The Daily - ‘I Want To Touch the World’

Episode Date: June 10, 2020

This episode contains strong language.Nearly 30 years ago, George Perry Floyd Jr. told a high school classmate he would “touch the world” someday. We went to the funeral in Houston of an outsize man who dreamed equally big and whose killing has galvanized a movement against racism across the globe.Guest: Manny Fernandez, The New York Times’s bureau chief in Houston.For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily Background reading: Mr. Floyd’s funeral served as both a national reckoning and a moment of personal mourning. The Rev. Al Sharpton demanded more action against police brutality.As a young man, Mr. Floyd had big plans for his future. This is the story of his life and dreams.

My name is Jonathan Veal. I have known George Floyd since the sixth grade at James D. Ryan Middle School in the community of Third Ward, which is located in Houston, Texas. The first day I saw him, I was in the cafeteria and he came in and I was just blown away by his height. He was 6'2". And I was just in awe, just like, wow, that's a tall guy. And he was just tall and skinny. This guy is in the sixth grade. And that was the beginning of our relationship. I remember it was the last day of school on our junior year. And there was this place just north of our school, maybe three blocks, that we called The Hill.

And we would just kind of go there just to hang out. And for some reason, the conversation shifted to like, okay, we're about to graduate. Like, it was like, we're no longer going to be like teenagers anymore. So I know I talked about this, want to get married and George talked about college. And all of a sudden he made this statement and says, man, I want to be big. I want to touch the world. Most of us had not seen the world outside of third ward or the Houston

community. So it was just like, oh, wow, okay. He was just a fun person to be around. Like, it was never a dull moment. Never a dull moment. never a dull moment. Me and Big George used to go to school all the time and, you know, get out and listen to music and talk about the music world and how we want to do this and do that

and just, you know, be successful. You know, we was young. We was kids. We was still trying to figure this thing out, you know. You know, it was when you're in your 20s, you're in your 20s, and you're trying to figure it out. You're trying to really see what direction you're going in.

Just waking up and just trying to figure it out. I met Floyd seven or ten years ago while I was trying to plant a church, Resurrection Houston's ministry, in the middle of Third Ward, Houston, Texas, in the CUNY Homes housing project. And say I go to a neighborhood, I can knock on 50 doors. 50 people may come out. Floyd comes out the door, 100 people come out. Everybody knows him. He's connected. Man, just to see his impact was amazing. His road to redemption and then how God used him in this season, in this moment. As soon as he come in the door, he asked you, are you good?

You all right? Always. And he would say, he always said things twice sometimes. Like, he always called me Al Al. And he called Teresa Titi. He just, that's just him. He just, like, every time we cooked him a meal, gave him a plate, he'd come down, rub in his tummy, and he'd go, thank you, thank you, thank you.

You know what I mean? And he always said this. For the whole time that Teresa and me and him lived here together, he always would tell us, I want y'all to know I appreciate you. He always would tell us that. After I learned that this was my friend, just a flood of emotions came about.

I didn't sleep, you know, the next couple of nights just thinking about what happened. And then that's when it became global. And then I'm like, wow. It's literally happening. He's touching the world. He's touching the world. It's like, wow. From the New York Times, I'm Caitlin Dickerson. This is The Daily.

Today. George Floyd's funeral. My colleague, Manny Fernandez, was in Houston. It's Wednesday, June 10th. Hi, guys. Hey, Manny. It's Caitlin. How you doing? I'm okay. How are you and where are you?

I'm in the parking lot of the Fountain of Praise Church in southwest Houston, where George Floyd's funeral was just held. Mm-hmm. And what was today about? And what was today about? So today was about two different things. And you saw this during the service itself. And then I got this sense from talking to people outside. On the one hand, there's a lot of people who wanted to talk about George Floyd as a symbol of a movement and George Floyd's death not being in vain. And yet, on the other hand, a lot of people were trying to say like, hold on, wait,

let's talk about him as a man. And let's kind of talk about the jokes he used to crack and the pranks he used to pull and what he was like, you know, in the projects of Houston where he's from. And so I think that there was that two-sided story that you kind of heard today. Let's remember the man who's become this symbol and let's also just remember the man himself. And this is a familiar dynamic for you, right? I mean, you've covered funerals for other people who've died at the hands of police, and you've seen this dynamic before. Brown's funeral, when people gather around and they say, give us a little bit of space in this social justice movement that's popping up around this person's death. Give us like a few hours in a day to talk about them and their flaws, right? And to sort of talk about them as a full human before their life becomes more myth than reality. And I think that, you know, the people here at the funeral try to sort of, you know, hold on to that space as long as they can before the train has left the station. Mm-hmm. And you heard some of that today, but you've also been reporting for the

