Your Black Muslim Bakery Tried to Steal $22 Million, But Isn’t Killing People Anymore
No thanks to Kamala Harris.
Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is an investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical Left and Islamic terrorism.
Most bakeries kill people with fattening sugary sweets. Your Black Muslim Bakery was a health food bakery with no sugar, fats or food coloring according to the guidance of the Koran.
It had other ways of killing people.
Since Your Black Muslim Bakery opened in the sixties it has not only racked up a bigger body count than most bakeries, but could give a decent Mexican cartel a run for its money. When its members weren’t assaulting black restaurant owners for serving pork or black storekeepers for selling liquor, they were torturing, killing, raping, and politicking their way across Oakland.
Your Black Muslim Bakery is an Oakland institution. Or a crime ring with Democrat ties.
On the one hand there are the rapes, kidnappings, frauds, and murders. On the other are Senator Kamala Harris, Rep. Barbara Lee, and other pillars of the Democrat establishment.
Unlike most bakeries, Your Black Muslim Bakery isn’t boring. It’s a soap opera of crime.
A decade ago, the body of Waajid Aliawaad Bey, the head of Your Black Muslim Bakery, was found buried under a tarp in the hills. His decomposing corpse had been there for months. While some proposed that the bakery boss had died of natural causes, the tape around his body indicated that he had met with the fate of so many of the bakery’s health food aficionados.
Every bakery can encounter a little bad luck, but then his successor, Antar Bey, was shot to death on Martin Luther King Jr. Way. Bey was the son of Yusuf Bey, Your Black Muslim Bakery's founder, who died after being busted for raping one of his foster daughters, in keeping with the teachings of the Koran which forbid sweets, but legalize child abuse. Authorities first suspected something was wrong when the girl, at the age of thirteen, gave birth to another Yusuf baby.
But Bey, who had sired 42 children, could not afford to be picky about who he sired them with.
Antar Bey had been linked to the murder of Chauncey Bailey, a black Oakland Post reporter who had been writing about the less than sweet shenanigans at Your Black Muslim Bakery.
Bailey was murdered by Devaughndre Broussard, one of the few thugs and psychopaths associated with the bakery who hadn't taken the last name 'Bey', who had been paroled by Kamala Harris. Had Kamala done her job, Bailey might still be alive and doing his job.
But Kamala was hardly alone in catering to the homicidal bakery which doubled as a Democrat political organization. Your Black Muslim Bakery wasn’t just a bakery, it was also an Islamic cult. And it wasn’t just a bakery, a cult, and a crime ring: it was also a political movement.
Governor Jerry. Brown, a politician who knew the value of good health food, stopped by the bakery. It was only fair. He had spent plenty of time with Jim Jones and his murderous cult.
And when Yusuf Bey wasn’t fathering and raping children, he was running for public office.
Bey, whose Your Black Muslim Bakery was a splinter group of The Nation of Islam, kicked off his campaign by inviting Khalid Muhammad, who had been kicked out of the Nation of Islam for being too antisemitic, to call out, “We got to see some white folks die sometime.”
Obviously, the Islamic child rapist was running on a platform of racial healing.
In response to complaints from the Jews, Bey declared that "they're not worthy of being hated."
That’s probably the nicest thing a black Muslim leader has ever said about the Jews.
But Bey wasn’t just a crank. As the East Bay Express noted, “members of the Bey family have cultivated connections in city government, the political establishment, and the press.”
When Your Black Muslim Bakery faced bankruptcy after a long string of crimes and the health department had shut down the non-sweet shop over rat droppings, California Democrats rushed to its defense.
Your Black Muslim Bakery "has established itself as an integral part of the community, and its loss would be distressing to untold numbers of Oakland citizens" Mayor Ron Dellums wrote.
Rep. Barbara Lee wrote her own letter in support of the death bakery, which she later recanted.
“Congresswoman Lee considers the bakery to be an asset and an institution of the community and has offered her assistance in facilitating the resolution the issues with the Internal Revenue Service," a Your Black Muslim Bakery filing claimed.
Meanwhile, the Bey crime family was being kept afloat with government contracts and loans for everything from providing security to running fictional businesses and non-profit organizations.
