Slew of racist, violent memes and texts circulated by Wichita, Kansas cops leaked

In case you were wondering, there are some extremely bad apples in the Witchita Police Department. So many, in fact, that it may be time to defund the police. Just sayin’.

According to reporting from The Wichita Eagle, 11 officers were investigated after text messages found on one officer’s phone revealed a slew of racist memes and texts—many of which referred to civilians who’d been shot or killed by the police. 

RELATED STORY: Police union claims ‘dozens’ to resign over vaccine mandate, state says only one has so far

One of the texts found was sent by a white Wichita officer, Sgt. Jamie Crouch, showing a photoshopped image of Geroge Floyd’s murder but replacing the officer who killed Floyd, Derek Chauvin, with an image of a naked Black man sitting on Floyd’s head. 

A meme, sent by another Sedgwick County sheriff’s deputy, showed an image of the cartoon character Elmer Fudd, holding a shotgun, saying, “Be very very quiet, I’m hunting [racial slur].”

Another Sedgwick County deputy allegedly sent a meme to a group chat of officers, mocking the discovery of a noose found in the garage of Black NASCAR driver, Bubba Wallace. The meme showed cone-shaped cups with the caption: “Breaking news: KKK hoods found next to water cooler in Bubba Wallace’s garage.” This officer was eventually placed on paid suspension and, in September, retired.

One of the most terrifying texts was sent from Sedgwick County sheriff’s deputy, Sgt. Justin Maxfield, praising a colleague on the SWAT team for being one of the “ultimate de-escalators” who “permanently de-escalated people who needed permanent de-escalation.”

One of the three Wichita officers who responded to Maxfield’s message positively was officer Lee Foese, who was involved in two fatal shootings—one in 2012 and another in 2020. One of the shootings involved a Black man shot five times in the back as he ran from a bar shooting. Foese allegedly responded to Maxfield’s “de-escalated” message with Maxfield also “de-escalated people who needed it.”

Crouch, who sent the Floyd meme, also has a long history of civilian shootings, according to the Eagle. He shot a Black 17-year-old who he thought was involved in a double-murder. The teen turned out not to be the suspect police were looking for. 

Crouch was reprimanded, but not suspended, and remains employed by the Wichita Police Department. 

The messages were uncovered in April 2021, during an investigation into a domestic violence case involving Maxfield. The messages were shared with the Eagle by an unnamed source. 

Maxfield was arrested in April 2021 for allegedly stalking his ex-girlfriend. He was suspended without pay on the day of his arrest and was later convicted and placed on probation, according to The Daily Beast

Prior to his resignation, Maxfield allegedly shared another image of Floyd with the caption, “You’re telling me [racial slur] couldn’t breathe?” Arrows pointed to Floyd’s lips and nose, a source told the Eagle.

The three officers who commented on the “de-escalation” post were given “coaching and mentoring,” according to the Eagle.

Sedgwick County Sheriff Jeff Easter has called the texts and memes “a big deal,” and told The Daily Beast that three deputies have been fired over them and could “be impeached” if racial bias or deceitfulness is found. 

“By law, I had to notify the U.S. Attorney’s Office, because that’s potential information against these deputies, and also the District Attorney because that’s potential impeachment material,” he said.

A year after Breonna Taylor’s death at the hands of Louisville police, the world still says her name

Breonna Taylor most likely never dreamt that she’d become a household name, but here we are.  In the darkness of March 13, 2020, three plainclothes Louisville Metro Police officers forced their way into the home of Taylor, an emergency room technician and former EMT. They were there on a “no-knock” warrant, searching for a man who was already in custody. Taylor’s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, let off a warning shot from his own legally-possessed firearm. The plainclothes police fired off 32 shots in response, and six hit Taylor. The 26-year-old died in her apartment; not one of the police officers attempted to provide medical assistance. Taylor was Black; predictably, the Louisville officers were white.

