President Donald Trump said Friday that he wasn’t aware of the effort to have him pardon Derek Chauvin, the white police officer convicted of murdering George Floyd.
‘No I haven’t even heard about it,’ Trump answered Friday in the Oval Office.
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Trump, in turn, ran counter to it during his quest for reelection that year.
During one of Trump’s most controversial moments in office, Black Lives Matter protesters were tear gassed and H Street N.W. was cleared so that the Republican president could march over to Saint John’s Church and hold up a Bible.
The historic yellow church located just steps from the White House had its basement nursery lit on fire during the demonstrations over Floyd’s death at the hands of Chauvin.
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Chuavin was convicted in April 2021 on the state charges of unintentional second-degree murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter – and was the first white police officer convicted in the death of a black victim in Minnesota history.
He was sentenced to 22.5 years in prison on the state charges.
In June 2021, Chauvin was also convicted on federal charges including depriving Floyd of his civil rights. Chauvin also was convicted of depriving a 14-year-old of his civil rights in a separate case.
Still, it would be a symbolic win against the Black Lives Matter movement.
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The Trump administration has also tried to undo some of the racially sensitive measures put in place on the heels of Floyd’s death.
One such move came from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to revert Fort Liberty’s name to Fort Bragg.
In the aftermath of the killing of Floyd and the subsequent Black Lives Matter protests that broke out, the military started making moves to rid bases of names of Confederate officers, who had sought to preserve slavery during the Civil War.
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Last month, Hegseth announced that Fort Bragg would return.
What Hegseth didn’t tout publicly, but was contained in the order, is that Fort Bragg would now be named after Roland L. Bragg, a heroic American World War II fighter, and not the Confederate general credited with helping the South lose the Civil War.
* Original Article:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14474407/amp/donald-trump-pardon-derek-chauvin-george-floyd.html?ito=smartnews