All of that happened over a decade ago. Your Black Muslim Bakery went out of business, but its homicidal spirit lives on, and the crimes linked to the institution never actually stopped.
Two years ago, Faheem Bey was arrested for arson in Oakland. The construction worker had been promoting his work by boasting, "I'm just letting you know so you don't have to hire the Asian or the Mexican."
And when the Paycheck Protection Program, a giant wheelbarrow of money, rolled out, members of the infinite Bey clan, most of whom were not actually fathered by Yusuf, were on it.
Sharieff Dahood Bey has now been charged with trying to rip off the PPP program for $22 million. When the FBI came, Bey, an ex-con, tried to flush his records down the toilet.
“This is a no loss paper crime," Bey's lawyer argued.
That wouldn’t be much of a defense ordinarily, but for a Your Black Muslim Bakery leader, the abscence of child rape, torture, murder, and kidnapping makes it an almost philanthropic act.
Bey had founded a Your Black Muslim Bakery spinoff and served as its minister, while claiming to be a Harvard grad, an FBI agent, and demanding to be addressed as “Mr. Pasha.” All of that was less illegal than the millions in fraudulent government contracts that sent him to prison.
Even though he was sentenced to five years in prison in 2015, he got out, and was at it again.
While the $22 million fraud allegation sounds serious, Dahood Bey has reformed. If you take the long view. A decade ago, he had been put on trial for allegedly torturing a member of Your Black Muslim Bakery for disrespecting the memory of the hate bakery’s child raping founder.
Members of Your Black Muslim Bakery beat the man, then threatened to pull out his tongue and teeth with pliers. The jury however failed to reach a verdict. Meanwhile, as The Mercury News noted, “He has twice threatened to kill people, including the mother of one of his children.”
Violence involving the cult cum bakery cum crime ring has also continued more recently.
All of this barely scratches the surface of the frauds and crimes associated with the Nation of Islam spinoff group. The tale of front groups and assaults is all but endless. Its workers attacked police, its leaders spewed racist death threats, and terrorized the black community. There was torture with hot knives, women were kidnapped, and children were abused.
Meanwhile, Your Black Muslim Bakery was winning contracts to protect abused children.
And when foster children complained to social workers about being raped and abused, their complaints were buried by a Democrat establishment in bed with Your Black Muslim Bakery.
"The leadership you provide should be an inspiration to all concerned over the city's future," Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata wrote to Yusuf Bey.
The Democrats in the State Senate even honored Bey with his own resolution.
Some of the Democrats, like Alameda County Supervisor Keith Carson, who vouched for one of the Bey crime clan, are still in office. “Politicians were in bed with Mr. Bey and would do everything they could to garner his support,” one anonymous source claimed.
And so Your Black Muslim Bakery, like a crumb stuck between two teeth, never goes away.
There is always another generation of ‘Beys’, vicious thugs, charismatic leaders, ex-cons, who take on the name and the role, finding dumber thugs to serve them and women to abuse, preaching about racism, the evils of the white man, the original superiority of the black man, shaking hands with local politicians, scoring government contracts, and getting arrested.
But at least no one was killed, tortured, or raped in the alleged $22 million PPP fraud.
Breonna Taylor: Anatomy of A Racial Hoax
How Oprah Winfrey and Black Lives Matter are colluding in a plot to perpetrate a social injustice.
