Former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel was grilled about the police murder of Laquan McDonald at a Senate hearing on Wednesday, seven years since the day of the black teen's death.
Emanuel was partaking in a confirmation hearing to become President Joe Biden's ambassador to Japan.
At one point during Wednesday's hearing, Democratic Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon confronted Emanuel about his city's decision to force McDonald's family to sign a non-disclosure agreement before they could see video of the teen's murder.
He questioned whether Emanuel knew more than he let on at the time - but the former mayor wouldn't give a direct answer.
'That's a pretty significant decision, you're saying you had no idea of the circumstances of the shooting?' Merkley asked.
'Senator, in that situation, the family approached the city about a settlement, an NDA is standard practice at that time,' Emanuel replied before venturing to explain the bureaucratic red tape that go into such agreements.
But Merkley pushed ahead, clarifying: 'Yes of course, I didn't ask about the NDA, I asked if at that point you had been briefed on the details of the shooting.'
Emanuel came to Capitol Hill for a confirmation hearing to be Joe Biden's Ambassador to Japan, but the 2014 murder of a black Chicago teen at the hands of a white police officer loomed over his testimony
Oregon Senator Merkley pressed Emanuel about his role in the alleged cover-up of McDonald's murder
Emanuel appeared to stare downward as he slowly articulated his answer.
'The details were in the public domain when then - when the corporation council briefed the alderman,' he said.
Merkley stated that Emanuel's role in Chicago's handling of the teenager's death should not be overlooked at a time the country is grappling with 'the challenge of Black Lives Matter' and a nationwide racial reckoning, noting other officials have also spoken out on the issue.
'I think it's important for this committee to actually weigh this,' he said, adding to Emanuel: 'Thank you for addressing this now.'
He concluded, 'Just to clarify - because all of these things happened, the family requested the video, the city attorney reached out proactively before there was a lawsuit to ask for a settlement, the settlement was approved in a less than one minute meeting with no public discussion, it seems hard to believe that all those things happened but you weren't briefed on the details of the situation.'
The former Obama administration official's eight-year tenure as mayor of Chicago was historically unpopular and marked by a number of high-profile scandals involving police shootings.
Laquan McDonald was 17 years old when he was shot 16 times by a white police officer
Emanuel's administration refused to make public police dash cam video of the killing for more than a year and not until being compelled to do so by a state court.
The video's release proved that police lied about the details leading to McDonald's 2014 death, in which the 17-year-old was shot 16 times by Chicago Police Officer Jason Van Dyke.
He later apologized for his handling of the situation, which sparked weeks of mostly peaceful protests in the nation's third-largest city after the video's release.
Van Dyke was convicted of second-degree murder for McDonald's death and jailed for nearly seven years.
Emanuel didn't mention McDonald in his opening remarks, but at one point in the hearing the former official was given the opportunity to discuss the murder by Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chair Bob Menendez.
'Seven years ago, a young man had his life taken on the streets of the city of Chicago. He had all the promise ahead of him and a police officer took his life, killed him. I said then, I’m the mayor and I’m
