WASHINGTON (AP) — Presidents typically say a few words before they turn legislation into law. But Joe Biden flipped the script Tuesday when it came time to put his signature on the Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act.
Highlights
- Biden signs the Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act in the White House Rose Garden.
- Biden said it’s “a little unusual to do the bill signing, not say anything and then speak” Biden: “Racial hate isn’t an old problem — it’s a persistent problem.
- It only hides,” he said.
- The law makes it possible to prosecute a crime as a lynching when a conspiracy to commit a hate crime leads to death or serious bodily injury.
- It lays out a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison and fines.
- The bill is named for the Black teenager whose killing in Mississippi in the summer of 1955 became a galvanizing moment in the civil rights era.