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CNN Live Event/Special

Remembering George Floyd; Any Moment Funeral Service For George Floyd In Houston; Final Viewing And Sealing Of Bier. Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired June 09, 2020 - 12:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[12:00:00]

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN HOST: George Floyd his last words, "I can't breathe," has become a rally and cry across the country and across this world against racial injustice and police brutality. And today hundreds of people will say goodbye in his home town.

The speakers we are expected to hear from today are his attorney and Former Vice President Joe Biden. Now after this service George Floyd will travel his last mile and horse-drawn carriage and will be buried next to his mother and you will remember he cried out for her during his final moments.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: And Victor, this, of course, today is a private service. During a public tribute, Floyd's brothers remembered him as a 46-year-old father whose life and the movement that he has sparked by his memory has been so impactful here in the United States. Let's listen.

RODNEY FLOYD, GEORGE FLOYD'S BROTHER: And I'll tell you what if he was told he would have to sacrifice his life to bring the world together, knowing him and he would have did it. Again, I love this love and we're hurting as a family and, you know, George we know, unfortunately, again, he's a family man, great man.

He stands for the definition of a man because we didn't have a father figure growing up and my brother, all the steps as a human being, as a young teenager, and it makes so much sense now to me as I'm older and understood the stuff he was doing is teaching us lessons.

My brother was a huge role model for a lot of people. He was the first person who everybody looked up to and our neighborhood because he was the first one to get a scholarship. To go and play basketball, football, what he wanted to die.

I just - I thank you all so much for coming out to support us. And all the families here with me today, Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Arbery, it just hurts. Breonna Taylor, everybody. Thank you so much.

Stay strong, my brother! Thank you all! We will get justice. We will get it. We will not let this door close.

KEILAR: George Floyd also leaves behind children, a son and two daughters. The youngest of who are only 6 years old. And in this moment caught by Floyd's friend ex-NBA player Steven Jackson it is clear that his little girl knows what impact her father is making.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That's right.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Daddy changed the world!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLACKWELL: Daddy changed the world! Let's go now to Houston. CNN's Omar Jimenez and Sara Sidner are there outside the Fountain of Praise Church.

KEILAR: Tell us the plan, Omar, here because this is the last tribute for Floyd before he's buried.

OMAR JIMENEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right Brianna. So we have gone from Minnesota to North Carolina and of course here to Houston, Texas, where he's from and just any minute now we are expecting the funeral proceedings to begin for George Floyd, a chance for the family, friends and those that knew him best to say good-bye one final time.

Now we mentioned as you're probably seeing on the screen people are being greeted with song as they make their way into Fountain of Praise Church here in Houston. The guest list will be limited to about 500 people as we understand and it's going to see guests anywhere from the Mayor Sylvester Turner here in Houston, Boxer Floyd May Weather and of course friends and family again invited guests.

From this point after it is over, the Houston Police Department will then escort Floyd's body over to Pearland, Texas which will be where his final resting place is, the final mile of that procession will be by horse-drawn carriage where people will be able to line the streets and give George Floyd one final sendoff as he makes his way to what will be his final burial spot next to his mother, the very same mother he cried out for in his final moments under the knee of a police officer a little over two weeks ago to the day.

BLACKWELL: Omar Jimenez, thank you. Sara Sidner, we'll talk after the service. Let's go now inside the Fountain of Praise Church in Houston for the funeral service of George Floyd.

All right, there's a break in a bit of music that's happening before the start of the service, we have heard from Pastor Mia Kay Wright of the Fountain of Praise Church if this will be a home-going celebration for George Floyd, they want to remember his name, remember the man that he was.

His contributions to the people who will be there long before the rest of the world learned his name but also those we will hear from civil right leaders. You heard from his brother Philonise Floyd who says we will not let this door close.

[12:05:00]

BLACKWELL: Brianna, a portion of what we're going to hear today is going to be a call for a reform of social justice and a call to change policing practices.

KEILAR: That's right. His death can't be in vain. I think that's what we're hearing so much from those who knew him well. They're suffering a tremendous loss as they have this final good-bye to their friend and brother and their son and they want to make sure that the changes that we have seen here in the last couple weeks persist. It is very important for this family and also for all of the families there to support the Floyd family, Victor.

