Ebony editor questions if Dallas police shootings qualifies as a ‘hate crime’

Jul 16, 2016

Ebony editor Jamilah Lemieux isn’t sure she is “comfortable” with President Barack Obama classifying the shooting of five Dallas police officers as a hate crime.

“I have to say, I would not describe ‘hate crime’ as the most comfortable word choice, considering these circumstances,” she said on CNN Wednesday.

“There’s so much that we do not know about what took place, what motivated this person. We only have the one account of law enforcement,” Lemieux said, pointing out that the only account we have of his motive is from police themselves.

She went on to say that “when we use a phrase like ‘hate crime,’ we’re typically referring to crimes against people of color, people of various religious groups, LGBT people, people who have been historically attacked, abused or disenfranchised on the basis of their identity. To now extend that to the majority group and a group of people that have a history with African-Americans that has been abusive– and we can apply that to either police officers or to Caucasians– I think gets into very tricky territory.”

But CNN contributor and former FBI agent Steve Moore shot back with, “You can’t just say that only certain groups are allowed to be hated, only certain groups can have crimes designated as hate crimes against them. That’s racism.”

Check out the exchange below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQQSoaSnTjY