by Clayton Tramel
On May 25th, 2020, a year in America that had already been turned upside down by the Covid pandemic and a contentious election campaign, had gas thrown on it’s fire when civilian cell phone footage spread on the internet of a black man named George Floyd who died while pleading for help under the knee of a white officer named Derek Chauvin in Minneapolis, Minnesota. His dying words “I can’t breathe” became a slogan amongst protestors of Police brutality.
Despite universal condemnation of Officer Chauvin’s actions, within hours protests led by the Black Lives Matter coalition, immediately began in cities across the country. As had happened in previous deaths involving Police Officers and black Americans in cities such as Ferguson, Missouri, and Los Angeles, California, the protests quickly escalated from peaceful to destructive. All told, between the property damage and the looting that took place across the country, the George Floyd race riots would total over a billion dollars in damage claims. The costliest riot in American history.
Something more costly was looming for the Democratic Party, whose trajectory would be forever altered by four words given by then Senator and newly cemented Vice Presidential candidate Kamala Harris.
Throughout the coming weeks and months, the country was on edge. America was a pot of water on the stove waiting to be brought to a boil. A ticking time bomb waiting to go off. On August 23rd in Kenosha, Wisconsin, the bomb went off.
Officers responded to a domestic abuse call from a female caller named Laquisha Booker. According to Booker, a 29-year-old black man named Jacob Blake who she had previously had a relationship with had entered her house, taken a set of car keys, and refused to give them back. Booker told 9-1-1 operators that Blake was not authorized to be in her house.
Three months previously in May, Booker had reported that Blake had sexually assaulted her. A warrant was issued for Blake’s arrest on third degree sexual assault, trespassing, and disorderly conduct stemming from this incident. Now in August, the Police were made aware of his warrant on their way to Booker’s house.
image of Jacob Blake seconds before being shot by Police officers after resisting arrest for a sexual assault warrant.
When Police arrived, Blake was standing on the rear passenger side of his vehicle, where he had just put his three children inside. Officers ordered him to freeze, instructing him he was under arrest for the prior warrant. Blake refused.
Officers tried to physically subdue Blake, but he fought them back. Reportedly, putting one of the officers in a headlock.
Officers warned Blake if he didn’t comply with their orders he would be tazed. Blake refused. Two officers deployed their tazers but to no effect. Blake shook them off.
Verbal commands, physical altercations, and the use of tazers were all ignored by Blake. No matter the instruction given, Blake did not comply.
Blake told Officers he had a knife.
At this moment is where civilian video of the incident that spread online would begin.
Blake continued to refuse the Officers orders to surrender, and calmly and casually began walking from the rear passenger side of his vehicle, to the front of the passenger side, around the hood of the car, and finally towards the drivers side door.
Three Officers, two male, one female, all white, with their guns fully drawn, followed Blake as he strolled, pleading with him to comply.
Blake opened his car door and reached inside when Officer Rusten Sheskey, standing behind Blake, fired seven shots, hitting him four times in the back and three times in his side.
A knife was found inside the vehicle where Blake was reaching.
Seconds after Blake was shot the Police officers called for Emergency Services. Blake was air lifted to a hospital where he was ruled paralyzed from his injuries.
Just as in Minneapolis, violent protests began instantaneously. On August 24th a State of Emergency was called in by the Governor. The Wisconsin National Guard was deployed. Businesses were looted. Police cars were destroyed. A local courthouse was vandalized.
Protests once again spread across the Country. NBA players, just starting their Covid delayed post season refused to play in protest.
Enter Kamala Harris.
then Senator and Vice Presidential candidate Kamala Harris
Democrats, who have long used race baiting as a strategic talking point in their elections, had begun to exponentially weaponize race in the wake of Donald Trump’s entrance into politics.
It started with Trump’s often-blunt rhetoric of the issues with our Southern border. Blunt-rhetoric, but not without merit.
This opened the door in the instant social media era of unchecked accusations of wide spread racism in the Republican party and among Trump supporters. From the Covington High School story, to the Gold Star phone call with the wife of a fallen soldier Myeshia Johnson, to the most repeated and long debunked story of Trump calling Neo Nazi’s and White Supremacists in Charlottesville, Virginia ‘very fine people.’ The later, a lie repeated as recently as the Democratic National Convention this past summer by President Joe Biden, and this years second Presidential Debate by Kamala Harris.
All completely fabricated stories. All amplified by the Democrats and their closest partners, the main stream media, to poison the well of Americans who might otherwise consider voting for a candidate who wasn’t a Democrat.
Jacob Blake provided another great opportunity, and Harris seized it.
Days after the shooting while he was recuperating in a hospital bed, the Vice Presidential hopeful paid a visit to Blake.
When asked what her message was to the young man, it was revealed in four words: “I’m proud of you.”
When asked what her message was to the young man, Kamala Harris said “I’m proud of you”
To my knowledge, no reporters or journalists on print or television have ever asked the question I most wanted asked since I was stunned by this story. So I’ll ask it now:
Kamala Harris, what were you proud of?
Was it the Domestic abuse that Blake would later plead guilty of? The forced entry into Booker’s residence? The theft of her car keys? Or the repeated failure to follow the orders of the police officers?
I can’t find something to be proud of from Blake’s actions.
I certainly can’t find a hint of racism in what happened either. If you’re a white man, with a warrant for sexual assault and an officer orders you to put your hands in the air and you refuse, wrestle the officers and shake off their tazers then reach inside your vehicle while being ordered not to, you’re going to get shot. You’re just not going to make the news.
And maybe that’s what Kamala was proud of. Maybe she was glad Blake had given her campaign one more shining front page top of the telecast chance to divide the country further and demonize our police as racist, regardless of the circumstances and actions of the victim, if they happen to be black.
We felt the repercussions of liberal leadership all the way into my hometown of Norman, Oklahoma, where the junior activists that had penetrated our city council followed suit of their hero Kamala and introduced a motion to defund the Police Department that nearly ripped our city at it’s seams.
The type of tyranny that it takes, in weakening the necessary infrastructure of Police in your own country just for votes to retain power, is inexcusable. It’s something that Democrats have long flirted with, but on this occasion, in an election year with the amps already turned to eleven, they went for it in broad daylight. It comes across one way: evil.
And that’s what it ultimately cost the Democratic Party. Their legitimacy. There is no conviction. There is no identity. There is only the desire to be in power no matter the cost. That’s a recipe for evil.
If you cant win an election based on the merit of your positions you have to try to win based on the hatred you can drum up against your opponent. Dont believe me? Did anyone see Kamala Harris’ interview with Brett Baier last night? She was repeatedly asked about her positions but all she could talk about was Donald Trump.
I knew that they would tear down any one man in order to hold onto power. Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh taught me that. I was surprised that to hold onto power, they would tear their own country in half.
Shameful.