04/21/21 04/21/21 [captioning made possible by democracy now!] amy: from new york, this is democracy now! >> guilty. amy: guilty. guilty. guilty. former minneapolis police officer derek chauvin has been convicted of all three charges of murdering george floyd. close with a jury as to count one, unintentional second degree

murder while committing a felony, find the defendant guilty. amy: derek chauvin is the first white minnesota police officer ever to be convicted of killing a black person. george floyd's family is vowing to keep fighting for racial justice. >> we have to protest because it seems like this is a never ending cycle. reverend al always told me, we have to keep fighting. i am going to put up a fight every day because i am not just fighting for george anymore, i am fighting for everybody around this world. amy: we will go to minneapolis to speak with kandace montgomery of the black visions collective. plus, harvard professor khalil gibran muhammad, the author of "the condemnation of blackness: race, crime and the making of modern urban america." all that and more, coming up. welcome to democracy now!, democracynow.org, the quarantine

report. i'm amy goodman. guilty. three weeks after the start of a trial that was watched around the world, a jury of 12 heepin county residents delivered their verdict on the three counts against former police officer derek chauvin who murdered george floyd last may by kneeling on his neck for nine and a half minutes. judge peter cahill read the unanimous verdict. >> with the jury as to count one, unintentional second degree murder while committing a felony, find the defendant guilty. the jury as to count two, third-degree murder perpetrating an emily dangerous act, find the defendant guilty. we the jury, countnkhree, culpable negligence, crating any unreasonable risk, find the defendant guilty. amy: jurors deliberated for just over 10 hours before delivering their guilty verdict. judge cahill revoked chauvin's

bail and will sentence him in eight weeks. he faces up to 40 years in prison for the most serious charge, second-degree murder. it's the first time a white officer has been found guilty of murdering a person of color in minnesota. an npr investigation found that police officers have shot and killed at least 135 black men and women across the u.s. since 2015. at least three quarters of those officers were white. on the streets of minneapolis and around the country, protesters greeted the news with joy, relief, and vows to keep fighting. george floyd's murder last may set off a global movement for racial justice and against police brutality. george floyd's brother philonise floyd responded to the verdict at a news conference with other family members and civil rights leaders. >> i am going to put up a fight every day because i am not just fighting for george anymore, i

am fighting for everyone around this world. i get calls, dm's people from germany. london, italy. they were all saying the same thing. we won't be able to breathe until you are able to breathe. today we are able to breathe again. amy: after headlines, we'll spend the rest of the hour on the historic verdict and the reactions they have garnered. protests broke out in columbus, ohio, tuesday night after a police officer fatally shot a black teenage girl. 16-year-old ma'khia bryant was reportedly in an altercation with two people and police claimed they thought she was going to stab someone before an officer shot her four times. the unnamed officer has been put on leave. she was killed shortly before derek chauvin was found guilty of murdering george floyd.

ma'khia bryant had been staying at a foster home. her mother paula bryant spoke to a local news channel about the last time she saw her daughter. >> we hugged each other. she said, "mommy, i made honor roll." she said "mommy, i am looking forward to coming home." she had a motherly nature about her. she promoted these. -- she promoted peace. that is something i want to be remembered. amy: a judge has denied a motion to toss the 20-year prison sentence of former police officer michael slager, who murdered unarmed black motorist walter scott in south carolina in 2015. slager tried to argue that his defense was ineffective, but the federal judge ruled -- "a careful review of this entire tragic episode makes plain that slager has no one to blame for his present predicament and sentence but himself. what sealed fate was his own

willful act of shooting an unarmed man in the back five times as he ran for his life." an international news, india has hit a grim new coronavirus milestone with over 2000 covid deaths in a day and close to 300,000 new cases. hospitals are running low on oxygen and available beds amid the devastating surge. prime minister narendra modi said india was facing a coronavirus storm but is resisting another nationwide lockdown, calling instead for regional lockdowns. meanwhile, the former king and queen of nepal have tested positive for covid-19 after attending the religious festival of kumbh ma in the northern indian city of haridwar, which has drawn millions of pilgrims in recent weeks. mexican president andrés manuel lópez obrador received his first dose of the astrazeneca vaccine

