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      Lindsey Graham calls reports of Mark Robinson’s ‘black Nazi’ posts ‘beyond unnerving’

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      The senior Senate Republican Lindsey Graham has said reports that the North Carolina Republican candidate for governor, Mark Robinson, calling himself a “black NAZI!” in posts on the porn forum Nude Africa a decade ago are “beyond unnerving” and should see him end his political career if proven true.“If they’re true, he’s unfit to serve for office,” the long-serving South Carolina senator said Sunday. “If they’re not true, he has the best lawsuit in the history of the country for libel.”But Graham stopped short of calling for Robinson, who has denied claims made by CNN that the incendiary entries on the forum are his own, to step down from his bid for the state governorship or that Donald Trump, who has called Robinson “Martin Luther King on steroids”, should drop his endorsement of the candidate.“I think what’s going to happen here is that he deserves a chance to defend himself,” Graham said. “He’s claiming they were artificially created.”Graham advised Robinson, who has a history of controversial and racist statements, to “hire me the best lawyer I could find. I’d sue the hell out of CNN, because what they’re saying about him is just unbelievable.”But Graham said Robinson “needs to do more … he has a right to defend himself. He has an obligation to defend himself. This is hanging over his campaign.” But he said he did not think that the Trump protegee’s comments “hurt Trump”.“But as to Robinson, he’s a political zombie if he does not offer a defense to this that’s credible,” Graham added.Robinson’s alleged porn site comments dominated the US Sunday talk shows, a day after Trump held a rally for 10,000 supporters in North Carolina without mentioning Robinson or the candidate appearing on stage.“These are not my words and this is not anything characteristic of me,” Robinson, who is the first Black lieutenant governor of North Carolina, has said of the alleged posts. He has said that he intends to remain in the race.Robinson’s opponent, the former state attorney general Josh Stein, told CNN that his opponent’s “vile insults” made him “utterly unqualified” to be governor.“What he said in the posts is in keeping with what he has said publicly on Facebook” Stein said. “He embraced Hitler, he compliments Hitler, he says he’s a Nazi, he buys little toy SS soldiers, he insists he wants to bring back slavery … things that defy comprehension.”One of Robinson’s alleged comments on the site, which was made while Barack Obama was in the White House, included: “I’d take Hitler over any of the shit that’s in Washington right now!” and “Slavery is not bad. Some people need to be slaves. I wish they would bring [slavery] back. I would certainly buy a few.”The controversy over Robinson’s alleged comments come as North Carolina, a typically red state, is a must-win state for Trump if he is to reach the 270 electoral votes necessary to win the White House.Polls show Stein averaging about a 10-point lead over Robinson, but other Democratic candidates on the ballot in the state, including the presidential nominee, Kamala Harris, are in tighter races.How far Robinson’s alleged comments will affect Trump’s support is unknown, but Democrats are hoping to tie them to Republican campaigns locally and nationally.The North Carolina Democratic party chair, Anderson Clayton, has said Robinson is a “standard bearer” amid signs that local Republicans will stand by their candidate. “He represents their party … The rest of the Republican ticket would serve as nothing but a rubber stamp for his agenda,” she said.On Sunday, the former New Jersey governor Chris Christie told ABC This Week that a controversy of Robinson was “predictable” because Robinson’s tenure in public life “has shown erratic, sometimes highly offensive statements over and over again”.But Christie acknowledged that it was a problem for Republicans because “as Donald Trump is your recruiting agent for candidates in swing states, we’re going to continue to get our rear ends handed to us.”Christie said he doubted that other Republicans would be affected, a political concept know as “reverse coattails”, but said Robinson “is starting to get the feel for what it’s like to have been a former friend of Donald Trump’s”.He added: “Donald Trump, from a political perspective, smells rotting flesh better than anybody you’ll ever find … And I bet you, George, before we get to November 5, he’s going to claim to not even really know who Mark Robinson is.” More

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      ‘We are staying in this race’: behind the unraveling of Mark Robinson’s campaign in North Carolina

