During the Paris Olympics Opening Ceremony, the female American flag bearer will be Coco Gauff, the 20-year-old tennis star. She will be the youngest flag bearer in American Olympic history. Basketball legend LeBron James has been selected as the male flag bearer.

Gauff said, “I was not expecting that.”

Delighted to be selected, Gauff admitted she has “no idea” what her assignment includes, adding, “I don’t know if there’s flag bearer-training I have to go to.”

James has been to the Olympics four times. He was part of U.S. teams that won bronze in 2004, gold at Beijing in 2008 and gold again in London in 2012.

But this will be his first time as the flag bearer.

He said, “It’s an absolute honor. I hope I continue to make my community proud and continue to make my family proud.”

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The stunning news of President Joe Biden’s decision to withdraw from the presidential race coalesced into a groundswell of support for Vice-President Kamala Harris, who Biden endorsed for the Democratic nomination. One by one, Democratic members of Congress announced their endorsement as did former President Bill Clinton and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. And donors contributed millions through the fundraising platform ActBlue, which reported a $49.6 million haul in less than 24 hours.

Civic organizations moved quickly to add momentum to Biden’s endorsement. WinWithBlackWomen converted its weekly virtual meeting into a webinar allowing 44,000 women to join the historic discussion about the possibility of the first woman Vice-President also becoming the first female president. Organizers say they raised more than $1.5 million in three hours.

“Sometimes when you’re in the middle of history, you don’t even know it,” explained Ray Winbush, Director of the Institute for Urban Research at Morgan State University. “But people jumped in with support of Vice-President Harris. I support her.”

As Republicans rushed to regroup following Biden’s change of plans, Winbush cited a “breath of relief” from American voters who expressed dissatisfaction with a Biden-Trump rematch.

Next Steps

Some former Nikki Haley supporters, committed to keeping Trump from winning re-election, announced their endorsement of Harris. The group was named Haley Voters for Biden, but members seized the momentum surrounding Biden’s endorsement of Harris and renamed itself, Haley Voters for Harris.

“There is no time to lose,” the group said.

The Democrats will begin their convention on August 19. Between now and then, Harris will likely announce her running mate. Three Democratic governors have been mentioned: Pennsylvania’s Josh Shapiro, Andy Beshear from Kentucky and North Carolina’s Roy Cooper.

When voters elected Biden and Harris to the White House in 2020, Black voters supported the ticket, applauding Biden’s delivery on his campaign promise to choose a Black woman as his running mate.

At that time, he also said, “Look, I view myself as a bridge, not as anything else … they are the future of this country.”

With his decision to step down, the longtime public servant has kept his word, again, and passed the torch to a new generation led by the Black woman he chose as his Vice-President.

Since the presidential debate, Black Congressional leaders have held public and private meetings to discuss President Joe Biden’s widely panned debate performance which has led to a growing list of Democrats, donors and voters who think the 81-year-old is not fit for the job and needs to remove his name from the ticket.

But members of the Congressional Black Caucus remain steadfast in their support of Biden’s campaign, with only one member of the CBC publicly calling for Biden to reconsider.

Democratic Congressman Jim Clyburn appeared on NBC’s “Today Show” Friday and encouraged his party to focus the conversation on “the record of this administration, on the alternative to his election and let Joe Biden continue to make his own decisions about his future,” adding that Biden has earned that right.

Clyburn, a respected and influential South Carolina Congressman, provided key support to Biden during the 2020 presidential election.

“Those of us who are real close watchers of Joe Biden, we do know that he sometimes mangles words and phrases, but all of that is almost natural for people who grew up stuttering, and they do focus a little more, and when you focus more, you lose the flow,” Clyburn explained. “He has one of the best minds that I’ve ever been around … I would hope that we would focus on the substance of this man rather than these, sometimes, misspoken words and phrases, and how he has run this country.”

Longtime Missouri Congressman and former president of the CBC, Emanuel Cleaver said, “I have loyalty to Biden, no question about it. As things stand, I want him to win. But if he says, ‘You know, I’ve been listening and chatting with people and I don’t want to go any further,’ or something like that, I am ready for somebody who can win.”

Despite the public support of most CBC members, there are some fissures. Congressman Ritchie Torres, a New York Democrat, wrote on X (formerly Twitter), “The narrative that the President simply had one bad debate performance reflects a continuing pattern of denial and self-delusion.”

The latest polls indicate that the race between Biden and Trump remains unchanged: it is still a close call although a majority of voters are concerned about Biden’s health. The Biden campaign points to the polls showing that the debate had little impact on the voters’ support for Biden as president.

Where do African American Voters Stand?

Voting rights advocate and former candidate for Georgia Governor, Stacey Abrams, repeated her endorsement for Biden in a post touting the administration’s achievements.

The attention for many African American voters will turn to Las Vegas next week where the NAACP, the country’s preeminent civil rights organization, will hold its convention. The keynote address will be delivered by President Biden.

In a press release, NAACP President Derrick Johnson said, “Ahead of this crucial election, the NAACP has worked fervently to educate our members and our community on the importance of exercising our right to vote. The rights of Black Americans are under rampant attack – from efforts to limit access to education, the mass absolving of diversity programs, and officials at every level actively working to dilute voting rights. There is no better time than now for our presidential candidates to reassure our community our voices are heard, and our concerns are a priority.”

It’s been more than two weeks since the June 27 presidential debate, and what some call “the debate about the debate” continues despite the Biden campaign’s efforts to quell it. The president’s supporters hope he will be able to quiet some of the discussion with more public events like the NAACP convention while his Republican opponent, former president Donald Trump, prepares to accept his party’s nomination at its July 15 convention in Milwaukee.