Zach Morris aka Jordan Feder
As some of you may know, Richard Barrett of The Nationalist Movement came to Morristown, New Jersey for the second year in a row on the Fourth-of-July. Last year, he was there against affirmative-action. This year, he was there in support of racial profiling. He was there to support NJ state troopers James Kenna and John Hogan, who are on trial for shooting four unarmed minorities.
On July 3rd, one of the members of the band Give Us Barabas went to go and give a flier to the Mayor of Morristown, John “Jay” Delaney. The flier contained information and facts of when Fascism goes directly unopposed. The Mayor said to the band member, “This is bulls—. You are the reason we had problems last year. Why don’t you just go home?” and refused to look at or take the flier. About ten of us confronted the Mayor on this. He walked away and turned his back a few times, not wanting to talk to us.
Last year, the town spent over $100,000 protecting the Nazis. The town could have taken half of that money and thrown a street party and not allowed Barrett to have his rally. The morning of the 4th came with the Black Bloc meeting in the town green (a park) and marching over to a check-point to get into the rally (new for this year). People’s Organization for Progress met at the Crew house. When the Bloc got to the check-point, there was a sign that said that no one can bring in back-packs, fanny-packs, bottles, amplification-devices, signs on sticks, food or drink, drums, etc. and that everyone will be subject to a metal-detector search.
Many people went away, then came back. This was the case for all check-points. After a brief stand-off with the police, the Bloc moved to another check-point to try to get closer to the rally that was about to start. Word was received that at the third check-point it was close enough to see Barrett and people assembled there. Most of the Bloc went around to the third check-point, where some members of Towson University Anti-Racist Action, Philly Anti-Racist Action and other autonomous members of the Bloc went.
Once inside the protest area, we joined up with New York Ya Basta, Progressive Labor Party and others. About 250 people were directly across from Barrett holding up signs and shouting. About 100 people were on the west side of him, not in the protest area, but still able to see him. We were not able to hear him. However, he probably said nothing of value. Barrett was there with one named Gerald McManus. We were also greeted by great news: two people had knocked over flags, podium and speaker-system, rendering them useless. These two infiltrators were arrested. Barrett was forced to use a megaphone, after his speakers were broken.
The day went on with no major instances other than one more arrest of someone at the check-point who tried to bring in a switch-blade and brass-knuckles. This brought the arrest total to three on the day. A man showed up at our group and wanted to support Barrett. After being exposed as a Nazi, he was sent away by us. He returned and we chased him off a second time. Oh, yeah. There were about 300-400 cops there to protect the Fascists. Another time, a group of about six police came to “fix the barricade,” which moved forward about five inches. This is also known as police “flexing their muscle,” trying to show they still are in control.
The day went on with non-stop noise. I asked to speak to Captain Peter Demnitz. I did so at the check-point, too, but was denied. Moments later, Demnitz appeared. I said how I felt that our First-Amendment rights were violated to protect Barrett with the unlawful check-points. All in all, Barrett was able to speak and we were not able to shut him down.