The black Washington resident and tour guide calling himself “Truth Conductor” told the Star Newspaper Group he stepped forward to protect One America News reporter Jack Posobeic at Friday night’s Antifa and Black Lives Matter rally in Washington’s Lincoln Park, because it was the right thing to do.
“They was going to attack Jack,” said Don Folden, who runs DCBlackTours.com and is a regular fixture wherever there is a swarm of reporters, such as the court appearances of retired Army Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn.
“My thing was: ‘Hey, what a minute, man,’ I mean the guy—I saw they were purposely targeting him and when I saw them pushing him around that is when I said: ‘Look, man, c’mon, let’s get out of here. Let’s leave’” said Folden.
As Posobeic stood by the crowd protesting the statue of Abraham Lincoln and a freed slave,a number of young men in all black clothing, helmets and goggles formed a circle around him.
The Navy veteran was shoved and pushed and at one point doused with water. “I was hoping to be able to catch the scene on camera when Antifa closed in on me, and tried to push me down the steps on the concrete,” he said.
That is when Truth Conductor stepped in, later joined by Fox News White House reporter Kevin Corke, whose own security detail walked Posebeic out of the crowd to safety.
Watch this video of Truth Conductor with Jack Posobeic posted by Epic Entertainment and used with their permission:
The protest was an escalation in the movement to tear down the statue of the national park’s namesake, described here by the National Park Service:
To further recognize President Lincoln, a memorial statue was placed in the park in 1876. The statue was unveiled on April 14, the 11th anniversary of President Lincoln’s death, with over 25,000 people in attendance. Frederick Douglass delivered the keynote address before President Ulysses S. Grant, his cabinet, and members of Congress. He discussed both his approval and disapproval of the monument.
The statue features President Lincoln in his characteristic frock coat, holding the Emancipation Proclamation before a kneeling African American man. Modeled after Archer Alexander, the last person captured under the Fugitive Slave Act, the man’s arms are extended to show his shackles have been broken.
Posobeic told the Star Newspaper Group he was getting up close to take a video of Folden’s own attempt to counter the rally against the Lincoln statue.
“Don is someone I have seen around DC at various events and we have always been friendly. He was standing up to have his voice heard as a historian in our nation’s capital, and yet they wouldn’t let him speak,” he said.
“What he did for me intervening that day was a blessing,” Posobeic said. “I can only hope unity and dialogue we showed that day can be a symbol for how despite our outward differences we are all Americans.”
Truth Conductor said, “Right is right. Wrong is wrong. What some of those protesters don’t realize is: ‘What if that was you surrounded by an angry crowd? How would you feel? Wouldn’t you want somebody to step up on your behalf?”
Folden said he was not worried about the angry mob hurting him.
“I have a secret weapon,” he said. “I can’t tell you what my secret weapon is, but you know, let’s just say there is something about me they respect—and I know they respect it. That’s why I can move in these crowds. I know what it is, but they don’t know what it is.”
Truth Conductor said he wished young black men in Washington could stop to realize that even they know the real enemy is not the police.
“The problem with a lot of these young boys right now–they not walking down the street looking over their shoulders for the police,” he said. “They looking over their shoulders for another kid who looks just like them–and yet, they said: ‘Black lives matter'”
The Alabama native said it was in January, when it came to him to adopt the Truth Conductor persona. “I was having one of my moments and I went to a park, where my wife and I used to sit. As I was sitting there, all I could hear was ‘Truth Conductor’ and I didn’t know what it was supposed to mean.”
Folden, who came to Washington as a 22-year-old in 1975, said people had always told him he looked like a railroad conductor, so he decided to go with it.
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Neil W. McCabe is a Washington-based national political reporter for The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. In addition to the Star Newspapers, he is a Media Fellow at the Gold Institute for International Strategies. Prior to joining the Star Newspapers, McCabe covered the White House, Capitol Hill and national politics for One America News, Breitbart, Human Events and Townhall. Before coming to Washington, he was a staff reporter for Boston’s Catholic paper, The Pilot, and the editor of two Boston-area community papers, The Somerville News and The Alewife. McCabe is a public affairs NCO in the Army Reserve and he deployed for 15 months to Iraq as a combat historian. Follow him: @neilwmccabe2
Photo “Jack Posobiec ” by Epic Entertainment.
