Fears of ‘Another Genocide’ in Sudan as Distracted World Focuses on Ukraine and Gaza

Reports of ethnically motivated attacks have multiplied, and aid organizations say the world isn't paying attention

Published 11/24/23 

Nikhil Kumar

Destruction in a livestock market in al-Fasher, capital of Sudan’s North Darfur state, September 1, 2023. The conflict between Sudan’s army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), has seen at least 27 localities burned down by the RSF and allied Arab militias, according to the Humanitarian Research Lab at the Yale School of Public Health.AFP via Getty Images

The warnings have come regularly — the United Nations highlights reports of “sexual violence, torture, arbitrary killings, extortion of civilians and targeting of specific ethnic groups."

The European Union says recent atrocities “are seemingly part of a wider ethnic cleansing campaign.”

Both point to the possibility of what the E.U. calls “another genocide.”

But this isn’t about the wars in Ukraine or Gaza. They are talking about Sudan.

In one of Africa’s largest countries, there has already been a genocide. And now there are fears that it’s happening again — and that the rest of the world isn’t paying attention.

Gripped by a fresh civil war that began earlier this year, the country “is no longer at the precipice of mass atrocities,” the heads of 50 humanitarian and rights groups warned in a joint appeal, “it has fallen over the edge.”

That warning came in September. The same groups say there’s been almost no global outcry.

The violence is centered in the same region that witnessed a genocide at the start of this century: Darfur, in western Sudan, where Arab militias backed by the Sudanese army attacked black African tribes in a violent conflict that broke out in 2003.

Now a group of Arab paramilitaries are once again accused of violence aimed at the same non-Arab population — in the most striking case, a house-to-house rampage earlier this month that killed more than 800 people.

“Twenty years ago, the world was shocked by the terrible atrocities and human rights violations in Darfur,” the U.N.’s top official for refugees, Filippo Grandi, warned earlier this month. “We fear a similar dynamic might be developing.”

How the current crisis began

The recent escalation is the result of a fallout between rival generals that devolved into all-out violence in April.

On one side is the country’s army chief, General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan. His rival is Lieutenant General Mohamed Hamdan, the head of what are known as the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a paramilitary group.

The two men used to work together, in concert with a civilian-led government that followed the 2019 ouster of the country’s longtime ruler, Omar al-Bashir. The pair ultimately seized power for themselves, ousting the civilian leadership in 2021.

Their alliance lasted only two years, with tensions between the two men ultimately spilling into war between the regular army and the RSF paramilitaries.

Already, this conflict has displaced more than 4.8 million people inside the country of around 46 million; a further 1.2 million have fled to neighboring countries since the civil war began, according to the U.N.

Fears of genocide

As the war plays out, the RSF has moved to consolidate its position in the Darfur region, where it has notched a series of victories against the regular army.

And multiple accounts suggest that these conquests — the RSF is now said to be close to seizing the entire region — have come with ethnic violence on a large scale.

The RSF and its allies — smaller militias in the region — are Arab, and have been accused of targeting the non-Arab population in Darfur, the same people who suffered years of genocidal violence at the start of the century.


Earlier in November, more than 800 people were reported killed after the RSF and its allies rampaged through a town in West Darfur, killing non-Arabs in their homes, according to the Associated Press.

“They violently attacked the town,” Salah Tour, head of the Sudanese Doctor’s Union in West Darfur, told the news agency. “They went from house to house, killing and detaining people.”

It was this episode that triggered the U.N.’s warning earlier this month that a “similar dynamic” to the genocidal violence seen twenty years ago might again be unfolding in Sudan.

Before those raids, in October, the Centre for Information Resilience, a British government-backed research group, said its analysis of satellite imagery from Darfur showed signs of the deliberate torching of non-Arab villages by Arab fighters.

And in August, the UK, Norway and the U.S. issued a joint warning, citing reports that the RSF and its Arab allies had engaged in “killings based on ethnicity and widespread sexual violence.”

A distracted world

As the violence unfolds and the warnings multiply, Sudan has for the most part been absent from global headlines.

The E.U., following the killings in West Darfur, said “the international community cannot turn a blind eye on what is happening in Darfur and allow another genocide to happen in this region,” but for the most part, the world’s attention has been dominated by the war in Israel and Gaza. And before October, it was focused on Ukraine.

This even as the conflict in Sudan has made it the center of the “largest child displacement crisis in the world, with a recorded 3 million children fleeing widespread violence in search of safety, food, shelter and health care,” according to Unicef, the U.N.’s children’s agency.

Aid workers say that the world’s distraction has a profound impact; resources aren’t in the pipeline to meet the needs of the people there. Last month, the Red Cross warned that “many Sudanese residents feel angry and abandoned, as relief efforts fall short compared to the level of suffering.”

Data from the OECD showed that while global aid spending by rich countries surged in 2022—up by almost 14 per cent—the jump was due entirely to spending on Ukraine. Spending on assistance for the poorest countries, on the other hand, actually fell.

The U.N.’s own humanitarian appeal for Sudan— its call for the funds it needs to adequately address the crisis there–has drawn only about 25 percent of what’s needed.

For the humanitarian and rights groups that issued that warning in September, this points to one clear conclusion: the world has forgotten about Sudan.

Dr. Christos Christou, the head of Doctors Without Borders, said recently that global inaction on Sudan “epitomizes a catastrophic failure of humanity.” It’s a failure, he said, marked by “the dire neglect and shortcomings of international organizations in delivering an adequate response.”

Do not ignore the suffering of Sudanese women

Women are bearing the brunt of the vicious war in Sudan. The world should not look away.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf
Former President of Liberia
Published On 24 Nov 2023

A Sudanese woman, who fled the conflict in el-Geneina in Sudan's Darfur region, mourns her relatives who she says were killed by the RSF, in Ourang on the outskirts of Adre, Chad, on July 25, 2023

 [File: Zohra Bensemra/Reuters]

Sudanese women have always been an inspiration to me.

When the people of Sudan took to the streets to call for the ouster of President Omar Hassan al-Bashir in 2019, women were at the forefront, leading the movement for democracy and change. It was estimated that women – who have long endured marginalisation, harassment and sexual violence in Sudan – made up as many as two-thirds of the protesters. Who can forget the viral image of the young protester Alaa Salah standing atop a car in a white toub leading a chant against the regime? After four months of demonstrations, the reign of President al-Bashir was ended.

Now, in a terrible turn of events, Sudanese women are bearing the brunt of the vicious war that began in mid-April between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF). More than six million people have been displaced since the new war erupted including an estimated 105,000 women who are currently pregnant, according to the United Nations. Of the 1.2 million who have fled to neighbouring countries, nearly nine in 10 are women and children. The healthcare system in Sudan is in a perilous state – 70 to 80 percent of hospitals in conflict areas are not operational – with devastating consequences for women in need of maternal health medicines.

