Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity Pulls Its Estimated $15 Million Convention From Florida Following Ron DeSantis’ String Of Legislation Targeting Black History

Ron DeSantis

Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity Pulls Its Estimated $15 Million Convention From Florida Following Ron DeSantis’ String Of Legislation Targeting Black History

The city of Florida just lost a major business deal!

After Governor Ron DeSantis‘ signed off on a widely controversial piece of education legislation recently, Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity has opted to move its coming convention in protest.

As we covered last month, many minority community and civil rights organizations have banded together to protest laws on education that have been passed in Florida. Most recently, DeSantis and Florida’s board of education came under fire for approving a K-12 Black History curriculum that suggests slavery was “beneficial” to its victims, because it helped them “develop skills”. The bill has been called ludicrous by many critics, and opponents argue that DeSantis – who has stated Florida is “where woke goes to die” – is once again attempting to manipulate the country’s gruesome relationship with slavery for his own political agenda.

Now, it seems the oldest Black fraternity in the country has joined the movement to protest. Announcing that they will no longer be hosting their 2025 convention in the Sunshine state, the organization wrote to their website:

“Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. General President Dr. Willis, L. Lonzer, III announced the relocation of the Fraternity’s 99^th General Convention and 119^th Anniversary Convention from Orlando, Florida, scheduled to take place in 2025, due to Governor Ron DeSantis’ harmful, racist, and insensitive policies against the Black community.”

Reportedly, the groups president, Willis L. Lonzer III, added in a subsequent interview:

“This is a multi-pronged armamentarium that we have to provide to attack racial prejudice and policies that are white supremacist in nature…We have here, a situation where Jim Crow has morphed from what it was 40, 50 years ago. And we’re in the process of developing new tactics to attack this.”

On their website, Lonzer estimates the decision not to host their convention in Florida, which reportedly draws around 10,000 of its 250,000 members annually, will approximately cost the state around $4.6 million. However, the president reportedly stated in another interview that the estimated combined total of loss for Florida could be up to $15 million once guests from other organizations who regularly attend the meeting are included as well.

Excerpt From Alpha Phi Alpha’s Official Web Address

Lonzer additionally expressed his hopes that the move will encourage other organization to stop doing business that will promote the DeSantis ran state as well. Reportedly, Omega Psi Phi fraternity has scheduled their 2024 convention in Tampa, which has reportedly caused some tension between its members. The report also notes that due to DeSantis‘ continued attack on Black History in the state, the National Society of Black Engineers has already announced they pulled their conference from the state, and plan to host it instead in Atlanta, GA in March of next year.

[VIA 1,2]

What are your thoughts on organizations economically protesting Florida? Let us know in the comments section below!