Alabama Senator and former college football coach Tommy Tuberville is facing intense backlash after comparing descendants of enslaved people to criminals.
NPR reports Tuberville made the comments during a rally for former President Donald Trump in Nevada last weekend. During the rally, the former football coach criticized Democrats for being pro-crime.
“They want crime because they want to take over what you got,” Tuberville said at the rally. “They want to control what you have.”
“They want reparations because they think the people that do the crime are owed that. Bull****! They are not owed that.”
The comments received immediate backlash, including from NAACP President, Derrick Johnson, who did not mince words in a statement released Monday.
“Senator Tuberville’s comments are flat-out racist, ignorant, and utterly sickening. His words promote a centuries-old lie about Black people that throughout history has resulted in the most dangerous policies and violent attacks on our community,” Johnson said.
“We’ve seen this before from the far-right, and we’ve seen what they can do when they take power. Next time the Senator wants to talk about crime, he should talk about Donald Trump’s hate-fueled rally on Jan. 6, 2021, and the attacks that followed.”
“Perhaps the real criminals are in his orbit.”
Tuberville’s comments were especially concerning considering he spent more than 15 years coaching dozens of young Black men at the University of Cincinnati, Auburn University, and Texas Tech University.
Additionally, there has been growing support to provide reparations to descendants of enslaved people. While many are still against reparations, some areas have come up with programs around reparations. In Illinois, the town of Evanston started a reparations program around housing.
Last year 11 mayors in St. Louis, Los Angeles, and even Oklahoma, pledged to develop reparation programs to help Black Americans
in the form of home loans, business investments, and more.In California, the state began a reparations task force and released two studies detailing its history of racism and recommending ways the state can give reparations back to descendants of formerly enslaved people, including housing grants, tuition benefits for college students, and raising the minimum wage.