And sexual and gender-based violence has become an epidemic. According to the World Health Organization, more than four million women and girls are at risk of sexual violence in Sudan.

While a UN experts’ report accused both parties of violations of humanitarian and human rights law, the experts expressed alarm at the brutal and widespread use of rape and other forms of sexual violence by the RSF. Some of the reported rapes appeared to be ethnically and racially motivated, the experts said, in a frightful echo of the Darfur crisis of 20 years ago.

A Human Rights Watch report found that the RSF committed a ‘‘staggering number of rapes and other war crimes’’ during attacks on West Darfur’s capital, el-Geneina, between late April and late June 2023.

The Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa documented hundreds of cases of women who were victimised by the RSF, either forcibly disappeared while trying to flee the fighting, kidnapped for ransom, or abducted and compelled to serve as sex slaves. ”I am four months pregnant,” said a 21-year-old survivor. ”I cannot even count how many times I have been raped.”

A new UN report describes how women and girls are being abducted and held in ”inhuman, degrading slave-like condition in areas controlled by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Darfur, where they are allegedly forcibly married and held for ransom.” Sources told the UN that women and girls have been seen in chains on pick-up trucks and cars.

The accounts are almost too painful to read.

I am deeply concerned by accusations about regional powers intent on worsening the situation for Sudan’s women. In particular, I have been troubled by reports that the United Arab Emirates has been supplying arms to the RSF. A prominent analyst of the Sudan crisis has described the UAE’s material support for the RSF as ‘‘the worst kept secret going right now’.’ When asked by a journalist whether the UAE is supplying arms to the RSF, the US ambassador to the UN said, ‘‘We have called for all countries who might be engaged in this war to cease those efforts.’’ The UAE has denied the accusations. I hope the reports are wrong.

It is essential that all regional and international actors play a constructive role in bringing peace to Sudan, especially at this moment when the world’s attention is focused on other crises. They must not overlook gross human rights abuses in pursuit of selfish economic and strategic interests. The UAE is proud of its standing in the world, which it seeks to highlight by hosting the United Nations Climate Change Conference – COP28 – from November 30 until December 12 at Expo City in Dubai. But its global reputation will deserve a black mark if it fails to ensure a clean break from any association with the warring parties in Sudan. The UAE has a duty to renounce and sever any ties with the criminal forces of the RSF.

When I was given the privilege of serving as president of Liberia, I assumed responsibility for rebuilding a nation nearly destroyed by war and plunder. I saw first-hand how essential women’s empowerment was in moving a country towards reconciliation.

So it must be in Sudan. Let us – all of us – contribute to that effort.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf
Former President of Liberia

OPINION

Why won’t the war in Sudan end?

November 23, 2023 

Smoke rises as clashes continue between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), in Khartoum, Sudan on May 5, 2023 

[Ahmed Satti/Anadolu Agency]

by Sameh Rashid

300 days after the outbreak of battles in Sudan between the Rapid Support Forces and the Sudanese state army, stopping the war is still far from the imagination. There are traditional reasons for this, including the insistence of both parties of the crisis to resolve the situation militarily and refusing to offer any valuable concessions. The very important factor is the complexity of the situation on the ground and the balance of power being closer to the balance between the two forces.

However, reading between the lines is clearer and deeper than these apparent features, as military balance means a closeness in forces and capabilities, similarity of weapons systems in quality and quantity, in addition to combat efficiency and numbers of available manpower. This has not happened, as the Sudanese army is superior in all of these elements. It has an air force armed with fighter planes and bombers, while the Rapid Support Forces do not have an air force, but they excel on the ground by controlling approximately 70 per cent of Khartoum and the surrounding areas, most of which are residential areas, not open battlefields. Therefore, air force superiority is not a decisive element or a major advantage in the violent battles centred in and around the capital.

OPINION: Sudan refugees detail second wave of ethnic purge by RSF militia

Under normal circumstances of a war between a regular army and a rebel militia, a few days of pursuit and guerrilla warfare in the streets of Khartoum are enough for the (Sudanese) army to be able to completely destroy the rebels. However, this has not happened in Sudan for over eight months, during which the battles between the two sides have not stopped. This is because the supposedly weaker party in the equation (the Rapid Support Forces) receives direct and intensive aid and support, both military and political. Hamdan Dagalo’s (Hemedti) forces obtained advanced weapons, and even developed their capabilities based on the development of battles in a way that balances the capabilities of the regular Sudanese army. For example, after the outbreak of the crisis and the outbreak of battles, it obtained anti-aircraft guns and air defence radars, which it had not possessed before. Furthermore, the communications, control and guidance systems that these forces use to coordinate their movements and transmit orders and instructions vertically and horizontally, with advanced technology and special modifications and features, are available only to a few countries, some of which are in the Middle East.

Another reason to question the continuation of the war is the unique ability of the Rapid Support Forces to compensate for losses in personnel and equipment and to obtain new quantities of weapons in the ongoing combat operations, the fronts of which change from time to time. It is as if there were open channels or corridors through which weapons, and even fighters, flow non-stop. The necessary question to understand the full picture must address the failure to impose an air and sea embargo on any irregular military shipments heading to Sudan or, at least, monitoring airports, seaports and land crossings.

From the first moment the crisis erupted, the major powers cried to each other about the need to stop the fighting, without any practical actions, or even taking a single step in this direction. Since the outbreak of the crisis, the intelligence services have certainly had a complete and accurate map showing the locations of Rapid Support Forces, their weapons’ stores, and command, direction and control sites, as well as all the official and unofficial ports and corridors through which weapons can be smuggled into Sudan.

The continuity of the war is not due only to traditional factors but is primarily linked to the fact that regional and global parties wanted the crisis to break out, in the first place, and for the war to continue for as long as possible. It may later be transformed into a permanent status and an actual division of the territory of the Sudanese State, joining the series of disintegration and collapse that has afflicted Arab countries that had previously been central and had a pivotal role in determining the fate of the region as a whole.

READ: UN food agency needs over $526m as hunger emergency looms in South Sudan

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.

MODI'S CURSED TUNNEL

Efforts to rescue workers from collapsed tunnel in India to resume

24 November 2023, 09:54

India Tunnel Collapse. Picture: PA

A drilling machine is being redeployed to help reach 41 trapped people after it ran into problems on Thursday.

Rescuers racing to evacuate 41 construction workers who have been trapped in a collapsed tunnel in northern India for nearly two weeks are hoping to resume drilling on Friday after a mechanical problem a day earlier forced them to halt.

