Why The Left Lionizes Communist Cop Killer Assata Shakur

On Saturday, the self-proclaimed champions of civil rights sprang from their newsrooms and classrooms to honor the passing of convicted murderer, terrorist, and “revolutionary” of the Black Liberation Army and Black Panthers, JoAnne Deborah Byron, commonly referred to as “Assata Shakur.”

The New York Times, among other left-leaning publications, took to X, mourning the death of 78-year-old Shakur, a “black revolutionary… [who] found sanctuary in Cuba for decades after escaping from a New Jersey prison… serving a life sentence in the 1973 shooting death of a state trooper.” The Times’ tweet included her obituary, which lauded the black militant communist as a heroic freedom fighter of the oppressed.

Shakur’s portrayal as a civil rights hero by the Left, driven by ideological DEI, misrepresents her legacy as a convicted felon and terrorist, excusing her crimes while reinforcing limiting racial stereotypes.

The leftist innate call for action beyond more measurable activism plays another part, which can be interconnected to ideological DEI. It’s an endorsement of violence based upon their justifications of a pseudopolitical morality grounded upon perceived social justice. It is adhered to as a righteous religion.

Under this premise, media outlets, including The Times, The Guardian, and CNN, sought to present a more palatable and humanizing narrative about Shakur. More conservative-leaning networks, like the Daily Mail, reported on the “leftist” hypocrisy that actually carried over to the Chicago Teachers Union’s X-account. It, too, honored Shakur, speaking on behalf of 30,000 educators. The post was not well-received, with an overwhelming ratio of 6,000 replies to a surprisingly high 3,800 likes.

While media outlets and supporters glorify Shakur as a revolutionary, her life tells a far less heroic story. But what do people know about Shakur? I’d confidently assume very little besides the fact that she was godmother to slain rapper Tupac Shakur. Honestly, though, how could this FBI-designated terrorist be anyone’s choice as a hero or champion of anything?

In Shakur’s autobiography, she wrote that her teachers responded to her as if expecting her not to be intelligent. That is quite noteworthy. She also insisted that the education system sugar-coated the oppression of black Americans.

“I didn’t know what a fool they had made me out of me until I grew up and started to read real history,” Shakur wrote.

Her college life during the Vietnam War officially pulled her into politics, through general activism, and into where she sought ideological refuge — communism. Ironically, that may even describe much of the experiences of today’s college students. BestColleges surveyed the rise of collegiate activism in October 2024, finding that more than one in three students were actively involved with protests.

Returning to Shakur, in 1967, again, like most students of today, she became “woke” after three years of “academic enrichment.” She protested the underrepresentation of black faculty and black studies by chaining herself to the entrance of a Borough of Manhattan Community College building with 100 other students. Later, Shakur was arrested for trespassing.

After college, her ideological drive became more extreme, as she joined up with the Black Panthers to lead its Harlem chapter. Her autobiography recounts the stint as short-lived, as she left the party because she believed it was too “macho” and lacking authentic African American history.

She then pivoted to the Viet Cong-inspired Black Liberation Army. The group is known for its urban guerrilla tactics against the U.S. government, ranging from planting bombs, bank holdups, and murdering law enforcement.

Her violent “activist” career began in 1971. Shakur was shot in the abdomen at the Statler Hilton Hotel in Midtown Manhattan. The story is described in her memoir as an altercation where, while armed with a revolver, she demanded cash from a guest.

Newsday reported she later told a journalist that drugs were involved, but refused to elaborate further. She had, however, admitted the Black Liberation Army was funded through these acts of terror and crime, such as her own, writing, “There were expropriations, there were bank robberies.”

Shakur details her criminal ventures at length in her autobiography. In August 1971, she was involved in a bank robbery in Queens. In December, the New York City Police Department named Shakur a suspect in a hand grenade attack that had blown up a police car and injured two officers in Queens. In January 1972, law enforcement questioned her in the wounding of a police officer in Brooklyn. In March, she was again questioned, but for a $89,000 Brooklyn bank robbery. The following year, September 1973, she was suspected of another Brooklyn armed robbery, but at Our Lady of the Presentation Church.

