By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on September 13, 2023 Today, the Washington Post published a lengthy editorial opinion written by columnist David Ignatius calling for Joe Biden – and Kamala Harris – to step aside in 2024 and allow someone else to become their Democratic Party’s nominees for president and vice president. As Ignatius sees it: “Biden would carry two big liabilities into a 2024 campaign. He would be 82 when he began a second term. According to a recent Associated Press-NORC poll, 77 percent of the public, including 69 percent of Democrats, think he’s too old to be effective for four more years. Biden’s age isn’t just a Fox News trope; it’s been the subject of dinner-table conversations across America this summer. Because of their concerns about Biden’s age, voters would sensibly focus on his presumptive running mate, Harris. She is less popular than Biden, with a 39.5 percent approval rating, according to polling website FiveThirtyEight. Harris has many laudable qualities, but the simple fact is that she has failed to gain traction in the country or even within her own party.” In other words, Joe Biden is too old, and Kamala Harris is too unpopular. Ignatius fears that these two liabilities would open the door to a second term for Donald Trump. I agree! On January 16, 2022, I published an article titled, “Democrats Must Dump Biden in 2024.” Here is what I wrote on why Democrats need to select someone else as their presidential and vice presidential nominees in 2024: "Biden won the 2020 election primarily because former president Donald Trump demonstrated his colossal incompetence during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. Americans were also tired of Trump's non-stop daily drama, buffoonery in office, braggadocios conduct, constant chess-pounding, narcissism, and megalomania. Trump lost the 2020 presidential election to Joe Biden. The election was not stolen. There was no massive fraud in the nationwide voting, as alleged by Trump and his minions in over 60 court cases that he lost. In many of these cases, Trump-appointed federal judges ruled against him. The qualities that made Joe Biden an unattractive presidential candidate in 2020 are worse today. Biden does not embody the presidential leadership qualities Americans need today. Additionally, Biden is too old, slow, and weak to lead America in today's fast-paced, rapidly changing world. It is also apparent to me and other objective observers that Biden is suffering from senility, which worsens with the passage of time. Biden's approval rating is underwater in 40 states. Here are some of the reasons why: Inflation is out of control. The nation is on the verge of a recession. Gas, food, and housing costs are still sky high. Biden’s absent mindedness caused him to leave classified national security documents at three separate locations. There is no excuse for this kind of reckless and dangerous conduct, whether it was perpetrated by Donald Trump or Joe Biden. The Biden administration has offered no practical, workable, non-racist solution to the migration crisis at America's southern border. Biden's hasty troop withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021 was an unmitigated disaster. Additionally, Biden's initial response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022 was too little, too late. Biden’s voting rights protection legislation sank like the Titanic in 2022. Long-established constitutional rights of women are being ripped from them without a real presidential fight to protect them. Biden's Attorney General is doing nothing to stop the wholesale dismantlement of constitutional protections for women. Biden still has "burrowed-in" Donald Trump political appointees running the U.S. Department of Justice in Southern states, with no plan to replace them. The list of Biden’s presidential leadership failures goes on and on....... Vice President Kamala Harris is NOT the answer for Democrats in 2024. Harris has failed to deliver on every major initiative Biden entrusted to her. She failed to deliver the votes necessary to pass Biden's voting rights legislation. She has shown no ability to lead the Biden administration's efforts to solve the crisis at our southern border. The same holds true for Biden's clean energy initiatives. Harris simply does not understand the world of clean energy or electric vehicles beyond what she reads from the teleprompter during White House press conferences. If Kamala Harris has an area of problem-solving expertise, I have not seen it. Today, Harris functions more like a glorified Biden cheerleader.” Now that the Washington Post has joined my call for Biden and Harris to step aside in 2024, the Democratic Party should push to find attractive candidates to run for president. Otherwise, America needs to brace herself for the return of Donald Trump to the presidency.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on September 12, 2023 According to the latest U.S. Census data, the average American household size is 2.6 people. The number of renters was 114.4 million, or 35% of the U.S. population, in 2021. The U.S. national median rent is vastly outpacing annual household income, whether the renter is a Republican or Democrat. As a result, evictions are soaring. What is Washington doing about this problem? Absolutely nothing! How to Make the Presidential Candidates Pay Attention to this Pressing Pocketbook Issue I am a registered Independent voter who lives in California. I study critical pocketbook issues and practical solutions to problems that threaten our quality of life. Blind alliance to a political party is forcing American voters to choose between a four-times indicted presumptive GOP nominee and a senile and fragile presumptive Democratic nominee in the 2024 presidential election. I am forming a California-based Super PAC in early 2024. My PAC has identified the U.S. national median rent versus household income disparity as one of the growing and critical pocketbook issues that is choking the economic life out of over 40 million working-class Americans. Yet, no presidential candidate, Democrat or Republican, has addressed this issue. Instead, both political parties are saturating American voters with divisive political rhetoric about book banning, drag queens, the personal failings of candidates' family members, and who is using what public school bathrooms to urinate, flatulate, and defecate. In Florida, for example, homeowners and renters are having an extremely difficult time purchasing homeowners and renters insurance policies without paying exorbitant premium prices, if they can get any insurance at all. Again, no presidential candidate, including Ron DeSantis, is addressing this problem. My Independent Super PAC will steer the presidential debate back to the issues that directly impact the pocketbooks of ordinary Americans. We will also target the swing states to make sure that get the attention of the Republican and Democratic Party nominees in the 2024 presidential election. What we know for sure is this fact: If Wall Street firms were suffering from this kind of economic chokehold, our national government would declare a national emergency and immediately hand out trillions of your hard-earned tax dollars to bail them out. Watch this short, one-minute video to see this economic disparity for yourself: https://x.com/ninaturner/status/1701273605261152396?s=20 As educator and activist Nina Turner @ninatirner says, "This IS NOT sustainable."

