Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) said Thursday on Fox News Channel’s “Your World with Neil Cavuto” that the way white rioters that breached the U.S. Capitol were treated by law enforcement on Wednesday exposed “institutional racism” in law enforcement.
Gillibrand said, “One of my other concerns, Neil, is that we did not prepare for this riot in the same way that we prepared for the Black Lives Matter, nonviolent, peaceful protests.”
She added that the issue is “about this problem of institutional racism in how we look at public safety and how we look at law enforcement. Because they prepared to do something very different when black people were marching than when white people were marching. When white people came into the Capitol, broke into the Capitol, and defiled public spaces, they didn’t arrest them. They — it was as if they were on a Capitol tour. It was not done in a way that was appropriate. And there were many Capitol Police that were so brave and were violently attacked.”
Gillibrand added that it isn’t “a leap” to say that police held off because of the race of the rioters. And that black rioters “would have been shot. So, let’s be clear. We treat black people in this country and white people in this country differently.”
Gillibrand acknowledged that one person was shot and killed and added, “Our Capitol Police held their ground, did the right thing, and tried to protect as many staff that were in these buildings and many people.”
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