Jason Kessler, the right-wing blogger who unsuccessfully petitioned to remove Vice-Mayor Wes Bellamy from office, pleaded guilty today to punching a man while gathering petition signatures, but challenged the victim’s statements outside the Charlottesville General District Court. In the same court March 3, the prosecution asked the judge to dismiss with prejudice an assault complaint […]
Jason Kessler, the right-wing blogger who unsuccessfully petitioned to remove Vice-Mayor Wes Bellamy from office, pleaded guilty today to punching a man while gathering petition signatures, but challenged the victim’s statements outside the Charlottesville General District Court. In the same court March 3, the prosecution asked the judge to dismiss with prejudice an assault complaint […]
Jason Kessler chastised reporters on his way into court today and spoke disrespectfully to the special prosecutor who requested that Kessler’s petition to remove Vice-Mayor Wes Bellamy from office be dismissed because it lacked enough signatures. Kessler, who burst into the local spotlight after he discovered unsavory tweets Bellamy made before taking office in […]
It was no secret that today’s hearing on a petition to remove Vice-Mayor Wes Bellamy from office was going to be continued, but that didn’t prevent more than four dozen people from showing up in Charlottesville Circuit Court, most of them Bellamy supporters. The petition with 527 signatures gathered by right-wing activist Jason Kessler was filed […]
In the latest twist of the saga of Vice-Mayor Wes Bellamy’s controversial and racially charged statements on Twitter unearthed by Jason Kessler, a right-wing activist, Bellamy’s attorney has filed a response to the petition calling for his removal from office. In a press conference February 16, Kessler and his supporters presented their petition with 527 […]
In a press conference today at City Space on the Downtown Mall, conservative activist Jason Kessler presented his case for the removal of Charlottesville Vice-Mayor Wes Bellamy from office, along with a petition intended to begin the legal process, which is unprecedented in the city. Bellamy, 30, recently came under fire for old tweets […]
Last month’s City Council vote on a motion to remove the statue of General Robert E. Lee deadlocked 2-2 and left the chamber in disarray for 30 minutes. The issue was back on the agenda February 6 after Councilor Bob Fenwick announced he was changing his abstention to a vote to remove the statue, and […]
In his second press conference of the week, Councilor Bob Fenwick, who abstained during the heated City Council 2-2 vote to remove Confederate statues last week, said today he’ll vote to move the statue of General Robert E. Lee at the next meeting February 6. “Immediately upon the vote being recorded, I will make a separate motion […]
Charlottesville’s confrontation with its slave-owning past has resulted in difficult discussions since Vice-Mayor Wes Bellamy and Councilor Kristin Szakos called for the removal last March of statues of Confederate generals Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson and the renaming of the parks where they reside. At City Council’s January 17 meeting, the debate spiraled out […]
At the same time Donald J. Trump was being sworn in as the United States’ 45th president, University of Virginia students and faculty joined area leaders on Inauguration Day with a call to walk out of class, join a rally on the Rotunda steps and attend walkouts, seminars and teach-ins on Grounds. Organizers say the event, […]
Fate of the Republic The 1980s Republic Plaza on West Main has been brought to its knees over the past month to make way for luxury student apartments. By Christmas, a claw had relentlessly chomped away its top two floors. In its place will be The Standard, a six-story, mixed-use structure with 189 apartments and […]