‘Hell was unleashed’: Biden urges reckoning on race at Tulsa massacre anniversary, taps Harris to lead on voting rights
with the three remaining survivors of the massacre, Viola Fletcher, Hughes Van Ellis and Lessie Benningfield Randle, who are 101 to 107 years old. Not just Tulsa: Racist mobs were ‘widespread and a constant concern’ 100 years ago
Describing the events, Biden said, “Hell was unleashed. Literal hell was unleashed.” He noted how private planes dropped explosives on the Black neighborhood of Greenwood. And he said victims of the massacre were unable to get reimbursed for their losses through insurance and no one was prosecuted for taking part in the mob.
“My fellow Americans, this was not a riot. This was a massacre. Among the worst in our history but not the only one. And for too long, forgotten by our history. As soon as it happened, there was a clear effort to erase it from our memory, our collective memory.”
After the speech, Rev. Dr. William Barber of the Poor People’s Campaign led a group, including the survivors of the massacre, in singing the civil rights anthem “Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around.” The songs lyrics read, in part: “ain’t gonna let no racism turn me around.”
amid a showdown in Texas over Republican state lawmakers’ attempts to rewrite state election laws. Texas Democrats staged a walkout walked out of the Capitol to prevent voting on Senate Bill 7, which would limit certain ways of voting.
Harris said more than 380 bills have been introduced in legislatures nationwide that would make it harder for Americans to vote. Most were introduced in response to former President Donald Trump’s baseless allegations of voter fraud in the 2020 election.
In Congress, Biden supports the Democrat-backed H.R. 1 voting rights bill – which would override many of the state-level actions – but it lacks Republican support in the evenly divided Senate to overcome a potential filibuster.
“The work ahead of us is to make voting accessible to all American voters, and to make sure every vote is counted through a free, fair, and transparent process,” Harris said in a statement. “This is the work of democracy.”
More:Voting rights: Where do the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and For the People Act stand?
‘Make sure America knows the full story’
For a century, the Tulsa race massacre of May 31, 1921, went largely ignored by sitting U.S. presidents, never prompting a trip specifically to honor those killed in the once-thriving Black neighborhood of Greenwood until now.
Racist violence continued for decades after the killings in Tulsa.
Trump visited Tulsa last June for his first campaign rally amid the coronavirus pandemic. He faced criticism for initially scheduling it on Juneteenth, the holiday celebrating the emancipation of enslaved people in the U.S., then moved the rally to a day later, June 20. Trump did not refer to the massacre in his remarks, making headlines instead by saying he wanted to slow down testing for the COVID-19 virus.
“For much too long, the history of what took place here was told in silence, cloaked in darkness. But just because history is silent, it doesn’t mean that it did not take place,” Biden said. “And while darkness can hide much, it can never erase what happened. That’s why we’re here: to shine a light, to make sure America knows the story in full.”
More:100 years after the Tulsa Massacre, entrepreneurs revive spirit of ‘Black Wall Street’
More:TikTok teens credited with lowering Trump’s Tulsa turnout
The Black educator Booker T. Washington coined the name “Black Wall Street” for Greenwood in recognition of thriving Black middle, upper and professional classes with Black-owned businesses dotting the streets.
The neighborhood sprouted after O.W. Gurley, a wealthy Black landowner, bought 40 acres of property in Tulsa in 1906 and named it after the Mississippi city Greenwood. He started a boarding house for African Americans, ensured land was sold only to Black people and provided loans for business ventures.
and the attack destroyed millions in personal wealth, including savings that were kept in homes by residents who mistrusted white-owned banks. Thousands of Black people were left homeless.
More:Tulsa’s Greenwood neighborhood wasn’t America’s only Black Wall Street
The massacre erased decades of Black wealth accumulated in Tulsa and hamstrung wealth creation going forward. Various estimates determine the amount of wealth lost to be more than $200 million in value adjusted for 2021.
“The Black citizens of Tulsa were let down by their city government, by their state government, but they were also let down by the federal government in this massacre,” said Scott Ellsworth, a professor at the University of Michigan and author of “Death in a Promised Land: The Tulsa Race Riot of 1921.”
“There was never any sort of federal investigation despite the fact that over 1,000 Black homes and businesses were burned to the ground and more than 10,000 people were made homeless,” he said. “The federal government never stepped in and tried to figure out what happened.”
More:107 years old and asking Congress for justice: Tulsa race massacre survivors testify
‘I still see Black men being shot’
The three living survivors testified in May before a House Judiciary subcommittee. Among them, Viola Fletcher, 107, told lawmakers, “I will never forget the violence of the white mob when we left our house.”
“I still see Black men being shot, Black bodies lying in the street. I still smell smoke and see fire. I still see Black businesses being burned. I still hear airplanes flying overhead. I hear the screams. I have lived through the massacre every day.”
House Democrats have promised to introduce legislation that would allow victims to pursue a path to seek damages for the death and destruction that occurred on May 31 and June 1 of 1921. Similar legislation was proposed but never approved in 2007.
Fletcher told the subcommittee members they have “the power to lead us down a better path.”
“Open the courtroom doors to us,” she said.
At roughly 100 days into Biden’s presidency, 89% of Black Americans said they approved of the job he is doing – more than any other racial group, according to a Pew Research Center poll.
At the start of his presidency, Biden identified racial justice as one of the four crises of his presidency.
How his administration tackles the issue, particularly regarding economic inequality and criminal justice will be closely watched. The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which Biden had pushed to pass by the anniversary of Floyd’s death May 25, remains stalled in the Senate.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People criticized Biden for not including measures to combat student loan debt facing Black Americans among his steps aimed at racial equity.
“You cannot begin to address the racial wealth gap without addressing the student loan debt crisis,” NAACP National President Derrick Johnson said in a statement. “You just can’t address one without the other. Plain and simple. President Biden’s budget fails to address the student debt crisis.”
The White House has also faced criticism by some racial justice advocates for not going far enough in advancing some police reform and other progressive measures, though most have conceded Biden has been more responsive than past administrations on the issue.
‘I have lived through the massacre every day’
Contributing: Carmen Forman and Chris Casteel of the Oklahoman
Reach Joey Garrison on Twitter @joeygarrison. Follow Matthew Brown online @mrbrownsir.