Black Texas Congress members call for justice, urge peaceful protests after death of George Floyd

Rep. Colin Allred, D-Dallas, also condemned rioting, writing Sunday that the violence "should not drown out the message of the many who are in pain."

Allred continued that repeated killings of black people at the hands of police and systemic racism have created an atmosphere of grief in Dallas.

[Dallas] has always been a city with vastly different outcomes based on where you live and what you look like," he wrote. "That history is still very much with us, and it is something we have to acknowledge if we are going to deliver real, equitable change."