The horror story is still not resolved, though Louisville did settle with Taylor’s family in September, and Walker finally got all charges permanently dropped less than a week before this heartbreaking anniversary. No police officers—including Myles Cosgrove, who fired the fatal shot—faced any charges for her death. Grand jurors blame Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron, who served as special prosecutor, for “terribly misus(ing)” them as he sought that outcome, and (unsuccessfully) attempted to  impeach and remove him from office.

A year after Breonna Taylor’s death, there remain more questions than answers as the world comes together to say her name.

Say her name. Remember her face. 

One year ago, on this date: Breonna Taylor was shot and killed by Louisville police officers in her apartment. pic.twitter.com/1BzDzxU4XG

— philip lewis (@Phil_Lewis_) March 13, 2021

Remember: It’s not just what “was” that was taken away. Taylor never got to find out “what could be.”

On this night last year, Breonna still had a world of dreams ahead of her.

— Charles Booker (@Booker4KY) March 13, 2021

That her killers walk free while Taylor died for committing no crime is no accident. It’s just the system working.

Today, Breonna Taylor should be enjoying her Saturday with family and friends. Instead, it’s the anniversary of her murder and her killers - Brett Hankison, Myles Cosgrove and Jonathan Mattingly - walk free. The system was built to allow this. Don’t ignore that. Get involved. pic.twitter.com/2XBqlQ0FhF

— Ava DuVernay (@ava) March 13, 2021

Louisville Police may have turned Taylor into a statistic, but she was a person.

Breonna Taylor: who she was, how she died, and why justice is long overdue. pic.twitter.com/wp4IMybN8W

— The Daily Show (@TheDailyShow) March 13, 2021

Women of color—particularly Black women—rarely attract much attention when they’re victims of police brutality. Taylor’s mom, Tamika Palmer, is thankful she, with the help of attorney Ben Crump, was able to garner wide concern for Taylor’s killing even as she continues to seek justice and police accountability. “I couldn’t imagine something like this happening to her and that nobody was paying attention,” Palmer told The 19th.

The #SayHerName movement didn’t start with Taylor, and it does not end with her.

It’s been one year since we lost Breonna Taylor.    We cannot forget her—or the countless other Black lives that have been so needlessly taken from us. We must continue to #SayHerName, demand accountability & take action against these tragic injustices. #BlackLivesMatter

— Senator Reverend Raphael Warnock (@SenatorWarnock) March 13, 2021

No justice. No peace. 

Today marks 365 days of injustice. Breonna Taylor’s murder was an injustice. The ensuing cover-up was an injustice. Daniel Cameron’s mockery of a grand jury hearing was an injustice.

— Cori Bush (@CoriBush) March 13, 2021

This powerful video from LeBron James’ More than a Vote shows how Breonna Taylor’s death changed us.

Breonna Taylor was killed one year ago today. We #SayHerName because her life mattered. We #SayHerName because she deserves justice. We #SayHerName because our work must continue until Black lives are treated with equal value. pic.twitter.com/EyxAtMPzjw

— More Than A Vote (@morethanavote) March 13, 2021

Say. Her. Name.

One year. We will never forget you, Breonna Taylor. We will never stop saying your name. pic.twitter.com/HOEU6e4fok

— Meena Harris (@meenaharris) March 13, 2021

Again: The battle for police reform is far from over. 

It’s been one year, 365 days, since Breonna Taylor has not gotten justice...and we can’t rest until she gets it. #SayHerName #JusticeForBreonnaTaylor pic.twitter.com/Srinuw8umm

— Wanda Sykes (@iamwandasykes) March 13, 2021

Missouri Rep. Cori Bush says it better than I could.

Tomorrow marks the one-year anniversary of Breonna Taylor’s murder. To Breonna’s mother, Tamika Palmer: We won’t stop making them say her name. pic.twitter.com/C8xL9VQFXh

— Cori Bush (@CoriBush) March 13, 2021

Please feel free to share tributes to Breonna yourself, both on social media and in the comments.