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      Mark Robinson, North Carolina’s tub-thumping Republican candidate for governor, had been trying to extricate himself from problems caused by his own words long before CNN dumped a truckload of dirt on him Thursday afternoon.Robinson has treated outrage over his ever-increasing litany of racist, sexist, homophobic and antisemitic offense as a badge of honor during the course of the campaign and his term as the state’s lieutenant governor. But CNN’s report tilled his pornographic internet history, unearthing comments that still managed the power to shock.CNN’s report connects Robinson’s name, email address and biographical details to the “minisoldr” persona, where Robinson described himself as a “Black NAZI!”, praised Hitler, described Martin Luther King Jr in racially offensive terms, expressed sexual interest in transgender pornography and described peeping on girls in a public shower when he was 14.“Slavery is not bad,” Robinson reportedly wrote. “Some people need to be slaves. I wish they would bring it [slavery] back. I would certainly buy a few.”CNN refrained from exposing the entirety of its findings because some of it was too disturbing to address in public, the news organization said.Shortly before the report came out, Robinson claimed he would remain in the race. If Robinson did not drop out before midnight, he couldn’t drop out; the deadline in North Carolina would have passed.Knowing how the left has sought the removal of supreme court justice Clarence Thomas for receiving questionable largesse from billionaires, it was characteristic of Robinson to liken his situation to Thomas’s “hi-tech lynching” 33 years ago over allegations of sexual misconduct with Anita Hill. “We’re not going to let them do that. We are staying in this race. We’re in it to win it,” Robinson said.But the bombastic candidate had already been facing a crushing defeat after a mix of resurfaced remarks and poor polling led the national Republican party, and Donald Trump, to back off from their support.Robinson’s apparent interest in transgender pornography stands in sharp contrast to his public opposition for trans rights. Calls for his resignation began in 2021 after comments surfaced in which he described education that discussed trans issues as “child abuse”, LGBTQ+ content as “filth” and suggested that trans people should be arrested for using the wrong bathroom.Robinson’s opponent, the North Carolina attorney general, Josh Stein, has needed to do little more than saturate the airwaves and social media with campaign ads drawing on Robinson’s own rhetoric, while speaking in broad positive terms about the state and his platform and reaffirming his support for reproductive rights.“As your next governor, I will veto any further restrictions on reproductive freedom,” Stein said at a rally in Greensboro for Kamala Harris.Abortion policy is at the center of Robinson’s appeal to the right and perhaps at the center of the electoral disaster unfolding for Republicans in North Carolina as well. Robinson’s pro-life politics have not just been strident but defiant and accusatory.In one recently unearthed video from a church sermon in 2022, he attacks women’s empowerment and birth control. “Why don’t you use some of that building up of your mind and building up of empowerment to move down here, to this region down here,” he said, waving his hand around his crotch. “Get this under control.”Notably, Robinson has admitted to paying for an abortion for his then girlfriend, now wife, in the 80s, something he said he regrets. It is the stridency of his anti-abortion rhetoric that has kept North Carolina’s religious right in his corner.Lorra Parker lives in McDowell county, where Republicans have a three-to-one advantage. She went to hear Robinson speak last week. Though she has a broad set of conservative political interests, abortion policy was critical to her identity as a voter, she said. Even as Trump appeared to vacillate on this issue in the debate, he doesn’t need to be the perfect candidate, just the better candidate.She applies the same logic to Robinson. Now, she’s reserving judgment while the reporting sorts itself out, she said.“Honestly, I’d need to hear it from a source other than CNN,” she said. “I think if he’s not guilty of this, then he should fight to prove that he’s not guilty of this. He’s got time to do that. But he’s been lieutenant governor for four years and they just found this out now? That’s a little suspicious to me.”Robinson’s public appearances and social media posts are a treasure trove of opposition research for Democrats painting their opponents as extremists.“The choice couldn’t be clearer,” reads one ad. “Donald Trump and Mark Robinson, their vision is one of division, violence and hate. Mark Robinson just fights job-killing culture wars … Just a few weeks ago, from of all places a church pulpit, he said ‘some folks need killing.’”On defense from all angles, Robinson went to ground shortly after winning the Republican primary earlier this year, refusing interviews with all but the most stridently conservative publications and broadcasters and largely avoiding public appearances.But a strategy of riding Trump’s coattails and counting on the state’s generally conservative lean had been collapsing as waves of negative press – about his campaign finances, the maladministration of his wife’s government-funded non-profit, and always his incendiary rhetoric – flooded the field.Robinson has not led in a poll since June; even before CNN’s revelations, the withdrawal of Joe Biden from the race in July threatened to turn a close race into a rout. The latest poll from Emerson College shows him losing to Stein by eight points.So, Robinson resurfaced a few weeks ago. He had made tentative steps in small venues far from the scrutiny of big-market news reporters to test messaging that retained as much heat as possible without burning people: cayenne rhetoric, not Carolina Reaper.On 11 September, the day after the Harris-Trump debate, Robinson stepped into the back room of Countryside Barbecue in cherry red Marion, North Carolina, looking for friendly territory and as much of a rhetorical rebrand as he might muster under fire.His stump speech touched on gas prices and teacher salaries and state taxes – policy issues instead of the culture war molotov cocktails about abortion and guns and gay people which launched his career and won him the nomination.But time and again, his attention turned to how the press and his Democratic opponent, had been lighting him up.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“We’ve got a guy named Josh Stein who wants to talk about any and everything except the truth,” Robinson said. “He’s got something about me from Facebook eight or nine years ago, where he cut it off just to play about three seconds of it. He didn’t play the whole thing, something about ‘keep your skirt down.’”Robinson was referring to the wall-to-wall ads playing across the state replaying a Facebook video from 2009 in which he says abortion “is about killing the child because you weren’t responsible enough to keep your skirt down”.“He cut off the part where he said ‘or keep your pants up’,” Robinson said to the conservative crowd last week, for whom that was convincing. Then he suggested that ad and others were deceptive. He called his opponent a liar. He dared the press to report it. He also demanded a debate, which Stein has been refusing.Shades of the Robinson bluster lay under the fresh paint of respectability.He spent almost as much time haranguing the president and vice-president in the mountain towns of western North Carolina as he did his actual opponent.“The same one that was right there riding shotgun with [Biden] while he was doing it was on TV last night talking about how she was going to fix it all,” Robinson said of Harris. “She tore it up, but she can’t fix it. What policy has she ever championed since she’s been in any office that will fix the problems that we’re facing right now?”Robinson has been walking back his previous, strident calls for a total abortion ban in North Carolina. Earlier this year, he argued for a six-week “heartbeat” law limiting abortion. Earlier this week, he argued for the public to “move on” from the abortion issue.In a room packed with church-going Republicans in Marion, he said: “Everybody may have a different opinion on that.“My opinion is this: no matter where that law sits, as the governor of this state, I’m going to fight to save every single solitary life in the womb. It doesn’t matter whether it’s 12 weeks, six weeks, eight weeks, 20 weeks – we’re going to fight for life in this state.In a reference to Trump and his running mate, JD Vance, Ohio senator and author of Hillbilly Elegy, some of Robinson’s road team wore shirts printed with the words “Felon / Hillbilly”.The shirts reflect the tone of Robinson’s race. He has tied himself for good or ill to Trump’s tenor and politics. But even Trump’s team has had enough.According to the conservative Carolina Journal, the Trump campaign has been pressuring Robinson to withdraw, out of fear that North Carolina’s election-deciding swing voters will not just abandon the lieutenant governor but the entire Republican ballot.Citing anonymous campaign sources, the Carolina Journal reported that the Stein campaign leaked the material to CNN, and that the Trump campaign told Robinson that he was no longer welcome at rallies for Trump or Vance. Trump has not mentioned Robinson in the last week. Vance held his first solo rally in North Carolina on Wednesday. Robinson did not appear. His office announced that Robinson had contracted Covid-19.Trump campaign officials denied that they had been pressuring Robinson to quit the race in comments to NBC.The Stein campaign released a terse statement shortly after the CNN piece aired.“North Carolinians already know Mark Robinson is completely unfit to be Governor,” the campaign said. “Josh remains focused on winning this campaign so that together we can build a safer, stronger North Carolina for everyone.”The Harris campaign, however, has gleefully circulated videos with Trump praising Robinson. Trump referred to Robinson as “Martin Luther King Jr on steroids.”Robinson, in comments under his “minisoldr” persona, said: “I’m not in the KKK. They don’t let blacks join. If I was in the KKK I would have called him Martin Lucifer Koon!” More

