Why are there so many fewer Black farmers today than in the past? Hint: It’s not about how good they are at farming… W. Kamau Bell joins Black National Farmers Union Founder, John Boyd Jr., on an all-new episode of #UnitedShades, Sunday at 10 p.m. ET/PT

Meet John Boyd Jr., a fourth-generation farmer and the founder and president of the National Black Farmers Association, which advocates for Black farmer’s rights in America. In order to raise awareness about the plight of Black farmers, who are often denied loans and other support from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, he rode his mules and wagon for 17 days to reach Washington D.C. and lobby legislatures there.

I’m a fourth-generation farmer, and my dad is a farmer. My dad’s father was a farmer, his father was a farmer, and his father was a slave. The farm that my grandfather had has been in the family for over 100 years and passed down from generation to generation.

In the late 1980s, John Boyd was a hard working fourth-generation Virginia farmer just trying to stay ahead. When his loan request was turned down again and again by the Dept. of Agriculture and his requests for other forms of state assistance available for farmers were ignored, John turned his deep frustration into action.

Today's Black farms primarily are small enterprises with particular needs for the crops we grow. Our productivity comes from our enterprise and hard work, aided by biotechnology innovations that help our crops tolerate certain herbicides and protect them against insects.

Forty-four days late, justice finally showed up for Trayvon Martin and his family. Florida Special Prosecutor Angela B. Corey announced yesterday that she will charge George Zimmerman with second-degree murder for the shooting death of the unarmed teenager on February 26 in Sanford, Florida.

African Americans are lucky to have a strong advocate in President Obama. He is committed to restoring middle-class security and ensuring that everyone gets a fair shot at the American dream. We have all benefitted from a country where everyone does their fair share and everyone plays by the same rules.

This week marks the 47th anniversary of "Bloody Sunday," the violent assault by Alabama police and state troopers on peaceful Civil Rights marchers seeking voting rights for black Americans. Yet, even as that landmark event in Selma is recalled in a symbolic repeat of the march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge, a national voter suppression campaign is creeping across the land, through actions by some state legislatures.

When President Barack Obama signed a $1.25-billion bill that would fund a settlement between the Agriculture Department and Black farmers who were discriminated against in December of 2010, Boyd knew the battle had reached an important milestone, but was not over.

This past June, I had the opportunity to meet with United States Trade Representative Ron Kirk. We discussed ways to improve trade opportunities for Black and other minority farmers, including the Korea, Columbia and Panama agreements. The NBFA supported the passage of the implementing bills for these agreements and is honored to takepart in the signing ceremony at the White House with President Obama and Ambassador Kirk.

Yet in a public attack that smacks of racism, Bachmann and a small number of Republican colleagues are alleging that the majority of applications being made by black American farmers under this ruling are fraudulent. According to Bachmann, this “mass fraud” is evidenced by the fact that the number of black American farmer claimants is far higher than the number of black American farmers who were on the agricultural census during the period concerned.