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RIGHT WING EXTREMISM

74 Year Old Who Sent Over 60 Anonymous Threats of Violence and Death to LGBTQ People Sentenced to Prison

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A 74-year old Long Island, New York retired high school teacher was sentence to 30 months in prison after spending eight years sending anonymous letters threatening to bomb, shoot, and kill more than 60 LGBTQ people, government officials, businesses, and organizations.

Robert Fehring “was arrested in December and subsequently pleaded guilty in February as part of a deal with prosecutors to one count of mailing threatening communications,” Buzzfeed News reports.

“The defendant has a First Amendment right to hold bigoted beliefs; he does not have a right to threaten people based on his bigoted beliefs,” prosecutors told U.S. District Court Judge Joanna Seybert in their 11-page sentencing memo last month. “It is now time for the defendant to face the consequences of his hate-filled conduct.”

Buzzfeed published some of Fehring’s threats, including one sent last year to the owners of New York’s historic Stonewall Inn, considered the iconic birthplace of the LGBTQ civil rights movement.

READ MORE: Fox News Vilified LGBTQ People on Most Days in the First Half of the Year – and Almost Every Day of Pride Month: Report

(Caution: graphic and possibly triggering.)

“ALL OF YOU SHOULD BE SHOT, HUNG, EXTERMINATED,” he wrote. “WE WILL BLOW UP/BURN YOUR ESTABLISHMENTS DOWN. WE WILL SHOOT THOSE WHO FREQUENT YOUR DENS OF FILTH, SHIT, SCUM AND PERVERSION . . . JUST A MATTER OF TIME. PLEASE . . . CATCH AIDS AND DIE . . . JUST FUCKING DIE!!”

Threatening to bomb a Pride parade, Fehring wrote: “THIS WILL MAKE THE 2016 ORLANDO PULSE NIGHTCLUB SHOOTING LOOK LIKE A CAKEWALK.”

49 people were killed in that Florida mass shooting, targeting the LGBTQ and Hispanic communities in 2016.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York detailed more of Fehring’s actions, including sending letters in which he “threatened to, among other things, use firearms and explosives against the recipients.”

“Two such letters threatened that there would be an attack on an LGBTQ+ event in Huntington, New York that would be like the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing.  Another letter threatened that radio-controlled explosives would be planted at a beach club in Long Beach, New York that had hosted a LGBTQ+ event.  In another letter sent in June 2018, Fehring threatened the operators of a water ferry service from Sayville to Fire Island, New York that they should ‘screen everyone coming on board with a metal detector’ and that ‘a thorough search of your boats would be in order.'”

READ MORE: Newsmax Host Says Pride Month Makes Heterosexuals ‘Feel Marginalized,’ LGBTQ People Are No Longer ‘Persecuted’

A letter to a “barbershop purported to be from People Who Hate Gays … and In Particular [n-word] Gays and stated, ‘your shop is the perfect place for a bombing … or beating the scum that frequents your den of [expletive] into a bloody pool of steaming flesh.'”

The DOJ’s press release adds that on “November 18, 2021, the FBI Civil Rights Squad and the New York Joint Terrorism Task Force executed a search warrant at Fehring’s home in Bayport, New York, and recovered copies of letters containing threats, supplies used to mail threatening letters, 20 LGBTQ+ Pride flags that were stolen from flagpoles in Sayville, New York in July 2021, and reconnaissance-style photographs from the Eisenhower Park Pride event.”

“The FBI also recovered electronic devices owned by Fehring that contained internet searches for Fehring’s victims and related LGBTQ+ affiliated events and businesses,” it adds. “Law enforcement officers also recovered from Fehring’s residence two loaded shotguns, hundreds of rounds of ammunition, two stun guns, and a stamped envelope addressed to an LGBTQ+ affiliated attorney containing the remains of a dead bird.”

