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23-Year Old Beheaded In Anti-Gay Hate Crime Murder In South Africa

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A 23-year old transgender and gay man was beheaded in his home town of Kuruman, South Africa Friday, in an anti-gay hate crime. Thapelo Makutle, who was crowned Miss Gay Kuruman, was murdered by two men who remain at large. Reports state that police, for reasons of language and training, are not classifying the murder as a hate crime, and do not understand the significance of the attack. On report states the police reject that Makutle was beheaded, but acknowledge his throat was slashed.

Mamba Online reports:

According to the group Legbo Northern Cape, Thapelo Makutle was attacked at his place of work in the John Taolo Gaetsewe district on Friday. The organisation said that there was an argument related to “his sexuality and homosexuality”.

His two attackers are believed to have followed him to the room where he lived and on Saturday cut his throat, decapitating him.

They left his body under a blanket as though he were sleeping.

Makutle, who identified as both gay and transgender, was a volunteer for Legbo Northern Cape. He recently participated in the Kimberley Out In Africa Gay and Lesbian Festival, was known as a beauty queen named Queen Bling and was recently crowned Miss Gay Kuruman.

“It’s so sad. I can’t describe the pain that we are feeling right now,” Shaine Griqua, director of Legbo Northern Cape, told Mambaonline. “We have lost a young, talented, gay man who was open about who he was. The last few days have been like a dark cloud.”

He said that no arrests have yet been made in connection with the murder. He expressed his frustration with the lack of support for LGBT people in the Northern Cape and noted that hate crimes are on the rise in the province.

“We recently had a lesbian stabbed three times in a bar because they said that she should be a woman and not a man. She chose not to press charges because she didn’t want her family involved,” Griqua said.

“The government is not interested in this problem,” he added.

A later report form Mamba Online states:

According to the Mothibistad police, Thapelo Makutle’s body was found lying on the floor of his rented room. It is alleged that the victim has been out with his friends that night. He left unannounced and his friends assumed that he had gone home to sleep.

Shaine Griqua, Director of Legbo Northern Cape, who first reported the attack, said that confusion around the state of the body likely stems from miscommunication due to most people in the area not speaking English as a first language.

Griqua believes that the attack was a hate crime and said that he has information that Makutle was killed as a result of an argument about his sexuality and gender appearance, but police have yet to confirm this, saying that the motive is as yet unknown.

He told Mambaonline that the police in the area are ill-equipped to deal appropriately with a hate crime.

“These people [the police] are not reliable. They don’t even know what a hate crime is. If you ask them if it was related to his sexuality they will say ‘no’ because they don’t understand the context,” Griqua insisted.

Global Post adds:

In a statement, Cosatu’s Northern Cape secretary Anele Gxoyiya condemned “this brutal attack on a young, brilliant and educated soul whose head was chopped off in a hate crime.”

While South Africa is one of the few countries in the world to extend equal rights to homosexuals, and the only nation in Africa to allow same-sex marriage, the reality of life in townships and rural areas for gays and lesbians has been one of often brutal violence.

In a high-profile incident last year, Noxolo Nogwaza, a lesbian activist based in KwaThema township near Johannesburg, was gang-raped and then stabbed and stoned to death, in what the New York-based group Human Rights Watch described as part of an “epidemic” of hate crimes against gays and lesbians in South Africa.

Politics Web published a statement in response to the murder, by Lindiwe Mazibuko MP, Democratic Alliance Parliamentary Leader:

This violent and gruesome assault is yet another reminder that many of our country’s people are still denied the basic rights and freedoms which our Constitution enshrines.

There is a spate of homophobic hate crimes which have recently taken place across our country, including the repugnant and unconscionable crime of so-called “corrective rape” committed against lesbian South African women.

At this time, South Africa needs strong leadership from President Jacob Zuma, and an indication of his commitment to ensuring that all South Africans are able to live their lives free from fear of discrimination or violence.

