Category: Nashville

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Is Nashville’s Gideons Army Racist and Anti-Police? You Decide!

 

 Here we are in 2022 where police officers are being assaulted, harassed and killed, with crime at an all time high in many liberal run cities and Nashville wants to give a racist, anti-police organization $750,000. In May of 2021, Mayor John Cooper created a Community Safety Partnership Fund Advisory that reports to the Board Mayor’s Office of Community Safety which makes recommendations to the Metro Council for grant funding to nonprofits.

This Community Safety Partnership Fund Advisory Board, which is comprised of “experts” has no budgetary authority but does send recommendations to the Metro Council which includes where grants and donations are disbursed.

Two non-profits have been recommended to the board to split a $1.5 million dollar pilot “violence interruption” program, Gideons Army is one of the two. The issue at hand, is it appears Gideons Army creates more violence than it interrupts.

On Sept 22, 2022 founder of Gideons Army, Rasheedat Fetuga entered Pearl Cohn High School, where she deliberately ignored requests by staff to stop, yelling profanities as she looked for Principal Miriam Harrington. After several attempts to remove her failed, Fetuga eventually left, but on her way out she removed a picture on the wall in the lobby, and once outside began to stomp on that picture breaking the glass and frame.

 

In April of 2022, another employee of Gideons Army, Charles Brooks, was sentenced to four years in federal prison related to his role in a shootout last year in a North Nashville neighborhood.  In 2006, Brooks faced state charges for voluntary manslaughter.

Charles Brooks

 

Also in April of 2022, paid employee of Gideons Army Cleveland Shaw, was killed in what police say was another shootout on nearby Clarksville Pike.

In November of 2020, we (Dailyrollcall) published an article exposing Gideons Army revealing some disgusting details about members of a group that claims to be “for the children”.

Mic True, former Gideons Army member

In order to be an effective organization that claims to want to stop violence within the community, you must have a good relationship with law enforcement. Gideons Army may say they do, however they are promoters of the defund the police movement.

While Gideons Army may have provided the community with groceries, and occasionally helps kids, does it appear they are a racist front group, run by anti police activists? The last thing these social justice warriors need is $750,000. 

 

 

 

 

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Catholic Charities..Help for Refugees over Nashvillians.

 

Catholic Charities doesn’t care about Nashvillians  in need, but they do care about refugees and illegals. That’s right, the same Catholic Charities that received $7.3 million dollars from the bloated TANF fund (Tennessee Assistance for Needy Families) is the same organization sitting on over $100,000 meant to be distributed to those victims of the Nashville Christmas day bombing in 2020.

From September 2021 through March of 2022, Catholic Charities will help resettle over 150 Afghanis in the city of Nashville, the same city where many Nashvillians and businesses were displaced by a terrorist and need help to rebuild.  

In a recent tv interview between News Channel 4 and Ashley Bergeron, who lost her apartment and her art gallery, Bergeron states she needs help, and after one year of trying to make ends meet, she needs it now. Bergeron says she received a little over $3,200 that helped pay for things like her mortgage and utility bills, but those bills haven’t gone away. “Now that its been almost a year I’m now realizing okay wow, I’m going to need to ask for some more support,” said Bergeron.

Almost a year after the bombing, Ashley Bergeron is still feeling the impact

 

 

 

 

 https://www.wsmv.com/news/investigations/one-year-later-christmas-day-bombing-survivors-still-struggle-financially-where-s-all-the-donated/article_746f9e02-63f7-11ec-ba25-aff5cb8f7697.html?block_id=994460

Why is it Nashvillians are not receiving the assistance they need? Judy Orr, the executive director of Catholic Charities says “What we try to do is take care of the most immediate needs. If someone were to come forward now with additional expenses all of those would be considered.” Considered? Seriously?

 So what does CC bring to the table when refugees are involved? Afghans receive 30 to 90 days of assistance, case management and $1,225 per individual. Per individual. So for a family of lets say 4 that is $4900, $1700 over what Nashvillian Bergeron was given. But wait, the Afghan refugees, according to Kellye Branson, director of Refugee and Immigration Services for CC, will also receive  housing complete with furnishings, Social Security cards, enrolling their kids in school , and following up on any medical needs or mental health needs they might have.  Gee..did those suffering from the Nashville 2020 Christmas day bombing get that help and service?

Executive Director Judy Orr

 The bottom line is $950,000 was forked over to The United Way and The Community Foundation in Nashville, in addition to a $2 million grant.  The question begs to be asked where is the money for those Nashvillians?  Perhaps it is time for donations to be given elsewhere rather than large wealthy non profits. Catholic Charities may imply they are religious, and a charity, however it looks more like refugees and illegals are more profitable for them rather than those in their own backyard.

 

 

 

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Jewish Communities Show Anti-Evangelical Christian Film – Coming to Nashville?

A recent documentary titled “Til Kingdom Come” is being shown in Jewish film festivals sponsored by local Jewish community organizations here, here and here.

The film goes out of its way to portray American Evangelical Christians in the most unflattering way possible and send the message that their support for Israel should be rejected by Jews.

http://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5r5rhUNQaXY

Last week, Nashville’s Jewish community hosted speakers who consider mainstream Republicans white supremacists.

In 2015, Abbie Wolf, the Nashville Jewish Community Relations Director, published an article in the Nashville Jewish paper questioning the value of a relationship with Christian Zionists so it wouldn’t be a stretch to see this film pushed out to their viewing community. Wolf wrote:

“While Israel benefits from Christian Zionism, some members of the Jewish community have a host of questions about this fervent support. Some find the gamut of views advocated by Christian Zionists to be disquieting.