BLACKWELL: Indeed it is. While we have this moment, let's check back in now with Sara Sidner. Sara, we also heard a bit of the mention of the other names, those families have joined this somber fraternity of having lost their loved ones to similar violence and many of them will be there today. Who will be there showing their support?

SARA SIDNER, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: They came yesterday, as well to pay their respects to George Floyd but also, to stand in solidarity with the Floyd family. It was quite a tearful moment to see all of these families standing with one another, all of them African-American families who have been through this before, who have felt this pain themselves and who have been in the spotlight, the national spotlight because of what happened to their loved one and most of them police shootings.

We talk about who was going to be here. Michael Brown's father is going to be here, Michael Brown Senior is going to be here. Breonna Taylor's mother is here, the mother of Eric Garner who is the first person that the world heard the words I can't breathe and where that caught on across the nation and to hear from his mother and to hear her say I was hoping that my son would be the last to have to utter those words underneath a police hold.

It broke her down to think that someone else's family to go through this, as well. We heard those words so many times, also the family of Ahmaud Arbery is here and everyone knows his story and seen that terrifying video of his final moments.

So many people have been through this and to see all these families come together was both powerful and sorrowful as you saw them standing outside of the Church and then filing into the Church to have to say good-bye yet again to another black man in America whose life was taken by a police officer.

KEILAR: And Omar, tell us. This is, of course, Houston. We saw the initial memorial take place in Minneapolis. George Floyd has ties to many areas. He loved Minneapolis. But Houston was home. Talk to us about why this is so special, such a special place for him and his family?

JIMENEZ: Well Brianna, for him to be able to come back here to where he grew up in the 3rd ward here in Houston where you hear from the people that knew him at that time, including his friend and Former NBA player Steven Jackson they joke even at times about how they first met each other because they both felt like they were twins and that's where their relationship started even going back to the neighborhood where they were here growing up. And then as we understand I spoke to Roxy Washington, who is the mother of George Floyd's 6-year-old daughter Gianna and she told me that George moved to Minneapolis from Houston to try and find work and try and provide for their family, a family she says he was very much present for and he had been living there for years until what we saw unfold just a little over two weeks ago now.

But the pride of him being from here was evident in the thousands that showed up yesterday for the public memorial. People came dressed in masks and hats definitely donning Houston shirts wearing George Floyd and some ways you talk about the tragedy of the death in this but this is also seemed to be the spark of the birth of a movement we are seeing and the push for long-term police reform in places across the country.

And while the death happened in Minneapolis, the energy seems to stem from here in Houston at least for the time being. So it is a very special place for the family a very special place for those that knew him even before and well before this happened and that there is no more fitting place for all of this to play out than here in Houston.

BLACKWELL: Yes Sara, we saw in the thousands, more than 6,000 there, who streamed through yesterday, a mix of those who knew him and those who have now joined this global call for change. Floyd killed on Memorial Day. Since then what we have seen just remarkable, not just in the big cities, small cities, in the U.S. and across this world.

SIDNER: Yes. There is something that is different. I have been covering these issues between black folks and police for many, many years, for CNN and before CNN, and I will tell you that in every single case there's always been this spark of a moment and then that is turned into a movement.

The black lives matter movement but I have never seen the response we have seen from what happened to George Floyd.

[12:10:00]

SIDNER: The response has been remarkable and that's what's different because the response wasn't just coming from people who went out to march in the streets from black folks and white folks that decided that they couldn't take this anymore but it came from the Police Chiefs of this country.

And it's come from the Governors of this country and some of the political leaders of this country who we haven't heard from in the past. I was able to speak with the Police Chief here, Chief Acevedo and he said very plainly that there has to be a change in our departments and he talked about his own.

He says I can't guarantee that this will never happen again. What I can guarantee is that we have to make reforms in the police departments. When there are police officers who do not do their jobs well and the community knows that and expresses that they need to be out instead of being able to stay in. He says a lot police officers are good, honest people who were just

trying to do their jobs but the truth is that there are folks in the department and the way that they're trained and the way that they respond to the training that is just plain wrong and that has to change.

We heard from the Governor Greg Abbott who said that George Floyd has changed the world because he is also calling for police reform. You don't hear that from both sides of the aisle every single time. This time, you heard that plain and clear, Republican, Democrat, someone in the streets, someone is a CEO.

You heard that from all different walks of life in 50 states. And that I have never seen before in this country.

