Chicago peace activist Tio Hardiman told Fox News’ “The Story with Martha MacCallum” that he would like to meet with Black Lives Matter officials to find ways to “stop the tide” of violence afflicting Black inner-city communities.
Hardiman, executive director for the group Violence Interrupters, made news this week for an impassioned speech after a particularly deadly weekend crime in Chicago during which he implored Black men to “shut down the Black community until we get it right.”
Fox News anchor Martha MacCallum asked Hardiman to react to Black Lives Matter of Greater New York chairman Hawk Newsome’s promise to “burn down this system and replace it” if his group’s demands are not met.
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“First and foremost, I would like to meet with the president of Back Lives Matter in the United States, but mainly, my reaction would be that we need to really do a lot of work in our own backyard right now in order to stop the tide of violence that is taking so many lives here in Chicago, Baltimore and Philadelphia,” said Hardiman.
The Chicago peace activist acknowledged what the group is trying to do regarding police brutality, but he said he would also like to see the group help “stop the gun violence in Chicago.”
“The entire nation should be outraged when a 3-year-old is executed on the streets of Chicago and a 13-year-old young girl was killed on the West Side of Chicago as well,” he said. “And two young women were executed on the South Side of Chicago last week. Because it makes no sense to me if we can stand up against the system, but we will not stand up in our own neighborhood, it makes no sense to me, Martha.” (RELATED: Larry Elder Rips Black Lives Matter: ‘All About Transferring Property From White People To Black People’)
Hardiman offered to meet with the group in order to “organize and unify together and pretty much stop the killings in our neighborhoods.”