by Travis Mateer

Once upon a time a black man ran for political office in Montana. This black man came to America as a refugee and had dreams of being Mayor, but was he the RIGHT kind of black man?

Maggie Bornstein, a young white woman interning for the Montana Human Rights Network at the time, didn’t think so, and she wrote a letter to the editor on May 4th, 2021, to describe WHY this black man was really a Trojan horse for right-wingers. Not stated in the letter was the fact she developed this theory while interning at MHRN.

Here is some of that letter from Bornstein:

Last month, a mayoral candidate boasted a successful fundraising launch. This was accomplished through large, indoor events where he and attendees did not wear masks.

This comes as no surprise, as his donors and supporters include right-wing key players and militia-affiliated Montanans. He’s touted his support for religious freedom in the context of LGBTQ discrimination, and his supporters are found frequently commenting, dehumanizing our homeless neighbors.

Because Jacob Elder was the WRONG kind of black man, he was summarily destroyed, politically. Would Jacob’s fate have been different if he was one of Maggie Bornstein’s “homeless neighbors”?

I don’t think so, because we have ANOTHER wrong kind of black person to consider, and that’s the corpse of Johnny Lee Perry.

How did Johnny Lee Perry become a corpse? I’d like to know the details of that, but no one in Missoula really seems to care about what happened out on the Southside Road on August 29th, 2021, where Johnny was allegedly wielding a machete before he was shot and killed by unnamed Sheriff Deputies.

The Sheriff is an elected position, so we have DEMOCRACY at play here AND a dead black man shot by law enforcement. Shouldn’t the Montana Human Rights Network be all over this?

If Sheriff McDermott ran as a Republican, and Missoula was a conservative town, then I suspect the Montana Human Rights Network would be MUCH MORE active in helping uncover what happened. But he isn’t, and we’re not, so who the fuck cares about a dead black man and what might be happening with the state investigation into why he’s dead.

I would love for the Montana Human Rights Network to prove me wrong on all this, but they are too busy pretending that a legitimate coup attempt occurred last year on January 6th to bother themselves with the corpses of black men in Missoula.

Here is some of that bullshit from their Facebook page:

We may have just turned the page on 2021, but a day of infamy falls early in the new year. January 6 marks one year since right-wing insurrectionists physically attacked the U.S. Capitol in an effort to overthrow our time-honored process of free and fair elections. Criminal charges and jail sentences for the insurrectionists continue to roll out, as does the investigation by a special committee of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Since the fateful day, January 6 will be remembered as a time when an unthinkable attack on our nation happened right in front of our eyes. It also served as an example of what happens when extremism leaves the shadows and transforms into domestic terrorism, which, in this case, was viewed in real time on screens across the country. January 6 should be a day of thoughtful reflection about how so many people were incited to violence and how we can prevent another dangerous attempt to overthrow a legitimate election. As we consider how to safeguard our nation, extremist groups and leaders continue banging the drum for violent insurrection.

I bolded the part about a LEGITIMATE election because we all know Democrats spent 4 years pushing a bullshit conspiracy theory that Russia elected Donald J. Trump. In their propaganda-poisoned minds, this is the ONLY explanation as to why Hillary Clinton didn’t win.

A non-profit organization promoting “human rights” shouldn’t be so heavily involved in partisan politics because, if they are, then their supposed concern for human rights will be undermined, along with their pro-democracy stance, and they will be seen as nothing more than a political arm of the Democratic party in Montana.

Thanks for reading.