So what are some of the concerns about Christian Zionism? One is a distrust of the motives behind their support. What’s the catch, we wonder? What will they ask of us, and when? Is there an expectation of quid pro quo? If it’s support for their domestic agenda they seek, that would be challenging. For example, on many issues like maintaining a strong wall between church and state, we tend to part ways.

Another concern is that Christian support of Israel comes at the expense of our ultimate survival as a people. We fear their support is grounded in Christian biblical prophecy. If their support for Israel is based on their belief that the ingathering of Jews in Israel is a prerequisite for the End of Days, where does that ultimately leave the Jewish people? Further, many believe we must exercise caution in dealing with Messianic Jews – Christians who consider Jews who haven’t accepted Jesus to be ‘incomplete.’

Still others in our community feel that Christian support for Israel comes at the expense of the Muslim community, both here and abroad. Some Christian Zionists’ views are strongly rooted in the belief that there are no moderate Muslims and that Islam is a faith rooted in violence. This broad-brushing of Islam doesn’t consider Muslims who want nothing more than peace for their families and communities.”

To round out the cynical views of Israeli filmmaker Maya Zinshtein, the anti-Trump message is included because as everyone knows, President Trump was the worst thing ever to happen to Jews and their ancestral homeland Israel. Viewed through Zinshtein’s lens, the sole reason Trump moved the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem and endorsed Israeli sovereignty over the security strategic Golan Heights, was to snare the votes of America’s large Evangelical voting bloc.

The German funded internet portal Qantara, designed to “promote dialogue with the Islamic world,” has also reviewed the entire film. They note that Zinshtein likely had “unique access” to her film’s subjects simply because she is from “the Promised Land.”

Most revealing is the reviewer’s impression that “Zinshtein is evidently irritated by this unqualified love for her country. Yet the leaders of the Evangelical movement who feature in the film don’t seem the slightest bit interested in her critical distance to Israel, which she makes absolutely no effort to hide at any point during the film.”

Zinshtein also appears to be warring against Trump supporting Jews, using her medium to further divide Jewish communities:

“Among other things, Zinshtein filmed during a gala dinner where money was being raised for the IDF. The dinner was attended by billionaire Sheldon Adelson, who has supported both Netanyahu and Trump with huge sums of money. On that evening, Eckstein told Adelson that Jewish communities around the world are not growing, but that evangelical communities are.

The message is crystal clear: pro-Israeli Christians – some of whom refer to themselves as “Zionist Christians” – are much more important allies for Israel’s nationalists than Jewish communities around the world, most of which are liberal and are more critical of this one-sided support than all other religious communities in the USA.”

Political commentator and anti-Trumper Michael Medved spared no criticism of the film – describing it as “hopelessly one-sided,” relentlessly cynical,” and “profoundly misleading.”

The supposed draw for why liberal and leftist Jewish groups would show this film is to show that the mix of conservative politics, support for President Trump’s MidEast policies, and Evangelical “end of times” prophecy, where supposedly 2/3 of Jews are killed and 1/3 convert to Christianity, does not serve the best interest of Jews in the U.S. or Israel.

Nashville’s Jewish community takes a protectionist approach in their relationship with the anti-Zionist Muslim organization AMAC despite the fact that Jews don’t fare any better under the Islamic end of times; in fact neither do Christians – “He will break the cross, kill swine, and abolish jizyah. Allah will perish all religions except Islam.”

Palestinian Islamic scholar Mraweh Nassar, stated in a February interview that “Jews were ‘the most dangerous enemies’” and that “Muslims will experience a golden age ‘after the Jews are killed, in the time of Jesus.’”

If you have concerns about the showing of this film in Nashville, contact Deborah Oleshansky the current Nashville Jewish Community Relations Director – deborah@jewishnashville.org

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Nashville’s Gideon’s Army Not What Local News Reporter Says.. Part 1

The public face of Gideon’s Army is one of blacks helping blacks within their community. From mental health issues, to mentoring Nashvilles black youth, to “violence interrupters” walking the city streets trying to enforce peace. Sounds great, and on one level this is a much needed community resource.

However, one only has to look and listen to what members of Gideon’s Army says and does privately and you will see that public persona is a front for radical activism. Doing good for the community is great, using that community to promote an agenda is not.
Recently, in an ad campaign that portrayed Gideon’s Army to be an extreme arm of black power, a local Nashville News reporter, Phil Williams decided to take to the streets with Gideons to see the work they do. What the local reporter did not do was delve into who the members are, and who they connect and partner with.

The first noticeable problem is how they present themselves to the community. Dressing as black militants,and wearing shirts with black raised fits denotes radical activism. Claiming to be role models for the youth of their community while dressed like street soldiers sends a really bad message to young kids. To some it may even be intimidating. If your goal was to truly show black kids how to develop into constructive adults, why not show them how to dress for success?

Another disgusting show of disrespect for their own, is the constant referral to others in the community as “niggas”. Haven’t blacks fought for years to have that word banished as they find it highly offensive? Yet members of the Gideons army use it repeatedly. Don’t tell me it is acceptable within the black community to use that word when people have been fired and arrested for calling a black the “N” word. You can’t have it both ways. In this video clip, Hambino Godbody is discussing the stupidity of N’s killing N’s, and how there is a time and a place for it but not against their own. Watch fast, it is sure to disappear!

http://https://www.facebook.com/hambino.godbody/videos/3473111956116590

 

Working with children in black communities is of utmost importance to members of Gideon’s army, yet their personal posts on social media ( all public) show a lack of respect for woman, and down right disgusting sexual references. 