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on September 11, 2023 An Editorial Opinion Growing up in the president’s mansion at Alabama State University in the 1960s, I met the greatest black college football coaches of all time. Men like Jake Gaither at Florida A&M University (1945-1969), Eddie Robinson at Grambling University (1941-42 and 1945-97), and John Merritt at Tennessee State University (1963-1983) were regular guests in our home on campus. These men, all of whom were distinguished and respected African-Americans, compiled incredible records of achievement as head football coaches at their respective universities. Jake Gaither had a 203-36-4 record over his 25-year career at FAMU, for a winning percentage of .844. In a 10-year streak from 1953 to 1962, his teams went 87-7-1. Gaither's teams won six black college national championships. Yes, everything in the American South, including major college football, was racially segregated in the 1940s, 50s, 60s, and 70s. Eddie Robinson coached at Grambling for 55 years. He set a major-college record with 408 victories, 165 losses, and 15 ties. Robinson won nine black college national championships and sent more than 80 players to the American and National Football Leagues. Robinson’s Grambling Tigers beat Oregon State 23-6 on September 28, 1985, for his 323d victory. With this win, Robinson tied University of Alabama Football Coach Paul "Bear" Bryant for the all-time coaching record. Then came Oct. 5, 1985. The Tigers beat Praire View A&M University 27-7. This was victory No. 324 for Robinson, putting him ahead of Bear Bryant. John Merritt’s teams at Tennessee State produced a 172-33-7 record. Five of his teams were unbeaten, while five of them lost only one game. In the period 1969 to 1973, Merritt's record was 48-3-1. Merritt’s TSU teams were black college national champions for 1965, 1966, 1970, 1971, 1973, 1979 and 1982. Merritt also coached 144 TSU players who went on to become pro football stars. Despite their unparalleled success in college football, none of these men got the opportunity to coach at an Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) university that was afforded by the University of Colorado to Deion Sanders on December 4, 2022. In their era, FBS universities were too steeped in racism to hire winning black head football coaches at HWCUs. Hell, in the 1960s, it took federal court orders to get head football and basketball coaching jobs for highly qualified black coaches with outstanding win-loss records at their all-black high schools who later applied for similar positions at the newly desegregated white high schools. In 2022, Deion "Prime Time" Sanders Enters on the FBS Stage Deion “Prime Time” Sanders is a graduate of Talladega College, an HBCU in Talladega, Alabama. Prior to taking the Colorado head football coaching job, Sanders coached for 3 years at Jackson State University, a historically black university where he amassed a 27-6 record and an undefeated season last year. Deion Sanders is an all-star in sports, business, finance, and life. He is also a parent who actively fathers his adult children and many young men who do not have active fathers in their life. Deion Sanders and his Colorado football team are playing for something much bigger than a great win-loss record, accolades from sportscasters, and sports trophies. Deion Sanders recognizes that he is standing on the shoulders of Jake Gaither, Eddie Robinson, and John Merritt. God has afforded Sanders the big-time college football coaching opportunity that was consistently denied to Gaither, Robinson, and Merritt. Deion Sanders is fighting for the respect in the college sports world that was denied to Gaither, Robinson, and Merrittt and the national championship teams that they consistently produced at their historically black universities -- for decades. Jake Gaither, Eddie Robinson, and John Merritt were men of honor. They did for college football what nobody else could do -- they established a record of excellence that is unbroken today. Deion Sanders carries on the legacies of Coaches Jake Gaither, Eddie Robinson, and John Merritt and their football players each and every day. The spirits of these great coaches are watching over Sanders from Heaven. They are cheering for his success. They are praying for Deion Sanders, whose tears of joy in victory are theirs, as well. Deion Sanders picked up the torch of football coaching excellence at Jackson State and he is now carrying it at the University of Colorado -- on the highest stage of college football. Unlike the few blacks before him who were lucky enough to have the opportunity to coach at FBS universities, Deion Sanders did not renounce his "blackness" or his connections to the black community as a quid pro quo for getting the Colorado head coaching job. Sanders has brought all of us along on this ride with him to the land of greatness, and we are basking in his success. This is a defining moment in FBS college football. It will never be the same. Deion Sanders' Colorado team will go all of the way to the FBS National Championship game, and win it. No other FBS university is on the same mission, with the same purpose and same passion. In January 2024, Deion Sanders' Colorado Buffaloes will be the last team standing. This is their destiny, and no FBS team can stop this historic event from happening. All articles are shared on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. If you enjoyed this article, please click on these links to follow Donald Watkins: https://www.facebook.com/donald.v.watkins https://www.linkedin.com/in/donald-watkins-683a7952/ https://twitter.com/donaldvwatkins

