Cavs star Donovan Mitchell calls out ‘BS’ Minnesota shootings

The National Basketball Players Association put out a statement on Monday afternoon regarding ICE’s killing of local protestor Alex Pretti over the weekend, which was preceded by Good’s death just weeks earlier in the same city. Outside of Minneapolis, a Los Angeles man named Keith Porter was killed by an off-duty ICE officer on New Year’s Eve as well, sparking uproars across the country to demand accountability.

“I see the ‘Oh, it’s the sides.’ Like, nah, it’s the human element,” said Mitchell, a vice president of the NBPA. “It’s the human part that, I’m trying not to curse, that gets to me, you know what I’m saying? There’s so much craziness, like, ‘Oh, it’s this. It’s that.’ It’s like, nah, let’s be humans. What about that? That’s what is awful. It’s not right. It’s not right that it keeps happening, and it’s not right that it’s desensitized the way it is.”

During his response to Cleveland.com beat reporter Ethan Sands’ question, Mitchell felt compelled to address another sad situation involving a five-year-old boy, Liam Ramos. He and his father, who have a pending asylum claim, were detained and sent to a family detention facility in Dilley, Texas.

“I even saw the little kid,” Mitchell said. “I don’t know the full [story], but I saw the little kid that was by his self. Like, what about the human side of that? That’s a child by itself, no parent. I feel like we lose that in all of this, you know what I mean? That’s what’s alarming, disheartening for us, for us as a family. I have family who came to this country, and they fear for their lives, and they’re legal citizens. Like, they fear.

“I don’t know the whole situation of the people that got murdered, but I do know this is BS. It’s BS. That’s just been my standpoint on it. I pray for the families that are affected by it, I pray for everybody’s that affected by it, and I pray we figure this out because it’s getting out of hand. It’s something that we need to just figure out. And hopefully we do soon because it’s just become the norm. It’s nuts. It’s insane. That can’t be who we are as a country, as a people.”

Cavs head coach Kenny Atkinson also said his piece on the matter before the team’s game on Monday.

“We’re aware,” Atkinson said. “It’s really tragic for the community, for the families. You just feel for the whole situation. We’re definitely aware of what’s going on. Violence, personally, I try to put over there in a box, but I know it’s part of this world. You have to have empathy for what’s going on in that community and for the families.”