Daunte Wright’s Funeral Was Filled With Calls to End Police Brutality

The funeral for Daunte Wright, the 20-year-old Black man who was shot and killed by police during a traffic stop, was held in Minneapolis on Thursday. He was honored as the “Prince of Brooklyn Center,” in a service that focused on police brutality against Black Americans. 

Rev. Al Sharpton delivered the main eulogy, and used the reason police gave for detaining Wright in the first place—an alleged expired registration—to call out racism and police brutality in the U.S.

“I come to Minnesota to tell you, your tags have expired,” Sharpton told the crowd of mourners. “Your tags of racism have expired, your tags of police brutality have expired, your tags of white supremacy have expired, your tags of looking at us different than everyone else have expired.”

After police stopped Wright on April 11, they handcuffed him for an alleged outstanding warrant. When Wright climbed back into his car, Kim Potter, a 26-year police department veteran, shouted “Taser,” before firing her gun and killing him. Potter was charged with second-degree manslaughter a few days later. 

Wright’s mother said in a recent press conference that Wright called her just before he was killed, and told her that police stopped him because there were air fresheners hanging in his rearview mirror. 

"You thought he was just a kid with an air freshener,” said Sharpton at the funeral. “He was a prince." 

Wright’s family took the stage during the service Thursday to share their grief, and memories of Wright’s “contagious” laugh.

“My son should be burying me,” Katie Wright, Daunte’s mother, said as she cried onstage. “He was a brother, a jokester. He was loved by so many. He’s going to be so missed.”

Prominent Minnesota politicians including Ilhan Omar, Tim Walz, and Amy Klobuchar also spoke. Walz said that Wright’s death was connected to “deep and systemic racism in our society,” adding that change was needed at every level of government.  

Both Sharpton and Sen. Klobuchar talked about the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, and speaker after speaker highlighted the spate of high-profile police killings of Black Americans in just the last week. Andrew Brown Jr. was killed by police in North Carolina on Wednesday, the same day that police in Columbus Ohio killed Ma’Khia Bryant.

"It is the right thing to do to fight for our children, because if we don't fight for our children, we can't expect nobody else to fight for our children like us,” said Ben Crump, the attorney for George Floyd’s family, and Wright’s funeral. “We have to fight for our children until hell freezes over. And then we have to be prepared to fight on the ice."