Jon Stewart Gets Real About the Injustice of the Eric Garner Case

Jon Stewart was left speechless in the wake of the grand jury’s decision not to indict NYPD Officer Daniel Pantaleo in the choke hold death of Eric Garner in July.

The decision came in just before The Daily Show taped, leaving the staff and Stewart little time to process the events. “I don’t know what to say,” Stewart said Wednesday night.

Calling the decision “utterly depressing,” he went on to raise the questions many Americans are grappling with right now. There are many similarities with the decision less than two weeks ago not to indict a white officer who killed an unarmed black man in Ferguson, Mo., but “none of the ambiguities that existed in the Ferguson case exist in the Staten Island case,” Stewart said.

He was referring to the widely circulated video of Garner’s death, in which he puts his hands in the air and repeats that he cannot breathe. President Obama has requested additional funds for police body cameras, yet video footage did nothing to increase accountability in Garner’s case.

Stewart also mentions that choke holds are a banned form of restraint within the NYPD, and that the coroner ruled Garner’s death a homicide.

“We are definitely not living in a post-racial society,” Stewart concludes. But it wouldn’t be The Daily Show if Stewart didn’t end with a little comedy. He shows a sweet video of two playful kittens to lighten the mood—before screaming a few expletives.