
By EMMA R.

By EMMA R.

By Pam Key
Green said, “And still I rise. And I rise today with love of country in my heart and a belief that the record has to be set straight. The record has to always reflect the truth, and there is a truth that is being obscured. I want to set the record straight because there seems to be a belief that if you have committed acts of bigotry, if you have been a racist, if you have been engaged in homophobia, xenophobia, Islamophobia, if you do one thing, somehow that thing will eradicate and eliminate all of the bigotry that you have perpetrated. I rise to correct the record because I want the record to show that at least one person came to the floor of this Congress and made it clear that, yes, unemployment may be low for African-Americans, yes, it may be low, but it’s still twice that of Anglo-Americans, generally speaking. Yes, you may have signed a bill to deal with some aspects of criminal justice in a just way, and that’s appreciated. But there’s still more work to be done. But notwithstanding the fact there’s more work to be done, it’s still appreciated. But the record has to be set straight. And here is what the record should show; that does not eliminate the bigotry emanating from presidency. Eliminating bigotry does not occur because you signed one bill. It does not occur because unemployment is low. It does you have to do more than simply sign a bill.”
He continued, “And I am not saying to you than an apology is in order. I tell people, tell the truth, just tell the truth. Say I was wrong when I instituted a policy that separated babies from their mothers. That emanates the type of bigotry we don’t condone in this country. Say I was wrong when I said there was good people among those who were the racists, the bigots, the xenophobes and homophobes in Charlottesville. Say I was wrong when you don’t have to be so kind when you are part of the constabulary, you are part of the policing force in this country. Just say you were wrong if you want to atone. Signing bills won’t do it. Going to church won’t do it. Asking forgiveness will cause you to be forgiven, and I will forgive you, but that doesn’t mean you will no longer be sanctioned for your bigotry. I want to thank those who have stood and made their points clear as it relates to bigotry. I’m listening to these morning programs now. They’re all talking about bigotry emanating from the presidency, not necessarily in those words. They’re talking about the racism that the President perpetrates. I appreciate what they are saying. But we got to do more than talk about it. We cannot allow a president to remain in office who has engaged in this kind of bigoted conduct.”
He added, “It is time for us to take a stand here on the floor of the House of Representatives. There were no fine people in Charlottesville. You ought not separate babies from their mothers. You ought not have policies that would condone bigotry and encourage others to engage in it. I believe that we have a duty to take a vote. And at some point in the near future we will take another vote, notwithstanding the Mueller report. I yield back the balance of my time.”

By Jeffrey Cawood
Abdullah, a 15-year-old sophomore in high school, co-founded the Black Lives Matter Youth Vanguard. The advocacy group – made up of children and adolescents aged 6 to 18 — started organizing students, parents, and faculty against the “over-policing” of L.A.’s public schools in 2016. The district is the second-largest in the nation with an enrollment of more than 600,000.
Thandiwe follows in the footsteps of her mother, Dr. Melina Abdullah, who is a founding member of the Black Lives Matter activist network and has led its L.A. chapter since its inception. The elder Abdullah has felt comfortable exposing her daughter to the glare of media for several years while Thandiwe has blossomed into a nationally-known fighter for progressive change.

“I have the honor and the privilege to present to you a young lady that is recognized as one of the 25 most influential young people in this country…out of 42 million children,” said L.A. Council President Herb J. Wesson during a presentation at City Hall on Wednesday.
Wesson went on to commend Thandiwe’s activism and work with the Youth Vanguard, whose members were featured speakers at a March For Our Lives gun control rally last year and currently lead a drive to abolish police in local schools incrementally.
Black Lives Matter is allied with the United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA) labor union, which went on strike for six days last month. According to Black Lives Matter, at least two of its members are also high-ranking UTLA leaders. The two organizations often work toward common goals to transform the institution of public education.
“We were campaigning with a lot of the teachers to get random searches out of our schools because we found out that they were criminalizing a lot of black youth,” Thandiwe said at the ceremony in her honor. “We actually won that with our last strike when a lot of students stood with the teachers, and we’re so thankful to them for doing that for us.”