Breonna Taylor was a 26-year-old emergency-room medical technician. Her death on March 13, 2020 at the hands of Louisville, Kentucky police officers became a marquee case for the Black Lives Matter movement. One of the most celebrated figures in American life, Oprah Winfrey, took up Breonna’s cause and bought 26 giant billboards – each one representing a year of her short life. The billboards featured Taylor’s image and the words: “Demand that the police involved in killing Breonna Taylor be arrested and charged.”[1] A website called UntilFreedom.com, describing itself as “an intersectional social justice organization rooted in the leadership of diverse people of color to address systemic and racial injustice,” joined Oprah in carrying out the initiative.[2]
In addition to the billboards, Oprah put Taylor’s photo on the cover of her best-selling monthly magazine “O,” which had featured Oprah herself on the cover of every issue since its inception twenty years before.[3] For this special issue, Oprah wrote a moving editorial tribute to Breonna’s life, which contained this account of the incident that ended her life: “We know how Breonna died. March 13. Louisville police storming into her apartment in the middle of the night. No uniforms. No ‘This is the police!’ Terrifying Breonna and her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker.”[4]
Well, not exactly. Along with other sources available, the CNN account to which Oprah provided a link, tells a more complicated story.[5] The raid on Taylor’s apartment was one of five taking place that night, all of them included as suspected distribution centers for a crack cocaine dealer named Jamarcus Glover.[6] Glover had been Taylor’s boyfriend two years previously, and she had kept in touch with him. According to The New York Times, after they first became a couple in 2016, Taylor agreed to rent a car for Glover and ended up interviewed in a murder investigation. A man was found shot to death behind the steering wheel of that car, and drugs were also found.[7] Yet Taylor kept up her close relationship with the drug dealer and continued to provide valued services to his drug operation.
Drawing on the Times investigation, former prosecutor Andrew McCarthy summarized the continuing relationship: “In the years that followed, Glover was repeatedly arrested on drug charges, and Taylor arranged bail for him and one of his confederates on at least two occasions. Weeks before the fateful March 2020 raid, when Glover was in custody after yet another arrest, they were recorded exchanging intimacies on the phone. After that, police surveillance established that Glover continued to make regular trips to Taylor’s apartment, and Taylor herself was seen outside a house that investigators say was part of the drug trafficking operations.”[8]
Taylor’s car was seen in the vicinity of a “trap house” associated with Glover several times, and was photographed in front of that location in mid-February. “Trap houses” are used for storing drugs. Police also had evidence that Glover used Taylor’s address to receive parcels sent by mail. He was seen leaving her apartment carrying a package in mid-January.[9]
Glover was known to make frequent trips to Taylor’s apartment; he had visited her the month before the raid, and he used her apartment as a mailing address where he commonly received packages as well as important documents like bank statements.[10] This led police investigators to think her house might have been part of his drug network.[11] As it turned out there were no drugs in Taylor’s home, but this knowledge came as a result of the raid and therefore too late.
In the hours after he was arrested in a separate raid on March 13, Jamarcus Glover made repeated phone calls from the jail in which he was being held. In those calls, he informed a man that he had exchanged text messages with Taylor the day before about items which he had shipped to her apartment.[12] Glover also said that Taylor was “hanging onto my money,” while he tried to come up with enough cash to post bond.[13] According to Glover, Taylor was holding $8,000 of the drug dealer’s money.[14]
The other man in Breonna Taylor’s life in March 2020 was her new boyfriend, 27-year-old Kenneth Walker, a low-grade drug dealer. After Taylor’s death on March 13, investigators recovered, from Walker’s phone, text messages in which Walker discussed selling “pills” to Hooters waitresses. In another text conversation, he transmitted an image of a bag of marijuana which he advertised as “Cali High Grade Premium Cannabis 1LB.” And in other messages still, Walker offered to sell half ounces of marijuana for $25, or two “zips” – a slang term for “ounces” – for $260. Moreover, in a group chat where Walker discussed plans to rob someone, he asked how much “bread” the intended target had in his possession. When another participant in the chat asked whether Walker would need to do a certain amount of “homework” (i.e., preparation) for the theft, Walker replied that he himself was in the habit of doing his “homework” in advance of “every mission.”[15]
Investigators also recovered photos of Taylor and Walker posing with firearms. In one photo stored on Walker's phone, a smiling Taylor stood next to Walker as he held a Glock 9mm handgun and a Springfield Saint AR-15. The picture was accompanied by a caption that read, “Partners in crime,” along with a cartoon rendering of handcuffs. In text messages that were also recovered from Walker’s phone, Walker stated that his Glock was not registered to him, and that he had purchased it from a “white boy.” Taylor had sent an image of herself holding the AR-15 in a text message to Walker.[16]
At 12:30 AM, on the morning of March 13, three officers appeared with a “no knock” warrant at the door of Taylor’s apartment.[17] However, their supervisors told them to knock anyway and announce that they were police, which they later claimed to have done, although Walker, who was also in the apartment, claims not to have heard them.[18] When they got no response from anyone inside the apartment, the officers used a battering ram to break down the door.[19]
Either roused by the officers’ announcement or by the sound of the breaking door, Taylor and Walker got out of bed and went to the entrance hall. Walker was carrying a weapon that was legally registered.[20] He fired at the intruders in the darkness, hitting Sgt. Jonathan Mattingly in the leg.[21] This triggered a hail of bullets from the officers, six of which hit Taylor, and killed her.[22] Contrary to the Black Lives Matter accusations, social media posts and media reports claiming that Taylor had been shot “in her sleep,” she actually died on the floor of her hallway where she followed her new boyfriend Kenneth Walker.[23]
If this was a racial killing, why not shoot the boyfriend, who was armed and also black, instead of the unarmed woman? It is more likely that the boyfriend jumped out of the line of fire after pulling the trigger, but Taylor did not.
