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The Rev. Al Sharpton and civil rights attorney Ben Crump are shifting their focus to a white teenager who was killed by police in Arkansas, after advocacy efforts that largely focused on Black individuals who have died during police encounters.

Sharpton and Crump were two of the mostprominent figuresfollowing themurder of George Floyd, a Black man who died in May 2020 after a white Minneapolis police officer knelt on his neck for more than nine minutes.

Crump, who represented Floyds family after the incident,has also represented the families of Breonna Taylor and Michael Brown, both of whom were fatally shot by police.

Sharpton and Crump are now drawing attention tothe death of 17-year-old Hunter Brittain, who was fatally shot during a traffic stop on June 23.

An officer wasrelieved of his dutiesearlier this monthafter failing to turn on his body camera during his alleged involvement in Brittains death.

Crump told The Washington Post in an interview that Brittains death will help muster greater interracial support amid a push to pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act in Congress because his blood is now on this legislation, just as Floyds and Breonna Taylors blood is.

The lawyer said the picture of an unarmed white teenager being fatally shot by police will start to change the narrative and perception of the problem of police violence as the country sees that children of all races and ethnicities can be victims.

It is closer to home now, for people who probably could not comprehend when it was happening to Black teenagers, he told the Post.

Crump, who has been called Black Americas attorney general by Sharpton, emphasized that his mission has always been to make sure that all our children can get home safely and not be killed by the police who are supposed to protect and defend them."

We have always said its about trying to make sure that all our children can get home safely and not be killed by the people who are supposed to protect and defend them Crump told the newspaper.

Before Brittains memorial service last week, Sharpton told reporters:Hunter did nothing wrong, just like we felt George Floyd did nothing wrong. But if we segregate how we react, then were wrong.

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Sharpton, Crump shifting focus to white teen killed by police in Arkansas | TheHill - The Hill

Al Sharpton went on MSNBC on Thursday to gush over Joe Biden, praising the president for his speech on voting rights in Philadelphia the day before.

Sharpton went so far as to say that Bidens speech in which helikened recent GOP-led voting integrity laws to Jim Crow laws was monumental.

I think he made a monumental speech, Sharpton declared. For a president to stand there in the shadows of where they signed the Declaration of Independence and attack Jim Crow 21st century was something that I was not expecting.

And I also thought the fact that he did not, in any way, shape or form, duck the racial aspect of what were seeing in terms of the pushback by many states in coming with new restrictions, he said. That is where we are, but now what are we going to do about where we are?

Related: Al Sharpton Claims A Lot Of People Have Taken Advantage Of Our Pain Rather Than Trying To Ease Our Pain

During this same appearance on Morning Joe, Sharpton doubled down on calling for a workaround for the filibuster to enact voting rights legislation.

And I think that what he has got to do is, in a firm way, figure out how to work around the filibuster, if they will not end the filibuster, he said.

The question, the dilemma that he has, and the White House has, is do they have the votes to end the filibuster if they came out and joined us, and I certainly want to see it ended, but you need the votes in the Senate to even end it. So, can you do a workaround like you do on economic or fiscal policies? he continued. And I think thats where he, being someone thats been in the Senate for so long, can use his personal relationships.

Sharpton had slammed the filibuster days before.

I certainly support, and have been saying this for some time, that we must have a way that we raise the issue of voting around the filibuster, Sharpton said. Filibuster should not stand in the way of democracy, should not stand in the way of our constitutional rights.

Full Story: Al Sharpton Slams The Filibuster Says It Should Not Stand In The Way Of Democracy

I said to the president, along with my seven colleagues that lead national civil rights organizations, that he ought to take that position, he continued. I do not know what he will say today, but we certainly encourage him to speak forcefully.

If he talks history, if he talks about, weve been here before, and what we had to do to get past that, I think thats a good thing, Sharpton said. If he also deals with the fact that we need to have a workaround a filibuster, I think that will be a great thing. I intend to be there to hear what he has to say. Im glad hes speaking up, though.

This piece was written by James Samson on July 16, 2021. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

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The opinions expressed by contributors and/or content partners are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Political Insider.

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Al Sharpton Gushes Over Biden And His 'Monumental' Voting Rights Speech The pink report news - The pink report news

Theres no doubt that left-wing culture warriors have done great harm to the Democratic cause. Some of it is mere foolishness. Ive never forgotten being chided at a college talk several years ago for using the word murderess to describe a character in my book Widows Web who shot her husband in his sleep and later orchestrated a plot to kill her defense lawyers wife.

Murderess, one professor said, was unacceptably gendered language. To quibble about it would have been pointlessly distracting. Even so, Ive wondered about it ever since. After all, is murderer an honorific?

