While my time here has now come to an end, I want you to know that in the last days and hours of my life you inspired me. You filled me with hope about the next chapter of the great American story when you used your power to make a difference in our society. Millions of people motivated simply by human compassion laid down the burdens of division. Around the country and the world you set aside race, class, age, language and nationality to demand respect for human dignity.

That is why I had to visit Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, though I was admitted to the hospital the following day. I just had to see and feel it for myself that, after many years of silent witness, the truth is still marching on.

Emmett Till was my George Floyd. He was my Rayshard Brooks, Sandra Bland and Breonna Taylor. He was 14 when he was killed, and I was only 15 years old at the time. I will never ever forget the moment when it became so clear that he could easily have been me. In those days, fear constrained us like an imaginary prison, and troubling thoughts of potential brutality committed for no understandable reason were the bars.

Though I was surrounded by two loving parents, plenty of brothers, sisters and cousins, their love could not protect me from the unholy oppression waiting just outside that family circle. Unchecked, unrestrained violence and government-sanctioned terror had the power to turn a simple stroll to the store for some Skittles or an innocent morning jog down a lonesome country road into a nightmare. If we are to survive as one unified nation, we must discover what so readily takes root in our hearts that could rob Mother Emanuel Church in South Carolina of her brightest and best, shoot unwitting concertgoers in Las Vegas and choke to death the hopes and dreams of a gifted violinist like Elijah McClain.

Like so many young people today, I was searching for a way out, or some might say a way in, and then I heard the voice of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on an old radio. He was talking about the philosophy and discipline of nonviolence. He said we are all complicit when we tolerate injustice. He said it is not enough to say it will get better by and by. He said each of us has a moral obligation to stand up, speak up and speak out. When you see something that is not right, you must say something. You must do something. Democracy is not a state. It is an act, and each generation must do its part to help build what we called the Beloved Community, a nation and world society at peace with itself.

Ordinary people with extraordinary vision can redeem the soul of America by getting in what I call good trouble, necessary trouble. Voting and participating in the democratic process are key. The vote is the most powerful nonviolent change agent you have in a democratic society. You must use it because it is not guaranteed. You can lose it.

You must also study and learn the lessons of history because humanity has been involved in this soul-wrenching, existential struggle for a very long time. People on every continent have stood in your shoes, through decades and centuries before you. The truth does not change, and that is why the answers worked out long ago can help you find solutions to the challenges of our time. Continue to build union between movements stretching across the globe because we must put away our willingness to profit from the exploitation of others.

Though I may not be here with you, I urge you to answer the highest calling of your heart and stand up for what you truly believe. In my life I have done all I can to demonstrate that the way of peace, the way of love and nonviolence is the more excellent way. Now it is your turn to let freedom ring.

When historians pick up their pens to write the story of the 21st century, let them say that it was your generation who laid down the heavy burdens of hate at last and that peace finally triumphed over violence, aggression and war. So I say to you, walk with the wind, brothers and sisters, and let the spirit of peace and the power of everlasting love be your guide.

A watchdog group is alleging that Donald Trump’s presidential campaign has laundered $170 million through companies controlled by campaign officials as part of an effort to avoid disclosing which vendors it is really paying for services.

Under Federal Election Commission rules, campaigns are supposed to detail who they are paying. While some campaign vendors do hire sub-contractors or farm out work to other firms, a complaint to the FEC filed Tuesday by the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center alleges that the Trump campaign is doing this on an industrial scale and is obscuring vast amounts of spending.

According to the complaint, then-campaign manager Brad Parscale and other campaign officials in 2018 created a company called American Made Media, which has since been paid more than $106 million, making it the campaign’s largest vendor. The campaign said that instead of hiring outside media buyers to purchase ads for the campaign, this new company would be used to directly purchase the ads and cut out the middle-man.

However, the Campaign Legal Center complaint points out that public records of television ad purchases appear to show that at least some of the campaign’s ad-buying has been conducted by a Virginia firm called Harris Sikes Media. The campaign has never reported to the FEC that it hired Harris Sikes. According to the Campaign Legal Center complaint, this suggests that American Made Media isn’t buying ads itself, just blocking the FEC from seeing who the campaign is hiring to buy ads.

For the past two years, the city of Portland, Oregon has been terrorized by a series of increasingly violent clashes between Patriot Prayer, a right wing protest group, and several antifascist groups. The most vicious of these conflicts occurred on June 30, 2018; what started as a Patriot Prayer rally descended into a riot. Five people were hospitalized, one with serious injuries.

Antifascists contend that Patriot Prayer, while not a fascist group, helps “normalize” fascist street violence in their community. They point to the fatal stabbings of two people on a Portland MAX train by former Patriot Prayer marcher Jeremy Christian as one example of this. They also note that most of the male members of Patriot Prayer are also members of the Proud Boys, an SPLC designated hate group.

Antifascists point out that, while not openly fascist themselves, Patriot Prayer has marched with out-right fascist groups, including Identity Evropa. Neo-Nazi YouTuber Baked Alaska has given speeches at several Patriot Prayer events.

For their part, Joey Gibson and Patriot Prayer claim that the antifascists are the violent ones. They accuse “Antifa”, as they are frequently called, of scaring conservatives and liberals alike out of exercising their free speech. Joey bills Patriot Prayer as standing against hate and in favor of open dialogue. To this end on Thursday, January 17, 2019, Patriot Prayer convened a flash mob outside of a Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) meeting in downtown Portland. They were refused entry by the DSA...

...On January 21, 2019, Reggie Axtell posted a video where he threatens Portland mayor Ted Wheeler.

“I promise you this. Ted Wheeler, you and all your little masked thugs running around beating people up in the streets of Portland, your days are fucking numbered. You hear me? Your days are fucking numbered. Because I promise you this, Ted Wheeler, I’m coming for you you little punk. And all your little Antifa bastards, I’m coming for you fuckers too.”