Contrary to the cries of the lynch mob seeking to destroy the lives of police officers and a black Attorney General for doing their jobs, Taylor was not killed because she was black. Nor was she innocent in creating the situation that led to her death. The police were at her house because she was an accomplice to a known drug dealer. One can understand how the heart can lead perfectly decent people to be drawn into indecent situations, but Breonna Taylor had serious warnings – the dead body in the car she had rented for her boyfriend should have been sufficient – to cease providing assistance to a dangerous criminal.
Anyone looking at this incident with hindsight can see multiple parts of the search plan and pre-raid investigation that were faulty and could have been modified to prevent the tragedy that occurred. What is difficult for an impartial observer to understand is how any of the officers, obviously fearful for their lives and acting in the dark, could be held criminally accountable for the death of Breonna Taylor. Amidst the public uproar over the incident, the Louisville city council passed “Breonna’s Law,” legislation that banned no-knock warrants and required officers serving search warrants to wear body cameras.[24] How would either of these reforms have had a positive effect on the outcome?
Many entertainers, celebrities, athletes, and political figures became outspoken champions of the effort to win “justice” for Breonna Taylor and her family. During a post-game interview on June 23, 2020 NBA basketball star LeBron James demanded that the police officers involved in Taylor’s death be arrested.”[25] In the Women’s National Basketball Association, numerous players dedicated their season to Taylor and wore her name on the backs of their jerseys.[26] On June 5, Democrat Senator Cory Booker tweeted that Taylor’s “life was tragically taken by police and we will not stop marching for justice until it’s served for her and her family.”[27] That same day, Senator Kamala Harris lamented that Taylor’s life had been “horrifically” snuffed out, and she urged Americans to “keep up the calls for justice.”[28]
On September 18, Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron announced that a grand jury had decided not to file homicide charges against any of the three officers in connection with Taylor’s death, on grounds that they were justified in having used their weapons to defend themselves.[29] Brett Hankison, however, was indicted on three counts of “wanton endangerment” because several of the shots he fired penetrated the walls separating Breonna Taylor’s apartment from that of the next-door neighboring family.[30] In response to the failure to recommend a homicide indictment, massive Black Lives Matter protests erupted in Louisville, where two police officers were shot, and in numerous other cities across the country.[31]
Attorney General Cameron, a black Republican, was condemned by the left after making his announcement. Among his more vocal critics was rap star Megan Thee Stallion, who appeared on Saturday Night Live and played an audio clip in which leftwing activist Tamika Mallory said, “Daniel Cameron is no different than the sellout Negroes that sold our people into slavery.” Cameron responded by calling it “disgusting” that “someone would get on national television and make disparaging comments about me because I'm simply trying to do my job” – i.e., trying to “stand up for truth and justice as opposed to giving into a mob mentality.”[32]
But a mob mentality is the very air that Black Lives Matter breathes.