 

 

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News

Arizona State Senator Proposes Health Study Looking Into ‘Trump Derangement Syndrome’

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President Donald Trump and his allies have long accused critics of suffering from the imaginary ailment Trump Derangement Syndrome. Now, an Arizona state senator wants the local health department to conduct a study on the made-up disease.

State Sen. Janae Shamp introduced Senate Bill 1070 on Monday, asking Arizona’s Department of Health Services to “conduct or support research” on TDS, “including its origins, manifestations and long-term effects on individuals, communities and public discourse.” If the bill were passed into law, the department would have a year to submit a report on its findings.

READ MORE: ‘Monstrous’: Trump Blasted for Blaming Rob Reiner’s Death on ‘Trump Derangement Syndrome’

Shamp’s bill defines Trump Derangement Syndrome as “a behavioral or psychological phenomenon that is characterized by intense emotional or psychological reactions to Donald J. Trump, his actions or his public presence as observed in individuals or groups.” From there, the bill lays out its reasoning—mainly a laundry list of Trump’s accomplishments, including reducing the corporate tax rate by 14%, eliminating “22 regulations for every new one in 2017”, and “affirming biological truth in federal policy to protect family values.”

“Despite these contributions to America’s prosperity, security 26 and values, ‘Trump Derangement Syndrome’ (TDS) has emerged since his 2016 campaign,” Shamp wrote.

“TDS has led to significant social harm, with Americans who 33 support President Trump or his policies reporting discrimination, 34 intimidation or ostracism in professional, academic and social settings, 35 further eroding community cohesion,” she added.

The bill borrows heavily from a House bill proposed by Rep. Warren Davidson (R-OH), according to Tucson.com. It is unknown what chances Shamp’s bill has of passing the Arizona Senate; Davidson’s bill died in committee. But even should it pass, it is unlikely to be signed into law by Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs.

When asked if Hobbs would sign the bill, her spokesperson laughed and told a KTVK-TV reporter “You can quote me on that.”

Image via Reuters

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CORRUPTION

Sotomayor Slams SCOTUS Over Ruling ‘Declaring All Latinos Fair Game to Be Seized’ by ICE

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Justice Sonia Sotomayor had harsh words for the Supreme Court in her dissent in a ruling allowing Immigration and Customs Enforcement to continue to arrest people based on profiling Latinos working low-wage jobs.

Monday morning, the Supreme Court of the United States issued an emergency decision in Noem v. Vasquez Perdomo. The case concerns “Operation At Large,” which deployed ICE agents in the Los Angeles area to car washes, bus stops, farms and other locations believed to be frequented by Latino people who may or may not be undocumented immigrants. On July 11, the Central District Court of California ruled that ICE had to stop Operation At Large until appeals in the case could be heard.

The Court’s ruling contained no official explanation for the ruling, however Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote a concurrence. In his concurrence, Kavanaugh said the law allowed ICE to “‘briefly detain’ an individual ‘for questioning’” if they have “a reasonable suspicion, based on specific articulable facts, that the person being questioned . . . is an alien illegally in the United States.”

READ MORE: Loyalty Litmus Test? Trump Allies Quietly Prep SCOTUS Short List

Operation At Large, he said, represented “reasonable suspicion” to detain someone on the following factors: “(i) presence at particular locations such as bus stops, car washes, day laborer pickup sites, agricultural sites, and the like; (ii) the type of work one does; (iii) speaking Spanish or speaking English with an accent; and (iv) apparent race or ethnicity.”

He added that “apparent ethnicity alone cannot furnish reasonable suspicion” but could be a “‘relevant factor,” and that if someone detained by ICE turned out to be a citizen, they would be “free to go after the brief encounter.”

Sotomayor disagreed that this is what was happening, citing what had happened to other citizens. Jason Gavidia worked at a Los Angeles tow yard that ICE stopped at. Agents repeatedly asked if he was a citizen. They then took his phone, pushed him against a metal fence, twisted his arm, and took away his identification, according to Sotomayor’s dissent.

