Local Black Lives Matter activists applaud Elizabeth Warren’s forceful speech
The reviews are in: Sen. Elizabeth Warren is getting rave reviews from activists for her speech noting the racist history of the United States and likening Black Lives Matter to a modern civil rights movement.
“What she offered I think was an understanding of the sense of urgency that this movement is facing,’’ Daunasia Yancey, a leader of Black Lives Matter Boston, told WBUR. “[It was] definitely a more accurate historic view in terms of linking the civil rights movement and the current movement as not being very separate, [but] as a continuation of some of the same struggle.’’
On Sunday, Warren forcefully traced the origins of Black Lives Matter to last century’s civil rights movement. In addition, she said she would seek reforms to combat current issues in the forms of police violence, reduced access to voting, and fewer economic opportunities.
“We have made important strides forward. But we are not done yet. And now, it is our time,’’ Warren said in a speech on Sunday at the Edward Kennedy Institute in Boston. “It comes to us to once again affirm that black lives matter, that black citizens matter, that black families matter.’’
The speech was, as The Washington Post called it, “the speech that Black Lives Matter activists have been waiting for.’’ Yancey, for example, told Boston.com last month that she had yet to hear a politician make a “deep analysis’’ of racial justice issues.
Warren’s speech was also lauded by Shekia Scott, a co-organizer of the Boston Police Camera Action Team, who told WBUR that “a speech like that was long overdue.’’
Gallery: A look back at Ferguson, one year later.
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