such an effort has been proposed by two national, activist organizations, The Public Union and the recently founded Latino Freeze Movement.

Designed strategically to change the spending patterns of the nation's Black, Hispanic and Asian consumers, it is an effort to cease the purchases of goods and services from national corporations and retailers that have publicly announced the termination of their dei-related commitments.

Choose to make purchases only from businesses that support us

The campaign organizers are also recommending that consumers seek out and patronize Black, Hispanic and Asian businesses, and others that have not waivered in their support DEI, at every level of their operations.

In addition, the organizers are recommending that consumers seek out and patronize black, hispanic, and asian-owned businesses to make their purchases for goods and services, rather than to do so, at businesses that have branded themselves as "DEI-deniers."

Lists of supporting businesses & those that are boycott targets

Please remember that the selective patronage organizers, in conjunction with their overall efforts, also plan to make available separate lists of companies that are "DEI-deniers,” “DEI-supporters," and of businesses owned by Black, Hispanic and Asian entrepreneurs.

Combined consumer spending power: Blacks, Hispanics and Asians

Those who might wonder whether organized community spending power can effectively impact sales and profitability levels at "DEI-denier" businesses, should be aware that the combined spending power of Black, Hispanic and Asian consumers nationwide, now stands at $5.3 trillion, a substantial increase over previous-year levels.

We also completely understand that there is no better time to leverage the fact that, together, our national communities now constitute more than 42% of the total U.S. population and 66% of the total population of Philadelphia.

We have faith that these facts can provide a foundation for relieving our current socioeconomic challenges and for ensuring the continued growth and prosperity of the nation, as a whole.

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Philadelphia's leading Black- and Hispanic-owned media outlets (scoop USA media, The Philadelphia Sunday sun, Al Dia News media and the "Dishing's" Daily Audio Podcast (dap) have agreed to be key supporters of the two, national, game-changing, "selective patronage"/boycott campaigns that will launch on february 28, 2025.

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Mario Ruiz, Co-Founder, Infinity Ventures: "Find founders who are Latino/Black, who are going through the same experience as you are, and share. Those founder stories, you’ll realize, are very similar. A lot of the walls you want to break through are similar."

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Once we absorb the data below, Blacks, Hispanics and Asians, in Philadelphia, and across the U.S., can more fully recognize the fundamental value, especially during politically stressful times, in working more diligently, together, to unify and strengthen our communities. 

At the same time, fortified with this information, we can comfortably begin to focus, more effectively, on developing new relationships and additional mechanisms that will enable us to work more cooperatively, across imagined racial and cultural lines. 

That would be, finally the "gift from God" that our communities have long needed.

Indeed, those same false divisions have led us, for far too many years, to keep our communities unnecessarily divided. They have also kept the country's Black, Hispanic, and Asian communities from making productive use of their combined resources and brainpower, and from being able to maximize the tangible benefits that should have always flowed into our family units, and into our neighborhoods.

Once we look, closely, at the comparative population and spending power data, here, we can more readily understand why our political adversaries have been so invested in efforts to keep us apart from one another.    

The numbers tell us that, with the power of our collective economic and political resources, we can no longer allow ourselves to be simply dismissed as "minority" participants in U.S. society or its related, world-class economy.

* This is the first part of this OP-ED