The platform of the drilling machine, which became unstable while boring through rock debris, has been fixed, Bhaskar Khulbe, a former adviser to the Prime Minister’s Office, said at the accident site.

Before they can resume drilling, rescuers are manually digging through the debris to remove pieces of metal to avoid damaging the machine, said Kirti Panwar, a government spokesperson.

Drilling was also paused on Wednesday after the boring machine hit a metal girder, causing some damage to its blades and a six-hour delay as rescuers worked to clear the obstacle.

The workers have been trapped since November 12 when a landslide in mountainous Uttarakhand state caused a portion of the 2.8-mile tunnel they were building to collapse about 650ft from the entrance.

Rescuers began drilling through the entrance of the tunnel to reach them but have been stymied by debris and technical problems.

Rescuers gather at the site of the tunnel (AP/PA)

The mountainous terrain has proved a challenge for the drilling machine, which broke down earlier as rescuers attempted to dig horizontally toward the trapped workers. The machine’s high-intensity vibrations also caused more debris to fall.

As efforts stretch into the 13th day, rescuers have drilled through 151ft and need to excavate up to 40ft more to create a passageway, Mr Panwar said.

Rescue teams are inserting and welding together pipes through which the trapped workers are to escape to freedom. About 151ft of pipes have been put in so far, he said.

Members of the National Disaster Response Force will then bring out the workers one by one on stretchers that have been fitted with wheels.

Officials earlier hoped to be ready to start bringing the workers out on Thursday but now that will not happen.

Authorities have been supplying the trapped workers with hot meals made of rice and lentils through a six-inch pipe, after days in which they survived on dry food sent through a narrower pipe. Oxygen is being supplied through a separate pipe.

Officials earlier released a video after a camera was pushed through the pipe showing the workers in their construction hats moving around the blocked tunnel while communicating with rescuers on walkie-talkies.

Most of the trapped workers are migrant labourers from across the country. Many of their families have travelled to the accident site, where they have camped out for days to get updates on the rescue and in hopes of seeing their relatives soon.

By Press Association

Native American activists mark annual Day of Mourning to dispel 'Thanksgiving myth'

Activists also express support for Palestinian people, saying US aid to Israel 'must end'

Servet Gunerigok |24.11.2023 

WASHINGTON

Native American activists gathered Thursday in the state of Massachusetts to mark the 54th annual National Day of Mourning to honor their ancestors.

The annual event, which falls on the Thanksgiving holiday observed in the US, was organized by the United American Indians of New England at Cole's Hill in Plymouth.

Kisha James, an enrolled member of the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah) and the Oglala Lakota Nation, said the native activists gathered to mourn their ancestors, tear down settler mythologies and speak truth to power.

"Once again on so-called Thanksgiving Day, United American Indians of New England and our supporters are gathered on this hill to observe the National Day of Mourning for the Indigenous people murdered by settler colonialism and imperialism from Turtle Island to Palestine," said James.

"Turtle Island" is a term used by some Indigenous peoples to refer to the continent of North America.

She said the National Day of Mourning was established 53 Thanksgivings ago when her grandfather, Wamsutta Frank James, an Aquinnah Wampanoag man, was invited by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to speak at a banquet celebrating the 350th anniversary of the arrival of the pilgrims.

"However, the speech that Wamsutta wrote, which was based on historical fact rather than the sham version of history perpetuated in the Thanksgiving myth, was a far cry from complementary. In his speech, Wamsutta not only named atrocities committed by the pilgrims, but he also reflected upon the fate of the Wampanoag at the hands of settler invaders," she said.

James also pointed out that some Wampanoag ancestors had welcomed the pilgrims and saved them from starvation, only to receive in return "genocide, the theft of our lands, the destruction of our traditional ways of life, slavery, starvation and never-ending oppression" from the settlers.

"When people perpetuate the myth of Thanksgiving, they are not only erasing our genocide but also celebrating it," she said. "We did not simply fade into the background as the Thanksgiving myth says. We have survived and flourished. We have persevered."

During her speech, James expressed support for the Palestinian people, pledging to continue their efforts "until Palestine is free."

Mahtowin Munro, co-leader of the United American Indians of New England, also addressed the gathering, expressing solidarity with refugees and migrants who she said are being forced to leave their home countries due to US policies.

She highlighted the "misguided" notion held by the pilgrims and Puritans that they were entering a wilderness provided for them by their God, as if the lands were empty and awaiting their arrival.

"This idea is so embedded that even today I hear from school children and adults alike that the Europeans brought civilization here, and that Indigenous peoples were not actually doing anything with the land," said Munro.

She said the settler invaders renamed the streets and villages and rivers, adding: "They actively erase the existence of people who lived here and continue to live here. And this certainly sounds familiar to Palestinians."

"When I look at Gaza, I see two reflections of all the Indigenous people killed in the wave after wave of massacres here in North America, in Congo, in Haiti, in Australia, and Ireland, Puerto Rico, the Philippines, Algeria -- people around the world whose only crime has been to exist and resist settler colonialism," she added.

"The Palestinian people need reparations to rebuild. Occupation and settlements must end, US aid to Israel must end. Palestine must be free," said Munro.

Later, the crowd, carrying Palestine flags, chanted "Free, Free Palestine.”

Since 1970, Indigenous people and their allies have gathered at noon on Cole's Hill in Plymouth to observe the National Day of Mourning on the US Thanksgiving holiday.

According to the organizers' website, many Native people do not celebrate the arrival of the pilgrims and other European settlers. For them, Thanksgiving Day serves as a reminder of the genocide of millions of Native people, the theft of Native lands, and the erasure of Native cultures.

Dating back to the early 17th century when English Pilgrims, seeking religious freedom, settled in Plymouth, Massachusetts, Thanksgiving is celebrated on the fourth Thursday in November.

 AMERIKA

Native American Heritage Day honors Indigenous people, but it's falling short

NOVEMBER 24, 2023

It's Native American Heritage Day. NPR's Steve Inskeep talks to Ned Blackhawk, a professor of History and American Studies at Yale, about the history of the day and what it means to observe it.

How Much of ‘Killers of the Flower Moon’ Is Actually True?

The National Archives breaks down the story of the new film and the history of the Osage Nation.

SAMIR HUSSEIN

 NOVEMBER 24, 2023

This story is reposted in collaboration with Made for Us and The National Archives.

If you watched Killers of the Flower Moon in disbelief, you weren’t alone. After the movie premiered, Google searches for “Osage” increased 75%, and one of the most searched-for phrases was “is Killers of the Flower Moon true?”

This is often the reaction whenever a chapter of our history is made into media for public consumption. But the story—and proof of it—have been in the National Archives for decades. Here’s how this tragedy was uncovered.

