Delivering the eulogy at George Floyd's Houston funeral Tuesday, Rev. Al Sharpton rejected police officers "protected by wickedness in high places" and added rebukes of President Donald Trump and NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell.
"We are not fighting some disconnected incidents," Sharpton told the congregation, which included families of others killed by police officers. "We are fighting an institutional systemic problem that has been allowed to permeate since we were brought to these shores.
"And we are fighting wickedness in high places. When you can put your knee on a man's neck and hold it there eight minutes and 46 seconds that's even normal to a civilian, less known to a police officer.
"Try it when you go home to put your knee down on someone and hold it there that long. You've got to be full of a lot of venom. Full of something that really motivates you to press down your weight that long and not give out."
Sharpton asked "how are you going to scare a bad cop, if bad cops don't go to jail?"
"Who taught this to cops that they can do this to George . . . when they have the highest level of government that excuses it," he continued.
"The signal that we're sending is, if you are in law enforcement, that the law doesn't apply to you, and I'm telling you the law ought to especially apply to you, because you're giving special powers others don't have."
Sharpton called for law enforcement officers breaking the law should pay a higher price because they "should know better than that."
Sharpton also took the NFL to task for its late apology for not paying enough attention to national anthem protests.
"It's nice to see some people change their mind," Sharpton said, drawing the a loud applause, a standing ovation from many, and raised right fists. "The head of the NFL said, 'Yeah, maybe we was wrong. Football players, maybe they did have the right to peacefully protest.'
"Well, don't apologize, give Colin Kaepernick a job back! Don't come with some empty apology. Take a man's livelihood, strip a man down of his talents, and four years later when the whole world is marching, all of a sudden you go and do a FaceTime talking about you sorry?!
"Minimizing the value of our lives. You sorry? They repay the damage you did to the career you stood down, because when Colin took a knee, he took it for the families in this building, and we don't want an apology, we want him repaid."
Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
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