The Los Angeles Times reported that the district “agreed to expand to 28 the number of schools that will no longer conduct random searches of middle and high school students,” adding, “that provision was especially important to students who marched in support of their teachers.”
At Wednesday’s presentation, the younger Abdullah also spoke about “an attack on black bodies and black people.” She stressed the concept of intersectionality, a theory that claims systems of oppression overlap, institutionally dehumanizing groups that identify as marginalized.
“It’s really important…to give way to the people who are most vulnerable: that’s black youth, especially queer black youth; black Muslim youth, which includes me; and black trans youth.”
She has also promoted that intersectional philosophy when advocating on behalf of “the Muslim women and femmes in Palestine,” whom Thandiwe says are victims of a “global war on terror” advanced by the United States and Israel. She made those comments before an estimated crowd of 500,000 people at L.A.’s edition of the Women’s March in 2018.
Thandiwe descends from a long line of progressive organizers. Her bloodline includes a grandfather who was an active participant in the Occupy movement and a grandmother who used to volunteer at a breakfast program run by the Black Panther Party. As The Daily Wire exclusively reported in 2017, her great grandfather was the late Gunter Reimann – a world-renowned Marxist economist who was part of the Communist resistance to Adolf Hitler’s accession to power in Germany. After Nazi officials raided his home in the 1930s, he fled to the United States as a political refugee.

Two German Shepherds and three cats died in the two-story blaze that was initially investigated as a hate crime by the FBI and local law enforcement.
Investigators found traces of gasoline in five rooms on the first floor of the wooden-frame house, according to the police report, while Joly was found to have bought $10 of gas at a local gas station the morning of the fire “so he could cut his grass,” according to the report. Joly stopped halfway through because it was too hot out, while police say the sequence of events “would have made it difficult for anyone but Joly to set the fire.”
He went to work at the church and got a call from Moore at 1:02 p.m., said the report. Moore had forgotten to pack her lunch so asked Joly to bring it to her at work. The couple share one car.
Joly returned home, which was two miles away, went inside for a minute or two, and left, he told police.
The fire was reported by neighbors at 1:16 p.m.
The sequence of events would have made it difficult for anyone but Joly to set the fire, Grove said in the police report. –The Detroit News
“The timeline shows a window of less than five minutes for another person to enter the residence, splash gasoline around, ignite the fire and then leave without being scene,” wrote police detective Aaron Grove.

Two weeks after the fire, Joly was questioned by two FBI agents and a city police detective.
During the interview, he drooped his head, staring at the floor, not looking at his interlocutors, according to the report. He didn’t admit setting the fire and didn’t deny it, either. –The Detroit News
The arrest of Joly, a biological woman who identifies as a man, came as a surprise to the gay community in Jackson, as Joly helped open the city’s first gay community center and was a co-organizer of the city’s first gay festival – earning the Citizen of the Year award by a local paper.
Authorities later determined the fire was intentionally set, but the person they arrested came as a shock to both supporters and opponents of the gay rights movement. It was the citizen of the year — Nikki Joly.
“It’s embarrassing,” said Travis Trombley, a gay resident who fought for the ordinance. “How do you do it to the community you have put so much effort into helping?”
Why Joly, 54, would allegedly burn down his home remains a mystery. He didn’t own the house, which was insured by its owner, police said.
His attorney said the lack of a motive cast doubt on the case. –The Detroit News
The police report suggests a motive, however; two people who worked with Joly at St. Johns United Church of Christ, where the Jackson Price Center is located, said the trans activist was “frustrated the controversy over gay rights had died down,” and that the Jackson Pride Parade and Festival – held five days before the fire, “hadn’t received more attention or protests.”

Barbara Shelton questioned the police’s version of her statement, telling the Detroit News “Not sure I said that,” in an email, adding “I have no idea about anything, never heard Nikki comment in any fashion about anything like that.”
According to Joly’s attorney, Daniel Barnett, “It doesn’t make sense,” adding “He was citizen of the year. There was plenty of media coverage already before the fire.”
While Joly was stoic in public, he could be abrupt, even combative in private, said acquaintances. He was headstrong, unwilling to have his views challenged by others.
He also could be deceptive, Shelton and James said in the police investigative report.
One year after the pride center opened, Joly broke it away from the church. Unknown to church officials, Joly had secured nonprofit status for the center, Shelton told police.
Shelton said she felt betrayed because she was the one who secured the original funding for the center by applying for several grants.
“Shelton and James both described Nikki as very deceptive and stated that when it comes to Nikki there are ‘layers of manipulation,’” police detective Aaron Grove wrote in the report. –The Detroit News
Local drag queen Jeff Graves said that he was alarmed by the details of the investigation, and said that if Joly is found guilty, he will try to claw back donations raised for the transgender activist’s legal defense.
“I feel as though I was used for a money scam,” said Graves. “It hurt and it still does.”

