PJI Files Suit for Educators Facing Discipline For Offering Solutions on Gender Identity Policies

 

PJI Files Suit for Educators Facing Discipline For Offering Solutions on Gender Identity Policies PJI attorneys represent Grants Pass teacher, administrator punished for expressing their views on their own online platform June 8, 2021 Media Contact: Brad Dacus, 916-616-4126 GRANTS PASS, Ore. – Representing two educators with the courage to call for balance in educational policies concerning gender identity, the Pacific Justice Institute (PJI) filed a federal lawsuit on Monday against the Grants Pass School District. District officials have placed the educators, Rachel Damiano and Katie Medart, on administrative leave for voicing their opinions about local, state, and national policies concerning students’ gender identity on their own online platform. The educators started a grassroots organization, “I Resolve,” to speak out on gender identity education policy and offer solutions aimed at (1) letting teachers continue teaching without violating their consciences and (2) honoring parents’ rights by requiring parental involvement in decision-making – all while still treating all students with respect and dignity. “This is an incredibly important case on multiple levels,” said Ray D. Hacke, PJI’s Oregon-based staff attorney. “The Supreme Court has made clear that educators don’t check their freedom of speech at the schoolhouse gate when they accept employment with public school districts – they have as much right to speak out against district policies they consider harmful as any other citizen. The school district erred egregiously here in punishing Rachel and Katie for daring to take the stand they did.” Damiano and Medart have been in the education field for many years, most recently working at North Middle School in Grants Pass. Damiano serves as assistant principal at NMS; Medart teaches science there. Together, the two started “I Resolve” to promote a tolerant solution to gender identity education policy. They propose allowing staff and students to abide by their consciences and refrain from using preferred pronouns for students whose anatomic sex does not match the students’ pronoun of choice. Damiano and Medart also propose requiring parent involvement to change students’ pronouns. In addition, Damiano and Medart call for restrooms and locker rooms to be labeled as “anatomically male” and “anatomically female” to correspond with students’ anatomic sex. They also propose giving all students the option to request access to private restrooms and locker rooms. After Damiano and Medart posted a video on their website promoting their proposed policy solutions, the Grants Pass School District placed the educators on leave pending an investigation, set to conclude before the school year officially ends on June 10. Damiano and Medart are now facing termination of their employment for engaging in speech that the First Amendment protects. “Educators, like everybody else, have ideas and opinions they should be free to express,” PJI President Brad Dacus said. “This expression is protected by our First Amendment. Advocating for solutions they believe in should stimulate conversation, not subject dedicated educators to disciplinary action. “PJI is proud to fight for the rights of educators like Rachel and Katie to ensure that much-needed conversations on gender identity take place.” Contribute today!

Asm. Kevin Kiley Announces Exploratory Committee for Governor

I want to thank everyone who has encouraged me to run in the Recall election. I can’t tell you how humbled and appreciative I am.

I got involved with the Recall in a supporting role: to help support the countless Californians who worked tirelessly, heroically, to build the greatest citizens movement in our history. I didn’t do so with any intention of being a candidate.

As I’ve traveled the state, I’ve had the chance to meet many of you in person. I’ve listened to your input, and have learned so much. I’ve thought about what it will take to get our movement across the finish line. And I’m ready to play whatever role gives us the greatest chance to make that happen.

To that end, Orrin Heatlie, the Lead Proponent of the Recall, has offered to organize a committee of Recall leaders to explore that question: whether my candidacy would best serve the goals of removing Newsom and bringing the fundamental change California needs.

At this point, much about the race remains unsettled. That includes the election date, which is looking like September but could be November. The field is also still taking shape. For instance, former acting Director of National Intelligence Ric Grenell is still considering a bid, and he’d be an immediate frontrunner.

So before taking any formal steps, I’m going to trust in the citizens who built this movement. Orrin’s group will account for all dynamics in advising on the best path forward. And I’d love to hear from you directly – just reply to this email!

