Story by Timothy Bella • 4h ago
Category: Anti Civil Rights ideas & “Friends”
By Larry Keane. May 23, 2023
‘Gun control’ groups are foisting ‘gun control’ on the American public by taking to university campuses to convince law students to pledge to never represent the firearm industry, or its interests, in court.
‘Gun control’ groups are big Shakespeare fans, apparently. They’re taking a page from the famed Elizabethan-era bard’s Henry VI as the next play on foisting ‘gun control’ on the American public.
“The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers,” Shakespeare wrote in the play.
Two ‘gun control’ groups are putting a 21st Century twist on the line and taking to university campuses to convince law students to pledge to never represent the firearm industry, or its interests, in court.
Call it the long game. ‘gun control’ isn’t satisfied with attacking Second Amendment rights, or even First Amendment rights. Now, they’re targeting Sixth Amendment rights too. That’s the amendment that guarantees the right to be represented by legal counsel.
Giffords Courage to Fight Gun Violence and March for Our Lives, ‘gun control’ groups headed by former U.S. Rep. Gabby Giffords and antigun billionaire Michael Bloomberg, respectively, are canvassing campuses to convince law students to sign a pledge they won’t represent the firearm industry or firearm owners when it comes to protecting and preserving Second Amendment rights. The ‘gun control’ groups’ pledge peddles verifiably false claims to convince the aspiring lawyers that the firearm industry is responsible for violent crime in America.
Not criminals. Not gang violence. Not the illicit drug trade. They’re blaming the industry for crimes committed by violent offenders and ignoring basic legal foundations to sway law students to deny legal services to companies and individuals that follow the law.
Do You Swear?
David Pucino, Giffords’ deputy chief counsel, makes some dubious claims to convince law students that after they earn their juris doctorate, they should sign the ‘gun control’ group’s nonbinding pledge to never represent the legal interests of a Constitutionally-protected industry. First among these misleading claims is that firearms are the leading cause of death for American children.
This is a favorite false talking point among ‘gun control’ groups and antigun politicians, including President Joe Biden. The problem is that it is demonstrably false. The University of Michigan manipulated data sets to include 18 and 19-year-old adults as “children” to boost the figure of childhood deaths to surpass those caused by motor vehicle accidents. When 18 and 19-year-olds are backed out because they’re not children, but in fact adults, that claim falls apart. NSSF demonstrated that here.
Giffords’ pledge website also claims the firearm industry actively opposes “any effort to pass gun safety laws.” Again, this is demonstrably false. NSSF backed the FIX NICS Act, named for the firearm industry’s FixNICS® initiative to get all states to submit disqualifying records into the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). NSSF changed the laws in 16 states and in Congress to get the background check system to work as intended. In fact, NSSF helped create the instant point-of-sale background check system that would instantly inform a firearm retailer if a customer is prohibited from purchasing a firearm.
Pucino urges law student to never work for firms that represent the firearm industry because, in his estimation, the firearm industry “represent some really reprehensible companies that have done some horrible things.”
Never mind that the firearm industry administers the Real Solutions. Safer Communities® campaign that includes FixNICS and Project ChildSafe®, which partners with over 15,000 law enforcement agencies in all 50 states and five U.S. territories to distribute over 40 million free firearm safety kits including locking devices. Real Solutions also includes the partner programs with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to prevent illegal “straw” purchases of firearms through Don’t Lie for the Other Guy™ and Operation Secure Store® to help firearm retailers voluntarily increase security to deter and prevent firearm burglaries and robberies. The firearm industry also partnered with the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP) to provide firearm retailers and ranges kits to encourage a “brave conversation” to prevent suicide tragedies.
Persona Non Grata
Giffords and March for Our Lives think these programs are “reprehensible” enough to demand the ATF not work with the firearm industry on these campaigns that have been proven to save lives. Giffords was among 43 other ‘gun control’ groups that demanded the ATF stop working with the industry it regulates.
“Stop funding, partnering, or co-branding programs with the National Sports Shooting Foundation via the Department of Justice and other Federal Agencies,” the letter said, according to The Reload. “No longer should the ATF hold private briefing and training sessions at NSSF’s annual SHOT SHOW without making their remarks available to the public online.”
NSSF pointed out how “unserious” ‘gun control’ groups are with their demands then. They continue to prove that unseriousness now. These ‘gun control’ groups put special-interest political agendas ahead of real answers to keep the public safe. Their answer isn’t to “do something” as they demand. It is to “do something” to ban guns. And now, apparently, it is also to ban legal representation.