tuesday after weeks of mixed messages over whether he would get inoculated. he previously said he would not get the shot as he believed his january infection gave him sufficient covid-19 antibodies. amlo has come under fire for his response to the pandemic, including his refusal to issue a mask mandate or even wear one himself on many occasions. mexico's official death toll is 213,000 -- the third highest in the world -- but officials said last month the true number could be 60% higher. here in the united states, the state department is updati its traveldvisories to recommend avoiding travel to 80% of countries around the world because of coronavirus risks. johnson & johnson is resuming its rollout in europe after the european union drugs regulator said the vaccine may be linked to extremely rare blood clots,

but that its benefits far outweigh its risks. the european regulator said the vaccine should carry a warning. it will be up to individual eu countries to decide whether and how to distribute the vaccine. on friday, panel from the cent disease control will need to make recommendations on its use in the u.s. which has been temporarily halted. new york congressmember alexandria ocasio-cortez and massachusetts senator ed markey reintroduced their green new deal resolution tuesday, over two years after it was first unveiled. it now has over 100 co-sponsors in the house. the plan would overhaul u.s. infrastructure, investing in clean energy, and creating 20 million union jobs. this is ocasio-cortez at a press conference on capitol hill. >> we are going to transition to a 100% carbon-free economy that

is more unionized, more just, or dignified, and guarantees more health care and housing then we have ever had before. that is our goal. that is the goal of a green new deal. what we're going to do is make sure communities like flint, baltimore, the south bronx, st. louis -- will ban community's's infrastructure was never properly built in the first place are first in line to rectify the injustices of the past. amy: meanwhile, president biden will reportedly announce plans to cut u.s. greenhouse gas emissions at least in half by 2030 -- nearly doubling the target the u.s. committed to under the 2015 paris climate agreement. biden has convened an international climate summit with world leaders, which will kick off thursday. earth day. in chad, the son of late president idriss deby, mahamat

idriss deby, has been nad interim head of state by a military council after his father died, reportedly while visiting frontline soldiers as they battled a rebel advance in the north of the country. the army has also enacted a nationwide curfew and announced chad's land and air borders be shut down. rebel forces threatened to move towards the capital, proting fes of further unrest. idriss deby had been in power for over 30 years and was just announced the winner of a recent presidential election before his death. rights groups are calling for a quick transition to democratic civilian rule and an accounting of human rights abuses under his reign. a new report by reporters without borders says journalists in over 100 countries have been blocked from reporting on the coronavirus pandemic and other stories retaliad agains for their work. in its and worried for -- in its annual report for press freedom, the group also highlighted

attacks on u.s. journalists by law enforcement while covering racial justice and anti-police brutality protests last summer. in pakistan, veteran journalist absar alamwas shot and wounded tuesday while on a walk near his home in the capital islamabad. officials have launched an investigation into the attack, which the pakistani minister of information and broadcasting is condemning as an assassination attempt. alam has been a long-time vocal critic of the country's military. journalists are routinely targeted in pakistan, with news organizations facing censorship from the military and government. reporters without borders recently ranked pakistan near the very bottom out of 180 countries for press freedom. over 250 nonprofits, including oxfam, save the children, and the international rescue committee, are urging governments around the world to increase aid for hunger relief programs. in a letter addressed to world leaders, the groups warn over 270 million people are facing acute food insecurity, with many

"teetering on the very edge of famine" due to ongoing conflicts, the climate crisis, systemic inequities, and the pandemic. oxfam recently noted, "only 26 hours of global military spending is enough to cover the $5.5 billion needed to help those most at risk" and called cuts to food aid by wealthy countries "an extraordinary political failure." back in the united states, the biden administration has officially backed statehood for washington, d.c., ahead of a house vote on the issue thursday. the white house called on congress to "provide for a swift and orderly transition to statehood" for the 700,000 washington residents who are not fully represented in congress. the bill is expected to pass the house but faces an uphill battle in the evenly divided senate where it would need 60 votes to overcome the filibuster. los angeles mayor eric garcetti

