John Legend Discusses Political Activism and Justice System Reform with Bevy Smith
“It should never be ‘shut up and sing,'” he said on Radio Andy. “We’re all citizens, and we all pay taxes, except Donald Trump.”
“I’ve always been political, I’ve always spoken my mind,” John Legend revealed Thursday on “Bevelations” with Bevy Smith. “A lot of the greatest artists in the world have been those that haven’t been afraid to speak their mind politically, people who spoke out for justice. And it was interracial artists that were doing it.”
“It should never be ‘shut up and sing,'” Legend reiterated. “We’re all citizens, and we all pay taxes, except Donald Trump.”
He added, “I’m not just going to change who I am because I have a broader base of fans, I want to invite them to my point of view, invite them to listen to my music. You don’t even have to agree with me on my politics — we can agree to disagree. But I think we should each other’s point of view and empathize with each other’s point of view.”
Smith pointed out her initial reluctance to support Hillary Clinton because “her husband signed the crime bill into effect, which of course led to droves of Black and Latino people getting locked up for low, non-violent offenses.”
Legend, who is an outspoken advocate for reforming the criminal justice system through his campaign Free America, also expressed concern over the legislation put into place during President Bill Clinton’s administration.
“Out of fear, they overreacted and put us in a place where we locked up too many people for too little offenses,” Legend said of the crime bill from the 1990s. “That was wrong. There’s no two ways about it. The Clintons were wrong, and whoever else voted for that bill — they might have thought they were in the right place at the time — but they were wrong.”
He continued, “Yes, we have to reconcile with that when we decide to vote for [Clinton], but I decided to vote for her because I still think she’s the best qualified to be president among those that are running. And she’s actually reconsidered all the things that they did in the ’90s and said, ‘You know we made some mistakes and we need to fix them.'”
“She’s actually listened and incorporated people’s points of views into her platform,” Legend concluded. “We all have a stake in what’s happening.”