Running for Governor is never something undertaken lightly, and that’s especially true at this moment. Any candidate must approach the task with the greatest measure of humility and the highest sense of responsibility.

But also, with a sense of possibility: an earnest excitement for what we can achieve together, as we endeavor not just to fire America’s worst governor but to save America’s greatest state.

We’ve already made history. Now comes the fight for California’s future.

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My Mother Thought Fathers Didn't Matter

Dennis Prager just released a video about the importance of fathers.

Yes, Dads matter.

When I was growing up, however, my mother gave off this perverse impression that Dads do NOT matter. She even reduced the roles and importance of fathers to "provider and protector." She also said nasty things about men in general, since she was so bitter towards her father and her husband, and of course that would slop onto me, too.

I look back on all of that abuse, and it finally all makes sense what I was going through as a kid. My mother was indeed, crazy, but more seriously, she was so bitter and angry. 

During high school, our mother (my sister and I) were walking around the Old Ports o' Call in San Pedro. We stopped at one of the tables near the fish market, and she led us through another one of her legalistic Bible studies.

I remember saying to her: "It seems that moms are all that matter. Why are Dads important, then?"

I get sick to my stomach when I think about this statement. I actually said that, and at the time, I really believed that fathers did not matter. So much of the hate that had been coming out of my mother's mouth was so denigrating towards men. It was a very sad time.

Today, I know very well that fathers matter. I submit that fathers matter even more than mothers, especially considering the increased societal breakdown which we are witnessing around the world.

It was such abuse that my mother treated fathers in general with such contempt. But Dads do matter!

Mayor Pat Furey: Corrupt, Lawless, Pro-Criminal, Won't Support Resolution of No Confidence Against George Gascon

Over the last three days, I have exposed a number of people on the Torrance City Council, men and women who are not taking a firm, courageous stance to put the city on recording with a Resolution of No Confidence in corrupt, pro-criminal Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascon.

Now, I want to focus on one of the worst mayors in the state of California, and certainly in the history of Torrance: Pat Furey.

This guy got elected because two more qualified candidates for mayor split the vote. This happened two times in a row, and it's quite disgusting. This guy has no business sitting on the dais. He violated campaign finance laws in the city of Torrance. He has been one of the rudest, most incompetent heads of the city in recent memory. He cannot even control a meeting properly, ever since Black Lives Matter burst into the city council chambers in 2018 and began harassing the council and residents in the chambers.

This man is a disgrace. Jared Sidney Torrance is rolling over in his grave, to think that such perverted incompetence has become so commonplace.

This guy can't even take the lead to push forward a Resolution of No Confidence in Los Angeles County DA George Gascon.

Torrance deserves better. We need real leadership on the city council, not some wishy-washy weakness that cares more about virtue-signaling than actual virtue.

Pat Furey used to be a prosecutor in the Los Angeles District Attorney's office! One would think that he would go on record opposing Gascon and supporting a Resolution of No Confidence in George Gascon.

What is his problem?!

Contact Torrance Mayor Pat Furey, and tell him to stop siding with corruption and pro-criminal policies, and tell him to support a Resolution of No Confidence against Gascon!

Email: pfurey@torranceca.gov

Phone: (310) 618-2801

Torrance City Council: Reject "Pride Month" Resolution

Dear Torrance City Council:

I am saddened and disgusted that (once again), the Torrance City Council wants to celebrate "PRIDE" Month.

6C. PROCLAMATION declaring June 2021 as LGBTQ Pride Month in the City of Torrance.

Why is this city council, or any city council for that matter, celebrating sexual perversion, degeneracy, and deviance as something to cherish?

First of all, if people are "born that way", then what is there to celebrate? What is this celebration really about? That a man wants to misuse his genitals, like someone shoving a straw up his nose to drink, or a woman using her elbow to scratch her head? This is a travesty, not something to celebrate at all. The behaviors are inherently damaging, cutting the lifespan short of individuals who engage in them by an average of 20%. In LGBT affirming countries like Sweden, the suicidality rate for transgenders is 40%! This is not a set of lifestyles to celebrate, but rather a set of mental illnesses and emotional maladjustments which need care and treatment.

