Why the Black community didn’t blink when Fani Willis said she keeps lots of cash at home

Misconduct allegations have put Georgia prosecutor Fani Willis’ election subversion case against Donald Trump in jeopardy, but after her fiery testimony last week, her status as a Black woman is firmly intact.

Willis took the stand during a hearing centered on Trump codefendant Mike Roman’s allegation that she and special prosecutor Nathan Wade improperly benefited from the case by using public money to pay for vacations they took together. If Willis is found to have acted improperly, she could be disqualified from prosecuting Trump, her professional future could be irreparably damaged, and the case against Trump could eventually die.

In often dramatic testimony, Willis — the district attorney in Fulton County, Ga. — insisted she paid her own way, with thousands of dollars in cash that she kept in her home. For some, that testimony seemed implausible. For me, it was further proof that Black people, regardless of our socioeconomic status, are largely distrustful of America’s racist systems. Therefore, we often seek security in the one thing America respects: cash.

We’ve learned, through painful and persistent experience, that we cannot depend on institutions that were built on the backs of our ancestors, and later wielded like weapons against us.

We’ve seen banks redline segregated communities that our forebears were forced to occupy. We’ve watched that practice morph into lending patterns that leave Black mortgage seekers denied at twice the rate of the general population.

Still, we managed to purchase property and insure it in an effort to protect our generational wealth. But in the wake of the Tulsa Race Massacre, where a Black community suffered millions in property losses, insurers exploited loopholes to avoid hefty payouts and hung Black property owners out to dry.

Medical researchers abused us in the Tuskegee experiments, collected our skulls to promote racist junk science at the University of Pennsylvania, and exploited mostly Black prisoners in experiments at Holmesburg Prison. Doctors notoriously harvested the cells of Henrietta Lacks without her family’s knowledge or consent.

There’s more, but you get the point.

Perhaps if such discrimination were limited to private entities, we could put our trust in government. Unfortunately, government agencies have also been complicit.

After World War II, the GI Bill disproportionately benefited white troops, while leaving a million Black veterans behind. Soon after, governmental agencies destroyed Black neighborhoods through urban renewal and eminent domain.

Many predominantly Black schools in Pennsylvania are underfunded. Black employees make less than their white counterparts, and while Black unemployment hit an all-time low last year, our unemployment rate is still twice that of white people, and it’s been that way for decades.

We’ve been subjected to racism by virtually every structure America has put in place, and that’s taught us not to depend on such systems. That lesson has been passed down through generations. It’s a lesson that makes Willis’ cash reserve not only understandable but necessary.

Willis’ father, John Floyd III, who is also a lawyer, said as much when he was called to the witness stand during the hearing. He was asked if his daughter said anything to him about having a large amount of cash.

Turning to the judge, he said, “Your honor, I’m not trying to be racist, OK? But it’s a Black thing.”

He was right, of course. Black people keep cash because there’s not much else in America we can depend on when racism rears its ugly head.

To punctuate the point, Willis’ father told a story about taking his then-wife and 3-year-old daughter, Fani, to a restaurant in Cambridge, Mass., years ago.

“There was a sign that said, ‘We take credit cards,’” he recalled. “For whatever reasons, the man would not take my American Express credit card. So I pulled out my Visa card, and he wouldn’t take my Visa card. So then I pulled out my traveler’s checks. He said, ‘We don’t take checks.’”

Floyd had a $10 bill, and the man at the counter claimed their tab was $9.95.

Willis’ father said he never forgot that experience. Frankly, no Black person should.

African Americans keep cash because we never know when racism will strike, and sometimes, when things come down to Black and white, the only way out … is green.