Leftist Magazine Editor Actually Suggests Pro-Trump Cops Rigged Smollett Case
All evidence in the Jussie Smollett case seems to point to a self-perpetuated hoax, but one guest on MSNBC just directed blame toward a stunning place: American police officers.
Smollett, of course, is the black and gay actor who claimed he was the victim of a “lynching” carried out by Trump supporters in Chicago. After investigators dug into the story, however, they determined it didn’t happen how he said.
Instead, Smollett himself was arrested on a felony charge after police said he paid two Nigerian-American bodybuilders to fake the assault, which he then falsely pinned on Trump supporters.
Anger toward Smollett has flowed from both sides of the political aisle, especially after many liberals found themselves embarrassed for believing the hoax. Even the Chicago police chief, himself an African-American, expressed outrage that the actor had wasted resources in a city full of real crimes.
But instead of being righteously fed up with the hoax, one leftist commentator decided to unleash a conspiracy theory against cops.
During an appearance on MSNBC, Zach Stafford — the editor-in-chief of LGBTQ magazine “The Advocate” — ranted against Chicago police and suggested that they had framed Smollett while covering up a crime.
“The police were openly confirming and not confirming certain reports and not doing it to other parts of the story, due to the vocal nature in this case, it was really peculiar,” Stafford said, as if he were the authority on which details the Chicago Police Department was permitted to comment on.
He then suggested on national television that police officers in Chicago were all conspiring against Smollett because of — you guessed it — Donald Trump.
“People have a lot of reason to not trust them (Chicago police officers)… a deep history of openly lying to citizens,” he alleged. “This police department did, in 2016, openly, through their union support Donald Trump.”
He was apparently referring to the Fraternal Order of Police, which agreed with Trump on the need for strict anti-crime measures in a city with the ninth highest homicide rate in America.
If there was any doubt that Stafford was pushing a conspiracy theory about bias within the Chicago PD, his next statement cleared it up.
“To have a police department that hasn’t been as cooperative as they have been this round, do not openly give information, do openly lie and mishold (sic) information in cases and then to know that they have openly supported Donald Trump in the 2016 election, a lot of activists on the ground are saying, ‘Wait, what’s going on here?” he said.
“Who do we believe out of these two suspect people?” he finished, suggesting that he doesn’t think the police are telling the truth.
Yes, he just called the Chicago police force liars and suspects because he doesn’t like admitting that a gay black man might have committed a crime.
The implication was clear: It couldn’t possibly be that a spoiled, rich actor faked a crime for attention. No … even though dozens of detectives found that Smollett lied and even his alleged accomplices have admitted the hoax, in Stafford’s mind the “real” sham is being perpetrated by the entire Chicago police department to protect Trump.
And remember, Chicago is one of the most liberal, Democratic cities in the country. Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson is himself a black man who presumably despises hate crimes as much as anyone. But none of that matters. It must be a Trump plot, facts be damned.
At the same time, MSNBC’s refusal to shut down his anti-cop rant or push back against it with basic facts confirms why so many Americans are fed up with the establishment media. They essentially just gave a platform for someone to spread his personal conspiracy theory on national television and didn’t even have the spine to call him out.
This is Trump Derangement Syndrome taken to a whole new level. Blowhards like Stafford become part of the problem when they refuse to accept evidence and would rather push an unfounded, anti-police conspiracy. To them, the narrative is more important than anything — even reality.
Truth and Accuracy
We are committed to truth and accuracy in all of our journalism. Read our editorial standards.
Advertise with The Western Journal and reach millions of highly engaged readers, while supporting our work. Advertise Today.
