'Slavery is over': Hired Ferguson protesters demand pay

 

Protests turned violent after Officer Darren Wilson was not indicted in the shooting death of Michael Brown.

“Black Lives Matter” protesters who were apparently hired to cause a ruckus in Ferguson, Missouri, are angry because, they say, they haven’t been paid for their hard work.

So they’ve launched a #CutTheCheck hashtag on Twitter and held a sit-in at the offices of Missourians Organizing for Reform and Empowerment, or MORE – the successor group to the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, in Missouri.

The protesters have received as much as $5,000 a month to generate civil unrest in the troubled suburb of St. Louis, according to FrontPage Mag’s Matthew Vadum.

“MORE is the re-branded Missouri branch of ACORN, which filed for bankruptcy in late 2010,” Vadum reported. “MORE and other groups supporting the Black Lives Matter movement have received millions of dollars from billionaire financier George Soros.”

The angry agitators held a sit-in outside MORE’s offices on May 14 to demand their money, Weasel Zippers reported. The site posted a video of several black individuals shouting at a white man, who Weasel Zippers identifies as Jeff Ordower, founder of MORE and a longtime leftist activist who previously worked as a union organizer for SEIU in Texas and former Midwest director of ACORN.

Ordower had not responded to a WND request for comment at the time of this report.

MORE’s website, OrganizeMO.org, posted a memo on March 30 that announces a “support fund” offering “travel funding for individuals and grassroots groups that are working to advocate for police accountability and Black lives.”

“A fixed sum of $20,000 has been set aside for this initiative,” the memo states. “… Travel funding is available for Individuals ($300), Groups of 3+ ppl ($1000), and Large Collaborations of 6+ ($2000) to take trips that directly help attendees advocate for police accountability and Black lives.”

Upon returning from their trip to Ferguson, MORE says, protesters are required to share their experiences in one of two ways:

• “Complete a written report explaining the event/trip, experiences, and gains which will be posted online and share [sic] with the broader community.”
• “Schedule a public report back session to [sic] feedback on the trip and answer questions.”

A group called Millennial Activists United posted a letter insisting MORE should “cut the checks” to the protesters.

“Early in the movement, non-profit organization MORE, formerly known as the St. Louis chapter of ACORN, and local St. Louis organization Organization for Black Struggle created a joint account in which national donors from all over the world have donated over $150,000 to sustain the movement,” the letter states. “Since then, the poor black [sic] of this movement who served as cash generators to bring money into St. Louis have seen little to none of that money.

“Questions have been raised as to how the movement is to sustain when white non-profits are hoarding monies collected of off [sic] black bodies? When we will [sic] hold the industry of black suffering accountable? The people of the community are fed up and the accountability begins here and now.

The statement continued, “We NEED to be thinking about justice for black people. This means white people must renounce their loyalty to the social normalcy that maintains white power and control. If black lives really matter, justice and self-determination for black people would mean the black community would control [its] own political and economic resources. Moving forward, we are building a board of accountability within this movement. We must funnel economic [sic] into this movement through the hands of black people who are fighting with and for black life. More on this board will be discussed as we develop.”

Other online reactions to the protesters’ demands for payment include:

• “So these really were pro agitators. Some movement. “We shall overcome. After we get paid.”
• “I’d rather see [people] protesting something they are passionate about (even if their behavior is way off base) than #CutTheCheck=Disgusting.”
• “Lots of folks doing work & acting on conscience. It’s not fair that a group of 20 get [sic] $50,000 for throwing a tantrum.”

MORE reportedly released the following list of who had been paid from September 2014 through April 22, 2015, amounts and purpose of the payments.

Some payments were listed for the following purposes:

• Gas
• Video services for Ferguson
• Debt repayment for Ferguson
• Red light camera charges
• “Supplies for non-indictment”
• Training supplies
• Food
• Bullhorns
• Catering
• Art supplies
• Permits
• Walkie-talkies
• T-shirts
• Van rentals
• Youth stipends
• Cell phones for Ferguson
• Emergency support, and others.

'Slavery is over': Hired Ferguson protesters demand pay
-NO AUTHOR-
Tue, 19 May 2015 20:23:24 GMT