Saturday, June 23, 2018
Tags: Pittsburgh , Antwon Rose , East Pittsburgh Police , gun violence , Summer Lee , Mike Doyle , Conor Lamb , Ed Gainey , Jake Wheatley , Rich Fitzgerald , Bill Peduto , Juneteenth , protest , Image , Slideshow
Thursday, June 21, 2018
On Thursday afternoon, Ford sat in his wheelchair at the Allegheny County Courthouse amid thousands protesting the shooting death of Antwon Rose.
“This is painful for me,” Ford said. “I fought for six years and I didn’t think this would be happening.”
Tags: Antwon Rose , East Pittsburgh Police , Allegheny County Courthouse , Pittsburgh , Leon Ford , Stephen Zappala , Brandi Fisher , Jasiri X , Alliance for Police Accountability , police shooting , unarmed , Image
Tuesday, May 22, 2018
Since 2017, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has seen several regulations stripped by Congress, including a repeal championed by U.S. Rep. Keith Rothfus (R-Sewickley).
Now, a law co-written by U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Lehigh) has eliminated another CFPB guidance; one that was created to ensure racial minorities aren't taken advantage of by the auto-lending industry. On May 21, President Donald Trump signed into law the repeal of that informal rule. With the guidance gone, consumers in Allegheny County and the entire U.S. shouldn’t expect the CFPB to tackle car companies and auto lenders that upcharge based on race.
Tags: Pat Toomey , Consumer Financial Protection Bureau , auto lending , racial minorities , United Steelworkers , Republican , Donald Trump , regulations. U.S. Congress , PolitiCrap , Image
Monday, May 7, 2018
But state Rep. Daryl Metcalfe (R-Cranberry) may be learning that if you come out extremely pro-gun in today’s America, you may be inviting some pretty extreme individuals to celebrate with you. On April 30, Metcalfe hosted a pro-gun rally at the Pennsylvania Capitol building in Harrisburg titled “Rally to Protect Your Right to Keep and Bear Arms.”
Rally-goers filled the Capitol rotunda to listen to speakers like Metcalfe, state Rep. Eli Evankovich (R-Murrysville) and NRA news host Cam Edwards. Republican gubernatorial candidate and Richland resident Paul Mango was also in attendance. But the rally was also attended by members of the American Guard, which the Anti-Defamation League has labeled a white supremacy group.
Tags: Daryl Metcalfe , Harrisburg , Pennsylvania , Republican , American Guard , white nationalist , white supremacist , pro-gun , gun owners. anti-immigration , neo-Nazis , PolitiCrap , Image
Thursday, April 26, 2018
The statue came off of its post fairly easily. A crew of several Department of Public Works employees wrapped thick rope around the statue and it was pulled off the base with a backhoe. The ropes were removed after the statue was loaded onto a flatbed truck; the truck drove slowly away and nothing was damaged.
Tags: Pittsburgh , Stephen Foster , Oakland , statue , racist , Pittsburgh Arts Commission , Department of Public Works , African American , Image , Slideshow
Wednesday, April 18, 2018
Owen Benjamin is a well-known comedian in the conservative-media world. Benjamin is white and one of his signature bits is singing a song called “that [n-word] stole my bike.” Benjamin has defended his takes on race as tackling political correctness. He is a self-described critic of liberalism and left-leaning politics. In March, he tweeted “what a [n-word] queer” and linked a story about Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Benjamin has said efforts to curb his brand of comedy are censorship.
In late March, the New Hazlett Theater canceled his stand-up event in Pittsburgh after learning more about Benjamin’s material and social-media presence. About a week later, Benjamin’s Twitter account was suspended after he tweeted about Parkland Shooting survivor David Hogg’s pubic hair. He had more than 180,000 followers on Twitter before his account was suspended.
But before Benjamin’s Twitter account was permanently suspended, he had a confrontation with Pittsburgh comedian Day Bracey, who had pushed back against Benjamin’s racist and anti-LGBTQ rhetoric. Bracey believes Pittsburgh venues shouldn't work with Benjamin, given his use of racial and LGBTQ slurs. But, in arguing with Benjamin and his legion of fans on Twitter, Bracey had his Twitter account permanently suspended, which he says is a big hit to his growing brand in Pittsburgh. Even so, Bracey is hopeful Pittsburgh will reject Benjamin's brand of comedy. But Benjamin has apparently found a new venue and he has cast himself as the victim of "activists" like Bracey. He hopes to use Pittsburgh to highlight what he calls a "shaming" culture on the left.
Tags: Pittsburgh , Owen Benjamin , Day Bracey , Drinking Partners , Twitter , New Hazlett , comedy , race , LGBTQ , Image
Thursday, April 5, 2018
The Last Billboard, created by Carnegie Mellon professor Jon Rubin, has been posting messages by local artists to a billboard on top of a building in East Liberty since 2013, but last week marks the first time the building's landlord intervened. "There Are Black People In The Future" was posted to the billboard on March 3 and removed several weeks later.
"Last week, The Last Billboard’s landlord, We Do Property, forced Alisha’s text to be taken down over objections to the content (through a never-before evoked clause in the lease that gives the landlord the right to approve text)," Rubin wrote in a statement on the project's website on April 3.