Unfortunately, the silence from the Presidency has been deafening. This silence is made worse by the fact that President Zuma has in the past shown himself to be prejudiced towards homosexuals.

Last year, the DA welcomed the establishment of a government-led Joint Task Team on a “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Intersex (LGBTI) Intervention Strategy”, established in September 2011, under the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development.

Unfortunately, this task team has yet to make any report on its work.

Meanwhile, the spate of crimes continues.

President Zuma must speak out against this weekend’s horrific murder, and the many others like it, which are in danger of becoming all too commonplace in our country today.

I will today be calling for a debate in Parliament about the prevalence of these crimes in South Africa, and calling on MPs to discuss what can be done by the government to address this ongoing problem.

In addition, I will also be writing to the President to ask what immediate steps his government will be taking to address the violence and intimidation that homosexual South Africans must face on a daily basis.

Such crimes, and the President’s silence on them, cannot be allowed to continue.

Hat-tip: Towleroad

 

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‘I Feel So Bad for Him’: George Conway Trolls Trump Amid White House Attack

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Longtime Never-Trump critic turned Democratic congressional candidate George Conway is mocking President Donald Trump in a campaign video and a social media post while the White House targets him in a highly critical attack.

“Hi, Donald, it’s me, George Conway,” Conway, a conservative attorney, says in his video. “I cost you 88 f —— million dollars, and I’ve only just gotten started.”

“I know you like putting your name on everything from your plane to the Kennedy Center,” he continues. “But the only thing your name is gonna be left on when I’m done with you is the orange jumpsuit you’re going to have to wear in prison.”

“And you see that building back there?” he says over an image of Congress. “That’s where we’re gonna hold your third and final impeachment trial. The one that’s gonna put you away for good. And I’m gonna enjoy every minute of that.”

“We’ve got a lot of serious problems in this country, including, and especially, the price of gas — which is hitting $6 a gallon in some places, and that’s all because of you, Donald Trump. We can’t fix those problems until we impeach you and convict you. And that’s why I’m running for Congress.”

In a statement to Fox News, the White House blasted Conway.

“Lightweight George Conway is a stupid person’s idea of a smart person,” a spokesperson said. “His severe and debilitating disease known as Trump Derangement syndrome has melted his brain and made him crazy in the head.”

Conway is a co-founder of The Lincoln Project and was considered for a post as Trump’s Solicitor General at the start of his first administration. Conway withdrew his name from consideration.

On social media, Conway further mocked President Trump.

“Here’s our TV ad that poor wittle Donnie (@realDonaldTrump) didn’t wike and had to compwain to Fox ‘News’ about,” Conway wrote. “Sad! I feel so bad for him.”

Conway is running for a reliably blue seat in Manhattan.

“Conway, who previously lived in Bethesda, Md., before launching his congressional campaign, faces an uphill battle in the race for the heavily Democratic seat vacated by longtime Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., who is retiring,” Fox News reported.

Earlier this year, Conway warned, “The way things are going in America, it should be clear we don’t have much time.”

“We certainly don’t have three years,” he said in February. “We need to help ourselves by pushing for impeachment and removal as hard as we can and carrying it out as soon as humanly possible.”

 

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A Letter From Florida Has a Blunt Verdict on the MAGA Movement: It’s ‘Dying’

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The Villages in Florida, the largest retirement community in the world, has been home to an extremely active MAGA movement. Roughly seven out of ten county residents voted for Trump in 2024, and its MAGA golf cart parades are legendary.

But Sunday’s parade was sparsely attended, according to a letter to the editor in The Villages News, which declares that the MAGA movement there is “dying.”

Casey Marr writes that they arrived at President Donald Trump’s 80th birthday golf cart parade, found many open parking spaces “and only a few people milling around” 30 minutes before the starting time. At 1:00 p.m., the official start time, “there was certainly no big crowd of cheering people” to welcome the parade of golf carts, which numbered only about 100 and lasted just 20 minutes.