FEBRUARY 25, 2019
Not only were the students she approached ecstatic to sign it, but one member of UCLA’s student government encouraged her to change the language to “diversity” and “sensitivity training” to hide their real intentions so the administration would approve it.
Also watch Kaitlyn interview clueless Californians unable to answer basic presidential trivia.

FEBRUARY 23, 2019
After a clip ran of an exclusive NBC News interview with Muthana, Ruhle turned to her panel of guests for reaction. Real Clear Politics Associate Editor A.B. Stoddard agreed with the Trump administration: “This country is a gift and I think she’s relinquished her privilege and I’m kind of in agreement with the President that she, you know, may not be allowed – shouldn’t be allowed to come back here.”
https://www.infowars.com/msnbc-analyst-anti-american-to-deny-u-s-re-entry-to-isis-terrorist/
Moments later, Johnson chimed in to complain: “There are white domestic terrorists who get radicalized online all the time in America who are out shooting people, threatening to kill people….And we’re not deporting them. They’re allowed to be here.” He argued that Muthana was “an American citizen” and that any attempt to block her return was somehow antithetical to American values:
If she’s willing to come back and face whatever consequences she faces for being a part of a terrorist organization that’s declared war on the United States, that’s perfectly fine. But this idea that this administration has been promoting that we can pick and choose who citizens are and determine citizenship based on if we like somebody and their ideology is anti-American. She is still an American citizen, she should be allowed to come back.
Even Philippe Reines, a former State Department official under Hillary Clinton, was wary of allowing Muthana back in country:
So, yes, if she wants to come back, I think she should be allowed to come back. I would feel a hell of a lot better if she were facing charges before she came back….she should know that she is facing X charges in X jurisdiction, X felony for X amount of years….But it can’t be this vacuum of everyone gets to come back no matter what they do to our country.
Johnson defended his argument by seeming to downplay her involvement with ISIS: “And just being a part of ISIS, we need to determine exactly – we’ve had people flee and join ISIS. Before you had somebody do that a couple years ago. We need to – ”
Ruhle interrupted him: “Let’s not give ISIS excuses, okay?”
Johnson insisted:
I’m not giving ISIS excuses. What I’m saying is, people have left and joined these kinds of terrorist organizations before….And just because she was a part of ISIS, I would like to know, similar to you, look, “Did you help in any bombing? Did you help in any planning? Did you give people information about America?” Because that determines what kind of punishment you should receive.
He reiterated: “But again, she’s an American citizen. And if there’s anybody that should punish her, it should be us back here because she’s an American citizen.”
The U.S. State Department has adamantly refuted that assertion. “Ms. Hoda Muthana is not a U.S. citizen and will not be admitted into the United States. She does not have any legal basis, no valid U.S. passport, no right to a passport, nor any visa to travel to the United States,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced on Wednesday.

By Tony Lee
She said it is “very concerning” that the leaks all came from the Chicago Police Department and insisted that Smollett’s claim that he was attacked by two President Donald Trump supporters in near sub-zero temperatures in Chicago who were yelling “this is MAGA country” and hurling racial and homophobic slurs was “staunchly believable” as of two days days ago.
On February 19, when Sanders said she thought Smollett’s story was still “staunchly believable,” news reports had already surfaced that indicated that Smollett had paid two Nigerian-American brothers to orchestrate the attack after the the hate letter that he allegedly mailed to himself on the Empire set did not get enough attention. Celebrities such as Snoop Dogg and Dave Chappelle had already mocked Smollett for his alleged hoax while Cardi B had declared that Smollett “f*cked up Black History Month.”
“I have spoken with Jussie Smollett’s team. I’ve heard Jussie tell his account in his own words. And I want to tell you… When I had this conversation about two days ago, I believed him,” she insisted. “It was staunchly believable.”
Sanders said she only changed her mind when the video of the two Nigerian-American brothers buying ski masks and a red cap surfaced. Smollett reportedly paid the brothers $3,500 to stage the attack and gave them an additional $100 to buy supplies.
“When the video came out today of the two gentlemen buying what I’ve referred to as a hate crime starter pack, I, like everyone else, had questions,” Sanders said. “At this point, my thoughts are…. we need to see some of the evidence… I think it’s very concerning that all of these leaks came from the Chicago Police Department… So frankly all we have is leaks from the Chicago Police Department… now what they’ve said at this press conference and what Jussie Smollett and his team have said.”
Sanders insisted that “things do not add up here” and “this just doesn’t seem right” because, in reference to the $3,500 that Smollett reportedly paid to the brothers to stage the attack, “$3,500 won’t even buy a round-trip ticket to Nigeria.”
“So I, like many people in America, are confused… even though I’ve heard, I’ve seen what the police department’s said,” she said. “So at the very least I think we should see the police report.”
Sanders said Smollett has lost in the court of public opinion, adding that “this is not a good day for Jussie Smollet” and “frankly it’s a terrible day for folks who have not come forward who have experienced hate crimes and who now are maybe hesitant to come forward if something does actually happen to them because of this.”
“So it’s just not a good day,” Sanders said. “It’s still a terrible Black History Month.”