Thanks to the Black Lives Matter successful propaganda campaign and the efforts of celebrities like Oprah Winfrey, Breonna Taylor’s family received a $12 million settlement on September 15, 2020, and three officers and a black Attorney General are under fire for protecting the public and defending the facts. [33]
[1] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/oprah-billboards-breonna-taylor-massive-campaign-to-demand-the-cops-who-killed-taylor-are-arrested-and-charged/
[2] https://untilfreedom.com/about/ ; https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/local/breonna-taylor/2020/08/07/oprah-winfrey-placing-breonna-taylor-billboards-around-louisville/3316770001/
[3] https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/31/entertainment/oprah-winfrey-breonna-taylor/index.html ;
[4] https://www.oprahmag.com/life/a33449982/oprah-breonna-taylor/
[5] https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/23/us/breonna-taylor-police-shooting-invs/index.html
[6] https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/local/breonna-taylor/2020/09/23/minute-by-minute-timeline-breonna-taylor-shooting/3467112001/
[7] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/30/us/breonna-taylor-police-killing.html
[8] https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/09/breonna-taylor-case-just-decision-not-to-file-homicide-charges/
[9] Ibid.
[10] Anchorhttps://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/local/breonna-taylor/2020/09/23/minute-by-minute-timeline-breonna-taylor-shooting/3467112001/
[11] Anchorhttps://www.wdrb.com/in-depth/new-court-records-reveal-jail-phone-calls-after-breonna-taylor-shooting/article_7b75f76c-e899-11ea-96de-4bbf9536d026.html
[12] Ibid.
[13] Ibid.
[14] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8816249/Louisville-police-release-details-Taylor-investigation.html
[15] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8816249/Louisville-police-release-details-Taylor-investigation.html
[16] Ibid.
[17] Anchorhttps://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/crime/2020/06/16/breonna-taylor-fact-check-7-rumors-wrong/5326938002/ ; https://www.nytimes.com/article/breonna-taylor-police.html
[18] https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/local/breonna-taylor/2020/09/23/minute-by-minute-timeline-breonna-taylor-shooting/3467112001/
[19] Ibid.
[20] https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/crime/2020/06/16/breonna-taylor-fact-check-7-rumors-wrong/5326938002/; https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8816249/Louisville-police-release-details-Taylor-investigation.html
[21] https://www.nytimes.com/article/breonna-taylor-police.html
[22] https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/local/breonna-taylor/2020/09/23/minute-by-minute-timeline-breonna-taylor-shooting/3467112001/
[23] https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/crime/2020/06/16/breonna-taylor-fact-check-7-rumors-wrong/5326938002/
[24] https://lite.cnn.com/en/article/h_8e5f5f8c9f3d1ba908e1a041fe8159ae
[25] https://www.latimes.com/sports/lakers/story/2020-07-23/lebron-james-anthony-davis-discuss-breonna-taylor-social-justice
[26] https://www.nytimes.com/article/breonna-taylor-police.html
[27] Ibid.
[28] Ibid.
[29] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/23/us/breonna-taylor-decision-verdict.html
[30] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/sep/24/breonna-taylor-protests-louisville-grand-jury-decision; https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/23/us/wanton-endangerment.html
[31] https://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/24/breonna-taylor-case-protests-erupt-after-kentucky-grand-jury-decision.html
[32] https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/06/us/breonna-taylor-louisville-case/index.html; https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/04/entertainment/megan-thee-stallion-snl-daniel-cameron-savage-trnd/index.html
[33] https://apnews.com/article/police-lawsuits-louisville-breonna-taylor-archive-42df1f3ebea59ff20a309b8fe04619df
PERHAPS KAMALA HARRIS SHOULD TELL BLACK PARENTS THAT THEY
ARE FAR, FAR, FAR MORE LIKELY TO BE MURDERED BY A BLACK THAN BY WHITEY! AND
THEN ASK YOURSELVES WHAT BARACK OBAMA AND JOE BIDEN EVER DID FOR BLACK AMERICA
AS THEY SABOTAGED HOMELAND SECURITY AND OUR JOBS FOR INVADING MEXICANS!
Too often, Black parents have
to sit their teenage children down and tell them they may be stopped, arrested,
or even shot because of the color of their skin. Our nation’s history of
systemic racism and use of excessive force must be confronted so we can begin
to heal.
Video: Kamala Harris
Attends George Floyd Protest Outside White House
30 May 20201,195
2:42
Sen.
Kamala Harris (D-CA) on Saturday attended a protest outside the White House as
violent unrest rages across the United States over the death of George Floyd,
the man who died after a Minneapolis police officer placed his knee on
Floyd’s neck while he was handcuffed.