Giffords and March for Our Lives rolled out their “pledge” drive at the University of California – Berkeley School of Law, Cardozo School of Law, City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law, Vanderbilt Law School and Yale Law School. Pucino said the drive isn’t limited to those schools. Plans are to make it “broad and national.”
The goal is to encourage the aspiring lawyers to flex their legal muscle, putting pressure on law firms that they’ll miss out on talent because these law school graduates will refuse to assist in any cases defending the firearm industry or Second Amendment rights. It’s a tall order.
“There’s certainly the case that the legal system allows for and encourages for everyone to have representation, of course,” Pucino conceded in an interview with The American Independent.
These ‘gun control’ groups might want to read Shakespeare’s Hamlet and flip forward to the line that reads, “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.”
U.S.A. — “President Biden Announces 13 New Actions to Reduce Gun Violence by Maximizing the Benefits of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act,” a Sunday White House Briefing Room “Fact Sheet” statement claims. The unproven presumptions packed into that headline are that “gun violence” is a legitimate term rather than an exploitable political one, that it will be reduced, that infringements on rights are beneficial, that they are politically unifying, and that the result will be safer communities.
That’s some concentrated weasel-wording there, packing five full lies in just 20 words. Seasoned Democrat propagandists are nothing if not pros at that.
“These reports make clear that BSCA is saving lives,” the statement continues, citing as “proof” that “enhanced background checks” have kept some under-21-year-olds from buying guns, prosecutions of people, some of whom may just be enthusiasts and collectors, is up, and tax plunder has been redistributed “to make our schools safer, improve access to mental health services, and help young people deal with the trauma and grief resulting from gun violence.”
That the schools are still “gun-free” predator empowerment zones, and that the statement is short on empirically documenting how swarms of headshrinkers have done anything but encourage and fund complementary neuroses is secondary to an observable reality: They’re claiming lives are being saved without actually proving that they are. Yeah, they’re pros at this.
As for those benefits, the statement is promising that will be forthcoming, it’s curious that an administration that’s talking about enhanced background checks is so quiet – some might say obstructionist – on the president’s son, Hunter Biden, getting a gun after denying using controlled substances on a Form 4473 Firearms Transaction Record. ATF, the Justice Department, and a federal court have all said that’s Hunter’s private business and no one else’s, and the Secret Service has signed an affidavit denying any involvement at all.
As far as keeping guns out of dangerous hands, the false assumption being pushed here is one that ignores a 2016 Department of Justice prisoner survey:
“An estimated 287,400 prisoners had possessed a firearm during their offense. Among these, more than half (56%) had either stolen it (6%), found it at the scene of the crime (7%), or obtained it off the street or from the underground market (43%). Most of the remainder (25%) had obtained it from a family member or friend, or as a gift. Seven percent had purchased it under their own name from a licensed firearm dealer.”
In other words, don’t look for weekend headlines on Chicago and Baltimore homicides to show a statistically significant reduction anytime soon. Ditto for anything “mental health” or “red flag”-related, especially since we’re basically talking bribes to the states to do end runs around due process.
The whole thing is a meaningless boondoggle that does what Democrats with the media in their pockets do best: Spend money that’s not theirs, attack rights, and spread lies. And helping them do that this time out were the usual suspects from the Vichycon wing of the GOP, the useful idiot/self-serving swamp creatures who continually prove themselves adept at turning coats and stabbing backs.
First, we get to thank Marco Rubio, who introduced the bill.
Then there are 10 Senate Republicans who cut a deal in June of last year to an “agreement in principle [talk about an oxymoron] on gun control legislation,” which was “the number needed to break a GOP filibuster on the package.” They were:
- John Cornyn, R-Texas
- Thom Tillis, R-N.C.
- Roy Blunt, R-Mo.
- Richard Burr, R-N.C.
- Bill Cassidy, R-La.
- Susan Collins, R-Maine
- Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.
- Rob Portman, R-Ohio
- Mitt Romney, R-Utah
- Pat Toomey, R-Pa.
And true to what we’ve come to expect from them, NRA at the time provided cover, saying:
“As is our policy, the NRA does not take positions on ‘frameworks’. We will make our position known when the full text of the bill is available for review.”
That way, a form of “plausible deniability” could be maintained with those who don’t look too closely at things to realize the bill itself would never have advanced in the first place without that “compromise.” No matter, memories are short, and everyone was counting on four of the senators retiring in 2022 and another five not being up for re-election until 2026.
