Miami Police Union Plans Beyoncé Concert Boycott, Tennessee Sheriff Blames “Formation” Video For Drive-By

Matt Cowan/Getty

Miami Police Union Plans Beyoncé Concert Boycott, Tennessee Sheriff Blames “Formation” Video For Drive-By

Matt Cowan/Getty

Beyoncé’s new “Formation” video is awesome, and so was her performance of the song at the Super Bowl halftime show. But some people — mostly old white dudes and/or police officers — are continuing to get all upset about it. Rudy Giuliani called the halftime show an “attack” on police, The Daily News reports that a Tennessee sheriff blamed a drive-by shooting outside his home on Beyoncé, and earlier this week, someone organized an anti-Beyoncé rally in NYC (which no one actually showed up to and which was probably a hoax anyway).

Beyoncé is kicking off her Formation World Tour on 4/27 at Miami, Florida’s Marlins Park, and now, as The Miami New Times reports, Miami Fraternal Order Of Police President Javier Ortiz is calling for a police boycott of the concert, citing “the fact that Beyoncé used this year’s Super Bowl to divide Americans by promoting the Black Panthers” and her supposed “anti-police message.” Read his full statement below.

The Miami Fraternal Order of Police has voted to have all law enforcement officers boycott Beyoncé’s concert which is being held at the Miami Marlins Stadium on Wednesday, April 26, 2016. The fact that Beyoncé used this year’s Super Bowl to divide Americans by promoting the Black Panthers and her anti-police message shows how she does not support law enforcement.

I was one of the tens of thousands of law enforcement officers that didn’t watch the Super Bowl halftime show out of respect for our profession. On another day while flipping through the television channels, I did mistakenly watch her “Formation” video that shows scenes of a young black boy dancing in front of police in riot gear, who signal their surrender by putting their hands up, referencing the “Hands up, don’t shoot” anthem of the Black Lives Matter movement inspired by the 2014 death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. I challenge Beyoncé to review the eighty-six page report written by the United States Department of Justice on the death investigation of Michael Brown. As quoted by a witness that was interviewed by investigators, Witness 108 refused to provide additional details to either county or federal authorities, citing community sentiment to support a “hands up” surrender narrative as his reason to remain silent. He explained that he would rather go to jail than testify before the county grand jury. As detailed throughout the USDOJ report, those hands up, don’t shoot accounts are inaccurate because they are inconsistent with the physical and forensic evidence. Countless others contradicted or recanted their accounts of what transpired. Hands up, don’t shoot was built on a lie.

While Beyoncé physically saluted the 50th anniversary of the Black Panthers movement at the Super
Bowl, I salute NYPD Officer Richard Rainey, who succumbed to his injuries on February 16, 2016 from being shot by two Black Panthers who he had pulled over in a traffic stop. I also salute the dozens of law enforcement officers that have been assassinated by members of the Black Panthers.

We ask all law enforcement labor organizations to join our boycott across the country and to boycott all of her concerts.

Maj. Delrish Moss, a spokesman for the Miami Police Department, tells The Huffington Post that Ortiz and the Fraternal Order Of Police do not speak for the police department or the city and that the venue will be protected by police. “Right now the union president has his First Amendment right to say whatever he wants to say, but that doesn’t always translate to reality,” says Moss. “As far as we see, there’s no indication that anything that is said there will translate into police officers not working the job.”

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