KEILAR: No we have never seen that. It is curious and what's still stands to I guess figure out is how all of those people are going to come to any sort of agreement on how to move forward, right? Where do they take what happened to George Floyd and, look, all of these other families who are there and experienced this same pain as the Floyd family, where do they go from here?

If you can stand by for us, Omar and Sara you are there in Houston at the service, I want to bring in now our Political Commentator Van Jones, who is also a Former Obama Administration official and Laura Coates, Former Federal Prosecutor and CNN Senior Legal Analyst.

She is barred in Minnesota where George Floyd was killed by police. The Minneapolis City Council, Laura, is vowing to defund and dismantle their police department. And actually, Van, if I can ask you this, instead of proposing a new system of public safety, when folks say defund the police, Van, there are a lot of people who think oh, so there will be no more police ever. Explain to us what defunding means and also kind of what the range of meanings on this are?

VAN JONES, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: It's a new slogan so it's going to mean different things to different people. I think the people who are advancing the slogan what they mean is they want to rebalance some of the funding in cities and actually law enforcement should embrace an element of this.

Right now you have police are being asked to do everything, because we stripped out so much social support, so many new programs, so many social programs have been defunded over the years now police officers have to be cops, they have to be counselors, they have to be marriage counselors, coaches.

It is too much on them and their budgets have ballooned so now just the overtime budget for a police officer's sometimes bigger than the social services budget for kids. So what they're saying is take the money away from police departments that are being asked to do too much and taking up too much money and put those dollars to better use in communities.

If you want safe streets, if you want peaceful neighborhoods, you have got to rebalance it. Saying defund, I think some people are alarmed. Double click on that word and look at the how the activists are pushing it forward.

What they mean to say is something I think now everyone will agree with we need to take some of these dollars that are being put on overtime for cops doing stuff not even cop's job and putting it toward actual social workers, actual youth counselors actual jobs for people to have safer streets.

BLACKWELL: And to give you an idea of what you are seeing here on the screen, this is the family of George Floyd being led in. You saw for a moment there the Reverend Al Sharpton who will be delivering the eulogy today his family all in white being led to the front of this sanctuary.

Laura, let me come to you about these calls for reforms in departments. We have seen some policy movement in Minneapolis and some cities across the country but do you expect we'll see significant change in other major cities and how sustainable this moment is?

LAURA COATES, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Well, it would depend on whether the house bills that have been proposed recently as yesterday would actually gain some traction in the Senate and be able to articulate a national standard.

I think you are certainly seeing across the country a concerted effort by protesters who are seeking justice for George Floyd that it be a comprehensive look at the police system and our criminal justice system.

[12:15:00]

COATES: Keith Ellison, the Attorney General in Minnesota, has very clearly stated that although he is invested in the criminal prosecution of these four officer that what he is sliver of what needs to happen in the overall pie and quest towards reform in this country and that has to be in many ways Victor a comprehensive take, legislatively, at the judicial branch as well, examination of qualified immunity.

Justice Thomas and Sotomayor rarely on the same page on issues are both talking about a re-evaluation of qualified immunity and holding police to a different level of accountability or transparency in the effort and you have to look at the executive branch, as well whose job it is to enforce the law without favor to one over the other.

About the consent decree that needs to take place and be instituted rolled back by Jeff Sessions in a last act of duty before he was released from his post. And so a lot of it has to be about questioning whether it could be implemented, whether or not there's a holistic effort and holistic interest by members of Congress and state and local and across the branches?

KEILAR: And we're watching here as the Floyd family has entered the Fountain of Praise Church and you can see as they're talking there to Al Sharpton. Let's listen in.

[12:20:00] BLACKWELL: You're watching members of George Floyd's family come to view Floyd and then take their seats at his funeral service in Houston at the Fountain of Praise Church. You see on the left of your screen the Reverend Al Sharpton who will eulogize Floyd.

On the right you can see just over the shoulder of Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee who represents Houston. We were having a conversation with Van Jones and Laura Coates about police reforms but I want to pause that for a moment and just talk about this family, bring back Omar Jimenez and Sara Sidner who are outside who have been covering this now for weeks.

Omar let me start with you. We have covered, unfortunately, so many of these families who have been thrust into the center of a national and in this case global conversation and the dignity and strength with which this family has approached this unwanted role is really remarkable over the last several days and weeks after losing George Floyd in such a monstrous way?