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on September 10, 2023 An Editorial Opinion With his losses mounting in the Georgia RICO case, Donald Trump has only two moves left to keep himself out of a Georgia state prison. These are the moves: The “I Didn’t Know” Defense First, Donald Trump must blame ALL of the acts that form the basis of the racketeering charge in his Georgia indictment on the overzealous and unauthorized conduct of crooked 2020 campaign operatives, misguided White House subordinates, and incompetent and deceitful private lawyers, all of whom were "rogue agents" and all of whom betrayed the trust and confidence Trump placed in them as key advisors. This move is known as the “I didn’t know” defense. Trump must show that he trusted rogue agents who, without his knowledge or consent, organized and engaged in an unlawful criminal racketeering enterprise to keep him in power. This is the only viable criminal defense available to Donald Trump in his RICO case. If and when this defense is executed to perfection by highly qualified and capable defense counsel, there is a high probability it will work. Whether Trump is represented by highly qualified and capable defense counsel in any of his four criminal cases is an open question. While Trump has plenty of defense attorneys, he does NOT appear to have "effective assistance of counsel." The "I didn't know" defense is explained in a Texas A&M University, Texas Wesleyan Law Review article that was written in 2006 by a brilliant law student named Walter "Trey" Stock. The article is titled, “United States v. Scrushy and Its Impact on Criminal Prosecutions Under the Certification Requirements of Sarbanes-Oxley." Mr. Stock discusses this defense at pages 249-250 and 252-259. The article is published in 13 Tex. Wesleyan L. Rev. 239 (2006). Mr. Stock is now a state prosecutor in Texas. To execute the "I didn't know" defense properly, Donald Trump must throw ALL of his RICO co-defendants under the bus. Trump also must effectively designate Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, Kenneth Chesebro, and Mark Meadows as the RICO conspiracy "kingpins." Then, Trump must blame all of his conduct in the case on his misplaced trust in the "kingpins" to do the right thing in challenging the outcome of the 2020 election, including their proper supervision of the other indicted and unindicted co-conspirators in the case. Will Trump throw all of his co-defendants under the bus? Yes. Trump has NEVER shown two-way loyalty to any wife, friend, acquaintance, co-worker, ally, subordinate, contractor, professional services provider, or political operative. In Trump's world, everybody is expendable. Trump Must Win the 2024 Election Second, Donald Trump MUST win the 2024 presidential election. This is a "do or die" situation for him. Losing the election is NOT an acceptable option for Trump. Trump is already the presumptive GOP nominee for president. If Trump wins the election, he will surely exercise the awesome powers of the presidency in such a manner as to free himself from ALL federal and state charges and/or convictions. There will be no guardrails on Trump's exercise of power in this regard. If Joe Biden is the Democratic nominee for president, Donald Trump will likely WIN the 2024 election in a landslide for the reasons articulated by author Andrew Sullivan in his insightful September 8, 2023 article, titled, “It’s Time for Biden to Leave the Stage.” Sullivan says out loud what concerns most Americans today – Joe Biden is growing increasingly fragile and senile with each passing day and the public displays of his deteriorating physical and mental conditions can no longer be explained away with credibility. Epilogue On multiple occasions, I have urged the Democratic Party to dump Joe Biden as its nominee for president. For reasons I cannot understand, the Party refuses to do so. Despite his criminal defense team’s stunningly poor lawyering performance to date, Donald Trump still has the unique ability to free himself from all of his criminal charges.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on September 8, 2023 Today, a federal judge in Atlanta issued an Order rejecting a bid by former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows to remove his Georgia state RICO case to federal court in that city. Meadows was indicted on state racketeering charges, along with Donald J. Trump and 17 other co-defendants. The racketeering case brought against Trump, Meadows, and the other 17 defendants is being prosecuted by Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis, who specializes in criminal RICO cases. Today's adverse ruling was a blow to Meadows and the overall defensive effort in this RICO case. Meadows’ motion to remove the case to federal court was lightweight, ill-conceived, amateurish, and counter-productive. The pretrial losses for Donald Trump (and his co-defendants) in his Atlanta, New York, Washington, D.C., and Miami criminal cases are mounting faster than anything I have seen in my nearly five-decades long legal career. The defense lawyering in these cases have been stunning weak, totally lacking in creativity, and downright embarrassing. Law students could do a better job of representing Trump and the 18 Georgia RICO co-defendants in the Georgia case. The criminal defense teams in Trump's four cases have been running a clown show since day one. Based upon the rate and severity of defeats Donald Trump and his co-defendants are suffering during the pretrial proceedings in his criminal cases, Trump’s fate in these cases will be sealed in about 90 days. The self-inflected pretrial mistakes and miscues are killing Trump's chances of winning any one of his four criminal cases. His co-defendants are likely doomed, as well. What is more, Donald Trump will likely become the first criminal defendant in history to lose on all 91 felony counts against him, which I believe would establish a record in the annals of American jurisprudence.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on September 8, 2023 An Editorial Opinion Deion Sanders and Fani T. Willis exude a level of confidence, competence, and courage I have not seen in black public figures in nearly four decades. They are African-Americans who are using their confidence, brainpower, and courage to dominate the field of play within their respective professions. I have known plenty of highly competent black public figures in my lifetime. However, only a handful of them had the confidence and courage of Callie House, Marcus Garvey, Billie Holiday, Jackie Robinson, Martin Luther King, Jr., Rosa Parks, Mohammad Ali, Maya Angelou, Maynard Jackson, Marion Barry, Adam Clayton Powell, Thurgood Marshall, Malcolm X, and other blacks who changed the fabric of American life and culture in a permanent and positive way. All of the black public figures who were agents for positive change in America were hated in their time by most white Americans for simply displaying their brilliance with confidence and courage. When he was assassinated in 1968, 75% of white Americans disliked Martin Luther King, Jr. Today, Dr. King is a national hero. Deion Sanders and Fani Willis have joined