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      If US Senators are openly Islamophobic, what hope is there? | Representative Ilhan Omar

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      On Tuesday, Senator John Kennedy told the only Muslim American witness during a committee hearing to “hide [her] head in a bag”.The intended purpose of Tuesday’s historic Senate judiciary committee hearing was to bring attention to the rise in hate against Muslim, Jewish, and Palestinian Americans. The rise of antisemitism has sparked many hearings in Congress. In contrast, this was the first hearing since 7 October that addressed hate targeting Arab, Muslim, and Palestinian Americans. Fighting bigotry requires us to condemn it wherever we see it. For far too long, hate speech made against Arab, Muslim and Palestinian Americans goes ignored.The increase in threats, hate speech and violence across the country demands serious attention. Instead, Kennedy used his time to verbally attack the witness, Arab American Institute executive director Maya Berry, for her identity. It was telling that Kennedy along with his Republican colleagues could not avoid actively engaging in anti-Muslim hate speech during a hearing about the rise in hate crimes.In the face of vile accusations, Maya Berry answered Kennedy’s remarks with grace, sensitivity and poise. She used her time to educate the sitting senators on the committee about the uptick in hate that too many communities face daily. As unfair remarks were hurled at her, the American people witnessed the very purpose of the hearing in plain view for all: the normalization of hate speech is alive and well.During Kennedy’s questioning, he repeatedly tried to make his line of questioning about foreign policy in the Middle East, instead of making it about the rise of hate crimes impacting Americans. Kennedy did not get the answers he wanted so he resulted in telling the witness to hide her head in a bag. To be clear, Kennedy’s bigoted comments were unacceptable for anyone, let alone a sitting member of the US Senate. Not only should his comments be unequivocally condemned by every single sitting member of Congress, but his remarks raise serious concerns about the normalization of Islamophobic hate speech in our country.Regrettably, we know that espousing anti-Muslim, anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian bigotry resonates well within the base of the current Republican party. During the committee hearing, senators Cruz, Hawley, Graham and Kennedy were competing for the top bigot award. Islamophobia sells to their base and that is why they remain hellbent on ginning up hate speech at the expense of communities across this country they deem as “other”, including their own constituents. The reality is, Kennedy will face no consequences for his actions because of his power, position, privilege and incompetence. But for millions of Arab, Muslim, and Palestinian Americans across this country, it is imperative that we call out this speech in order to bring needed change and for the safety of those communities.As Maya Berry clearly stated in her testimony, the hateful stereotypes of Arab, Muslim, Palestinian Americans normalized in our media and by our elected officials contribute to the widespread hate felt by millions of Americans. We cannot afford to let Kennedy’s comments slide because this is not a one-off or an isolated comment, it is reflective of a harmful trend.We have seen the tangible consequences of this play out in communities across the country. In November, three college students of Palestinian descent were gunned down in Vermont, leaving one of them paralyzed. Last December, Wadee Alfayoumi, a six-year-old Palestinian American child was brutally murdered in Chicago and his mother hospitalized. Another horrific hate crime happened when a Pakistani American woman was stabbed multiple times in Texas.In Minnesota, we have seen an uptick in anti-Muslim attacks throughout my own district, including residents being shot and physically assaulted, many of the incidents going unreported. During the protests across college campuses, many of the Arab, Muslim, and Palestinian students were unjustly censored, suspended and arrested. Even Donald Trump and JD Vance’s false claims about Haitians in Ohio have resulted in bomb threats across Springfield.Hate-filled rhetoric has dangerous implications. As someone who has been the subject of frequent death threats and offensive Islamophobic speech, I know the harm of hate speech first hand. From former president Donald Trump telling me to go back where I came from, to the outrageous words by sitting congresswoman Lauren Boebert when she suggested I was a suicide bomber, to mainstream media including CNN and Fox News peddling Islamophobic tropes in their coverage – this harmful language not only endangers my life, but the lives of all Muslims and people who share these identities with me. This speech is corroding our democracy, the fabric of our communities, and the future of our country. In the US, we should be better than this.As Berry rightfully pointed out: “Hate against any one group is inseparable from hate against all and hate prevention should be done collectively – in coalition and partnership with all communities affected by hate.” Hate in all its forms should have no place here in the US.Kennedy’s comments were just the tip of the iceberg. It is incumbent upon all of us to call out hate speech whenever we see it because fighting bigotry of any kind means fighting bigotry of every kind.

