White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow told reporters on Wednesday he doesn’t believe systemic racism exists in the United States.
“I don’t believe there’s systemic racism in the U.S.,” Kudlow said. “I’m not gonna go into a long riff on it. Black employment increased 300,000, did you know that? You didn’t, right. So, that’s a big win. And the black employment-to-population ratio went up over a percentage point. That’s a big win.”
White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow says he doesn’t believe there is systematic racism in the U.S. pic.twitter.com/260EJobWgG
— Reuters (@Reuters) June 10, 2020
The nation has seen protests in multiple cities following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Floyd, who is black, died after a white police officer knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes despite pleas that he couldn’t breathe. The officer, Derek Chauvin, was charged with second-degree murder. Three other officers involved with Floyd’s detainment were charged with aiding and abetting with murder and manslaughter.
Protests across the country have decried systemic racism and police brutality and have led multiple cities to put police reform at the top of their priorities.
Kudlow said he believes what happened to Floyd was “abysmal,” and the problem with policing comes when there are “very bad apples” working in law enforcement.
Kudlow also credited policies attempted to improve the lives of black Americans put forward by President Trump.
“We do believe that returning to growth and prosperity creates opportunities for everybody,” he said. “We have also worked very hard, putting out about a thousand opportunity zones with various tax regulatory breaks. … We’ve given a lot of money to historic black colleges and universities. We’ve worked for very strong criminal justice reforms.”
