George Floyd's Brother Describes Call With Trump: 'He Didn't Give Me The Opportunity To Speak'

George Floyd’s brother describes disappointing call with President Trump

In the wake of George Floyd’s tragic death at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer, President Trump called Floyd’s brother Philonise Floyd, presumably to share his condolences. However, as Philonise explained to MSNBC’s Al Sharpton in an interview on Saturday, May 30, 2020 — his phone call with the President was disappointing.

Philonise spoke to both Joe Biden and Donald Trump and said that while he “begged” the presumptive Democratic nominee for “justice” for his brother, he said his call with Trump didn’t go quite so well.

Shaking his head and sighing, Philonise said the call with Trump was “so fast.”

“He didn’t give me the opportunity to even speak,” Philonise explained. “It was hard. I was trying to talk to him but he just kept like pushing me off like ‘I don’t want to hear what you’re talking about.’ I just told him I want justice. I said that I can’t believe that they committed a modern-day lynching in broad daylight. I can’t stand for that, that hurt me.”

We can’t say we’re shocked. Not listening is Trump’s hallmark. Earlier today he said that the protests outside the White House had “little to do with the memory of George Floyd,” but if he even read a single sign or listened to the protest speeches, he’d know that wasn’t true and he’d also know that the protests are about so much more — they’re about justice, civil rights, and a call to end police brutality.

As Philonise continued to chat with Sharpton, he got emotional, fighting back tears and saying, “I just don’t understand, man. Why we have to go through this? Why we gotta have all this pain, man? I love my brother. I’m never going to see him again.”

Trump mentioned the phone call during a speech at the Kennedy Space Center on Saturday, claiming he “spoke to George’s family and expressed the sorrow of our entire nation for their loss.”

On Friday, Derek Chauvin was charged with the murder of George Floyd, though the other three officers who stood by as Chauvin pressed his knee in Floyd’s neck for eight minutes, have yet to be arrested. To that Philonese says, “They all need to be convicted of first-degree murder.”

“He wasn’t a person to them, he was scum. He was nothing,” Philonise told Sharpton. “I can imagine how many people they did like that. I don’t need them on the streets to kill anybody else. I’m hurt, my family is hurt. His kids are hurt. They will grow up without a father. Everybody is crying and in pain right now.”