Assuming Rubio, Cornyn, Tillis, Graham, and McConnell are still in the running, expect “A” grades and boilerplate assurances that they’re “staunch defenders of the Second Amendment.”
U.S.A. — President Joe Biden remains “fully committed to further regulations on guns,” according to a recent report in The Advocate, but a statement from the White House following a deadly shooting at a mall in Allen, Texas suggests he is also committed to hypocrisy.
In a Briefing Room statement, Biden referred to the eight people killed in Allen and then said, “Jill and I are praying for their families and for others critically injured.”
However, as Business Insider noted, “Biden called out Republicans for sending ‘thoughts and prayers’ following the latest mass shooting, and called on members of Congress to pass gun-control bills.”
If Biden can do it, why can’t Republicans? Does the Oval Office have a monopoly on prayers for murder victims?
Whatever else Biden wants in during the remainder of his presidency, restrictive gun control and a ban on semi-auto rifles remains at the top of his wish list, The Advocate story indicated. Following the shooting in Allen, Biden made what has become a reflexive pitch for additional gun controls. He also wants to eliminate the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA), which protects the firearms industry from junk lawsuits trying to hold gun makers responsible for crimes committed with their products.
As reported in the Business Insider article, “Biden noted that the Texas gunman wore tactical gear and was armed with an AR-15-style weapon.”
“Once again I ask Congress to send me a bill banning assault weapons and high-capacity magazines,” Biden said in a prepared statement. “Enacting universal background checks. Requiring safe storage. Ending immunity for gun manufacturers…”
White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters Biden is “using his bully pulpit; he’s been very clear.”
Following the shooting, Biden dragged out the traditional gun control wish list. In a tweet, he spoke of a ban on so-called “assault weapons” and “high-capacity magazines,” universal background checks and a safe storage mandate. These are all things he has been wanting for years, long before the mall shooting in Allen.
If Congress were to deliver such legislation, Biden says he would “sign it immediately,” according to Politico.
But Congress does not appear inclined to accommodate the gun control president. While he’s been outspoken on the gun control issue, Biden has also acknowledged he has essentially done all he can, and that the ball is in Congress’ court.
Press reports about Biden’s inability to get the GOP-led House to cooperate on gun control routinely fail to mention two important points.
In a story published by the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE) in June 2022, it is clearly explained, so that even a reporter can understand, “Nearly two decades ago the Department of Justice funded a study to analyze this very topic, and it concluded that the assault weapon prohibition had ‘mixed’ results.
“Researchers noted there was a decline in crimes committed with firearms classified as assault weapons,” the report acknowledged, “but noted ‘the decline in AW use was offset throughout at least the late 1990s by steady or rising use of other guns.’
“In other words,” the FEE article explained, “there was a decline in crimes committed with firearms that were banned, but the drop was replaced by crimes committed with other types of firearms that were not banned.
“While gun violence overall fell in the US during this period—just like many other countries around the world—the decline continued even after the Federal Assault Weapons Ban ended in 2004. Authors of the government-funded study plainly stated ‘we cannot clearly credit the ban with any of the nation’s recent drop in gun violence’ and any future reduction in gun violence as a result of the ban was likely ‘to be small at best and perhaps too small for reliable measurement.’”
Add to that a Rand report from earlier this year which noted, “we find inconclusive evidence for the effect of assault weapon bans on mass shootings,” and “we find limited evidence that high-capacity magazine bans reduce mass shootings.”
The second point is even more egregious because the White House and the media can easily look at the annual FBI Uniform Crime Reports, which consistently show that rifles of any kind are used in only a fraction of homicides in any given year. According to FBI data, far more people are murdered annually with knives or “personal weapons” (i.e. fists, feet, hands) than with rifles.
Possibly the biggest hypocrisy of all is that Biden, and his allies in Congress, are all protected by the same kinds of guns they want to ban for everyone else.
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U.S.A. – New York Attorney General Letitia James has taken legal action against Mean Arms, a Georgia-based gun accessory manufacturer, for their alleged involvement in the illegal possession of assault weapons in New York. The lawsuit follows the tragic incident in Buffalo, where a shooter used Mean Arms’ magazine lock, known as the MA Lock, to replace magazines in his AR-15 and carried out a mass shooting that claimed the lives of 10 individuals.
According to the lawsuit, Mean Arms deceptively promotes the MA Lock as a device that makes weapons compliant with New York’s gun laws. However, it is alleged that the lock can be effortlessly removed, allowing the shooter to add 30-round detachable magazines to the firearm used in the massacre. The Attorney General argues that Mean Arms’ marketing practices and instructions on how to remove the lock contribute to the illegal possession of assault weapons in the state.
