Tommy Sotomayor | |
|---|---|
 Sotomayor in 2015 | |
| Born | Thomas Jerome Harris [1] 1975 (age 48–49) |
| Occupation(s) | Radio show host, YouTube personality, commentator |
| Website | sotomayortv |
Thomas Jerome Harris (born 1975) is an American radio and internet talk show host, YouTube personality, conservative political commentator, men's rights activist, and film producer. [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8]
In July 2016, a video from the night of the 2016 shooting of Dallas police officers showed two on-duty Dallas Police Department police officers calling fellow officers "cowards" on the podcast "Your World, My View Podcast" hosted by Sotomayor. [9] The officers called into the podcast and, as their fellow officers were driving to the scene of the shooting and answering other police calls, the two North Dallas patrol officers drove around espousing controversial opinions about police shootings. [9] "Quit hiring cowards, they are hiring cowards ... my partner says they are hiring cowards," said one of them about rookie officers coming out of the police academy. "They are hiring ex-military and they don’t see people as human." [9]
The Dallas Police Association later said the two officers were not a reflection of how other police officers feel and police department officials informed the media that Internal Affairs was investigating both officers. [9] The video was later removed from YouTube and both officers remained on active duty but could have faced serious disciplinary action. [9]
In 2015, in Orting, Washington, former mayor and city Councilman Guy "Sam" Colorossi was placed under investigation after sending out a mass email containing a 14-minute video by Sotomayor that encouraged white officers to avoid policing black communities, an Orting black police officer complained about the video's content, which the city condemned as "offensive and deplorable." [10] Sotomayor used racially charged language in the video and alluded to well-documented incidents in which white police officers were held accountable after clashing with black citizens in communities around the country. [10] Colorossi later apologized. Orting Mayor Joachim Pestinger posted in response that Colorossi's email should have never been sent. [10] Colorossi told The News Tribune he did not wish to offend anyone with the email and was passing it along for informational purposes. [10]
In July 2016, Harry Houck, a CNN law enforcement analyst promoted a video by Sotomayor on Twitter that declared African Americans are responsible for most violent crime in the United States. In the video, Sotomayor claimed that black Americans are a more serious threat than guns. Houck, a retired NYPD detective, linked to Sotomayor’s video via Twitter, saying that the radio host "knows what he’s talking about!". [11]
Sotomayor has also been a guest on the television news series On Point with Tomi Lahren on One America News Network [12] and Blaze Media. [13]
Russell Dale Martin was an American radio personality in Dallas, Texas. He worked in the Dallas radio market for 31 years. Martin hosted the No. 1-rated The Russ Martin Show on KLLI Live 105.3 in Dallas, until December 8, 2008, when KLLI switched to an all-sports format. On July 12, 2010, Martin returned to radio with his afternoon show on 97.1 "The Eagle" (KEGL).
The Dallas Police Department, established in 1881, is the principal law enforcement agency serving the city of Dallas, Texas.
The Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) is the primary law enforcement agency in Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. It is also the largest police department in Minnesota. Formed in 1867, it is the second-oldest police department in Minnesota, after the Saint Paul Police Department that formed in 1854. A short-lived Board of Police Commissioners existed from 1887 to 1890.
Blaze Media is an American conservative media company. It was founded in 2018 as a result of a merger between TheBlaze and CRTV LLC. The company's leadership consists of CEO Tyler Cardon and president Gaston Mooney. It is based in Irving, Texas, where it has studios and offices, as well as in Washington, D.C.
"Smart-Aleck Kill" is a short story by writer Raymond Chandler. It was first published in July 1934 in the magazine Black Mask.
Black Lives Matter (BLM) is a decentralized political and social movement that seeks to highlight racism, discrimination, and racial inequality experienced by black people, and promote anti-racism. Its primary concerns are incidents of police brutality and racially motivated violence against black people. It started following the killings of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, Eric Garner, and Rekia Boyd, among others. The movement and its related organizations typically advocate for various policy changes considered to be related to black liberation. While there are specific organizations that label themselves simply as "Black Lives Matter", such as the Black Lives Matter Global Network, the overall movement is a decentralized network of people and organizations with no formal hierarchy. The slogan "Black Lives Matter" itself remains untrademarked by any group. Despite being characterized by some as a violent movement, the overwhelming majority of its public demonstrations have been peaceful.
Tomi Rae Augustus Lahren is an American conservative political commentator and television presenter. She hosted Tomi on TheBlaze, where she gained attention for her short video segments called "final thoughts", in which she frequently criticized liberal politics. Many of her videos went viral, with The New York Times describing her as "the Right's rising media star". Lahren was suspended from TheBlaze in March 2017 after saying in an interview on The View that she believed women should have legal access to abortion.
Police reform in the United States is an ongoing process that seeks to reform systems of law enforcement throughout the United States. Many goals of the police reform movement center on police accountability. Specific goals may include: lowering the criminal intent standard, limiting or abolishing qualified immunity for law enforcement officers, sensitivity training, conflict prevention and mediation training, updating legal frameworks, and granting administrative subpoena power to the U.S. Department of Justice for "pattern or practice" investigations into police misconduct and police brutality.