      Ilhan Omar is an American politician serving as the US representative for Minnesota’s 5th congressional district More

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      ‘Racism is embedded in our society’: how attacks on immigrants in Ohio highlight US disinformation crisis

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      In recent weeks, racist conspiracy theories about immigrants have dominated the election cycle. High-ranking Republicans have doubled down on unsubstantiated rumors about Black and brown migrants, tapping into anxieties that immigrants are responsible for increased crime in US cities.During last week’s presidential debate, Donald Trump echoed a baseless claim that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, were eating pets. “In Springfield, they’re eating the dogs. The people that came in. They’re eating the cats. They’re eating – they’re eating the pets of the people that live there,” the Republican nominee said.And in response to a question about high costs of living, Trump alluded to viral rumors that members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua were taking over a Colorado apartment complex. “You look at Aurora in Colorado. They are taking over the towns. They’re taking over buildings. They’re going in violently.”Both claims are completely untrue.Experts argue that the spread of such disinformation amplifies existing xenophobic beliefs within the American psyche as a means of political gain. “It’s so dangerous when people with a platform are repeating these very fabricated rumors,” said Gladis Ibarra, co-executive director of the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition. “These are very much part of a large coordinated strategy to continue to demonize our immigrant neighbors. It’s undermining the values of our nation and historically what people have said this nation stands for.”Misinformation (inaccurate information that is spread unknowingly) and disinformation (false information that is meant to mislead) are widely shared via social media platforms, despite a push for fact checking and accuracy since the 2016 presidential election. The phenomenon of inaccurate news still occurs at alarming rates as people’s online algorithms are largely driven by their political biases, according to Jeffrey Layne Blevins, a journalism professor at the University of Cincinnati.“[The algorithm] is merely designed to keep users engaged,” Blevins said, referring to metrics such as how long a person looks at content or shares it in their feed. “And what tends to engage most people? Things that outrage them or piss them off.”Blevins added that rightwing figures share disinformation in hopes of “outraging people on the political right”, especially during an election cycle. Such content is accepted as truth by those online who already share rightwing beliefs themselves. “It creates an echo chamber of sorts,” he said. “When public figures who share your political beliefs post content like this – people are more likely to accept it at face value.”Republicans at all levels of government have linked immigrants to instances of violent crime, including drug smuggling and assault. During his campaign for the 2016 presidential election, Trump claimed Mexicans crossing the US southern border were “rapists”, “bringing drugs, bringing crime”. He began the construction of a wall along the border – among other anti-immigrant policies – to deter “large sacks of drugs [from being thrown] over”. During this election cycle, Trump has said that undocumented people are “animals” who are “poisoning the blood of our country”, despite immigrants being significantly less likely to commit crimes than US-born citizens.The demonization of immigrants is a repeated move by lawmakers to secure votes, said Germán Cadenas, an associate professor at Rutgers University who specializes in the psychology of immigration. “Immigration is really not as divisive as some politicians are trying to make it out to be,” he said, as 64% of Americans believe immigration is beneficial for the country. “It’s a tactic that has been used historically to mobilize voters who feel threatened.”For centuries, Cadenas said, politicians built policy around the stereotype that immigrants are a “threat” to US identity and safety. Anti-immigration laws such as the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and the 1924 Immigration Act were among the first to curtail US immigration based on nationality. The Chinese Exclusion Act came largely after high-ranking union members warned of a “Chinese invasion” that would steal white, American jobs. Similarly, US senators advised their fellow legislators to “shut the door” on immigrants as a migrating population would “encroach upon the reserve and virgin resources” of the US, before the passage of the 1924 Immigration Act.Fast forward to the early 2000s, as states such as Arizona passed laws allowing local law enforcement to target anyone they believed was in the country without documentation. Arizona Republicans called arriving undocumented people an “invasion that must be stopped” and a “national security threat”, a political tactic to encourage support of the controversial bill.Politicians also attempt to etch out a voting bloc by passing anti-immigrant policies. “Historically, these stereotypes, these falsehoods, have [then] been used to mobilize voters to elect policymakers who are going to make anti-immigrant laws and policies.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionEven as most Americans have a positive view of immigration, Cadenas said: “Racism and xenophobia are deeply embedded in our society and our psychology.” A study by Cadenas and Elizabeth Kiehne found that white US adults are most susceptible to the core stereotype of Latino immigrants being a threat.“The anti-immigrant rhetoric is less about convincing than about amplifying and strengthening beliefs that are already held,” Cadenas said. “It takes large efforts to unlearn these problematic beliefs and biases.”Disinformation about immigrants has consequences, Cadenas and Ibarra said. “Across the nation, a number of states have an ‘anti-immigrant policy climate’,” Cadenas said, meaning those states pass laws that make the lives of immigrants harder.“A small minority of folks who are threatened by immigration are electing policymakers who are crafting policies that are negative towards immigrants,” he added “These policies trickle down to housing. They trickle down to the way that authorities deal with immigration at the local level. These policies trickle down to healthcare and the kinds of access to health and mental health that immigrants have.”In Aurora, Venezuelan residents of the aforementioned apartment complex have said they feel unsafe after the rumors of a gang takeover and they fear being stereotyped as criminals.Springfield has received more than 33 bomb threats since Trump’s statements at the debate. Its city hall was evacuated, along with some local schools. Springfield hospitals are also on alert, and Haitian immigrants say they have received several threats. “People that are hardworking, contributing to our communities, are not the danger, Ibarra said. “The danger is all of these violent ideologies that are being fueled by the people that repeat these lies, by the people that go on social media and on TV and continue to repeat them.” More