Tucker and guest go full racist: ‘We should not be bringing more Black children into the country’

The Fox News machine, along with the Republican Party, has spent the last 24 hours attempting to place blame for the power outages and electrical grid failures in Texas on environmentalism and “green energy.” This is because, as the entire state has been historically Republican-run, with its purse strings held by the fossil fuel industry, the real blame lies in corruption and a lack of infrastructure that Republican officials neglected to fix for the past few decades.

Tucker Carlson, to be clear, is a shitty misogynistic asshole and topped off the anti-green energy segment of his show by talking with former Texas governor and Trump-appointed Energy Secretary Rick Perry. While ending that interview and the first two-thirds of his show, which was dedicated to anti-environmentalism, Tucker literally said, “These people, go back to the gender studies department and stay away from our power grid.” Offensive and stupid on a few levels: That’s the Tucker Carlson brand.

Tucker wanted to end on a high note though, a note that he feels very at home in: white supremacy.

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So he brought on Heather Mac Donald of the Manhattan Institute. The Manhattan Institute is a pretend think tank that’s really just a place where conservatives who can’t publish legit scholarly work are allowed to pretend they’re scholars, and then go out into the world to preach against things like police reform, environmentalism, economic equality, higher taxes, and any other whatever actual facts the world has to offer. Heather Mac Donald is best known for being super racist against what she believes to be the myth of diversity, and a war on policing. She has been brought on Tucker Carlson’s show over the years, usually to talk about her expertise in telling Fox News viewers that America isn’t racist and Black people are mistreated by “bad apples” and frequently because Black people don’t behave correctly. That’s her thing. It’s a racist thing, but you don’t have systemic racism and a white supremacist power structure without white supremacists willing to talk about how bad people of color really are.

Anyway, President Joe Biden has promised to try and ameliorate the zero tolerance human rights catastrophe of the last administration, and this means accepting immigrants into our country—specifically immigrants that aren’t from germanic and nordic countries. The Republican Party is the party of racism, or better said, “the politics of whiteness.” Heather Mac Donald is here to stoke that fear of a Black planet, while also telling those viewers not to feel bad about being racist because racism isn’t really real.

HEATHER MAC DONALD: On the one hand as Biden said during the campaign, as he said in his inauguration speech, as he said since then: America is lethally racist. On the other hand we should break down every single reasonable, common sensical immigration control in order to bring in legally and illegally as many third-world immigrants of color as possible. Both positions cannot be true. If Biden believes that Black children are at risk of getting a shot every time they step outside, we should not be bringing more Black children into this country.

Tucker, in his most earnest of television reactions, says “You are so right,” and proceeds to expound upon how “liberals” and their “incessant talk about race” has been hurting the country. He attempts to transition into another question about what the “end game” is for liberals and how badly they want immigrants to be allowed entrance into our country and Black people stuff and Latino people’s rights. This question, like every question Heather Mac Donald answers in her public life, leads to her saying an even more racist thing than she said before. Whereas I said above that Mac Donald was there to tell the Fox News viewers that racism isn’t really real, the second part of that statement is that while it isn’t real, Black people are coming and you should be afraid because they inherently are different than you.

HEATHER MAC DONALD: They want to completely change the character of this country, the foundation of it, the norms, the traditions, and the demographics of it to be very honest. It is based in hatred towards a civilization deemed too white and too male, and they're going to do everything they can—whether it's spewing the poison of identity politics, teaching Americans to hate each other, to hate their past, or flooding it with mass low-skilled immigration that increases the wealth gap that hurts American Blacks and Hispanics.

She goes on to say that on top of all of this, immigrants are uppity when they come here because they hear the liberal white supremacist narrative, internalize it, and then feel entitled to things. She actually says all of that. That’s it, folks. If you are ignorant enough to see sense in this than you are a racist who has enormous sections of your education that need development.

Mac Donald comes on around the 33-minute mark. Trigger warning: She’s crazy racist.

