Did you hear? The Department of Justice is responsible for organizing rallies to support Trayvon Martin! Gasp!
The conservative group Judicial Watch published records that show the Community Relations Service, a civil rights unit of the DOJ, helped with security for the rallies. Conservative groups have interpreted those records to mean there was wrongdoing; the Heritage Foundation has gone so far as to demand an oversight hearing for the Community Relations Service’s “potentially unethical involvement.” Fox News, Daily Caller, and other conservative media have taken up the same spin. CNN picked up the report, as well.
But the same documents show nothing inflammatory about the DOJ involvement, which was limited to ensuring security for the protests.
Salacious. Race-bait-y. Click, click, click.
Here’s the reality — the Department of Justice’s Community Relations Service is a neutral watchdog that provides security even to some of our nation’s biggest scumbags, ensuring their right to protest. As Ryan J Reilly reports.
Back in 2000, they provided this same type of “support” for a Ku Klux Klan rally. And on the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, they were in place at a rally held by the anti-gay Westboro Baptist Church and an anti-Muslim rally featuring blogger Pamela Geller and Quran-burning pastor Terry Jones.
CRS officials, often described as “peacemakers,” seem to have played the same role in Sanford that they did in Jena, La., during the Bush administration, after nooses were hung from a tree at the little town’s high school. Impartiality is key to their mission.
Did CRS officials “support” and “organize” those who hung nooses from trees under the Bush Administration?
No, but if you were to operate under the same assumptions as Heritage, Fox News, and The Daily Caller did today, you may believe so. Of course we know that isn’t the assumption, because Eric Holder is blackety-black, ya’ll.
This is classic race-baiting.