a small but elite class of highly competent black public figures who also possess the confidence and courage to be true to themselves and true to their people, even when it displeases many white Americans. Deion Sanders and Fani Willis are not seeking to be liked by everybody. However, they are commanding everybody’s respect based upon their consistent display of confident, superior intellectual acumen and attainment of outstanding results in their respective professions. In other words, Deion Sanders and Fani Willis are letting their work speak for them. Both are showcasing their awesome brainpower to a nation that is only accustomed to seeing black achievement that flows from the impressive athleticism of sports figures and the outstanding singing and dancing abilities of entertainers. Deion Sanders and Fani Willis have experienced severe criticism for having the audacity to demonstrate exceptional confidence and superior brainpower in venues where blacks have had only recent and limited opportunities to showcase their knowledge, skills, and abilities. Sanders' and Willis' confidence, high level of competence, and undeniable courage makes those who are the guardians of the status quo in America feel very uncomfortable. In some cases, this combination of personal attributes makes Deion Sanders and Fani Willis the subject of hate campaigns and racially motivated death threats. They handle both negative circumstances well. Deion Sanders and Fani Willis stand in stark contrast to many black professionals who share these same attributes. Most of those blacks lead miserable double lives where their confidence and competence can be displayed to fellow blacks in private, but not to whites --out of fear that it will offend them or make them uncomfortable. In many instances, those scared and timid blacks voluntarily and needlessly subjugate themselves to lesser qualified whites solely for the purpose of gaining social acceptance within white society. Deion Sanders and Fani Willis have never embraced the “go along to get along” mentality that has transformed far too many gifted and talented black professionals into neutered and spaded eunuchs who are paraded around in white society like house pets. Furthermore, Dion Sanders and Fani Willis have never renounced their "blackness" to fit within with a "Negrophobic" white society’s profile of an “acceptable” black person the way Clarence Thomas, Ben Carson, Herschel Walker, Tiger Woods, and Tim Scott have done. To me and millions of Americans of color like me, Deion Sanders and Fani Willis represent a much-needed break from the growing disease of gratuitous subservience that has infected America’s black community.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on September 7, 2023 An Editorial Opinion Congressman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee in Washington, D.C., is no match for Fulton County, Georgia District Attorney Fani T. Willis. In one well-written and brilliantly researched letter, Willis body-slammed Jordan, a former Ohio State University wrestling coach, and pinned him to the judicial mat. Fani Willis' letter showcases her superior legal acumen over Jim Jordan's unlicensed political posturing. Willis is the real deal. Click here to read the letter for yourself. While Jim Jordan is a law school graduate, he never took any state's bar exam. On Fox News and inside the halls of Congress, Jordan sounds tough. He often pontificates about principles of law, as if he is an attorney (which he is not). In the legal arena, Jordan is viewed by many professionals (Democrats and Republicans alike) as a loud-mouth lightweight and a weak-kneed pushover.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on September 6, 2023 An Editorial Opinion For months now, I have watched Donald Trump's defense attorneys stumbling through his four criminal cases. The criminal defense teams hired in Donald Trump’s four criminal cases appear to be so inept that I feel the need to point them in the right direction. Otherwise, the proceedings in Trump’s criminal cases will turn into a total and complete embarrassment for the nation’s criminal defense bar. A Student’s Law Review Article Provides Some of the Help Trump's Lawyers Need On October 1, 2006, a smart Texas A&M University, Texas Wesleyan Law Review student named Walter "Trey" Stock wrote an article titled, “United States v. Scrushy and Its Impact on Criminal Prosecutions Under the Certification Requirements of Sarbanes-Oxley.” The article is published in 13 Tex. Wesleyan L. Rev. 239 (2006). Mr. Stock's article was republished by the Texas A&M Law Scholarship in 2022. Mr. Stock carefully analyzed my criminal defense team's work in Richard Scrushy’s $2.7 billion fraud case. We defeated federal prosecutors on all 85 felony charges lodged against Scrushy in the original indictment. This feat stands as a record in American jurisprudence for a single-defendant case. Stock’s analysis was perceptive and brilliant, especially for a law student. He figured out how and why we won Scrushy’s case. The techniques Stock discussed in his article have apparently eluded Trump’s $40 million criminal defense lawyers. The Washington Post analyzed the “Not Guilty” verdicts in Scrushy's case and called them a “miracle.” “God works in mysterious ways, but his or her decision to acquit Richard Scrushy ….on all charges of financial fraud is especially inscrutable. Five consecutive HealthSouth chief financial officers admitted to cooking the books and copped a plea. They all fingered Scrushy. But jurors chose to believe that the man on top knew nothing about what was going on directly below him.... Only one word can describe Scrushy's acquittal. It is a miracle.“ [Michael Kinsley, Editorial, “The Lord and Richard Scrushy,” Washington Post, July 3, 2005, at B-07] Calling the “Not Guilty” verdicts a “stunner,” the New York Times had a similar take: “If ever a chief executive seemed destined for prison, it was Richard M. Scrushy. Mr. Scrushy has always maintained his innocence. But at his trial, no one disputed that there was a staggering $2.7 billion accounting fraud at HealthSouth, the company he helped found in 1984. Federal prosecutors lined up many former executives, including five former chief financial officers, to testify that Mr. Scrushy orchestrated the wrongdoing. In court, they played a secret tape-recording that seemed to incriminate him. Jurors, who heard from dozens of witnesses but never the man himself, agreed with Mr. Scrushy -- to the surprise of many lawyers watching the case. "It's a stunner, given how strong the government's case seemed to be.” [“A Style That Connected With Hometown Jurors,” New York Times, June 29, 2005, at C-1.] Suggestions for Trump’s Lawyers Donald Trump’s criminal defense lawyers need to quit pretending like they know what they are doing and start reading the following passages from Walter T. Stock’s Law Review article: III(A), Scrushy’s Pretrial Strategy, at pages 249-250, and III(C), The Trial-Why Did Scrushy Win?, at pages 252-259. Mr. Stock does not identify all of the techniques Trump’s attorneys need to win his criminal cases, but he provides enough information to keep Trump's four trials from turning into blowouts for the prosecution. I do not know Mr. Walter T. Stock, but I can tell from his article that he is a very smart attorney. He is now a state prosecutor in Dallas Texas. Amazingly, no other attorney since the "Not Guilty" verdicts were rendered in Richard Scrushy’s case has picked up on the defense technique Stock discusses in Section III(C)(3)(b) of his article, at page 258. We will see if Donald Trump’s criminal lawyers are capable of comprehending and processing the information in Stock’s article.