Joy Reid Compares Kyle Rittenhouse Trial to ‘Those Cases in the 1950s’ Where White Males Were Acquitted

MSNBC anchor Joy Reid on Tuesday compared the Kyle Rittenhouse trial to Jim Crow-era cases.

Rittenhouse was 17 years old when he shot three men, killing two, during riots in Kenosha, Wisconsin, last year after the police shooting of Jacob Blake, a Black man.

Rittenhouse is facing multiple charges related to the shootings. Rittenhouse’s attorneys have argued that Rittenhouse was acting in self-defense, while the prosecution has claimed otherwise. As of Tuesday morning, the jury has been deliberating the charges.

On The ReidOut, teeing up NBC and MSNBC legal contributor Katie Phang, Reid said, “It’s stunning, Katie, this feels like those cases in the 1950s where it was in and out, in and out, you know, somebody white male killed someone and they were in and out fast and acquitted. That’s how it feels to me.”

Phang concurred:

Yes. And I feel like people are going to be intellectually dishonest if you’re to say that it would be the same result if it was a young black male carrying an AR-15 on the streets in the middle of what is happening. You’re being dishonest intellectually, socially, in every single way, if you were to say it would be the same outcome, he would have been dead if it was a young black male holding the AR-15.

So, when you have a situation where — apparently, by all accounts, this is how the judge acts by the way. This is — from what attorneys have said, this is how he is, this is how he acts. But I don’t think that’s an answer. He’s the longest serving judge in this circuit. He’s 75. Maybe it’s time that there is another judge. But, fundamentally, you don’t want to ever see the deck stacked against you either way, prosecution or defense. It’s supposed to be justice is blind and I don’t see that happening in this case right now.