Marr explains that there were two smaller starting places, and says that even if they had a similar number of carts, there would only have been “a pitiful 303.”

“This was advertised as a Guinness World Record challenge,” Marr says. “The record was set on Sept. 4, 2005, here in The Villages with 3,321 golf carts.”

According to Newsweek, Trump’s approval in Florida is 13 points underwater. Nationwide, Trump is 23 points underwater.

“Several states that began his term in positive territory, including Florida, Ohio and Texas, are now net negative,” Newsweek noted. “Deep-red states still form Trump’s strongest base, but many of those margins have narrowed sharply since January 2025.”

The golf cart parade fell short of the record, but Marr notes that The Villages’ “No Kings” rallies have grown “exponentially.” The “latest had two locations with attendance close to 6,000.”

“There is now a ‘Leaving MAGA’ billboard here on U.S. Hwy. 441,” Marr writes. “The ‘Trump 47’ website is down. The MAGA Club almost never holds any events. You almost never see a Trump flag flying anymore.”

Trump, Marr charges, “is using the office to line his pockets. Started a war which spiked gas prices along with everything else. Inflation and unemployment are rising. Aligned himself with murderous war criminals like Putin. He continues to protect pedophilia. This weekend he is desecrating the White House by holding a fighting match like Caligula being entertained by gladiators. The list of horrific things being done, especially in this administration, is endless. And he’s even lost former stalwarts like Marjorie Taylor Greene and Tucker Carlson.”

“Yes,” Marr declares, “MAGA is dying in the country and even here. Florida is purple now again and turning bluer daily.”

 

Image via Reuters 

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Red State Democrats Sound 2026 Warning Over ‘Trump Derangement Syndrome’

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Democratic candidates running in red states and hoping to flip districts are warning against “Trump Derangement Syndrome,” the president’s and his supporters’ name for reflexive anti-Trump sentiment.

“Arguing about Donald Trump, somebody people voted for probably three times, isn’t going to be very conducive to getting things accomplished or reaching some common ground,” Kansas farmer and veterinarian Don Coover, challenging an incumbent GOP congressman in a deep-red district, told Bloomberg Government. Coover “said his party has to dial back the national rhetoric if it wants to compete in Trump-friendly places.”

Andrew Sneed, who is challenging a GOP incumbent congressman in a deep red Alabama district, told Bloomberg, “If we make this election about President Trump in my district and in districts like this around the country, we’re going to lose.”

Democrats hope to retake the House majority, and have targeted 25 GOP-held seats.

U.S. Rep. Tom Suozzi (D-NY) urged Democrats to focus on the issues, such as affordability, and not on Donald Trump.

“It’s less about him than the fact that he’s not paying attention to the issue of affordability,” Suozzi told Bloomberg. “It’s not about Trump. It’s not about Trump derangement syndrome, and it’s not about his sometimes interesting behavior. It’s about policies that affect peoples’ lives.”

U.S. Rep. Laura Gillen, a vulnerable New York Democrat who is being targeted by the House GOP’s campaign arm, “said she is focused on touting her bipartisan work across the aisle, keeping Trump’s name at bay.”

“My messaging has been focused on what I am doing to try and make life more affordable,” Gillen told Bloomberg. “I ran for Congress and said I’d work with anyone from any party to get things done.”

Some warn that campaigning against Trump directly could backfire, especially should the president’s low approval numbers rebound.

Bloomberg notes that Republicans are targeting 29 Democrats, including 23 incumbents who represent voters in districts Trump won.

Democratic incumbents and candidates have stated their messaging plainly. The Republican National Committee is  accusing them of “TDS.”

“Voters want secure borders, lower prices, safer communities, and a strong economy, not Trump Derangement Syndrome,” RNC spokesperson Kiersten Pels said in a statement. “Americans are seeing through the Democrats’ tired strategy of attacking and vilifying President Trump and his supporters.”

 

Image via Reuters 

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