AP Photo/Gerald Herbert
The parents of Tyre Nichols, the Black man who was fatally beaten by Memphis police officers, have accepted an invitation from the Congressional Black Caucus to attend President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address on February 7.
The invitation came days after the Memphis Police Department released bodycam footage that, as warned, showed an abuse of power that was “heinous, reckless, and inhumane,” reigniting calls for police reform nationwide. Biden, who spoke with Nichols’ mother and stepfather, RowVaughn Wells and Rodney Wells, on the phone, has called the footage “horrific.”
“It is yet another painful reminder of the profound fear and trauma, the pain, and the exhaustion that Black and Brown Americans experience every single day,” Biden said in a statement. On Sunday, an attorney for the Nichols family demanded Congress pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act in the wake of Nichols’ death. As my colleague Noah Lanard wrote:
The bill would ban chokeholds, no-knock warrants in federal drug cases, create a national registry of police misconduct, and force police departments to collect more data, NPR has reported. The bill would also push more money toward community-based policing. It would mostly impact federal law enforcement.
Crump argued that there hasn’t been federal police form legislation since Lyndon Johnson was president. “It didn’t happen with Rodney King, it didn’t happen with Michael Brown in Ferguson and it didn’t happen with George Floyd,” he continued. “How many of these tragedies do we have to see on video before we say we have a problem, America?”