Tags: Last Billboard , Jon Rubin , Alisha Wormsley , We Do Property , Eve Picker , Image
Thursday, January 25, 2018
But as he continued to walk down Meyran, he spotted about 15-20 more swastikas. All were drawn into the snow on car windshields, on both sides of the avenue. That was when the student knew he had to do more than just brush off the swastikas. So, he took pictures of the swastikas and posted them on Facebook, along with a post saying that this behavior needs to stop and denouncing anyone for promoting Nazism and white supremacy. The post was shared more than 620 times. The student requested to remain anonymous, saying he fears retaliation from making the incident public.
“Someone took the time to stand there to make them perfectly visible,” said the student in an interview with Pittsburgh City Paper a week after the event. “I think it was somebody who wants to promote hate. I am Jewish and am I gay, that symbol triggers me.”
Tags: Oakland , Pittsburgh , swastika , anti-Semitism , University of Pittsburgh , Jewish Federation of Pittsburgh , Meyran Avenue , Facebook , Federal Bureau of Investigations , Steelers , Mike Tomlin , Image
Thursday, October 26, 2017
Day Bracey had had enough. Earlier this month, the well-known Pittsburgh comedian and co-host of the Drinking Partners craft-beer-focused podcast had been engaging in some social-media back-and-forth with another area comedian, Zach Hudak. Bracey took offense at some of Hudak’s posts, which often included racist and homophobic memes, and responded to some of the posts on Facebook.
Then Hudak took the discourse to another level. He responded to Bracey days later with a video he made and posted to Twitter on Oct. 16, tagging Bracey, who is black. The video (shown above) features Hudak, who is white, in black face, imitating Bracey, using a minstrel-like voice, and saying, “Hello there, this bes Day Bracey, when I sees the racist, sexist, Eskimo-phobic, peckerwood motha fucka Zach Hudak, I am gonna be curb stompin’ his ass.”
Tags: Day Bracey , Drinking Partners , Zach Hudak , Race , Ashley Corts , Black Forge Coffee , Indiana County , Comedy , Epicast , Twitter , Facebook , Image
Friday, September 15, 2017
Pittsburgh City Paper first reported about some of Lloyd's recent actions in August. Lloyd, who has a history of violence and membership in white supremacist organizations, resurfaced just two days after the neo-Nazi and white supremacist events in Charlottesville, Va. One Mount Lebanon resident who asked not to be named attended the Mount Lebanon protest and told CP in August that Lloyd was wearing a camouflage hat with a double lightning-bolt symbol. This symbol is sometimes referred to as “SS bolts” and is derived from the Schutzstaffel (SS) of Nazi Germany, according to the Anti-Defamation League’s website. The ADL says SS bolts are a common symbol in white-supremacist/neo-Nazi circles.
The resident said Lloyd gave a Nazi salute yelled "white power" and walked through the crowd quickly. The resident called Lloyd's actions "disturbing."
In July, he was released from prison after serving time for online harassment, threatening police officers and contacting another white supremacist. As a condition of Lloyd's parole, he was not allowed to have contact or post content on the internet in ties to terroristic organizations like white supremacists.
Lloyd took to the Internet to comment about the story and single out those who spoke to CP. For example, Lloyd called several sources connected to the story race traitors and in response to a source who said the situation in Mt. Lebanon with Lloyd "scares you." To that Lloyd wrote: "If that scares you you'll have a heart attack with my plans for the muds and jews [sic]."
According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, U.S. Marshals "found weapons [Lloyd] isn't allowed to have, including a hatchet, a switchblade, a modified baseball bat and a martial arts 'fighting stick' he ordered online."
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), Lloyd was the former Pennsylvania head of the World Church of the Creator, an organization that believes “race, not religion, is the embodiment of absolute truth and that the white race is the highest expression of culture and civilization.” The SPLC also reports that in 2002 Lloyd began “referring to himself as ‘the doctor of all hate’ and promoting himself as the leader of the so-called ‘Order of National Socialism,’ whose motto was ‘Wake up and Kill Someone.’” In 2003, Lloyd was involuntarily committed to a psychiatric facility and kicked out of the World Church of the Creator.
For decades Lloyd had run-ins with the law and was in and out of jail, mostly for illegally owning firearms. In 2004, Lloyd was acquitted of a murder charge, even though he admitted to shooting and killing Lori Hann, a woman he met through online dating. The jury in that case “apparently believed that Lloyd reasonably assumed that Hann was armed,” according to SPLC. The SPLC also notes four years after the shooting, Lloyd posted a video online apparently taunting the Hann family by rapping a song titled “Bitch Killer” with the lyrics, “Bitch killer, better her than me, bitch killer, fuck Hann's family, bitch killer, I know Lori's family's grievin', bitch killer, but tonight I got even.”
Lloyd was ordered to remain in custody by U.S. Magistrate Judge Cynthia Reed Eddy. Lloyd's preliminary hearing is Sept. 19.
Tags: Hardy Lloyd , Pittsburgh , Mount Lebanon , U.S. Marshals , white supremacist , neo-Nazi , Pittsburgh City Paper , Pittsburgh Post-Gazette , Southern Poverty Law Center , Tim Murphy , Charlottesville , Va. , Image