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      Biden, Harris address Congressional Black Caucus: ‘The baton is in our hands’

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      President Joe Biden and vice-president Kamala Harris spoke on Saturday at the Congressional Black Caucus’s Phoenix Awards dinner, bringing a message that its members were in a “battle for the soul of the nation”.Biden highlighted his relationship with the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC), and Black voters.“In 2020, I ran for president to redeem the soul of America, to restore decency and dignity to the office of the president,” he said. “I ran to rebuild the backbone of America, the middle class. And I ran to unite the country and remind ourselves when we’re together there’s not a damn thing we can’t do.”The spectre of Trump, Maga Republicans and the threat Democrats say they pose to the country loomed over Biden’s remarks, and his call to action for those CBC members gathered.“The old ghosts in new garments [are] trying to seize your power and extremists coming for your freedom making it harder for you to vote and have your vote counted, closing doors of opportunity, attacking affirmative action,” he said. “My predecessor calls the insurrectionists who stormed the Capitol on January 6 ‘patriots’, but when peaceful protesters marched for justice for George Floyd, Trump wanted to send in the military, but they wouldn’t go.”Biden continued by pointing to the juxtaposition between his and Harris’s tenure in the White House and that of their predecessor’s. On the theme of unity, Biden once again condemned Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s running mate, JD Vance, who, in recent weeks, has led a rallying cry of baseless, racist accusations toward Haitian-American immigrants in Ohio.“It’s wrong. It’s got to stop,” he said. “Any president should reject hate in America and not incite it. Folks, to win this battle for the soul of the nation, we have to preserve our democracy and speak out against lies and hate.”Towards the end of his remarks, Biden spoke about his time in Congress, during which he served with Shirley Chisholm, the first Black woman to run for president.CBC attenders were jubilant when Harris, also the Democratic candidate for president, walked on to the stage to Beyoncé’s Freedom after the president introduced her as “Kamala Harris, for the people”.Members of Harris’s sorority, Alpha Kappa Alpha gleefully greeted her with their trademarked “Skee-Wee” call.Harris began by highlighting the importance of the caucus. For a November win, she said, the support of the CBC was necessary.“The Congressional Black Caucus has served as the conscience of the Congress and of our nation, and as a proud former CBC member, I know first-hand America relies on the leaders in this room, not only for a conscience, but for a vision,” Harris said.Harris said the CBC’s vision for the future was under “profound threat” and went on to point out the differences between her and Trump while also reiterating her platform, including reproductive rights, building an “opportunity economy”, healthcare and “not going back”.“We actually have a plan for healthcare, not just ‘concepts of a plan,’” she said, referencing Trump’s comments during Tuesday night’s debate.Towards the end of her speech, Harris returned to “joy” and hard work, two of her campaign themes.“Now the baton is in our hands,” she said. “I truly believe that America is ready to turn the page on the politics of division and hate, and to do it, our nation is counting on the leadership in this room.”Harris called on and thanked members of the CBC for their work registering voters and mobilising people to vote. She and Biden spoke during the 53rd Annual Legislative Conference (ALC) or, “CBC week” in Washington, during which Black political and social leaders convene on public policy. The Harris campaign has been working to increase the enthusiasm of Black voters, particularly in key battleground states.“We know what we stand for, and that’s why we know what we fight for,” Harris said. “And when the CBC fights, we win.” More

