While the “Saturday Night Live” Season 46 premiere lampooned the recent chaotic presidential debate, Covid super-spreading events, and honored the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the show’s political statements were largely flaccid. That was until musical guest Megan Thee Stallion took the stage: The rapper used her first performance of the night to demand we “Protect Black Women” and delivered a powerful indictment against Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron’s handling of Breonna Taylor’s death at the hands of Louisville police.
During her performance of her number-one hit “Savage,” Megan and her dancers paused while an edited version of a 1962 speech by Malcolm X played: “The most disrespected, unprotected, neglected person in America is the Black woman.”
The interlude continued with more recordings of Malcom X and activist Tamika Mallory. Megan used a segment from recent comments made by Mallory, an organizer of the 2017 Women’s March, about Cameron, who is Black: “Daniel Cameron is no different than the sellout negroes that sold our people into slavery.”
Then Megan began speaking:
“We need to protect our Black women and love our Black women. Because at the end of the day, we need our Black women. We need to protect our Black men and stand up for our Black men, because at the end of the day, we’re tired of seeing hashtags about Black men.”
Cameron has faced uproar over his handling of Taylor’s case. Taylor, 26, was shot and killed by Louisville, Kentucky police in March during a raid at her apartment. After months of calls for justice by activists, a grand jury last month indicted one of the officers involved in her death, but declined to issue charges against the officer whose shot killed Taylor.
Attorney Ben Crump and Taylor’s family members spoke out against the decision at a September 25 press conference. Crump questioned Cameron’s commitment to justice. “Did he present any evidence on Breonna Taylor’s behalf? Or did he make a unilateral decision to put his thumb on the scales of justice to help try to exonerate and justify the killing of Breonna Taylor by these police officers? And in doing so, make sure that Breonna Taylor’s family never got their day in court,” Crump said at the conference, according to NBC News.
As Variety reported, Megan recently faced gun violence herself, allegedly at the hands of rapper Tory Lanez.
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