“Other Operation At Large encounters have included even more force and even fewer questions. For example, agents pulled up in four unmarked cars to a bus stop in Pasadena; ‘the doors opened and men in masks with guns started running at’ three Latino men who were having their morning coffee, waiting to be picked up for work,” she wrote.

“In Glendale, nearly a dozen masked agents with guns ‘jumped out of . . . cars’ at a Home Depot, and began ‘chasing’ and ‘tackl[ing]’ Latino day laborers without ‘identify[ing] themselves as ICE or police, ask[ing] questions, or say[ing] anything else.’ In downtown Los Angeles, agents ‘jumped out of a van, rushed up to [a tamale vendor], surrounded him, and handled him violently,’ all ‘[w]ithout asking . . . any questions.'”

Sotomayor concluded that Operation At Large and the Court’s decision “all but declared that all Latinos, U. S. citizens or not, who work low wage jobs are fair game to be seized at any time, taken away from work, and held until they provide proof of their legal status to the agents’ satisfaction.”

She also condemned the court for not issuing an explanation beyond the concurrence. She alleged that the Court had been eager to “circumvent the ordinary appellate process” when it comes to President Donald Trump and his administration.

“Some situations simply cry out for an explanation, such as when the Government’s conduct flagrantly violates the law,” Sotomayor wrote, adding that Operation At Large and the Court’s ruling clearly violates the Bill of Rights.

“The Fourth Amendment protects every individual’s constitutional right to be ‘free from arbitrary interference by law officers.’ After today, that may no longer be true for those who happen to look a certain way, speak a certain way, and appear to work a certain type of legitimate job that pays very little. Because this is unconscionably irreconcilable with our Nation’s constitutional guarantees, I dissent,” she wrote.

Image via Shutterstock

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law

Arkansas Senator Files Bill to Abolish State Library, Give Education Department Control

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The right-wing war on knowledge continues as an Arkansas state senator filed a bill Thursday to abolish the State Library as well as the library board.

Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-Jonesboro), along with State Rep. Wayne Long (R-Bradford), filed Senate Bill 536 on Thursday. The bill would not just remove all references to the State Library from existing laws, but also put the state’s other libraries under the control of the Arkansas Department of Education.

A previous version of the bill, SB184, would have also shuttered the Arkansas Educational Television Commission, which oversees the state’s PBS stations, according to the Arkansas Advocate.

READ MORE: Clean Up Alabama Wants State to Dump ‘Marxist’ American Library Association

The Arkansas State Library is not just a regular library. In addition to providing information to state agencies and lawmakers, it also distributes funding to the other libraries around the state. Under SB536, the Department of Education would take on all its responsibilities. The State Library is officially a part of the Department of Education already, but it operates as an independent organization.

While the proposal may sound like a shuffling-around of duties, the main thrust of the bill is to allow more direct control over the Arkansas library system by controlling the purse strings. The bill would keep libraries from distributing “age-inappropriate materials” to those under 17 years old and sex education materials from those under 12. Libraries would also have to set up a system where those in the community could request that certain items be banned for minors, according to KARK-TV. Those that don’t meet these restrictions will have state funding pulled.

Earlier legislation filed by Sullivan and passed into law includes Act 242, which ended the requirement for library directors to have a master’s degree in library science, the Advocate reported.  Sullivan, however, was unsuccessful with a proposed amendment to another bill that would strip funding from libraries affiliated with the American Library Association—meaning most, if not all of them. That amendment was rejected this week over concerns the language in it was too broad, according to the Advocate.

The ALA has been a target of right-wing politicians and activists upset with its free speech stance and fights against censorship. Sullivan in particular has objected to a provision in the ALA’s Library Bill of Rights protecting library access for all ages, the Advocate reported. He also called for the state’s chapter of the ALA to be defunded—despite the fact that it receives no state funding.

Image via Shutterstock

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