Second of all, I happen to support science and research. There is no evidence that people are born gay, transgender, two-spirit, etc. I thought that Torrance, as a well-balanced industrial, commercial, and residential city would stay true to the fundamental principles of science and research. The latest report on these origins of homosexuality and transgenderism have confirmed that there is no "gay gene":

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-02585-6

Why is the city council taking on such an anti-science position, to assert that these destructive behaviors should be celebrated as innate civil rights? How about celebrating "Detransitioners Month", to recognize the growing number of men and women who realize that they could never change their sex, and that all attempts to do so via sex mutilation were foolish and futile? How about "Ex-gay" month, for the millions of men and women around the world who realized that the whole LGBT movement is based on lies, and that they no longer had to live "that way" because they were not "born that way"?

Third, all of this "Resolution Virtue-Signaling" ignores very serious issues in the city. When is the city going to get the ordinance in place for our Health District, so that we will no longer be under the arbitrary diktat of an unelected health director in Downtown Los Angeles in the event of another so-called "pandemic"? The city needs to address the homelessness issue effectively, so that we do not turn into Skid Row in Downtown Los Angeles. These are the issues that the city council needs to address, not this aberrant virtue-signaling.

Fourth, this LGBT movement has metastasized into elitist, arrogant, and tyrannical movement at its core. From the late 1960s onwards, when there was this massive push to decriminalize homosexual conduct, the public at large was told not to worry, because this was all about private behavior between consenting adults. Today, we see LGBT being pushed onto kids in their cartoons and on cereal boxes as well as in the classroom. LGBT activists bully churches, charities, and small businesses if they do not comply and promote LGBT themes and ideologies. Corporate interests around the world (except in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia) reshape their logos with the six-colored PRIDE backgrounds to show their solidarity with this "movement". The notion that LGBT activists and individuals who engage in these behaviors are somehow oppressed or in need of support and promotion in city councils is laughable. If nothing else, we are witnessing a perverse movement in which every citizen must pander and celebrate this agenda or be forced out of work, out of the public square, and out of the civic compact. This is all wrong, and it's time for governments at all levels to stop pandering to this destructive agenda.

Last of all, I informed this city council that the South Bay LGBT Center, which had paraded a bunch of despicable pride flags in the Torrance City Council chambers in 2019, had a trustee member who had molested five youths. FIVE! That agency should have shut its doors in disgrace, not flaunted sexual degeneracy before all, including in the city of Torrance.

Here's the report from former Daily Breeze Crime Reporter Larry Altman about that South Bay LGBT Center Trustee:

https://www.dailybreeze.com/2017/02/08/transgender-woman-sentenced-to-prison-for-sex-acts-with-teen-boys-in-torrance/

Why would the city counci celebrate something that is promoted by such a discredited non-profit in the city?

I must remind you that the first directly-elected Torrance Mayor Albert Isen wanted to preserve the culture of this vibrant, growing city during his tenure. He went to great lengths to keep sexual perversion out of the city, even going so far as to launch an anti-smut campaign and take the lead on banning topless bars in the city.  A few years ago, even the current mayor took great strides to stop the proliferation of massage parlors in the city of Torrance, many of which were turning into dens of prostitution in the city.

Now, fifty years after Isen's tenure, the Torrance City Council is actually celebrating sexual perversion as a civil right?!

This is outrageous.

The city council needs to stop with this deviant virtue-signaling nonsense. How about celebrating "Nuclear Family" Month, if the city insists on celebrating something that relates to families?

For the time being, this silly resolution needs to be tabled permantly. Let's celebrate civic pride, not sexual degeneracy.

Torrance is better than this. Enough is enough.

