Times Helps Muslim Rep. Ellison Obstruct Terror Probe
Seven years in prison for the crimes of murder and attempted murder strike most people as hardly enough, but Ellison considered Olson a fighter for social justice.
By Cliff Kincaid
In an editorial titled “Homeland Blather,” The New York Times said that it agrees with Rep. Keith Ellison that it is “very scary” that the incoming chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, Rep. Peter King, wants to investigate the “radicalization of the American Muslim community.” The editorial, however, failed to note that Ellison, “the nation’s first Muslim elected to the House,” comes from a district that includes young Muslims recruited to go to Somalia to participate in plots to kill Americans.
The problem of radicalization, as we pointed out in another column about Ellison’s resistance to the probe, has been examined by the Senate Homeland Security Committee. The topic was addressed by Andrew Liepman, Deputy Director of Intelligence of the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC). “FBI Watching Somali Muslims In Minneapolis” was the headline over a CBS News story about the danger.
Investigations into this continuing problem are clearly warranted, especially in relation to the Muslim problem in Minneapolis—Ellison’s district. But perhaps Ellison, the newly elected co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, fears being probed as well. After all, the radicalization of American Muslims is personified in his own transformation from radical leftist to advocate of Muslim causes.
In addition to being the first Muslim member of Congress, which is usually mentioned by the media, Ellison was an official of the National Lawyers Guild (NLG), cited as a Communist Party front organization by the House Committee on Un-American Activities. It remains the U.S. affiliate of the International Association of Democratic Lawyers, the old Soviet front. In that capacity, Ellison had been a vocal supporter—and attended a fundraiser for—Sara Jane Olson, a member of the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA), an off-shoot of the Weather Underground that is probably best known for kidnapping Patricia Hearst.
Olson served seven years in prison for involvement in the murder of a bank customer and the attempted murder of Los Angeles police officers by bombing their cars.
Before she was apprehended by law enforcement authorities, she had been hiding out in Minnesota. She was paroled in 2009 for crimes committed in California and returned to Minnesota. Seven years in prison for the crimes of murder and attempted murder strike most people as hardly enough, but Ellison considered Olson a fighter for social justice.
An Ellison speech on behalf of Olson, in which he called the terrorist a freedom fighter, has been eliminated from most websites, including one devoted to her legal defense, but a Minneapolis blogger who followed the case saved and posted it. One notices the lavish praise that Ellison bestows not only on Olson, also known as Katherine Soliah, but to Bernardine Dohrn, the former leader of the communist terrorist Weather Underground. Ellison also praised cop-killers Mumia Abu-Jamal, on death row in Pennsylvania, and Joanne Chesimard (aka Assata Shakur), who escaped the U.S. and is now living under the protection of the Castro dictatorship.
As he campaigned to be the first Muslim member of Congress and then won the seat, the PowerLine blog and WorldNetDaily covered the story of Ellison’s radical transformation and ideology.
In an article for The Weekly Standard, entitled, “Louis Farrakhan’s First Congressman,” Scott Johnson of PowerLine blog examined Ellison’s radical record, including his involvement with the Nation of Islam, and how the local paper, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, tried to keep this information from the voters.
The New York Times did so as well. A Times story about his election to Congress highlighted praise from Muslims, including Al Jazeera, and only referred to his “past support” for Louis Farrakhan and the “radical group,” the Nation of Islam. It said nothing about his praise for the SLA terrorist and membership in the NLG.
Now we know why Rep. Ellison wants to obstruct a probe into radical Islam. But why would The New York Times want to conceal this information?
Cliff Kincaid is the Director of the AIM Center for Investigative Journalism and can be contacted at cliff.kincaid@aim.org.
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