Clarence Henderson, civil rights activist and president of the North Carolina chapter of the Frederick Douglass Foundation, spoke on the third night of the Republican National Convention on Aug. 26, 2020. Henderson praised Trump for providing funding to historically black colleges and universities and for signing criminal justice legislation that freed inmates, claiming that 91 percent of them were Black people. In 2018 Trump signed the First Step Act, one of the most significant pieces of legislation aimed at criminal justice reform in years. Among other things, the bill takes steps to ease mandatory minimum sentences under federal law and reduce the sentencing disparities retroactively for crack cocaine and powder cocaine that disproportionately affected Black communities. A U.S. Sentencing Commission report found that 91.3 percent of those who received sentencing reductions under this new provision were Black, but it did not necessarily release them from prison.
On HBCUS, last year Trump signed a bill to permanently provide $250 million a year to HBCUs and other institutions that serve large populations of minority students, after funding lapsed. The Congressional CARES Act, signed by Trump in March as a coronavirus relief effort, also provided about $1.4 billion in emergency funding to HBCUS and minority serving institutions.

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