But its when cant touches upon real-world concerns that the trouble starts. Consider the phrase Defund the Police. Has there ever been a dumber, more politically maladroit slogan in American political history? Worse even than Hillary Clintons basket of deplorables.

Far worse, actually. Clintons remark merely convinced people that she was a snob. Rhetoric about doing away with cops made voters think that liberal Democrats inhabit a different planet. In an interview with VOX, veteran political operative James Carville put it this way: Maybe tweeting that we should abolish the police isnt the smartest thing to do because almost no one wants to do that.

Words matter, Carville insists. You ever get the sense that people in faculty lounges in fancy colleges use a different language than ordinary people? They come up with a word like Latinx. ... Or they use a phrase like communities of color. I dont know anyone who speaks like that. I dont know anyone who lives in a community of color. This is not how voters talk. And doing it anyway is a signal that youre talking one language and the people you want to vote for you are speaking another language.

In the real world, for example, people wake up to headlines like these, which arrived in my inbox as I composed the preceding paragraph: UAMS officer kills gun-wielding man; Police ID man fatally shot at apartment complex; and 15-year-old arrested in killing of Jacksonville man.

One medium-sized southern city; one ordinary weekday in July.

Abolish the police? In which solar system, pray tell?

So no, what with homicide rates rising sharply nationwide, I was not surprised to see Eric Adams, a Black former NYPD captain who campaigned on making New Yorkers feel safe and restoring confidence in the citys police, winning a Democratic primary that makes him the citys de facto mayor-elect.

The debate around policing has been reduced to a false choice, Adams declared. You are either with police, or you are against them. That is simply wrong because we are all for safety. We need the NYPD we just need them to be better.

Whether or not Adams can deliver, thats exactly how Democrats should be talking. Also, contrary to a lot of loose rhetoric, its all about the guns. Property crimes burglary and theft are actually decreasing in many places. Gun battles between rival gangs and drive-by shootings of innocent bystanders are way up.

Although youve not heard about it in the national news, something else that happened in my backyard has convinced me that ordinary people are hungry for change. In the farming community of Lonoke, Arkansas, roughly 35 miles northeast of Little Rock, a sheriffs deputy shot a 17-year-old white kid named Hunter Brittain to death during a 3 a.m. traffic stop. The boy was unarmed and had no criminal history. Hed been working late to fix his uncles truck transmission.

Details are scant, because the state police have kept their investigation close, although a special prosecutor has been appointed. And the deputy never turned on his body camera, for which hes been fired. Nightly protests began outside the sheriffs department, growing steadily more intense. His family likened young Brittain to Minneapolis murder victim George Floyd. Even Little Rock media, however, showed limited interest.

Until the Rev. Al Sharpton showed up in town to preach Hunter Brittains funeral, along with Ben Crump, George Floyds attorney virtually the only Black faces among hundreds of mourners.

Sharpton referenced a can of antifreeze the victim held as he died. Weve been frozen in our race; weve been frozen in our own class, he said to thunderous applause. I believe today Hunter is calling to us. Its time for some antifreeze.

Ive got my reservations about Sharpton, but the symbolism of his appearing was impossible to ignore: Americans are ready to talk.

Send letters to letters@suntimes.com

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Dems need to do better job of speaking to voters - Chicago Sun-Times

Al Sharpton went on MSNBC on Tuesday to slam the filibuster, calling on Democrat lawmakers to work around it tosecure more voting rights.

Sharpton claimed that the filibuster should not stand in the way of democracy while also saying that President Joe Biden should join him and other civil rights leaders to work around it in the name of voting rights.

I certainly support, and have been saying this for some time, that we must have a way that we raise the issue of voting around the filibuster, Sharpton declared. Filibuster should not stand in the way of democracy, should not stand in the way of our constitutional rights.

I said to the president, along with my seven colleagues that lead national civil rights organizations, that he ought to take that position, he continued. I do not know what he will say today, but we certainly encourage him to speak forcefully.

Related: Al Sharpton Claims A Lot Of People Have Taken Advantage Of Our Pain Rather Than Trying To Ease Our Pain

If he talks history, if he talks about, weve been here before, and what we had to do to get past that, I think thats a good thing, Sharpton said. If he also deals with the fact that we need to have a workaround a filibuster, I think that will be a great thing. I intend to be there to hear what he has to say. Im glad hes speaking up, though.

U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) took to Twitter last month to slam the filibuster, as she is hoping to get rid of it so that she can force her radically liberal agenda on the American people.

Call me radical, but I do not believe a minority of Senators should be able to block voting rights for millions of people, she tweeted. But I guess Im just from that far-left school of thought that legislation should pass when a majority of legislators vote for it.