 
Then there is a the racism issue. Whites are often excluded or put down as being supremacists if you don’t agree with BLM. Martin Luther King worked for equality and the desegregation of blacks, but now through groups like Gideon’s Army and other radical organizations, they demand their own of everything. Black tv, black radio, black schools, black sports, black unions, and much more.  Gideon’s Army engages with other groups like the Black Nashville Assembly, that call for the “transformation” of Nashville. Unlike their public persona, which claims to be all about children, and peace, they stand with others that want to defund the police and develop “political clarity”. 

 

 This is not the way to go about  changing the black community. Has Gideon’s Army done good for their neighborhood? In part, yes. What they need to learn is you have to practice what you preach. 

 

 

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Nashville Metro Council & TIRRC – Pay to Play?

The TN Immigrant & Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC), a Soros-funded organization, seems to consistently get special treatment from the Nashville City Council.

Granted, it helped that one of TIRRC’s now former co-directors is married to a far left Metro Council member. It also helps that the majority of the Metro Council members are open border far lefties who hate ICE and believe that criminal illegal aliens should have the same benefits and privileges as legal immigrants and American citizens. 

TIRRC advocates for illegal aliens and legal immigrants such as refugees and intentionally blurs the line between the two by using the legal terms “refugees” or “asylum-seekers” loosely to refer to all their constituency.

TIRRC is a named affiliate of the National Council of La Raza (renamed UnidosUS), the largest Hispanic organization in the U.S. which “lobbies for racial preferences, bilingual education, stricter hate crimes laws, mass immigration, and amnesty for illegal aliens.”

Two recent Nashville Council resolutions, one giving TIRRC money, and the other, giving TIRRC an opportunity to influence the selection for the next Chief of Police, were sponsored by TIRRC-endorsed candidates elected to the Metro Council.

Shortly before the August 2019 election for the Nashville Metro Council, three organizations came together to form the Nashville Justice League (NJL), a PAC whose goal was to move the city council further left. Of the 15 endorsed candidates, 13 won their races.

One of the those organizations was TIRRC Votes, the 501(c)(4) arm of TIRRC. The TIRRC-backed Metro Council candidates continue to deliver on their promises to help fund and promote TIRRC’s agenda.

Substitute Resolution RS2020-459, introduced, adopted and passed on August 4 was “approved” and signed by Mayor Cooper the next day. This resolution appropriated $1,244,000 of COVID-19 Pandemic Fund to nine non-profit organizations operating in Davidson County.

TIRRC got $50,000 and fellow traveler Justice for Our Neighbors (JFON) got $50,000.

TIRRC’s endorsed candidate Bob Mendes (who is also the architect of the 34% property tax increase), sponsored this resolution. In 2017, pro-sanctuary city Mendes introduced two bills that had they passed, would have made Nashville the most liberal sanctuary city in the country. The bills were withdrawn after state legislators raised a ruckus.

TIRRC is flush in the money department with the ability to raise over $100,000 annually in donations. Influence Watch has posted the organization’s 990’s which show that in 2016, TIRRC’s budget included revenue of $1,935,988 and assets of $619,228. 

TIRRC has 24 paid staff and its 501(c)(4) TIRRC Votes in 2019, employed six lobbyists. TIRRC has a newly built 7,000 SF free-standing $2.5 million dollar building which reportedly, is fully paid for. The building will also house a legal services clinic which would most likely be JFON.

Not bad for an organization claiming to represent the poor, down-trodden and lawbreakers.

TIRRC, JFON, the American Muslims Advisory Council and others, have been long-time resident partners housed in the Conxion Americas building called Casa Azafran. The newly empty space now houses a Catholic Charities social services office. 

TIRRC repeatedly tries to turn refugees, the people they claim to represent, against the government that pays for all the public support made available to help them start new lives in Tennessee.

Justice for Our Neighbors (JFON), another open borders organization, provides legal services to legal immigrants and illegal aliens.

In 2016, JFON was all about “defending unaccompanied minors.” UAC (unaccompanied alien children) arrivals enter the U.S. illegally, are under age 18 and for whom, “there is no parent or legal guardian in the United States, or no parent or legal guardian in the United States available to provide care and physical custody.”

One Tennessee example of the loophole of the legal definition of UACs is the case of 16-year old Edwin Mejia, a UAC from Honduras who in 2013, was transported to Tennessee and released into the custody of his brother, an illegal alien living north of Nashville in Madison, Tennessee. The following year the two brothers moved to Nebraska where Edwin struck and killed 21-year old Sarah Root  while he was drunk and street racing in his truck. Root had just graduated from college. Mejia posted bond and left town.

A 2018 report from the Center for Immigration Studies documents that MS-13 gang members have entered the U.S. as UACs. Available data shows that from 2014 part-way through 2017, over 4,000 UACs were brought to Tennessee.

The other Metro Council resolution, RS2020-431, introduced on July 7, 2020, sought to have Mayor Cooper include certain special interest groups, a representative from the Fraternal Order of Police, and a representative from the anti-police Community Oversight Board, to help select the new Nashville Chief of Police.

Three of the four sponsors of this resolution were TIRRC Votes’ endorsed candidates.

The resolution was amended to direct Mayor Cooper to work with TIRRC, the Equity Alliance, the anti-police Community Oversight Board, the (ultra left) Metro Human Relations Commission and the Fraternal Order of Police in the process to select the new Chief of Police.

