Rep. Byron Donalds, a Black Florida Republican and potential Trump running mate, alleged that Black families were better off during the Jim Crow Era during a “Congress, Cognac, and Cigars” campaign event for the former President in Philadelphia last Tuesday.
Byron boldly stated, “You see, during Jim Crow, the Black family was together. During Jim Crow, more Black people were not just conservative — Black people have always been conservative-minded — but more Black people voted conservatively,” the Philadelphia Inquirer reports. In addition, Donalds also criticized government programs that offer aid for people of lower socioeconomic status and promote civil rights, claiming they are “hurting Black Americans and eroding family values.”
The following day, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) and other Democrats spoke out on the House floor, denouncing Rep. Byron Donalds’ comments. “We were not better off when a young boy named Emmett Till could be brutally murdered without consequence because of Jim Crow,” said the Black Congressman from New York.
“We were not better off when Black women could be sexually assaulted without consequence because of Jim Crow. We would not better off when people could be systematically lynched without consequence because of Jim Crow,” said Jeffries, who is ironically from the same Brooklyn neighborhood as Donalds. “How dare you make such an ignorant observation? You better check yourself before you wreck yourself.”
A spokesperson from the Democratic National Committee called it “absurd to suggest” this time “was anything but a horrific stain on our country’s history.” In addition, NAACP President Derrick Johnson condemned Donalds’ remarks.
Posting on social media, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, (D-TX), wrote “I grew up in the Jim Crow era. I went to school in the Jim Crow era. I traveled in the Jim Crow era. I know what life was like under Jim Crow. For one of my colleagues to say life is worse now than under Jim Crow is absolutely absurd and unconscionable.”
“Jim Crow was the name of the racial caste system which operated primarily, but not exclusively in southern and border states, between 1877 and the mid-1960s. Jim Crow was more than a series of rigid anti-black laws. It was a way of life. Under Jim Crow, African Americans were relegated to the status of second-class citizens,” per the Jim Crow Museum, housed at Ferris State University.
Even after the 13th, 14th, and 15th Constitutional Amendments were passed, which were supposed to grant Black people the same protections under the law as their white counterparts, the Supreme Court helped to legitimize Jim Crow with the now-overturned Plessy v. Ferguson case in 1896, allowing “separate but equal,” which was not overturned until 1954 with the landmark Brown v. Board of Education. Jim Crow was a way of life that was often associated with violence against Black Americans. Despite these dangers, “[m]any black people resisted the indignities of Jim Crow, and, far too often, they paid for their bravery with their lives.”
Amidst the public outcry and backlash about his statements, Donalds doubled down on his statements in defense, posting a video on social media saying, “Now they’re trying to say that I said Black people were doing better under Jim Crow. I never said that. They are lying. But why would you be surprised? Because they always lie…What I said was, is that you have more Black families under Jim Crow and it was the Democrat policies under [the former Department of Health, Education and Welfare], under the welfare state, that did help to destroy the Black family. That’s what I said.”
“I know what I said and I’ll say it straight to camera,” added Donalds. “They got to run to the Philadelphia Inquirer to use their lies. Joe Biden does not care about Black people. He never has. He cares about power.”