The country is in the middle of a "moment" concerning racial equality, but the question remains about what will be done about it, Sen. Cory Booker said Friday, responding to a poll showing that almost three-quarters of Americans see the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis as a sign of a broader problem in the nation.
“I think that this could be a moment, this could be the moment of struggle that we begin to see real reform in our country," the New Jersey Democrat said on MSNBC's "Morning Joe." "None of us — I mean none of us — should relent until our nation takes these strides towards greater equality in the law."
Booker's comments come a day after he and Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., both of whom have dropped their races for the 2020 Democratic Party presidential nomination, engaged in an emotional exchange on the Senate floor after Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., sought to add an amendment to anti-lynching legislation, effectively blocking it.
Paul argued the bill was overly broad and called for it to apply criminal penalties for lynching only, leading to both Harris and Booker speaking out, with the New Jersey lawmaker formally objecting, reports CNN.
"I can't legislate you to love me but I can pass laws to stop you from lynching me," Booker said Friday. "There has to be legal changes to our system like changing the actual way that the federal government holds police departments accountable, collecting data on police misconduct, police use of force."
Booker recalled "just losing it" over the Rodney King verdict, after the Los Angeles man was brutally beaten by a police officer in 1991, and writing a column about the eventual acquittals in the case.
“By the time we witnessed that Rodney King verdict where somebody was so viciously, savagely beaten, I just remember just losing it," said Booker. "I don’t want to have a college student now, a teenager now, have to have the same pain that I have that 30 years have passed and nothing has changed.”
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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