On May 17, 2015, in Waco, Texas, United States, a shootout erupted at a Twin Peaks restaurant where more than 200 persons, including members from motorcycle clubs that included the Bandidos, Cossacks, and allies, had gathered for a meeting about political rights for motorcyclists. Law enforcement, which included 18 Waco Police Department officers and four Texas Highway Patrol troopers, had gathered to monitor the restaurant and meeting from outside, and, according to police, "returned fire after being shot at". Nine bikers were killed, 18 others wounded or injured, and 177 individuals were ultimately arrested and initially detained in connection with the shootout, most for alleged participation in organized crime. According to The New York Times, "the response by prosecutors was widely criticized as brazen overreach". According to the Waco Tribune-Herald, the shootout led to a "four-year prosecutorial fiasco that resulted in zero convictions."
The 2015 Texas pool party incident, also known as the "McKinney pool party", was a civil disturbance that occurred on June 5, 2015, at a pool party in McKinney, Texas, United States.
On November 15, 2015, two police officers fatally shot Jamar Clark, a 24-year-old African-American man, in Minneapolis. The two shooters were Mark Ringgenberg and Dustin Schwarze. They were a part of the Minneapolis Police Department which subsequently placed the men on paid administrative leave. The night after Ringgenberg and Schwarze shot him, Clark died at the Hennepin County Medical Center after being taken off life support. His death resulted from one of the gunshot wounds the shooters inflicted on November 15.
The murder of Laquan McDonald took place on October 20, 2014, in Chicago, Illinois. McDonald was a 17-year-old who was fatally shot by a Chicago Police Officer, Jason Van Dyke. Police had initially reported that McDonald was behaving erratically while walking down the street, refusing to put down a knife, and that he had lunged at officers. Preliminary internal police reports described the incident similarly, leading to the shooting being judged as justifiable, and Van Dyke not being charged at the time. This was later disproved after a video of the encounter was released, showing that McDonald was walking away.
On July 6, 2016, Philando Castile, a 32-year-old African American man, was fatally shot during a traffic stop by police officer Jeronimo Yanez of the St. Anthony police department in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul metropolitan area.
On July 7, 2016, Micah Xavier Johnson ambushed and shot police officers in Dallas, Texas, killing five, injuring nine others, and wounding two civilians. Johnson, a 25-year-old Army Reserve Afghan War veteran, was angry over police shootings of black men. He shot the officers at the end of a protest against the recent killings by police of Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and Philando Castile in Falcon Heights, Minnesota.
On July 17, 2016, Gavin Eugene Long shot six police officers in Baton Rouge, Louisiana in an ambush attack, in the wake of the shooting of Alton Sterling. Four died, including one who was critically wounded and died from complications in 2022, and two others were hospitalized; of the officers who initially died, two were members of the Baton Rouge Police Department, while the third worked for the East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff's Office. Long, who associated himself with organizations linked to black separatism and the sovereign citizen movement, was shot and killed by a SWAT officer during a shootout with police at the scene.
The killing of Korryn Gaines occurred on August 1, 2016, in Randallstown, Maryland, near Baltimore, resulting in the death of Gaines, a 23-year-old woman, and the shooting of her son, who survived. According to the Baltimore County Police Department, officers sought to serve Gaines a warrant in relation to an earlier traffic violation. She had refused to vacate her vehicle or show her driver's license, and resisted arrest. Immediately after the first officer entered her home to serve the warrant, Gaines pointed a shotgun at him, prompting him to withdraw without shots being fired. The Baltimore County SWAT team responded and a standoff began. She recorded and live streamed to Facebook where Gaines's friends told her to "continue on". She is seen to have told her son that "the police are coming to kill us". Upon her refusal to let them in, police got a key from the rental office but found the chain lock blocked their entry. An officer then kicked in the door. Police say Gaines pointed a shotgun at an officer, telling him to leave.
Angela Rye is the Principal and CEO of IMPACT Strategies, a political advocacy firm formerly based in Washington, DC. She is a special correspondent on ESPN.
The Next Revolution was a television program that debuted on the Fox News Channel, being broadcast on the channel from June 4, 2017–May 28, 2023. The hour-long weekly program was hosted by Steve Hilton, who served as a political adviser to former British prime minister David Cameron. The program focused on providing opinion commentary about the right-wing populist movement.
Frank Morris (1914–1964) was an American businessman who died as a result of arson to his shoe shop in Ferriday, Louisiana, a city with a history of racial violence. There have been allegations of witness intimidation, evidence tampering, and involvement by local law enforcement. No charges have been brought despite three FBI investigations.
New York City has been the site of many Black Lives Matter protests in response to incidents of police brutality and racially motivated violence against black people. The Black Lives Matter movement began as a hashtag after the shooting death of African-American teen Trayvon Martin, and became nationally recognized for street demonstrations following the 2014 deaths of two African Americans, Michael Brown and Eric Garner. Garner was killed in the Staten Island borough of New York City, leading to protests, demonstrations, and work towards changes in policing and the law. Following the murder of George Floyd in Minnesota in 2020, the global response included extensive protests in New York City, and several subsequent changes to policy.