New York Mayor Details Talk with Biracial Son on Dealing with Police
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BY: STEPHEN A. CROCKETT JR., theroot.com
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio hugs his son Dante de Blasio at his election night party on November 5, 2013 in New York City.
New York mayor Bill de Blasio made waves with the police union last week after comments that his biracial son needed to take special precautions when dealing with police.
According to the Huffington Post, De Blasio commented that after the Staten Island grand jury decided not to indict an officer responsible for the choking death of 43-year-old Eric Garner, he and his wife “had to literally train” Dante on how to handle dealing with police.
“The head of the city’s police union said De Blasio’s statement ‘threw cops under the bus,” the Huffington Post notes.
De Balsio, who has refused to endorse the grand jury’s Eric Garner decision, didn’t back down from his position that the country, and the way children of color are policed is different from their white counterparts.
“It’s different for a white child. That’s just the reality in this country,” de Blasio said on ABC’sThis Week with George Stephanopoulos on Sunday. “And with Dante, very early on with my son, we said, look, if a police officer stops you, do everything he tells you to do, don’t move suddenly, don’t reach for your cell phone, because we knew, sadly, there’s a greater chance it might be misinterpreted if it was a young man of color.”
De Blasio noted that he didn’t believe that he was any different from any of father who has children of color.
“I’m just saying what people are actually experiencing and have been for decades,” de Blasio said Sunday. “I’ve talked to a lot of families of color, well before this time, because I’ve said things like this before. And they’ve said to me over and over and over again that they appreciate someone finally acknowledging that they have that conversation with their sons. It’s a painful conversation. You can sense there’s a contradiction in that conversation.”
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