Bernie Sanders says Sandra Bland would be alive if she were white

The democratic socialist is sounding off

Protesters line the streets of Minneapolis. (Fibonacci Blue/Flickr)

A Texas grand jury announced on Tuesday night that they would not bring charges against sheriff’s officials and jail employees in the death of 28-year-old Sandra Bland.

Presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders sounded off shortly after the decision was announced.

“Sandra Bland should not have died while in police custody. There’s no doubt in my mind that she, like too many African-Americans who die in police custody, would be alive today if she were a white woman,” Mr Sanders wrote in a statement.

“My thoughts are with her family and her loved ones tonight. We need to reform a very broken criminal justice system.”

Democrat Martin O'Malley, who's been a nonfactor in national polls behind Mr Sanders and frontrunner Hillary Clinton, also issued a statement via Twitter.

"#SandraBland's case shows that we need to do more than #SayHerName. We must continue the fight for meaningful criminal justice reform."

Kirsten West Savali, a senior writer at The Root, agreed with Mr Sander’s by saying that the Texas grand jury did not value Ms Bland’s life.

“The grand jury decided that even though her intake documents reportedly stated that she had previously been suicidal following a miscarriage, deputies assigned to watch her are in no way responsible for not doing so—because her life did not matter,” she writes, citing various grand juries across the country who failed to bring charges against police using excessive force against black women.

“Sanders is absolutely right. She would not be dead. Let’s be clear, though: If Sandra Bland had been white, she never would have been arrested in the first place.”

Geneva Reed-Veal, Ms Bland’s mother, has since filed a wrongful death suit against the Department of Public Safety, Waller County and the involved officers.

A federal judge set the January 2017 trial date earlier this week.