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on September 6, 2023 An Editorial Opinion Yesterday, Enrique Tarrio, 39, was sentenced to 22 years in prison for orchestrating a failed plot to keep former president Donald J. Trump in power. Tarrio, who led the far right-wing Proud Boys paramilitary group, received the longest sentence to date among the hundreds of cases connected to the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the National Capitol in Washington, D.C. As the Proud Boys’ Chairman, Tarrio wielded his influence over his subordinates and allies to “organize and execute the conspiracy to forcibly stop the peaceful democratic transfer of power” as lawmakers convened in Washington to certify the results of the 2020 presidential election, said prosecutors. The insurrection resulted in five deaths and hundreds of law enforcement officers being injured. The insurrection was fueled by Donald Trump’s false assertion that the 2020 presidential election was “stolen” from him. In the nearly three years since Trump lost the election, neither Trump nor his attorneys has produced one shred of evidence showing that outcome-determinative voter fraud cost him the election. Donald Trump’s false claim never rises above campaign rhetoric. Yet, it is this rhetoric that has imprisoned hundreds of people and ruined the lives of thousands of Trump supporters and their families. Trump and others are awaiting trial in Washington and Georgia on additional criminal charges arising from the insurrection. Tarrio Begged for Mercy Before his sentence was handed down in U.S. District Court in Washington D.C., Tarrio apologized for his actions. He called the Capitol riot a “national embarrassment” and vowed that his days of meddling in politics are over. Tarrio also denounced his false claim that the election was “stolen” from Donald Trump by admitting, “My candidate lost.” Tarrio choked up with emotion as he begged U.S. District Court Judge Timothy Kelly, a Trump-appointee, for mercy. His admission that Trump lost the election came too late to save him from being hit with the longest prison sentence to date over the Capitol riot. Other Proud Boys Sentenced to Long Prison Terms Tarrio was among four members of the group who was convicted of a seditious conspiracy and other crimes earlier this year following a four-month trial. A jury determined that Tarrio, as the group’s leader, organized and directed a mob towards the U.S. Capitol, where Proud Boys dismantled barricades and broke windows to breach the halls of Congress. Tarrio then bragged about their actions on social media and in group chat messages that were later shared with jurors. Four other members of the Proud Boys were sentenced last week for their roles in the attack. Ethan Nordean received a sentence of 18 years in prison, tying Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes for what is now the second-longest sentence to date among the hundreds of people convicted in connection with January 6. Joe Biggs was sentenced to 17 years, Zachary Rehl was sentenced to 15 years, and Dominic Pezzola – the sole co-defendant among them who was not convicted of seditious conspiracy – was sentenced to 10 years. Epilogue In the insurrection’s aftermath, Enrique Tarrio wrote on the social media platform Parler that “when the government fears the people, there is liberty,” a post he accompanied with a photo of House members ducking for cover. Despite their best efforts to overthrow the duly elected United States government on January 6, 2021, Enrique, his Proud Boys, and Oath Keepers allies failed to take down our democracy. The real oath-keepers in blue police uniforms bled, died and were injured as they held the front line for American democracy that day. I do not have sympathy for Enrique Tarrio and his army of Donald Trump sycophants, who tried to maintain a defeated candidate in the presidency based upon a lie. Instead, I have extreme pride for the men and women in blue uniforms at the Capitol who put it all on the line for America in the face of the insurrection.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on September 5, 2023 In Dillard v. Crenshaw, 640 F. Supp. 1347 (1986), a federal court in Montgomery, Alabama described the long, ugly, and documented history of Alabama’s harsh and oppressive discrimination against its black citizens in every aspect of public life. According to the court, Alabama had an “unrelenting historical agenda, spanning from the late 1800s to the 1980s, to keep its black citizens economically, socially, and politically downtrodden, from the cradle to the grave.” (p. 1357). No area has been more problematic for blacks in the state than achieving voting rights and access to the political process, which the court in Dillard v. Crenshaw described in excruciating detail. (pp. 1356 to 1360). Today, a three-judge federal court in Birmingham issued an Order striking down Alabama's latest map of congressional election districts because the state failed to obey a prior court order directing the state to draw a second black Congressional district, as required by the anti-vote dilution provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. On June 8, 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the three-judge court’s prior order to mandate a new Congressional redistricting plan. Led by Attorney General Steve Marshall and Alabama Solicitor General Edmund LaCour, Alabama openly defied the prior Voting Rights Act orders issued by both the three-judge court and U.S. Supreme Court. Today, the three-judge panel said they are "deeply troubled that the State enacted a map that the State readily admits does not provide the remedy we said federal law requires." Once again, the state of Alabama is proudly engaging in “massive resistance” to the protection of voting rights for its black citizens. Once again, the state is championing the openly hostile, anti-black agenda described in Dillard v. Crenshaw. Once again, Alabama's white constitutional officers, state legislators, local elected officials, political advocacy groups, and corporate leaders have fallen silent on the subject of protecting voting rights for blacks in the state. In the end, the state of Alabama will lose this court battle and the state's taxpayers will be forced to pay millions of dollars in legal fees to the lawyers for the plaintiffs and the court appointed lawyers and experts who are now charged with redrawing a Congressional redistricting plan that complies with the mandates of the Voting Rights Acts.