has proposed a guaranteed basic income pilot program, which would make l.a. the largest u.s. city to run such a program. >> this year los angeles will launch the largest guaranteed basic income pilot of any city in america. we have budgeted $24 million to find $1000 a month to 2000 households for an entire year, no questions asked. amy: data from a similar initiative in stockton, california, has shown recipients had greater success in finding employment and improved mental health. around one in five people in los angeles live in poverty. standing rock water protector steve martinez has been released after more than 60 days behind bars for refusing to give testimony to a federal grand jury. martinez was summoned as a witness in the case of sophia wilansky, a water protector whose arm was severely wounded during a police crackdown on anti-pipeline protests in 2016.

prosecutors were attempting to shift blame for wilansky's injuries from law enforcement to water protectors. the campaign to free steve martinez blasted the use of grand juries as a "divisive and cruel tool of repression." and supporters of imprisoned journalist and activist mumia abu-jamal say he underwent successful heart surgery monday. abu-jamal got covid-19 last month and was diagnosed with congestive heart failure, which he attributed to medical neglect and prison conditions. advocates are demanding he not be shackled to his hospital bed and continue to call for his release. the african-american journalist ami abu jamaal is 66 years old and has been in prison for nearly 40 years. and those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the quarantine report. i'm amy goodman in new york, joined by my co-host juan gonzález in new brunswick, new jersey. hi, juan. juan: hi, amy. juan: welcome to all of our

listeners and viewers from around the country and around the world. amy: a jury in minneapolis has convicted former police officer derek chauvin on three counts for murdering george floyd by kneeling on his neck for nine minutes and 29 seconds lastde may. chauvin is the first white police officer in minnesota to ever be convicted of killing a black person. the jury reached its decision after 10 hours of deliberation. just after 5:00 p.m. eastern time, judge peter cahill read the jury's decision. >> we the jury as to count one, unintentional second be murder while committing a felony, find the defendant l2. we the jury as to count two, third degree murder perpetrating dangerous act, find the defendant guilty. we the jury as to count three, second-degree manslaughter, creating an reasonable risk of a

find the defendant guilty. amy: moments later, derek chauvin was handcuffed and taken into custody. he will be sentenced in two months. he faces up to 40 years in prison for the most serious charge, second-degree murder. outside the minneapolis courthouse, crowds erupted in cheers when the verdict was announced. [cheers] amy: residents of minneapolis described feeling relieved by the jury's decision to convict derek chauvin. >> i feel like a weight is lifted off my shoulders. i know the work is not done. i know there is a lot of work to do, but for today, black people have liberation. tomorrow is another day to work. amy: george floyd's younger brother philonise addressed reporters. he invoked the name of emmett

till, the 14-year-old boy who was lynched in 1955 in mississippi. >> he was the first george floyd. were today you have the cameras all around the world to see and show what happened to my brother , it was a motion picture, the world seeing his life being extinguished. i could do nothing but watch. we have to protest because it seems like this is a never ending cycle. reverend al always told me, we have to keep fighting. i am going to put up a fight every day because i'm not just fighting for george anymore, i am fighting for everybody around this world. i get calls. i get dm's people from brazil,

germany, london, italy. they are all saying the same thing. we won't be able to breathe until you are able to breathe. today, we are able to breathe again. amy: george floyd's nephew brandon williams also spoke. he called for reforms to policing in the united states. >> today is a pivotal moment. for america. it is something this country has deeded for a long time now. hopefully, today is the start of that. when i say a pivotal moment, we need change in this open system. it was built to oppress us. we need police reform bad. these guys are able to wear a badge and go out in the field, which means there qualified and trained to do their job at a

high level. but when you shoot and kill a man that is running away from you that does not pose a threat, you're not qualified and highly trained or it is a choice and you want to kill black men and women. it is either one or the other. and i think today, keith ellison and his team proved just because you are the law, you're not above the law. we need each and every officer to be held accountable. and until then, it is still scary to be a black man or woman in america and encounter police. amy: the reverend jesse jackson and al sharpton stood behind the family members as they spoke. the reverend al sharpton of the national action network spoke alongside the floyd family. >> we don't find pleasure in this. we don't celebrate a man going

