On Monday night, a damning report from the Daily Beast was released, highlighting how Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), when he was the principal of a middle school, wrote poetry and other posts for a blog that clearly promoted conspiracy theories, including about 9/11. Notably, the congressman did not deny the existence of such posts, which were deleted before February 2016, though there's still archives.
Here's what the Daily Beast had on his response:
After being asked about his writing, the New York Democrat disavowed it—saying in a statement Monday that he “regrets” his posts and does not believe in those theories.
“Well over a decade ago, as I was debating diving into a doctoral degree, I explored a wide range of books, films, and articles across a wide swath of the political spectrum and processed my thoughts in a personal blog that few people ever read,” Bowman said, though he did not address whether he gave credence to the conspiracy theories at the time.
He provided a further statement, that contained not only explicit language, but also reference to, you guessed it, "MAGA extremists." As the report further mentioned:
In his statement Monday, Bowman said: “I don’t believe anything that these cranks have said, and my life’s work has proven that. As a Congressman, I’ve written a Congressional Resolution condemning a dangerous conspiracy theory, I’ve stood up to MAGA extremists, and I’ve called out the endless bulls**t of the far-right.”
He added that he has “learned how misinformation spreads” since the time of the blog post and “I regret posting anything about any of these people. Anyone who looks at my work today knows where I stand.”
Of particular concern, especially since Bowman was a principal of a school located in and now represents a district in New York City, is how he wrote about 9/11 Truther theories. As the report further details:
Every entry was deleted some time before February 2016, but the compositions preserved in archives included 137 lines of free verse from May 2011 entitled ‘Recapitulate.’ What begins as a meditation on a decade-plus of world events, recollecting anxiety over Y2K and controversy around the 2000 Florida recount, swiftly delves into the world of 9/11 trutherism.
“2001/Planes used as missiles/Target: The Twin Towers,” a stanza on the terror attack begins. “Later in the day/Building 7/Also Collaspsed [sic]/Hmm.../Multiple explosions/Heard before/And during the collapse/Hmm…”
Bowman there invoked a favorite, disproven trope of the paranoid fringe: that the collapse of Building 7 was the result of a controlled demolition. In fact, the National Institute of Standards and Technology determined that Building 7 buckled and fell after debris from its taller peers struck it and ignited a blaze inside, undermining its structural integrity. The agency found that none of the details of collapse, from the manner in which the building’s windows broke to the sounds reported in the area, were consistent with the massive blasts a controlled demolition would have required.
The poem then pursues even more obscure conspiratorial musings.
“Allegedly/Two other planes/The Pentagon/Pennsylvania/Hijacked by terrorist [sic]/Minimal damage done/Minimal debris found/Hmm…” he wrote.
That would appear to allude to Flight 93 and Flight 77, both of which left behind considerable debris, including black boxes and human remains. The strike on the Pentagon led to part of its outer wall collapsing, resulting in 125 fatalities within, and the deaths of all 59 people aboard the plane.
“We blamed Osama/Went to war in Iraq/Captured Saddam/Killed him,” Bowman’s poem reads. “Bin Laden is Afghan/So we went to war there too.” In fact, Bin Laden, who openly took credit for the Sept. 11 attacks, never held Afghan citizenship and was born into a billionaire Saudi family.
In the poem, Bowman also points to the source of the falsehoods he is propagating—”Watch Loose Change/And Zeitgeist,” he exhorts.
Loose Change is a viral “documentary” which has become an international laughingstock for positing that the U.S. government carried out the Sept. 11 attacks, based on a range of debunked and nonsensical assertions.
This is not the only concern to do with the Squad member. Last September, when the House was voting to avoid a government shutdown, Bowman pulled the fire alarm as he was exiting the House building, despite there being no fire. He was later charged with violating the DC code, though he was let off easy as a deal was struck that the charge would be withdrawn. The House also censured Bowman last December.
It was in the aftermath of that instance as well that Bowman lashed out on those on the right, as his team even circulated talking points to allies looking to cause a distraction from the congressman pulling the alarm. Bowman did have to walk back one of the talking points bringing up how "Republicans need to instead focus their energy on the Nazi members of their party before anything else," as he claimed the term was used without his "consent."
It's certainly been quite the week for Squad, and not just because of Bowman, and it's only Tuesday. Comments made by Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) about protecting Somali interests while she is in Congress have been circulating and drawing concern, and Rep. Cori Bush (D-MO) has also confirmed she is the Democratic member who is under investigation over allegations that she misused taxpayer funds for her private security provided by her now husband.
Any primary opponents for such members certainly have plenty of material to draw from, as if they didn't already.
Bowman was first elected in 2020 after he beat former Rep. Eliot Engel, then the incumbent, in the Democratic primary for New York's 16th Congressional District.
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