By John Friend
The radical left is gaining political traction in St. Louis, as evidenced by the recent Democratic primary victory of Cori Bush, a nationally recognized Black Lives Matter organizer and community activist, over incumbent William Lacy Clay, who had represented Missouri’s 1st congressional district since 2001. Bush is now set to coast to victory in the Democrat-leaning district in the upcoming November election, and would become the first black woman in Congress from Missouri.
Clay succeeded his father following his retirement in 2000, with the senior Clay holding the congressional seat, which encompasses the east side of St. Louis, since 1969. Bush’s victory over the Clay political dynasty represents “one of the most significant moments in the history of St. Louis politics,” noted St. Louis Public Radio political correspondent Jason Rosenbaum. “It is enormous.”
Bush, 44, challenged Clay, himself a progressive Democrat who supports the Green New Deal, Medicare for all, and other far-left policies, in the same primary race in 2018, losing by 20%. This time around, Bush had the support of a number of highly dedicated and energetic radical political activist groups, including the Sunrise Movement, a youth-oriented activist group focused on advancing Green New Deal policies and fighting “white supremacy.” Fight Corporate Monopolies, an anti-monopoly group, also threw their weight behind Bush and purchased a six-figure political advertisement in the weeks leading up to the primary designed to undermine Clay for his past support for the financial industry, according to “The Intercept.”
Give the one-time homeless person Bush some credit. She is, in many ways, an American success story. “They counted us out. They called me just the protester. I’m just the activist. With no name, no title, and no real money. That’s all they said that I was,” Bush declared following her primary victory. “But St. Louis showed up today.”
She went on to describe her victory as “historic,” noting “that this year, of all the years, we are sending a black, working-class, single mother, who’s been fighting for black lives since Ferguson, all the way to the halls of Congress.”
Bush gained attention following her involvement in the Black Lives Matter movement in Ferguson, Mo., a suburb of St. Louis, after the 2014 death of an 18-year-old black man named Michael Brown. Brown engaged in a strong-armed robbery prior to being pursued by Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson. During the pursuit, Brown attacked Wilson and attempted to take possession of his firearm, resulting in Wilson shooting and killing Brown.
Following Brown’s death, riots and looting erupted in St. Louis, resulting in widespread destruction and mayhem. A lengthy criminal investigation followed, resulting in the acquittal of Wilson, who was proven to have acted in self-defense.
St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner, who has received financial backing from political action committees financed by the kleptocratic far-left globalist George Soros, also won the recent Democratic primary, defeating her opponent Mary Pat Carl with roughly 61% of the final votes. Gardner, who is completing her first term as circuit attorney, is the first black woman to hold the office. Yet another far-left radical, she has vowed to pursue criminal justice reform as a key part of her agenda, resulting in more criminals on the streets and fewer prosecutions.
In recent months, Gardner has been heavily criticized, including by Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt, for failing to pursue charges against rioters, looters, and other criminals involved in demonstrations following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
“To see that kind of level of violence and rioting that went on, police officers being shot and shot at, a retired police captain being murdered, people throwing rocks and gasoline and frozen water bottles at police officers, firefighters being assaulted and blocked from doing their job, businesses that have served the community for years being burned to the ground, it’s unfathomable that every single person arrested that night has been released,” Schmitt stated in early June following the chaos and upheaval during the rioting. “It is stunning.”
Schmitt went on to describe Gardner’s failure to pursue charges as “emboldening” the criminals and terrorists destroying the city. “There have to be consequences [for their crimes] and we’re just not seeing that from the local prosecutor,” Schmitt noted.
Unsurprisingly, Gardner has attempted to pursue felony charges against Mark and Patricia Mc-Closkey, a St. Louis couple who gained international attention after displaying firearms outside their home in a St. Louis neighborhood. [See AFP issue 31&32, 2020.—Ed.] Black Lives Matter protesters had smashed a gate blocking the private street the McCloskey’s live on and, according to Mark, proceeded to threaten and intimidate the couple.
