Alliance MLAs' donations to Black Lives Matter bail fund 'taken completely out of context'
The Alliance Party has said that donations by two Alliance MLAs to a US-based criminal bail fund are being taken “completely out of context” by “bad actors”.
The issue was referred to in the Assembly this week by DUP MLA Phillip Brett, who questioned Alliance’s credibility on condemning the recent riots.
Alliance say that the matter is being used as a “distraction” from the violent anti-immigrant scenes of the past week.
The issue dates back to the Black Lives Matter protests that erupted after the death of George Floyd on May 25, 2020.
On May 29, Eoin Tennyson – then a councillor, but now an MLA and deputy party leader - posted on Twitter: “Feel so angry and powerless watching what’s unfolding in Minneapolis from across the Atlantic.
"I’ve made a small donation to the Minnesota Freedom Fund to help post bail for those protesting the racist murder of George Floyd.
"Please donate if you can.”
His party colleague Danny Donnelly – also then a councillor, now an MLA – responded: “Done similarly. Thanks for highlighting this very worthy cause. #JusticeForGeorgeFloyd.”
The Minnesota Freedom Fund largely pays to bail out black and other ethnic minority suspects from prison.
It has been operating since 2016, and today its website says it exists to pay “pretrial bail and immigration bonds for people who cannot afford their freedom, as we’ve worked to end oppressive, discriminatory, and coercive jailing”.
According to a report by Fox 9 (a regional branch of Fox News covering the Minneapolis-St Paul area) the fund “has bailed out defendants from Twin Cities jails charged with murder, violent felonies, and sex crimes, as it seeks to address a system that disproportionately incarcerates Black people and people of color”.
It added: “The Minnesota Freedom Fund received $35m in donations in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd, with many of those donations intended to help protesters who were jailed during the demonstrations and riots in May.”
On Monday this week, the Northern Ireland Assembly debated the recent wave of anti-immigrant rioting in the Province.
DUP North Belfast MLA Phillip Brett condemned the rioting but went on to add: “I will not take lectures from political parties that, only a number of years ago, were willing to donate their money to bail out protesters and criminals in the United States of America but now condemn people in Northern Ireland.”
He also said: “Peaceful protest is the cornerstone of any free and democratic society. That is what the overwhelming majority of people participated in, and they do not deserve to be condemned nor caricatured.”
X (Twitter) users have also unearthed the Alliance pair’s six-year-old tweets and have begun posting criticism of them afresh in the last week.
In response the Alliance Party told the News Letter: “This issue has been taken completely out of context and stirred up by bad faith actors online.
"The 2020 donation was intended to protect the rights of peaceful protesters in the aftermath of the murder of George Floyd.
"Obviously, politicians in Northern Ireland had no role in how the fund operated.
"This is simply a distraction from the racist thuggery seen on our streets recently, and the politicians who have fanned the flames of hate and division."
During the Assembly debate on Monday, Mr Tennyson had told MLAs: “Some have suggested that the violence was the result of people seeking to express genuine concerns about immigration legitimately, but AI posts urging men to wear masks, to dress in dark clothing to prepare to be arrested tell a very different story.
"These were never protests, they were hate marches.
"This was racism, pure and simple, no ifs, no buts, and we must not fall into a trap of seeking to rationalize that or legitimize that after the fact.”