Political Scientist Maya Rockeymoore Cummings Applies RAGEism Book Framework to Current U.S. Government Policies at Home and Abroad

WASHINGTON, Sept. 10, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Political scientist Maya Rockeymoore Cummings, Ph.D., says developments involving Jackson's water crisis, birthright citizenship, immigration and the controversy following the death of Cambridge professor Jason Arday are testing the framework of her recently published book.

In RAGEism: Racism, Ageism, and the Quest for Liberation Democracy (Routledge, 2026), Rockeymoore Cummings identifies eleven political tricks and policy traps used to deny resources, restrict rights, weaken political power and perpetuate racial inequality.

Flint Was the Warning. Jackson Is the Verdict.

On September 4, the Fifth Circuit rejected federal constitutional claims by Jackson, Mississippi, residents arising from alleged lead contamination of the city's water supply, pointing them instead toward tort remedies and the political process.

RAGEism had already identified Jackson as an example of Resource Hoarding, or "The Keep Away." The book also examines Flint, drawing on 2016 congressional hearings where Rockeymoore Cummings's late husband, Congressman Elijah E. Cummings, pressed Michigan Governor Rick Snyder on accountability.

In TIME on May 4, 2016, the day President Obama visited Flint, Rockeymoore Cummings called for a 9/11-style compensation fund, arguing that charitable assistance and expanded Medicaid were insufficient to compensate affected households for the breadth of their losses.

"Policymakers, including judges, make decisions, allocate resources, exercise authority, and decide who receives protection and who bears the risk," she said. "People of color are consistently on the negative end of government decision-making. Biased human agency is at the heart of rageism."

More Babies. But Whose Babies?

The Trump administration has expressed concern about declining birthrates while pursuing restrictions on birthright citizenship. A federal judge blocked its latest order September 2. Until another federal court intervened in August, the administration had also suspended immigrant visas for nationals of 75 countries.

"The question is not simply whether America needs more children. It is whose children this government wants to become the next generation of Americans. These are explicit governmental choices about race, population, power and belonging."

The administration's National Security Strategy warns of Europe's potential "civilizational erasure" and declares, "We want Europe to remain European."

"When that is viewed alongside the expulsion and exclusion of Black and brown immigrants, extraordinary refugee preferences for white South Africans and attempts to restrict birthright citizenship, we are witnessing white supremacy elevated into government policy."

Academic Freedom for Whom?

U.S. Ambassador to Belgium Bill White intervened in the Ghent University controversy involving American postdoctoral researcher Nathan Cofnas, who accused Arday of plagiarism before Arday's death and has advocated "race realism." Ghent suspended Cofnas and later barred him from teaching for three months while its disciplinary inquiry continued.

"There is a profound hypocrisy in claiming the mantle of academic freedom abroad while constraining universities and political expression at home," said Rockeymoore Cummings.

"Policies do not write themselves," she added. "Budgets do not allocate themselves. People in power make those choices. RAGEism names the pattern and exposes the playbook they use to carry it out."

About the Author

Maya Rockeymoore Cummings, Ph.D., is a former Distinguished Presidential Research Fellow at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Hillary Rodham Clinton calls RAGEism "the bold call to action we urgently need."

CONTACTS

United States: Maya Rockeymoore Cummings, Author | [email protected] | Replies within two hours, 8 a.m.–8 p.m. ET

UK / Europe / Africa: Becky Parker-Ellis, Taylor & Francis | [email protected] | +44 7818 911310

Book, author headshot and high-resolution cover: RAGEism: Racism, Ageism, and the Quest for Liberation Democracy | Routledge

SOURCE Dr. Maya Rockeymoore Cummings