Senate Democrats Block Obama Radical Nominee from Civil Rights Post

Last week saw a somewhat surprising victory against the racialists running the Obama administration. It was surprising, not so much in the result, but in how it was achieved.

I’ll explain via The Washington Post:

Several Senate Democrats joined with Republicans in voting against Debo Adegbile, whose nomination was adamantly and vocally opposed by conservatives due to his participation in an appeal filed on behalf of Mumia Abu-Jamal–an internationally-known prisoner convicted of the 1981 murder of Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner.

Adegbile was Obama’s choice to head the Civil Rights Division of the Holder Justice Department.

Of course, Adegbile’s prospects at confirmation were intertwined with the story of Mumia Abul-Jamal. So let’s review the facts of what took place the night Faulkner was murdered.

Early on the morning of December 9, 1981 (3:50 a.m., to be exact), Officer Daniel Faulkner stopped the car of William Cook, Abu-Jamal’s brother. Abu-Jamal, driving a taxi, happened to be parked nearby, and upon witnessing the altercation involving his brother, took off across the street to confront Faulkner, shooting him in the back. Officer Faulkner did manage to fire back, wounding Abu-Jamal, who then stood over Faulkner and shot him point blank in the face, killing him instantly.

Abu-Jamal, a former member of the Black Panther Party, was found guilty and received the death sentence, which was later commuted to life in prison. The “guilty” decision was “not a close call“:

“The question of Abu-Jamal’s guilt is not a close call,” according to John Fund. “Two hospital workers testified that Abu-Jamal confessed to them: ‘I shot the motherf***er, and I hope the motherf***er dies.’ His brother, William, has never testified to his brother’s innocence even though he was at the scene of the crime. Abu-Jamal himself chose not to testify in his own defense.”

Cook, I should note, has shown up at protests on behalf of his brother’s “civil rights” battle but never in court to testify under oath. And our Corruption Chronicles blogger Irene Garcia covered the grassroots opposition from police organizations to Adegbile:

Obama’s nominee to be Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division at the Department of Justice (DOJ), Debo Adegbile, spent more than a decade in various leadership positions–including director–at the Legal Defense and Education Fund of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). During Adegbile’s leadership the NAACP volunteered its services to represent Mumia Abu-Jamal, a member of the Black Panthers who murdered a police officer (Daniel Faulkner) in Philadelphia three decades ago.

Abu-Jamal was sentenced to death by the jury that convicted him in 1982 and his supporters–including the man who could soon be an Assistant Attorney General–have long claimed that he was the victim of a racist legal system. Nevertheless, Abu-Jamal has lost multiple appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court has twice rejected his case. In 2012, under the leadership of Adegbile, the NAACP’s Legal Defense and Education Fund represented Abu-Jamal in his latest appeal to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. The cop murderer lost that one too, but the fact remains that Adegbile continues fighting on his behalf.

Understandably, this is upsetting to hundreds of thousands of law enforcement officers represented by the National Fraternal Order of Police. In a hard-hitting letter to President Obama, the group expresses “extreme disappointment, displeasure and vehement opposition” to Adegbile’s nomination. “As word of this nomination spreads through the law enforcement community, reactions range from anger to incredulity,” the letter says, reminding that there is no disputing that Officer Faulkner was murdered by the “thug” who Adegbile continues defending.

“This nomination can be interpreted in only one way: it is a thumb in the eye of our nation’s law enforcement officers,” the letter continues. “It demonstrates a total lack of regard or empathy for those who strive to keep you and everyone else in our nation safe in your homes and neighborhoods–sometimes giving their lives in the effort.” Adegbile will certainly exacerbate the growing division and distrust between law enforcement and minority communities, the FOP claims. The group ends by telling the commander-in-chief of its hope that candidates with records of “fairness and respect to all Americans” are considered for future leadership positions in the administration.

Don’t hold your breath. It’s really not all that surprising to see a radical candidate like Adegbile nominated for this particular job. Remember the last guy (now Labor Secretary Thomas Perez) Obama picked to head the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division? He is a renowned La Raza advocate who led the DOJ’s attack on Arizona’s illegal immigration enforcement law and state Voter ID measures nationwide. Perez was also heavily embroiled in a scandal involving the DOJ’s abrupt decision to abandon its own voter intimidation lawsuit against the New Black Panther Party for Self-Defense. Judicial Watch uncovered documents that show Perez lied under oath to a commission investigating the Black Panther debacle.

Putting Adegbile’s defeat in perspective: every time the President fails to get an appointee approved, there are accusations of political grandstanding and/or racism coming out of the White House. This time, however, the President cannot rely on these time-tested tricks. The President was defeated by his own party because he nominated a man whose greatest claim to fame was that he once defended and, yes, made a hero out of a cop-killer.

President Obama called the defeat a “travesty” and complained that while Adegbile played by the rules, “Washington used the rules against him.” No, members of Congress merely used their common sense.

It is also interesting that Harry Reid’s recent power play to restrict the use of the filibuster for presidential nominations blew up in his face with this nomination. With a sixty vote threshold, dishonest senators could vote to end a filibuster against a radical like Adegbile, and then, because Democrats had votes to spare, vote “against” the nominee when only a bare majority vote was required. By moving the bar down to only requiring a bare majority vote to end filibusters, senators no longer have it both ways by casting fraud votes “against” awful nominees.

We’ve seen what the President has done before when his appointees are too radical to confirm. He simply installs them in positions of power. So should we be preparing ourselves for Debo Adegbile’s new role as “Race Relations Czar”? Now that would be a travesty.