Civil rights activist and longtime radio host Joe Madison has died. He was 74.
Madison’s household introduced his loss of life in an announcement shared on social media on Thursday, saying the influential radio host died “peacefully at dwelling surrounded by household.”
“Joe devoted his life to preventing for all those that are undervalued, underestimated and marginalized,” the assertion learn. “On air he typically posed the query, ‘What are you going to do about it?’”
“Though he’s now not with us, we hope you’ll be part of us in answering that decision by persevering with to be proactive within the combat towards injustice,” the assertion continued. “The outpouring of prayers and help over the previous couple of months lifted Joe’s spirits.”
Madison, referred to as “The Black Eagle,” is survived by his spouse, Sharon, and their 4 youngsters.
The influential radio host most lately hosted a morning weekday present on SiriusXM City View known as, “Joe Madison The Black Eagle.” He introduced in December he was taking a while away from the present, after the prostate most cancers he’d initially been identified with in 2009 returned.
“Upon making ready to return from the Thanksgiving hiatus my well being took an adversarial flip, making it difficult to host a four-hour, stay present day-after-day,” Madison mentioned in an announcement on the time.
Madison, born in Dayton, Ohio, graduated with a bachelor’s diploma in sociology from Washington College in St. Louis.
He grew to become the youngest government director of the Detroit department of the Nationwide Affiliation for the Development of Coloured Folks at age 24, the group states.
He was later appointed because the group’s nationwide political director, and was then elected to the nationwide board of administrators, the place he served from 1986 to 1999. He was appointed chairman of the NAACP Picture Awards in 1996.
Madison’s civil rights advocacy has been well-documented by his work with the NAACP and all through his time on the airwaves.
The veteran host, who started his radio profession in 1980 in Detroit, used his platform to name consideration to numerous points, together with the Sudanese genocide within the early 2000s, Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the 2010 earthquake in Haiti and efforts to curtail voting rights.
In 2015, Madison raised funds for the Smithsonian’s Nationwide Museum of African American Historical past and Tradition by internet hosting a 52-hour on-air broadcast. He raised greater than $250,000, the museum mentioned.
He went on a 73-day starvation strike in 2021 to encourage congress to move voting rights laws.
“Simply as meals is crucial for the existence of life, voting is crucial for the existence of democracy,” he advised CNN on the time.
Madison additionally fiercely pushed for the passage of The Emmett Until Antilynching Act, a invoice to formally make lynching a federal hate crime, which was signed into regulation in 2022.
Madison was inducted into the Radio Corridor of Fame in 2019.
President Joe Biden mourned Madison’s loss of life in a statement on Thursday on X, previously Twitter, calling Madison “the voice of a era.”
“Whether or not it was a starvation strike for voting rights or his advocacy for anti-lynching laws that I used to be proud to register 2022, Joe fought arduous towards injustice,” he wrote.
Tributes from different elected officers and journalists have continued to pour in: