Politics
Metropolitan Water District board member censured for racist remark
A board member of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California has been censured for making a racist remark about an Arab American employee.
The MWD board of directors voted to censure John Morris, a member representing the city of San Marino, after an investigation found that he used a racist term when he referred to a staff member at a board event last year. The district said the investigation was conducted in response to an anonymous complaint and determined that Morris’ remark violated the MWD’s antidiscrimination policy.
Mohsen Mortada, the district’s chief of staff, said in a recent letter that during a December 2023 visit to Gene Camp, a facility in the desert, Mortada overheard an MWD director refer to him as a “camel jockey.” He did not name the board member who uttered the slur, but officials confirmed that the incident he described was the same that led to the public rebuke of Morris.
Mortada, an American citizen who emigrated from Syria in 1987, said in the letter that he did not file a formal complaint, but was later interviewed by an investigator.
As part of the action, the 38-member board voted to cease funding for Morris’ travel, bar him from representing the agency at events and require him to receive counseling.
“Metropolitan cannot and will not tolerate racist comments from its leaders,” said Adán Ortega Jr., chair of the MWD board. “While we are not able to directly remove a director from our board, we have taken the measures we can to demonstrate that we absolutely do not tolerate this type of behavior.”
John Morris, a board member of the Metropolitan Water District, listens to a discussion during a meeting in which the board voted to censure him.
(Kevin Mapp/Metropolitan Water District of Southern California)
The agency said it was notifying the city of San Marino of the decision.
The San Marino city manager’s office said in an email to The Times that it “strongly condemns the use of racially motivated speech and biases against any individual anywhere at any time.”
“The San Marino City Council will consider and take the appropriate course of action as soon as possible,” the email said.
Morris — who according to a biography on the MWD website has been a board member since 1990 — responded briefly to questions from other members, indicating he did not contest the findings of the investigation. He declined a request for comment from The Times.
The censure comes as the MWD investigates harassment allegations against Adel Hagekhalil, the water district’s first Arab American general manager.
Hagekhalil has denied wrongdoing, and his lawyer and others have said they are concerned that discriminatory anti-Arab sentiments among some board members could affect their handling of the investigation.
The investigation of Morris’ remark did not involve Hagekhalil, Ortega said. But as part of the censure, the board barred Morris from taking part in deliberations and votes regarding the Hagekhalil investigation.
Hagekhalil’s lawyer, Kerry Garvis Wright, claimed at Tuesday’s meeting that anti-Arab sentiment is a larger issue for the board.
“While Mr. Hagekhalil has always had a positive relationship with the board as a whole, we have recently learned that certain directors charged with deciding his fate have made overtly anti-Arab and Islamophobic statements,” Garvis Wright said.
“That such anti-Arab and Islamophobic sentiment is held by these directors is, of course, itself deeply disturbing and frankly sickening. Knowing that these same directors are being permitted to decide whether Mr. Hagekhalil will continue to serve the district, in the face of what are otherwise bogus complaints, is shocking and wrong,” she said. “The board must take immediate corrective action.”
Adan Ortega Jr., board chair of the Metropolitan Water District, listens during a meeting on Dec. 10.
(Kevin Mapp/Metropolitan Water District of Southern California)
Garvis Wright did not mention any board members by name.
Mortada said in his recent letter that he was “writing to inform you of outrageous racist comments made by Metropolitan directors that bring bias and discrimination to the Board and its investigative process.”
Portions of Mortada’s letter were redacted in the version the MWD released to The Times. Rebecca Kimitch, a spokesperson, said the district determined that parts of the letter were exempt from disclosure because they included allegations that are either unsubstantiated, currently under investigation, or being considered for possible investigation.
Civil rights advocates have also voiced concerns about potential discrimination. The Council on American-Islamic Relations told the district earlier this year that Hagekhalil has been “subjected to discriminatory and racist actions and behaviors” by some board members.
Amr Shabaik, the council’s legal director in Los Angeles, told the MWD board in an October letter that board members have allegedly used “derogatory terms against immigrants, Muslims, and Arabs.”
“Such alleged statements include the following: ‘When are we going to get rid of those refugees?’ ‘When are we going to hire someone that we can pronounce their last name?’” Shabaik wrote. “These remarks are indicative of a strong animus and unlawful discriminatory intent by Board members.”
Shabaik said the decision to censure Morris is “a step in the right direction.” But he also said it “does not necessarily indicate that all the issues and all the concerns have been addressed.”
During Tuesday’s meeting, board members agreed that Morris’ remark was unacceptable.
“It’s not OK,” said Gail Goldberg, the board’s vice chair. “We have to think about the integrity of the organization and what our values are.”
Morris spoke briefly several times during the hourlong discussion, but he did not offer an apology. Some board members said that did not sit well with them.
Ortega said he had doubts about a provision of the sanctions against Morris that allows for a committee to consider after one year whether Morris could be allowed to again fully participate in the board’s activities.
“What is he rehabilitating for if he’s not accepting any responsibility?” Ortega asked his fellow board members.
Morris replied: “It was not my intent to say I’m not accepting any responsibility. That was not my intent.”
The vote was nearly unanimous. Board member Ardy Kassakhian abstained, saying he was troubled by Morris’ lack of contrition and a discussion among board members that he felt largely danced around the gravity of the issue. He said it’s deplorable how people of Middle Eastern descent continue to be “targeted and picked on.”
“I don’t know if Mr. Morris said what he said as a punchline to a joke, or if it was something he said in the passing moment, but the term itself applied to any other minority group, group of color, said in even the most innocuous way, would not be tolerated,” said Kassakhian, who represents Glendale.
After the vote, Kassakhian said he felt “stronger actions are essential to demonstrate that we as the Metropolitan leadership unequivocally embody these principles of equity and justice.”
“We need to address instances like this directly, openly and decisively,” Kassakhian said. “MWD has done a lot of work to try and address these types of issues, and I think this incident shows how fragile the work is and how much more we can do.”
Ortega said he shares the concerns Kassakhian raised. He said he is using his authority as board chair to remove Morris as vice chair of a subcommittee working on plans for a large water recycling facility, and will only appoint him to a minimal number of committees as required under the agency’s rules.
“Mr. Morris never verbalized an apology, and he was given multiple opportunities,” Ortega said. “We need to recognize that there were individuals here that were denigrated and that an apology is due to them.”
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Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is leveling a stunning accusation at Vice President JD Vance amid the national furor over this week’s fatal shooting in Minnesota involving an ICE agent.
“I understand that Vice President Vance believes that shooting a young mother of three in the face three times is an acceptable America that he wants to live in, and I do not,” the four-term federal lawmaker from New York and progressive champion argued as she answered questions on Friday on Capitol Hill from Fox News and other news organizations.
Ocasio-Cortez spoke in the wake of Wednesday’s shooting death of 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good after she confronted ICE agents from inside her car in Minneapolis.
RENEE NICOLE GOOD PART OF ‘ICE WATCH’ GROUP, DHS SOURCES SAY
Members of law enforcement work the scene following a suspected shooting by an ICE agent during federal operations on January 7, 2026, in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Stephen Maturen/Getty Images)
Video of the incident instantly went viral, and while Democrats have heavily criticized the shooting, the Trump administration is vocally defending the actions of the ICE agent.
HEAD HERE FOR LIVE FOX NEWS UPDATES ON THE ICE SHOOTING IN MINNESOTA
Vance, at a White House briefing on Thursday, charged that “this was an attack on federal law enforcement. This was an attack on law and order.”
“That woman was there to interfere with a legitimate law enforcement operation,” the vice president added. “The president stands with ICE, I stand with ICE, we stand with all of our law enforcement officers.”
And Vance claimed Good was “brainwashed” and suggested she was connected to a “broader, left-wing network.”
Federal sources told Fox News on Friday that Good, who was a mother of three, worked as a Minneapolis-based immigration activist serving as a member of “ICE Watch.”
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Ocasio-Cortez, in responding to Vance’s comments, said, “That is a fundamental difference between Vice President Vance and I. I do not believe that the American people should be assassinated in the street.”
But a spokesperson for the vice president, responding to Ocasio-Cortez’s accusation, told Fox News Digital, “On National Law Enforcement Appreciation Day, AOC made it clear she thinks that radical leftists should be able to mow down ICE officials in broad daylight. She should be ashamed of herself. The Vice President stands with ICE and the brave men and women of law enforcement, and so do the American people.”
In Springfield, Ill., in 1838, a young Abraham Lincoln delivered a powerful speech decrying the “ravages of mob law” throughout the land. Lincoln warned, in eerily prescient fashion, that the spread of a then-ascendant “mobocratic spirit” threatened to sever the “attachment of the People” to their fellow countrymen and their nation. Lincoln’s opposition to anarchy of any kind was absolute and clarion: “There is no grievance that is a fit object of redress by mob law.”
Unfortunately, it seems that every few years, Americans must be reminded anew of Lincoln’s wisdom. This week’s lethal Immigration and Customs Enforcement standoff in the Twin Cities is but the latest instance of a years-long baleful trend.
On Wednesday, a 37-year-old stay-at-home mom, Renee Nicole Good, was fatally shot by an ICE agent in Minneapolis. Her ex-husband said she and her partner encountered ICE agents after dropping off Good’s 6-year-old at school. The federal government has called Good’s encounter “an act of domestic terrorism” and said the agent shot in self-defense.
Suffice it to say Minnesota’s Democratic establishment does not see it this way.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey responded to the deployment of 2,000 immigration agents in the area and the deadly encounter by telling ICE to “get the f— out” of Minnesota, while Gov. Tim Walz called the shooting “totally predictable” and “totally avoidable.” Frey, who was also mayor during the mayhem after George Floyd’s murder by city police in 2020, has lent succor to the anti-ICE provocateurs, seemingly encouraging them to make Good a Floyd-like martyr. As for Walz, he’s right that this tragedy was eminently “avoidable” — but not only for the reasons he thinks. If the Biden-Harris administration hadn’t allowed unvetted immigrants to remain in the country without legal status and if Walz’s administration hadn’t moved too slowly in its investigations of hundreds of Minnesotans — of mixed immigration status — defrauding taxpayers to the tune of billions of dollars, ICE never would have embarked on this particular operation.
National Democrats took the rage even further. Following the fateful shooting, the Democratic Party’s official X feed promptly tweeted, without any morsel of nuance, that “ICE shot and killed a woman on camera.” This sort of irresponsible fear-mongering already may have prompted a crazed activist to shoot three detainees at an ICE facility in Dallas last September while targeting officers; similar dehumanizing rhetoric about the National Guard perhaps also played a role in November’s lethal shooting of a soldier in Washington, D.C.
Liberals and open-border activists play with fire when they so casually compare ICE, as Walz previously has, to a “modern-day Gestapo.” The fact is, ICE is not the Gestapo, Donald Trump is not Hitler, and Charlie Kirk was not a goose-stepping brownshirt. To pretend otherwise is to deprive words of meaning and to live in the theater of the absurd.
But as dangerous as this rhetoric is for officers and agents, it is the moral blackmail and “mobocratic spirit” of it all that is even more harmful to the rule of law.
The implicit threat of all “sanctuary” jurisdictions, whose resistance to aiding federal law enforcement smacks of John C. Calhoun-style antebellum “nullification,” is to tell the feds not to operate and enforce federal law in a certain area — or else. The result is crass lawlessness, Mafia-esque shakedown artistry and a fetid neo-confederate stench combined in one dystopian package.
The truth is that swaths of the activist left now engage in these sorts of threats as a matter of course. In 2020, the left’s months-long rioting following the death of Floyd led to upward of $2 billion in insurance claims. In 2021, they threatened the same rioting unless Derek Chauvin, the officer who infamously kneeled on Floyd’s neck, was found guilty of murder (which he was, twice). In 2022, following the unprecedented (and still unsolved) leak of the draft majority opinion in the Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health Organization Supreme Court case, abortion-rights activists protested outside many of the right-leaning justices’ homes, perhaps hoping to induce them to change their minds and flip their votes. And now, ICE agents throughout the country face threats of violence — egged on by local Democratic leaders — simply for enforcing federal law.
In “The Godfather,” Luca Brasi referred to this sort of thuggery as making someone an offer that he can’t refuse. We might also think of it as Lincoln’s dreaded “ravages of mob law.”
Regardless, a free republic cannot long endure like this. The rule of law cannot be held hostage to the histrionic temper tantrums of a radical ideological flank. The law must be enforced solemnly, without fear or favor. There can be no overarching blackmail lurking in the background — no Sword of Damocles hovering over the heads of a free people, ready to crash down on us all if a certain select few do not get their way.
The proper recourse for changing immigration law — or any federal law — is to lobby Congress to do so, or to make a case in federal court. The ginned-up martyrdom complex that leads some to take matters into their own hands is a recipe for personal and national ruination. There is nothing good down that road — only death, despair and mobocracy.
Josh Hammer’s latest book is “Israel and Civilization: The Fate of the Jewish Nation and the Destiny of the West.” This article was produced in collaboration with Creators Syndicate. X: @josh_hammer
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Ideas expressed in the piece
- Democrats and activist left are perpetuating a dangerous “mobocratic spirit” similar to the mob law that Lincoln warned against in 1838, which threatens the rule of law and national unity[1]
- The federal government’s characterization of the incident as self-defense by an ICE agent is appropriate, while local Democratic leaders are irresponsibly encouraging anti-ICE protesters to view Good as a martyr figure like George Floyd[1]
- Dehumanizing rhetoric comparing ICE to the Gestapo is reckless fear-mongering that has inspired actual violence, including a shooting at an ICE facility in Dallas and the fatal shooting of a National Guard soldier[1]
- The shooting was “avoidable” not because of ICE’s presence, but because the Biden-Harris administration allowed undocumented immigrants to remain in the country without legal status and state authorities moved too slowly investigating immigrant fraud[1]
- Sanctuary jurisdictions that resist federal law enforcement represent neo-confederate “nullification” and constitute crass lawlessness and Mafia-style extortion, effectively telling federal agents they cannot enforce the law or face consequences[1]
- The activist left employs threats of violence as systematic blackmail, evidenced by 2020 riots following Floyd’s death, threats surrounding the Chauvin trial, protests at justices’ homes during the abortion debate, and now threats against ICE agents[1]
- Changing immigration policy must occur through Congress or federal courts, not through mob rule and “ginned-up martyrdom complexes” that lead to personal and national ruination[1]
Different views on the topic
- Community members who knew Good rejected characterizations of her as a domestic terrorist, with her mother describing her as “one of the kindest people I’ve ever known,” “extremely compassionate,” and someone “who has taken care of people all her life”[1]
- Vigil speakers and attendees portrayed Good as peacefully present to watch the situation and protect her neighbors, with an organizer stating “She was peaceful; she did the right thing” and “She died because she loved her neighbors”[1]
- A speaker identified only as Noah explicitly rejected the federal government’s domestic terrorism characterization, saying Good was present “to watch the terrorists,” not participate in terrorism[1]
- Neighbors described Good as a loving mother and warm family member who was an award-winning poet and positive community presence, suggesting her presence during the incident reflected civic concern rather than radicalism[1]
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President Donald Trump said on Thursday that he plans to meet with Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado in Washington next week.
During an appearance on Fox News’ “Hannity,” Trump was asked if he intends to meet with Machado after the U.S. struck Venezuela and captured its president, Nicolás Maduro.
“Well, I understand she’s coming in next week sometime, and I look forward to saying hello to her,” Trump said.
Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado waves a national flag during a protest called by the opposition on the eve of the presidential inauguration, in Caracas on January 9, 2025. (JUAN BARRETO/AFP via Getty Images)
This will be Trump’s first meeting with Machado, who the U.S. president stated “doesn’t have the support within or the respect within the country” to lead.
According to reports, Trump’s refusal to support Machado was linked to her accepting the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize, which Trump believed he deserved.
But Trump later told NBC News that while he believed Machado should not have won the award, her acceptance of the prize had “nothing to do with my decision” about the prospect of her leading Venezuela.
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