Voices of the Community
Protest organized by Rep. Maxine Waters causes flap amongst L.A.'s black leadership
You wouldn't exactly call it the October Surprise, but the October 2 protest organized by Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-Ca.) at the Mt. Moriah meeting of the Baptist Ministers Conference of Los Angeles and Southern California certainly startled the community. The ministers had planned to meet with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, whom they invited to present his agenda for their communities. But upon arriving at the church, ministers reported finding more than 100 "rowdy" protestors calling them "sellouts" instead.
Project Islamic Hope founder Najee Ali was completely unprepared for what happened next. According to Ali and other eyewitnesses, Waters began yelling as soon as she saw him, warning him against speaking to the media. "I remember her saying she was going to make it rough for me and that she was going to get me," says Ali. "I was stunned that a U.S. congresswoman would threaten me because I wanted to exercise my freedom of speech. "
As first reported by the Wave's Betty Pleasant, dismayed leaders continue to call on Waters to apologize. Schwarzenegger got a call about the Mt. Moriah protesters and cancelled his presentation.
On Monday, Ali was granted a temporary restraining order against the congresswoman. "Our paths cross South Central a lot and [my attorney] doesn't want her to have any contact with me whatsoever," says Ali.
To many, the entire episode was a lost opportunity. "I was looking forward to meeting with the governor based on the point that both candidates should have the opportunity to explain their agenda," says Rev. K.W. Tulloss, president of National Action Network, L.A. chapter, who notes that the ministers had previously met with gubernatorial candidate Phil Angelides.
But conference member Rev. Earl Pleasant chose to briefly join the group. "It wasn't rowdy," Pleasant insists. "It was just people voicing their opinion that they don't want the governor to have another term. There's nothing wrong with him coming but I, personally, don't want to hear his agenda."
Ironically, the Baptist Ministers Conference members had no intention of endorsing any candidate.
"This situation is filled with ironies," says conference member Rev. Norman Johnson, former executive director of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference L.A. "Number one is the fact that the governor did not come. The second irony is that the congresswoman should have felt in a common place with Najee, who worked on the clemency of Tookie Williams. The third irony is that it took place at a church, a group that, by constitution, is bipartisan."
On October 19, Waters sent CityBeat a statement, which reads in part: "I responded to a request to show that some of us Democrats have 'backbone.' I'm sick and tired of the misdirection of this country by Bush and the failed policies of this state headed by Schwarzenegger.
"Here we are fighting to keep Martin Luther King Hospital open for poor people, the sickest people in this county, and the governor refused to declare a state of emergency if Martin Luther King Hospital is threatened with closure ... . Gov. Schwarzenegger is a 'President Bush Republican.'"
Johnson is a personal friend and supporter of Angelides. Even so, he says he defends the right of the ministers to hear all candidates. "It seemed to me that there was an absence of respect or there even was some claim to ownership. That is unfortunate."
Syndicated columnist and political analyst Earl Ofari Hutchinson spoke with Waters and says that her statement indicates that she feels she speaks for the majority of African Americans. "Maxine is looking at these ministers who have supported her and now they are inviting the enemy into the camp. In her mind, it's a betrayal," he says.
The bad blood between Ali and Waters goes back five years when Ali - an early supporter of Antonio Villaraigosa's first mayoral campaign - was fired from his job as columnist for L.A. Focus magazine after criticizing the congresswoman on a local radio show for her support of then-Mayor James Hahn. (Ali later sued L.A. Focus and won.)
Ali has since emerged as a highly visible, outspoken, and respected activist. He has campaigned for unity between African Americans and Latinos, tried to prevent the distribution of the controversial new energy drink "Cocaine," and protested against the Black Minutemen.
And Waters was once his idol. "One of the things I learned from Maxine: in politics you have no permanent friends, no permanent enemies, only permanent interests," says Ali.
The recent incident represents a strange ideological twist for Ali, a registered Democrat who has also protested against Schwarzenegger. "I was at the forefront of protesting against him for his stance on the death penalty with Tookie Williams. Still, I went to [Mt. Moriah] to hear his platform and what we feel he can bring to South Central and L.A., especially with the crisis at King/Drew Hospital."
Schwarzenegger's office declined to comment but the Angelides campaign sent CityBeat a statement saying, in part, "Treasurer Angelides is honored to have the support of Congresswoman Maxine Waters."
The incident at Mt. Moriah highlights a growing debate: Is the established, black civil rights community - or the "old guard," as the younger activists have dubbed them -finally sick of the Democrats, or Waters, taking their support for granted?
"Personally, I take it as the politics of intimidation," Johnson explains. "'You do what I say or ... I'll go after you like I go after others.' It has not gone over well. It's caused the clergy community to take a step back, to look at the relationships that we have with elected officials. In that sense, I think there's a potential of a positive outcome: our involvement has to be driven by political principles, not political personalities."
Ali believes that the Democrats do take the black and Latino vote for granted. "Too many of our elected officials are in bed with the Democratic Party and they resist every type of change," he says, noting that Villaraigosa launched his school reform bill, which Waters resisted, exactly because half of black and Latino children who go to high school in her district don't graduate.
"The old leadership is afraid of the ones who are up and coming," says Anthony Willoughby, a trial attorney and one-time California Assembly candidate who questions why Waters is on the House Banking and Finance Committee but has been unsuccessful in bringing business to her district. "Maxine's focus is social equality. But to take care of the community you have to take care of it economically."
Twenty-nine-year-old activist Jasmyne Cannick was named by Essence magazine in 2005 as one of the 25 Women Shaping the World. On this question of leadership, Cannick shared an experience she had with talk show host and political commentator Tavis Smiley after she wrote a piece critiquing his State of the Black Union series. A few minutes after Cannick's op-ed appeared on the newswire, Smiley called and accused her of "misleading" her readers.
"He then went on to threaten me that he was going to tell my boss that he should be ashamed of me. I did offer to turn over the phone to my boss so that he could tell him, but Tavis said he'd do it later."
To Cannick, this is a perfect example of why there are so few up-and-coming leaders in Black America. "It does a disservice to blacks when the leadership fails to allow new voices into the arena. Do they honestly think that they're going to be running things from their grave?" she asks.
Nation of Islam Minister Tony Muhammed expresses his respect for Waters's stature and accomplishments, but stands with the ministers on this one. "If the majority of the clergy thinks she is wrong, she should humble herself and apologize.
"Anybody should have the right to meet with any candidate. Black people need to know what the Republicans and the Democrats are going to do for poor black people. No longer should anyone tie black people to any political party. The question is: will your policies affect our community positively? Then you have our support," he adds.
Published: 10/26/2006
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