By PAUL BOIS
Over at MSNBC, Zach Stafford, Editor-in-Chief for the LGBTQ magazine The Advocate, went so far as to accuse Trump-loving cops in the Chicago P.D. of rigging the investigation in order to deal maximum damage to the disgraced actor.

According to Stafford, the Chicago P.D. intentionally leaked information pertaining to the investigation in order to destroy Smollett, alleging that the police called “it a racist and homophobic attack” even though it initially understood Smollett to be lying. Stafford claims this was all just a part of a broader setup.
“Personally, it was incredibly shocking on day one to see the police department call it a racist and homophobic attack. Their first statement — they exclusively said that, said they’re investigating it as a victim case,” Stafford said, according to Fox News. “As someone that has been investigating these for years in Chicago, that was really unprecedented before.”
Stafford went on to say that the Chicago P.D. essentially played into the victim narrative against Smollett in order to spring a trap on him.
“And a lot of the time people in the background were worried they were leaning into this victim part of the story because they didn’t believe him and they wanted to use it against him at the end when they were able to prove that he was lying,” Stafford continued.
The LGBTQ magazine editor went on to throw dirt at the Chicago P.D.’s past record of leaking information, saying they have a history of lying to the population.
“The police were openly confirming and not confirming certain reports and not doing it to other parts of the story, and so, due to the vocal nature in this case, it was really peculiar,” Stafford said. “Chicago has a deep history of openly lying to citizens. This police department did in 2016, openly through their union, support Donald Trump.”
Stafford suggests that the police union’s support of Trump indicates that there is reason not to believe them — especially in light of the information leaks.
“The central question of this case was, ‘Are Donald Trump supporters out here committing hate crimes?’ And that’s what really sparked a lot of the tension,” Stafford said. “To have a police department that hasn’t been as cooperative as they have been this round, do not openly give information, do openly lie and mishold information in cases and then to know that they…have openly supported Donald Trump in the 2016 election, a lot of activists on the ground are saying, ‘Wait, what’s going on here? Who do we believe out of these two suspect people.'”
In the end, Stafford suggested that even if Smollett were guilty of staging a hoax “hate crime,” he still highlighted a greater truth. “Jussie may have created this whole situation to highlight a reality that is happening every day,” he said. “Our current administration doesn’t support people like him — that are black and queer.”
By Ben Warren

The victim, described as an “Iranian gay man,” received such a fierce beating from the asylum seekers in the dining room that the local migration board had to hire a security company to “maintain order” days after the incident.
“It [was] like twenty rockets were lit,” said a staff member. “The entire dining room was coming. They charged over tables and chairs.”
“…They attacked no one else.”
The staff present only interfered after the attackers began to use chairs and forks on the victim.
Only one of the attackers, Abdul Azizi, was convicted of assault; he claims his actions were in “self-defense,” an account the staff and victim denies.
“If I had been alone and he had said [such] ugly things then I could have checked myself, but when he said this openly to everyone, we all became so upset and couldn’t control us,” said Azizi. “We may have made an unconscious error, but honor violations are serious for us.”
This particular asylum home is locally celebrated due to it being the first of its kind to be LGBTQ-certified by Sweden’s Federation for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Rights (RFSL) back in 2015.
To earn that title, workers went through 16 hours of training, two workshops, and paid attention to details like sex-divided toilets and the art on the walls.
Interestingly, prosecutors have ruled out the assault being a hate crime, a perspective the victim seems to disagree with.
He asserts the attack was the latest in a series of harassments that targeted him and other gay residents.
“When we go to the restaurant, they insult us, scream at us and threaten us,” he said. “It also happens elsewhere in the accommodation.”
