The Other January 6th Shooter
Signs of hope for 2025
After his victory in the 2024 election, former President Trump—now President-elect Trump—reaffirmed his intention to pardon participants in the January 6th Capitol protest. He likened these individuals to the Canadian truckers, portraying both groups as victims of politically motivated persecution by an increasingly hostile ruling class. Trump also alluded to potential consequences for those he believes orchestrated this political targeting.
Coincidentally, today marks the anniversary of a separate January 6th event that was quickly and efficiently memory-holed by legacy media after only a few days of sporadic coverage. That event was the 2017 shooting at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. Despite its severity, the incident received minimal sustained media attention, in stark contrast to the exhaustive, round-the-clock coverage that typically accompanies such high-profile tragedies. A shooting at a major airport with all the excessive TSA security protocols post 9/11 should have dominated headlines for weeks. Yet, there was no elevation of the national threat level, no nightly panels on MSNBC, and the shooter pleaded guilty. This is a common occurrence in Islamist-related terrorism cases when the assailant survives, as a guilty plea prevents much of the evidence from being entered into the court record.
Trump supporters are well aware of the killing of Ashli Babbitt at the Capitol by Lieutenant Michael Byrd of the Capitol Police, who shot her in what many believe to be cold blood. Yet, unlike the widespread outrage over George Floyd’s death after injecting lethal amounts of fentanyl. Somehow a drug addict swallowing lethal amounts of a fatal toxin after creating a disturbance at a local small business, sparked months of riots and caused billions of dollars in damage in cities like New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, Chicago, Portland, Atlanta, Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia—there were no cries of “police brutality” from the left. Those who lean liberal may be unaware of these facts because their news sources strategically omit verifiable information through propaganda techniques, including lies of omission.
For me and others like me, January 6th holds personal significance: another birthday. Perhaps that is why the other January 6th event, the shooting and killing of innocent civilians at Fort Lauderdale Airport, an airport I have traveled through most of my life, remains deeply ingrained in my memory. In January 2017, I was near Fort Lauderdale when Esteban Santiago-Ruiz, who had adopted the name Aashiq Hammad, claimed to have been in regular contact with ISIS before randomly killing six innocent people at the baggage claim area. Once his apparent allegiance to ISIS slipped through the great firewall of the legacy media, the incident was quickly forgotten.
This is the point I want to highlight: the legacy media’s blatant lack of intellectual curiosity in uncovering the truth and, more critically, the conscious decision by editors-in-chief to bury certain stories almost immediately. Why? Is there a particular class or group of individuals in America who are above scrutiny?
There’s an old saying often cited by conspiracy theorists: “If you want to know who is in control, look at who you are not allowed to criticize.”
Consider the proliferation of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories online since October 7th. Some people seem to absurdly believe that Jews are a single, uniform group and that they are complicit in orchestrating their own genocide and persecution. Yet, while people freely spread this irrational obsession, editors-in-chief across most media outlets routinely suppress stories with clear links to Islamic terrorism. Why the double standard? What’s behind this preferential treatment?
I have a theory.
One lawfare case I’m familiar with was filed during the four-year period when the killings of Nigerian churchgoers seemed to take a brief reprieve. During that time, in the city of Toronto alone, 108 lawfare harassment suits were launched against various jewish advocacy NGOs and media outlets that dared to discuss jihadism and Islamic extremism. 108 just in the city of Toronto. This mirrors the same kind of lawfare we’ve seen targeting President Trump in the years leading up to the 2024 election.
Is this now ubiquitous tactic of lawfare a primary reason why our legacy media misleads us? Could this be the source of the credibility crisis within legacy media? And if so, who is financing it?
All of this may seem like doom and gloom, but there are signs of a cultural shift.
The era of woke censorship is waning, with increased coverage and open discussion of Islamist extremism. Many Muslims and ex-Muslims now speak openly about jihadism and extremism, despite risks to themselves and their families. This vulnerability persists because some politicians continue granting moral leverage to extremist groups, endangering secular and integrated Muslims. Islamist extremist groups launder millions to lobby politicians for silence and use lawfare to suppress dissent. However, this may soon end as these politicians and public figures face exposure for their unethical and subversive behavior.
Most recently, Elon Musk has drawn attention to the Pakistani rape gangs that were rampant throughout the United Kingdom for over a decade—crimes that were deliberately ignored by law enforcement. This was something we covered on The Quiggin Report podcast back in 2018. Better late than never.
The universe can be cruel at times, but the newfound courage of people speaking openly is making it significantly more difficult for corporate fake news to bury stories related to cultural enrichment from violent extremists. People are now mocked for watching legacy news, calling it “TikTok brain news,” suggesting that corporate media is for those lacking the cognitive ability to think for themselves. While this characterization is harsh, it may be necessary to help pull people out of the artificial echo chambers created by legacy media and the establishment, moving us into an age of greater enlightenment.
While some of us were targeted for speaking out in the past, it has never been easier to be honest and clear about the world about us.
Happy New Year to all of you and I hope your resolution is to no longer keep quiet.
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Not central to your point, but Byrd’s treatment (promoted to Captain, BTW) is infinitely offensive because the uniform standard for using deadly force is that the target must pose the “imminent threat of deadly force or great bodily harm.” This standard applies to police and civilians alike.
There was NOTHING in Ashli Babbitt’s actions that day that rose to that level of threat.
Personally, I would love to see Byrd charged with murder, for which there is no statute of limitations.