The Story of the Osage Nation

The Osage Tribe has deep roots in our nation, first emerging as a people around 700 B.C. Osage means “People of the Middle Waters” and likely relates to where their tribe first developed: in the valley of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. Centuries later, they remained close to the water as they migrated west and settled where the Mississippi met the Missouri River.

It was here that they claimed their ancestral lands, establishing a powerful presence throughout the Midwest. They were feared and respected by other tribes and white settlers because they were a nation of brilliant warriors, strategic traders, and skilled hunters. Their trading posts were key to the economic prosperity of the West, and the Osage nation flourished as they established relationships with French fur traders.

But after the Louisiana Purchase, things for the Osage began to turn. Early after the land acquisition, famed explorer Meriwether Lewis advised President Thomas Jefferson that the powerful Osage would become a problem. The population of the eastern United States was growing, and pioneers were eager to venture off into “unsettled” lands. Because the Osage were much too powerful for the U.S. government to take on, it became a quiet, but deliberate, strategy to goad other tribes into war with them. As the government was forcing tribes in the east off their lands, the Osage saw them not as displaced nations, but as invaders. While settlers moved west and claimed acreage for themselves, tribes were fighting among one another for parcels of land that were shrinking every day.

The 19th century was painful for the Osage. In the 1830s, missionaries and settlers descended on the tribe—and they brought smallpox with them. The casualties were severe and devastating. By the time the Civil War erupted, the Osage were residing in modern-day Kansas, but the soon-to-be state was embroiled in its own conflict about whether it would join the Union as a free or a slave state. Although the Osage attempted to stay neutral as the Civil War escalated, geography was not their friend. They were surrounded on all sides by Union and Confederate forces, and both sides raided the Osage nation for food and supplies. As a result, the Osage suffered a devastating famine, and by the 1870s, they had lost half of their population.

By the end of the Civil War, the Osage were ready to abandon their battle-torn Kansas lands. They sold their territory to the Grant Administration, and—in a rare move for tribal nations—purchased their own reservation in Indian Territory, now modern-day Oklahoma. Although they owned their new land, the Osage were worn down after years of disease, war, displacement, and poverty. Until they struck gold.

Osage Riches

In 1894, oil was found under the Osage reservation in Indian Territory. Despite a government-imposed cap that restricted the Osage to 10% of the oil profits, their ownership of their land’s mineral rights was immensely profitable—so profitable, in fact, that the tribe made between $10-30 million per year, making them the richest people per capita in the world at the time.

Then, on March 3, 1921, Congress enacted a “guardianship” program, ostensibly to help the Osage manage their funds. Any individual who was more than half “Indian blood” or an Osage minor had to have a guardian who would be appointed until they could prove that they were “competent” enough to manage their own funds. Guardians had total control over how much money an Osage person received, and even how they spent it. Plus, they were entitled to payment for their services, which they often took directly out of Osage profits. Whether a member of the Osage nation was competent or incompetent was noted on Indian census rolls, ensuring that “incompetent” Osage could not receive funds without a guardian’s presence or permission.

The guardianship program didn’t protect the Osage—it put a target on their backs. Wanting a piece of the profits, white settlers flocked to Oklahoma, and unscrupulous businessmen, lawyers, and others attempted to swindle the Osage out of their mineral rights. But the most insidious attempts came from white male settlers who married Osage women to assert their rights as a spouse, become their guardian, and gain control over their money.

Killers of the Flower Moon follows the true story of Mollie Burkhart, an Osage woman married to a white man, Ernest Burkhart. Mollie’s large family-owned multiple properties on the Osage reservation, and they were thriving off the profits generated from their mineral rights. But in 1918, Mollie’s sister Minnie died of a mysterious “wasting illness.” Just a few years later, her mother, Lizzie Q, died of a similar disease. In May 1921, Mollie’s sister, Anna, was found dead in a ravine with a bullet in the back of her head. Less than two years later, Mollie’s cousin Henry Roan was shot and killed. And in a particularly violent incident, Mollie’s third sister Rita and her brother-in-law Bill were killed when an explosion leveled their house.

Mollie and her family weren’t the only victims. Across the reservation, the Osage were dying mysterious and violent deaths that local authorities were too quick to declare accidents, suicides, or alcohol poisoning. But the Osage knew the truth. In 1925, they petitioned a new federal law enforcement agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, to look into these crimes. The Bureau's director, J. Edgar Hoover, was eager to investigate.
Unraveling the Conspiracy

FBI agents went undercover within the tribe and among settlers. As they began untangling the web of lies, death, and destruction, one name was at the center of it all: William Hale.

Hale was a local rancher, but he was also known by another moniker, “King of the Osage Hills.” Cunning, determined, and ruthless, Hale understood the potential profit he could reap by swindling the Osage out of their mineral rights. He also forged life insurance policies, taking one out on Mollie’s cousin, Henry Roan, for $25,000, of which he was the sole beneficiary. Two weeks later, Roan was dead. When his cons failed to produce the kind of money he was looking for, Hale turned to murder. But he didn’t work alone. One of his conspirators was another local, John Ramsey. The other was his nephew: Ernest Burkhart.

Suddenly, the pieces of the puzzle made sense. Under the guardianship program, Ernest had applied for and had been granted guardianship over Mollie. When members of her family began mysteriously dying, their mineral rights were transferred within the family. Soon, she was the only one left.

Hale and his co-conspirators were arrested, and in 1926, Hale, Ramsey, and Burkhart were all indicted on charges of conspiracy and murder. At first, Ernest pleaded not guilty, but two months into his trial, he had a change of heart. With this change of plea came his story: Hale was the mastermind behind all the murders. Knowing to whom mineral rights would transfer upon a death in the family, Hale had carefully plotted the order in which Mollie’s family members were murdered. Once she had inherited all the mineral rights from the rest of her family, she would be murdered last so Ernest could reap the maximum reward.


During Ernest’s trial, it was revealed that Mollie’s attempted murder was already in progress when doctors found poison in her bloodstream. Fortunately, she made a full recovery.

Hale and his co-conspirators were eventually convicted of the murders of Mollie’s family. But more than 60 deaths had occurred on the reservation over the seven-year period the Osage called the “Reign of Terror.” Many of these murders still remain unsolved.
Bringing the Truth to Light Decades Later

Before the debut of the blockbuster movie starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert DeNiro, and Lily Gladstone, this dark chapter of our history remained relatively unknown. So how do these little-known stories get uncovered? For author David Grann, it started with a visit to the Osage Nation museum in Pawhuska, Oklahoma in 2012. On one of the walls was a beautiful panoramic photo of members of the Osage nation alongside white settlers. But one of the panels had quite obviously been cut out. When Grann asked the museum curator why, she said, “The devil was standing right there.”

