A Tulsa, Oklahoma police officer said “All the research says we’re shooting African Americans about 24% less than we ought to be based on the crimes being committed” during a recent radio interview. A local Tulsa TV news station reports the following:
“During a recent radio interview, Major Travis Yates explained why he believes systemic racism “doesn’t exist” and “all the research says we’re shooting African Americans about 24% less than we ought to be based on the crimes being committed.”
The president of Tulsa’s Black Officers Coalition, TPD Lieutenant Marcus Harper, held a press conference Wednesday to address Yates’ comments.
“He’s in a position of power in the police department,” Harper said. “His attitude is going to go downhill to that young, brand-new officer or that officer in field training right now.”
During the Monday morning interview on KFAQ Talk radio 1170, Yates spoke with host Pat Campbell. Multiple times, Campbell reminded listeners Yates was there to speak not on TPD’s behalf, but as a private citizen.”
Of course, the powers that be want to find a way to remove him because he is not following the leftist narrative. If you think that actual statistics show something different than the left, you must lose your job. Because those young and impressionable officers might actually look up the stats and find out what you are saying does not match the narrative of Black Lives Matters and the rest of the left.
You can believe that what happened to George Floyd was an injustice and at the same time reject the systematic racism narrative of the left. And while all Americans can agree that what happened to George Floyd was an injustice, how may Americans see the injustice of trying to have a police officer fired for his views on the validity of the systematic racism narrative?
There is a reason why the first amendment to the Constitution deals with free speech. When that goes, everything else goes along with it.