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      More bomb threats hit Springfield, Ohio, after Trump elevates false claims about Haitians

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      Two hospitals in Springfield, Ohio, were sent into lockdown after bomb threats, police said Saturday, marking the fourth such case in as many days that appears linked to false claims circulating among the far right that Haitian immigrants there are eating domestic pets and wildlife.Saturday’s threats came even after the woman who started the rumors acknowledged to NBC News that they were unfounded and publicly apologized.Kettering Health Springfield was one of the medical facilities targeted, with officials later saying they found nothing suspicious during a search. Another hospital, Mercy Health’s Springfield regional medical center, received a similar threat.A spokesperson with Mercy Health said the hospital has continued to operate and thanked Springfield police as well as hospital staff “for their swift, efficient and caring response”.The bomb threats Saturday came after others had been called in to government buildings Thursday, forcing their closure and causing local schools to be evacuated.“We recognize that the past few days have been particularly challenging for everyone in our community,” Springfield police said in a statement. Police added “we remain fully committed to ensuring the safety and well-being of each and every person”.On Friday, a Springfield woman, Erika Lee, apologized for rumors about Haitian immigrants eating pets that resulted from a post she wrote on Facebook claiming that the friend of a neighbor’s daughter lost her cat – and then found the animal strung up outside the home of a Haitian family.Lee now says she had no firsthand knowledge of the claim. The neighbor referenced in the post, Kimberly Newton, revealed that she also had heard the story from an acquaintance and not her daughter.Lee said she was filled with regret and insists she never intended to put a target on the backs of the Haitian community.“It just exploded into something I didn’t mean to happen,” Leetold NBC News on Friday.Local authorities in Springfield had already debunked the lies even before Donald Trump made the allegation that Haitian immigrants were eating pets during the debate with Kamala Harris on Tuesday. Lee told the outlet she never imagined her social media post would become fodder for conspiracy theories and hate aimed at the Haitian community in Springfield.“I’m not a racist,” Lee said, adding that her daughter is half-Black and she herself is mixed race as well as a member of the LGBTQ+ community. “Everybody seems to be turning it into that – and that was not my intent.”The city of Springfield believes the rumors may also have arisen from a case in Canton, Ohio, where an American with no known connection to Haiti was arrested in August for allegedly stomping a cat to death and eating the animal.Separately, an explanation for a viral photo of a man carrying two geese in Columbus, Ohio, has been made, although it also helped set off the now-discredited rumors about pet-eating in nearby Springfield.The Ohio state division of wildlife told TMZ that the man had been picking up the two geese that had been hit by a car. The agency also reported that there is no evidence that the man is Haitian, an immigrant or that he intended to eat the geese.About 15,000 Haitian immigrants began trickling into Springfield – a city of 60,000 – to work in local produce packaging and machining factories in 2017. They have been in demand at Springfield’s Dole Fresh Vegetables and at automotive machining plants whose owners grappled with a labor shortage in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. More

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      Trump ally Laura Loomer called herself ‘white advocate’, audio reveals