Attorney General James danced in the blood of the Buffalo shooting, calling it “one of the darkest days in the history of New York and the nation.” While dramatically claiming that the harm caused cannot be undone, and she aims to seek “justice” for the lives lost by the acts of a madman by now pursuing legal action against Mean Arms.
The NY lawsuit seeks several “remedies”, including a halt to Mean Arms’ operations in New York, restitution, damages, and civil penalties for the company’s alleged violations of state laws. Moreover, the Attorney General intends to force Mean Arms to issue corrective statements regarding the misleading claims made about the MA Lock.
Mean Arms’ MA Lock is designed to lock a detachable magazine in place on a semiautomatic rifle using a shear bolt mechanism. However, the New York Attorney General’s office found that the company provides instructions on how to easily remove the lock on the packaging itself. Online videos also demonstrate the removal process, which involves using a #2 speed out drill bit and a power drill.
The lawsuit reveals that the Buffalo shooter had purchased a semiautomatic rifle with the MA Lock installed and a 10-round magazine in January 2022. Using the common tools and a power drill, he removed the lock, enabling him to attach multiple illegal, under New York law, 30-round detachable magazines. This modification allowed the shooter to continue firing 30 rounds without reloading, as would be the case with the NY arbitrary number of 10 rounds, and according to the AG, that somehow contributed to the increased “lethality” of the attack.
Attorney General James’ legal bullying of Mean Arms is part of her ongoing efforts to claim she is doing something to curb “gun violence” and to force “responsible gun safety laws” on New York. In recent months, her office has wasted taxpayer monies on a statewide gun buyback program and cracked down on online ammunition sellers for “illegal” shipping.
While the lawsuit claims to hold Mean Arms accountable, it is worth noting that laws like New York’s, banning so-called high-capacity magazines have faced legal challenges. Various federal courts, including the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, have ruled such bans to be unconstitutional, citing the Second Amendment right to bear arms.
The lawsuit against Mean Arms, however, underscores the Attorney General’s commitment to doing the dirty work of gun banners. The legal action has garnered support from advocacy groups like Everytown for Gun Safety, as well as local leaders, including U.S. Representative Brian Higgins and Buffalo Mayor Byron W. Brown.
By Fred Riehl and AI technology. Note: This article was generated using AI technology and may contain some automated content and analysis.
I guess Memphis, Tennessee city council members haven’t gotten any smarter since I left town. Not even smart enough to ask someone with a little knowledge firearms and law for some help.
The council is preparing a couple of gun control referendum questions. Since Tennessee is a firearms preemption state, that seems to be asking for trouble right off. But they acknowledge that, and said, What the hell; why not?
Memphis City Council to consider gun restrictions, but state law could preempt change
Memphis City Council members are poised to consider Tuesday approving two ballot referendums that would allow Memphians to vote on whether handguns should be banned in city limits without permits and whether the sale of assault rifles should be banned in the city.If approved by city council members and then the voters, those ordinances would directly contradict state law.
The proposed language of the referendum questions is interesting… in a morbidly amusing way.
“Shall the Charter of the City of Memphis be amended to read:
1. No person shall be allowed to carry a handgun in the City of Memphis without possessing a valid handgun carry permit.
2. No person shall be allowed to carry, store, or travel with a handgun in a vehicle in the City of Memphis without possessing a valid handgun permit.”
Aside from state preemption law, that runs afoul of federal law: 18 USC 926A. I suspect active enforcement of that one — what; checkpoints on I-40 and I-55? — would cost Memphis taxpayers quite a few million dollars in lawsuit settlements.
Next up, we have this gem.
“Shall the Charter of the City of Memphis be amended to read:
1. Hereafter, the Commercial Sale of Assault Rifles within the City of Memphis is unlawful and is hereby prohibited.
2. The provisions of this Chapter shall not apply to the Commercial Sale of Assault Rifles to:
-insert the usual law enforcement and military exceptions-
Huh. “Assault rifles;” not some vague, undefined “assault weapon.” I am pleased to see that question 2 leaves AR-pattern firearms (like the actual AR-15) alone. But given the restrictions of the National Firearms Act of 1934, I really don’t see much point in it. Lawful transfers of machine guns already require background checks, taxes, and long delays; whether a commercial sale or private. Oh, and a lot of money for the gun itself.