last few weeks on George Floyd, who he was. So what have you learned about his life? I spent a lot of time at the place where he's from. And he's from a place called The Bricks. from a place called The Bricks. And The Bricks are a nickname for the CUNY Homes public housing project in Houston. And he grew up in the CUNY Homes in the 80s, in the 90s, and the early 2000s. And it's a hard world. But by all accounts, he's a pretty happy kid. George's mother was sort of a matron of the Cuny homes. She was raising her kids. She was raising George. At the same time, she started raising her own grandchildren for a time. And she started raising some of the neighbor's children. And she fed them. They spent the night at her apartment. And that's who Miss Sissy was. That's who George Floyd's mother was, a mother to a lot of CUNY homes.

So what happens once George moves into high school and then adulthood? So George Floyd goes to high school just down the street from CUNY homes. He goes to Jackie H's high school. He's a big kid. You know, eventually he grows to six foot six and he's kind of immediately becomes a star basketball player and a star football player. He helps take the football team to state championships in 1992. And he is so good that he gets a basketball scholarship to go to college in South Florida. And he goes there and he plays a little bit of basketball. It doesn't work out. He transfers back to Texas. He goes to the Kingsville campus of Texas A&M University.

And he goes there for a couple years. Meanwhile, he's going back and forth to Houston, back and forth to the Third Ward. And as he's doing that, he meets this legendary producer named DJ Screw. Who eventually becomes sort of a legend in Houston rap circle. And there was a time in the early 90s when DJ Screw made a bunch of mixtapes. And DJ Screw is rapping on these tapes,

but he also invites other rappers to come in. And a lot of these rappers are just like kids from the neighborhood. While George Floyd is one of those guys rapping on DJ Screw's mixtapes. And he calls himself Big Floyd. And then meanwhile, he's still in college. He's going to Texas A&M Kingsville. And it doesn't work out. He pulls going to Texas A&M Kingsville. And it doesn't work out. He pulls out of Texas A&M. He never gets his degree. And he goes back to CUNY Homes. And that's when his

life sort of takes another turn. And it's in 1997 that he gets his first run in with law enforcement. that he gets his first run-in with law enforcement. And so, you know, for about a decade of his life, from the age of 23 in 1997 to when he was 34 in 2008, he had a string of arrests in Houston. Some of the arrests were felonies. Some of them were misdemeanors. He was arrested for drugs and for robbery and a few other charges.

His most serious case comes in 2008. He's arrested for his role in a home invasion robbery, according to court documents. And so he pleads guilty to aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon. He's sentenced to five years in state prison. He only serves four years and he's released in 2013. And after he's released from prison, you know, he really starts to turn his life around. He becomes more religious. George Floyd has a daughter who's born around that time after he gets out of prison. And it turns out what we learned at the funeral is that he actually had five children and two grandchildren. And he starts reconnecting with his kids.

He starts speaking out about and against gun violence. And he becomes this, almost this unofficial community leader back in the King Holmes, back in Third Ward. And he has a lot of respect out there. And then eventually he gets plugged into this program that will eventually take him to Minneapolis. We've been criticized for not writing about and publicizing more the details of his criminal history. I think some people have this worldview where if you're an ex-con, then you're an ex-con and that's all you'll ever be in your life.

And the people in the CUNY homes, a lot of them have run-ins with law enforcement, but your life moves on after that, and people change, and so I think it's sort of a balance to try to write about the totality of somebody's life, the good and the bad, and try to do that in a way that honors the memory of a person

whose reason for being in the news has to do with him being a victim of a crime and not the perpetrator of one. So tell me about George Floyd's final years and his final chapter. You know, he has a pretty quiet life in Minneapolis. He's living with roommates. He's working as a security guard at a nightclub. He has a girlfriend. He's still very religious, reading the Bible.

And he has this sort of quiet life. You know, he called it his new chapter in Minneapolis. The people who knew him here in Houston say they thought he was pretty happy out there. We'll be right back. So that's George Floyd, the person. And like you said, there's also George Floyd, the symbol and the beginning of a movement. So how did those two ideas of him play out during his funeral today? Yeah. out during his funeral today. Yeah. So the funeral was at a church in Houston called the Fountain of Praise. And the media wasn't allowed inside. And so I spent most of the day outside talking to people.

Pastor Wright, we want to bring greetings to everyone who is within the sanctuary walls, as well as those who are watching via stream or some platform today. But it was live streamed. In the tradition of the African-American church, this will be a home going celebration. Come on, I want to say it again. This will be a home going celebration of Brother George Floyd tonight. And here you had, you know, a number of elected officials, including many of the African-American political leaders in Houston and in Texas. Let me just speak briefly, say, let me on behalf of the city of Houston.