Desperate to avoid impeachment talk, Tucker blames Black Lives Matter, George Floyd for … something

The sinking ship that is Fox News is helmed by the ghost of William F. Buckley Jr.’s toilet bowl, Tucker Carlson, financial liability Sean Hannity, and hoax racist Laura Ingraham. Tucker Carlson has been purveying his solid brand of fact-free, intellectually bankrupt, rhetorical monologue skills to promote racist COVID-19 conspiracy theories, and racist fearmongering of Black Lives Matter protests most of the year. Now, with Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial making it hard for Fox News to ignore, Tucker turned his attention on becoming a low-grade version of Infowars’ Alex Jones for the evening. But like everything Tucker, he adds a dash more white supremacy on top of what even Alex Jones has the capacity for.

Tucker went full deep state corporate conspiracy theory on Wednesday night in a long-winded, roundabout opening 12-minute monologue where he questioned the facts of the Capitol insurgency, arguing that Trump both didn’t incite the coup attempt, and then saying that it wasn’t a long-planned event, while also saying that it had to be either or of those two things. It’s a rhetorical trick where you create a straw man argument and then you step out of the fake argument to say that both positions are not real, thus negating your entire argument while pretending you have proven your argument. It’s the kind of intellectually vacuous dirtbaggery Carlson has made his entire existence on. But Tucker wasn’t done there, he needed a motivation for why everything we have seen has happened but also not happened the way we all seem to have seen it happen.

Black people, y’all. It’s socialism and Black people. It’s socialism and Black people that is funded by corporations—an organization well-known for loving both socialism and Black people? And that’s just one small piece of how offensive Tucker goes in his conspiracy theory.

Tucker explains that the facts Fox News viewers know—make-em-up things Tucker pretends are facts—contradict the impeachment proceedings. He explains that the reason this grand lie is being told to the American people dates back to this summer “beginning of Memorial Day, BLM and their sponsors in corporate America completely changed this country. They changed this country more in five months than it had changed in the previous 50 years.” Whoa! How’d this happen?

Well, as Carlson tells it, after George Floyd died at the hands of Minneapolis police officer Derrick Chauvin, protesters “upended society.” But even more importantly, the whole thing was a lie. According to Tucker, “The story they told us about George Floyd's death was an utter lie. There was no physical evidence that George Floyd was murdered by a cop. The autopsy showed that George Floyd almost certainly died of a drug overdose fentanyl.” Let’s pretend for a moment that one of the top reasons George Floyd’s death, unlike so many thousands of Black people’s deaths at the hands of law enforcement, set off mass protests, was because it was filmed by onlookers, while the sun was still out, and people were pleading with the officers to stop. Let’s pretend that that irrefutable fact does not exist.

Tucker is lying. His assertion about the autopsy is a lie. Not a misrepresentation of things but a straight-out lie. The autopsy notes the drugs in his system but the Hennepin County Medical Examiner's Office autopsy report determines Mr. Floyd died of "cardiopulmonary arrest complicating law enforcement subdual, restraint, and neck compression.” Tucker Carlson is a liar. He’s a weak-minded and cynical white supremacist apologist asshole, whose lazy mind cannot even come up with decent bullshit defenses for his obtuse attitudes and positions. Tucker goes on to make the textbook white American racist claim that these BLM protests “destroyed” the “fabric” of American society.

Here’s a man who has never been a good person but now finds himself grabbing at the empty void that their destitute morality has left them protecting. The 11-minute mark is around the moment where Tucker Carlson takes his final steps off the ledge of last night’s drivel.

This is infowars shit, just a completely batshit conspiracy theory blasted into your meemaws face pic.twitter.com/pjHzzeo5At

— Andrew Lawrence (@ndrew_lawrence) February 11, 2021

After hallway threats, Democratic congresswoman’s office moved away from QAnon congresswoman

Since Jan. 6, newly elected Democratic Rep. Cori Bush of Missouri has been one of the leaders calling for the ouster of all “Republican members of Congress who incited the white supremacist attempted coup.” One of the most prominent Republicans being referred to is Georgia millionaire and manic conspiracy theorist Marjorie Taylor Greene. In recent days, more and more media outlets have become hip to how out-of-control, bananas scary Greene’s very recent history of delusional thinking is. On Friday, Rep. Bush turned to her Twitter account to share news of what sounds like another American’s unfortunate and frightening run-in with Greene, writing: “A maskless Marjorie Taylor Greene & her staff berated me in a hallway. She targeted me & others on social media. I'm moving my office away from hers for my team's safety. I've called for the expulsion of members who incited the insurrection from Day 1. Bring H.Res 25 to a vote.”