In 1972, Shakur’s crimes put her in the sights of the feds with the FBI’s nationwide manhunt for her, a suspect involved in a “series of cold-blooded murders of New York City police officers.” The bureau detailed her alleged “execution style murders” of Officers Joseph Piagentini and Waverly Jones in May 1971, along with NYPD Officers Gregory Foster and Rocco Laurie in January 1972. Later that year, The New York Times reported she was wanted for questioning in a grenade attack against police, several other police murders, and a Queens bank robbery. By June 1973, she had essentially become part of the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force apparatus. Almost daily, briefs were released regarding Shakur’s whereabouts and the alleged crimes.

Ultimately, she was convicted in March 1977 of the charges in the 1973 New Jersey Turnpike shootout. Shakur was convicted of the first-degree murder of Trooper Werner Foerster, along with six other related felonies. She was sentenced to life in prison plus 26-33 years.

While serving her life sentence on Nov. 2, 1979, Shakur escaped New Jersey’s Clinton Correctional Facility for Women with the assistance of the Black Liberation Army and the May 19th Communist Organization. She then fled to the Bahamas in 1980, and thereafter to Cuba in 1984, where she was granted political asylum. The FBI held a $2 million price on her head ever since, and in 2013, Shakur became the first woman on the FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorists list.

After learning a bit about Assata Shakur, she doesn’t seem to be a shoo-in as an honorable civil rights activist — the one today’s Left demands for us to honor. Objectively, Shakur is a 7x felon with an “activist” past marked by serious crimes ranging from bank robbery to murder.

So, why does the Left celebrate her?

Shakur’s celebration by the Left stems from the framework of ideological DEI, which thrives on immutable traits like her identity as a black woman. This mindset lowers the bar for accountability under the guise of social justice, projecting a stereotypical narrative onto the “oppressed.”

For Shakur, this means her crimes are downplayed, as if she were inherently bound to a criminal fate due to systemic oppression. Such “antiracist” equity reduces individuals to monolithic racial stereotypes, stripping away personal responsibility and free will. This approach not only excuses serious crimes but also perpetuates a limiting, negative view of those it claims to uplift.

Recall earlier, Shakur mentioned feeling as if she were viewed as unintelligent by her teachers. This inadequacy, however established, whether through actual racism or a poor attempt at DEI social justice, has the same, if not similar, guiding principles and outcomes.

Treating a human being as if they are objects for our social justice ambitions seems commonplace in DEI ideology. It’s become the norm to bind groups or classes through this sort of “hobby politics.” It tries to remedy the believed oppression; however, it actually mandates a very limiting, stereotypical [negative] future for the so-called oppressed.

This diminishes the true sense of self, creating the object for the political left hobbyist. The innate nature of human beings to hold free will vanishes, rendering the victims of ideological DEI oppressed through a lack of virtue of self-mastery. This is why criminals like George Floyd and Assata Shakur are celebrated. The characters fit the designated DEI roles and further cyclically reinforce the ideology.  

The final facet to which she is honored is through her fulfillment of the violence pledged under the leftist doctrine of social justice. Shakur met all the criteria for an intensively active revolutionary — the kind Antifa and Black Lives Matter aim for. She was met with what she believed to be tyrannical oppression, and through her criminality, she sought “justice.”

Shakur is a dreamboat model for what the far-left seeks of today’s youth, particularly on college campuses — explosive responders fighting, not in the name of Christ, but for the leftism religion.

This is why someone of her pedigree, including those like George Floyd, would be uplifted by today’s Left. The disregard for past violence through ideological DEI is actually reinforcing violence through their adherence to leftist politics that hinge upon a perceived morality. Action is always a “must” against “evil” under these “morally” guiding principles.

Brian J. Pfail is a freelance reporter and writer. He previously reported for Newsmax digital and the Long Island Herald. He covers a wide variety of topics, primarily focused on crime, immigration and politics. Follow him on Twitter at @brian_pfail.