During the Monday broadcast of “Around the Horn” on ESPN, Washington Post sports columnist and frequent ESPN panelist Kevin Blackistone reacted to NBA great Michael Jordan’s statement regarding the tension between African-Americans and law enforcement. In the statement, Jordan said he donated $1 million each to International Association of Chiefs of Police’s newly established Institute for Community-Police Relations and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund.
Blackistone does not think the NBA legend should have donated money to a police organization, reasoning that police departments would have more money if they “policed their communities a lot better and treated black people a lot more humanely.”
“I’m hard-pressed to find out how you can be emotionally moved by the extra judicial killings of black men in this country and then cut check for $1 million to the police. The police aren’t in need of funding when it comes to this situation. I mean, you’re talking about a city like the city of Baltimore, which has paid out over $12 million in settlements for police brutality lawsuits between 2010 and 2014. If they had policed their communities a lot better and treated black people a lot more humanely, then they would have a lot more money to spend for their police department,” he said.
Follow Trent Baker on Twitter @MagnifiTrent
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.