The devil was William Hale. But Grann didn’t want to center his book on the person who caused so much destruction. Instead, he chose Mollie, the sole survivor of her family and a person who worked tirelessly to seek justice. “​​At great peril to her own life, she crusaded for justice. I didn’t think you could understand these events without her perspective,” said Grann.

To tell Mollie’s story, Grann began his research at the National Archives Museum in Fort Worth. Hearing of his compelling research, Archives staff worked to help David pull more than 3,000 documents relevant to the Osage, including: Original accounts from Osage who lived through that time

Records from private investigators who tried to both solve the crimes and cover them up
Secret grand jury testimony

Records from J. Edgar Hoover, the FBI director who took on the case that made the Bureau what it is today.

Grann also conducted oral history interviews with descendants of the Osage who lived through the Reign of Terror.

According to Grann, “The museum director had removed the photograph of the killer not to forget what happened, but because the Osage can’t forget. And yet too many Americans, including myself, had either forgotten or never knew about this part of history....I think this episode is a further reminder that much of our history is scattered in archives, crying out to be told.”

The story that Killers of the Flower Moon projects onto the big screen is one that’s hard for many of us to confront, and the horrific nature of the events might even cause some viewers to chalk it up to creative Hollywood writers. But the great majority of the events of the film are, unfortunately, accurate. The exploitation and pain of the Osage, the evil of William Hale and his co-conspirators, and reluctance of local authorities to investigate are all truths pulled directly from museums and archives. We may not always like what we see when we look into the mirror of our collective past, but learning about and confronting it can lead to a better path forward.

TEEN VOGUE

Don’t Call Elon Musk a “Green” Billionaire

He boosted EV production, but the man is a super-emitter who props up climate deniers.

OLIVER MILMAN

 Mother Jones

Kirsty Wigglesworth/AP

This story was originally published by the Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

Elon Musk was once lauded as a sort of green Tony Stark—the genius inventor who leads a double life as superhero Iron Man—for single-handedly tackling the climate crisis one Tesla at a time, helping to forge a clean energy future and pushing for new taxes to drive down fossil fuel use.

But the climate credentials of the world’s richest person have become clouded by his embrace of rightwing politicians, some of whom dismiss global heating, as well as by his management of X, formerly known as Twitter, during which many climate scientists have fled the platform amid a proliferation of misinformation about the climate crisis.

Those contradictions run deeply through his work and life. The man who sometimes seems to think of himself as a spartan-living, green thinker is actually one of the elite 1 percent of the world’s population who, according to a new Oxfam report, produce as much carbon pollution as the poorest two-thirds of humanity, comprising 5 billion people. Where does the reality lie?Musk’s private jet has taken about 200 flights in the past year.

In 2020, Musk vowed to get rid of “almost all physical possessions” and he has since jettisoned a number of mansions, opting instead to occasionally sleep on the couch of friends’ homes and, more recently, to move into a $50,000 modular home in Boca Chica, Texas, near the testing and development site of SpaceX, his space tourism venture. And unlike many billionaires, Musk does not own a superyacht, which tend to be highly polluting.

He can also point to his work furthering Tesla, a company that has eclipsed traditional carmakers as it has reshaped the electric car market around the world. And he can cite Xprize, a $100 million competition to spur new technology to remove carbon from the atmosphere.

For many years, and most recently in an interview in 2021, Musk backed the idea of taxing carbon emissions to force down planet-heating pollution, arguing that carbon was an “unpriced externality”.


But Musk’s rampant use of private jet flights creates part of the problem that his car business is trying to tackle. Since last October, the month he assumed control of X, Musk’s private plane—a $70 million Gulfstream jet with 19 seats and a kitchen—has taken about 200 flights, shuttling between his business interests in Texas, the home of SpaceX and Tesla, and the Bay Area, where X has its headquarters.

There have been longer trips, too, to France, Italy, and Singapore, flight records show, meaning Musk’s private jet has spent nearly a month in the air over the past year, creating more than 2,500 tons of planet-heating emissions in the process.

The emissions from these flights dwarf those caused by the average US household, which amount to fewer than 50 tons a year. Musk has argued that the aircraft helps him work longer hours and is the “one exception” to a lifestyle that is relatively spartan for a man with a personal wealth of more than $230 billion, a figure approaching the GDP of Greece.“The rise of climate denialism on X and the support of candidates who call climate change a hoax is incredibly unhelpful.”

Emissions flowing from Musk’s investments are also significant, with the Oxfam report finding that his stake in Tesla meant he was responsible for a further 79,000 tons of CO2 emissions.

Still, that is far less than others in the rarefied world of the ultra-rich; the report calculates that 125 of the wealthiest people emit an average of 3 million tons of planet-heating pollution a year via their financial dealings.

Research by Jared Starr, a sustainability scientist at the University of Massachusetts, found that America’s richest 10 percent of people were responsible for 40 percent of the country’s climate pollution. He said: “Musk is a complicated figure. On one hand he’s played a critical role in popularizing EV and battery storage with Tesla, on the other he’s flying space tourists on missions that create a huge amount of pollution. Private jets also use a lot of fossil fuel, so he would himself be in the super-emitter category.”

Possibly more troubling is X’s descent into becoming a wellspring of climate denialism under Musk—the platform has become a “dumpster fire,” according to Starr—and the billionaire’s embrace of Republican politicians, some of whom have dismissed established climate science.

“The rise of climate denialism on X and the support of candidates who call climate change a hoax is incredibly unhelpful and takes away some of the shine from the image of him as a benevolent billionaire helping us reach the promised land of clean energy future,” Starr said.

Musk has praised Vivek Ramaswamy, an entrepreneur and GOP presidential hopeful, as “a very promising candidate” despite Ramaswamy calling the climate change agenda a hoax. Musk responded to Ramaswamy on X about the climate crisis saying: “It is possibly overstated in the short term, but we should be concerned about it long term.”

This month, Musk, who has appeared to back a growing number of rightwing conspiracy theories, suggested that environmentalists had “gone too far”. He said on Joe Rogan’s podcast: “If you start thinking that humans are bad then the natural conclusion is humans should die out. If AI gets programmed by the extinctionists, its utility function will be the extinction of humanity. They won’t even think it’s bad.”

Musk, who has 11 children, has expressed concerns about population collapse, although experts have forecast the opposite, with a further 2 billion people expected to be added to the global population in the next 30 years.

These pronouncements, and the changes in moderation wrought upon X, have dismayed scientists and activists.

“Daily, I receive comments that range from disparaging to downright vile,” posted Prof Katharine Hayhoe, a prominent climate researcher who pointed out that Twitter had once been a vital resource for those concerned about worsening global heating. “I mourn its destruction,” she added.“Leading on climate on one hand and then propping up climate deniers on the other isn’t a complementary picture.”