No, not too bright at all. But then, they do still have a Ford on the council. I think Edmund, Sr. is the one who called for blacks to rise up, riot, and destroy the city that one time.
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Conservatives hail Daniel Penny as ‘hero’ after killing man on subway
Conservatives hail Daniel Penny as ‘hero’ after killing man on subway© David Dee Delgado/Reuters
In the nearly two weeks since Daniel Penny was recorded killing Jordan Neely on a New York City subway with a minutes-long chokehold, the 24-year-old Marine Corps veteran has faced calls to be arrested, been denounced as a vigilante by activists and been labeled a “murderer” by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.).
But in the lead-up to the Manhattan district attorney’s office charging him with second-degree manslaughter, Penny has found a groundswell of financial and online support from high-profile Republicans such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Fox News personalities and conservatives on Elon Musk’s Twitter. Many of them have rallied around Penny and hailed the veteran as a “hero” and “good Samaritan.”
“We stand with Good Samaritans like Daniel Penny,” DeSantis tweeted Friday night. “Let’s show this Marine … America’s got his back.”
“The Marine who stepped in to protect others is a hero,” tweeted Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.).
A legal-defense fund set up by Penny’s attorneys on a crowdfunding site that has hosted fundraisers for defendants in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection and Kyle Rittenhouse had raised more than $1 million as of Saturday afternoon. Most of the money has come from anonymous donors thanking him for what he did and agreeing with his lawyers’ statement that Penny never intended to harm Neely, 30.
The right-wing response to the case suggests that Republican lawmakers and pundits could make Penny into the latest conservative talking point.
In the process, conservatives and right-leaning media outlets have described Neely — a Black homeless man who authorities say was described by witnesses as acting in a “hostile and erratic manner” — as “unhinged” and with “a long history of violent crime.” The political right has seized on police statements that Neely had 44 previous arrests for offenses such as assault, disorderly conduct and fare evasion. (Authorities have not confirmed Neely’s record for The Washington Post.) Fox News host Greg Gutfeld said the manslaughter charge against Penny was “pro-criminal” and “anti-hero.”
Greene went one step further.
“Jordan Neely was a violent criminal who should have been behind bars,” she wrote on Twitter on May 6. Her tweet was liked by Musk, who also liked a Twitter poll from another user asking, “Did Jordan Neely deserve what happened to him?” (More than two-thirds of those who voted in the poll said, “Yes, he had it coming.”)
Andre Zachery and Mildred Mahazu, father and aunt of Jordan Neely, a man whose death has been ruled a homicide by the city’s medical examiner after being placed in a chokehold on a subway train by Daniel Penny, walk on the day of a news conference in New York City on Friday. (REUTERS/Brendan McDermid)© Brendan Mcdermid/Reuters
The political right’s embrace of Penny — whose New York voter registration in 2016 listed his party affiliation as “Conservative” — is an attempt to take the legal case against him out of the courtroom and onto television, social media and the fundraising circuit, experts told The Washington Post.
“Penny’s case has been injected into the bloodstream of partisan politics,” said Matt Dallek, a professor of political management at George Washington University. “A lot of conservatives can point to vigilantes like him and say, ‘They’re standing between us and the mob.’ It fits into a political narrative, and people like Penny are appropriated, whether they want to be or not.”
Steven M. Raiser, one of Penny’s attorneys, did not immediately respond to a request for comment Saturday regarding the right-wing support his client has received.
Daniel Penny charged with manslaughter in Jordan Neely’s subway chokehold death
Penny, of Long Island, was arraigned Friday on a charge of second-degree manslaughter and was released on a $100,000 cash bond. His next court appearance is scheduled for July 17. If convicted, Penny could face five to 15 years in prison.
“Jordan Neely should still be alive today, and my thoughts continue to be with his family and loved ones as they mourn his loss during this extremely painful time,” Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg (D) said in a statement.
The Neely family’s attorneys said they are seeking a grand jury indictment, telling reporters that Penny “didn’t care about Jordan” when he placed him in the fatal chokehold. Penny’s attorneys have argued that their client acted in self-defense and “could not have foreseen [Neely’s] untimely death.”
The conservative response to Penny’s actions has drawn comparisons to Rittenhouse, who was acquitted on all charges after killing two people and wounding a third during unrest related to a police shooting in Kenosha, Wis., in 2020, said Jon Marshall, an associate professor at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism who has studied the relationship between presidents and the press. Rittenhouse has been championed by conservatives, with Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk and others calling him a “hero.”
