Biden says Floyd death having bigger global impact than MLK assassination

Former Vice President Joe Biden on Thursday said that he thinks the killing of George Floyd in police custody last month is having a greater global impact than even the 1968 assassination of Martin Luther King.

Speaking at a roundtable discussion in Philadelphia, the presumptive Democratic nominee for president said that the advent of smartphones had allowed the reality of police brutality against people of color to spread like it never has before, comparing it to how the rise in the number of homes with televisions in the 1960s showed Americans the police violence that marked the civil rights movement.

“Even Dr. King’s assassination did not have the worldwide impact that George Floyd’s death did,” Biden said. “It’s just like television changed the Civil Rights movement for the better when they saw Bull Connor and his dogs ripping the clothes off of elderly black women going to church and firehoses ripping the skin off of young kids.”

“What happened to George Floyd — now you got how many people around the country, millions of cellphones. It’s changed the way everybody’s looking at this,” he continued. “Look at the millions of people marching around the world.”

Floyd, a 46-year-old black man, died while being arrested in Minneapolis on May 25 after now-former police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes. His death sparked some of the most widespread civil unrest in the U.S. since the 1960s, igniting calls for police reform and efforts to address systemic racism.

The protests have not been limited to the U.S. Protests against racial injustice have also broken out around the world, including in Europe, Africa and Australia.

Chauvin has been charged with second-degree murder for his role in Floyd’s death. Three other officers involved in the arrest are also facing charges for aiding and abetting second-degree murder.

Biden also on Thursday also for police reform, saying that the American public is on board with such proposals.

“I’m convinced that with rational proposals that cost a lot of money the American public is ready to step up,” he said. “They understand the need to make these systemic changes, dealing from racism to structures that our economy has just stacked the deck against anybody that doesn’t have any money.”