Spike Lee says ‘worsening’ race relations are a ‘direct response’ to Obama’s presidency

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Spike Lee has argued that race relations have “worsened” in response to Barack Obama’s presidency.

The Oscar-winning filmmaker, whose new film Da 5 Bloods arrives on Netflix today (12 June), had been asked why Obama’s two terms as US president hadn’t shifted race relations in the country for the better.

“You have to understand,” Lee answered. “Race relations – which have gotten worse – are a direct response to having a black president.”

Lee was answering questions from celebrities and the general public for The Guardian. Asked whether, when making his film Do the Right Thing in 1989, he expected race to still be such an issue in 2020, he said that he did, but not to such an extent.

“What’s made it worse for me is the camera phones,” Lee said. “Before, you just read articles about it. Now, you are seeing these horrific murders. That makes all the difference in the world.”

He continued: “The image of King George Floyd being suffocated for the last eight and a half minutes of his life went global and that is why we’ve had marches globally.

“People round the world saw a human being with this cop’s knee pressed against our brother’s neck, crying out for his deceased mother. You know what? As he was dying, I believe he saw his mother. His mother came to him in his last breaths.

“That image hit people’s hearts all round the world and that’s why people took to the streets in England. Get a globe, spin it and, wherever you stop, there’s a good chance people were marching.”

Floyd’s death in May has sparked weeks of international protest against police brutality and systemic racism.