Related: AOC: Filibuster Not Needed Because The Senate Already Amplifies Minority Power

Democrats are suddenly against the filibuster morally despite the fact that they have used it many times when they needed to. Funny how that works out.

This piece was written by James Samson on July 14, 2021. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

Read more at LifeZette:Trey Gowdy Reveals Lethal Mistake Democrats Made They Owe America An ApologyChris Wallace Confronts Pentagon Press Sec. Kirby About Withdrawing Troops From AfghanistanChris Wallace Confronts TX Gov. Abbott About GOP Voting Law Point Is To Suppress Voting By People Of Color?

The opinions expressed by contributors and/or content partners are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Political Insider.

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Al Sharpton Slams The Filibuster Says It 'Should Not Stand In The Way Of Democracy' The pink report news - The pink report news

This Sundance award-winner is an absolute joy, uncovering a treasure trove of pulse-racing, heart-stopping live music footage (originally captured by TV veteran Hal Tulchin) that has remained largely unseen for half a century. While Mike Wadleighs Woodstock and the Maysles Gimme Shelter have long been considered definitive documents of the highs and lows of 1969 pop culture, Summer of Soul makes both look like a footnote to the main event: a festival in the heart of Harlem that was somehow written out of the history books. Capturing Stevie Wonder at a turning point in his career, Mavis Staples duetting with Mahalia Jackson (an unreal moment, says Staples) and Nina Simone at the height of her performing powers, director Ahmir Questlove Thompsons feature debut intertwines music and politics in one of the best concert movies of all time.

Produced and MCed by Tony Lawrence (a hustler, in the best sense), and supported by the liberal Republican New York mayor, John Lindsay, with security by the Black Panthers, the 1969 Harlem Cultural festival played out over six weekends in Mount Morris Park at a time of profound cultural re-evaluation, a year on from the assassination of Dr Martin Luther King. Up in space, Neil Armstrong may have been taking one small step for a man, but as a festivalgoer states: Never mind the moon, lets get some of that cash in Harlem.

Astutely chosen news footage outlines a decade of tension, producing disparate strands of resistance civil rights and Black power. Among those on stage are the saxophonist Ben Branch, whom King spoke to immediately before his death, requesting that Branch play his favourite song, Precious Lord, Take My Hand. Its that song that Staples and Jackson perform together in a moment that matches the ecstatic heights of Amazing Grace another long-delayed music doc, covering Aretha Franklins 1972 performances at the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles.

Blending wry laughter with piercing insight, interviewees explain how the word Black shifted from a fighting-talk term of abuse to one of self-determination and pride. Trailblazing journalist Charlayne Hunter-Gault remembers the battle she fought to get the New York Times to use Black rather than negro, while others describe festival power-couple Abbey Lincoln and Max Roach as being unapologetically Black they lived that phrase every day.

Watching footage of her band the 5th Dimension performing Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In with tasseled orange suits, Marilyn McCoo remembers how they had been criticised for being not Black enough, and how happy they were to be there in Harlem, reclaiming their identity. Then to cap it all, we watch Nina Simone showcasing a new song, inspired by the stage production To Be Young Gifted and Black, performed in a voice that the Rev Al Sharpton astutely characterises as somewhere between hope and mourning.

While Simone is described as looking like an African princess, Hugh Masekelas performance of Grazing in the Grass seems to transport the audience to another land, soaring from the parks of New York to distant plains. Elsewhere, Sly and the Family Stone embody the psychedelic Afrofuturist R&B vibe, with Rose Stone and Cynthia Robinson giving their bandleader a run for his money on keyboards and trumpet respectively, and the audience gradually accepting that a white drummer can kick it after all.

Gladys Knight recalls that it wasnt just about the music; we wanted progress; the Edwin Hawkins Singers perform Oh, Happy Day in lime-green harmony; Ray Barretto and Mongo Santamara bring the Latin-fusion beat; BB King cradles his guitar like a baby while he sings the blues; Rev Jesse Jackson speaks to the soul; and Stevie Wonder is on fire on drums, keyboards and vocals as he enters a new era of meaningful jazz funk.

The fact that the rose coming through cement of this festival was overlooked for so long served as further evidence that Black history is gonna be erased. Yet Questloves film begins and ends with festivalgoer Musa Jackson viewing the uplifting reclaimed footage (a sly counterpoint to the horrorshow bookending of Gimme Shelter) and tearfully thanking the film-maker for proving to him that Im not crazy! that this really happened. Thanks to this terrific film, we can all share in that sense of wonder.

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Summer of Soul review the best concert film ever made? - The Guardian