Not only does the amended resolution name specific organizations, but it also adds new language, which read in the full context of the resolution, suggests that some of these organizations represent communities who are allegedly the most “impacted communities” which need a say in the selection process.

The Equity Alliance and TIRRC already have their interests represented since The Equity Alliance is part of the Nashville Justice League, the PAC which also includes TIRRC Votes and the Central Labor Council that helped get these same Metro Council members elected.

The Community Oversight Board’s (COB) agenda for the new Police Chief has already been laid out in a report issued by the COB in April 2020. The report was requested the COB’s vice-chair Andres Martinez who also serves as Director of Policy and Communications for Conexion Americas, a Nashville organization and named affiliate of the National Council of La Raza.

The COB report says that there are 31,000 illegal aliens living and working in Davidson County. A deep dive into the COB report shows that they are pushing for the MNPD to adopt four policies that will help illegal aliens in Nashville go undetected and to ignore the state’s sanctuary city law, something a new police chief could make happen.

Equally concerning about the COB report is the glowing reference to a resolution adopted by the Austin City Council after Texas passed a very strong sanctuary city law which was subsequently ruled as Constitutional by a federal appeals court. The Austin City Council resolution was specifically intended to obstruct and skirt the state’s sanctuary city law.

Nashville Mayor’s Immigration Task Force is also recommending that the Metro Council adopt the Austin City Council resolution. If that happens, expect to see the same in Knoxville, Chattanooga and Memphis.

Now that TIRRC and The Equity Alliance have packed the Metro Council and maintain strong alliances with members of the COB and the Metro Human Relations Commission, it is reasonable to assume that voices regarding the new Police Chief will out-influence every other constituency in Nashville.

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Marxists Are Winning Local Elections in Tennessee! – Part 3 in the TN Highlander Series

Tennessee is rapidly becoming a Marxist political fantasy come true. In a super RED state like Tennessee which too often is undeserving of being described as “conservative”, Marxist-backed candidates are winning their political races.

Candidates don’t call themselves Marxists. Instead they use labels like “socialist” or “progressive” to camouflage their desired outcomes, which align with the openly radical left.

Jonah Goldberg summarizes it this way in Liberal Fascism – “In Italy they were called Fascists. In Germany they were called National Socialists. [later renamed Nazis] In America we call them progressives…”

Marxism provides the theoretical framework for communism and socialism – political systems which centralize power, suppress opposition and exert control over the masses using economic, social and psychological means.

There are many Marxist groups operating in Tennessee. They all act as electoral fronts with the same objectives and goals, such as the organization, Liberation Road – to fill seats in local elections with like-minded comrades, a sweet feat in a Trump state.

Liberation Road, Our Revolution, Nashville Justice League, Memphis for All, and the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) to name a few, work in concert to get their candidates elected. They refer to each other as “comrade” as affirmation of solidarity with a Marxist movement to overthrow ordered government.

Student groups like the Vanderbilt Young Democratic Socialists of America and the UT Knoxville Progressive Student Alliance (which has nothing to do with being “progressive”), are becoming more engaged in local elections helping to provide boots on the ground to canvass and man phone-banks.

At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter what they call themselves – it’s what they seek to accomplish that matters. The groups discussed below work in concert with each other, creating the “new political ‘us’” laid out in Liberation Road’s 2019 – 2022 strategy, which is an agreement to form strategic alliances to defeat their enemies – the United States Government, the Republican Party and establishment Democrats.

The bottom line for these groups – if you don’t support creating a totalitarian socialist/communist America complete with the economy killing Green New Deal, Medicare for All, abortion on demand and open borders to name a few, you are their enemy.

Our Revolution (OR) – federal and state elections

Our Revolution (OR) and the Democrat Socialists of America (DSA) often collaborate to help fellow comrades win elections. The senior electoral manager of OR who was also the former deputy director of the DSA has disclosed that nothing prevents the forming of a two-sided DSA/OR local chapters. In a 2017 interview, OR cited Knoxville’s OR chapter which helped elect two DSA candidates to the city council.

OR is very active in Tennessee. It has a Nashville/Mid TN chapter and one in Memphis called Memphis for All.

In 2019, OR’s 6 endorsed candidates all won their races for the Metro Nashville City Council. Two winners along with another Metro Council member served as Bernie Sanders’ Tennessee 2020 presidential campaign co-chairs.

Our Revolution began as the 501(c)(4) arm of the failed 2016 Bernie Sanders presidential campaign. It now joins the mix of revolutionary change agents working to “grow the squad” and get more of their “progressive” radicals like Jew-haters Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib elected to public office. OR is also responsible for helping Ocasio-Cortez get elected.

In 2020, OR endorsed Nashville’s Keeda Haynes who lost her primary race for U.S. House of Representatives against 30-year incumbent Democrat Jim Cooper. But Tennesseans should not lose sight of the fact that Haynes took 44% of the vote.

OR also endorsed first-timer and BLM protest leader, Cori Bush in Missouri, who won her primary for Congress, ousting a 20-year incumbent. Bush’s campaign includes defunding the police which is part of OR’s “progressive” platform to “defend democracy.”

OR did not endorse first timer from Memphis, Marquita Bradshaw in the Tennessee Democratic primary for Lamar Alexander’s seat. After winning her primary, OR support for Bradshaw is now coming in the form of Cori Bush’s endorsement who herself was endorsed by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).

