The video discusses the alarming rise in violent crime in Chicago, particularly focusing on a recent mass shooting that left 14 people injured. It highlights the ongoing struggles with gang violence, the perception of diminished police authority following the George Floyd protests, and the distrust in local prosecutorial practices. The discussion involves community voices expressing their frustrations and demands for new approaches, such as treating violence as a public health crisis and the need for legislative changes.

In addressing these issues, the video presents contrasting viewpoints on the impact of federal intervention suggested by President Trump. While some community members welcome additional law enforcement to combat crime, others argue that the problem is deeper, rooted in socioeconomic disparity and requiring more than just a law-and-order approach. A dialogue featuring experts like Dr. Cornel West sheds light on the need for systemic change beyond immediate policing measures.

Main takeaways from the video:

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Key Vocabularies and Common Phrases:

1. enmities [ˈenmɪtiz] - (noun) - Feelings of hostility or animosity towards someone. - Synonyms: (hostility, antagonism, animosity)

The pandemic and the killing of George Floyd has brought all sorts of enmities surging to the surface.

2. undermined [ˌʌndərˈmaɪnd] - (verb) - To weaken or damage someone’s authority or position. - Synonyms: (weakened, impaired, sabotaged)

Police officers will tell you, since the death of George Floyd, they've been undermined by the politicians and the lawbreakers know it.

3. sanctuary [ˈsæŋktʃuˌɛri] - (noun) - A place of refuge or safety; shelter from danger. - Synonyms: (refuge, haven, safe haven)

This is our sanctuary.

4. augmenting [ɔːɡˈmɛntɪŋ] - (verb) - To make something greater by adding to it; increase. - Synonyms: (supplementing, enhancing, expanding)

On behalf of the people of Chicago, I feel that the president's doing the right thing by augmenting the federal police force.

5. legislation [ˌlɛdʒɪˈsleɪʃən] - (noun) - Laws, considered collectively, to be enacted, enforced, or amended. - Synonyms: (laws, statutes, rules)

And others moving legislation or to write the votes

6. prosperous [ˈprɒspərəs] - (adjective) - Successful in material terms; flourishing financially. - Synonyms: (thriving, successful, flourishing)

There are sections in Chicago that used to be prosperous black commercial strips that are literally grasslands now.

7. animosity [ˌænɪˈmɒsɪti] - (noun) - Strong hostility or opposition towards someone or something. - Synonyms: (bitterness, acrimony, resentment)

It's anecdotal, but people I've talked to in Chicago, who are black, actually welcome it.

8. disproportionately [ˌdɪsprəˈpɔːrʃənətli] - (adverb) - To an extent or degree that is not in proportion with something else. - Synonyms: (unequally, inconsistently, asymmetrically)

Our most vulnerable citizens, no matter what color, but disproportionately black and brown.

9. chicanery [ʃɪˈkeɪnəri] - (noun) - The use of trickery to achieve a political, financial, or legal purpose. - Synonyms: (deception, deceit, trickery)

Because I live in Chicago, where political chicanery is rampant.

10. empathy [ˈɛmpəθi] - (noun) - The ability to understand and share the feelings of another. - Synonyms: (sympathy, compassion, understanding)

I don't want to see a mother on tv crying. Cause I'm sitting there crying with her.

Have police lost control of the streets of Chicago? - BBC Newsnight

Breaking news that we're following this morning, a mass shooting in Chicago overnight. 14 people were injured. Three women were shot in Avalon park. One was killed when she was shot in the chest. This is a city with a violent past. But in the last two months, violence and crime have exploded once again in Chicago. Something tells you that there's a serious cycle. There's a problem in the psychic of America. A total of 64 people were shot this past weekend. And for the fourth consecutive weekend, children were among the victims. I don't want to see a mother on tv crying. Cause I'm sitting there crying with her.

Police warned that they've lost control of the streets, of the mob rules this city. He had just had an 82 year old man carjacked at 08:00 on a Sunday morning downtown. The raw crime stats coming out of Chicago Police Department are barely believable. In the last week for which they've issued a bulletin, 26 murders in this city. That's up 76% on the same week last year. 92 shooting incidents, up 96% on the same week last year. In July alone, this city is approaching its 100th murder. What everyone wants to know is what's causing this? Walk around this city and you'll get different answers to that question. Police officers will tell you, since the death of George Floyd, they've been undermined by the politicians and the lawbreakers know it. Oh, there's no doubt. I mean, they absolutely know that the Cook county state's attorney here is not going to prosecute people almost 90% of the time. You know, some simple statistics. The Cook county jail here has 50% the population. It did in 2020, but yet the violence hasn't changed.