to jail. we would rather george be alive. we celebrate that we, because young people -- white and black -- many that are here tonight marched and kept marching and keptoing. many of them looked down, but they kept marching and would not let this die. and this is an assurance to them that if we don't give up, we can win some rounds. but the war in the fight is not over. just two days from now, we're going to have to deal with the funeral of daunte wright in the same county, the same area. we still have cases to fight. but this gives us the energy to fight on. and we are determined that we are going to fight until we make federal law, the george floyd justice in policing act.

amy: minnesota attorney general keith ellison was in charge of the prosecution. he also referenced the recent police killing of daunte wright in nearby brooklyn center , minnesota. >> we have seen rodney king, oscar grant, eric garner, michael brown, freddie gray, sandra bland, philando castile, laquan mcdonald, stefan clark, anton black, breonna taylor, and now daunte wright and adam toledo. this has to end. we need true justice. that is not one case. that is a social transformation that says nobody is beneath the law and no one is above it. this verdict reminds us that we must make enduring systemic, societal change.

amy: the first african-american elected to statewide office in minnesota and the first muslim elected to statewide office anywhere in the united states, keith ellison. president biden addressed the nation on tuesday and condemned systemic racism. pres. biden: it was a murder in full light of day and ripped the blinders off for the whole world to see the systemic racism the vice president is referred to. systemic racism is a stain on our nation sold. the knee on the neck of justice for black americans. profound fear and trauma, pain and exhaustion that black and brown americans experience every single day. the murder of george floyd launched a summer a protest. we had not seen it since the civil rights in the 1960's.

protest that unified people of every race and generation and with peace and purpose to say enough. enough. enough of these senseless killings. amy: vice president kamala harris spoke just before president biden. vice pres. harris: today we breathe a sigh of relief. still, it cannot take away the pain. a measure of justice is not the same as equal justice. this verdict brings us a step closer. and the fact is, we still have work to do. we still must reform the system. amy: when we come back, we will spend the rest of the hour looking at the chauvin verdict and we will speak with kandace montgomeryf the black visions collectiven minnesotand harvard professor khalil gibran muhammad. stay with us. ♪♪ [music break]

amy: this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the quarantine report. i'm amy goodman with juan gonzalez. as we have reported, a jury in minneapolis has convicted former police officer derek chauvin on three counts of murdering george floyd by kneeling on his neck for nine minutes and 29 seconds. he is the first white police officer minnesota to ever be convicted of killing a black person. the jury reached a decision after 10 hours of deliberation. judge peter cahill revoked chauvin's bail and will sentence him in two months. he faces up to 40 years in prison for second-degree murder. for more, we go to minneapolis, where we speak with kandace

montgomery, co-executive director of black visions collective, a black-led queer- and trans-centering community organization based in the twin cities of minneapolis and st. paul that is part of the movement calling to defund the police. welcome to democracy now! first, your reaction to the verdict. >> thank you so much for having me. my reaction, like many, was an exhale our community. many of us have been holding our breath in anticipation for this verdict. though i don't think justice can ever be served when you have lost a life in this type of situation, i do think it is important to be able to honor that exhale of a breath and honor the peace that i'm sure george floyd's family and friends are naval -- able to experience and feel. for that i am very happy.

juan: i am wondering your reaction to the statements of attorney general keith ellison. he gave a very lengthy statement after the verdict, going into basically the history of abuse of african-americans by law enforcement. your reaction to that and his role in all of this? >> i think it is really critical that we are lifting up this history and that attorney general keith ellison is also doing so and his work to really push for justice in this moment has been important in many ways. at the same time, attorney general keith ellison also has been part of the militarized occupation that is currently happening in minneapolis and across minnesota in preparation

