Philly Hate Attack Mob Claiming Self Defense After Brutal Beating Sends Gay Men To Hospital
Members of a gang of about 12 twenty-somethings are claiming they were acting in self-defense after attacking two gay men in Philadelphia.
On September 11, two gay men were attacked by a gang of about 12 friends in their 20’s. The men were on their way to dinner, the group was leaving a posh downtown Philadelphia restaurant. Police describe them as “a group of approximately 10-12 white male and females all in their early 20’s, clean-cut and well-dressed.” Other reports have described them as “preppy.”
According to multiple reports, the two men, 26 and 28-years old, were asked by members of the group, all friends who had attended a local Catholic high school together, if they were a couple. Not in a nice way.
“Is this your f***ing boyfriend?,” was one of the questions one of the 12 had for the two men. “Are you a dirty fag?” was another.
And then, according to the victims, “I said yes I am a dirty fag and he punched me in the face.”
That was just the beginning.
LOOK:Â Digital Sleuths Use Twitter, Facebook To Help Solve Violent Assault On Gay Philly Couple
“The victims say the group of attackers were yelling homophobic slurs during the beating,” WTXF-TV reported. “Then, they took off leaving one of the men in a pool of his own blood.”
“When I saw 3 or 4 of these guys on me, I turned around and saw his head hit the ground like hard and didn’t come up and I was horrified. I thought he was dead,” said the victim.Â
This image was taken by Caryn Kunkle. “This is what a hate crime looks like,” Kunkle writes on Instagram. “Detectives and media are all over this case, which happened to my two gay friends in Center City, Philadelphia, on Thursday night.”Â
http://instagram.com/p/s5XUVYwVGu/?modal=true
But now, according to multiple sources, the attackers — who have been interviewed but not arrested by police– are claiming the 12 against two fight was self defense.
Philly Mag’s Victor Fiorillo interviewed a witness who saw the attack from his third floor apartment.
Geoff Nagle says there’s no way it was self defense.
“I don’t see how it could be self-defense,” Nagle says. “There were 12 people there. The self-defense thing is a little crazy to me. It wasn’t like a guy just threw a punch to protect himself and ran away. That’s not what happened here. There were multiple punches to the one guy’s face — on both sides of his face.”
Nagle says the entire group was not directly involved in the violence. (Although there were many who stood and watched without calling the cops. Nagle did and notes police were there “within a minute.”)
“There was really one guy that inflicted what I saw. The punches I saw from him were what knocked the one guy out. You see those kinds of punches in boxing matches a little bit, but you don’t see them in person. It really connected. The guy got knocked out cold.”
“I could also hear some slurs like ‘fucking faggot’ and I also heard someone say ‘I am sick of this fucking faggot.’ If you saw the victims, they were small, not as large as the two guys.”
Pennsylvania is one of many states that does not include sexual orientation in its hate crimes law, so even though the police originally characterized the attack as a hate crime, it cannot be prosecuted as one.
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President Donald Trump last week reportedly blasted a group of dozens of U.S. Attorneys for what he viewed as a lack of urgency in pursuing his political adversaries.
The federal prosecutors had traveled to the White House for a photo shoot, The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday, but after Attorney General Pam Bondi introduced them to the president, “Trump criticized them as ineffective, saying the group was making it difficult for Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche to do their jobs.”
The exchange between Trump and the U.S. Attorneys “came a day before federal prosecutors sent grand jury subpoenas to the Federal Reserve on Friday, related to Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s testimony last summer about the central bank’s building-renovation project.”
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Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, was in attendance at the White House event, the Journal reported. The subpoenas reportedly were sought by prosecutors in her office.
One of Trump’s complaints to the U.S. Attorneys was that they were not acting fast enough and had yet to bring a case against U.S. Senator Adam Schiff (D-CA), a top Trump adversary.
The DOJ reportedly has been examining whether Schiff engaged in mortgage fraud, which has become a common allegation against other Trump critics, including New York Attorney General Letitia James. That case was dismissed, and subsequent grand juries have refused to indict her.
“The president criticized some specific prosecutors by jurisdiction and said he felt betrayed,” the Journal added.
