Rep. Jamal Bowman (D-NY) called for the eradication of white supremacy and Trumpism "by any means necessary."
The second-term New York Democrat has made a name for himself challenging Republican lawmakers like Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Thomas Massie (R-KY) over gun violence and corruption, and he issued a challenge to systemic racism using a phrase associated with slain civil right leader Malcom X to call for equal rights, reported Salon.
"By any means necessary we have to address this threat, whatever that may look like," Bowman told columnist Dean Obeidallah. "I think the bigger part of it is we need more people raising their voices and recognizing and acknowledging that this threat actually exists, and more people speaking truth to power to condemn it and suppress it and get rid of it."
"Because it doesn't just manifest in mass shootings; it manifests in policy, it manifests in hiring practices. It manifests in how we talk about particular groups, whether it's the trans community, women, people of color, the Jewish community, the Muslim community, etc."
The lawmaker said a mass movement was necessary to stamp out white supremacy, and he said law enforcement must take a more active role.
"Law enforcement has a long history of surveilling poor communities and communities of color," Bowman said. "Absolutely we need to know who's a danger to our American way of life, like the insurrectionists. They're still out there, and they're still coordinating and organizing on social media and other spaces. So absolutely, by any means necessary."
White nationalists and other extremists have embraced Donald Trump as their avatar, Bowman said, because he has turned widespread dissatisfaction with wealth inequality and other injustices and blamed them on marginalized groups instead of the powerful elite who benefit.
"He says something that's true," Bowman said. "He says, 'The system is rigged and broken.' That is true. But he blames progressives and liberals and Democrats and people of color for it. He doesn't blame the people he also gets a lot of support from, the wealthy elite. He doesn't blame them for it, and they should be blamed for it."
"The idea of white supremacy that lives in politics as well, not as the Ku Klux Klan, but as deference to the white patriarchy," the lawmaker added. "So yes, those aspects of the system are broken, but he blames the wrong people. He blames who the working class and working poor whites blame for their lot in life, and that's how he gets them. So he has the wealthy elite, and he has a whole base of working-class white supporters, and he also has evangelical supporters as well. So he has three very strong bases. He has a coalition to help him. That's why we can't take him for granted. That's why we have to push back on everything he does and says right now."
