 Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., on NBC’s ‘Meet the Press’ |
In a private session videotaped yesterday on Capitol Hill, Rep. Barney Frank, D, Mass., accused the Bush administration of “ethnic cleansing by inaction” against poor blacks in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Frank, the new chairman of the House Committee on Financial Services, said that after the administration’s initial “incompetence,” it has done “virtually nothing to alleviate” the loss of housing by the poor in New Orleans, who mostly are black.
“What I believe is, at this point, you’re not talking about incompetence, you’re talking about values … when in a calculated way you refuse to do anything for well over a year after the disaster,” Frank said.
“The policy, I think, is ethnic cleansing by inaction. …”
Steve Adamske, a spokesman for Frank, clarified the congressman’s remarks for WND.
“He’s saying it’s by government inaction; he’s not accusing them of genocide or mass murder,” Adamske explained. “He’s talking about doing nothing – that it amounts to ethnic cleansing by inaction.”
But Frank, Adamske acknowledged, called the alleged Republican inaction a “policy” and “calculated.” He affirmed the congressman, who was speaking to a group of “liberal bloggers,” would say the inaction is intentional.
Frank said, according to an amateur video clip posted on YouTube, “What they recognize is they’re in this happy position for them, where if the federal government does nothing, Louisiana will become whiter and richer. … So by simply not doing anything to alleviate this … crisis that was so greatly exaggerated by Katrina, they let the hurricane do the ethnic cleansing, and their hands are clean. …”
It wasn’t the first time Frank has made the ethnic-cleansing charge, but the YouTube posting is drawing attention on the Internet today.
“It’s great that we have fighters in there willing to do what’s necessary,” said supportive blogger Matt Stoller, who posted the clip of Frank’s remarks on the popular video site.
Last February, Frank spoke to a group of some 400 Katrina survivors who came to the nation’s capital for two days of rallies, protests and meetings with lawmakers about the rebuilding of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, the Washington Post reported.
The paper said the crowd “thundered” when Frank called the lack of progress in rebuilding less-affluent neighborhoods “a policy of ethnic cleansing by inaction.”
NBC News Producer Mike Viqueira also noted the February quote on his newssite’s blog, saying the “room was rockin'” as Frank, Pelosi, Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., and others “drew shouts and standing ovations as they enumerated the alleged sins of the government on such issues as trailers, insurance, hotel accommodations, etc.”
The Post in February said a panel of Democratic members of Congress planned “to hold the administration accountable for the treatment of the region since Katrina and then Rita hit.”
Adamske told WND a series of hearings has been held within Frank’s committee this past year “to address the serious housing problem.”
But when asked for the result, he said, “No specific plan has been determined yet.”
The White House has not responded yet to WND’s request for comment.
The federal government has approved $88 billion for Katrina relief.
 HUD Secretary Alphonso Jackson acknowledges public housing resident Donna Davis at a grand opening of new homes in New Orleans, August 21, 2006. HUD said Jackson also used the opportunity to announce the agency’s overall efforts to bring New Orleans public housing families back home. |
In an interview with BET.com, the Black Entertainment Network’s website, Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Alphonso Jackson, who is black, addressed charges of racism related to the government’s response to Katrina.
Jackson said his agency has helped Katrina evacuees move out of shelters and hotels, but very few are being placed in the New Orleans area.
He said his agency has addressed specific accusations of housing discrimination toward blacks but insists the problem is not widespread.
The difficulties his agency faces in New Orleans, he said, are unusual, because the flood waters moved homes off their foundations.
“So our first task is examination; is it safe to move the homes; and second is it safe to rebuild,” he said. “We might not want to rebuild the way we did before.”
Jackson argued conditions in New Orleans’ Lower Eighth and Ninth Wards were “not livable” before the flood.
“It disturbs me tremendously when people want to say racism played a part in this,” he said. “As I reminded the Reverend Jesse Jackson and (NAACP President) Bruce Gordon, for 31 years we’ve had a black mayor in New Orleans; for 25 years we’ve had a predominately black city council in New Orleans, and the quality of life did not change for black people living in the Lower Eighth and Lower Ninth.”
In fact, Jackson asserted, “the quality of life had only gotten worse until the flood came in. … My contention is it wasn’t race, it was inefficiency and non-compassion.”
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