On Monday, Pirro appeared to be quickly backtracking in her office’s investigation of Powell. The Federal Reserve Chairman announced on Sunday that he was being investigated by the Trump Department of Justice, sending markets — and prominent Republicans — spinning.
The Daily Beast reported that Pirro’s investigation is “an inquiry that even Republican lawmakers have blasted as a revenge plot against one of the president’s adversaries that threatens the independence of America’s central bank.”
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Image via Reuters
The price of food in grocery stores and restaurants surged to a three-year high last month, even as President Donald Trump on Tuesday insisted he had “defeated” inflation during what he described as “the greatest first year in history” of any president.
“Grocery prices are starting to go rapidly down,” Trump told an audience in Detroit on Tuesday. CNN’s Daniel Dale noted Trump made the claim “on the same day new Consumer Price Index data shows December had the biggest one-month spike in grocery prices, 0.7%, in more than three years.”
Despite the president’s claims, Axios reported that the cost of food in grocery stores rose “roughly 2.4% in December compared to the prior year.”
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“But that masks double-digit price increases for a slew of household staples over the past 12 months, including coffee (+20%), beef (+16%) and candy (+10%).”
Delivering his speech on affordability — which as recently as last month he declared a “hoax” — Trump said on Tuesday, “Under our administration, growth is exploding, productivity is soaring, investment is booming, incomes are rising, inflation is defeated, America is respected again, like never before.”
On tariffs, which experts say could increase prices for American families by nearly $5,000 annually and push nearly one million Americans into poverty, Trump pushed back.
“The evidence shows overwhelmingly that the tariffs are not paid by American consumers,” he said, a claim not supported by experts.
The White House on Monday said that Trump has been “laser-focused on making America affordable” since taking office. Just one month ago, President Trump called affordability a “hoax” perpetrated by Democrats.
Trump: Meanwhile, grocery prices are starting to go rapidly down pic.twitter.com/D5WU4nIVTD
— Acyn (@Acyn) January 13, 2026
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Image via Reuters
As Republicans continue their exodus from the House, a CNN analyst reveals that Democrats hold an advantage in party identification over the GOP, Democrats identifying as liberal just hit a 50-year high, and Democrats — he predicts — will take back the House in the November midterm elections.
CNN analyst Harry Enten reported that “the self identified liberalness of this country is at a 50-year high.” And he noted that “more folks are identifying as liberal than at any point since the Gerald Ford administration.”
In 1976, 30 percent of Democrats said they were liberal, Enten said.
“Look at where we are today: 59 percent — 3 in 5 Democrats — say they are liberal.”
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“This Democratic party is a liberal — it is a liberal party. Fifty-nine percent of Democrats now identify as liberal,” he continued. “That is also a 50-year high.”
Enten noted that “that is not the only good news for liberals.”
“The party ID margin, Democrats versus Republicans. Now get this, in the latest reading according to Gallup last quarter, it is an eight-point advantage for Democrats.”
“That looks nothing like what we saw going into the 2022 midterms when Republicans had a five-point advantage, and of course, took back the House. This is even better than what we saw Democrats had back in 2017, in quarter four, when they had a six-point advantage, and, of course, Democrats easily took back the House then.”
READ MORE: Pirro Backtracks as Powell Investigation Rapidly Goes Off the Rails
“Democrats are gonna take back the House,” he said.
Enten also pointed to the prediction markets, which now say there is a 77 percent chance of Democrats taking back the House in November.
Liberal used to be a four-letter word in this country, but no longer.
The % of Americans identifying as liberal is at a 50-year high. Most Dems now say they’re liberal (59%), a 50-year high too.
Also, the Dem lead on party id is even bigger than at this pt in the 2018 cycle! pic.twitter.com/wriMxybqVG
— (((Harry Enten))) (@ForecasterEnten) January 13, 2026
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Image via Reuters
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Democrat Demands DOJ and DHS Reveal How Many Pardoned ‘Insurrectionists’ Have Been Hired
Warning Signs Flash for GOP as CNN Analyst Predicts House Flip
Trump Declares Grocery Prices ‘Rapidly Down’ as Cost of Food Surges to 3-Year High
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