After the custodial killing of George Floyd, an African-American man, by a white Minneapolis police officer early this year, the issues of racism and police reforms gained prominence in the US election. Police shooting of Breonna Taylor, Elijah McClain, Jacob Blake created intense public outrage.
Just like on several other issues, Republican nominee President Donald Trump and his Democratic challenger Joe Biden, have different views on the issue.
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On racism
For Biden, the defining moment that motivated him to run for presidency was Trump’s remarks on the violence that erupted between white supremacists and counterprotesters at a 2017 rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in which a woman was killed and 20 others were injured.
Trump had blamed “both sides” for the violence.
“With those words, the President of the United States assigned a moral equivalence between those spreading hate and those with the courage to stand against it,” Biden said while announcing his presidential bid.
He has chosen Kamala Harris, an African American woman, as his running mate.
Trump, on the other hand, questioned the citizenship of Barack Obama — the first African American president of the United States.
He has also drawn backlash over his comments against Mexicans.
“When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best,” he said in 2015.
“They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists,” he added.
After assuming office in 2017, he issued a travel ban on predominantly Muslim countries.
He has also called the ‘Black Lives Matter’ a “symbol of hate.”
Biden, however, has also come under fire over his remarks on racism.
In an interview in May this year, he said if African American voters support President Trump over him in November, they aren’t “black.” He also faced backlash for comparing the diversity in African American communities to Latino communities, suggesting the former is a monolith.
On police reforms
“Defund the police” was a slogan often raised during the Black Lives Matter protests that raged through the US, following Floyd’s death.
While Biden said he doesn’t support defunding the police, he promised grants to improve officer diversity and training.
Trump urged a militaristic response to the Black Lives Matter protests and threatened to strip federal funding from Democratic-run cities like Portland unless they quell unrest.
In June, however, he signed an executive order on police reform that encourage police departments to use less excessive force by leveraging federal funds to end practices like chokeholds.