Bradshaw campaigned as an environmental activist who was also an experienced labor organizer. She was first endorsed by the DSA. Her platform is based on The Justice Guarantee, (you have to read the 6 planks to believe it), which is supported by the Sunrise Movement and many other radical left wing groups including the ACLU. The Justice Guarantee platform is a project of Tides Advocacy which according to Capital Research, runs the Fund for Fair and Just Policing campaign funded by George Soros.

After winning the primary in Tennessee, Our Revolution’s Nashville & Mid TN chapter, Nashville Musicians For Change, Memphis-Midsouth DSA, Sunrise Tennessee, Vanderbilt Young Democratic Socialists of America, & Indivisible Tennessee joined together to endorse Bradshaw and are working to get her elected to flip Lamar Alexander’s seat.

The joinder of these groups follows the formula promoted by Liberation Road.

Our Revolution’s Nashville candidate James Turner for the Tennessee House, lost his primary to long-time incumbent Rep. Mike Stewart. But OR’s Memphis for All candidates fared much better. Gabby Salinas and Torrey Harris won their primaries, while Jerri Green and Andrea Bond-Johnson had no opponents in the Democrat primary. They will each face incumbent Republicans except for Harris who will be challenged by 26-year incumbent Rep. John DeBerry who is running as an independent after being kicked out of the Democrat party for being too conservative.

Memphis for All and OR’s Nashville and Mid-TN chapter, are part of Liberation Road. Thomas Wayne Walker, a member of Liberation Road’s National Executive Committee is also a Memphis for All Steering Committee member.

In 2018, Memphis for All endorsed and helped get former state senator Lee Harris elected for Shelby County Mayor. The group also added two county commissioners, Tami Sawyer and Racquel Collins. Sawyer, is a Black Lives Matter Leader and organizer of taking down Confederate statutes in Memphis.

The following year, Sawyer ran unsuccessfully for mayor of Memphis with support from Memphis for All and Marxist fellow traveller Highlander co-director Ash-Lee Henderson.

Memphis for All also endorsed and helped elect Katrina Robinson for state Senate and London Lamar for the Tennessee House. Liberation Road volunteers were noted to have helped Memphis for All canvassing in these districts.

In early August 2020, Sen. Katrina Robinson was indicted on 48 counts of theft and embezzlement of federal program grant funds.

Memphis Liberation Party

This newly formed group endorsed Marquita Bradshaw and is working to help her get elected. This group identifies itself as a “political party fighting for workers’ rights, environmental justice, and self-determination for the people of Memphis” and is promoting a comprehensive platform of demands to “liberate Memphis” from the State of Tennessee.

Democratic Socialists of America (DSA)

Knoxville’s DSA is an affiliate chapter of Our Revolution and has successfully helped three of their comrades get elected to the Knoxville city council running on platforms that reject capitalism in favor of supporting “working class interests.”

Seema Singh Perez was the first Knoxville DSA member to win a seat on the city council in 2017.

This DSA chapter is running the “City Council Movement” and two years later, the chapter endorsed three comrades for the council – Amelia Parker, David Hayes and Charles al-Bawi. Amelia Parker won an at-large seat.

In 2018, Knoxville DSA member Edward Nelson, endorsed by Our Revolution for a Tennessee House seat lost to the Republican candidate.

Anti-police Sean Parker in Nashville (no relation to Amelia other than in comradeship), is the co-founder of the Middle TN DSA, a fact he proudly shared on his campaign page. He was elected in 2019, to represent District 5 (hipster East Nashville neighborhoods), on the Metro Nashville City Council.

Chattanooga’s DSA chapter is just getting started by issuing a “list of demands on local government and business leaders to alleviate the effects of the COVID-19 crisis on the working and vulnerable people of greater Chattanooga.”

Highlander co-director Ash-Lee Henderson has deep agitator roots in Chattanooga. In 2012 she was an organizer with United Campus Workers, an organization that the college DSA chapters attach to.

She was also a Board member of Chattanooga Organized for Action (COA).

In 2014, working as an organizer for Concerned Citizens for Justice (CCJ) in Chattanooga, Ash-Lee was arrested while marching against alleged police brutality. That same year, Ash-Lee marched again with CCJ to affirm organization’s solidarity with Palestinians.

Don’t be surprised when Chattanooga Marxists start catching up to their comrades in Nashville, Knoxville and Memphis.

Nashville Justice League (NJL) whose tagline is “A New Power is Rising” helped 13 “progressive” far-left radicals get elected to the Metro Nashville city Council.

Shortly before the August 2019 election for the Nashville Metro Council, three organizations came together to form the Nashville Justice League (NJL), a PAC whose goal was to move the city council further left. Of the 15 endorsed candidates, 13 won their races.

Well into 2020, the NJL candidates have proven to be the “progressive” far-left radicals the PAC wanted.

The three organizations which organized the NJL are:

TIRRC Votes is the 501(c)(4) arm of the Soros-funded TN Immigrant & Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC), which advocates for illegal aliens and legal immigrants such as refugees. TIRRC began its collaboration with BLM in 2015; this was during the time that TIRRC’s board was led by Daoud Abudiab, a Muslim activist.

The Equity Alliance Action Fund which is the 501(c)(4) of the Equity Alliance. Founded in 2016, The Equity Alliance, a 501(c)(3) non-profit, employs state-wide and community organizers, communications and operational managers along with two co-executive directors. This group organizes around issues of alleged police brutality, equity for people of color, and like every other far left group, maintains a 501(c)(4) arm which is working to vote Trump out of office and elect progressive socialists.

