Journalist
The latest March of Dimes annual report on preterm births, released in November 2025, contains dire news: Premature infants born to Black mothers in the U.S. increased 14.7%, with a 14% jump in premature babies born in Louisiana alone.
After decades of roadway projects that indiscriminately bulldozed through predominantly Black and Latino neighborhoods and created a legacy of toxic exposure, a planned fix under the Biden administration was set in motion.
Before Vernice Miller-Travis became the environmental justice legend she’s considered to be today, her early work was doing traditional civil rights and racial justice advocacy. She still thinks about Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.—and other leaders—every day. “It’s the reason that I wanted to be involved in civil rights work. It’s because I saw what they were doing. I saw the change that they were making,” she says.