This comes a little over a week after Greene posted on Twitter that Rep. Bush needed to “denounce radical BLM violence and apologize to the McCloskey’s.” Funny story: The McCloskeys need no apologizing to, because they’re the assholes who stood in front of their St. Louis mansion threatening peaceful protesters with guns.* Greene posted a video she said proved that Bush berated her and not the other way around. In the video, Greene is talking directly into her phone, purportedly walking through the halls of the Capitol, with her “censored”-stenciled mask around her chin. Rep. Greene’s face is completely exposed as she breathily attempts to say she has denounced the Capitol insurrection and blame it on a few bad apples. At a point in the video, responding to someone telling her from down the hall to “follow the rules and put on a mask,” Rep. Greene turns, and does indeed put on her mask, while confusedly yelling back that “You know you shouldn’t bring COVID-19-positive members in here. Spreading COVID everywhere.”

To be clear, the only thing you hear what may or may not be Rep. Cori Bush saying to Greene is that she needs to follow the rules and put on her mask. And she says it once. It’s Greene’s staff that very quickly jumps to being Jesus on the cross, while suddenly having to put on their fucking masks like a bunch of boobs. According to CNBC, Reps. Bush and Greene have—or had—offices on the same floor of the Capitol. According to the news outlet, Speaker Nancy Pelosi has stepped in to reassign Bush’s office to another floor.

Rep. Greene’s continuing presence in the halls of the Capitol building is just another reminder, like Trump, of how bad a democracy can be when it is pumped full of swamp water and corruption.

A maskless Marjorie Taylor Greene & her staff berated me in a hallway. She targeted me & others on social media. I'm moving my office away from hers for my team's safety. I've called for the expulsion of members who incited the insurrection from Day 1. Bring H.Res 25 to a vote.

— Cori Bush (@CoriBush) January 29, 2021

The tweet below with the video attached provides a very succinct example of the cognitive disassociation people like Greene have when it comes to their actions and statements, and their perception of how reality works.

Rep. @CoriBush is the leader of the St. Louis Black Lives Matter terrorist mob who trespassed into a gated neighborhood to threaten the lives of the McCloskey’s. She is lying to you. She berated me. Maybe Rep. Bush didn’t realize I was live on video, but I have the receipts. https://t.co/CJjnI3ZTjC pic.twitter.com/ZMLGOGjxKw

— Marjorie Taylor Greene 🇺🇸 (@mtgreenee) January 29, 2021

Rep. Greene is as guilty as Trump and the rest of the Republicans who have promoted the evidence-free election fraud theories that, combined with Second Amendment paranoia and fear-driven racism, led to the general toxic and violent climate we find ourselves in today. The fact of the matter is that if Marjorie Taylor Greene had not been elected by a hoodwinked and gerrymandered GOP district, she’d likely be dealing with charges of breaking and entering of our nation’s Capitol building, like this Texas realtor.

*To be clear, if the BLM protesters were as scary and violent as people like Greene pretend, the McCloskeys and their two guns would not have been much of a match for the hundreds of marchers.

Rep. Cori Bush needs just 30 seconds to slam the door shut on Donald Trump’s presidency

Newly elected Rep. Cori Bush of Missouri came into office on the mandate that she is fighting for Black lives. She has been very clear that she intends to do everything in her power to help save the lives of millions of Americans mistreated by a racist and unequal justice system. Bush is also very aware that there is a history of white supremacy in our country that is deeply embedded in the institution she is now hoping to reform. Bush, like every Black person who has risen into a politically powerful position before her, is now faced with the tangible political and physical violence that always accompanies the threat she poses to white supremacists and their anxieties.