“What we’re seeing now for Daniel Penny after he killed Jordan Neely is that he fits within a long, ugly history of some media and politicians glorifying vigilante violence,” Marshall said. “There’s a history of the ‘us vs. them’ narrative, and the ‘us’ is besieged and under great threat, and that’s what justifies these acts of great violence.”
Experts say it’s a narrative among conservatives that has helped fuel the online fundraiser for Penny’s legal-defense fund. Penny’s attorneys set up the fundraiser on GiveSendGo, a Christian crowdfunding site created after the site GoFundMe removed far-right campaigns that went against its terms of service. GiveSendGo has hosted campaigns for Rittenhouse, Capitol riot defendants and the “Freedom Convoy” — a group of truckers in Ottawa in 2022 that protested a rule requiring cross-border drivers to be vaccinated.
When Penny was charged with manslaughter on Friday, the campaign raised about $600,000 on that day alone, Jacob Wells, the CEO and co-founder of GiveSendGo, told The Post. Donors are giving an average of about $700 per minute to the fundraiser, he added. Rittenhouse’s campaign raised about $630,000 between August and November 2020, Wells said, and the convoy campaign’s record campaign raised nearly $10 million.
Penny’s $1 million crowdfunding campaign is already among the highest totals in the history of GiveSendGo.
“Daniel Penny and his legal team came to GiveSendGo first because they know, as a platform, we stand for people’s right to a fair and due trial,” Wells said. “I think it’s appropriate in this moment in time when social media is amplifying people’s voices significantly, it’s all the more reason why defendants need access to a rigorous defense and funds to afford that rigorous defense.”
At least 20 donors had given $1,000 or more to Penny’s GiveSendGo campaign as of Saturday afternoon.
“Thank you for protecting the citizens that day,” wrote an anonymous donor who gave $10,000, the largest single donation.
Another anonymous high-dollar donor wrote that Penny “had the bravery to stand up and do the right thing,” adding of Neely’s death: “No tears for the [man] who died.”
The financial support Penny’s legal team has received is due, in part, to the coverage of right-leaning media outlets and Republican politicians using his case to score points on the latest front of the culture war, experts say.
The beginning of the conservative media response to Neely’s death and Penny, whose name was not immediately known to the public, came when the New York Post described Neely as “unhinged” in its first story on the May 1 killing. It continued during Fox host Sean Hannity’s show on May 4, when the Fox News host described Neely as “a mentally ill homeless guy with a long history of violent crime.” After saying the Marine Corps veteran had “subdued” Neely, a member of Hannity’s audience exclaimed, “Woo!”
When police said Penny, who is White, was initially taken in for questioning and released without charges, protesters filled the subway system and demanded that the man who killed Neely be arrested. Kayleigh McEnany, a White House press secretary in the Trump administration who is now a Fox News host, scoffed at the protesters’ chants for justice, saying on May 5, “Well, at least they have rhythm.” Her co-hosts laughed off-screen.
Other conservative outlets such as One America News have had segments asking whether Penny “should be prosecuted or honored.” The Wall Street Journal’s conservative-leaning editorial board made the case against charging Penny, describing him in a Friday headline as “the Subway Samaritan.” Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) gave Penny a similar nickname — “Subway Superman” — on former president Donald Trump’s Truth Social platform.
Marshall, the Northwestern professor, noted that Penny’s case pointed to a history in which U.S. politicians have used crime and fear of crime to their own advantage, capitalizing on moments of division to strike a chord with their bases. Experts cited Trump as a recent example. They also emphasized how DeSantis, who is expected to seek the 2024 Republican nomination for president, exemplified this practice when he tweeted his support of Penny, saying the country must “take back the streets for law-abiding citizens.”
“Politicians speak about them and promote them long before the cases go to trial,” Marshall said. “In a prior generation, it would have taken weeks to build up to this point. Now, it can build up to this point in a matter of minutes, and people can jump to conclusions quickly and can make assumptions before the facts are known.”
On Twitter, Musk’s paid verification program has boosted the reach of conservative and far-right voices, which have called for Penny to be given a medal and said the manslaughter charge amounted to “a travesty.” Musk has called protests of Neely’s killing “disingenuous,” and he liked a tweet calling Neely “worthless.”
Experts agree that the emotionally charged atmosphere surrounding Penny’s case will persist into the summer.
“It’s a drumbeat that has begun,” Dallek said. “The dynamic that suggests that Penny is a victim of some sort of injustice and being unfairly persecuted, those cries will only grow in volume.”
___________________________________________________ But then its from the The Washington Post. So what can I tell you?Grumpy