Mayor Turner of Houston spoke. As I speak right now, the city attorney is drafting an executive order. And said that we will ban chokeholds and strangleholds. He wants to ban chokeholds in the Houston Police Department. And I have a resolution that will be presented to the family. You had Congressman Al Green come up. This resolution is going to say to those who look through the vista of time that at this time there lived one among us who was a child of God, who was taken untimely. But we are going to make sure that those who look through time,

that they will know that he made a difference within his time because he changed not only this country, not only the United States. He changed the world. George Floyd changed the world. And also... Hello, everyone, on this day of prayer, where we try to understand God's plan in our pain. Joe Biden made a video message.

Now is the time for racial justice. That's the answer we must give to our children when they ask why. Because when there is justice for George Floyd, we will truly be on our way to racial justice in America. Floyd, we will truly be on our way to racial justice in America. And they all sort of talked about and told the family that his death would not be in vain. God bless you all. God bless you all. I want to ask the members of the family who are going to come up and speak at this time, if you would please make your way to the stage. And then after the first half of the funeral is sort of taken up by politicians.

Welcome, everyone. I am George Floyd's aunt. I just want to thank everybody and I would like to thank the whole world what it has done for my family today. The family sort of takes over. But I just want to make this statement. The world knows George Floyd. I know Perry Jr. He was a pesky little rascal. But we all loved him. And they sort of physically take over, and they're up there as a group. I just want to say that I'm going to miss my brother a whole lot.

And I just want to say, Jim, I love you. And I thank God for giving me my own personal Superman. God bless you all. And they start talking about their brother and their uncle. Hello, my name is Brooke Williams, George Floyd's niece, and I can breathe. Long as I'm breathing, justice will be served for Perry. First off, I want to thank all of you for coming out to support George Perry Floyd. My uncle was a father, brother, uncle, and a cousin to many. Spiritually grounded, an activist. He always moved people with his words.

You know, and it becomes very powerful to hear them talk in a very intimate way about their relatives. My most favorite memory with my uncle was when he paid me to scratch his head. At the lone days of work, we arrived at home. We even created a song about it called Scratch My Head, Scratch My Head, yeah. But after that, I knew he was a comedian. He always told me, baby girl, you're going to go so far with that beautiful smile and brains of yours. You're going to go so far with that beautiful smile and brains of yours. Well, then fast forward to 1998, I started a college exhibition tour team touring around the country,

going to play different colleges and exhibition games. And Big Floyd, that was my first power forward. I would be calling around trying to get contracts with the different schools, and the coaches would ask me, who's your big man? I would say, George Floyd. They'd say, oh, you say oh you got Big Floyd okay well your team must be pretty good and so then we would go off and play. You know and it was those little those little moments and those little anecdotes that really I think help people get a sense of who George was. Everybody know who Big Floyd is now. Third Ward, CUNY home. As the family spoke. From the CUNY home to Jack Yates High. You know, you really heard. Third Ward and the CUNY homes to come and join me. This sort of

Third Ward pride come up. In Third Ward, CUNY home, Texas. You know, very historic. Black elected officials live there. It's home to the only Black-owned banking institution in Texas. Beyonce is from the Third Ward. It's just a place of a lot of Black pride and a lot of Black history. At the same time, it's also a place of a lot of struggle and a lot of poverty. And there's a real strong sense that George Floyd is from this place that is a hard fought and very proud place. At the direction of Senior Pastor, Pastor Remus Wright. And then. My privilege and my honor today. You have the final eulogy delivered by the Reverend Al Sharpton. Al Sharpton.

And he appears, he's standing there in a black and white preacher's robe. I hear people talk about what happened to George Floyd like there was something less than a crime. This was not just a tragedy. It was a crime. And to me, there was just one moment early on. You know, he's standing up there and then he puts his glasses on and he starts reading from this list.

I give him recognition. I must also recognize several families are here. As if he's going to thank some of the different people. And he starts talking about some of the people who are there. And he says, The mother of Trayvon Martin, will you stand? The mother of Trayvon Martin, will you stand? The mother...

The mother of Eric Garner, will you stand? The mother of Eric Garner, will you stand? And he runs through this long list. It's like a roll call. The sister of Botham Jean will you stand? And people are cheering. The family of Pamela Turner right here in Houston will you stand? They are standing.

The crowd is standing. The father of Michael Brown from Ferguson, Missouri will you stand. Wow. They're all there. Yeah. The father of Ahmaud Arbery, where you stand. And to have all of them there at this funeral, they know the pain of this more than anyone.

