Biden set to establish monument for civil rights icon Emmett Till

Akayla Gardner Bloomberg News

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden will fulfill a years-long effort by conservationists to establish a national monument to preserve landmarks tied to the killing of Emmett Till, a catalyst for the civil-rights movement.

Biden will sign a proclamation Tuesday to create a memorial in honor of Till and his mother, Mamie Till-Mobley, in Illinois and Mississippi. The signing will fall on the day that would have been Till’s 82nd birthday, a White House official said.

Till was lynched in Mississippi in 1955 when he was 14 years old. Photos of his deformed face were immortalized in Jet magazine after Till-Mobley insisted on having an open casket at his funeral, drawing national attention to racial violence.

The Biden campaign and the White House have blasted efforts in some states to suppress teachings about slavery and Black history in public school classrooms. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a leading candidate in the GOP presidential primary, has defended new state curriculum regulating lessons on race, which has drawn outrage from educators and civil-rights leaders.

“They want to replace history with lies,” Vice President Kamala Harris said Friday in Florida.

“Let’s be clear, I do believe this is not only about the state of Florida. There’s a national agenda.”

Black voters are a key constituency for Biden as he seeks reelection in 2024. The president will need to reenergize the bloc in places like Georgia, where he won by narrow margins in 2020.

Earlier this year, members of the Till family joined civil-rights leaders for a screening of the movie Till at the White House during Black History Month. Biden signed legislation last year to officially designate lynching as a federal hate crime, legislation Till’s family has advocated for years.

See Biden on page 6

Braden Bush Sport Editor

As OSU coach Mike Gundy says he wants to get back to focusing on the running game more, new rules in college football give more game-control advantages to rushing the football.

In April, the NCAA Playing Rules Oversight Panel approved a rule change that will allow the clock to run after first downs in all divisions except Division III. This is a rule that the NFL has already adopted.

At Big 12 Media Days, Gundy said many of his earlier teams put more emphasis on the run and often utilized three backs, and he added that he plans to transition back to more rushing. With the new rules, a viable rushing attack paired with fewer stoppages can lead to even better clock control.

“Now if teams have the ability to rush the ball with a clock that continues to move on first downs, very similar to what you see in the NFL, the game is going to expire much quicker and it’ll be considerably different to what it’s been in the past,” Gundy said.

The clock will continue to stop inside the final two minutes of each half, as it has in years past, which lengthens the final minutes and allows room for a late comeback.

“That’s important,” Steve Shaw, NCAA secretary ruleseditor and officials coordinator, told ESPN, “because the beauty of the difference in our game, and it allows a team late in the game, even without timeouts, to have a chance to advance the ball and come back and that sort of thing. So we’re still going to stop it in the last two minutes.”

See Gundy on page 4