Killer Mike has become somewhat ubiquitous as an artist with a keen political voice. Between his frequent presence in and endorsement of the Bernie Sanders campaign earlier this year and his speaking out on various issues of American social injustice, the Run the Jewels member is a celebrity with answers wholly worth listening to. And it seems people are:
As Pitchfork reports, Mike expressed in a TV interview a while back the desire to see the black community creating accounts in more black-owned banks, saying, “we have a one trillion dollar spending base and if you want to see change, you have to start to focus on, economically, how can we change our communities.” This was reiterated on a radio program on Hot 107.9 in Atlanta (where the rapper/activist is from), and here, he provided specific instructions, telling listeners to put their money in the Atlanta bank, Citizens Trust. (He’d also joined Usher and Jermaine Dupri to encourage people to do so back in February; since then, celebrities like Solange have also come forth stating that they’ve put their money in black-owned banks.) Now, Pitchfork notes that Citizens Trust has seen a big rise in accounts being opened.
Mike said in the interview:
We don’t have to burn our city down. But what we can do is go to your banks tomorrow. You can go to your bank tomorrow. And you can say, ‘Until you as a corporation start to speak on our behalf, I want all my money. And I’m taking all my money to Citizens Trust.’
A marketing director at the bank told the publication that, indeed, in the last month, they’ve seen a “huge influx of account openings,” and the President and CEO of the bank Tweeted a thank you to the rapper:
And the bank itself took to Instagram to suggest the sudden bump in support:
And Killer Mike reiterated it: