Member-only story
The Walmart Juneteenth Controversy
In January 2021 headlines announced 20 must-have items from Walmart’s MLK day sale, and there were no complaints about the corporate exploitation of MLK day. Besides, Coretta Scott King always said MLK day wasn’t a black holiday, it was a people’s holiday.
That June, President Joe Biden signed a bill that made Juneteenth a federal holiday. Biden was Vice President during the Obama administration, but a Juneteenth holiday to celebrate the emancipation of slavery in America was never mentioned during their tenure.
What changed in 2021?
The catalyst was the May 25, 2020 police killing of George Floyd and the riots that erupted nationwide. The next month, as Juneteenth approached, newspapers reported: As the Black Lives Matter movement gained momentum, lawmakers are considering making Juneteenth a federal holiday. President Trump also pledged to make Juneteenth a federal holiday during his re-election campaign. Trump was accused of political pandering, while his counterparts escaped charges of attempting to pacify a voting bloc.
There were opposers to the federal holiday, but the opposition wasn’t to the historical significance of Juneteenth. The opposers were concerned that if made into a federal holiday, Juneteenth wouldn’t be inclusive.