“We’ve lost an election, but we’ve not lost our minds,” Al Sharpton tells theGrio. The King family also weighed in on what the future looks like in another era of Donald Trump as president.
As Donald Trump takes the oath of office and is sworn in for a second time as president of the United States, the nation is also observing the federal holiday that honors Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s contributions to the nation and the world. The civil rights leader transformed America’s consciousness and was an architect of a movement that dismantled U.S. laws sanctioning racial segregation and oppression.
On MLK Day, civil rights leaders are reflecting on the day’s ironic juxtaposition to the inauguration of Donald Trump, whose leadership and moral character they say contradict that of Dr. King, who was assassinated in 1968.
The Rev. Al Sharpton, who is leading an MLK Day rally at the historic Metropolitan AME Church in Washington, D.C., told theGrio, “We’re going to take an oath to keep Dr. King’s dream alive, with what Donald Trump has represented in terms of his supporting states’ rights, on voting rights, him declaring war on DEI, his bigoted statements.”
The civil rights leader added, “It’s to bury Dr. King’s dream.”
Sharpton said keeping King’s true dream alive, which included social and economic justice for Black Americans, and all Americans, must be fought for “no matter who’s in the White House.” He continued, “We’ve lost an election, but we’ve not lost our minds.”
Dr. King’s son, Martin Luther King III, said of Trump’s inauguration as the 47th president of the United States, “We’ve seen this movie before. The question, I think, is, what do we do to stay engaged?”
King and his wife, Arndrea King, are urging the public to channel their anger and frustration through service in their communities. The Kings’ organization, Drum Major Institute, launched an initiative called “Realize the Dream,” which aims to encourage everyday citizens to engage in 100 million hours of service before Dr. King’s posthumous 100th birthday in 2029.
“We knew that regardless of what way the election went, we needed to be doing something to lift up humanity and lift up society,” said King, who said 100 million hours of service “equates to about $3 billion in value.”
Arndrea King told theGrio she understands why millions of Black Americans – particularly Black women – are feeling hopeless after the major defeat of Vice President Kamala Harris and as Trump and Republicans reclaim power. However, she cautioned: “We don’t have the luxury to sit it out.”
She added, “We can rest for a second. But what we cannot do and what we will not do is give up … I think all of our voices, all of our works, all of our efforts, all of our passions, all of our purpose is needed now more than ever.”
Martin Luther King III said there are lessons to be learned from his father’s leadership, including using “economic divestment when people do not pay attention to the respect and dignity of the community.”
“My dad and his team showed us through the Montgomery Bus Boycott and then through Operation Breadbasket,” he recalled. “When there are corporations that don’t support us, then at some point, we may have to decide whether or not we’re going to continue to support them.”
He added, “Those are the kinds of things that dramatically will create progress.”
Svante Myrick, president of People For the American Way, told theGrio that despite having to watch Trump, a “person who is overwhelmingly aligned against our interests, take the highest office in the land,” it’s “amazing” to see some of the progress that has been made since King’s assassination, including closing education and wealth inequality gaps, “all the way to electing a Black president.”
Myrick also noted, “We have two Black women in the U.S. Senate for the first time ever.”
He added, “It’s a pretty good metaphor for the complexity of life in America” for Black Americans.
Arndrea King lamented that her and MLK III’s daughter, Yolanda King – who is Dr. King’s only granddaughter – now has “fewer rights” than generations before her, given the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, which has upended reproductive care for millions of women, as well as the stripping of voting rights protections.
“Dr. King said, ‘I can’t legislate a man’s heart, but I can keep him from lynching me.’ So you can be rest assured that we will be on the front lines always pushing for legislation to lift us all up and speaking out against legislation that limits us,” said Arndrea King.
Myrick remembers that following the emancipation of enslaved Black Americans and the passage of civil rights laws came the rise of Jim Crow and the Ku Klux Klan, which terrorized and lynched Black communities.
“Dr. King, of course, was apt when he said, ‘The moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends toward justice,’” said the civil rights leader. “It takes lifetimes, but over the course of that time, we keep winning and they keep losing.”
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