Sincerely,

Arthur Schaper, Organization Director

MassResistance

Open Letter to CAGOP, Denouncing "Pride Month" Announcement from RNC Chair

To the current leadership of the California Republican Party:

My name is Arthur Schaper, and I am a delegate to the state party, having served as the GOP nominee for the 66th Assembly District in Los Angeles County.

I just found this tweet from Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel:

https://twitter.com/GOPChairwoman/status/1400212885595426824

 The contents of the tweet read as follows:

Happy #PrideMonth!@GOP is proud to have doubled our LGBTQ support over the last 4 years, and we will continue to grow our big tent by supporting measures that promote fairness and balance protections for LGBTQ Americans and those with deeply held religious beliefs.

— Ronna McDaniel (@GOPChairwoman) June 2, 2021

This is abhorrent and disgusting.

The Republican Party was founded on ending the twin relics of barbarism: slavery and polygamy.

Polygamy is a detestable practice which reduces women (and children) to property while undermining the inherent dignity of men.

The point is: pro-family policies must be defended at all costs in the Republican Party.

The idea that the Republican Party should welcome sexual deviancy and degeneracy as some kind of iteration of the Civil Rights Movement, or that sexual perversion should be treated as another class of essential being is anti-science and unconstitutional.

Human beings are not "born" gay. Even openly gay academics like Camille Paglia have recognized this fact. There is also a growing body of research which confirms that there is no "gay gene":

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-02585-6

We need to be the "pro-science" as well as the pro-natural law party.

I must remind all of you of the clear dictates of our nation's founding principles:

"When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."

The laws of nature recognize male and female, and recognize that marriage is a sacrament, an institution of one man and one woman. The head of our party should not be celebrating homosexuality, transgenderism, and like degenerate behaviors. There is no place for this perversity in conservatism.

The RNC Chairwoman must retract this outrageous tweet, which suggests that LGBT behaviors are concrete identities deserving of full support and protection. The California Republican Party must go on record opposing such perverse, improper declarations, as well.

We cannot allow our culture to descend into a malaise of cultural Marxism masquerading as "tolerance, inclusiveness, and diversity."

There are a number of behaviors and ideas which cannot be tolerated. They include the destruction of innocent life (abortion), the limitation of self-defense (gun control), and the destruction of the natural family (homosexuality, transgenderism, no-fault divorce, etc.)

As a delegate to the state party, I expect a response on this matter.

Thank you. 

Sincerely,

Arthur Schaper 

Open Letter to Councilman Herring: Torrance is NOT a Systemically Racist City

Councilman Herring:

I read your editorial published in the Daily Bulletin, entitled "Black Lives Matter, Mr. Mattucci".

I must say that I found the tone and the conclusions of this editorial quite surprising and striking for their serious disregard for facts and evidence.

You claim that "systemic racism that has existed in Torrance since its corporation in 1921."

Would you please explain which systems in the city of Torrance exhibit this racism, and what is your proof of this racism?

Your article did not cite anything specific. In fact, in a city council meeting in 2018, you declared that Torrance could not be a racist city, since the residents had elected you to the city council, and you were the highest vote-getter in the 2016 City Council election.

You assert that "Black Lives Matter is not a terrorist group." However, Black Lives Matter spokesman and activists have talked about taking land from white people in public forums. One of the leaders in New York City stated the following: "If this country doesn't give us what we want, then we will burn down this system and replace it." They have claimed that cities with a multi-ethnic heritage like Carson were founded "white supremacy", and in fact I recall that members of Black Lives Matter call you yourself a white supremacist. They have rallied around and then toppled monuments and statues throughout the United States, including memorials for African-American soldiers who fought for their own freedom and their fellow countrymen during the American Civil War. A number of times, BLM protesters have chanted "Pigs in a blanket, fry 'em like bacon." These phrases were directed at police officers. These are violent statements, implying perverse threats against police officers.

