Show an ad over header. AMP

Jim Clyburn calls for Mitch McConnell to pass John R. Lewis Voting Rights Act of 2020

19 July 2020
Dan Ackermann

House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) told NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday that in order to honor the legacy of Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), the Senate should pass and President Trump should sign the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Act of 2020, which the House passed under a different name in 2019.

Why it matters: In 2013, the Supreme Court struck down a core part of the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965 that had required certain states with a history of racial discrimination to get federal approval before changing voting laws. Lewis, a civil rights icon who dedicated his life to fighting for voting rights, did not live to see the law restored before his death on Friday.

What he's saying: "America is great because its people are good. If the people of America ever cease to be good, America will cease to be great. John personified the goodness of this country, and I do believe that that's what the fight is all about now. Restoring America's goodness," Clyburn told CNN's Jake Tapper.

  • "I really think we would honor him, and we should honor him, by creating a new Voting Rights Act to replace the 1967 Act that was gutted by the Supreme Court decision in Shelby v. Holder seven years ago."
  • "So when I get back, I'm going to ask the leadership of the House to consider reintroducing that bill the passed as HR4, I believe, re-introducing that bill and name it the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Act of 2020."
  • "Let's send it over to the Senate and then Mitch McConnell and the president can demonstrate the real respect for the life and legacy of John Lewis by passing that bill in the Senate and the president it signing it."

Clyburn also suggested renaming the Edmund Pettis Bridge in Selma, Ala., after Lewis, who was beaten along with hundreds of peaceful civil rights marchers by Alabama police in 1965. The bridge is named after a former Confederate general and Ku Klux Klan leader.

  • "I believe that will give the people of Selma something to rally around," Clyburn said. "I believe that would make a statement for people in this country that we do believe in that pledge, that vision of this country that's in the last phrase of the pledge — with liberty and justice for all."

Go deeper: John Lewis remembered as "one of the greatest heroes of American history"

Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times

Section2

Newly 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.