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on September 2, 2023 An Editorial Opinion Last month, everybody in the world learned the name of Fani T. Willis. She is the smart, seasoned, and highly-skilled District Attorney for Fulton County, Georgia. She is also one of the toughest prosecutors in America. Fani T. Willis is the African-American woman who indicted former president Donald J. Trump and 18 co-defendants on charges that they ran a criminal enterprise that had the purpose and intent of subverting Georgia election laws. Two of Trump's RICO co-conspirators are black. There are 30 unindicted co-conspirators in the case. All of the key witnesses for Fani T. Willis' prosecution team in Trump's case are Republicans. As expected, Donald Trump has distanced himself from all of his co-defendants. According to campaign "insiders," Trump views the co-defendants pictured below as dispensable legal and political baggage. They serve no useful purpose for him today. Evenhanded Justice -- Fani T. Willis Style Fani T. Willis is the first black public official in the criminal justice system since Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall who has been willing to relentlessly pursue justice in America on an evenhanded basis. Other players in federal and state criminal justice systems have repeatedly used a healthy dose of judicial or prosecutorial discretion to bailout well-connected criminal suspects and defendants. The recent U.S. Department of Justice's effort to "fix" Hunter Biden's tax evasion and illegal gun possession case is a prime example of undeserved preferential treatment and uneven justice. Unlike U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland's disgraceful prosecutorial misconduct in Hunter Biden's criminal case, Fani T. Willis adheres to one standard of justice. What is more, Willis applies the same standard of justice to everybody (e.g., schoolteachers and administrators, street criminals, gang members, drug dealers, pickpockets, and political subversives). Fani T. Willis’ evenhanded application of Georgia’s criminal RICO and election laws has subjected her to death threats and Republican-led efforts to remove her from office. The vast majority of today’s elected officials who hold public office only do so to feast on a gravy-train for themselves. In contrast, Fani T. Willis has demonstrated by clear and convincing evidence that she is only serving and protecting the state of Georgia's interest in election integrity. Willis is doing so under the most difficult of circumstances. Trump's RICO Case Puts Fani T. Willis in the Spotlight Fani T. Willis has taken on Donald J. Trump, the undisputed leader of the MAGA movement, in the most serious criminal prosecution in American history. In the court of public opinion, Republicans and Independents who support the MAGA movement have already pardoned Trump for whatever crimes he might have committed in trying to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. This pardon is based on political passion, and not evidence. Georgia Republicans like Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, and those of her ilk, support Donald Trump unconditionally. Their only regret is that the January 6, 2021 Insurrection at the National Capitol did not succeed. Republicans like Georgia Governor Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensberger have NOT pardoned Trump in the court of public opinion. They are allowing the criminal justice process to play out in Trump's RICO case. Except for former New Jersey governor Christ Christie, all of the Republicans who are running for president are spineless Trump sycophants. Even though some MAGA "patriots" expressed a desire to hang Mike Pence on January 6th, Pence is still a Donald Trump ass-kisser. Last week, Geoff Duncan, Georgia's former lieutenant governor, claimed that Trump’s got the "moral compass of a … more like an ax murderer than a president." Duncan is a popular Republican in the state. In eyes of black America (and many progressive whites), MAGA is the vanguard of a growing movement across America to conquer, dominate, and marginalize women, the poor, people of color, gays, Muslims, immigrants, and anybody who is deemed “woke” to the plight and suffering of historically oppressed groups in America. Florida governor Ron DeSantis is the MAGA movement’s wayward stepchild. DeSantis was created by Donald Trump, and he has betrayed Trump. The only thing DeSantis is proficient at doing is standing on the necks of blacks and transgender people like Derek Chauvin did to George Floyd. Willis is Not Afraid to Do Her Job In a nation where black public officials have become silent about the things that matter in life, where they are scared of white authority and power, where they have adjusted to the injustices that are administered on a daily basis to blacks by federal and state criminal justice systems, and where they have adapted to the MAGA crowd's indifference to marginalized groups, Fani T. Willis has shown all Americans that she is NOT like those weak-kneed, embarrassing, and self-centered public officials. The world knows that Fani T. Willis is NOT afraid to do her job. Fani T. Willis is NOT just another impotent black face strutting in a high place like a peacock. Those "peacock blacks" now populate the political landscape and corporate suites in America. Fani T. Willis has NOT been niggerized. For those who do not know what “niggerize” means, this is the systematic act of dehumanizing a person or people of color in order to render her/them fearful. Fani T. Willis has clearly established herself as a true national leader. She has the courage of Fannie Lou Hamer and quiet dignity of Rosa Parks. Willis breathes life into Dr. Martin Luther King’s famous quote: “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice,” and she is doing it in King's hometown. Willis also reassures a worried nation that the fair administration of justice will be applied in an evenhanded manner, without hesitation or reservation, just like Thurgood Marshall did. A Breath of Fresh Air Black public officials are elected