Los Angeles City Council President Nury Martinez resigned from her
position Monday after she and two other councilmembers were recorded making racist remarks.
Nury Martinez has resigned from her position as president, but so far she has not resigned from the Los Angeles city council.
Driving the news: In
a statement announcing her resignation, Martinez asked for forgiveness
"from my colleagues and from the residents of this city that I love so
much."
- "In the end, it is not my apologies that matter
most; it will be the actions I take from this day forward. I hope that
you will give me the opportunity to make amends. Therefore, effective
immediately I am resigning as President of the Los Angeles City
Council," the statement continued.
- The California and Los Angeles branches of the NAACP demanded late Sunday that Martinez and the others resign after the Los Angeles Times reported she called a Black child a monkey.
- The
NAACP chapters also called on Councilmembers Gil Cedillo, Kevin de León
and Los Angeles County Federation of Labor President Ron Herrera to
step down for participating in a discussion with anti-Black and
anti-Indigenous comments.
Details: Martinez
referred to a white councilmember's child, who is Black, as "ese
changuito," or that little monkey, during a Martin Luther King Jr. Day
parade, according to the leaked audio of a nearly year-old conversation.
- Martinez
also reportedly said that the councilor, Mike Bonin, handled his son as
though he were an "accessory." She also referred to Bonin as a "little
b---h."
- Herrera suggested that Bonin puts his young son out in public like a lawn jockey, the racist statues used to invoke the antebellum South.
Martinez also is heard making fun of Indigenous people from the Mexican state of Oaxaca, who have migrated to Los Angeles.
- She referred to them as "short little dark people" and called them "ugly."
What they're saying: "This
kind of overt racism has no place in political discourse," Rick L.
Callender, president of the CA/HI State Conference of the NAACP, said in
a statement.
- "We clearly know where your heart and mind are, and both of them are corroded with the rust of racism and hate."
Meanwhile, Los Angles Oaxacan chef, restaurateur, and Gold Award recipient Bricia Lopez joined in calls for resignations on social media.
- The words out of (Nury Martinez's) mouth cut deep in the Oaxaca
community of LA. I've dealt w my fair share of racism. But it's ten
times worse when it comes from a brown and woman. Girl, you gotta
resign," she tweeted.
Zoom out: The
secretly recorded conversation revolved around the councilors'
frustration that the growing Latino population wasn't resulting in more
Latino council districts and concerns Black leaders were keeping some
Black-majority ones.
- Martinez, De León, and Herrera have
issued statements of apology for their roles in the conversation.
Cedillo told the Los Angeles Times he had no memory of the discussion.
Of note: Protesters
demonstrated outside of Martinez's home and played portions of the
audio recording on Sunday. Los Angeles police were later seen in a
video shared on social media attempting to move the crowd away from her
house.
- Further protests were organized for Monday, with images shared to social media showing demonstrations outside the home of de León.
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