Musk tried to come across as environmentally conscious but was not, said Beatriz Barros, a researcher at Indiana University who co-authored a 2021 study on the carbon footprints of the super-rich (which found that Musk’s lifestyle was responsible for more than 2,000 tons of carbon dioxide a year even without his jet use, though this was prior to his house downsizing). “He tries to have it both ways, acting like this sort of problem solver while he’s responsible for these shocking levels of emissions from his private jet,” Barros said.

She added that not only did billionaires such as Musk have a “preposterous” outsized impact upon the environment through their own consumption and business practices, they also had a disproportionate influence over government policy. The White House has sought to ally with Musk, as well as other billionaires such as Bill Gates, in recent times to further its climate goals.

“It’s all so undemocratic: these people think they can behave how they like because they have money and power,” Barros said. “We are told to drive less, eat less meat, that we are all in this fight together, and then in one second these people are emitting more than someone in their entire lifespan. How is that fair?”

A possible remedy, Starr suggested, would be to apply a carbon tax, which Musk has previously supported, to billionaires. A 1 percent carbon tax on Musk alone would provide enough money to boost global climate adaption funding for developing countries—the places most vulnerable to disastrous heatwaves, floods and droughts unleashed by rising temperatures—by 10 percent, according to Starr.

“Leading on climate on one hand and then propping up climate deniers on the other isn’t a complementary picture,” Starr said. “A 1 percent tax would mean Musk would still get wealthier but it would make a huge difference to those countries least responsible for climate change but hit by their worst effects.”

Swedish Researchers Study Effects of LSD, Ketamine on Rats

Scientists are trying to get to the bottom of the origin of consciousness

 via trippy rats.

BYTHOMAS EDWARD HIGH TIMES

NOVEMBER 24, 2023

Shutterstock

Researchers at a university in Sweden are using acid and ketamine to better understand the workings of the brain, which would then lead to the development of artificial intelligence.

The researchers, based at Lund University in Lund, Sweden, “have developed a technique for simultaneously measuring electrical signals from 128 areas of the brain in awake rats,” the school said in a press release earlier this year. 

The study has drawn recent media coverage from both Reuters and the British tabloid Metro.

The university said that the researchers have “then used the information to measure what happens to the neurons when the rats are given psychedelic drugs,” with the results showing “an unexpected and simultaneous synchronisation among neurons in several regions of the brain.”

Pär Halje, a researcher in neurophysiology at Lund University whose team worked on the study, conceived of the “idea that electrical oscillations in the brain could be used to teach us more about our experiences” years ago, according to the release.

Halje’s team “was studying rats with Parkinson’s disease that had problems with involuntary movements,” when the researchers “discovered a tone – an oscillation or wave in the electrical fields – of 80 hertz in the brains of the rats with Parkinson’s disease” that “turned out that the wave was closely connected to the involuntary movements.”

“A Polish researcher had observed similar waves after giving rats the anaesthetic ketamine. The ketamine was given at a low dose so that the rats were conscious, and the equivalent dose in a human causes psychedelic experiences. The waves they saw were in more cognitive regions of the brain than in the rats with Parkinson’s, and the frequency was higher, but that still made us consider whether there were links between the two phenomena. Perhaps excessive brain waves in the motor regions of the brain cause motor symptoms, while excessive waves in cognitive regions give cognitive symptoms,” Halje said in a statement.

Halje’s team, the university said, “has developed a method that uses electrodes to simultaneously measure oscillations from 128 separate areas of the brain in awake rat.” 

“For several of these areas, it is the first time anyone has successfully shown how individual neurons are affected by LSD in awake animals. When we gave the rats the psychedelic substances LSD and ketamine, the waves were clearly registered,” Halje said.

The research team’s findings were notable in that ketamine and LSD “resulted in the same wave patterns even if the signals from individual cells differed,” even though the drugs are known to affect different receptors within the brain.

“When the rats were given LSD, researchers saw that their neurons were inhibited – they signalled less – in all parts of the brain. Ketamine seemed to have a similar effect on the large neurons – pyramidal cells – which saw their expression inhibited, while interneurons, which are smaller neurons that are only collected locally in tissue, increased their signalling,” the university explained.

Halje said that activity “in the individual neurons caused by ketamine and LSD looks quite different, and as such cannot be directly linked to the psychedelic experience.” 

“Instead, it seems to be this distinctive wave phenomenon – how the neurons behave collectively – that is most strongly linked to the psychedelic experience,” he said.

“The oscillations behave in a strange way. One might think that a strong wave starts somewhere, which then spreads to other parts of the brain. But instead, we see that the neurons’ activity synchronises itself in a special way – the waves in the brain go up and down essentially simultaneously in all parts of the brain where we are able to take measurements. This suggests that there are other ways in which the waves are communicated than through chemical synapses, which are relatively slow.”

Halje is bullish on the model’s potential, saying that it could expand research into psychosis and that artificial intelligence may also unlock our understanding of consciousness.

His dream, the university said, is that the “model will help us in the hunt for the mechanisms behind consciousness and that the measurements may be a way to study how consciousness is shaped.”

“Given how drastically a psychosis manifests itself, there ought to be a common pattern that we can measure. So far, we have not had that, but we now see a very specific oscillation pattern in rats that we are able to measure,” he said.

He continued: “In light of the development of AI, it is becoming increasingly important to clarify what we mean by intelligence and what we mean by consciousness. Can self-awareness occur spontaneously, or is it something that needs to be built in? We do not know this today, because we do not know what the required ingredients for consciousness in our brains are. This is where it is exciting, the synchronised pattern we see, and whether this can help us to track down the neural foundations of consciousness.

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for LSD 








LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for PSYCHEDELIC 

Legalize Public Cannabis Consumption

Legalization must mean the freedom to smoke weed, not just buy it.

BYZACH HARRIS

HIGH TIMES  NOVEMBER 24, 2023

“Smells good.”

If you smoke weed outside, especially in a city, there’s a pretty good chance you’ve heard that statement of fact from a stranger. It happens to me at least once a week, usually a lot more. 

Look in the pages of the New York Post, Wall Street Journal, and The Atlantic, watch local news, or listen to politicians, though, and you might be fooled into thinking that weed does not, in fact, smell good. Wild, right? 

Under titles like “I Don’t Want To See You Get High” and “NYC’s Disgusting Pot Stench Is Keeping Tourists Away,” those loud voices fed up with loud smells are the last gasps of prohibition’s fading foghorns. Weed won and the world hasn’t fallen into disarray (well… at least not because of weed), so cannabis critics are reaching for anything they can to push back against its growing role in American life. These smell sheriffs might even support legalization, just as long as they can’t see or smell it. 