So where are all those violent offenders at? They're still out there committing crimes. They're just not staying in jail anymore. Most violent crime in Chicago is connected to gangs and drugs. Jamal Cole is a campaigner and activist. He says something fundamental has changed in this city in relations with the police. We sick and tired. It's been too many murders. The police have been killing people. There's been so many, we can't even count. Stop killing us and we'll stop protesting the institutional murder and oppression of black people by authority. This is our sanctuary.

In the south side of Chicago, I met Pastor Anthony Williams. He lost his son to gun violence two years ago. He now wants to see a change in the law here to treat violence as a health emergency as urgent as Covid-19 my community would still be on the back of the bus if it was not for Doctor King. And others moving legislation or to write the votes. When you have a problem, you have to also take a legislative action. We have an opportunity in the state of Illinois and in the city of Chicago to set the tone in terms of passing violence as a health crisis. Pastor Williams told me that that means mental health and drug treatment, not just law and order policing. And until the law has changed. He's starting a hunger strike tomorrow on a corner nearby where a week ago, 14 people were shot.

I'm going to fast and pray on that corner until this legislation is passed. I'm prepared to die on that corner, and I'm not trying to die. We are trying to get this up and running. There are so many grieving parents in this city. Audrey Wright lost her son to a gun and now works in Chicago's most murder prone neighborhood to help train young people in skills like sewing and carpentry. But the pandemic has shut our operation, like the schools and many businesses. The result, she says, is boredom in young minds and a wave of trouble on the streets. Drugs is a killer by itself. Violence is a killer because that's what they turn to, violence. We got to learn to take our children off the street.

Meanwhile, the Chicago police union, angry and alarmed at what's happening, sees another solution. They've written to the president begging him to send federal forces to shore up their thin blue line, as many as they can spare. I mean, I know he sent somewhere between 152 hundred. I'd like to see three, four times that because it's the only thing criminals understand. And like, just like bullies is a punch in the face. And until we start getting serious about crime and obviously consequences, this city isn't going to be livable.

Talk of punches in the face from the federal government doesn't much appeal to Lashawn Ford, the Illinois state representative for Chicago's west side. He's championing the legislation that Pastor Williams is praying and fasting for. The president of the United States is speaking to his base. His base believes in law and order by all costs and any means necessary. And so when he goes out and say that he's putting federal agents on the streets to attack black people, that's right to his base. And I see the president using Chicago as a backdrop in his campaign ads to run for president. This is all political.

So Chicago is a city divided. The pandemic and the killing of George Floyd has brought all sorts of enmities surging to the surface. This is Bobby's barbershop. Bobby's barbershop is one of the only small businesses to open up in the last five years. In the south side of Chicago, where the drugs and the gangs and the guns wreck so many lives, I found a small, hopeful sign. Tours of the neighborhood conducted by young residents for new recruits to Chicago police. It's making a difference because it's building confidence in the youth. They don't get to talk to police officers unless they're getting arrested. And it's also getting the police officers to know their community and see people on the porch. Hey, how you doing? This is my name's who I am before you're arresting people. A walking tour clearly won't solve Chicago's problems on its own. But right now, this is a city where small steps are better than nothing.

Joining me now, Doctor Cornel west, professor of the practice of public philosophy at Harvard University, and Steve Bolton, chair of the Chicago Republican Party. Welcome to you both. If I may start with you, Cornell, what do you worry about with Trump, Trump's involvement in Chicago's law and order situation?

Well, it's already a sad day with the burial of the great John Lewis and magnificent Jim Lawson talking about the ways in which our most vulnerable citizens, no matter what color, but disproportionately black and brown, when you have not just high levels of poverty and unavailable decent housing and healthcare, you also have a nihilism, a meaningless, a hopelessness, a shattering of families and communities. And violence is profoundly american, with long histories of America in terms of use of violence and psychic regeneration through violence. And you see, we see this too often on our streets. It could be police killing vulnerable folk, it could be citizens killing each other. Chicago is one of the wealthiest cities in the world, but the sections of Chicago we're talking about are 42% poor Lawndale, 45% poor.

