Chris Paul Tells ‘The View’ Fans How George Floyd’s Death Left His Daughter Worried For Her Brother

Chris Paul, a star point guard in the NBA, who has spent the last three seasons with the Phoenix Suns and is now being linked to a trade to the Washington Wizards. He discussed his approach to racism in America with his young children on a recent episode of The View.

The View is not airing any new episodes for the next few weeks since the show is on summer break. ABC will screen repeats of earlier programs instead of the live broadcast, and this particular episode was aired in June this year.

Paul sat down with Whoopi Goldberg, Sara Haines, Joy Behar, Sunny Hostin, and Alyssa Farah Griffin to promote his memoir, Sixty-One: Life Lessons from Papa, On and Off the Court, which is based on the lessons he learned from his grandfather, who was tragically killed on the day Paul signed his letter of intent to play college basketball.

According to Decider, Haines questioned the athlete throughout the interview about the discussions he had had about racism in the United States with his late grandfather and his children. Paul stated, "I think I had some of them with my grandad when I was growing up, but a lot of times, I was working. If I wanted new shoes or anything like that, my grandad — even though he had this wad of money in his front pocket — he’d be like, ‘If you want their shoes, you’re coming to work here for a week.'"

According to Paul, his grandpa was still a target of racism despite owning the first Black-owned service station in North Carolina. He said, "The racism that I saw growing up was my grandfather wanted to own the land that his service station was on, but the man that owned it said he wasn’t going to sell it to a Black man."

Paul and his wife attempted to "communicate" with their children as much as they can, which is how they deal with the sensitive topic with their 14-year-old son and 10-year-old daughter. He revealed, "When the George Floyd situation happened, instead of sheltering them from it and not talking to them about it, we showed them and talked to them about it. So they could see what was going on. And it was a very difficult time for us." He explained by bringing up Floyd, whose killing by a white police officer in 2020 sparked the nationwide Black Lives Matter movement.

Paul remembered his daughter's emotional response, prompted by concern for her elder brother, as the family discussed the idea of "being Black but especially being a Black male." He said, "My daughter — rightfully so, I remember being in our bathroom at home, showing them and talking to them — she cried because she was like, ‘Is this going to happen to Chris?'" Paul further added, " I think it’s very important to make sure that we communicate as much as possible with our kids because we want to protect them and shelter them but we also can’t make them oblivious."

According to Reuters, the FBI states in a report in March 2023 that the number of hate crimes committed in the United States increased by 11.6% in 2021, with the majority of these crimes being committed because of bigotry against Black people, followed by those motivated by bias against other ethnic groups, sexual orientation, and religion. In 2021, the majority (64.5%) of victims of hate crimes experienced prejudice based on their race, ethnicity, or ancestry; 15.9% experienced bias based on their sexual orientation; and 14.1% experienced bigotry based on their religious beliefs.