Three black lawmakers on Thursday mounted a staunch defense of the tough 1994 anti-crime bill — and even defended Hillary Clinton’s description of violent gang members as “super predators.”
Speaking on a conference call hours before Clinton’s scheduled debate with Bernie Sanders, Brooklyn Reps. Yvette Clarke and Hakeem Jeffries and Queens Rep. Gregory Meeks said the bill and the then-first lady’s remarks had to be understood in the context of the time.
”You have to remember that with the crack epidemic, there was tremendous victimization. So many communities of color, and black communities, were under assault, and felt they were being preyed upon,” Clarke said in the call, which was arranged by Team Clinton.
“When you look at the toll that the crime and the drug trade took on the black community at the time, that was one way residents in our community felt, that they were being preyed upon [by the] dangerous, hostile behavior of [those in] the drug trade,” she said.
Meeks called the mass imprisonment of blacks one of the “unintended consequences” that followed the bill’s passage.
“A number of members of the Congressional Black Caucus voted for it at the time. New York City had a murder rate of more than 2,000 [a year],” Meeks said.
While also defending Clinton, Jeffries joined his colleagues in pointing a finger at then-Rep. Bernie Sanders — who as a Vermont congressman at the time had a say on the issue, unlike the first lady.
“He voted for the 1994 crime bill,” Jeffries pointed out.
Meeks acknowledged that for some in the black community, the “superpredator” comment was offensive.
“At the time they [supporters of the bill] were concerned about the black lives being lost. Based on what was going on at that time, they were concerned about the crime and the deaths in the African-American communities. Was the choice of words in the heat of battle incorrect? Yes, maybe there probably was a better choice of words,” Meeks said.
In another development, Clinton praised a Connecticut judge’s refusal to toss out a lawsuit accusing gun manufacturers and sellers of liability in the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre.
“Today’s ruling in Connecticut is an important step forward for these families [of victims], who are bravely fighting to hold irresponsible gunmakers accountable for their actions. They deserve their day in court. Period,” she said in a statement.
Sanders has said that gun manufacturers and sellers should not be held liable in such cases.