On Wednesday, in a room filled with Republican white supremacists who want to bullshit America into believing they have some claim to the concept of “unity,” Bush delivered a short, powerful, and pitch perfect reason why she would be voting to impeach Donald Trump. This will be the second time Donald Trump is impeached during his presidency, and considering his actions over the last four years, the only surprising thing is that Donald Trump will have only been impeached twice.

This is the entire 30-second speech Bush gave. One might consider it the Gettysburg Address of impeachment speeches:

Madam Speaker, St. Louis and I we rise in support of the article of impeachment against Donald J Trump. If we fail to remove a white supremacist president who incited a white supremacist insurrection, it’s communities like Missouri’s First District that suffer the most. The 117th Congress must understand that we have a mandate to legislate in defense of Black lives. The first step in that process is to root out white supremacy starting with impeaching the white supremacist in chief. Thank you and I yield back.

Fin.

Rep. Bush’s speech was cheered by Democratic representatives in the chamber and booed by … some others.

What does it mean when they boo the Black congresswoman denouncing white supremacy?

— Cori Bush (@CoriBush) January 13, 2021

Fin, part deux.

Florida Man Rep. Matt Gaetz goes full white fright on Twitter and gets smashed … again

Florida Man Rep. Matt Gaetz was online today, doing what he does online: saying stupid, frequently racist, shite. Gaetz was responding to the story out of St. Louis, Missouri, of the wealthy white lawyer couple who decided to stand in front of their home and threaten peaceful protesters with guns as those protesters walked—legally—down their street, on Twitter. He tweeted out an image of the couple and wrote:

“In Joe Biden’s America your job is illegal, you are locked in your home, borders don’t exist, MS-13 lives next door and the police aren’t coming when the mob arrives. This is all of us.” Such a strange thing to say, eh? Very quickly, Rep. Gaetz’s Twitter feed was overrun with people wondering how Rep. Matt Gaetz is able to type and breathe at the same time. So, #MattGaetzIsATool began trending, as it seems to do at least once every week these days.

Most people are empathetic by nature, so they wanted to give Gaetz some advice.

Got to stop tweeting while drunk, Matt.

— Nickles (@pessoasclerk) June 29, 2020

That’s good advice. Others wanted to remind Matthew that sadly for the entire planet, we are not in any Democratic official’s “America” at this point in time.

The photo was taken in Trump's America.

— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) June 29, 2020

Of course there were the requisite reminders of how cowardly and craven Rep. Gaetz truly is.

As well as footnotes for Gaetz’s understanding of the world around him.

Yep, MS-13 lives right next door, Matt. pic.twitter.com/T4CdSk5zqW

— Cody Johnston (@drmistercody) June 29, 2020

Also a reminder that Matt Gaetz is afraid and he’s a racist.

Rep. Matt Gaetz: "Some might call that 'male privilege or 'white privilege.' You know what? Those terms are just racist terms to try to tell people to shut up, and we're done being quiet." pic.twitter.com/R91GvGT7WO

— The Hill (@thehill) June 23, 2020

At this point, this tweet is also obligatory, as Matt Gaetz … is a tool.

Matt Gaetz doing his obligatory tweet to get #MattGaetzIsATool trending on twitter... once again. You'd think he'd take a day off once and a while but the man is a tool.

— Coddiwomple (@wildjaden) June 29, 2020

And also this, because I’m not cursing if I let someone else do it.

And this one made me laugh.

#MattGaetzIsATool pic.twitter.com/UpKDos5fge

— Ronald Singleterry (@Singleterry) June 29, 2020

Then there’s this.

So we all agree that you are a privileged white person with poor taste, little common sense, who doesn't understand the concept of a well regulated militia and overreacts to the concept of democracy and diversity? Good, that's settled.#MattGaetzIsATool pic.twitter.com/y2JTV3fRTZ

— Devin Nunes' Slowed Down Testing (@tinkerdogcuss) June 29, 2020

And finally.

#MattGaetzIsATool pic.twitter.com/ynk2e7LhwQ

— Lev Parnas & Igor Fruman LLCðÂ�Â�Â� (@KurisuS) June 29, 2020