3 September 7-13, 2023 miaminewtimes.com | browardpalmbeach.com New Times | Contents | Letters | news | night+Day | CuLture | Cafe | MusiC | MONTH XX–MONTH XX, 2008 miaminewtimes.com MIAMI NEW TIMES | CONTENTS | LETTERS | RIPTIDE | METRO | NIGHT+DAY | STAGE | ART | FILM | CAFE | MUSIC | ▼ FLORIDA HATE CLICKS NEO-NAZI LEADER SIMULATES SHOOTING BLACK BOY AFTER JACKSONVILLE MASSACRE. BY IZZY KAPNICK A leading figure of the neo-Nazi movement in Florida simu- lated shooting a Black youth during an online chat in the af- termath of the recent massa- cre in which a masked man armed with an AR-15-style rifle emblazoned with swastikas murdered three Black people at a Jackson- ville-area Dollar General. In a video he posted on his website, Jon Minadeo II, founder of an anti-Semitic group known as the Goyim Defense League, can be seen telling the boy on the chat platform Omegle, “Put your face where I can shoot it, nigger.” Omegle randomly links up users for on- line chat sessions and Minadeo is known to take advantage of that feature in order to seek out Black people, often children, to re- cord as he subjects them to verbal abuse. On August 28, while using a digital filter he fre- quently applies to make himself look like an ape, Minadeo pointed a banana at the youth and showered him with slurs before simulat- ing a shooting motion as a gunshot sound ef- fect rang out. On Saturday, August 26, the Jacksonville shooter gunned down Uber driver Angela Michelle Carr, 52, Dollar General employee Anolt Joseph Laguerre Jr., 19, and Jerrald De’Shaun Gallion, 29, at the dollar store in the New Town community. Jacksonville Sheriff T.K. Waters said the gunman, whom he iden- tified as 21-year-old Ryan Christopher Palme- ter, killed himself at the scene. The sheriff said Palmeter, a white resident of neighboring Clay County, left behind a manifesto filled with racist rants and that the attack would be investigated as a hate crime. Minadeo attempted to convince his fol- lowers that the shooting was a false-flag op- eration meant to discredit the neo-Nazi movement. He said on his livestream that he discerned “Jew spellcasting codes” in news coverage of the Jacksonville shooting. “I know how you Jews do your codes. I know all your symbology. I know all your cri- sis actors,” Minadeo said. “The more we turn up the heat, the more the Jews are going to be doing the false flags. I just want to show you guys this. I called it a long time ago — that we’re going to put the pressure on these Jews, and they are going to do false flags. So there you go. I was proven right.” According to the donation tracker on his livestream, Minadeo collected more than $500 during the August 28 broadcast, a typical haul for his shows. The show was labeled as the 460th livestream for the website set up by Minadeo, a former YouTube rapper who has risen in popularity as an extremist media figure in recent years. He frequently solicits funding for the Goyim Defense League, including an instance where he asked for money to help replace a drone he claimed to have clumsily crashed into an FBI building in West Palm Beach. As New Times reported this past March, Mi- nadeo has used online livestreams to endorse violence. In February, he shared a video pur- portedly showing attackers beating a group of trans people in India, while he told his follow- ers, “I totally support this,” and, “This seems like good old-fashioned common sense.” “Bring out the sticks and just do what you gotta do,” Minadeo told his viewers as he warned, “We’ve gotta do something here. Folks, we are running out of time.” In late 2022, Minadeo, who is of Mexican- American descent, relocated from California to Florida, where he and other neo-Nazi groups have been courting new followers as the state sees a spike in extremist fervor. The California native maintains that the Goyim Defense League, known for its distri- bution of flyers and publicity stunts in which Minadeo projects swastikas onto buildings, does not condone illegal activity. He told his followers during the August 28 show that he has previously found “bad apples” in his group who were removed “for doing things that we don’t condone.” Both Minadeo and Josh Nunes, a neo-Nazi who leads a Jacksonville-based group called NatSoc Florida, have made use of anti-Se- mitic light projections to promote their brand of hatred in the northern Florida metropolis. That and other stunts by Minadeo, which have included yelling slurs at passersby near an Orlando-area synagogue, were stifled when the Florida Legislature passed a law outlawing unauthorized light projections and making it illegal to harass people for “wearing or displaying of any indicia relating to any religious or ethnic heritage.” Minadeo contended that the legislation violated his free-speech rights. Reached via email, the Jacksonville Sher- iff’s Office declined to comment about whether the Dollar General shooter had any interaction with Florida neo-Nazi groups, cit- ing an open investigation. Waters stated at an August 27 press conference that his office had seen no evidence that “the shooter is part of any large group.” | RIPTIDE | GET MORE NEWS & COMMENTARY AT MIAMINEWTIMES.COM/NEWS Jon Minadeo II is the founder of the anti-Semitic group the Goyim Defense League. Screenshot via GoyimTV ▼ MIAMI SCHADENFREUDE SAUREZ SUSPENDS PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN FOLLOWING DEBATE BLUNDER. BY NAOMI FEINSTEIN A fter falling short of qualifying for the Republican primary debate, Miami Mayor Francis Suarez has announced he is suspending his presidential campaign. Suarez attempted to promote himself as the Republican candidate best suited to connect with young voters and Latinos, but he gained little traction and saw his campaign fizzle out with less than one percent support in national polls. He exits a crowded presidential field led by former president Donald Trump, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, and biotech executive Vivek Ramaswamy. “I look forward to keeping in touch with the other Republican presidential candidates and doing what I can to make sure our party puts for- ward a strong nominee who can inspire and unify the country, renew Americans’ trust in our institutions and in each other, and win,” Suarez wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter. Over the course of his two-month cam- paign, Suarez repeatedly garnered national media attention for less-than-desirable rea- sons. He made headlines by mistakenly refer- ring to the persecuted Uyghur minority group in China as “The Weebles,” and by shelling out $20 giftcards to solicit donations, with an eye toward meeting the donor qualifications for the debate. SOS America, a super PAC backing the mayor’s presidential run, deployed some unconventional tools to muster support, including an “artificial intelligence” Suarez- mimicking chatbot that was supposed to answer questions on demand from voters but appeared to instead recite a limited number of pre-recorded messages. Suarez’s deci- sion to halt the campaign comes less than two weeks after he falsely professed he had met the polling qualifica- tions to appear on the debate stage in Milwau- kee on August 23. He was lambasted by U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz for keeping his false debate- qualification announcement pinned on his so- cial media account after the Republican National Committee made it clear he would not appear on the stage. Suarez maintained his confusion arose from a mix-up over which polls would qualify him for the debate. “I will continue to amplify the voices of the Hispanic community, the fastest-growing voting group in our country. The Left has taken Hispan- ics for granted for far too long, and it is no sur- prise that so many are finding a home in America’s conservative movement,” the mayor said in announcing his campaign’s suspension. In the weeks ahead of the debate, Suarez said candidates should drop out of the race and “not linger around” if they fail to qualify for the debate. He’s apparently stayed true to his word in that regard. [email protected] SUAREZ PROMOTED HIMSELF AS THE CANDIDATE BEST SUITED TO CONNECT WITH YOUNG VOTERS.
