NEWS REPORT: Video taken Monday
night at 38th and Chicago
in Minneapolis,
the man in the video has been
identified as George Floyd.
You can see Floyd struggling
and begging for help as
an officer kneels on his neck.
NEKIMA LEVY ARMSTRONG: When I
saw the video,
I was horrified.
I had tears
streaming down my face.
I just I couldn’t believe
that I had witnessed a man
essentially being lynched
in broad daylight.
It caused a lot of trauma,
but it also instilled a resolve
in people
to do what was in their power
to stand up and fight back.
TOMME BEEVAS: If not now, when?
If not us, who?
If not here, then where?
NEKIMA: Tommy Beevas
is an eternal optimist.
What I saw from Tommy
in the midst of everything
that was unfolding here
in the twin cities,
was a sense of steadiness
in terms
of identifying his mission
and actually going deeper
in his calling.
TOMME: After the lynching
of George Floyd the food desert
reared its ugly head.
Supermarkets were already
stressed due to COVID
and then the few remaining
were closed
as a result of the uprisings.
In the food capital of the
world, there was no food.
Pimento Relief Services was born
out of the need
and requests of the community.
We turned our restaurant
into a community food shelf.
Within 24 to 48 hours,
we were completely overwhelmed
with the generosity
of our neighbors.
To whereby we replaced
our rums behind us,
and it was stacked with diapers
and baby formula.
We recognized that if we boarded
up Pimento Jamaican Kitchen,
we'd have sent a signal
to our village that
we are afraid of our people.
We're afraid of our community.
And so, we decided that we were
never going to board up,
and if they decided to burn it,
it was theirs to burn anyhow.
Because this is theirs.
This is ours.
Pimento Jamaican Kitchen
belongs to us.
NEKIMA: I see Tommy
as a tremendous bridge-builder
in terms of uniting people,
helping people to see various
sides of an issue,
and trying to figure out
how to get access to resources
to community members
who were in need.
TOMME: Here at Pimento,
we're using our jerk chicken
as an instrument of liberation.
We brought together
150 of the top leaders
ranging from the Mayor
to Nekima Levy Armstrong
to help figure out
how do we best move forward?
NEKIMA: It was a challenge
for me as an activist
to be in the room
with elected officials
because I was so disappointed at
their sustained lack of action.
But Tommy somehow was able
to look past those concerns
and to bring all of those
different stakeholders
together in one room.
JACOB FREY: He’s made it
very clear
that the mission is not
just to serve delicious food.
But it’s also to provide a space
for people
to kind of challenge one another
in a thoughtful and honest form.
You kind of need to lean
into an area where you are
a little bit uncomfortable
to truly see change.
He was the right person
at the right time
to help us all out.
TOMME: Why do any of this?
Why not just sell jerk chicken?
Well because first of all,
I'm a black man in America.
But more importantly,
I know that humanity
can be way better than this.
And I'm excited to be able to be
a part of something
so much larger than self
to figure out what do we need
to do to reimagine ways
in which humanity can make
the next generation proud.