All Rev'd Up: White Nationalists Are 'Part Of Our Police Force'

In this Oct. 15, 2019, photo, Yashunn Hale responds to questions during an interview as he stands across the street from the home of Atatiana Jefferson in Fort Worth, Texas. Hale isn't sure he would call the police to report a crime. Not since an officer killed Jefferson, Hale's neighbor in her home.

Hannah Uebele is a producer for Under the Radar with Callie Crossley and previously worked as associate producer for Boston Public Radio. She graduated from Tufts University with a B.S. in English and Environmental Studies. She's a proud Delawarean but has found herself saying "wicked" more and more often, so the Bostonian metamorphosis is well underway.Contact: hannah_uebele@wgbh.org

October 21, 2019

Updated August 07, 2023

Atatiana Jefferson was babysitting her nephew in her own home when she was fatally shot by a Fort Worth, Texas police officer earlier this month. Reverends Irene Monroe and Emmett G. Price III joined Boston Public Radio on Monday to talk about this and police violence against black people as a whole.

"There's no refuge [for black people], whether it's the church, whether it is your home, whether it is your friend's house," Monroe said.

"The world is frightening right now, society is frightening and our nation is increasingly frightening when we look at the reality of the anxiety of being black regardless of one's gender orientation or identity," Price said. "Just being black is a threat to a non-black population, in the sense that you have government officials who can bombard into your home and kill you."

Monroe said she thinks that a domestic terrorist bill needs to be passed and that the police force needs to weed out anyone with white nationalist ideologies.

"It's nothing new, back in the day, and today, to have white nationalists as part of our police force," she said. "We have to weed out white nationalists who feel that now there is a race war and the best way to monitor, if not kill, black folks with impunity is to join the police force."

Monroe is a syndicated religion columnist and the Boston voice for Detour’s African American Heritage Trail and a Visiting Researcher in the Religion and Conflict Transformation Program at Boston University School of Theology.

Price is Professor of Worship, Church & Culture and Founding Executive Director of the Institute for the Study of the Black Christian Experience at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary.

Together they host the All Rev’d Up podcast, produced by WGBH.