But legalization without the guarantee of safe, free, and open consumption is not legalization at all, and while much of the discussion from inside and outside of the weed industry is about, well, industry, New York has quickly shown us that the right to public consumption should be one of the most important facets of any and every legalization law. 

New York has been the most important domino to fall into place on the legalization map since California and this conversation is only coming to a head now because of The Empire State’s uniquely progressive consumption laws. Out of 38 states with some form of medical or adult-use cannabis laws on the books, New York is the first to allow public cannabis consumption. Anywhere you can legally smoke a cigarette in New York, you can also smoke weed. 

In the other 37 states, cannabis use is largely restricted to the whims of property owners. Sure, some states have consumption lounges, although few and far between, but those are also businesses looking to turn a profit, adding another layer of transaction before renters, tourists, or the unhoused can legally consume their supposedly legal weed. In most legal weed states and cities, there are no consumption lounges, and those without property in their portfolios are forced to ask a landlord for permission or continue breaking the law to consume in public.

And so now, in the only state to recognize the catch-22 of legal cannabis consumption and allow smoking in public, the city’s media and politicians are arguing that smokers need to cut it out and go back to hiding – to some people, weed smokers just can’t win.

These screeds against the smell of weed sound eerily similar to the weak arguments used to shame protestors who can never march peacefully enough, queer people who won’t assimilate to hetero norms enough, and unhoused people who can never be quite out of the way enough. If everyone would just pursue a more free and just world a little more politely and out of the public view, the cause would finally get some respect. Sometimes perfect is the enemy of progress though, and trying to fit a non-consumer’s constantly shifting definition of perfect is always a losing battle.  

Instead of trying to cater to the loudest detractors and shape our community into impossibly perfect stoners in their eyes, hiding in shadowy alleys or breaking our leases to smoke inside, I reject the claims that the smell of weed is a public nuisance. People love the smell of weed.

Fighting anecdotal evidence of offensively pungent subway stations and tourists turned off by a smoked out Times Square with my own lived experience, I smoke weed outside just about everywhere I go, in cities where it is legal and cities where it is not, and the compliments I get on the scent exponentially outweigh the complaints and dirty looks. On sidewalks, in parks, at restaurants, and in stores, people love to comment on the smell of weed, and they are almost always smiling when they do. Everyone I know who smokes weed has the exact same stories. 

American cities smell like weed and are filled with weed dispensaries – both licensed and not – because Americans love weed. Legalization is often pitched as an easy way to stop unnecessary arrests and boost tax revenue, and it has been, but politicians and pundits often overlook the reality behind much of the support for legalization; millions of people love to smoke weed – just look at the sales numbers! – and they want to do so without breaking the law or risking the ire of their landlord. At this point, it doesn’t seem like too much to ask for. 

In many cities, including where I live in Philadelphia, where cannabis is only legal medically, public consumption has become fully normalized despite rules restricting it. That’s a good thing, but it also allows police to continue to use weed as an excuse to stop, search, and selectively harass people they would otherwise have no reason to. This same pothole in the legal weed landscape looms over people in California, Nevada, Michigan, and every other legal weed state outside of New York. Legalization at the discretion of police and property owners is not legalization at all. 

It is time for all cannabis laws to follow New York’s lead and include provisions for public consumption. It is a fight that should stand alongside the battle for home grow provisions and farmer’s market distribution systems as a necessary prong of social and financial justice-focused legalization efforts. 

Cannabis legalization cannot stop at buying and selling, we must legalize the free and open consumption of weed everywhere that it is legal.

US House Speaker Mike Johnson Spent Years Defending Christian Speech In Public Schools

“The ultimate goal of the enemy is silencing the Gospel," the Republican said in 2004 after Jewish parents sued a school for pushing Christianity on their kids.

By Jennifer Bendery
Nov 24, 2023

Before coming to Congress, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) spent years taking up lawsuits in defense of Christian speech and activities in public elementary schools and universities.

Johnson, who was a relatively unknown Louisiana congressman before being elected House speaker last month, previously spent eight years as senior attorney for Alliance Defending Freedom, an evangelical legal group focused on dismantling LGBTQ+ rights and outlawing abortion. It was in his role there that Johnson, a constitutional lawyer, took up case after case aimed at chipping away at the separation of church and state.

What’s alarming about this pattern in his background is that it raises questions about whether the House speaker ― the person second in line to the U.S. presidency ― disputes the first freedom guaranteed by the First Amendment in the Constitution: ”Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.”

In 2004, Johnson was the lead attorney for Stockwell Place Elementary when the Bossier Parish public school got sued for pushing Christianity on its students.

A set of Jewish parents sued the school after learning it was holding prayer sessions, teaching Christian songs in class and promoting a teacher-led prayer group called Stallions for Christ that met during recess. The Jewish parents, who had two children at the school, also cited a teacher with a Christian cross on the classroom door, a Nativity scene in the school library and a graduation program featuring Christian songs and a student-led prayer, and religious speeches delivered by two local sheriff’s deputies.

In their lawsuit, which you can read here, the parents claim their children were ridiculed and bullied by other kids for not participating in the religious songs. They raised concerns with the principal, who allegedly responded by defending the school’s Nativity scene and religious songs, and told the parents to “deal with it.” The parents also complained to the school superintendent, who allegedly defended the teacher-led prayer group because “this is the way things are done in the South” and “welcome to the Bible Belt.”

Johnson spoke about the lawsuit at his church, the Airline Drive Church of Christ in Shreveport, before taking on the case. He warned the congregation what was at stake with cases like the Jewish family suing to keep Christian activities out of a public school.

“The ultimate goal of the enemy is silencing the gospel,” said Johnson, according to an April 2004 story in the Shreveport Times about the lawsuit. “This is spiritual warfare.”


Here’s the article in the the Shreveport Times from April 2004:

"The ultimate goal of the enemy is silencing the gospel,” Johnson said in 2004 amid a lawsuit involving a Jewish family suing a public school for engaging students in Christian speech and activities.
SHREVEPORT TIMES


The Louisiana Republican also told church attendees, some of whom were reportedly nodding and wearing “I support Stockwell Place” T-shirts, that “if we don’t (win), they’re going to shut down all private religion expression.”


Johnson’s comments at church came a week after he wrote an opinion piece in the Shreveport Times calling the Jewish family’s lawsuit “the latest example of the radical left’s desperate efforts to silence all public expression of religious faith.”




Here’s Johnson’s article:

Johnson said in 2004 that a Jewish family suing a public school for engaging in Christian speech and activities was "the latest example of the radical left’s desperate efforts to silence all public expression of religious faith.”
SHREVEPORT TIMES

Johnson spokesperson Taylor Haulsee on Tuesday disputed that the House speaker was referring to the Jewish family as “the enemy” in the 2004 lawsuit.

