“There needs to be change, officers need to be trained better,” one protester who was arrested in Atlanta told CNN’s Nick Valencia as he was being detained by police.
A lack of change and police reform are just some of the reasons people are enraged.
“This protest is not just about George Floyd, and when people are looking at these protesters — this rebellion that’s going on around the country — I hope they have some empathy because these people are going home. We are going home, black folk are going home, brown folk are going home and drinking dirty water, going to poor schools, not having access to quality care and so this is bubbling over,” said CNN political commentator Bakari Sellers.
Here what some of them had to say:
Minneapolis
Leslie Redmond, president of Minneapolis NAACP
“What you’re witnessing in Minnesota is something that’s been a long time coming,” Redmond told CNN affiliate WCCO-TV.
“I can’t tell you how many governors I’ve sat down with, how many mayors we’ve sat down with. And we’ve warned them that if you keep murdering black people, the city will burn. We have stopped the city from burning numerous times, and we are not responsible for it burning now.”
Payton Bowdry, 22
“We have to advocate for justice, true justice to happen,” Bowdry told CNN.
Bowdry said things getting violent weren’t part of the plan.
“Riots were not part of the protests,” he said. “The looting and rioting wasn’t in George Floyd’s name.”
Alicia Smith, a community organizer
“There are no words in the English language that will convey the despair that I felt watching that man’s life leave his body and him scream out for his mother,” Smith told CNN. “I heard my son saying, ‘Mama, save me.'”
“My kids are little boys, and my son asked me, ‘Am I going to live to be a grown-up?'” she told CNN. “I’ve got to ruin his innocence and tell him how to exist as a young black boy in this country.”
Shanene Herbert, community organizer
“They (young people) have experienced trauma,” she told CNN. “Seeing your friends, your families and even yourself harassed by the police and killed by the police, it’s traumatic. And they don’t know what to do with that.”
Charlotte
Kass Ottley, a community activist
“There are a lot of things that need to change for us to move forward, but I think everybody needs to be honest about what the real problems are,” Ottley told CNN affiliate WCCB-TV. “How many times can you address the same issue and see nothing change.”
Greg Jackson, the founder of Heal Charlotte
“You have to remember that they ain’t mad at one situation,” Jackson told WCCB. “It’s systematic change that needs to happen.”
Atlanta
“Everyone’s ready for a change, ready to get together,” a woman identified as Bambara told CNN affiliate WSB-TV. She also said the stakes were too high to stay at home.
“I literally can’t breathe, can’t think, because I know at any time my life, or my brother’s or my friends’ life are in danger just because of the color of their skin,” she said.
New York
Gwen Carr, mother of Eric Garner
“This is just opening up an old wound and pouring salt into it,” Carr told CNN affiliate WABC-TV on Thursday. “The police officers come into our neighborhoods to brutalize, terrorize, and murder our children, and we have done nothing.”
Denver
Max Bailey, 22
Bailey was tossed from the hood of a car during a protest and told CNN affiliate KDVR-TV he’d do it again. Bailey said he jumped on the hood of a black SUV because he was worried the driver might run him over.
“If you can tell me something better for me to do — if you can tell me a way that we could change the world without trying to make noise like that, then I’ll get out of the streets. If you can show me the path, I’ll get out of the streets,” he said. “I won’t stand in front of no cars anymore if there’s an easy path.”
Kansas City
Randy Fikki, protester
“If you don’t speak up and don’t say anything, you’re just like the officers that stood by and watched,” Fikki told CNN affiliate WDAF-TV, adding many people try to ignore race or say they don’t see color. He believes that’s part of the problem.
“Your ignorance is not proof of your innocence,” he said. “The fact that you are remaining ignorant, you are no different than the individual who had their knee on that gentlemen’s neck.”
Anna Maria Kretzer, mother of 10-year-old boy
“I have to have a talk with him to make sure he doesn’t grow up to be one of those cops who kills a black man or a black woman,” she told WDAF. “I have to make sure that cycle doesn’t continue to him.”
