On Friday, while speaking with “Charlamagne tha God” on his show “The Breakfast Club,” former Vice President Joe Biden bashed people of color who are not voting for him, telling them, “you ain’t black.”
Biden said, “If you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump, then you ain’t Black.”
The insensitive comment comes as Biden has a rocky record with civil rights, writing and sponsoring the 1994 crime bill which disproportionately punished black Americans, joined segregationists in supporting racist legislation, and blamed African American parents for inequality.
While campaigning for Barack Obama, Biden claimed Republicans wanted to put black Americans “back in chains.”
Biden’s checkered past with black Americans is not an asset this election, and Biden bashing voters of color from the safety of his Delaware basement will likely not help with getting out the black vote in November.
During Friday’s interview, Biden also said, “The plan I have is my manifesto for black American, and particularly the portion of it that relates to how, in fact, we’re gonna deal with the prison system. If you are in prison, if you are convicted of a crime — No one should be going to jail for drug crime. Period. Nobody. Nobody. No matter what the crime, particularly marijuana which makes no sense for people to go to jail. They should be just wiped out completely, and the reason is that what, if anything, for those crimes that actually continue to be crimes, schedule crimes, as marijuana shouldn’t be anymore, what is happening is you shouldn’t go to prison. You should go to a mandatory rehabilitation. It costs less to put people in a drug rehabilitation program than it does in jail. And you have a chance. You’ve got to give people a chance!”