The Central Labor Council of Nashville & Middle TN (AFL-CIO) – Jobs With Justice has a chapter in East and Middle TN and is part of the Central Labor Council. Jobs With Justice lists the Highlander Center as one of their partners. The Council endorsed state Rep. John Ray Clemmons in the 2019 Nashville mayoral race. Clemmons is a fellow traveler of the radical left and is running unopposed for a fourth term.

The Nashville Justice League was recognized as an ally in Liberation Road’s July 2019 newsletter:

“The Nashville Justice League launched at the end of June to bring together the strategic alliance into the electoral field. This IPO Project is a new PAC, and a joint project with the Central Labor Council, the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition, and the Equity Alliance, a civil rights and civic engagement organization run by black millennial women. We are using voting pledges, social media advertising, and canvassing to break down the silos of our membership and combine our strengths to get true champions of justice elected. We are currently focusing on Nashville metro elections, but have our eyes set on combining the IPO city-based projects for 2020.”

Given the NJL’s core mission there is no surprise about the candidates they endorsed.

For example, Bob Mendes and Colby Sledge were the council members who in 2017, introduced two bills that if passed, would have made Nashville the most liberal sanctuary city in the country. Sledge is married to Lindsey Harris who until very recently, was a co-director of TIRRC.

The NJL also endorsed Zulfat Suara who openly admitted to being a socialist. She resigned her leadership of the TN American Muslim Advisory Council (AMAC) to run for the Metro Council. Under her leadership, AMAC board members began agitating against alleged police brutality. From the comfort of her new $650,000 home, Suara served as one of Bernie Sanders’ three Tennessee campaign co-chairs. Suara led her activist AMAC board to join forces with Linda Sarsour, a defender of Sharia law and intensely vocal anti-Semite, who served as “Bernie Sanders’s Anti-Semitic Surrogate”. More recently, Suara was chosen as a PLEO (party leader and elected official) delegate to the DNC. She nominated Bernie Sanders and voted “no” on the DNC platform because of the absence of Medicare for all and, following the lead of Jew-haters Sarsour, Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar, the absence of “stronger foreign policy language, especially on Israel and Palestine.”

Kyontze Toombs, who serves as Secretary and General Counsel for the Equity Alliance was endorsed and won her Metro Council race so they now have a front row seat at the table.

Gicola Lane, another NJL endorsed, but losing candidate, was paid by Black Voters Matter as a campaign coordinator in getting the anti-police Community Oversight Board on the ballot and passed. This year she is an electoral justice fellow with the Movement for Black Lives, the policy setting umbrella organization which Highlander Center’s co-director Ash-Lee Henderson, helps lead.

Ringleader TIRRC has a long-established relationship with the Highlander Center which they list as a coalition member. Beginning in 2007, Highlander provided Justice School for TIRRC with “sessions combin[ing] nuts-and-bolts training on organizing and leadership skills with broader discussions of social, political, and economic issues related to immigration and the immigrant rights movement.”

Vanderbilt sociology professor Dan Cornfield and his wife Hedy Weinberg the TN-ACLU director who has also served on TIRRC’s Advisory Board, have been long-time supporters of the Highlander Center.

Cornfield co-led Highlander trainings for Vanderbilt college students and faculty organized by Vanderbilt’s Office of Active Citizenship with “programs such as ‘More Radical Than Communism’ and on ‘Becoming a Change Agent.’”

Our Revolution joined forces with TIRRC Votes in July 2019.

Sunrise Movement

Sunrise is a movement to stop climate change. Their platform includes pushing for more regulations and government control of the economy under the guise of fighting climate change. They are mainly college, high school and middle school students who have been inducted into world of the socialist/progressive platform.

They call their chapters “hubs” and have hubs in Nashville, Franklin and Knoxville. According to the Memphis Progressive Student Alliance, there will soon be a Sunrise hub in Memphis.

Sunrise Tennessee joined with Our Revolution’s Nashville & Mid TN chapter, Nashville Musicians For Change, Memphis-Midsouth DSA, Vanderbilt Young Democratic Socialists of America, & Indivisible Tennessee, to endorse U.S. Senate Democratic candidate Marquita Bradshaw.

The leader of the Nashville Sunrise Movement is Rick Herron, believed to be the son of Roy Herron, former chair of the Tennessee Democratic Party. Roy Herron served in the Tennessee House and Senate.

Party for Socialism & Liberation

The Party for Socialism and Liberation has been active working outreach to like-minded minority communities in Nashville and held an event at the Islamic Center of Tennessee.

UTKnoxville Progressive Student Alliance (UTKPSA) has close ties to both the Highlander Center and Liberation Road. The UTKPSA has become active in local Knoxville elections, endorsing Charles al-Bawi in 2019 for the Knoxville City Council.

Here’s an example of how these Marxist organizations work together. Thomas Wayne Walker, a Memphis agitator, is a member of Liberation Road’s National Executive Committee. During his tenure as an executive board member of the United Campus Workers (UCW) movement in Tennessee, he engaged the UTKPSA in a campus protest. At the time, Ash-Lee Henderson was an organizer for the UCW. Several years prior, Ash-Lee and Walker were together at a public option rally in Nashville.

Coming full circle, Ash-Lee, who is also connected to Liberation Road, is currently the co-director of the Highlander Center whose staff members Coy Wakefield (also a BLM organizer in Knoxville), and Andre Canty interface with students at UTKnoxville.

Following the Marxist footpath of Ash-Lee Henderson, Movement 4 Black Lives, BLM and the DSA, the UTKPSA has signed onto the Jew-hating anti-Israel platform.

