Al Sharpton Threatens Companies Ending DEI with Boycotts: ‘Donald Trump Cannot Make Us Spend Money’
Al Sharpton promised a boycott of companies moving away from DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) policies, which has included Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta and Jeff Bezos’s Amazon.
Sharpton first announced the coming boycott while giving a speech for Martin Luther King Jr. Day at the Metropolitan AME Church in Washington DC. He told MSNBC’s Joy Reid later that day that his National Action Network would pick “two or three companies” to focus their boycott efforts on. Companies have been announcing an end to DEI policies since the election of President Donald Trump.
Sharpton said:
I saw Dr. King twice as a kid, but I joined the movement when I was 12 in the north. And what made Dr. King a national figure is what we picked up today at Metropolitan AME, a church that had the funeral of Frederick Douglass and where the body of Rosa Parks was brought. Dr. King called an economic boycott as Martin III just talked about, and hit them in the pocketbook. And what we said today is that these companies that are now saying they’re going to back up off of diversity and equity and inclusion, should therefore not have a diverse consumer base. You don’t want diversity, then we should not buy your products, and we’re going to name what we’re going to take 90 days, work with other groups and come up with two or three companies that we’re going to make the example of Dr. King… Donald Trump can’t make us spend money for companies that will not deal and commit and continue with diversity and equity and inclusion.
Sharpton also blasted Trump for his sweeping pardons of Jan. 6 Capitol rioters on not only his inauguration day, but MLK Day, saying pardoning “hoodlums” and “thugs” was a direct swipe at King’s legacy.
“His answer to Dr. King is, I’m going to let hoodlums, thugs who not only did violence but did it in the capital and pardon them,” he said. “How do you pardon them without saying you’re pardoning Dr. King’s meaning.”
Watch above via MSNBC.