JIMENEZ: That's right, Victor. Make no mistake about it. It's been a very painful two weeks for the family here because not only are they grieving within themselves, they also have the eyes of the world and reporters reaching out to them trying to get their story out there in the midst of them trying to process this all to begin with.

Because let's remember with all the movements that this has created and all the pushes that has spurred on at the very center of this. This is still a family that lost a father that lost a brother, and lost a loved one at the least.

So even speaking to Roxy Washington was one of the people I spoke with over the course of the past few weeks. She is the mother of George Floyd's 6-year-old daughter and one of the most painful moments for her when she first walked out to do a press conference in Minneapolis was about her saying that Gianna their daughter was not going to have a father to walk her down the aisle. She was not going to have a father to go through graduation with her.

Some of those key father/daughter moments that you would have are now gone. And that's when someone like Steven Jackson, as I spoke to a friend and former NBA player of George Floyd, he said he is now going to try and fill that role.

He is going to try and make sure Gianna the daughter has the life that she would have had with George Floyd here, with the provider that the family says that he was over the course of this.

So again, with the eyes of the world and this being the center of a movement that we are seeing toward larger police reform, a family is still hurting and there is a gap that still needs to be filled. And I think you're seeing some of those intersections of pain play out when you hear from the family members speak.

[12:25:00]

SIDNER: I want to jump in and say that in 2014, you know, I was in the streets as people for 100 days protested the death of Michael Brown in the police shooting there in the Ferguson police department and we have seen the families over time, this isn't a new movement.

Anyone who has been in America for long enough knows this isn't new but it is different. And to see this change happening because of this case, the reason why this has changed and if you talk to people about why is this sparking a different kind of cord, because so many times families have been through the pain and seen it now with this, right?

This has told us a lot of what's going on between black folks and police. The worst of it to be honest but what we have seen in this case is there was no question about the before and the after. In all the other cases there was always an argument that before what you saw on camera there was something else going on that caused the reaction by police officers.

In this case, we watched the before on the security cameras and we saw the before and after on a cell phone. A bystander decided that she was going to make sure that she recorded this because she saw something that was absolutely wrong in her mind as she was watching it happen.

Without all that we wouldn't be having this conversation but what is changed in this case is the before and after is captured on video and people could just not have an excuse for what happened in this particular case.

And I think that is the crux of what has happened to spark people not just in America but thousands, tens of thousands of people in Germany and London came out after seeing what they saw. No one can deny that what happened there was inhumane. And that should never happen in any country.

KEILAR: And talking, Sara, to people one of the things that I have heard them say is they saw videos before, they thought they were appalling, as well. They took for granted that they were so appalling that things would change.

And then here you see what happened to George Floyd two weeks ago and it became very clear that they couldn't believe it up to other people to make sure that things changed. I have heard so many people talking about what they want for their children, right?

The kind of life they want their children to be able to lead and what they want their children to have, whether they're white or black that they shouldn't have to be continuing the same fights for justice that their parents did.

And you know, one of the things, Sara, just watching this service here that strikes me so much is the inclusivity of this family. Victor put it so well when he said the dignity that they have shown as they walk through this path of pain, right?

But they're also bringing in, they know the difference, the attention that George Floyd brought to these issues and they are inviting the world in to look, Sara, and to join in this celebration of his life. It's amazing. It is remarkable. SIDNER: It is. It is remarkable but I want to say that so many families have done this, have been dignified and I don't think we can even put that sort of pressure on these families, these families are suffering so if they're dignified or not doesn't matter. They are suffering and they want people to see that suffering because they want it to end for the next person in this country.

BLACKWELL: Let's bring back Van Jones in this conversation. Van, you have helped families who have been in this situation, this position after a police killing or by a vigilante we've seen in other cases. Talk to me about those conversations and what the goals are of those families as we watch this one invite the country into this moment?

JONES: You know, it's almost impossible to understand what it means to kiss your loved one good-bye, text them, say something to them on the phone and then an hour later to find out that this person has been killed unarmed by law enforcement. Suddenly your life is completely different in every way.

First of all, that person is gone but before you can even process that you've got to become overnight an expert in police procedure. Overnight an expert in media management. Overnight an expert in being a grief counselor to people who are in your family -- overnight. But the bills still have to get paid. There's still, you know, diapers that have to be changed.