BLM protests have erupted into riots in many cities across the United States. They have destroyed businesses, homes, attacked police precincts. They have even attacked and murdered other black lives. They have repeatedly intimidated elected officials by disrupting public meetings and preventing other citizens from being heard in these public meetings. I personally have been assaulted and my life threatened by these activists. I must remind you that many of the businesses destroyed in these riots were owned by African-Americans.

Violence, acts of intimidation, destruction of property -- are not these behaviors examples of domestic terrorism?

Mr. Herring, you stated the following in your editorial:

"Mr. Mattucci, when we say that Black lives matter, we are not saying that other lives do not matter."

"We are saying that all lives cannot matter until Black lives matter and receive that same justice."

 All lives matter because they are all endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights. The notion that a life matters less because of skin color is antithetical to everything that the United States is founded on. The notion that other lives cannot matter until the lives of one segment of the population matter by receiving the "same justice" is in fact one of the most unjust, racist formulations I have ever read. Justice cannot be a matter of skin color. Justice must be a matter of actions and merits. The very notion that a segment of the population based on skin color has been denied justice because of their skin color requires more rigorous defense than you have provided.

What is your basis for the assertion that black lives are not receiving the same justice as everyone else?

Are you implying that Asian-American lives, which are most often harmed and harassed by black lives, do not matter?

Are you aware that the massive homicide rate in black communities is a result of black-on-black crime?

Are you aware that many black lives are lost because of abortion, and that Planned Parenthood, founded by an embittered racist named Margaret Sanger, deliberately targeted black communities for extermination via abortion?

Are you aware that in predominantly Democrat-run urban areas, most of the black homicides occur?

 Councilman Herring, I have no reason not to take your statements seriously. Precisely for that reason, I found many of your formulations in your editorial to be surprising if not disturbing for their lack of evidence, intellectual rigor, and seriousness. I submit to you that when black lives matter to other black lives, then the import of the larger statement "Black lives matter" will have more integrity. Furthermore, your claim that Torrance is systemically racist is, if I may be so bold, systemically flawed. By what metric can you claim that the city of Torrance is racist?

 Please respond to the questions which I have provided in bold letters above. As a retired city councilman, a pastor, and a retired military official, your reputation and the gravity of your assertions demand a response to the questions I have provided. You all but libeled the city of Torrance and its residents, and such brazen assertions must be challenged.

 Sincerely,

 Arthur Schaper

Hiding Heidi? Councilwoman Ashcraft Won't Favor Resolution Against Gascon, Anti-Camping Ordinance, Etc. -- Why?

Councilwoman Heidi Ashcraft has been on the Torrance city council for a number of years.

She was appointed in 2013 to fill in a term for Sue Rhilinger when she stepped down due to health concerns.

She was elected in her own right in 2014, the top vote getter in that year's election.

She declined to run for re-election in 2018, likely due to the unpleasant friction she endured with corrupt Mayor Pat Furey. I had even asked her to consider running for mayor, since a number of well-connected residents and activists think that Heidi is a tough lady, not afraid of a challenge, not afraid to stand on principle.

I was one of those people.

Now, sadly, I am starting to wonder ...

I had supported her second appointment to the Torrance City Council when Councilman Chen was re-elected in his own right to a district, compared to his election two years prior to an at-large seat on the city council.

Since then, sadly, I find her lack of resolve very disappointing. 

1. She was A-OK with discussing whether the city should impose a local mask mandate, just as Hermosa Beach and Manhattan Beach had done.

2. I confronted her about the former police chief, Eve Berg (once again, so glad that she is gone), and she rebuffed me completely on this. How could anyone stand with a police chief like Eve Berg, who thought that it was acceptable to let Black Live Matter bigots take up city streets, right outside of city hall and in front of people's homes? There is no excuse for allowing such lawlessness to run rampant, both outside as well as inside city hall.

