Thread by @JewhadiTM

Conference featuring 2020 Dems begins with fiery chant quoting fugitive cop-killer Assata Shakur

foxnews.com/politics/2020-…

Jamal Watkins, the Vice President of Civic Engagement at the @NAACP, began by telling the audience at the We the People conference that he would invoke the words of Assata Shakur, also known as Joanne Chesimard.

Among the groups in attendance were the @SierraClub, @MoveOn, @PPact, @SEIU and Communications Workers of America.

They were drawn to the conference to hear from a series of speakers that included 2020 Democratic White House contenders @CoryBooker, @JulianCastro, @BetoORourke, @amyklobuchar, @BernieSanders, @EWarren, @GovInslee and @SenGillibrand.

JoAnne Chesimard was born JoAnne Byron in New York in 1947. She grew up in New York City and North Carolina, and became involved in black nationalist politics in the late 1960s.

She became a Black Panther, then left the Panthers, changed her name to Assata Shakur, and joined the Black Liberation Army.

She was shot in the stomach in 1971 when she allegedly tried to rob a guest at a Manhattan hotel. She was sought for questioning after a bank robbery later that year, and named as a suspect in a grenade attack on police in December.

She was also wanted for questioning after the wounding of a police officer, a bank robbery and a church robbery in 1972, and was suspected of links to the murders of several New York police officers.

She was later acquitted of kidnaping and robbery charges, while other charges were dismissed.

Chesimard was sought in a nationwide manhunt. After midnight on May 2, 1973, New Jersey trooper James Harper pulled over two black males and a black female in a 1965 Pontiac with Vermont plates on the New Jersey Turnpike in East Brunswick.

Harper called in backup, and was joined by Trooper Foerster.

According to the police reconstruction of the incident, Clark Squire, AKA Sundiata Acoli, was driving the car, and Chesimard was sitting in the front passenger seat. James Coston, AKA Zayd Shakur, was behind Chesimard in the rear seat.

The battered white Pontiac was full of ammo, guns, fake ids and stolen license plates.

Squire got out of the car to show Harper license and registration — both fakes. Harper walked to the driver’s side to question Coston and Chesimard.

Trooper Foerster, 32, arrived on the scene in a second patrol car. He patted down Squire and found a loaded handgun. He shouted to Harper, who ordered Coston and Chesimard to put up their hands.

Chesimard then fired a handgun through the roof of the car and hit Harper in the shoulder. Harper ducked behind his car.

Chesimard and Coston then jumped out of the Pontiac. Harper shot Chesimard in the right arm and left shoulder. Coston fired three times at Harper before Harper shot him once, mortally wounding him.

Squire then shot Foerster in the arm. Squire's weapon jammed, and the two men began to wrestle. Chesimard walked around the car toward the fight and shot Foerster in the stomach.

Harper, bleeding and unable to reload, began to walk or run to the state police station at New Brunswick, which was just 200 yards away.

Chesimard and Squire stood over Foerster as he lay on the ground. Both their weapons had jammed. One of the two then took Foerster’s service weapon from its holster and shot the trooper twice in the head.

Squire drove the Pontiac five miles south on the Turnpike, with two wounded passengers, and pulled over. Coston had died in the back seat. Squire and Chesimard dumped his body next to the vehicle and were beginning to walk away when police pulled up.

Chesimard was captured immediately, while Squire was found 40 hours later.

Chesimard and Squire were both convicted of murder for Foerster’s death. Squire is still in a New Jersey prison, and was denied parole just last month. Chesimard was sentenced to life in prison.

In 1979, a group of four prison visitors helped Chesimard escape from the women’s prison in Yardville, New Jersey. By 1984 she was living in Cuba as Assata Shakur.

Authorities believe that Chesimard/Shakur, now nearing her 72nd birthday, is still living in Cuba.