Is America a racist country? These politicians had very different answers...
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00:00America is not a racist country.
00:04Racism is real in America, and it has always been.
00:12No, I don't think America is a racist country,
00:15but we also do have to speak truth about the history of racism in our country.
00:18It does not help to heal our country, to ignore the realities of that.
00:22Our systems are not racist. America is not a racist country.
00:27We just elected a two-term African-American president.
00:30The vice president is of African-American Indian descent.
00:34We've all seen the knee of injustice on the neck of black Americans.
00:38Now's our opportunity to make some real progress.
00:42And we won't ignore what our intelligence agencies have determined,
00:45the most lethal terrorist threat to the homeland today.
00:48White supremacy is terrorism.
00:52In much of the Democratic Party, it's now fashionable
00:55to say that America is racist.
00:58That is a lie.
01:01America is not a racist country.
01:04We know that racism is something that is systemic and structural,
01:07and it persists across all issues.
01:10We are family. We are all in this together.
01:14And we get to live in the greatest country on earth,
01:19the country where my grandfather, in his 94 years,
01:23saw his family go from cotton to Congress in one lifetime.
01:29You look at history, you see that the fundamental equality
01:34of all Americans has been denied in so many generations.
01:39Many young Americans have been fed lies
01:42about America being a wicked nation plagued by racism.
01:45But if you say we have no need for,
01:48to face racial injustice in this country,
01:51you haven't opened your eyes to the truth.
01:53They falsely and constantly smear America
01:56as a sinister and racist country
01:59that must be torn apart piece by piece.
02:01And you know the truth.
02:03America is the most magnificent,
02:06most virtuous nation that has ever existed.
02:09What you've seen from our founding are struggling to make real
02:12on the promise of this nation.
02:14You changed the phrase from systemic to structural racism.
02:17What does that mean?
02:19Does that mean everything, every institution,
02:22every person in America is a racist?
02:24I was disheartened to hear our colleagues suggest
02:28that when we discuss the fact of systemic racism,
02:32we are accusing people within the system
02:35and all people within the system of being racist.
02:38It is an extreme and simplistic attempt
02:41to reject the seriousness of this issue.
02:44America is a story that's a work in progress.
02:47Now is the time to build on that progress
02:50and make America even freer, fairer, and better for everyone.
02:54There's a movement in America right now
02:56that demands we confront the poison of racism in our country.