Yvette Felarca, the Berkeley area school teacher and militant left-wing protester responsible for organizing the riot at the University of California, Berkeley in February 2017, claims that violence against the far-right is “not a crime.”
Felarca, who belongs to “By Any Means Necessary,” a far-left group, is currently facing assault charges after she was caught on video assaulting a white supremacist during a July 2016 rally in Sacramento, Cali.
The school teacher and her compatriots engaged in violent clashes against members of the far-right Traditional Worker’s Party, which had a permit to march in the city. The violence between the two groups resulted in a number of assaults and multiple stabbings. In July 2017,police charged Felarcawith “assault by means of force likely to inflict great bodily injury, participating in a riot, and inciting a riot.”
As reported by Huffington Post on Wednesday during her arraignment, Felarca described her actions as a form of self-defense, and therefore “not a crime.”
“Standing up against fascism and the rise of Nazism and fascism in this country is not a crime,” she said. “We have the right to defend ourselves.”
Felarca previously justified her actions to Al Jazeera. She stated that neo-Nazis were “organizing to attack and kill us. So we have a right to self-defense. […] That is why we have to shut them down by any means necessary.”
The activist made similar statements during herappearance on “Tucker Carlson Tonight,”where she described conservative firebrand Milo Yiannopoulos as a “fascist” and urged others across the United States to organize mass violence against people like Yiannopoulos to shut them down.
Felarca is next scheduled to appear in courton Oct. 4.
Ian Miles Cheong is a journalist and outspoken media critic. You can reach him through social media at @stillgray on Twitter and on Facebook.
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