Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullors is saying out with the old and in with candidates of value in her double endorsement of Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Sen. Bernie Sanders for president. She said in an interview Monday with MSNBC that moderate candidates such as former Vice President Joe Biden and former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg just don’t cut it.
Cullors said that “old guard” Biden comes from an “old establishment” and that it’s time for him to “stand down.” She pointed to his support of the 1994 crime bill that advocates against it said contributed to the mass incarceration of black men. The legislation expanded funding for prisons and offenses deemed eligible of the death penalty, while cutting funding to prevention programs. It also instituted a “three strikes and you’re out” mandatory life sentence for repeat offenders, no matter the crime.
And as for Bloomberg, it’s so obvious that it’s barely worth mentioning why any group advocating for the betterment of black people would be reluctant to back him. He’s more than made his thoughts about black people clear, from his 2008 defense of the discriminatory practice of redlining to the stop-and-frisk policy he lauded for years, which in effect gave New York City police carte blanche to stop and search black men with little or no cause. “It's important that we beat the Bloombergs of the world and the Bidens of the world," Cullors said. "They have created much devastation in our communities, and I think we're at an important moment to get either Sen. Warren or Sen. Sanders into office.”
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Cullors told MSNBC that now’s the time for “all hands on deck” to rally against people like Bloomberg and Biden. She admitted that she’s not quite sure who she’d want at the top of a Warren-Sanders ticket but said that she is instead focused on uniting people and pushing for both Warren and Sanders to be top candidates.
While Sanders also supported the controversial 1994 crime bill, Cullors said the difference between him and Biden is that Sanders has proven through his actions that he has “evolved completely.” He fought alongside Black Lives Matter activists to challenge a $3.5 billion plan to build two new jails in Los Angeles County and to support a Los Angeles County ballot initiative dubbed Measure R. The initiative would add a reinvestment plan to the Sheriff Civilian Oversight Commission to reduce jail populations and reinvest funding for jails into prevention and mental health treatment. "So he has transitioned. He has moved, and he has really decided that he's going to stand on the right side of history," Cullors said of Sanders.
Although Cullors didn’t detail what drew her to Warren, Alicia Garza, another co-founder of Black Lives Matter, explained in an MSNBC interview on Feb. 20 that they were endorsing Warren because of her plan to positively change how race affects policy. "The reason that we support Elizabeth Warren is because she understands how race shapes policy and how race shapes practice," Garza said. “But not only does she understand it, she's got a plan for how to fix it and a plan for how to engage us in the decisions that impact our lives."
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