00:00We have an administration that has gutted the Clean Water Act.
00:15We have communities, particularly communities of color and disadvantaged communities all
00:19over this country, who are suffering from environmental injustice.
00:23I assure you, I lived in Grosse Pointe.
00:25What happened in Flint would not have happened in Grosse Pointe.
00:28This is part of the dark underbelly of American society, the racism, the bigotry, and the
00:34entire conversation that we're having here tonight.
00:36If you think any of this wonkiness is going to deal with this dark psychic force of the
00:41collectivized hatred that this president is bringing up in this country, then I'm afraid
00:45that the Democrats are going to see some very dark days.
00:48We need to say it like it is.
00:49It's bigger than Flint.
00:51It's all over this country.
00:52It's particularly people of color.
00:53It's particularly people who do not have the money to fight back.
00:56If the Democrats don't start saying it, then why would those people feel that they're there
01:00for us?
01:01And if those people don't feel it, they won't vote for us, and Donald Trump will win.
01:13It's not $500 billion in financial assistance.
01:16It's $500 billion, $200 to $500 billion payment of a debt that is owed.
01:22That is what reparations is.
01:24We need some deep truth-telling when it comes.
01:27We don't need another commission to look at evidence.
01:29I appreciate what Congressman O'Rourke has said.
01:33It is time for us to simply realize that this country will not heal.
01:37All that a country is is a collection of people.
01:39People heal when there's some deep truth-telling.
01:42We need to recognize that when it comes to the economic gap between blacks and whites
01:46in America, it does come from a great injustice that has never been dealt with.
01:51That great injustice has had to do with the fact that there was 250 years of slavery followed
01:56by another 100 years of domestic terrorism.
02:00What makes me qualified to say $200 to $500 billion?
02:04I'll tell you what makes me qualified.
02:06If you did the math of the 40 acres and a mule, given that there was four to five million
02:10slaves at the end of the Civil War, and they were all promised 40 acres and a mule for
02:16every family of four, if you did the math today, it would be trillions of dollars.
02:21And I believe that anything less than $100 billion is an insult.
02:26And I believe that $200 to $500 billion is politically feasible today because so many
02:31Americans realize there is an injustice that continues to form a toxicity underneath the
02:36surface, an emotional turbulence that only reparations will be able to solve.
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