Now, there are growing concerns about other serious issues facing the city council, and "Hiding" Heidi is done MIA. For a lady who spoke out a number of times on key issues, including her push to get rid of corurpt Mayor Pat Furey's son Pat Jr. from the Traffic Commission some years ago, she has become all too quiet, reticent, missing in action.

Will she support a resolution of No Confidence in pro-criminal LA County District Attorney George Gascon? There is no excuse for her to say or do nothing. She has enjoyed the support of local law enforcement, and she received the backing of every other city councilmember when she was appointed a second time to the city council. If she can build bridges and she could speak her mind before, what is problem now?

There is no excuse for her to say nothing, to not support the Resolution of No Confidence in anti-law and order DA George Gascon.

What's more, there is no notice, no information on the horizon that she will ensure that the homeless stay off our streets with a well-placed anti-camping ordinance. We need the city council to step up and speak out in favor of the issues that residents care about. We don't need "Hiding Heidi" to stay hidden.

Contact her office, and tell her to:

1. Support the Resolution of No Confidence against LA County DA George Gascon

2. Support the anti-camping ordinance to ensure that homeless do not come to Torrance to clutter up the streets and sidewalks.

EmailHeidi Ashcraft: hashcraft@torranceca.gov

Phone:   (310) 618-2801

Revelation About Faith vs. Facts and Feelings

Faith is the evidence of things hoped for. It's not something that we still hope for.

It's something that has arriced.

Faith is the substance of things unseen. It's the recognition and reality of things that we do not see.

How did Moses survive and then thrive?

"By faith he forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king: for he endured, as seeing him who is invisible." (Hebrews 11:27)

We see by faith! Faith is not a feeling, and it is not based on unstable facts.

Faith is about seeing what is invisible, for what is invisible to the human sense is eternal in the most important sense:

"While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal." (2 Corinthians 4:18)

For a long time, I kept confusing feelings and the flesh with faith. My parents taught me to walk by flesh and sight rather than faith and spirit. They were so focused on themselves they didn't see a living Savior caring for them.

They really believed that they were all alone in the world, or that praying to God was something that they did as an exercise, an activity to earn some favor or support. But for most matters in their life, they lived as though they were on their own.

It's a tough life, that kind of self-imposed hardship. It's remarkable how I was able to get through the earlier years of my journey. Both my parents did not have the full and working knowledge of God's grace and peace at work in their lives.

God is real! Christ is Alive! We are not stock on this rock called Earth trying to live our own lives in our own effort. We have Him who has been from the beginning (1 John 2:13) and we are not alone in this fight:

"For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure." (Philippians 2:13)

Faith is about recognizing divine reality apart of our limited senses. Faith is about recognizing truth based on God's Word, not man's world.

Consider the first example of faith in the Hall of Faith (Hebrews 11):

"3Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear." (Hebrews 11:3)

God's Word spoke the worlds into existence. Before the world, there was the Word.

John could not have said it more plainly:

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." (John 1:1)

Let's hear God's Word and believe that God has all the power that we need to get thorugh and thrive in this world. It's not about ourselves. It's about Himself. Christ Jesus died for us, rose for us, and lives for us after the power of an endless life at the right hand of His Father--and our Father!

Self-effort, man's striving, man's attempts to keep the law are NOT of faith:

"And the law is not of faith: but, The man that doeth them shall live in them." (Galatians 3:12)

Right before this point, writes clearly how the righteous live:

"But that no man is justified by the law in the sight of God, it is evident: for, The just shall live by faith." (Galatians 3:22)

This verse is the Gospel in a verse, one of the most oft-repeated verses in the entire New Testament, and for good reason.

Faith is all about seeing Jesus, and seeing that He has Finished the Work. Self-effort, self, works, tiring and toiling under law, is all about man looking at his thoughts, his feelings, his efforts, his world, his own words and works -- and always coming up short. We cannot save ourselves. Man seeking to make himself wise became a fool, convinced that God was holding out on him, and thus partaking of a tree which was not good for man to eat.