for this verdict as well as response to the murder of daunte wright. so my offering back to the attorney general's to really look at the ways we are able to not just reckon with the history that we have to deal with, but also look at how we are perpetuating that history in these moments -- specifically, by limiting the rights of black and brown protesters here in his state who are peacefully protesting against, once again, another police murder. juan: and in terms of the sentencing for chauvin will be approximately eight weeks, your sense of what wld be a just sentence for him in this situation? >> i don't necessarily think i have an assessment of what would feel as a just sentence in this

moment most of as an abolitionist and someone who thinks justice is tied up much beyond someone being in prison, i think it is important to really think about justice going forward actually looks like defunding and abolishing police. it actually looks like an militarized occupation in cities that are responding to police martyrs. truly uprooting the hideous roots of this institution of policing in a system that continues to kill black people at the same time that we were exhaling or collectively celebrating the verdicts of george floyd'sza murder, we also witnessed another murder of a black teenager ma'khia bryant almost at the exact same time. as folksre looking forward to the sentencing, i want to

encourage people to think about justice as much more long-term and that we set our bar a lot higher when it comes to calling for justice and an adequate sentencing or not. amy: last year, in the days after the protests erected over derek chauvin's murder of george floyd, the majority of the minneapolis city council made a pledge to dismantle the police. this is city council president lisa vendor. >> our commitment is to end our cities toxic relationship with the minneapolis police department, to end policing as we know it and to re-create systems of public safety that actually keep us safe. amy: around the same time last year after george floyd's murder, organizers with your group like visions collective and others convinced minneapolis

mayor jacob frey to step outside his home to speak with them. in this clip, we hear you questioning the mayor. >> [inaudible] >> go home, jacob, go home. amy: that is minneapolis mayor jacob frey telling you, kandace montgomery, "i cannot support the full abolition of the police." that was last june. i want to ask you to things. first of all, the words of the activists, something the floyd family repeated over and over last night in thinking activists, the only reason the first african-american elected to statewide office in minnesota , keith ellison, was in charge

of this prosecution is because it was taken out of the hands of hennepin county by the governor as a result of the mass protests . then i want to ask about the protests very much centering around this whole push for defunding the police in minneapolis, including the city councils vote in december to cut $8 million from the $170 million police budget and divert the funds to mental health and violence prevention. lay out for us what you have proposed and what you feel has been accomplished and what you think needs to be accomplished. >> so for the last years, even before 2020, black visions and our partners and other community organizations have been calling for the development from policing, in particular, the investment in our communities

stop investment as in investment in real safety, things that create conditions for safe and healthy and vibrant communities like housing and health care, like quality access to jobs, like water that you can drink. things like that. instead of wasting millions of dollars on policing that we know ultimately, one come have never been designed to protect and serve, low-income people, people of color ever step in fact, were intentionally created to oppress and keep us in our current conditions. that has been our call since 2018. in 2020, it was really an important and immediate called action to defund the police after the murder of george floyd. because for me, and my comrades, that is what justice actually looks like, ending this and

making sure there is never another george floyd or daunte wright or ma'khia bryant or breonna taylor ever again. that has been the work we have been doing. we have been working with the city council to push forward that demand. right now without looks like here in minneapolis is calling for the development of a departmentf public safety and a charter change in our city that will elinate the reirement for the correct shape of our police department, the amount of officers, and really the amount of money that we waste every year here in minneapolis on policing and allow us to move those resources and create the irastructure at citywide level for real investment in safety alternatives that do not rely on thpolice solely. and a public health approach to how we think about safety here in minneapolis that truly

centers care for all of our people. and the city council, along with community organizers, have been working on this initiative this year and are excited to bring into to the voters in november. this proposed charter change. what i will say about our mayor jacob fry is that what we have seen since last summer and to this point is that he is completely inadequate to fulfill the responsibilities of his executive role. to be clear about the types of decisions that he does or does not have power around come to actually fulfill the promises that he ran on, what he was being elected, and has continuously tried to pit black communities against each other in order to preserve his political standing and not move forward on community safety like his constituents have been calling for. so i think it is important for

