She shows how Richard Nixon’s promise to bring law and order to the country focused on imprisoning many members of the black community as “crime came to stand in for race”, and DuVernay coldly but emphatically attacks Ronald Reagan’s “War on Drugs” as well as noting how Bill Clinton’s militarization of the police and introduction of mandatory minimums only exacerbated the problem.
DuVernay is un-wielding in her attacks on how they have failed generations.
Yet, even after the Civil Rights Act was signed into law in 1964 and outlawed discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin, the political system, as well as the media, were able to slyly alter their rhetoric that still enforced racial barriers across the USA.