Howard Schultz tells CNN town hall 'unconscious bias' sadly 'exists widely,' but 'I honestly don't see color'

Potential 2020 independent presidential candidate Howard Schultz spoke at a CNN town hall in Houston on Tuesday night, and he went big on criticizing the Democratic and Republican parties — the "far left" and "far right," as he repeatedly called them — but largely declined to detail how he would do things better. He didn't say if he would drop out of the race if his participation would help re-elect President Trump, but he pledged not to run if that "math doesn't tally up." On "the issue of being a spoiler, how can you spoil a system that is already broken?" he asked.

Schultz called the New Green Deal well-intentioned but "not realistic" and "immoral" because of its price tag, backed ObamaCare but said it needs to be "fixed," and said that while "I don't know what the number is ... what I'm suggesting is that I should be paying higher taxes and I think people across the country are willing to pay higher taxes." And Schultz discussed race.

The April 2018 racial profiling incident at a Starbucks in Philadelphia was "a terrible moment for the company," Schultz said, but "we realized that we had a problem, and it's a problem that I think exists widely in this country. And it's something that I would characterize as unconscious bias, that many of us have based on our own life experience." The ongoing race-sensitivity training Starbucks requires for all employees "is deeply a courageous act, because we're doing something that we realize we fell short on, and we're admitting the fact that we have to get better at this," he said. "As somebody who grew up in a very diverse background as a young boy in the projects," Schultz added, "I didn't see color as a young boy and I honestly don't see color now."

The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Really? Green. Everyone who enters Starbucks sees green, and Schultz more than others.