*During a pre-game presser on Sunday, San Antonio Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich called out senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema for voting with Republicans to block the advancement of a sweeping voting rights bill that was supported by Democrats and President Joe Biden. It was all sparked by a question about Juneteenth becoming a federal holiday.
“A lot of people didn’t want Martin Luther King Day either, that was that was a big struggle. It’s just been a part of our country, always has been,” he told reporters before his game with the Philadelphia 76ers. “As far as Juneteenth. I might be too cynical, or maybe I’m just realistic, but it sort of felt like a lot of politicians acquiesced to Juneteenth and basically, either blatantly, or between the lines said, ‘Now shut up. You’ve got that be happy. What else do you want?”
He then pivoted to Manchin and Sinema refusing to change filibuster rules and dooming the passage of the Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act. This comes as states around the country pass laws that restrict voting, a trend that civil rights groups say disproportionately impacts communities of color.
“They know what’s going on, they understand, but there are more important things to them, and it’s damn selfish and dangerous to our country,” Popovich said. He added: “Thank God for Black people fighting, because I live in this country, and it’s one of the big reasons we still have a country that’s democratic because of the fights that they put up.”
“We have two senators that seem to not be able to understand the gravity of the situation. And it’s for political reasons, and they must think that we’re stupid, or they just don’t care, or both, but we’re in such a dangerous situation right now.
“It’s hard to know how to go forward, and the thing for me being a white person looking at our country, it seems that it’s ironic, but as much as a community of color has been oppressed, and denigrated, and so on, and so forth, those are the people who tried to save this damn country, from itself. It’s just ironic to me.”
That was just the tip of the iceberg. Click here to see and listen to Pop’s 9 minute unleash on Manchinema, white senators in general, the irony of Black people saving American democracy, beginning at the 4:45 mark, or listen along below via San Antonio’s KENS-5 video showing part of the frame.
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