Jacksonville, FL – On Monday, November 9, Jacksonville community members, alongside Jacksonville Palestine Solidarity Network (JPSN) and American Muslims for Palestine (AMP), mobilized to the Duval County Public Schools Board Meeting in condemnation of school board member Anthony Ricardo’s recent Islamophobic social media posts. They demanded Ricardo’s immediate resignation and an end to inflammatory hate speech targeting the Muslim community.
Around 150 community members attended in support of Muslim students, parents, and faculty members, many of whom spoke at the meeting, making up a majority of the 103 public comments registered that evening.
Monique Sampson, a local community organizer with the Jacksonville Community Action Committee took to the podium in support of the demand for Ricardo’s resignation, addressing him directly. “Using social media to disparage people, including Muslim students in your district is a disgrace,” Sampson said. She continued, “Your comments have emboldened white supremacists and outside agitators to come to our school board meeting to agitate for clicks and clout.”
Also in attendance was far-right influencer Jake Lang, well known for his participation in January 6 insurrection, threatening to burn Qurans in Dearborn Michigan, xenophobic and white supremacist hate speech, and being beaten up by a protester wearing a Spider-Man costume earlier this year.
As Jake Lang took to the podium to call Muslims “cockroaches,” the community members in attendance erupted with disapproval, calling his rhetoric “hate speech” and “Islamophobic,” demanding he be removed from the podium. Due to the magnitude of the community outrage and disruption, the public comment portion of the meeting was halted and Jake Lang, along with other far-right agitators in attendance, was given a police escort to his car.
Community members in attendance were also removed from the chambers and threatened with arrest for the disruption, where they took to chanting in the parking lot “Ricardo! Resign!” and “No hate, no fear, Muslim students are welcome here!”
The following day, Jacksonville Palestine Solidarity Network released a statement in response to the events of the meeting, stating “We in JPSN stand firm on the demand that Anthony Ricardo resign from his position, and that the DCPS School Board takes responsibility for allowing morbid forms of hate to infiltrate a space meant to empower the voices of others, all under the guise of exercising their first amendment rights. Protect our Muslim brothers and sisters and preserve their right to practice their religion freely without fear of retaliation in our public schools.”
#JacksonvilleFL #FL #ImmigrantRights #RightWing #JakeLang #JPSN
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