“You are mischaracterizing his remark,” he said in a statement. “Johnson was referring to any coordinated attempt to impede religious expression that is protected under the Constitution, not any single family.”

Haulsee also emphasized that the first bill Johnson brought to the House floor as speaker was a resolution condemning Hamas and standing with Israel.

The lawsuit was settled in August 2005 with a consent order clarifying the types of religious expression allowed in public schools. But most of the case had been dismissed months earlier because the family moved out of state.

“On or about December 28, 2004, the McBride family moved to Missouri to escape the harassment and threats Tyler and Kelsey were enduring at Stockwell Place Elementary,” reads a March 2005 amendment to the lawsuit.

The American Civil Liberties Union, which was not officially a party to the case, said at the time that the Jewish family likely would have won their case had they not moved away.

“The ACLU believes (the complaints) were meritorious and had the plaintiffs remained in the state, they would have been found meritorious,” Joe Cook, then the executive director of the ACLU’s Louisiana affiliate, told the Shreveport Times when the case was settled.

Before coming to Congress, Johnson spent a lot of time defending religious speech and activities in public schools, specifically Christianity.
TOM WILLIAMS VIA GETTY IMAGES

In another case in 2006, Johnson represented parents suing the Katy Independent School District in Texas for allegedly trying to ban religious expression and “acknowledgement of the Christian religion.” The parents argued that the school district violated their First Amendment rights by preventing them from “speaking about their religious beliefs” and “distributing religious items or literature to classmates” on school grounds.

This lawsuit was dismissed in 2010 with prejudice, meaning the plaintiffs can’t refile the same claim again in this court. The school did have to pay Johnson’s attorney fees, though.

The House speaker twice represented teenagers, in 2007 and in 2008, who were denied public school transportation to a “Just for Jesus” religious event.

In 2007, Johnson represented a high school student in a civil rights action lawsuit after her school refused to provide a bus for her club, called the One Way Club, to attend a “Just for Jesus” event. The student claimed that the school provided other clubs with transportation for fields trips and that it wasn’t fair to not provide a bus for the religious event. The lawsuit was eventually dismissed because the student found her own ride to the event.

A year later, Johnson represented a middle school student who sued her school for not providing a bus to the same event. This student, who was part of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, claimed that she was denied school transportation to the “Just for Jesus” event because she and others in her club talked about their religious beliefs.

School officials claimed the real issue was safety concerns, because there was a shooting near the “Just for Jesus” event the year before, and some students had been “injured and fearful.” The school officials suggested the organizers of the event hold it during non-school hours or on the weekend. As a compromise, school officials offered to give students excused absences if they went to the event on their own during the school day.

The judge in the case ruled that the school worked in good faith with the student by offering an excused absence and rejected Johnson’s argument that the student demonstrated “a substantial threat of irreparable injury.” The student voluntarily ended her suit shortly afterward.

“It is repugnant to Sonnier that he ... must obtain governmental permission to talk to a student about his Christian faith.”

- Johnson defending a traveling evangelist's right to preach on a public university campus.

Johnson also led lawsuits in defense of religious speech on the campuses of public universities. In 2008, he lost a case involving a traveling evangelist who sued Southeastern Louisiana University after a school police officer told him he had to move to a free speech zone on campus to deliver his remarks and get his speech pre-approved.

As they stood there, the evangelist, Jeremy Sonnier, began engaging with a student about religion, at which point the officer warned he would be arrested if he didn’t move.

Sonnier’ legal argument, led by Johnson, was that the university’s speech policy was “unduly burdensome” and based on religious grounds.

“It is repugnant to Sonnier that he, as an individual citizen, must obtain governmental permission to talk to a student about his Christian faith,” reads the legal document, presumably written by Johnson.

A passage from a lawsuit led by Johnson in 2008 in defense of a traveling evangelist.
U.S. DISTRICT COURT FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA

A federal judge ultimately dismissed the case with prejudice, meaning Sonnier can’t refile the same claim again in the court.

In another lawsuit in 2003, Johnson represented a student at Texas Tech University who accused the school of violating his First Amendment rights by requiring him to get his speech pre-approved in order to speak on campus in a spot that was not in the “free speech area” gazebo. The student was challenging a school policy that barred students from engaging in speech that might “intimidate” or “humiliate” another person on campus.

The university initially denied a permit to the student to deliver remarks outside of the designated area expressing his religious view that “homosexuality is a sinful, immoral and unhealthy lifestyle,” and passing out literature citing Scripture. But the student was ultimately given permission to do this if he moved across the street.

In 2008, Johnson was the lead attorney for the Tangipahoa Parish school board in Louisiana when it got sued for opening its meetings with prayers and requiring they be delivered by eligible members of the clergy in the parish.

The plaintiff took issue with the school board bringing religion into its meetings at all and with the denial of his wife’s request to give an invocation at a meeting because she was a non-denominational Christian.

“Plaintiff finds equally objectionable the non-secular manner in which the Board meetings are conducted,” reads the plaintiff’s legal filing. “The Board meetings are an integral part of Tangipahoa Parish public school system, requiring the Board to refrain from injecting religion into them. By commencing the meetings with a prayer, the Board is conveying its endorsement of religion.”

The lawsuit was dismissed in 2010 after the parties reached a compromise.

Asked Tuesday if Johnson fundamentally disagrees with the separation of church and state, his office pointed to comments that he made last week on CNBC, when he claimed that Americans “misunderstand” the concept.

“When the Founders set this system up, they wanted a vibrant expression of faith in the public square because they believed that a general moral consensus and virtue was necessary,” Johnson said in the TV interview. “The separation of church and state is a misnomer. People misunderstand it.”

He claimed that Thomas Jefferson meant something entirely different from what we think it means when he coined the phrase.

“What he was explaining is they did not want the government to encroach upon the church, not that they didn’t want principles of faith to have influence on our public life,” Johnson said. “It’s exactly the opposite.”

He never actually said, though, if he disagrees with the separation of church and state.

“An abject danger to our democracy.”
- Rachel Laser of Americans United for Separation of Church and State

Rachel Laser, the president and CEO of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said she has “grave concerns” about Johnson’s claims.

“Any public official ― let alone the speaker of the House and second in line to be president ― who claims America is a Christian nation and discredits church-state separation is an abject danger to our democracy,” she said.

Laser said Johnson is “repeating the myth that Christian nationalists typically use” to deny that church-state separation is foundational to democracy.

“Church-state separation is baked into the Constitution, from Article VI’s prohibition on religious tests for public office to the First Amendment’s religious freedom protections. Our freedoms, equality and democracy rest on that wall of separation. Without it, America would not be America.”