 Vanderbilt Young Democratic Socialists of America (VYDSA)

In December 2019, the VYDSA was given official DSA chapter status. Following the model laid down by the UTKPSA, the Vanderbilt DSA is endorsing Marquita Bradshaw for U.S. Senate, and staying connected to Robin Kimbrough who was also a socialist candidate in the primary but lost to Bradshaw. Kimbrough says she’s coming back in 2022.

VYDSA has also connected itself to BLM Nashville and pushed the VYDSA members to lobby Metro Nashville council members in support of the Peoples’ Budget Coalition recommendations.

The VYDSA also promotes a “mutual aid network” meaning that its members should also connect with their local Our Revolution and/or Sunrise movement chapter.

Memphis Progressive Student Alliance (MPSA)

The University of Memphis PSA has been around for a while. In 2011, six students attached to the MPSA, were arrested along with Ash-Lee Henderson for protesting inside and during a Tennessee legislative hearing. In late 2019, however, the board resigned and the organization disbanded due to improprieties of its president. The MPSA has now folded into the Memphis Liberation Party.

Justice Democrats – a federal political action committee (PAC)

It is a great concern for our state that the Justice Democrats operate out of a Knoxville address. This organization successfully installed “the squad” (Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ayanna Pressley) in Congress.  

They claim credit for Cori Bush’s win in Missouri. Of their 9 new candidates for Congress, 5 have so far won their primaries with one primary upcoming. Of the 7 incumbent candidates, 6 have won their primaries with one soon to come.

Incumbent Pramilla Jayapal, from Washington state, served as the co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC) which Ilhan Omar joined as soon as she was elected to the U.S. House.

 

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Nashville’s Liberal Mayor and His Use Of Obama’s Failed Policies. Part 2

In response to Mayor John Coopers forming a commission on police reform, and the eventual hiring of a new police chief, some of its members had this to say: “Nashville needs a police department that is responsive to all of our residents and that is committed to transparency and accountability,” said Sabina Mohyuddin, Executive Director of the American Muslim Advisory Committee. “I am grateful to Mayor Cooper for bringing together this diverse group to begin the process of making Nashville a more just city.”

“The Statement for Policing Policy Commission is comprehensive, ambitious, balanced and sensitive to the needs of the greater Nashville community,” said Dr. Chris Jackson, Pastor at Pleasant Green Baptist Church and President of the Interfaith Ministerial Alliance.

Notice the trend..responsive and sensitive to the Nashville community?

Mayor Cooper directed the Commission to form three committees to undertake this work, led by former Mayor Karl Dean and Judge Richard Dinkins, a civil rights activist and judge for the Tennessee Court of Appeals.  Cooper has requested the commission to complete their report by the end of October, reminding them that they are “drafting the blueprint which the next Chief of Police will build upon,”

The three committees will be working on:  1) Serving Nashville’s Communities 2) Screening, Supervision, Resources, and Recruitment and 3) Policies, Tactics, and Training.

Let’s look at the first area of work, “Serving Nashville’s Communities”. The basis for this agenda is what experiences have Nashvillians had with police use of force, how does the MNPD interact with people with mental illnesses, how can the MNPD better support community and neighborhood engagement strategies and more effectively address violent crime, particularly gun crime and are there opportunities for the MNPD (and Metro more broadly) to improve responses in its interactions with homeless residents, juveniles, and other vulnerable populations?

Police officers are required to fulfill 40 hours of mandatory, in service training every year.  That training includes courses on mental health, and child sex abuse, with new courses added as issues within communities evolve. Police training also focuses on use of force policies, and receive updates as policies change. Police training in Tennessee is overseen and certified by a POST Commission, with stringent guidelines, and well vetted instructors that must meet and comply with POST standards.

That being said, our law enforcement officers are professional, well trained individuals with skills that exceed past the classroom and into the communities.  Protecting and serving is their job, however “serving” seems to mean different things to many. Serving a community is the ability to keep it safe and free from crime. Serving is ensuring quality of life issues, and ordinances are adhered to.

 Serving is not bowing to a community to meet their whims, or appease one group over another.  It is not creating special classes of people, whether by religion, or ethnicity. These were the methods that Obama’s policing strategies attempted, and  failed.  Why would any city official continue to implement failed agendas.

Time after time, it is always the police that must change in order to please a community. Police are not the answer to all of societies ills, but are blamed for their existence.

Next up,  Part 3: Screening, Supervision, Resources, and Recruitment.

 

 

 

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Nashville’s Liberal Mayor and His Use Of Obama’s Failed Policies. Part 1

We either have laws, and law enforcers in our country or we don’t. 

We also have a President, and his name is Donald Trump, not Barack Hussein Obama, who radical liberal mayors continue to praise and implement his failed police policies.

On June 3 2020, Former president Obama urged mayors across the country to review their police departments use of force policies and to create reform within their jurisdictions based on his May 2015 report, “The President’s Task Force 21st Century Policing”.

On Aug 14, 2020 Nashville Mayor John Cooper announced the creation of Metro Nashville’s Policing Policy Commission, which has been created to review use-of-force policies within the MNPD and develop necessary reforms to set a new national standard in policing and public safety.

 Obeying  Obama’s call for action, Cooper’s announcement of this commission, he states “In response to a call to action from President Barack Obama for cities to address use of force policies and practices, I have created the Policing Policy Commission (PPC). The first purpose of the Commission is to identify ways for the Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) to reduce the use of force. But it also has a broader purpose: to begin a community-wide process of reimagining how Nashville can build trust and enhance community safety.”