people to understand the ways that our mayor has really blocked and gotten in the way of justice. i want to shout out the george floyd organizers who for almost an entire year have been out there every single day between 8:00 a.m. until late into the evening protesting and holding down truly sacred space that is providing mutual aid and care to community members, that is curating the art of this movement so people can memorialize and remember this moment. and is not letting the city back down from its promises. that has been so crucial. as well as the organizing led by young people during the uprising last summer that truly lit the fire under the conversation here in minneapolis, but across the country and across the globe and put pressure in all of the right

places that were needed. and then of course, our demands come alongside others, to not just call for black lives matter, but to call for the clear demand to change the system by defunding the police as we move toward abolition of the police ultimately over the years to come and invest in a new model, a new vision for how we do safety. that is really the moment here. i really appreciate you listing the importance of activism and not just activism, but intentional organizing that folks have put into intentional strategy that community members have been building for decades to get us to this point. amy: it is just incredible moment of the bystanders, the passersby who simply cared. did not know each other, including at the time the 17-year-old darnella frazier who

was the one you took the video. i what to end this conversation with a reminder of what actually came out from the police department versus what darnella frazier did. shortly after derek chauvin killed george floyd, the minneapolis police department issued a press release describing what happened. the release was titled "man dies from medical incident during police interaction." the statement said in part -- "two officers arrived and located the suspect, a male believed to be in his 40's, in his car. he was ordered to step from his car. after he got out, he physically resisted officers. officers were able to get the suspect into handcuffs and noted he appeared to be suffering medical distress. officers called for an ambulance. he was transported to hennepin county medical center by ambulance where he died a short time later.”

it was only that video, and then of course the eyewitness testimony of passersby who did not know george floyd but were deeply concerned about watching a slow motion murder, that showed the lie of this press release. your final comment? >> internally grateful for darnella frazier and her bravery in being willing to not only witness this murder but report it so that the family and others pursue justice for george floyd. and again, the police department will continue to show its true colors and what it is actually rooted in, which is making up lies against humanity for the sake of maintaining its institutional power. i think that is important. it should not be lost on people

that here in minnesota right now, we are experiencing extreme response and militarized occupation of national guard and millions of dollars being poured into policing, risking these same conditions. i think it is important we witness this, that we document these things, that we share these things, and that we continue to protest and get out in the streets. we know the police will lie on our name any day without hesitating, and we are the ones who can keep us safe. darnell reminded us of that. amy: she was with her nine-year-old cousin who is wearing a t-shirt that said "love." kandace montgomery, co-executive director of black visions collective, a black-led queer- and trans-centering community organization based in the twin cities in minnesota. next up, we go to harvard professor khalil gibran,

professor of history, race, and public policy. of "the condemnation of otherof "the condemnation of blackness: race, crime and the making of modern urban america." ♪♪ [music break]

amy: this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the quarantine report. i'm amy goodman with juan gonzalez. guilty. guilty. guilty. three weeks after the start of the trial was watched around the world and after 10 hours of deliberation, injury of 12 and up in county residents delivered their verdict and found guilty former minneapolis police officer derek chauvin. we are joined by khalil gibran muhammad, professor of history, race, and public policy at the harvard kennedy school, and the author of "the condemnation of blackness: race, crime and the making of modern urban america."

welcome back to democracy now! take us on a journey back. respond to the verdict but then talk about the beginning of policing in america and its connection to slave patrols. >> good morning. i think this verdict -- i have been thinking a lot about how to respect the family sense of closure and what they deserve in the delivery of accountability in this case. i have also been thinking about this in true battle, a broader context to war. and that warping justice for black peopl and for four people in this country. dein this sense, the outcome of this trial represents a battle that was one comelong fe and as kandaceer montgomery so eloquently described in the work she has been doing, the consequence of years of organizing work in minneapolis.

