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The United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has received clearance to request personal information from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) about undocumented taxpayers. On Monday, April 7, 2025, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the IRS filed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, according to The Guardian. The agreement gives immigration enforcement officials unprecedented access to help President Donald Trump fulfill his promise of mass deportations as his administration continues to investigate undocumented immigrants still in the country after receiving a final removal order from a judge. “As laid out in the MOU, DHS can legally request return information relating to individuals under criminal investigation, and the IRS must provide it,” per a court filing, which outlines the procedures for making such requests and specifies the role of each agency in accessing the...
The Russell Innovation Center for Entrepreneurs (RICE), dedicated to expanding opportunities for Black entrepreneurs in Atlanta, GA, and beyond, has received a $2 million donation from The Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation. According to a news release, Blank’s donation will help the center move forward with RICE 2.0, a hub for innovation, collaboration, and economic empowerment that will provide essential resources for Black business founders, including small business grants, expanded programming, and mentorship opportunities. “This investment reflects our chairman’s entrepreneurial journey and his commitment to giving back to Atlanta, a city that has given him so much,” Blank Foundation President Fay Twersky said. “RICE’s extraordinary work supporting entrepreneurs creates pathways to economic mobility and opportunity. By investing in entrepreneurs at all stages, we’re fostering collective thriving where individual success strengthens entire communities.” In 1978, Arthur Blank...
If you or someone you love is an immigrant to the United States, you may be experiencing a great deal of trepidation right now. Not only has Donald Trump’s new cabinet been voracious about rounding up and deporting people from all over the world, they have also expressed interest in closing down the border and locking out any immigrants who they nebulously deem undesirable. This process has already begun, leading to an untold number of families being torn apart. While this is quite tragic, there are several American businesses that have maintained their commitment to the inclusion of migrants, meaning there’s still hope for those who plan to enter the country and stay long-term. Many of these companies are even offering highly competitive roles to newly-minted Americans, particularly in the world of finance and tech. Despite the many challenges that immigrants face, these companies may provide a veritable boom of new workers. This is especially true of massive corporations that have...
Editorial Note: Opinions and thoughts are the author’s own and not those of AFROTECH™. Last week, President Donald Trump announced that the U.S. would sell “gold card” visas for over $5 million to wealthy foreigners to alleviate the country’s trillion dollars in debt. As he continues to align himself with billionaire oligarchs, sycophants like Vladimir Putin—it’s clear that Trump has never cared for ordinary people. In his statement, he claimed that this new initiative had never been done before. But as always, he is mistaken. Investing large sums of money in citizenship has been in place in various countries across Europe and the Caribbean. The incentive of citizenship for pay—with advantages like limited restrictions and more flexibility—can open the door for wealthy yet dubious individuals to perform illicit activities. While no one can assume that every person who pays upwards of millions of dollars for foreign citizenship is a criminal, the lack of regulations opens up the EU,...
Having a game plan always pays off. Anderson Douglas, a Houston, TX-based professional with a background in engineering, has spent nearly a decade working as a sales consultant. At one point in his career, he transitioned into the tech industry but stepped away for some time until November 2024. “I felt like the position that I was in, it was great pay. I just wasn’t maximizing my potential in regards to having an engineering background,” he told AFROTECH™. Douglas applied to countless tech roles and was receiving rejection emails. However, his fate would change during his attendance at AFROTECH™ Conference held in November 2024 in Houston, TX. Douglas purchased a corporate ticket, and his approach for the conference was to build authentic connections rather than focus solely on leaving with an offer. By engaging on the expo floor and having less formal follow-up conversations at events, he strengthened his connections with recruiters. He also leveraged a 15-second elevator pitch,...
This story is for all of the folks who were told to “stop wasting time playing those video games” as children because it looks like one man’s love of gaming just landed him the big bucks. At the age of 16, Josh Fabian emancipated himself from his white adoptive parents and ultimately dropped out of high school. Fast forward, and his gaming startup was valued at $105 million as of February 2022 — funny how life works out, right? According to CNBC Make It, Fabian managed to raise $34 million from investors for Metafy, the online platform that he launched at the height of the pandemic. It offers amateur video gamers the opportunity to pay for coaching sessions led by some of the world’s top players. Metafy Classes are LIVE! Grab a seat and learn from your favorite Experts as they share their hard-won experience and explain the aspects of the game that will help you and your classmates ruthlessly destroy your enemies! New Classes added constantly! https://t.co/dfALBUoMPk...
Gina Belafonte is someone who walks the walk and talks the talk. As the executive director of Sankofa, she’s combining the arts and activism to carry on her father’s legacy. Though initially starting out as an actress, Gina Belafonte is now focusing her efforts on the organization her father started and choosing to focus her efforts on larger social justice causes. But that doesn’t mean she doesn’t use entertainment to get her point across. On March 1, HB95 — a celebration of Harry Belafonte’s 95th birthday — will be a star-studded event that will take place at the Town Hall Theater in New York City. Proceeds will benefit Sankofa, whose mission “educates, motivates, and activates artists and allies in service of grassroots movements and equitable change,” per the organization’s official website. Their outreach is, of course, grassroots in nature — they work with local partners to amplify their message, but their amplification involves some of the biggest names in the entertainment...
Personal safety while traveling is still a growing concern, especially for women traveling alone. This is the thought that Jillian Tancil had in mind when she founded TanTek Technologies last year, a tech startup manufacturing necklaces equipped with tracking devices. The necklaces sync with a mobile application that shows approved contacts a person’s exact whereabouts. Consumers can also safely send emergency alerts through the necklace or app to approved contacts. “I never really intended to go into business. It’s not what I went to school for,” Tancil told AfroTech in a video interview. Tancil is an attorney by trade. During her third year of law school at Harvard University, she went on a solo spring break trip to Paris; this was the experience that birthed TanTek. Being the only girl out of her siblings, Tancil and her family often worry about safety, especially while traveling. Tancil’s wheels started turning when she did some research amid her trip and found that there aren’t...
