Project 21 co-chair Horace Cooper and former Hennepin County Sheriff Rich Stanek join ‘Fox News @ Night’ to discuss the rise in violent crime across the U.S.
Corporate voices boomed across the nation in support of Black Lives Matter and various social justice initiatives following the death of George Floyd in 2020. Nearly two years later, what was left in the wake of 2020 was a drastic spike Black murders with experts pinning blame on the BLM and defund the police movements.
The summer of 2020 was marked by protests and riots from coast to coast in support of the BLM and defund the police movements following the death of George Floyd. Companies stretching from behemoth e-commerce and tech company Amazon to beauty giant Ulta posted messages reiterating “Black lives matter,” and companies around the country pledged millions of dollars to various social justice organizations that pushed to reimagine policing and reallocate funds from police departments.
FBI data reported by Fox News Digital last week shows murders spiked disproportionally among Black Americans in 2020 by 32% compared to the year prior. Murders across the board spiked by nearly 30% that year, marking the largest single-year increase in killings since the agency began tracking the crimes.
At least 7,484 Black Americans were murdered in 2019, according to FBI data Fox News Digital reported last week. That number shot up to at least 9,941 murders in 2020, meaning there was an increase of 2,457 Black Americans murdered over the previous year.
For White Americans, FBI data show there were 7,043 White people murdered in 2020, meaning 2,898 more Black people were killed compared to Whites.
An average of 6,927 Black Americans were murdered each year between 2010 and 2019, meaning Black murders shot up by 43% in 2020 compared to the previous 10-year average.
To experts such as the Manhattan Institute’s Heather Mac Donald, BLM and the defund movements that swept the nation directly contributed to the spike. The spike “began months after lockdowns beginning only after riots,” Mac Donald told Fox News Digital, noting the “spike was not at all related to COVID.”
Fox News Digital reached out to a handful of corporations and companies that pledged support for Black Lives Matter and various organizations supporting tenets of the defund movement, such as the Equal Justice Initiative and the National Urban League in the days and months following the death of Floyd.
The Equal Justice Initiative advocates for the reallocations of “funds from traditional policing to services that promote public safety.” While the National Urban League outlines on its website that it has “21 Pillars” on “comprehensive and realistic reform and accountability,” including “collaborate with communities to re-envision public safety” and “change divisive policing policies.”
Representatives for Nike, Apple, Facebook, Amazon, Ben & Jerry’s, Nordstrom, Target and Ulta did not return Fox News Digital’s requests for comment.
Companies such as Nordstrom, Ben & Jerry’s and Amazon openly aligned themselves with Black Lives Matter.
Nordstrom said in January of 2021 that it was “supporting the important work of nonprofit organizations,” including the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation. Amazon announced in 2020 that it was donating $10 million “to organizations that are working to bring about social justice and improve the lives of Black and African Americans,” including BLM.
While Ben & Jerry’s noted in 2020 that it supported the BLM movement years before Floyd’s death and declared, “Today, we want to be even more clear about the urgent need to take concrete steps to dismantle white supremacy in all its forms.”
Nike – along with Converse, Jordan Brand and Michael Jordan – announced in 2020 it would donate a combined $140 over 10 years to organizations such as the National Urban League and Equal Justice Initiative. Apple launched a $100 million program called the Racial Equity and Justice Initiative in June of 2020, which pledged support to various groups including working with EJI. Facebook pledged support to groups fighting racial inequality just days after Floyd’s death, including EJI, as did Ulta Beauty. In 2020, Target announced a $10 million commitment to “advancing social justice,” including donations to the National Urban League.
The Equal Justice Initiative and National Urban League did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment when confronted with the FBI data on Black murders and experts arguing the defund movement contributed to the spike.
Black Lives Matter’s press team has not responded to repeated requests for comment on the data and experts’ arguments. The national organization, which was co-founded by a self-described “trained Marxist,” has come under intense scrutiny in recent months as questions were raised about leadership’s financial dealings. Amazon announced in February of this year that it suspended the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation from its charity platform for failing to disclose where tens of millions of dollars were allocated.
Just last week, former diversity leader under the Donald Trump administration Bruce LeVell wrote an op-ed slamming corporations for their “huge miscalculation” in backing the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation.
“Unfortunately, BLMGNF has intimidated the leaders of some of America’s largest corporations into paying fealty to its harmful and deceptive narrative,” LeVell wrote in the Tennessee Star on Thursday. “Rather than challenging the Marxist provocateurs at BLMGNF, corporate leaders have prostrated themselves and even donated shareholder resources to a cause that is intrinsically opposed to free markets, individual liberties, law and order, and everything else that allows American businesses to thrive.”
* story by Fox News