just remind you, each one of these battles will take place in the courts of our country, whether it will be in toledo, ohio -- i'm sorry, whether it will be in chicago, whether it will be in this case most recently with ma'khia bryant in columbus, ohio. that is how i think about the trial and the work that remains. of course we know while the prosecution was performing in such a way to make the case derek chauvin was a rogue actor, the truth is policing should have been on trial in that case. and we don't have a mechanism in our current system of laws and the way we treat individual offenses to have that accountability and justice delivered. and the reason being is our policing system was never really built to do with individuals, it was to control groups. ranging from indigenous people

during the period of colonization and the early 19t century, and of course, the vast majority of african-american descent, for 250 years in a the context of chattel slavery, which meant simply to protect any canonic system where people have been defined as property and if that property decided to steal itself, there would be jeopardized armed white men -- deputized

they would not escape. that history is still with us. and policing right through this very moment remains overwhelmingly concentrated within the most vested, poorest communities that are going to be told, royal bank white americans who have extreme poverty, policing per capita is much lower. we have a system that began in the context of slavery and control and remains in his deepest roots that named system. juan: i wanted to ask about th because i often tell my students and journalists who go back to the archival history of our newspapers to see this represented vividly, for instance, in 1706, boston news, the first continuously published newspaper in america, wrote about black, line, and purloined." in a few years lat, said "th disorders committed by negores but their print masters to be out late at night as determined several substantial housekeepers to walk about the town in the night. a citizen watch patrols were already being developed in the early 1700s to control the black population of boston. you so eloquently expressed and becomes the actual -- the slave patrols and then modern police departments. to what degree are most americans aware of this history? >> i think it is right is a most are not aware. maybe the learning curve has deepened a bit over the past year. the truth is, americans, whether we talk about the origins of asing or the simple reality that 350 years covering chattel slavery to the segregation period, we know empirically most americans are not taught these histories. this is true for african-american children as well is curriculum are covered by state legislatures, which are dominated by whites who are not willing to come to terms or reckon with this history. and while i want to say one more thing about the example you described, what i think is so powerful about turning to colonial and antebellum archival records, white people did not

mince their words. they were quite clear about what it is they were doing with a simply criminalized blackness, criminalized the right to become as my colleague has written. our language has become a way of others getting those same mechanisms. we live in a time in this modern period of social media where we have accelerated the capacity to say one thing in public, but to do something else quite differently in policy and practice. thoshistory lessons are critical. indeed, i was a lifesaving when it comes to making sure as we move forward from this moment -- if it is even possible -- that would come to terms with the clarity with which past clinical elites talk about what they were doing. juan: in that vein, you mentioned initially there were attempts to control and suppress the native populations.

especially in light of the recent shooting of adam toledo, this history of the latinos and other people of color, for instance, there was a book that claims texasy rangers just between 15 and 1920 killed 5000 mexicans in the state of texas and "the l.a. times" recently reported there have been 465 latinos killed by police just in los angeles county since 2000. that works out to about one latino every two weeks for the last 20 years has been killed just in l.a. county. this whole issue of policing being used as a means of suppression and terrorism of these communities? >> those reminders that anti-blackness may have been the motivation for the

infrastructure of policing, but he did not stop there. i think as part of the broader name which we need to come to terms with the past as a predicate so action and the work that remains -- kandace montgomery such an articulate spokesperson for what is happening on the ground, but she is exceptional. the work of the black visions is exceptional. we still have members of black and brown communities that are still in need of recognizing the broader limits of police reforming themselves. and when you described the sure toll that is happening within latinx community's and tethering that to the fact we have evidence it may be there were just as many people come essential american or mexican ancestry killed by lynch mob or police agencies like the texas rangers, that number may exceed or match the numbers reported

lynchings of african-americans, just astounding and only shows exponentially how much terror has been an instrument of control in this country. amy: professor muhammad, you have "the guardian" reporting in a data breach, police helping to fund carl rittenhouse -- kyle rittenhouse, the young man who opened fire and killed two black lives matter activists and what ." protesters." and of police acting as terrorist themselves, the whole issue of terrorism and you write about this eloquently, against the poor. and also if you can talk about new immigrants and how police are used. >> that you, amy.

