House passes bill making Juneteenth a federal holiday
16 June 2021
The House voted 415-14 on Wednesday to make Juneteenth a federal holiday.
The big picture: The vote comes one day after the Senate unanimously approved the bill and three days before the holiday.
- 14 Republicans voted against the bill.
Catch up quick: Juneteenth, celebrated on June 19, memorializes when the last enslaved people in Texas learned about their freedom under the Emancipation Proclamation.
- 49 states and D.C. already commemorate Juneteenth, but the passage of the bill makes the day a legal federal holiday.
- In June 2020, then-Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Tina Smith (D-Minn.) and Ed Markey (D-Mass.) introduced legislation to make Juneteenth a national holiday.
What's next: The legislation now goes to President Biden for his signature.
Go deeper: States and corporations move to recognize Juneteenth
Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times
Section2Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.
Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.
The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.
- The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.
What the transcripts say:
- Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
- The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
- Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."
Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.