“We were threatened with our lives, threatened with a house being burned down, my office building being burned down, even our dog’s life being threatened,” he stated in an interview with a local St. Louis news outlet.
This matters not to radical leftists like Gardner, who is herself under investigation. According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, “In 2019, Gardner admitted to repeat campaign finance violations dating back to her time as a Missouri state legislator. These violations included using campaign donations to pay for a private apartment. Gardner reached an agreement with the Missouri Ethics Commission to pay a settlement of $6,314 in lieu of a $63,009 fine.”
And, according to a CNN report, “In January 2020, Gardner filed a civil rights lawsuit against St. Louis City and St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department on the basis of the 4th Amendment, 14th Amendment, and Ku Klux Klan Act of 1865, alleging a racist conspiracy” in the St. Louis P.D.
According to the website “STLToday.com,” “Fox News reporter John Solomon claimed that Gardner’s office violated the state’s Sunshine Law by refusing to make available records involving investigations into former Republican Missouri Governor Eric Greitens.” The allegations by Greitens against Gardner were serious. The former Navy SEAL has alleged that Gardner fabricated various corruption charges against him resulting in his resignation as Missouri governor. Subsequently, a court dismissed all charges against Greitens. Currently, however, Gardner has racked up $500,000 in legal fees defending herself. She tried to stick the bill on Missouri taxpayers, but a judge recently ruled that Gardner had improperly signed off on these out-of-state contracts with defense-law firms and taxpayers would not pay the bill. Fox News alleges that Soros has dumped more than $100,000 into the Kim Gardner PAC to help pay her legal expenses, this after Soros donations amounted to more than 60% of Gardner’s election campaign coffers.
Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass, recently attacked as an anti-Semite for mentioning Soros’s influence in local government, had this to say: “These Democratic cities are also where leftwing billionaire George Soros has spent millions of dollars to help elect liberal social justice warriors as prosecutors. He remakes the justice system in urban America, flying under the radar. The Soros-funded prosecutors, not the mayors, are the ones who help release the violent on little or no bond.”
Kass said in the recent column in the Tribune that got him into so much hot water, “If Trump truly wants to help the cities, he might privately call the mayors and ask them about the prosecutors backed by Soros. These prosecutors are among the few politicians in America who have delivered on their promises. They promised to empty their jails through the social justice warrior policy of ‘decarceration.’ They also help give repeat, violent criminals little or no bond when arrested. And in many of the violent cities, the prosecutors have delivered on their promises, not to keep the violent in jail, but to let them out.” More than 20% have gone on to commit new crimes, says Kass.
Kass points out as well that, “In Democratic Chicago, for example, the Soros prosecutor is Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx. In her 2020 campaign, she reportedly received at least $2 million from a Soros-backed political action committee.”
AFP readers remember Foxx. She is the one who let hate-crime hoaxer Jussie Smollett off the hook even though two foreign nationals admitted that Smollett paid them handsomely to fake the so-called attack on him. Her office is now under investigation for that fiasco.
Kass sums up the whole situation nicely:
“If you’re a Democrat, you might worry that Trump will score political points by sending federal agents to the violent cities. If you’re a Republican, or an independent with a new police scanner app on your cellphone, waiting for your firearm owners permit in the mail, you might say it’s about time.
“And if you’re trapped in one of the violent urban neighborhoods, you’re hoping that your children won’t be killed as they sit on your front porch.
“You can see that something is growing in the big cities: An overwhelming sense of lawlessness.”
America would be well served to figure out how to get Soros money and influence out of American politics and American cities. He is not helping social justice; rather, he is setting back race relations by decades and destroying once-thriving cities in the process.
So next time you vote in your local elections, check on whether any of the politicians on the ticket is supported by Soros. If they are, cast the lever for anybody else. You may very well be saving your town and your future.
John Friend is a freelance writer based in California.