listen, the fact of how much policing is baked into every system of our society -- you know, we think about what has been happening at the border during the trump administration, this is another expression of the way that the trump administration simply weaponized the systems that were already in place. did not invent them. and the degree to which something like the kyle rittenuse example of a white man self deputized as an anti-black terrorist to shoot people with the protections of the so-called second amendment, and then to be applauded and supported, to be given water on the scene, to later receive something like $600,000 in defense funds, many of which came from law enforcement itself, or to reflect on the

fact donald trump received 74 million votes in this election in calling for more policing, more white natnalism, or border patrol, and the repuican as we know now is holding up the george floyd policing act as a singular unit of support for this kind of ongoing terror that is happening in this country is just remarkable. we are nowhere near able at this time to recognize some consensus on the common way forward to recognize the humanity of people, whether they are asylum-seekers coming to this country from central america or whether they were born here in any part of this country. as much as i am hopeful for the possibilities of the activists work for people like kandace montgomery, i think we all need to be as vigilant as possible that we are nowhere near where we need to be in order to expect

that black lives will not continue to be cut short by everything we have seen so far. amy: just at the george floyd justice in policing act, which was passed by the house, it is being held up in the senate, among its components, chokehold span, no-knock warrants, create a duty to intervene, create a public registry, overhaul qualified immunity, and minneapolis congress woman ilhan omar tweeted after the verdict, "this is but a minuscule step on the path to justice." your response? >> listen, i think everything that ilhan omar has described is on the table. and i agree with her that the

justice floyd act limits -- well, demonstrates the limits of the federal government to control 18,000 decentlized agencies. and as she rightly notes come in as a first step come and i think it is a good first step for that reason much this will depend upon state legislatures to take over the work of transformation. we are seeing everything from the removal of traffic violations from policing as ppened in berkeley more recently, we are saying the public health authority being called upon to take greater responsibility for delivering community-based violence interruption and community-based trauma center harm reduction -- and i think these are all but we can imagine at this moment for bringing for transformation. but the bottom line is we are probably not yet there with a

full possibility of what is to come. we have to expect in the coming weeks, months, and years that people will be experimenting on the ground, trying things new. this will ultimately be about political accountability for elected officials because that is where the legislative change has to happen. juan: in an information society like ours, people tend to make a fetish of statistics and crime statistics are often used by politicians. could you talk about frederick hoffman, how he misused statistics to demonize black people? >> sure. in this day and age, we are having a conversation about crime statistics as an index of the threat and danger that black people pose when we are listening to a lot of political ites have particulay full these officials. but 're not having this conversation today -- the counterpoint would be that since

george floyd was killed, the fight and violence that occurred across major cities across this country is itself evidence, statistical evidence that black people are in need of more policing and not less policing. and this is the legacy of frederick hoffman, to make the argument that the evidence of crimes or violence or harm that happens within the community is evidence of the dysfunctionality in the dangerousness of that population. at that is a lie. has always been a lie. the violence within th community is itself a symptom of the violence of the state and the violence of a society that was focused on extraction and exportation of people. why do we know this? because it wasn't just like people who experienced a. it was white people, european immigrants who experienced this. about 100 years ago, the statistics recognized they should see violence as symptomatic of a capitalist

soety that is grinding people and committing acts of violence in the economy itself. how to fix that was not through policing but invest in those communities with prosocial intervention, give people t, security, collective bargaining rights, the right to be seen and simply be come as i to quote my colleague. we are still living with hoffman's legacy defining dangerousness and then driving policing as a response to that, still the legacy we live with. it is the structure many of us are trying to dismantle. amy: thank you for being with us. i want to end again, have the three guilty verdicts on chauvin and that in columbus, ohio, right at the time the verdicts were being read, many inside watching those verdicts. a police officer fatally shot four times a black teenage girl,

16-year-old ma'khia bryant. that does it for our show. khalil gibran muhammad, thank you for being with us, ford foundation professor of history, race, and public policy at the harvard kennedfvfvfvfvfvfvfvfvfv

we've been looking forward to showing you this place, because this is... barcelona. barcelona, exactly. this is a fantastic place. this city has a long, proud tradition of bold urban change. in the 1800s, one of the greatest urbanization projects in history began here. the word "urbanization" was coined here. barcelona saw the 1992 summer olympics as an opportunity for transformation. this old, industrial city opened itself to the mediterranean and reinvented itself in the process. the barcelona that we all have in our heads today is less than 30 years old.