 Just prior to Obama’s report, in March of 2015 his Department of Justice led by Eric Holder announced 6 cities would be the testing ground for his idea of a national and federal police force.  His scheme, which was very controversial due in part not only for federalizing police but for its $5 million dollar price tag and the DOJ stepping into local police departments business.

Obama and the DOJ publicly used the plan as a guise to “restore trust” in communities of color, and instituted the program in six cities. Minneapolis police embraced the “pillars” of the final report from Obama’s Task Force on 21st Century Policing, and after five years, the city is no closer to achieving the primary objective of creating trust between police and the communities they serve.  Riots burned large sections of the city after a police officer was involved in the death of George Floyd, a known thug. How’d that policy work for Minneapolis huh?

So now another city mayor, John Cooper has decided to structure his shot at police reform after a failed policy, from a failed former president. You can create all the policies and ideas of reform you want, but until and unless the criminal element in these communities is dealt with, police will always have to face using force. Why is it the police are the only ones in society that have to be reformed? Criminals aren’t born criminals, it is a learned behavior from a dysfunctional home life.

It is no different in Nashville Tennessee, where the mayor seems to think his communities are disadvantaged and mistreated by the police. In the upcoming parts, we will break down the mayors plan to reform the Metro Nashville Police, and who he has chosen to lead the commission.

Stay tuned…

 

 

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Nashville Metro Council Goes All Out Police State For Masks

First it was Metro Council member Sharon Hurt who wanted to criminalize not wearing a mask. Her idea was that if someone was outside not wearing a mask and someone else catches COVID, the non-mask wearer might be subject to criminal charges of attempted murder.

The Council’s director of legislative affairs advised her that it’s the state legislature’s job to define and set penalties for crimes and criminal behavior.

At Tuesday’s Council meeting a “late-filed” ordinance was presented. Given the contents and objective of this bill, it’s more likely that it was not timely filed so as to avoid public pushback …. or maybe state pushback.

As of this writing, the ordinance, which passed on first reading, has not been posted to the Metro government website but it’s not too hard to guess who the sponsors might be. What is known is that power-grabber and illegal alien protectionist Council member Bob Mendes, is a co-sponsor. This is the same Bob Mendes who back in 2017, sponsored a bill that had it passed, would have made Nashville the most liberal sanctuary city in the country, ie, illegal aliens committing crimes would be protected from deportation.

Mendes is the prime architect and sponsor of the 34% property tax increase passed by the Metro Council. He is assembling a record to run for mayor or Congress.

This new bill would allow Metro employees from pretty much any department to issue citations to anyone not wearing a mask.

Talk about abusing power under the cover of COVID. It’s also about enforcing the edicts of Nashville’s mayoral tyrant so that his subjects behave according to the little man’s orders.

The more you look at the actions of Nashville mayor John Cooper and the Council, the more it looks like they are carrying water for the Biden-Harris ticket. While Nashville is not currently being lit on fire by BLM Marxists, Cooper is pretty much on par with comrade NYC’s DiBlasio in taking down a once economically thriving city despite Cooper permitting hookah bars and strip clubs to stay in business.

From the start of COVID in Tennessee, Bill Lee said Metro Nashville could do whatever it wanted to manage the public health issue. Cooper’s “management” has Metro Nashville losing an estimated $100 million dollars weekly.

Lee’s lack of leadership is also costing the state millions. Davidson County is pretty much the cash cow for the state’s different tax collections which ultimately effects all Tennessee taxpayers.

 

 

 

 

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Bill Lee Must Step Up and Help President Trump on Illegal Immigration

Last week Breitbart News reported that so far, four states – Iowa, Nebraska, South Carolina, and South Dakota, have agreed to help the President’s effort to figure out the number of illegal aliens versus legal immigrants and American citizens who are living in the U.S.

These states have agreed to share driver license and state identification information with the Department of Commerce which tabulates and anonymizes the data per a directive from Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross.

The administration had tried to get the citizenship question on the 2020 Census but was blocked by the U.S. Supreme Court.

“In response, Trump signed an executive order ordering the Department of Commerce to collect state and federal identification data to develop a fair count of the American citizen population.”

Nebraska officials were the first to voluntarily share their state’s information.

So far, it appears that Tennessee has not stepped forward to comply with the President’s executive order.

In light of the recent disclosure by Nashville’s “anti-police” Community Oversight Board, that 31,000 illegal aliens are living and working in Davidson County, it’s in the state’s best interest to provide the information requested by the President’s Executive Order.

It’s certainly possible that Governor Lee hasn’t learned about redistricting yet (remember, after he blind-sided the legislature’s leadership on his refugee resettlement consent he said he was still learning how to do his job?).

In case Governor Lee is in the dark on the subject, the relationship between the Census, illegal aliens, redistricting and electoral votes is pretty straightforward and Breitbart makes it strikingly clear:

“Currently, those lines and votes are apportioned using a population count that includes non-citizens who are not eligible to vote, giving more power in Congress and elections to regions with significant foreign-born populations. The Census estimates that by 2060, about one-in-six residents will have been born outside the U.S.”

Since non-citizens are not eligible to vote, taking their numbers out of the equation helps restore the integrity and benefits of being a legal American citizen.

There’s simply no excuse that Bill Lee can provide to not comply with the President’s Executive Order on this issue. Contact his office and ask him whether Tennessee will comply.

It’s also campaign time and this is one perfect question to ask your current or soon-to-be new state representative and senator. If they value you as a voter, they should be able to commit to seeing to it that Tennessee turn in its data.