A masked Harris shared a video of herself attending a protest
alongside hundreds of other demonstrators chanting “Hands up. Don’t shoot.”
People are in pain. We must listen.
14.3K people are talking about this
Harris, a contender to be former Vice President Joe Biden’s
running mate, shared the video with the caption: “People are in pain. We must
listen.”
Harris communications director Sabrina Singh said the California
Democrat joined the protesters to advocate for “people to be heard.”
Hours after attending the protest, Harris tweeted:
Too often, Black parents have to sit their teenage children down
and tell them they may be stopped, arrested, or even shot because of the color
of their skin. Our nation’s history of systemic racism and use of excessive
force must be confronted so we can begin to heal.
Too often, Black parents have to sit their teenage children down and tell
them they may be stopped, arrested, or even shot because of the color of their
skin. Our nation’s history of systemic racism and use of excessive force must
be confronted so we can begin to heal.
7,483 people are talking about this
Protests erupted in dozens of cities across the United States
overnight as activists called for justice for Floyd’s death.
Speaking during a news conference Saturday, Minneapolis Gov. Tim
Walz blamed the violence on groups unrelated to the Floyd cause, including
anarchists, white supremacists, and drug cartel participants. He said he plans
to mobilize the National Guard to keep the peace for any further weekend
protests.
“Our cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul are under assault,” he
said, blaming riots on “an organized attempt to destabilize society.”
Walz said he spoke with Floyd’s family, who said the violence
that had overtaken the city was counterproductive to the message activists were
trying to send about the 46-year-old’s death.
Floyd died
Monday after
Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin kneeled on his neck during an arrest
for nearly 9 minutes. There have been daily protests since the incident — which
was recorded on video — calling for the officer and three others present during
the arrest to face charges.
Chauvin was
charged Friday
with third-degree murder and bail was set at $500,000. All four officers,
including Thomas Lane, J. Alexander Kueng and Tou Thao, were fired from the
MPD.
Protesters took to the streets across the country Friday night,
many beginning as peaceful demonstrations that later took a more violent turn.
Several buildings were torched while businesses were vandalized and looted.
The UPI contributed to this report.
Night of rage on Pennsylvania Avenue as protesters clash with Secret Service in front of the White House
https://news.yahoo.com/night-of-rage-on-pennsylvania-avenue-as-protesters-clash-with-secret-service-in-front-of-the-white-house-190027102.html
White House Correspondent
,
Yahoo
News•May 30, 2020
Comment
Something Went Wrong
PP-400-602
WASHINGTON — The barricades in front of the White House were
breached in the wee hours of Saturday morning as the wave of protests that has
swept the nation following the death of George Floyd quite literally hit
President Trump’s doorstep.
The demonstrations led to dramatic clashes involving fists,
shields and tear gas against the backdrop of Trump’s official residence.
Hundreds of protesters marched through the nation’s capital and made their way
to Pennsylvania Avenue early Saturday morning where they engaged in hours of
violent clashes with Secret Service officers before being dispersed with pepper
spray.
Trump addressed the protests outside his home in a series of
tweets on Saturday.
“Great job last night at the White House by the U.S. @SecretService. They were not only totally
professional, but very cool. I was inside, watched every move, and couldn’t
have felt more safe,” Trump wrote.
Hundreds of protesters moved through Washington, D.C., on Friday
evening as part of the nationwide backlash against the killing of George Floyd,
who died after being taken into police custody in Minneapolis. Footage showed
Floyd saying that he could not breathe as Minneapolis police officer Derek
Chauvin allegedly held his knee on Floyd’s neck.
Protesters face off with police outside the White House early on
Saturday, during a demonstration over the death of George Floyd. (Photo by Eric
Baradat/AFP via Getty Images)
Chauvin was subsequently fired and charged with third-degree
murder, but the incident has sparked several nights of nationwide protests,
which came on the heels of other videos of black men being killed by police and
would-be vigilantes.
Trump told Yahoo News earlier on Friday that he supported many
of those who protested Floyd’s killing in Minneapolis.
