graduation event—all that sort of coincided. So I saw it in the morning and I had to go and have a whole celebration later that afternoon.

JUSTIN WILLIAMS, 37

BALTIMORE

I was working from home and I was sitting in my home office till late that night trying to think through what was happening. I was seeing reactions to the video, and as someone who is policy-minded and used to dealing with politicians, I think—and I’ll say it publicly—I’m worried about the reelection of President Trump. I mean, as a Black land-use attorney I know that Baltimore’s problems can be traced to both parties, but President Trump called Baltimore a “disgusting, rat-and-rodent-infested mess.” And so I was trying to think about how—I mean, obviously, I felt terrible about what happened and was thinking through, Can people on the outside who have some platform, can we shift the debate a bit? Can we help shift debate in a way that will help improve things locally on specific issues, but also more broadly, and at the same time make sure that Donald Trump doesn’t get reelected?

JAMES GABRIEL, 35 BROOKLYN, NEW YORK

The video, which I have not seen, is almost nine minutes long. I forget how long the Rodney King video is, I think it’s shorter, but it’s still quite long and there’s no escape. Whereas we’ve seen other videos where it’s 45 seconds. And so I think that there was a length and inescapability. You know, if you had seen that at work, you might not have watched the whole thing if your boss was coming around to pick up your latest assignment.

EMILY WOLFENBARGER, 38

KNOXVILLE, TENNESSEE

I’ve never watched the video. Which I feel like is privileged, to not have had to see that, but I began seeing images from it. I was working from home on my laptop like I do every day. And for some reason, that moment was

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