to serve the interests of their constituents within the halls of government on a multitude of “quality of life” issues. Most of them, however, abandon their constituents’ political interests as soon as the swearing-in ceremony ends. Fani T. Willis is vastly different from this compromised group of public officials. In body and spirit, Fani T. Willis represents the people who elected her. Willis is a living example of the Voting Rights Acts of 1965 and its power to advance the cause of truth and justice in America. This is why the MAGA crowd has worked diligently with Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and four others on the Supreme Court to dismantle the major enforcement provisions of Act since 2013. To the MAGA crowd, justice in America looks and feels like the all-white Alabama Supreme Court (in a state with a 26% black population) pictured below, complete with its Confederate flag-waving Chief Justice,Tom Parker, and the Court's white supremacist supporters. Too many of today’s black public officials have no agenda for advancing and protecting the political interests of their political constituents. They are preoccupied with increasing their personal paychecks, traveling to conferences in America and abroad, begging for free tickets to concerts and sporting events, issuing feel-good proclamations on symbolic subjects, getting awards for doing nothing, and posting photos on Facebook and Instagram in an effort to portray an image of perceived power. When these public officials do fight for something, it is usually a battle for front-row seats at an entertainment event, or for VIP recognition at commemorative events celebrating the courage of civil rights icons of the 1950s and 60s. Most of today’s black public officials are nothing more than castrated political eunuchs who, like Clarence Thomas, perpetually hustle taxpayers, lobbyists, and corporate executives for extra perks in life solely because they are public officials. For these misguided individuals, dedicated public service to their communities has been replaced by non-stop self-aggrandizement. Fani T. Willis is a welcomed exception to this cesspool of fear, impotency, and irrelevancy that is swallowing black public officials. Black elected officials in Alabama have been told by certain Southern Company executives that they are forbidden to read and/or comment on articles appearing on my social media platforms. Except for Perry County Commission Chairman Albert Turner, Jr., and Mayor Steven Reed (Montgomery), these black officials have dutifully complied this Southern Company prohibition out of fear that they will be primaried during election season. The Southern Company has also forbidden black elected officials in Birmingham, Alabama from fighting on behalf of their political constituents in North Birmingham against environmental injustices occurring in three black neighborhoods, no matter how many residents in these neighborhoods are dying from toxic polluting in the air, ground, and water. Again, these blacks have complied with this prohibition. Epilogue By failing to exercise the power of their offices in a manner that exudes integrity, confidence, and political muscle, most black public officials have transformed once-powerful public offices into ceremonial positions that offer the black community little in benefits beyond important-sounding job titles. As a result of their collective impotence in the political arena, black communities in Alabama and across America are suffering terribly from a lack of effective leadership, economic development, strategic growth, and basic government services. Our urban cities across America are dying. Our public schools are failing the very students who are compelled by state laws to attend them. And, violent crime is skyrocketing in many cities governed by black mayors. No matter what happens to Donald Trump and his co-defendants in the Georgia RICO case, Fani T. Willis is making black Americans (and progressive whites) proud again. At least Willis is doing the right thing, in the right way, for all of the right reasons.

By: Donald V. Watkins Copyrighted and Published on September 4, 2023 An Editorial Opinion On March 18, 2023, The Tuscaloosa News published an article titled, “Disgraced Lawyer Donald Watkins Blogs from Prison.” The article was published seven months AFTER the publication of a widely-read article about my release from a federal prison camp near El Paso, Texas on August 25, 2022. In 2018, I had been indicted and prosecuted by Birmingham Alabama-based federal prosecutors for business-related conduct that unbiased federal prosecutors in Newark, New Jersey thoroughly reviewed two years earlier and concluded was not criminal. I was “railroaded” in a Birmingham federal court and imprisoned for three years. I was in and out of the federal prison system before my appeals had been exhausted. The entire ordeal was an Alabama-led effort to undermine, discredit, and destroy me. Over a four decade period, my landmark civil rights cases had profoundly changed the political, educational, economic, and social landscape of Alabama. I aggressively fought all forms of racial discrimination in a state that prided itself on "massive resistance" to equal rights for its black citizens. I was deemed a "troublemaker" who disturbed the Birmingham business community's "good relations with the colored community." I had also been asked to leave Birmingham on more than one occasion. After I left public office as a Montgomery city council member in 1983, Emory Folmar, the city's arch-conservative Republican mayor and then-Chairman of the Alabama Republican Party, publicly proclaimed that my departure from the council “was one of the greatest blessings since the Yankee troops went home in 1870.” The Tuscaloosa News Embodies the Spirit of Regressive Forces in Alabama The Tuscaloosa News is the same Alabama newspaper that ran an attack ad against Megan Rondini, an innocent University of Alabama honors student who identified a local Tuscaloosa playboy as her rapist in 2015 police report. With its publication of this ad, The Tuscaloosa News openly platformed an act of “victim shaming” that maliciously targeted Megan Rondini in July 2017 (after her death). Rondini committed suicide after Tuscaloosa County law enforcement officials refused to pursue criminal justice in her rape case solely because the designated offender/suspect came from a wealthy Tuscaloosa family that contributed mega bucks to the Alabama Crimson Tide football program. From the moment she filed her rape report, the criminal justice system in Tuscaloosa County became weaponized against Megan Rondini. After all, she had the audacity to timely report her rape and she demanded that her alleged well-known rapist be prosecuted. In 2017, I was