Rep. Al Green simply gave a masterclass on the way to deal with a Black man who exhibits as much as a congressional listening to carrying Blackface. The Black on Blackface crime occurred because the Department of Housing and Urban Development Secretary Scott Turner testified earlier than the House Financial Services Committee.
“Do you imagine that racism exists in housing?” Green requested Turner to begin his questioning.
It wasn’t a shouting match, it wasn’t theatrics, and it wasn’t disrespectful. It was accountability. And the rationale it felt so devastating is that it was Black on Black crime in essentially the most uncomfortable sense of the phrase — not violence, however publicity.
Al Green didn’t elevate his voice. He didn’t posture. He didn’t insult Turner’s background or query his intelligence. He did one thing way more deadly in Washington: he reminded a Black man in energy who he was speculated to be serving — and who he was really serving as a substitute.
That’s the half individuals don’t like to speak about.
“Do you imagine that racism exists in housing?”
This is a snowball query for any self-respecting one that is unafraid to confess the plain. In 2024, there were some 32,000 complaints based on race, nationality, or disability discrimination, the very best quantity in over twenty years. Homes in majority-Black neighborhoods continue to be appraised and undervalued in comparison with properties in majority-white neighborhoods. Even when credit score scores, revenue, and years on the job show to be the identical as their white counterparts, Black and Latino people continue to face higher denial rates for mortgages.
But Scott Turner is an agent for white supremacy. He’s a Black face that spouts white nationalistic principalities and statistics. He’s a Black man who doesn’t appear to care about Black individuals and couldn’t even reply, when questioned by Green, whether or not or not racism exists in housing.
Hell, you realize who may’ve answered this simply? President Donald Trump. He and his father, Fred Trump, and their Trump Management Inc. have been sued by the Department of Justice for refusing to rent Trump-owned apartments to Blacks.
So it’s vital to grasp that what Green was asking Turner, Black man to Black man in Blackface, wasn’t whether or not the top of HUD, an company whose very mission is tied as to if Black individuals stay in secure properties or are pushed additional into precarity, believed racism affected housing, it was whether or not he was courageous sufficient to confess it.
Let me spoil it for you: He wasn’t.
What Green was actually asking Turner to confess was an acknowledgement of all of the systemic methods wherein white supremacy has sought to forestall Black housing. To admit that redlining boxed our grandparents into neighborhoods the federal government deemed as unworthy of funding. Or to on the very least acknowledge the restrictive covenants that made it unlawful for Black households to purchase properties in sure areas?
Green wasn’t in search of Turner to quote case regulation; he simply wished the top of HUD to inform the reality. Every coverage selection HUD makes reverberates by way of Black communities first and hardest. Al Green is aware of that. Scott Turner is aware of that, too — or at the least he ought to.
Which is why Green’s dismantling of Turner landed the best way it did.
This was a beatdown, however not within the typical sense. Green didn’t elevate his voice or berate the top of HUD. He merely addressed a cupboard official and mentioned, You are failing the individuals who appear like you, and you’re doing it politely, in a swimsuit, with bipartisan language. And that type of failure cuts deeper than overt racism as a result of it comes wrapped in familiarity.
Because white supremacy doesn’t survive with out Black faces prepared to do its bidding. It’s not simply wanted, it’s anticipated. It’s telling that in Trump’s first presidency, Dr. Ben Carson, a world-renowned mind surgeon, was tasked with main HUD, an space wherein he had no experience. And now Turner. Two Black males who don’t join or resonate with Black individuals. When hurt is delivered by somebody who shares your historical past, your tradition, your ancestors’ struggles, it hits completely different.
That’s what made this second “Black on Black crime” within the truest sense: Green uncovered Turner as a prepared participant in insurance policies that preserve inequality whereas insulating himself with illustration. What Green was asking him was if he was prepared to take care of his individuals or his job (upholding white supremacy), and Turner couldn’t even convey himself to reply the query. Because Turner’s job isn’t to disrupt the system, it’s to ask the system if he can heat its mattress.
That’s why the second felt so heavy. Because Green wasn’t in search of data — he was demanding recognition. He was asking Turner to face in reality, even when it made the room uncomfortable. Especially if it made the room uncomfortable.
In Black areas, that type of query isn’t rhetorical. It’s a take a look at of alignment. A check-in. A quiet however piercing the place are you actually at?
And Scott Turner’s reply advised Al Green (and the remainder of us) every part he wanted to know.
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