You know, and they have the right to be angrier than everyone else. And yet here they are grieving with George Floyd's family. And you realize that George Floyd is part of this family of victims that should not be a family. All of these families came to stand with this family because they know better than anyone else the pain they will suffer from the loss that they have gone through so there was one moment when i think sharpton you know pulled together these two strands of the man and the symbol of George Floyd.

God always uses unlikely people to do his will. And that was a moment when Sharpton was alluding to George Floyd's arrest history. If George Floyd had been an Ivy League school graduate and one of these ones with a long title, we would have been accused of reacting to his prominence. If he'd been a multimillionaire, they would have said that we were reacting to his wealth. If he had been famous athlete as he was on the trajectory to be we would have said we were reacting to his fame but god took an ordinary brother and he was sort of talking about him as an ordinary from the third wall imperfect person from the housing projects from the third ward

projects that nobody thought much about but those that knew him and loved him. He took the rejected stone. And it was a very powerful moment where he called George Floyd a rejected stone, you know, making a reference to scripture. God took the rejected stone and made him the cornerstone of a movement that's going to change the whole wide world. stone of a movement that's going to change the whole wide world. And how those officers may have thought that nobody cared about a guy like that. Oh, if you had any idea that all of us would react, you took your knee off his neck. You know, and obviously the world knows now that the world did care about somebody like that and how he died and how he was treated.

If you had any idea that preachers white and black was going to line up in a pandemic. When we told to stay inside and we come out and march in the streets at the risk of our health, you'd have took your knee off his neck because you thought his neck didn't mean nothing. But God made his neck to connect his head to his body and you have no right to put your knee on that neck. I think in the past, I think there has been this desire to like, you know, to only, you know, pay attention to sort of perfect victims, to only to give attention to, you know, cases in which the person had this sort of, you know, holy life. And any brush with the law, no matter how many years ago, somehow was thought to taint, you know, how people viewed whatever police killing was in the news. And I think that shifted a little bit. And I see the difference in George Floyd.

I see the difference in George Floyd. Your family's going to miss you, George. But your nation is going to always remember your name. And Sharpton ended his remarks by touching on this idea that George Floyd was imperfect. And he still deserves the movement that was happening. So we're going to lay you near your mama now. You called for mama. We're going to lay your body next to hers. But I know mama's already embraced you, George.

You fought a good fight. You kept the faith. You finished your course. Go on and get your rest now go on and see mama now we gonna fight on we gonna fight on we gonna fight on we gonna fight on I want to speak to y'all real quick.

I just want to say, man, that I got my shortcomings and my flaws. I ain't better than nobody else. But, man, the shootings that's going on, man, I don't care. Where hood you from, man? Where you at, man? I love you and God love you, man. Put them guns down, man. That ain't what it is. You know? God bless, man.

And y'all hold y'all head up, man. We got parents out here selling plates, man, trying to bury their kids, man. Think about it, man. Love y'all. We'll be right back. Here's what else you need to know today. On Tuesday morning, President Trump endorsed a conspiracy theory that a 75-year-old man who police were filmed pushing to the ground during a protest in Buffalo last week had been using his cell phone to knock out law enforcement radios on behalf of the Antifa movement.

In a tweet, the president offered no evidence of the theory, but named a right-wing news organization, One America News Network, in his tweet. Did you have a reaction to the president's tweet earlier? I learned a long time ago not to comment on tweets, and I'm not going to break that. But they are official statements. Later in the day, Republican lawmakers and administration officials, including the White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, dodged questions from reporters. The man who was injured in the incident, Martin Gugino, is still recovering in the hospital from a serious head injury.

Meanwhile, a police officer in New York City was arrested and charged with assault on Tuesday after shoving a young woman to the ground, giving her a concussion, another scene that was filmed on a cell phone. And... This is wrong! This is America!

Please, God, help us! I mean it! This is a crisis in our world to make us not exercise our right to vote! Five states held their primary elections on Tuesday, including Georgia, where a new voting system put into place in 2018 after claims of voter suppression experienced catastrophic meltdowns. State-ordered voting machines were said to be missing or malfunctioning, causing voters to wait in line for hours at polling places across the state.

Some gave up and left before casting a vote. The problems were made worse by the coronavirus pandemic, which left fewer poll workers available than usual and added to wait times because machines had to be disinfected. Predominantly Black areas of Georgia experienced some of the worst obstacles to voting, raising concerns that the problems would further disenfranchise Black voters. That's it for The Daily. I'm Caitlin Dickerson. See you tomorrow.