the only journalist in the state who wrote and published in-depth articles about Megan Rondini’s rape case. Out of fear that they would lose advertising dollars from corporate entities and the political bodies run by the Alabama’s rich, white, male oligarchs, the state’s mainstream press turned a blind eye to Megan Rondini’s rape case. Tuscaloosa County is a Hostile Venue for Truth Seekers and the Fair Administration of Justice Tuscaloosa is the same county where Allen May, a newly appointed white Circuit Court judge, ruled against me (without a trial) in a so-called “defamation case” that was based upon five investigative articles I wrote and published about Megan Rondini’s rape case. Judge May, who was appointed to the bench by former Gov. Robert Bentley, applied a simple “negligence” standard to justify his adverse ruling, and not the more rigorous “reckless disregard of the truth” standard mandated in New York Times v. Sullivan (1964) for defamation cases involving journalists. Robert Bentley, a Tuscaloosa native, was forced to resign as Alabama’s governor in 2017 after I exposed his long-running illicit sex affair with Rebekah Caldwell Mason, a married senior advisor, in my “Forbidden Love” and “Executive Betrayal” series of investigative reports. Bentley also pled guilty to ethics charges arising from his “sex-for-power” scandal. Judge May completely disregarded my asserted legal position that truth is an absolute defense to a claim of defamation. A subsequent lawsuit between two business partners in an Alabama-based public relations firm confirmed that the plaintiffs in the defamation case had, in fact, thrust themselves into the Megan Rondini rape controversy, as I had reported in the articles in question. The all-white Alabama Supreme Court (in a state that is 26% black), led by Confederate flag-waving Chief Justice Tom Parker, unanimously and summarily affirmed the ruling of the Tuscaloosa County judge. Today, Chief Justice Tom Parker is the drum major for former Alabama governor George Wallace’s old doctrine of “interposition and nullification.” Parker has repeatedly proclaimed in writing that U.S. Supreme Court cases DO NOT bind the Alabama Supreme Court. Tom Parker’s stated judicial views on this subject faithfully and fully embrace Birmingham Public Safety Commissioner Eugene “Bull” Connor’s 1958 infamous declaration: “Damn the law. Down here, we make our own law.” Alabama is Home to Generations of Co-Opted and Compromised Journalists Alabama has been the home of co-opted and compromised journalists since the Mobile Press Register, Montgomery Advertiser, Tuscaloosa News, Birmingham News, and Huntsville Times volunteered to participate in the FBI’s COINTELPRO program to undermine, discredit, and destroy Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Rosa Parks, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and thousands of black civil rights activists around the country, beginning in August 1958. Journalists affiliated with these Alabama media groups actively facilitated the FBI in its attempt to: (a) deny Dr. King and Rosa Parks “respectability” within the black community, (b) prevent the long-term growth of the civil rights movement, especially among youth, (c) block free speech and access to the media for civil rights leaders, and (d) prevent the rise of a “messiah” who could unify and electrify the civil rights movement. These journalists faithfully adhered to COINTELPRO’s original goals. As a result, their media organizations have been unrelenting in their efforts to undermine, discredit and destroy strong and effective black leadership in the state. Whenever these journalists praise a black civic or political leader today, it is usually someone who has been thoroughly deconstructed and properly “niggerized.” For those who do not know what “niggerization” means, it is the systematic act of dehumanizing a person or an entire race of people to render him/her/them fearful. The institutions and people who administer the “niggerization” program in Alabama today have never lifted a finger to help black people or other Americans of color share in this nation’s upward mobility, economic prosperity, political advancement, or social justice. Surviving Alabama’s Weaponized COINTELPRO Agenda My international business partners occasionally remind me that every negative article about me on the Internet emanates from sources in Alabama. Outside of the state, I have a totally different and very positive public profile. Because of my long and effective record of protecting and advancing civil rights in Alabama, leading members of the state’s ultra-conservative political establishment, law enforcement community, and captive members of the mainstream media have gone to great lengths to portray me in the most negative light possible on various Internet platforms. This concerted effort, which is digitally platformed by the state’s mainstream news media, is a continuation of Alabama's dutiful role in the FBI’s original COINTELPRO program. The courageous work of a growing number of independent online journalists in Alabama, coupled with articles published on my constellation of Internet platforms, has effectively neutralized the adverse effects of Alabama-generated COINTELPRO negativity in my case. Unfortunately, other similarly situated black leaders in the Alabama and around the nation have not been so lucky. The Weaponization of Law Enforcement and Media Resources Have Deep Roots in Alabama and America Donald Trump’s MAGA supporters are right about one thing – the FBI has a long and ugly track record of weaponizing Department of Justice resources against emerging leaders who challenged and changed the established social, economic, and political order. However, from January 2017 to January 2021, Donald Trump headed the government that used the Department of Justice as a weapon against those who were disliked by his administration. Listed below are the names of some well-known black leaders who were targeted by the federal law enforcement establishment for neutralization and destruction, commencing in 1916. These accomplished individuals led highly successful movements that challenged the status quo in American life: 1. Callie House (1916) 2. Marcus Garvey (1922) 3. Billie Holiday (1947) 4. Martin Luther King, Jr. (1958) 5. Richard Arrington, Jr. (1988) 6. U.W. Clemon (1996) 7. Nathan Chapman (2003) My main issue with Donald Trump and his MAGA supporters on the question of the weaponization of the Department of Justice is simple: Where were you when the Department of Justice’s massive arsenal of law enforcement weapons was turned on black civil rights activists and those whites of interracial goodwill who supported us? Nobody within the MAGA movement has answered this question. I think we know why.