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      Close Donald Trump ally Laura Loomer told a white nationalist conference in 2022 that she considered herself a “white advocate”, according to a recording of the speech obtained by the Guardian.Loomer has come under scrutiny in recent days after being seen accompanying Trump on a flight to the presidential debate on Tuesday, and a subsequent string of racist tweets aimed at Kamala Harris.That caused a political firestorm after Trump’s disastrous debate performance, with Harris emerging the clear winner. In particular, Trump’s raising of false claims around Haitian immigrants in Ohio eating pets triggered outrage and mockery of him.Some observers have placed the blame on Trump’s performance partly due to his recent closeness to Loomer, including being pictured standing with him in his entourage at this week’s 9/11 commemorations.The revelation of Loomer’s comments about being an advocate for white people is likely to further fuel the controversy around Trump’s relationship with Loomer, not least because they are just the latest in a long line of extremist remarks by the podcaster and self-described journalist.Her attendance at the American Renaissance conference was reported at the time by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), but the contents of her speech have not been scrutinized until now.The American Renaissance conference, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, is a venue where “racist ‘intellectuals’ rub shoulders with Klansmen, neo-Nazis and other white supremacists”.Loomer spoke to the conference in November 2022, after losing a Republican primary in Florida’s conservative 11th district that August. To the applause of the audience, Loomer said: “I consider myself to be a white advocate and I openly campaigned for the United States Congress as a white advocate.”Apart from her claim to be a “white advocate”, Loomer’s speech was focused on her grievances with traditional and social media companies and the Republican party, all of whom she blamed for her loss.She claimed that during her campaign, “local TV stations would actually not allow me to have a congressional debate even though every other congressional candidate was able to have a televised debate in their district, because they called me a white supremacist”.Loomer continued: “And they said that I was, you know, too much of a nationalist and too far right, because I openly ran my campaign to the right of the GOP.”She said: “I have been a Republican my entire life, but unfortunately we live in a two-party system, which really just feels like a uniparty, but I’m here to tell you today that the Republican party is no longer rightwing enough for me.”She then struck a hopeful note about a third party. “So perhaps they’re going to be an alternative in the future some day.”Loomer then turned her sights on “Kevin McCarthy and the Congressional Leadership Fund and the Republican party”, saying they had “made such an effort this year to spend hundreds of millions of dollars … to get the Hispanic vote pushing to get the Black vote” while they also “used millions of dollars, by their own admission, to campaign against America First nationalist candidates”.Loomer told the gathered white nationalists that “the top three issues I focused on in my campaign were election integrity, combating big tech social media censorship and election interference, and a 10-year minimum immigration moratorium”.She said: “I was one of the first candidates to campaign in favor of mass deportations in an immigration moratorium and I was the first candidate to campaign on breaking up big tech.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionLoomer’s anti-immigrant rhetoric to the conference echoes Trump’s policy positions. In recent days the former president has repeated his promises to carry out mass deportations, and during the debate he falsely accused Haitian immigrants of eating pets.Loomer told the conference crowd that her positions had “demonized – as I mentioned – as an extremist by even my own Republican party”.But the remarks at the conference hardly stand alone.Weeks earlier, in a podcast recording before the conference, Loomer thanked Jared Taylor, the podcast’s host and conference organizer, for his “white advocacy and being a white advocate and pioneering the intellectual discussion, right around race and demographics in this country”.In March, in her podcast appearance before the primary, Loomer told Taylor that “my district is also the whitest district in the entire state of Florida”, and that she was pursuing “issues of [critical race theory] and anti-white racism and anti-white hatred”, and opposing the “anti-white Christian mentality the Democrats are pushing”.Loomer asserted to Taylor that Democrats were “trying to persecute white people. They’re trying to persecute Christians, the most persecuted people in the world.”Loomer added: “I look forward to being their advocate when I win my race and, you know, get elected as their next congresswoman.”Loomer subsequently lost to Congressman Daniel Webster.Loomer emerged as an anti-Muslim, pro-Trump activist during Trump’s first run at the White House in 2016. She has a long history of controversies, including protesting against a performance of Julius Caesar she saw as anti-Trump, handcuffing herself to Twitter’s headquarters to protest her deplatforming there, and now attacking migrants and Kamala Harris in the wake of Trump’s debate performance, which has been widely portrayed as disastrous for his campaign.The Guardian has contacted Loomer for comment. More

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      Haitian immigrants helped revive a struggling Ohio town. Then neo-Nazis turned up

