Vice President Kamala Harris, who Democrat leaders are backing to replace President Joe Biden in the 2024 presidential race, is reportedly a “dues-paying member” to a church where the pastor has called for reparations, even serving as a vice chair of California’s reparations task force.
Rev. Amos Brown is the pastor of Third Baptist Church of San Francisco and recently bragged to Religion News Service about Harris’s connection to the church, even describing her as a “dues-paying member.” Americans should not just take his word for it, either, as Harris has referred to Amos as “my pastor,” even describing him as someone she has turned to over the years. She heaped praise on Brown and his “wisdom” and guidance during her remarks at the 2022 Annual Session of the National Baptist Convention, USA. At the time, she said he has been there for her for roughly two decades. Further, Harris reportedly worked as Brown’s campaign manager when he sought reelection to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1999.
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According to Religion News Service, Harris reached out to Brown once again after Biden formally bowed out of the race and tapped her to take his place in the presidential race against former President Donald Trump. The outlet said Brown even recited lyrics from the “Black national anthem.”
Brown himself has a history of controversial positions, as he actually served as vice chair of California’s Reparations Task Force. His bio for that capacity reads:
Amos C. Brown, Th.D., 80, of San Francisco, is a renowned civil rights leader who studied under Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He was later arrested with King at a lunch counter sit-in in 1961 and joined the Freedom Riders who protested segregation in the South. Brown was awarded the Martin Luther King, Jr. Ministerial Award for outstanding leadership and contributions to the Black Church in America and was also inducted into the International Hall of Fame at the King International Chapel at Morehouse College. Brown has been a Pastor at the Third Baptist Church of San Francisco since 1976. He was a Pastor at Pilgrim Baptist Church from 1970 to 1976 and at Saint Paul’s Baptist Church from 1966 to 1970. Brown is President of the San Francisco Branch and a Member of the Board of Directors of the NAACP. He earned a Doctor of Theology degree from United Theological Seminary and a Master of Theology degree from Crozer Theological Seminary. Dr. Brown was appointed to the Reparations Task Force by Governor Gavin Newsom.
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It should come to no surprise, then, that Brown’s church also served as the place of meeting for California’s Task Force to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African Americans. That final report, which was tasked with looking at what it described as the “ongoing and compounding harms experienced by African Americans as a result of slavery and its lingering effects on American society today,” concluded that “160 years after the abolition of slavery, its badges and lingering negative effects of the incidents remain embedded in the political, legal, health, institution of slavery on descendants financial, educational, cultural, environmental, social, and of persons enslaved in the United economic systems of the United States of America.”
“This system of white supremacy is a badge of slavery and continues to be embedded today in numerous American and Californian legal and social systems,” an executive summary of the report reads, ultimately urging the legislature to formulate a “state reparations statute or program.”
Brown seems to support these sentiments, telling Religion News Service that the black community must “respond” to the harm committed by the country “and not react but respond in a responsible, rational, realistic way that will give us results to bring black folks from the bottom of the well economically, academically, healthwise.”
That aside, Brown is support Harris’s presidential endeavors, telling the outlet, “That’s what this nation needs.”
“That’s what this vice president and, hopefully, president, will be elevated to be: To bring this nation out of darkness,” he claimed. “The darkness of incivility. The darkness of lying. The darkness of injustice. The darkness of irresponsible behavior — and that goes at all levels, from the local community up to the national government.”
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That should come to no surprise, given that he was one of 350 faith leaders who endorsed Biden and Harris in the last election cycle.
The influence of Harris’s pastor can be seen in her political life as well, as she went full throttle on reparations demands in 2019 during her time as senator and launching her presidential bid, stating that she would support “some type” of reparations.
“So you are for some type of reparations?” Breakfast Club host Charlamagne tha God asked her during a 2019 interview.
“Yes I am, yes I am,” Harris responded.
That same month, Harris said reparations were needed to help black people heal from “trauma” caused by America’s “dark history.”
In another interview later that year, Harris said it is a complicated situation, adding that she does not believe that writing a check is gonna be enough.”
“I really don’t… And the worst thing that I think could happen is that checks get written and then everybody says ‘ok, stop talking about this now’ without addressing the systemic inequities that are deep and require investment,” she added.
It should be noted that California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) and legislators recently struck a budget deal in June that included $12 million for reparations.
