Jessica Williams films McKinney 'Daily Show' segment in bikini, body armor
Texas race relations skewered after officer pulls gun on unarmed teens at pool party
Jessica Williams skewered race relations in McKinney, Texas, on "The Daily Show" Monday, three days after a white police officer called to a disturbance at a pool party was seen throwing a bikini-clad girl to the ground and pulling his gun on two others.
Williams — aka "Senior Texas Aquatics Correspondent" — reported "live" from McKinney wearing a bikini over full body armor.
“This week’s incident has taught black people here something valuable,” Williams told host Jon Stewart. “When you go to a pool party, even in your own neighborhood that you live in, you have to know pool etiquette, which is no running, no splashing, no talking back, and, if at all possible, get your ass even further to the ground than it already is.”
When Stewart suggested that pool parties should be fun and involve "super soakers," Williams was shocked.
"A water gun at a Texas pool party? Are you trying to get me killed?" she said.
"It's Texas — people are always waving guns around," Stewart replied.
"Uh, no," she said. "White people are and they call it 'open carry.' For black people it's called 'He's got a gun! He's got a gun! He's got a gun!'"
The officer involved in Friday's melee, 41-year-old Eric Casebolt, was placed on administrative leave. Dajerria Becton, the teenage girl he pushed to the ground, said she had been an invited guest at the party and was obeying his orders to leave when he grabbed her.
"He grabbed me, twisted my arm on my back and shoved me in the grass and started pulling the back of my braids," Becton told KDFW-TV. "I was telling him to get off me because my back was hurting bad."
She was ultimately released to her parents, police said, and there were no reports of injuries.
Video of the incident sparked outrage on social media, drawing comparisons to recent high-profile cases of police bias in Ferguson, Mo., and Baltimore. But Williams said it actually represents progress.
"It’s progress because a cop pulled a gun on a group of black kids, and nobody is dead.”
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