National News
By George E. Curry
NNPA Editor-in-Chief
BIRMINGHAM,
Ala.
[NNPA] – After he com-
pletes his campaign for
more diversity in Silicon
Valley, Jesse Jackson plans
to expand the pressure on
technology companies in
other regions of the country
and then go after other sec-
tors of private industry,
including financial services,
banking and advertising.
In an interview after
speaking at the annual con-
vention of the Southern
Christian Leadership Con-
ference (SCLC) here, the
Atlanta-based civil rights
organization co-founded by
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
that gave birth to Jackson’s
Operation PUSH and Rain-
bow PUSH, the civil rights
leader was already eyeing
other targets.
to deal with that because
they have 2 percent or 3 per-
cent minority employment
across the board,” Jackson
told the NNPA News Serv-
ice.
When
Jackson
first
announced his Silicon Val-
ley initiative at his Wall
Street Project in New York,
it was not known if he
would follow through, as he
has done in other campaigns
in the past, or move on to
other issues, which he has
also done with equal fre-
quency.
He lamented on the lack
of Black board representa-
tion at Google or Facebook
and said he would challenge
the absence of people of
color.
“One of the myths is that
it’s [technology] is so
sophisticated that we can’t
do it,” Jackson said. “First
of all, 70 percent of all of
‘Technology is supposed to be
about inclusion, but sadly,
patterns of exclusion remains
the order of the day’
“As I looked at every-
body’s fight for who can
make the smallest govern-
ment, I thought about our
being basically a govern-
ment-created middle class –
policemen, firemen, teach-
ers. As you cut down on the
civil service jobs, those jobs
disappear. Where are the
growth industries? Silicon
Valley for starters, the auto-
motive industry next,
banking next – the whole
private sector. You fish
where the fish are.”
Jackson said getting high
tech companies to disclose
their employment data,
EEO-1 forms that large
companies must file with
the federal government, was
a major victory.
“We asked for their EEO-
1 reports, but most of the
big companies didn’t want
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the jobs in Silicon Valley do
not require high tech skills –
lawyers, ad agencies, mar-
keting, social services or
engineering, though we can
do that, too.”
He added, “When you
look at Facebook’s board,
the only engineer on its
board is Mark Zuckerberg,
its founder. Don Graham
[former publisher of the
Washington Post] is not an
engineer. [Former White
House chief of staff] Ersk-
ine Bowles is not an
engineer yet he sits on the
board. It’s just a tight, White
circle.”
In March, Jackson sent a
letter to 20 companies,
including Apple, Twitter,
Facebook, Hewlett Packard,
Google, and eBay saying,
“Technology is supposed to
be about inclusion, but
sadly, patterns of exclusion
remains the order of the day.
When it comes to African
Americans on Boards –
ZERO. C-suites, ZERO.
Minority firms in IPOs and
financial
transactions,
advertising and professional
services – ZERO. These
ZEROES are contrary to the
enlightened values exposed
by the industry. Rainbow
PUSH is seeking meetings
with tech leaders to address
these ZEROES head on.”
When Jackson met with
companies, most initially
resisted disclosing their
employment data.
“Those companies all
filed a lawsuit in court and
won – they won the right
not to expose their EEO
records,” he said. “Their
rationale was that if they tell
their numbers, they would
be giving up propriety infor-
mation.”
Before going on attack,
Jackson did what he always
does when he targets a com-
pany – he purchased stock
so that he could take his
case to shareholders at their
annual meeting. Then, one
by one, the companies
began disclosing employ-
ment data.
• eBay (61 percent White;
24 percent Asian; 5 per-
cent Latino; 2 percent
Black)
• Google
(61
percent
White; 30 percent Asian;
3 percent Hispanic and 2
percent Black)
• Facebook (57 percent
White; 34 percent Asian;
4 percent Hispanic and 2
percent Black)
Twitter resisted until Jack-
son used Twitter and
ColorofChange.org
to
launch an on-line petition
drive demanding that Twit-
ter reveal its employment
data. Ironically, Blacks over
index on Twitter (26 per-
cent), according to a Pew
Research Center study, fol-
lowed by Hispanics (19
percent) and Whites (14
percent).
Twitter finally disclosed
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Jesse Jackson Expands Silicon Valley Initiative
Jesse Jackson at SCLC 2014 convention in Birmingham, Ala.
its data on July 23, showing:
59 percent of its staff in the
U.S. is made up of Whites;
29 percent Asian; 3 percent
Hispanic and 2 percent
Black.
On the day Jackson
addressed SCLC, Apple
released its employment
data showing 54 percent of
its jobs were held by
Whites, 23 percent by
Asian, 11 percent Hispanic
and 7 percent Black. Its
employment of people of
color appears to be highest
among high tech compa-
nies.
“We have not demanded
two-way trade and our gov-
ernment has not volunteered
to initiate it,” Jackson said.
“By now, the EEOC should
be holding hearings. It’s so
public that they are violat-
ing equal employment
standards.”
He continued, “We feel
diminished by corporate
power. If we could fight the
government, surely we can
fight a corporation. This is
just the first step with Sili-
con Valley. The next steps
are for ad agencies, market-
ing, NNPA, Black lawyers –
the whole range of things
we do.”
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