COLUMBIA, S.C. – Kamala Harris made an outlandish comment that has gone largely unchecked when she compared the 2014 Ferguson riots with the 1863 Battle of Gettysburg. The vice president, who is prone to non-sensical word salads, made the absurd statement during a speech in South Carolina on Martin Luther King Day, the Post Millennial reported.
Harris said both events were examples of Americans fighting to “make the promise of freedom real.” What she failed to mention was that more than 300 arrests were made in Ferguson, Missouri for all manner of violent crime while law enforcement tried to keep the peace, or that more than 350,000 Union soldiers died during the Civil War in order fulfill the hope of freedom for enslaved people.
“I do believe the true power behind the promise of America is in the faith of her people,” Harris said at the NAACP South Carolina State Conference’s King Day at the Dome event on Monday. “The promise of America, I do believe, is in the faith of the people – our faith in the founding principles of our nation and our profound commitment to make those principles real.”
“Generation after generation, on the fields of Gettysburg, in the schools of Little Rock, on the grounds of this state house, on the streets of Ferguson, and on the floor of the Tennessee House of Representatives, we the people have always fought to make the promise of freedom real.”
Kamala Harris says the Ferguson riots and the disruptions by a few far-left Tennessee state representatives are just like what happened "on the fields of Gettysburg" and "in the schools of Little Rock" pic.twitter.com/axM6U5buHj
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) January 15, 2024
The 1863 Battle of Gettysburg eventually led to the end of the Civil War two years later and secured victory for the North, while quashing the Confederate’s ambition of forming a separate nation. It also helped set the country on path towards the abolition of slavery, the Post Millennial noted.
The Civil War cost tens of thousands of lives on both sides. Yet the North, fighting to abolish slavery, suffered more losses than the South.
“For more than a century, the most-accepted estimate was about 620,000 dead. A specific figure of 618,222 is often cited, with 360,222 Union deaths and 258,000 Confederate deaths,” according to the History Channel.
The 2014 Ferguson riots should never be categorized with anything noble. The ongoing violence was the result of a false and politically twisted narrative that Officer Darren Wilson fatally shot Michael Brown—a strong-armed robbery suspect—as he had his hands raised in the air. Evidence revealed that Brown violently attacked Wilson, forcing the officer to resort to lethal force.
Wilson was exonerated for his actions at the state and federal level, despite lies being perpetuated to disparage his name and the institution of law enforcement.
The riots that soon followed the shooting were among several landmark events in the past 10 years that have undermined the rule of law and upended the institution of law enforcement, which has further damaged marginalized individuals living in high crime areas in America.
