Black Lives Matter calls out Biden for excluding them from meeting

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Author and Iraq war veteran Rob Smith weighs in on the controversy on ‘Fox & Friends.’

Black Lives Matter seemed to knock President-elect Joe Biden on Wednesday after it was revealed that he didn't include them in a meeting where multiple civil rights groups laid out their recommendations for his Justice Department.

"Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, and Rep. Cedric Richmond met with several civil rights groups yesterday," the group tweeted.

"@blklivesmatter — as the largest social and justice movement in history— was not invited."

According to Politico, the wide-ranging discussion covered topics like voting rights, judges, and executive-level appointments. It also touched on criminal justice reform and racial equity — two issues that the BLM movement has been emphasizing in the wake of George Floyd's death in May.

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Biden's inaugural team did not immediately respond to Fox News' request for comment.

The meeting came at a pivotal time as Democrats struggled to achieve a consensus on the response to high-profile Black deaths. While many on the left have pushed "defund the police" measures, others have resisted those efforts as dangerous politically. 

Underscoring the intraparty tension, BLM co-founder Alicia Garza recently responded to former President Obama's concerns about the movement alienating voters.

“What I want to hear from former President Barack Obama if he’s going to use his vast platform for these conversations, what I want to hear from President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, is: What are you going to do?” she asked. “And that’s what we haven’t heard amid all this hoopla about ‘defund the police.’”

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She added that “[t]his movement, which really helped to push [Biden’s] campaign over the finish line, was used as a political football all throughout this election cycle and that was true in 2016 as well."

"There’s a lot of valuable airspace that was used to be condescending to the very people who have opened the imagination of what this country can be — and how we can get closer to the promise that this country has offered to so many," she said.