“Certainly there were a lot of different people and there were
good people too and they were protesting,” Trump said at the White House. “They
were protesting for the right reason. They were protesting in honor of a man,
George Floyd, where something happened that should not have happened.”
But Trump had also tweeted Friday that “when the looting starts,
the shooting starts,” which was widely seen as a threat to
protesters.
Trump later appeared to walk back the tweet, saying it was a “fact, not a
statement.”
Protesters removed multiple steel fences that stood across from
Trump’s residence as the demonstrations crept late into the evening. In total,
the demonstrators removed more than 15 barricades that they had piled up on the
ground in a park across the street from the White House.
The demonstrators squared off with uniformed Secret Service
officers who kept them at bay with riot gear and shields. Around 2 a.m., hours
after the protests in D.C. had begun, officers from the U.S. Park Police
arrived to reinforce the Secret Service. The combined forces of officers who
lined up in front of the White House were subjected to insults from the
crowd.
“I see you for what you are: a racist murderer,” one protester
yelled at police. “You are scared of me. … You have to hide behind a
badge.”
The protester added he was at the demonstration because he was
“tired of the police killing my people for no reason simply for being
black.”
Many of the insults were directed at the Secret Service officers
of color. One man named Eddie said he was frustrated with the more diverse
elements of the officer corps because “they’re standing there not saying
anything.”
“At the end of the day we’re all human. … No matter your color,
at the end of the day we’re all human,” said Eddie, who declined to give his
last name.
Eddie, who wore a button-down shirt and a mask, said he believed
Floyd had been murdered and that he was protesting to honor his memory.
“They killed him, so we ... speak for Mr. Floyd,” Eddie said.
Protesters hurled plastic bottles and bricks at the Secret
Service. Agents, in turn, charged the protesters with plastic riot shields.
Multiple protesters said they were concerned about both potential violence
stemming from the confrontation with police as well as the possibility of being
exposed to the coronavirus.
“This seems exponentially more important than not getting sick,”
a female protester said as she stood within the group crowded in front of the
White House.
Yahoo News asked an African-American Secret Service officer if
he believed the situation could be deescalated.
“Doubtful it could happen,” the officer, who was also talking to
protesters, said. “You kill somebody — how you deescalate that? He ain’t coming
back, right? At this point, what you going to do?”
Some protesters said they appreciated the officer’s apparent
concern for Floyd.
“At least we’re talking now,” one of the demonstrators
said.
“I take this off, I’m still black,” said the officer, gesturing
toward his uniform.
Protesters face off with police outside the White House early on
Saturday. (Photo by Eric Baradat/AFP via Getty Images)
As the protests continued, demonstrators and Secret Service
officers battled in Lafayette Park, which sits across from the White House.
Protesters managed to wangle multiple shields and barricades from the
officers.
Even after the reinforcements from the Park Police appeared on
the scene, protesters managed to take down more barricades and seize multiple
riot shields from officers.
The Secret Service on Saturday did not respond to questions
about the protests, including some about which agencies were involved in
responding. The Park Police also did not respond to questions.
In his tweets about the protests, Trump suggested that
Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser prevented her city’s police force from
responding to the protests.
“On the bad side, the D.C. Mayor, @MurielBowser, who is always looking for money
& help, wouldn’t let the D.C. Police get involved,” Trump wrote.
In response, D.C. police pointed to comments Bowser made in a
press conference on Saturday afternoon.
“I want to be very clear: My police department in Washington,
D.C., will always protect D.C. and all who live and visit here. In fact, that
is exactly what we did yesterday and last night. No one needed to ask the
Metropolitan Police Department to get involved because we were already
involved,” Bowser said.
She added: “D.C. police supported [the] uniformed Secret Service
last night like we have done literally dozens of times at Lafayette Park. [D.C.
police], the U.S. Park Police and the Secret Service coordinated throughout the
evening and night, and at no time was the chief of police concerned about
losing control of protest activity in Washington, D.C.”
The Secret Service and Park Police swept into and dispersed the
crowd using pepper spray at 3:22 a.m. on Saturday. Officers from both agencies
also pushed credentialed press out of the park across from the White House.
“Get the f*** out of the park!” officers said.
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