Elias Rodriguez’s alleged murderous rampage and the fifth anniversary of George Floyd’s death came four days apart, and these two events may not be as different as you think. They provide a grim omen that the revolutionary violence that shook the nation in the name of “social justice” five years ago is regrouping as anti-Israel mayhem, or worse.
That the players are the same is a clear sign that what we are currently seeing is a second act, or rather just one more attempt to mortally wound U.S. and Western societies. Israel, the supposed target of the general violence we’re seeing and of last week’s alleged terrorist outrage by Rodriguez, is actually an expedient for many.
These revolutionaries have aligned with real antisemites and with Islamist extremists because they have one common enemy, the West, of which the United States is the main champion. In Europe, this is called the red-green alliance—red for Marxism and green for Islamism.
Rodriguez shouted “Free, free Palestine” after he allegedly shot Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgram on May 21 outside the Jewish Capital Museum in Washington, D.C., (firing his gun again into Milgram as she struggled to crawl away).
But in 2018, Rodriguez also took part in disturbances organized by the Communist Party for Socialism and Liberation, which at one point identified him as a member, and others by the Party for Socialism and Liberation front group, the ANSWER Coalition (“Act Now to Stop War and End Racism”). These two groups are part of the same revolutionary ecosystem that supported Black Lives Matter.
Since Rodriguez’s arrest, both groups have said their association with Rodriguez was ephemeral and ended years ago.
However, Rodriguez also took part in marches organized by Black Lives Matter Chicago, one of the most radical chapters of the once-potent organization, which has not shied away from admitting that Rodriguez was a supporter.
Lest we forget, Black Lives Matter Chicago gleefully posted pictures of paragliders with Palestinian flags after Hamas terrorists used this method to penetrate Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, on their way to massacre 1,200 civilians and take more than 200 others hostage.
This past Sunday marked the fifth anniversary of George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis policeman Derek Chauvin, a tragedy that Black Lives Matter manipulated to attempt to launch an all-out street assault on society.
Black Lives Matter convinced many Americans and, in fact, people all over the world, that its struggle was for social justice and to shrink racial disparities. But its Marxist founders were often clear about their more far-reaching aspirations.
For example, founder Alicia Garza told a group of liberals in 2019, “We’re talking about changing how we’ve organized this country. … I believe we all have work to do to keep dismantling the organizing principle of this society.”
At a Left Forum meeting in 2015, she said, “It’s not possible for a world to emerge where black lives matter if it’s under capitalism.”
In a Heritage Foundation paper that we published last year, my colleague Mary Mobley and I wrote about “a revolutionary ecosystem” that supported and even nurtured the Black Lives Matter and anti-Israel movements.
“The infrastructure of organizations sustaining the anti-Israel protests today is virtually identical to the one that has supported the Black Lives Matter organizations since their birth in the middle 2010s,” Mary and I said.
“Today, this ecosystem—which consists of activist organizations, fiscal sponsors, donors, and radical media groups—is being tapped by the anti-Israel protesters, but they aim to do much more than destroy Israel. Their goal is to dismantle Western democracies, values, and culture, and their primary target is the United States. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that regimes such as communist China, Cuba, and Venezuela are increasingly part of this ecosystem,” we continued.
ANSWER has several links with the Party for Socialism and Liberation. It is a Marxist group thrown together three days after another terrorist outrage, the 9/11 attacks in New York and Washington, to try to preempt a U.S. response by building opposition through street protests.
ANSWER’s two founders were Chuck Kaufman of the Nicaragua Network/Alliance for Global Justice and Brian Becker, who also happened to be co-founder of the Party for Socialism and Liberation.
Becker once hosted Russian President Vladimir Putin’s Sputnik Radio, the country’s propaganda outlet in the U.S. Last year, he was the leader of the Party for Socialism and Liberation and ANSWER.
In a paper also published last year, Network Contagion Research Institute shed light on how ANSWER, the Party for Socialism and Liberation, and several other groups, particularly the People’s Forum and the International People’s Assembly, have ties to the Chinese Communist Party and Neville Roy Singham, an American millionaire who lives in Shanghai.
“The People’s Forum, IPA, and ANSWER Coalition serve as the conduit through which CCP-affiliated entities have effectively co-opted pro-Palestinian activism in the U.S., advancing a broader anti-American, anti-democratic, and anti-capitalist agenda,” Network Contagion Research Institute said.
In our paper, Mobley and I also fleshed out ties with other enemies of the U.S., namely Cuba and Venezuela. ANSWER has been a regular guest at conferences held throughout the years by the Foro de Sao Paulo, a Hemispheric gathering of Marxists. Black Lives Matter has also attended meetings.
Last July, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and then-Sen. Marco Rubio wrote to former Attorney General Merrick Garland asking him to look into all these matters.
“These reports suggest that Mr. Singham has expanded his network to include not only far-left, pro-CCP entities, but also radical, antisemitic entities,” they said.
Rubio is now the secretary of state and has the power to act.