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      While Donald Trump made baseless, dangerous claims that immigrants in Ohio were eating people’s pets in front of millions of viewers at Tuesday night’s presidential debate, Johnson Salomon, a Haitian man who moved to Springfield in 2020, was watching cartoons with his kids before putting them to bed.He got a text from a friend telling him to turn on the debate. When he saw the headlines about what the former president and Republican nominee in November’s election had said, he was in total shock.“This was a false claim. I couldn’t believe that such a high official could make such a claim,” Salomon said.Trump’s running mate JD Vance, Elon Musk and prominent Ohio Republicans had already spread the false rumors, lying about how Haitian immigrants had been killing and eating people’s pets in Springfield, a blue-collar town of 60,000 people in western Ohio. But the rumors, leaving Salomon and other Haitians in fear of being targeted for violence and discrimination, didn’t start with them.They were initially spread online in August on social platforms used by far-right extremists and by Blood Tribe, a neo-Nazi hate group.Springfield officials and police say they have received no credible reports of pets being harmed by members of the immigrant community, instead suggesting the story may have originated in Canton, Ohio, where an American woman with no known connection to Haiti was arrested in August for allegedly stomping a cat to death and eating the animal.View image in fullscreenBut that hasn’t prevented Republican party politicians from scapegoating Springfield’s 15,000 Haitian immigrants as Trump and others attempt to propel immigration to the center of their fall political campaigns. In addition to Tuesday’s debate, Trump held a news conference Friday in which he rambled without evidence about how Haitians had descended on Springfield “and destroyed the place”.When Haitian immigrants began trickling into Springfield to work in local produce packaging and machining factories in 2017, some thought the new residents could help the city regain its former vigor as a once-thriving manufacturing hub. Once home to major agricultural machinery companies in the mid-20th century, Springfield has lost a quarter of its population since the 1960s.“They came to us for one reason: they were looking for ways to find out how to work,” Casey Rollins, executive director of the St Vincent de Paul Society’s Springfield chapter, said of those who came to the Ohio city from Haiti.“So we got together immigration lawyers and interpreters to figure out how to help them work. We are getting them online and getting them to apply [for work permits]. We wanted workers here [in Springfield] – they want to work.”View image in fullscreenHaitians and immigrants from Central American countries have been in high demand at Springfield’s Dole Fresh Vegetables – where they’ve been hired to clean and package produce – and at automotive machining plants whose owners were desperate for workers due to a labor shortage in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.New Caribbean restaurants and food trucks have opened across south Springfield where once abandoned neighborhoods are now bustling with residents. A popular Haitian radio station has been broadcasting for several years. And every May, thousands turn out for Haitian Flag Day that’s celebrated at a local park.But the glut of new arrivals has also stretched hospitals and schools in the area, angering many locals who resented their presence. The outrage reached a crescendo last August, when an 11-year-old boy was thrown from a school bus and killed after its driver swerved to avoid an oncoming car driven by a Haitian immigrant who didn’t have an Ohio driver’s license.The child’s death fueled anger and racism on Facebook and at Springfield city commission meetings, where public comments about immigration have often run for more than an hour. Locals upset by the growing immigrant community wondered if they were being taken over – if Springfield had become ground zero for the baseless “great replacement theory”.Soon, rightwing extremists seized on Springfield’s unrest.Armed neo-Nazi members of Blood Tribe – a hardcore white supremacist group, according to the Anti-Defamation League – flew flags bearing swastikas and marched through a prominent downtown street while a jazz and blues festival was taking place nearby in August.One witness to the march, who declined to be interviewed by the Guardian due to fearing for their family’s safety after being doxed by rightwing extremists online, reported that members of the group pointed guns at cars and told people to “go the fuck back to Africa”.A Springfield police representative, however, appeared to downplay the scene, telling local media that the hate group’s march was “just a little peaceful protest”.Several days later, a leading member of Blood Tribe who identified himself as Nathaniel Higgers, but whose real name is Drake Berentz, spoke at a Springfield city commission meeting.“I’ve come to bring a word of warning. Stop what you’re doing before it’s too late,” Berentz told Springfield’s mayor, Rob Rue. “Crime and savagery will only increase with every Haitian you bring in.”Berentz was promptly kicked out for espousing threatening language. Nonetheless, on Thursday morning, a bomb threat prompted Springfield’s city hall, a school and other government offices to be evacuated.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe same group has marched in South Dakota and Tennessee this year.Last year, having turned up to protest a drag story time event in Wadsworth, Ohio, where white supremacists gave Nazi salutes and shouted “Sieg heil”, the organization allegedly set up a chapter in the state. Last year, Blood Tribe members were driven out of Maine having attempted to set up a compound and Nazi training camp in the rural north-eastern part of the state.View image in fullscreen“Blood Tribe celebrated Donald Trump bringing up the [immigrants killing cats] lie during the debate,” said Maria Bruno of Ohioans Against Extremism, a non-profit founded last month in part due to a rising presence of extremists in Ohio. “They are thrilled that there are politicians willing to echo their talking points.”JD Vance has regularly claimed that “illegal immigrants” are “generally causing chaos all across Springfield” on the campaign trail in recent weeks. Ohio’s Republican attorney general, Dave Yost, said he plans to direct his office to “research legal avenues to stop the federal government from sending an unlimited number of migrants to Ohio communities”.However, the vast majority of Haitians in Springfield are in the US legally through a temporary protected status (TPS) that’s been allocated to them due to the violence and unrest in their home country. Citizens of 16 countries, including Afghanistan and Myanmar, are eligible for TPS. It is not a pathway to US citizenship and is valid for only 18 months, at which point it must be renewed by the federal homeland security department for a status holder to remain in the country legally.“They are entrepreneurs, they want to innovate,” Rollins said of Haitian people in Springfield. “They just work excessively once they are eligible.”But many Haitians have been targeted in Springfield.View image in fullscreenIn December, a Springfield man was sentenced to 20 years in federal jail for hate crimes after attacking eight Haitians earlier in 2023. Last year, the local Haitian church was broken into and damaged twice. Longtime Black residents of Springfield have reported being verbally abused when walking on the city’s streets, having been confused with members of the Haitian community.The effect is plainly obvious.“Normally, when I drive through south Springfield, where a lot of Haitians live, you see people walking on the streets, at the Haitian markets and restaurants,” Salomon said.“For the past few days, I have seen far fewer people.”Rollins said she has received threats that the St Vincent de Paul branch would be destroyed for its support of Haitians.“People are messaging me, telling me that I’ve destroyed Springfield,” she said. “We’re just trying to help people.” More