BLM protesters go after senator behind Justice for Breonna Taylor Act just because he’s Republican

BLM protesters who swarmed Rand Paul demanding acknowledgement of Breonna Taylor’s death, didn’t seem to know that, in introducing the Justice for Breonna Taylor Act, he did much more than simply ‘say her name.’

A crowd surrounded the Republican Senator and his police escort on Thursday, obstructing their exit from the Republican National Convention and even pushing an officer into the politician at one point. The protesters could be heard chanting “Say her name!” They were referring to the unprosecuted death of Breonna Taylor, a young black Kentucky woman fatally shot by plain-clothes police who entered her apartment during a “no-knock” search.

However, the Kentucky congressman did, quite famously, “say the name” of his killed constituent when he introduced the Justice for Breonna Taylor Act in the Senate. The legislation, which was rejected, would have banned unannounced “no-knock” searches. Furthermore, it would have required law enforcement agents to notify a citizen before executing a search warrant.

The Republican politician is often considered a fringe member of his party for being an open libertarian and supporting criminal justice reforms. He even regularly partners-up with his supposed opposition, the Democrats, for this purpose.

Some political online commentators were therefore baffled as to why Paul had become a target of racial justice activists. Twitter users accused the protesters of focusing only on the Democrat versus Republican dichotomy instead of the issues’ substance.

Another critic noted that the partisan conversation around criminal justice reform could be easily flipped nowadays. They pointed to the Democratic nominee for president being Joe Biden, author of the controversial 1994 crime bill, which is widely considered to have been a key contributor to the mass incarceration of black Americans.

Some, however, remained unconvinced by Paul’s legislative record, remembering that he recently voted against a law that would have additionally criminalized racial hate crimes.

Paul prevented the Emmett Till Antilynching Act from passing the Senate in June. The Republican senator had previously explained his opposition to the bill by saying he was of the view that it might over-criminalize petty crimes and minor property damage by punishing them with years of jail time.

Since then, he has been accused of opposing criminal justice reform and even of being racist. This was speculated to have been the reason he was approached by the protesting crowd.

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