The mother of Michael Brown, the unarmed black 18-year-old who was fatally shot by a police officer in 2014, says she wants to run for City Council in her home city of Ferguson, Missouri.
“What I’m contemplating is running for City Council of Ferguson,” Brown’s mother, Lezley McSpadden, said during a panel on police brutality at Harvard University on Monday.
McSpadden’s announcement was met with a roar of applause from the crowd and a “Run, Lezley! Run!” chant, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
“We have to get behind people who look like us and get them in these elected seats so that they can really do what’s right by the community,” she added. “And I’m going to start with me by running for Ferguson City Council.”
McSpadden’s family attorney, Benjamin Crump, was also on the panel Monday evening, Mother Jones reported. Crump represented Brown’s parents, McSpadden and Michael Brown Sr. after he was killed. Currently, Crump is also representing the family of Stephon Clark, a 22-year-old unarmed black father who was shot and killed by police in March.
The lawyer pointed out just how powerful it would be for McSpadden to be elected to Ferguson’s City Council.
“What a legacy that would be ― elected to the City Council and supervising the same police department that killed Michael Brown,” he said.