How do I know Susan Rosenberg a convicted terrorist raises funds for Black Lives Matters? It has been heavily reported on and even liberal Snopes verifies it.
"Susan Rosenberg has served as vice chair of the board of directors for Thousand Currents, an organization that provides fundraising and fiscal sponsorship for the Black Lives Matter Global Movement."
Thousand Currents is undoubtedly very closely linked to the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, a Delaware-registered entity that is one of the leading formal embodiments of the broader Black Lives Matter movement. The Thousand Currents website
outlines the relationship between the two entities:
“In 2016, BLM Global Network approached Thousand Currents to create a fiscal sponsorship agreement. Thousand Currents, a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt nonprofit organization, provides the legal and administrative framework to enable BLM to fulfill its mission. Fiscal sponsorship is a common structure utilized by nonprofit organizations. Oftentimes, nonprofit initiatives seek fiscal sponsorship to be able to have the fiscal sponsor handle administrative operations while the organization focuses on its programs and builds up its own organizational infrastructure. In this capacity, we provide administrative and back office support, including finance, accounting, grants management, insurance, human resources, legal and compliance.”
Descriptions of Thousand Currents as an organization which “handles fundraising” for Black Lives Matter were therefore accurate.
As recently as June 24, the date on which the Capital Research Center published their report, the Thousand Currents website listed Susan Rosenberg as vice chair of the organization’s board of directors,
describing her as a “human and prison rights advocate and writer.” The entire “board of directors” page has since been removed from the site.
According to tax documents obtained by Snopes, Rosenberg sat on the board of directors during the
2015 and
2016 financial years, and was elevated to the position of vice chair in
2017. We asked Thousand Currents for the dates of Rosenberg’s tenure on the board, and as its vice chair, and invited the organization to comment on the ongoing controversy, and will update this story if we receive a response.
Rosenberg’s prominent position within Thousand Currents is clear, as are that organization’s close links to the Black Lives Matter Global Network (and thereby the broader Black Lives Matter movement). However, the question of whether she should be described as a “terrorist” or “convicted terrorist” is much more complicated.
Arrests, Charges and Convictions
Originally from New York City, Rosenberg was an active member of several revolutionary left-wing groups and movements during the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. In November 1984, she was arrested in Cherry Hill, New Jersey after police
said she and an associate, Timothy Blunk, were found transferring 740 pounds of explosives, an Uzi submachine gun, an M-14 rifle, a rifle with a telescopic sight, a sawed-off shotgun, three 9-millimeter handguns and boxes of ammunition from a car into a storage locker.
Rosenberg was tried and convicted on the following
charges: “Conspiracy to possess unregistered firearms, receive firearms and explosives shipped in interstate commerce while a fugitive, and unlawfully use false identification documents …; possession of unregistered destructive devices, possession of unregistered firearm (two counts) …; carrying explosives during commission of a felony … ; possession with intent to unlawfully use false identification documents…; false representation of Social Security number, possession of counterfeit Social Security cards.”
In May 1985, New Jersey U.S. District Court Judge Frederick Bernard Lacey gave Rosenberg and Blunk the maximum available
sentence of 58 years each in prison. On Jan. 20, 2001, his last day in office, President Bill Clinton
commuted Rosenberg’s sentence, and she was released from prison.
According to several contemporaneous news reports, Rosenberg had previously been charged with multiple offenses as part of a major 1982 conspiracy case against several prominent left-wing revolutionaries. Along with the others, Rosenberg was charged with conspiracy and racketeering offenses in connection with the following
incidents:
- The 1979 prison escape of Joanne Chesimard (also known as Assata Shakur), a former leader of the Black Liberation Army who had been serving a life sentence for the 1973 murder of a New Jersey State Trooper named Werner Foerster
- The 1976 attempted robbery of an armored car in Pittsburgh
- The 1980 robbery of an armored car in Manhattan
- Three attempted robberies of armored cars in Danbury, Connecticut
- Four attempted robberies of armored cars in Nanuet, New York, in 1980 and 1981
The most high-profile incident was the October 1981 Brink’s robbery in Nyack, New York. Several members of the Weather Underground and Black Liberation Army groups were accused of having orchestrated and carried out the violent robbery of a Brink’s armored vehicle at the Nanuet Mall, stealing total of $1.6 million. In the course of a police chase and shootout, two police officers and a Brink’s guard were
killed. The money was recovered. Specifically, Rosenberg was
accused of having driven one of the getaway cars.
After Rosenberg’s arrest in New Jersey in 1984, and her subsequent conviction and imprisonment on the weapons and explosives possession charges, prosecutors dropped the conspiracy and racketeering charges against her, and she was never tried or convicted in relation to the 1981 Brink’s robbery, the 1979 Shakur prison escape, or other armed robberies.