The NBA Foundation is working to make impactful strides in the social justice sector for its inaugural year. Just one year after the Milwaukee Bucks held a strike following the police shooting of Jacob Blake, the NBA has demonstrated a better understanding of what it means to invest in social-justice-driven philanthropy. In doing so, it’s putting its money where it’s needed most to uplift the next generation of Black leaders. According to an announcement from the NBA, the league’s newly-created foundation celebrated its one-year anniversary last week by distributing $6 million to 22 different organizations who aim to “create employment opportunities, further career advancement and drive economic empowerment for Black youth.” These grant recipients — including Black Girl Ventures — were a part of the foundation’s third round of grant funding to be given out in its first year. As part of its one-year anniversary, the NBA Foundation announced 22 new grants totaling $6 million today to...
When he was just 13-years-old, George Hofstetter was working as a sound technician at his local church. That same year, he was invited to his local Hackathon and brought his team to compete against Stanford’s best and brightest. With such an early interest in tech, it’s no wonder that he was able to host a TedTalk , start his own business, and create a life-saving app. “ GHTech, Inc., leads workshops on design thinking, radical social entrepreneurship, and presents keynotes on how to fight white supremacy through technology creation,” he told AfroTech. “We develop web & mobile app platforms centered around social justice as well as create free innovative online curriculums designed for students of color to bridge the ‘digital divide.’” George Hofstetter doesn’t just talk the talk in tech — he actually walks the walk, specifically with his creation of the CopStop app. Currently available on the App Store, the CopStop app aims to diffuse those tense situations between Black men and...
The social reckoning that sparked a national conversation around police brutality and racial justice last year became part of the origin story for many companies and their initiatives. Much of this was in response to George Floyd’s murder that occurred in Minneapolis, MN and as a result, three men living in the center of this movement decided to take matters into their own hands to help protect their communities. Late last year, Mychal Frelix, Andre Creighton and Jazz Hampton — co-founders of TurnSignl — left their corporate jobs to develop an idea around an app that protects both drivers and police officers during routine traffic stops by recording interactions that are guided by a lawyer on-call in real time. The app was developed in conjunction with both local Minnesota police chiefs and attorneys to help advise on the best way for this technology to exist. The premise of the app is to ultimately make these interactions less intense by giving all parties involved a level of...
Venerated entertainment industry magazine Variety has announced its newest partnership with a Black-owned tech company named Yappa. In a press release announcement, it was revealed that Yappa, an audio and visual commenting tool for the web, will be the exclusive new commenting solution for the magazine’s official website. The Yappa commenting widget will live at the bottom of each story throughout Variety’s website, allowing readers to leave audio and/or video comments based on what they just read or interacted with on the page. This partnership, which was made official as of yesterday, comes hot on the heels of Yappa’s most recent valuation of $200 million. They also recently secured more funding to further their technology, expand their team, and roll out new products. Jennifer Dyer, the Webby Award-winning CEO of Yappa, also said that this new infusion of funds will also allow the company to form partnerships with other online brands, including Vox Media, iHeart Radio, The Hill,...
Rick Ross is the latest hip-hop star to make a splash in the cryptocurrency market with his history-making debut. According to a report from Forbes, the music mogul — alongside producer duo Cool & Dre — has teamed up with luxury car designer Rich B. Caliente to create the first-ever Porsche 911 art car and an NFT. “This NFT is super fly. Just splashing paint with the can as art is a combination of the culture with the lifestyle while trying fly things while being creative,” Rick Ross said in an email to the outlet. “The synergy and energy that we had while we were doing this… it was like a one-off,” Caliente added. “It’s all our relationships combined and all our passions combined to create something and put it into one tangible asset.” The creative cryptocurrency collaboration was launched with help from NFT management consultancy company, Slashdot. Unlike most NFTs that just come with a digital asset, Forbes reports that the auction of the Porsche includes ownership of the art and...
Tired of toxic social media interactions? Marvel actor Blondy Baruti is too, which is why he launched a new social network called BePerk. While Baruti’s name doesn’t ring the same sort of bells as, say, Chris Evans or Robert Downey Jr., he has a respectable acting career to his credit. In addition to starring in “Guardians of the Galaxy,” Baruti is also starring in an upcoming NBA-based TV movie. Of course, that has to do with the fact that his previous career involved being a basketball player for the University of Tulsa. In any event, this native of the Democratic Republic of the Congo has launched BePerk, which Insider describes as being designed to give more people control over their actions and interactions. Specifically, the Marvel actor chose to launch it during Mental Health Awareness Month because he felt people were placing too much emphasis on social media interactions and not enough emphasis on self-care. He also said that it was something he built from the ground up. “I...
San Francisco has a goal to reinvest its multi-million dollar police budgets into Black-owned businesses in its community. According to an announcement from San Francisco Mayor London N. Breed, she shared that the city would be awarding $3.75 million from the Office of Economic and Workforce Development (OEWD) and the San Francisco Human Rights Commission (HRC) to its small Black business community as a means to divert the $120 million funding from law enforcement. The new move is part of the city’s Dream Keeper Initiative, which aims to mitigate the economic hardships in San Francisco’s Black community and help support rebuilding its economic power. “Across this country, and in our City, we’ve seen how the Black community’s economic growth and prosperity has historically been disrupted and marginalized,” Mayor Breed said in her statement. “This funding is part [of[] our efforts to undo the harm of generations of disinvestment and economic inequities. As we work to recover and make...