Cardi B calls on people to vote in order to "take power" following George Floyd death
Cardi B has called on people to “take power” by exercising their right to vote following the widespread outrage and protests that have been sparked in the US and worldwide by the death of George Floyd.
The Bronx rapper is among the many high-profile voices in music and entertainment who have expressed anger and sadness over Floyd’s death while in police custody in Minneapolis last week (May 25). Former police officer Derek Chauvin has been charged with third-degree murder and manslaughter.
Cardi has been vocal on social media over the past few days in her observations on Floyd’s death and the subsequent protests, calling the circumstances of Floyd’s death “sickening” and claiming that many of the people protesting have been “left with NO CHOICE” after being presented with “no solutions”.
In a video posted to Twitter on Friday (May 29), Cardi gave her take on the protests, reports of looting and the issue of police brutality in a clip that has since been viewed over six million times.
“Seeing people looting and going extremely outraged, it makes me feel like: ‘Yes! Finally! Finally motherfuckers is gonna hear us now. Yeah!’” she said. “And as much as people is so against it, at this point I feel like I’m not against it — even though it does scare me, and I don’t want anyone to get hurt.
“It’s really frustrating… police brutality been going on even way before I was born. But it’s become more visual ever since social media started poppin’… how many peaceful protests have we seen? How many hashtags have we seen? These hashtags keep repeating themselves.”
Spread pic.twitter.com/6V0HsGoTME
— iamcardib (@iamcardib) May 29, 2020
Cardi continued: “I feel like I have done videos against police brutality, I feel like this is like my seventh time. I feel I’ve been doing police brutality videos ever since my teeth been fucked up — and the only shit that changed has been my fucking teeth.
“People are tired of showing that it’s like: ‘Oh, motherfuckers are educated and could take “the grown and adult way” and act peaceful.’ People are tired of that, so now this is what people have to resort to.”
Cardi then told her followers that another way for “the people to take power… is by voting”.
“And when I say voting I’m not only talking about the president,” Cardi said in reference to November’s presidential election. “We could vote for mayors, we could vote for judges and we could also vote for [District Attorneys] for our counties.
“The people that are voting for these people are most likely cops, rednecks — that’s why every time this kind of fuckshit happens, it goes in their favour. These people — DAs, judges — have the power to prosecute these cops when they do fuckshit.”
It’s not only about getting the 4 cops arrested that were involve in George Floyd death.Its about the government and this country acknowledging police brutality tours blacks and enforcing laws tours police brutality and corruption.
— iamcardib (@iamcardib) May 31, 2020
Yesterday (May 31) Cardi followed her video by tweeting her view that both the government and the US as a whole needs to “acknowledge police brutality [towards] blacks and enforce laws [against] police brutality and corruption”.
Cardi joins the likes of Travis Scott, Jay-Z and Lizzo in speaking publicly following Floyd’s death and the subsequent protests.
