The violent insurrection, the attacks on police officers, the targeting of Black election workers, and the attempts to throw out hundreds of thousands of Black votes in Atlanta, Philadelphia, Detroit, and Milwaukee were all a part of a coordinated campaign to protect the interests of white America in our two-tiered system of justice…
Sadly, Trump’s pardons are not an isolated event in American history. By pardoning these thugs and labeling them “hostages,” he continues a long and tragic tradition of sweeping the interests of Black people under the rug to protect a misplaced sense of white victimhood.
This article made me realize something about myself- I had assumed that the insurrection was predominantly white. I mean, the pictures! All the most famous pictures of the insurrectionists that come to mind were exclusively of white people (perhaps with a few demographics sparsely represented in the background.)
“Those charged were overwhelmingly white (659 of 716, 92%) but also included Hispanics (39, 5.4%), Blacks (10, 1.4%), Asians (7.1%, 5 of the 7 were of Vietnamese ancestry) and one Native American.”
(If you add up all non-white persons and subtract them from the whole, these numbers indicate that 620 of those arrested were white, non-hispanic. So 39 people were white, also hispanic. So 86.5% were white, non-hispanic.) (See footnote.)
Those are really telling numbers. But while I was looking, I found something we don’t get enough of lately- good news.
“517 of 716 (72%) were charged as the result of tipsters and informants…”
I’m notoriously anti-snitch, but this gave me some good vibes. That is so many. And-
“35.1% of defendants were identified as going to the Capitol alone…”
I know that’s fewer than I’d like, but I’m choosing to believe that 250ish people had such unpopular ideas that they couldn’t talk anyone into going with them. I wish we had demographic information indicating which races were represented in that group.
(All info obtained here.)
Now… according to census.gov, the US is comprised of people who identify as white alone (non-hispanic) at 75.3%. As you may recall, 86.5% of the rioters were white, non-hispanic.
This means that more-than-general-population amounts of white people were represented at this thing.
I don’t know how to address this, and I myself am white enough that I classify myself as white on forms. So it feels like it’s a conversation we need to be having. I wish I knew how.
Footnote: I’m bad at math and doing my best. I promise I welcome corrections.