Wes Garfield, father Flager, my dear brother Marshall Hatch, two leaders in Chicago trying to wrestle with these problems. The police can't do it on their own, but at the same time, we have to recognize what Trump is talking about would be much worse. But the liberal policies with so many of our mayors have fallen far short, too. Let's bring in Steve at this point. Do you understand that based on what Cornell was saying, why some people, especially in Democrat cities, are uncomfortable with Trump sending federal agents in the. Surely the police in the area should be enough.

Well, actually, it's anecdotal, but people I've talked to in Chicago, black, who are black, actually welcome it. They're tired of the shooting. They're tired of their neighborhoods being shooting galleries. This is a city that needs every law enforcement agent it can get its hands on. We're not talking about troops in the street. We're talking about augmenting the federal forces of the United States attorney to enforce drug laws, to enforce gun laws, and to attack the drug gangs that are responsible for a great proportion of the shootings. You mentioned 14 people shot on a corner in Chicago. That was a funeral of a gang member. A rival gang pulled up, got out of a car, and opened up with a machine gun on the crowd. This gang violence is gripping this city. There is no justice without order. There is no equality without peace. It's got to be established first, and you cannot do this bye by undermining the police, by encouraging lawlessness and allowing these gangs to run free.

So on behalf of the people of Chicago, I feel that the president's doing the right thing by augmenting the federal police force and bringing in additional law enforcement to try and stem the tide. Cornell, what's your take on that this is something that the people of Chicago would welcome with these crime rates?

Well, I mean, that's not what I hear from my partners in Chicago. I mean, brother Steve's got his own group of people across the board, of course, different colors and things. I trust his judgment in terms of him reporting the truth as he understands it. But I would want to argue that you can have all of the federal troops, be they visible or invisible. It's not going to deal with the problems in terms of the depths of the poverty, the depths of the indecent housing, the shattering of the families, and therefore, these are all short term band aids. But if we don't get at the deeper problem, those troops are not going to be there forever.

There's never going to be enough prisons, there'll never be enough police to deal with overwhelming despair as a result of the unbelievably grotesque levels of wealth inequality in Chicago and the spiritual decay, the levels of corruption in government, the levels of greed in wealthy Chicago, corporate Chicago that's obsessed with profits rather than satisfying the needs of ordinary people. People. And among we black folk, ourselves, the shattering too often of our self respect and our self regard and the willingness to fall prey to self destructive activities.

Steve, what would you say to that? That actually, this is a Band Aid? Yes, you've got to deal with crime as it's happening, but what's also happening at the same time to try and deal with the reasons why perhaps people are in this position in the very first place.

There's no question that these communities are strongly afflicted. But it's been going on for decades. There are sections in Chicago that used to be prosperous black commercial strips that are literally grasslands now because the city demolishes abandoned homes rather than other cities and simply leave them to rot. So we have entire.

There is no black business community. What has to happen is these people need hardware stores as much as handouts. They need that self respect. I quite agree with Doctor west about that, but the problem is, how do we get there? The problem is, now President Trump has got new opportunity zones and grants. I completely agree with Doctor west. It's going to take an entire community effort, and one of the answers is to bring the wealth and the black communities higher than it is and to a more equal standing.

However, you're not going to do that by a zero sum game of taking away from one. Capitalism works by lifting a lot of boats. We need to create wealth in there, we need to get businesses going in there, and we need to have law and order so businesses can thrive.

Very briefly, it's time, slightly against me here, but I do want to get your take on this tweet from the president today who has suggested delaying the election. Is he chickening out because his polls don't look too healthy? No. And act about his desperation is a little ill founded. There's a recent poll, 55% of americans think Trump's going to win, and he's actually doing better than people think. Because as usual with these pollsters, no one's going to tell them they vote for Trump because they're going to be attacked somewhere online for it.

Under the constitution, the Congress has the power to decide election day. There's no question about that. All the president did was a suggestion. The reason why is that there's new mail by vote going on in many states in the United States, and many are calling it cheat by mail. Because I live in Chicago, where political chicanery is rampant, and the idea of mail in voting going on all over Chicago is one frightening possibility. As far as the legitimacy of the election results, we have to leave it there. These are the issues I'm sure we will return. Thank you, both of you, for your time this evening. We appreciate it.

Chicago, Politics, Social Issues, Crime, Leadership, Economics, Bbc Newsnight