Who is Keith Ellison? Minnesota AG felt 'a little bad' for Derek Chauvin after conviction in George Floyd case
The recent conviction of Derek Chauvin, a former police officer, in the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis in May last year, was met with a general jubilation but Keith Ellison, the attorney general of Minnesota and the lead prosecutor in the trial, is not too ecstatic with the outcome. He said on a current affairs show recently that he felt “little bad for the defendant” after the verdict came out even though he was satisfied with the ruling.
Ellison spoke to ‘60 Minutes’ show on CBS News where host Scott Pelley wanted to know his initial reaction after hearing the word “guilty”. In his response, the former said: “Gratitude-- humility-- followed by a certain sense of, I’ll say satisfaction. It’s what we were aiming for the whole time. I spent 16 years as a criminal defense lawyer. So, I will admit, I felt a little bad for the defendant. I think he deserved to be convicted. But he’s a human being.”
When Pelley said he had not expected to hear a compassionate tone from Ellison for Chauvin, the attorney general said: “I’m not in any way wavering from my responsibility. But I hope we never forget that people who are defendants in our criminal justice system, that they're human beings. They're people. I mean, George Floyd was a human being. And so I'm not going to ever forget that everybody in this process is a person.”
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Chauvin, 45, was fired from the Minneapolis Police Department a day after he was found pressing his knee on Floyd’s neck for nine minutes, leaving him gasping for breath and eventually dead. He was arrested a few days later and this month, he was found guilty of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter after a three-week trial. Chauvin faces a maximum prison term of 40 years and the sentence will be announced on June 16. When he was asked about the sentencing, Ellison said he wanted the court to “not go light or heavy”. “I don't know if it’s right for a judge to send a message through a sentence because the sentence should be tailored to the offense, tailored to the circumstances of the case,” he added.
Keith Ellison, a seasoned Minnesota politician
Ellison, who refuses to acknowledge that Chauvin’s act constituted a hate crime, is an experienced politician. The 57-year-old, who is serving as the 30th attorney-general of the North Star State. Ellison, a member of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party, also served as the deputy chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) between 2017 and 2018. He has also been a member of the House of Representatives from Minnesota between 2007 and 2019 before Ilhan Omar succeeded him. He also served in the Minnesota House of Representatives for four years between 2003 and 2007. He was the first Muslim member of the House and the first African-American representative from Minnesota. He became the attorney general in 2019 after winning the election the previous year despite facing accusations of abusing a former girlfriend.
Past association with Nation of Islam
Ellison’s profile caught the headlines after he joined the race to become the chair of the DNC in November 2016. He got support from the progressive groups and Senators Bernie Sanders and Chuck Schumer. His past association with the Nation of Islam and his defense of its anti-Semitic leader Louis Farrakhan earned him criticism from the moderate Democrats. He lost the race to Tom Perez but the latter appointed him as the deputy chair.
Born in Detroit to Leonard Ellison and Clida Ellison, Keith is the third of five children. His family has a history of involvement in the civil rights movement with his grandfather working as a member of the NAACP in Louisiana. He graduated from the University of Detroit Jesuit High School and Academy in 1981. He converted from Catholicism to Islam at the age of 19 and said he couldn’t claim that he was the “most observant Catholic”. He said when he looked at what might inform social change and justice in society, he found Islam. Ellison attended the University of Minnesota Law School in Minneapolis and graduated with a Juris Doctor in 1990.
In 1987, he married Kim and had four children with her. The duo got divorced in 2012. The man has made a mark in Minnesota’s political circles with his organizational skills, bold progressive politics and outspoken opposition to the previous Donald Trump administration.
On May 31 last year, days after the murder of Floyd, Ellison accepted Minnesota Governor Tim Walz’s request to become the special prosecutor in the case.