A liberal podcast host tried to convince people that the Justice Department was disproportionately executing Native Americans following Attorney General William Barr’s order to continue executions of federal inmates on death row.
Rebecca Nagle, a self-described queer “Cherokee writer, advocate & language learner,” is the host of the podcast “ThisLand” at Crooked Media. Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, Teen Vogue, and The Huffington Post. (RELATED: DOJ To Resume Capital Punishment, AG Barr Immediately Schedules Five Executions)
On Friday she tweeted, “Native Americans are 2% of the US population and 20% of the people currently slated to be executed by Department of Justice.”
Native Americans are 2% of the US population and 20% of the ppl currently slated to be executed by Department of Justice. #DeathPenalty https://t.co/gzKb2xyHFo
— Rebecca Nagle (@rebeccanagle) July 26, 2019
Nagle failed to mention that there is only one person of Native American descent on the Justice Department’s list of five inmates for execution.
Of the five inmates set to be executed, three are white and one is black.
The Native American inmate is one Lezmond Mitchell, who is scheduled to be executed on December 11th, 2019 by fatal injection. Mitchell was convicted in 2003 of first degree murder, felony murder, and carjacking resulting in murder.
“Lezmond Mitchell stabbed to death a 63-year-old grandmother and forced her nine-year-old granddaughter to sit beside her lifeless body for a 30 to 40-mile drive,” said the Department of Justice. “Mitchell then slit the girl’s throat twice, crushed her head with 20-pound rocks, and severed and buried both victims’ heads and hands.”
Many on Twitter were quick to mock Nagle for her misleading tweet. She has yet to delete the tweet.
He brutally murdered a 63 year old woman and her 9 year old granddaughter. pic.twitter.com/8YTv8m5yvz
— Chad Felix Greene (@chadfelixg) July 27, 2019
5 people are on this list. One person is Native American. So, yes, 20%.
This is why context matters, and this is why people don’t trust the media. https://t.co/P9G8cJbUaU— Jessica Fletcher (@heckyessica) July 27, 2019
Tweets like this fuel Trump’s fake news campaign.
1 in 5. So, 20%. Just stop.
Also, he stabbed a grandma 33 times before slitting the throat of her 9YO granddaughter & then smashed rocks into her head as she lay dying.
This guy is WHY we have the death penalty.
— Rae Dolan (@sugarrae) July 28, 2019
Lmao maybe those five guys should’ve thought twice about being murderers huh? Just a suggestion. https://t.co/Bd5xTXgP7b
— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) July 28, 2019
Its because its one guy
ITS ONE GUY OUT OF FIVE
THIS HAS OVER ONE THOUSAND RETWEETS
Yes one guy is 20% of the people about to executed…. https://t.co/wLDT24vcig
— Tim Pool (@Timcast) July 27, 2019
It’s one single man. There are five people total. How fucked in the head do you have to be to be this maliciously deceptive for retweets? https://t.co/nJgmX4BSg1
— Cassandra Fairbanks (@CassandraRules) July 28, 2019
As of publishing Nagle’s tweet has over 1,700 retweets and 2,300 responses.