The knowledge of good and evil, the knowledge of the law, does not make us live good and godly lives. The Tree of Life, the Gospel of Grace, seeing Him who is Invisible by faith based on His Word, that is how we live and reign in life.

Now more than ever, everyone in the Body of Christ needs to stop focusing on their feelings and the facts before their senses, and start seeking greater revelation, to see Jesus at work in their lives and around their environs, based on faith, not our feelings, not our fantasies, not our make-believe attitudes.

It's time for us to make these prayers our priority, that we would see more, not try to do more; that we would believe more, not achieve more. For the more that we believe in Him, the more that we can receive from Him, and the more that He can achieve through us! AMEN!

" [I] cease not to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers; That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him: The eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints," (Ephesians 1:16-18)

and

"That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; 17That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, 18May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; 19And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God." (Ephesians 3:16-19)

Councilman Mike Griffiths Makes Excuses, Won't Support Resolution Against Pro-Criminal LA County DA George Gascon

Torrance City Councilman Mike Griffiths answered my call last week.

I talked with him about getting the city of Torrance to go on record opposing LA County District Attorney George Gascon.

He just blew me off: "Not gonna happen."

And why not?

The gist of his answer was this:

The city attorney does not approve of it, and it's going to hurt the police department.

Really. That was his excuse.

And last year, Griffiths was more than happy to (rightly) open up the city and defy the lockdown orders from LA County Board of Health and the Governor of California.

Now he is worried about potential displeasure from the city attorney? Or lawsuits? Give me a break.

This is outrageous.

The city attorney, Patrick Sullivan, is not an elected official. The city council does not work for the city attorney. The city attorney works for the city council, and the city council works for us.

Residents of all backgrounds in the city of Torrance want LA County DA George Gascon OUT! Eighteen of the 88 cities in Los Angeles County have gone on record official issuing resolutions of No Confidence, including Rancho Palos Verdes and Manhattan Beach. Torrance City Council should not be dragging their feet on this issue, and that includes Councilman Griffiths. 

This attitude of ignoring the will of voters to cater to civil servants in city hall is a growing problem in the city of Torrance. Elected officials on the dais are not following through on their promises, and they are following orders from the city attorney, when they should be listening to the residents of the community.

Yes, the corrupt, pro-criminal district attorney George Gascon has reopened the case against two of Torrance's police officers because of their officer-involved shooting against Christopher "Cowboy" Mitchell. The previous DA, Jackie Lacey, declined to file charges, and even asserted that the officers rightly acted in self-defense. A growing audience of viewers and commentaters have also asserted that the two police officers acted in self-defense when one considers the full contents of the video. Am I saying that every police officer in the city of Torrance is good, or that the LA County DA should not pursue officer-involved shootings in the event of foul play? Of course not.

But in this case, and with what the city of Torrance is potentially facing with a pro-criminal county DA, and based on what residents have been saying for the last three weeks, it's time for the city of Torrance to go on record and issue a Resolution of No Confidence in George Gascon. There is nothing wrong with the city decrying the LA County District Attorney's bad behavior, disgraceful conduct toward constituents, and his pro-criminal policies which openly violate state law. This does not cast aspersions or undermine the well-being of the police officers who face investigation. In fact, the fact that the current, corrupt DA insists on reopening this case shows that he is partisan and political, rather than principled and pragmatic towards his office. All the more reason he needs to go!

And all the more reason that the city of Torrance needs to issue a Resolution of No Confidence in LA County DA George Gascon!

Gascon is putting murderous thugs back on the street, and trampling on the needs of victims and law-abiding citizens generally. He needs to be recalled. 

And the city of Torrance needs to go on record opposing him.

Contact Councilman Mike Griffiths, and DEMAND that he support a resolution of no confidence against corrupt, pro-criminal LA County District Attorney George Gascon. Remind him that he works for the people, not the city attorney.

(310) 618-2801

Email: mgriffiths@torranceca.gov