NEW ORLEANS — U.S. Rep. Nikema Williams used an Essence Festival of Culture panel on Black women’s economic power to make a pointed Georgia argument: the pay gap is not just a workplace problem. It is a political problem shaped by who holds power, writes laws and draws district lines.
Williams’ comments came as Black women continue to face some of the sharpest economic disparities in Georgia. Black women working full time, year-round in Georgia are paid 63 cents for every dollar paid to white, non-Hispanic men, according to the National Women’s Law Center.
When part-time and part-year workers are included, Black women in Georgia are paid 62 cents on the dollar. The group estimates the full-time wage gap would cost a Black woman entering Georgia’s workforce more than $1.05 million over a 40-year career.
That reality gave weight to the broader argument Williams made from the stage — Black women’s economic survival cannot be separated from political power.
The panel, convened by the Global Black Economic Forum, brought together labor leaders, economists, advocates and politicians to discuss Black women’s economic standing under the Trump administration. The conversation repeatedly returned to the same point: wages, job losses, wealth building, voting rights and political organizing are not separate fights.
Tiffany Cross, a political analyst and author who moderated the discussion, opened by saying the moment called for more than familiar talking points. She said hundreds of thousands of Black women have lost jobs during the current downturn, a figure that does not include those who never returned to the workforce after the COVID-19 pandemic.
“There’ve been a lot of conversations about us, but not a lot of conversations with us,” Cross said.
The national unemployment rate for Black women 20 and older was 5.7% in June, compared with 3.1% for white women in the same age group, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. In Georgia, the overall unemployment rate was 3.4% in May, according to the Georgia Department of Labor. Economic Policy Institute data for the first quarter of 2026 put Georgia’s Black unemployment rate, across genders, at 5.2%, compared with 2.2% for white workers.
For Williams, those numbers are tied to policy choices.
Cross pressed Williams on what Congress can realistically do while Democrats are out of power. Williams said legislation is only one measure of influence. She pointed to Georgia’s recent special session on congressional redistricting as an example of how public pressure can change political outcomes.
Republicans currently control every statewide constitutional office and both chambers of the Georgia Legislature. Even so, Williams said people who showed up at the state Capitol helped force lawmakers to delay action on the maps.
“The people’s voices were heard,” Williams said.
Williams did not offer a specific pay-gap bill from the stage. Instead, she argued that closing economic gaps requires organized political force — and that political power must be exercised inside Congress, at state capitols and in communities.
“It’s not just enough to think about this in the realm of what Congress is going to do,” Williams said. “It’s about Congress, yes. I’ve got to do my part, and I’ve got to make sure that people understand there are folks like me who are willing to stand on the front lines and fight for you every single day.”
That argument connected the panel’s economic focus to Georgia’s political reality. The state’s wage gap for Black women is not only a question of what employers pay. It also reflects broader fights over labor protections, health care access, child care, public investment and voting rights — all areas shaped by elected officials.
April Verrett, president of the Service Employees International Union, said Black women’s job losses reflect a lack of skill or preparation. She called resume-writing workshops for laid-off federal workers “insulting” to professionals who’d lost their jobs.
Verrett said the labor movement’s message is that workers are not to blame for conditions driven by economic exploitation, corporate greed and structural racism.
“We are enough,” Verrett said. “We are fine just the way that we are.”
Williams stressed that the fight to close the racial wealth gap began long before the current administration and will continue after it.
“It’s not about one person in Washington, because I ignore that man,” Williams said. “I know that the work that I’m doing to close the racial wealth gap existed before Donald Trump, during Donald Trump, and it will be thereafter until we come together to make sure that we’re using our voices collectively to move us all forward.”
Cross added historical context, citing the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre and the Red Summer of 1919 as reminders that Black self-sufficiency has often been met with violent backlash. She questioned whether building separate wealth and institutions can ever provide enough protection.
Williams said the strategies discussed onstage should not be viewed as competing ideas. Voting rights, labor rights, economic justice and community investment must move together, she said.
Williams, who holds the congressional seat once held by the late U.S. Rep. John Lewis, said her organizing philosophy is rooted in the civil rights movement’s understanding that democracy and economic justice are linked.
“They don’t want to see us thriving,” Williams said. “And I understand that I’m working within a system that was not designed by or for people who look like me, and that’s why organizing for me is so important.”
She closed by invoking Lewis’ words: “Our struggle is not the struggle of a day, a week or a month. It’s the struggle of a lifetime.”
