Man, it was a busy week last week. We had the Army's 250th birthday parade, the "No Kings" protests, the shootings of two Minnesota lawmakers, and Sen. Alex Padilla's stunt of bum-rushing the podium in the middle of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem's press conference. As I reported, Padilla just happened to "stumble upon" the press conference and thought he'd go in and just ask an innocent question … or at least that was his story. Now the whole "Don't you know who I am?" narrative has taken over. He was on the Sunday shows, so he did get some free airtime out of it.
When I talk about the biased mainstream media, I usually leave out the Los Angeles Times, but it's right up there with the New York Times and Washington Post, if not more so. As I reported last week, this was the Los Angeles Times' take on the stunt.
What a joke.
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) June 12, 2025
People see right through this thinly veiled propaganda.
Source: Los Angeles Times pic.twitter.com/LKKJrTFYDV
The Times didn't stop there, however; all of its columnists had a hot take on the "manhandling" of Padilla, who, I admit, I wouldn't recognize wearing what he was wearing. Maybe in a suit with his senator's pin.
The same writer who published the "look down our Latino senator" piece wrote a column on the gaslighting of Padilla on the Right.
Chabria: The gaslighting of Alex Padilla is already in full swing on the right https://t.co/ffEUI5Mo7F
— Los Angeles Times (@latimes) June 14, 2025
Columnist Anita Chabria writes:
Recommended
Lunging men are perceived as dangerous.
In an America that has long weaponized descriptions of how men of color look and move to justify use of force, that is especially true of dark men lunging at white women.
So when Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said after Sen. Alex Padilla interrupted her news conference Thursday that “people need to identify themselves before they start lunging” — it’s hard to believe it wasn’t meant to be an intentionally loaded word, with loaded results.
Lunging men are perceived as dangerous. But it's hard to believe Noem didn't know what she was doing by using the "intentionally loaded word" lunging, which is associated with "dark men lunging at white women." I'm old enough to remember the think pieces accusing Hillary Clinton's senatorial opponent of "attempted rape" when he approched he platform with a pledge to sign. That was her white woman space.
Another columnist for the Times, Gustavo Arellano, contributed this to Padilla's stunt.
Arellano: Sen. Alex Padilla's crime? Being Mexican in MAGA America https://t.co/V2eZJepXxM
— Los Angeles Times (@latimes) June 13, 2025
He's not Mexican. The fact that Arellano thinks he is speaks to a lack of understanding of citizenship.
Holy moly, LA Times. Way to stoke the fire.
— Diane DiPiero Rodio (@DianeOhiodiane) June 13, 2025
But wait, there's more! Columnist George Skelton wrote that Padilla was right to challenge Noem's "right-wing lunacy."
A Senator rushes the podium to confront a Cabinet member, physically -- and he's a relatively big man, and she's a smaller woman -- and somehow left-wing nuts in the California media like @LATimesSkelton think this is not only justified, but praiseworthy. https://t.co/IN41i9AH28
— Joel Pollak (@joelpollak) June 16, 2025
Skelton admits:
He broke in with a shouted question.
OK, he shouldn’t have done that. There’s a protocol at formal news conferences. Only reporters ask questions. Certainly not visiting politicians. And questioners really shouldn’t interrupt the person at the lectern, although it happens.
This wasn’t a Senate committee hearing in which Padilla could ask anything he wanted — when it was his turn. He wasn’t “doing his job” at Noem’s event, as his Democratic colleagues later asserted. He was there as an observer. If he wanted to ask the secretary a question, this wasn’t the time or place.
But his emotional reaction to Noem’s comments was totally understandable.
It was totally understandable by the right-wing lunacy that Noem was spouting. It was totally planned.
"The Trump administration did another stupid thing. Padilla came out a hero," he concluded.
No he didn't … he came out as a bully — and a security threat. He's only a hero to Los Angeles Times columnists.
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