Cole Carnick writes for the Washington Free Beacon about a new project designed to counteract the New York Times‘ effort to rewrite American history.

A group of predominantly African-American academics, journalists, entrepreneurs, and community activists on Friday launched one of the most significant challenges yet to the New York Times’s controversial 1619 Project, which is named for the year slaves arrived in Virginia and argues that the United States was founded on racism.

Bob Woodson, a leader in the African-American community who has spent his career fighting to stave off the cycle of poverty and crime, argued on Friday that the 1619 Project’s message—that life outcomes for African Americans are shaped by the history of slavery and Jim Crow—is a “lethal” narrative that perpetuates a culture of victimhood in the African-American community. During the launch of his new 1776 initiative, named for the year America was founded, Woodson said the new group would challenge those who assert America is forever defined by past failures.

While different academics and journalists have criticized the 1619 Project since its release last year, the 1776 project represents one of the largest coordinated challenges to the New York Times’s narrative. It will focus its efforts on opposing the negative impact the 1619 story will have on future generations of African Americans.

The 1776 project will promote a series of essays and educational resources that provide an “aspirational and inspirational alternative” to the Times’s narrative.