New York City Mayor Eric Adams (D) said Monday on “CNN This Morning” that racism was involved in the death of Tyre Nichols.
Host Don Lemon asked, “Much has been made about the officers, all of them being black. You said that diversifying police departments would allow us to have a level of policing we deserve. These five officers are all black. Is there an entrenched police culture of aggression towards black people?”
Adams said, “Clearly, we could not ignore the ethnicity of the officers that are involved. That is the pink elephant in the room. And people talked about that. And when we want to diversify departments, it’s not only African-American. We have increasing number of members from the AAPI community, Spanish-speaking officers, Muslim officers. The role was to ensure that you diversify departments, so the officers are coming from the communities that they represent and grew up in those communities.”
Referencing Memphis Police Chief Cerelyn “CJ” Davis, Lemon said, “Chief CJ Davis said all the officers being black it takes race off the table. Do you agree that?”
Adams said, “No, I don’t.”
He added, “I think race is still on the table. When a culture of policing historically has treated those from different groups differently, even when the individuals are from that same group, that culture can still exist, and we have to zero in on it, being honest about it, and making sure that we properly train police for the realities of the cities that they are policing.”
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