by Keith Boykin
Over the years, I’ve also learned from watching and reading Bree Newsome, Nikole Hannah Jones, Jamil Smith, Jelani Cobb, Michael Eric Dyson, Cornel West, Donna Brazile, Paul Butler, Charles Blow, Rashad Robinson, Clay Cane, Dorian Warren, Malcolm Kenyatta, Jasmyne Cannick, Mandy Carter, Phill Wilson, George M. Johnson, Darnell Moore, Ravi Perry, James Jones, Jemele Hill, Reverend Al Sharpton, Jericho Brown, Tarell Alvin McCraney, Hari Ziyad, Symone Sanders, and Samuel Sinyangwe, and from my media colleagues Joy-Ann Reid, Tiffany Cross, Eugene Scott, Abby Phillip, Michael Harriot, Don Lemon, Aisha Mills, Jonathan Capehart, Zerlina Maxwell, Bakari Sellers, and Angela Rye.
Finally, the only pleasure reading I had time to do while writing this book was Robert Jones Jr.’s beautiful novel The Prophets; choosing to read it was one of the best decisions I ever made.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
In the fall of 2018, one of my former students from Columbia University reached out to me with a question. He wanted to know if I had followed up on an idea that I had mentioned in the classroom that I might write a book based on the themes we discussed in the course he took. Although I wanted to write that book, I was overwhelmed at the time with the day-to-day grind of keeping up with Donald Trump for my job as a CNN political commentator. Nevertheless, my former student persisted, offering his help and volunteering to serve as a research assistant if I did pursue my idea. I took him up on that offer, and over the course of the next year, we’d meet nearly every week, researching issues, bouncing off ideas, and developing themes—many of which would eventually find their way into this book. My first acknowledgment is to that former student, Andrew Wang, for his time, dedication, and commitment to this project.
Of course, I also must thank the Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia University, which gave me the opportunity to develop the syllabi for the courses I taught on race and politics, and especially to Shawn Mendoza and Sharon Harris. The young students of all colors who took my classes also deserve credit for challenging me to think more broadly on a number of issues.
Before I began this book, I also had a brief but fortuitous conversation with historian Douglas Brinkley that encouraged me to write. During a break in a TV segment on CNN one day, he asked what projects I was working on. When I mentioned that I was struggling to find time to write a new book, he reminded me that my life would not be defined by “one more TV appearance” but by the body of work that I left behind.
Many others contributed to my ability to complete this book, but a few deserve special recognition. I have to thank my agent, Jane Dystel, for believing in me; my editor, Brandon Proia, for his patience; and my publisher, Clive Priddle, for understanding the importance of this project. Thanks also to Andre Bell, Logan Carrington, and Tony Pinder for sharing your stories with me.
I especially want to thank my friends, Neil Stanley, Flo McAfee, and Nathan Hale Williams, for repeatedly encouraging me to write this book. Thanks to my mom for opening her Texas home to me for nearly four months in 2020, while I was writing and quarantining. Thanks to my TV-scriptwriting partner, Jarrett Hill, who patiently allowed me time to write while we were developing a screenplay. And thanks to my close friends and family— Jeremy Graves, Lorin Brown, Michael Adams, Dr. Maurice Franklin, Kyeng Beeman, James Grooms, Ted Winn, Cheryl Jones, Mike Ramsey, Cameron Jones, Jardin Douglas, Brandon Adams, Keith Dickerson, Robert Dickerson, Reginald Dickerson, Lori Newberry, Hulon Bahar, Julian Roberson, Will Reese, Rochelle Teague, Allen Orr, Krystal Adams, Maiysha Simpson, and Corece, all of whom made this book possible with their love and support.
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Credit: Ricky Day
Keith Boykin is a CNN political commentator, New York Times–bestselling author, and a former White House aide to President Bill Clinton. Boykin has taught at the Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia University in New York and at American University in Washington, DC. He is a cofounder and first board president of the National Black Justice Coalition. He was a cohost of the BET Network’s talk show My Two Cents and starred on the Showtime reality television series American Candidate. A graduate of Dartmouth College and Harvard Law School, Boykin is a Lambda Literary Award–winning author, and Race Against Time is his fifth book. He lives in New York City.
Praise for Race Against Time
“In Race Against Time: The Politics of a Darkening America, Keith Boykin provides us with the insights of someone who is an eyewitness to history. This is history we have made together and lessons Boykin recommends to help shape the future.”
—Donna Brazile, former chair of the Democratic National Committee
“In evocative fashion, and through the depth of his personal experiences at the highest levels of American politics, Keith Boykin traces the parameters of America’s ‘never-ending civil war,’ from the shock of Clinton’s Black-voter-driven presidency though Bush and Obama and the white nationalist nightmare of Donald Trump. Race Against Time is essential reading at a calamitous time.”
—Joy Reid, host of MSNBC’s The ReidOut
“With clear insights and provocative analysis, Keith Boykin showcases why he is one of the country’s foremost experts on race and politics in America. This book is timely, relevant, and important.”
—Leah Wright Rigueur, associate research professor at Johns Hopkins University
“Race Against Time is Keith Boykin’s best book yet in a long list of books and anthologies that have helped define what cultural criticism is. This book is also an account of what it means to be overlooked in a capitalist landscape that denies the existence and contribution of Black queer citizens. What floors me is that Boykin’s genius—from all the political and racial history from Reconstruction onward, to his well-wrought recounting of the antics of US presidents from Reagan to Trump—still allows him to remain a man of hope and a writer that affirms the spirit in essays that speak to us as a comforting brother would.”
—Jericho Brown, author of The Tradition