(Matt Lamb, Headline USA) An ousted “Squad” member spent one of his last days as an elected official ranting about the acquittal of Daniel Penny. But social media users quickly responded with their own criticism.
“Dear White People,” Rep. Jamaal Bowman, D-NY, wrote on X yesterday.
“I don’t know why I feel the need to keep talking to you. I don’t know why part of me still has hope for you and for us,” Bowman wrote. “Some of you are too far gone. But maybe enough of you aren’t and will join us in fighting to end white supremacy.”
Dear White People,
I don’t know why I feel the need to keep talking to you. I don’t know why part of me still has hope for you and for us. Some of you are too far gone. But maybe enough of you aren’t and will join us in fighting to end white supremacy.
— Rep. Jamaal Bowman Ed.D. (@JamaalBowmanNY) December 10, 2024
Bowman lost his primary race in June this year to George Latimer.
He made the comments criticizing the jury’s acquittal of Penny, who used a chokehold on Jordan Neely, a black man who was acting erratically on a New York subway train last year.
Bowman, who once pulled a fire alarm to disrupt a U.S. House meeting, wrote a lengthy thread that included his opinion, some facts, as well as a fictional retelling of racial history.
“The first Black man I saw violently attacked on camera was Rodney King. Those officers were acquitted,” he wrote. A Community Note on X helpfully points out that two officers were convicted.
“Jordan Neely is the latest. He was sick. He was not a threat,” Bowman said later in the thread. “He was subdued. Still not a threat. Daniel Penny choked him for 6 minutes. And killed him. We all watched it on camera, and he was still acquitted.”
Witnesses, include a “woman of color,” called Penny a “hero” for subduing Neely.
X users reminded Bowman that Neely had a troubled history.
“The system failed him when it didn’t put him in prison where he and the public would be safe,” Mike Osborne wrote.
The absurdity of, 'white supremacy,' is if a white person went on the insane racist rant you just did they'd be socially ostracized, banned and fired from their job.
An elected official doing this? It'd be 24/7 outrage news.
You are privileged.
You're the supremacist. https://t.co/UXr6E0QLt7— Chad Felix Greene 🇮🇱 (@chadfelixg) December 10, 2024
“The absurdity of, ‘white supremacy,’ is if a white person went on the insane racist rant you just did they’d be socially ostracized, banned and fired from their job,” commentator Chad Felix Greene wrote. “An elected official doing this? It’d be 24/7 outrage news. You are privileged. You’re the supremacist.”
Black commentator Christy Kelly also criticized Bowman.
“What trauma is ‘deep in your bones’ – from the hands of white people? I’d really like to know,” she wrote.
“Is that the same trauma that made you ignorantly pull a fire alarm at your former place of employment,” she asked.
Bowman has a history of pushing radical views.
As a middle school principal, he included cop-killer Assata Shakur on the school’s “Wall of Honor.”
‘I will refuse to denounce,” he said, after saying he was teaching minority students about “black and Latino history.”
He also had to walk back comments dismissing claims that Hamas had raped women in Israel as part of its terrorist attack that began on Oct. 7, 2023.
Editor’s note: The author is a community note rater for X but did not contribute to any of the notes on Bowman’s posts.
