Parishioners at a black church in Selma, Alabama, stood and turned their backs on former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg as he spoke on Sunday morning, the anniversary of “Bloody Sunday.”
Video from the Brown Chapel AME Church, a historic black church, showed a group of people standing with their backs turned to Bloomberg as delivered remarks.
Members of a congregation turned their backs to Mike Bloomberg as he spoke at a church in Selma, AL. pic.twitter.com/wuSP1mVjJR
— The Hill (@thehill) March 1, 2020
Images soon popped up across social media. “During @MikeBloomberg’s remarks at Brown AME Church on this 55th Anniversary Bridge Crossing Jubilee, several parishioners stood up and turned their backs to Bloomberg in a silent protest,” one Twitter user wrote.
During @MikeBloomberg’s remarks at Brown AME Church on this 55th Anniversary Bridge Crossing Jubilee, several parishioners stood up and turned their backs to Bloomberg in a silent protest. Photo via @BenPu_nbc’s feed pic.twitter.com/ZkaeHJi445
— Maura Barrett (@MauraBarrettNBC) March 1, 2020
“Bloomberg then faced—from my vantage point—10 protestors who turned their back at him as he spoke. He seemed unmoved while and after it happened,” wrote another.
Bloomberg then faced—from my vantage point—10 protestors who turned their back at him as he spoke. He seemed unmoved while and after it happened. pic.twitter.com/2OaA5KqKfo
— Marianna Sotomayor (@MariannaNBCNews) March 1, 2020
Bloomberg was visiting the church on the 55th anniversary of “Bloody Sunday,” when state troopers attacked black civil rights activists as they marched over the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma.
The New York Daily News said that while protesters “didn’t utter a word, the signal they sent was loud and clear: They don’t want the ex-mayor who once championed stop-and-frisk for president.”
“I have tried to listen and I have tried to learn,” Bloomberg told the congregation. “I certainly gave people the opportunity to change my mind.”
In other remarks, Bloomberg cited Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., saying he “understood that the right to vote was only the first step in the march to true equality because true equality means that wealth in this country should have no relation to race or ethnicity. That’s what my Greenwood Initiative is all about.
“You may know about Greenwood, in Tulsa, Okla., but until a year ago, like so many other Americans, I did not. Greenwood was a thriving and prosperous black neighborhood until a white mob attacked and destroyed it back in 1921. More than 200 African Americans were killed. It was one of the worst tragedies in American history,” Bloomberg said. “But sadly, it was just another instance of black families being systematically robbed and exploited, something that didn’t end with slavery but continued with Jim Crow and redlining.”
Shortly after Bloomberg entered the race, he stopped at a black megachurch in Brooklyn and apologized for his stop and frisk policy.
“I now see that we could and should have acted sooner, and acted faster, to cut the stops,” he said. “I wish we had and I’m sorry that we didn’t, but I can’t change history. However, today I want you to know that I realized back then that I was wrong and I’m sorry.”
Civil rights leader Rep. John Lewis, also gave a speech on Sunday in Selma, saying “Fifty-five years ago, a few of our children attempted to march … across this bridge.
“We were beaten, we were tear-gassed. I thought I was going to die on this bridge. But somehow and some way, God almighty helped me here. We must go out and vote like we never, ever voted before,’ said Lewis, 80, who was diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer in December.
“I’m not going to give up. I’m not going to give in. We’re going to continue to fight. We need your prayers now more than ever before. We must use the vote as a nonviolent instrument or tool to redeem the soul of America,” Lewis added.