Following an altercation at a restaurant in New York City, involving three black patrons and a waitress, the Black Lives Matter of NYC and other social justice organizations have claimed that vaccine passports are being used to propagate racism.
According to the original police report, three black women from Texas got into a fight with a 24-year-old waitress at Carmine’s restaurant last week, Thursday. The fight was allegedly related to vaccine passports.
However, the information provided by lawyers from both sides indicates that the three women did provide vaccine passports. The lawyers told the New York Times that the trouble began after three men arrived to join the three women who were already seated in the restaurant. Two of the men did not have proof of vaccination.
A lawyer representing one of the women claimed that the fight started after the waitress accused them of carrying fake vaccine passports. The lawyer, Justin Moore, representing Kaeita Nkeenge Rankin, a doctor, said that the waitress used the N-word.
Following the fight, the NYPD arrested the three women for assault and criminal mischief.
On Monday, the Black Lives Matter Greater New York organized a demonstration outside of Carmine’s to clarify the story from the perspective of the women.
Aside from speaking against the use of the racial slur, speakers at the rally said that vaccine passports were being used to discriminate against black people. BLM claimed the waitress was white, but the restaurant’s owner, Jeffrey Banks, told the New York Post that the employees that were assaulted were Asian American, Latina, and Black.
BLM Greater New York co-founder Hank Newsome accused the restaurant of covering for “their employees’ actions by using [the] vaccination passport as an excuse.” He further demanded the release of the restaurant’s security footage, which showed that indeed one of the customers threw the first blow.
Chivona Newsome, the other co-founder of BLM Greater New York said that the city’s vaccine mandate and vaccine passports has resulted in the discrimination of black people.
“Being a doctor does not protect you from anti-blackness. Having a vaccination card does not protect you from discrimination. The 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibits the actions of Carmine’s. It says it is illegal to discriminate against you on the basis of race,” she said.
“Seventy-two percent of black people in this city from ages 18 to 44 are unvaccinated. So what is going to stop the Gestapo, I mean the NYPD, from rounding up black people, from snatching them off the train, off the bus?” she added.
Chivona threatened to take to the streets if such incidents persisted.
“We’re putting this city on notice that your mandate will not be another racist social-distance practice. Black people are not going to stand by, or you will see another uprising. And that is not a threat; that is a promise,” she said. “The vaccination passport is not a free passport to racism.”
“Most black people aren’t going to acknowledge that the Democratic Party has disenfranchised us. Malcom X said it’s foxes and wolves. The fox pretends to be your friend to your face but passes laws behind your back to harm you. The wolf is not your friend, they don’t like you, and they treat you as such. But who do you respect more? Black people tend to fall for the fox,” a protester, who did not wish to be identified, told the National Review.
“This vaccine mandate is disproportionately affecting people of color. People shouldn’t be forced to do it. It’s ‘for your health,’ but they’re willing to ruin people’s lives to protect against a virus with over a 99 percent survival rate. . . This is going to be the new Jim Crow, and it’s going to affect mostly people of color,” the person added.
