Rogers caused a national stir with a post on the social media app Telegram shortly after news broke about the shooting that “Fed boy summer has started in Buffalo.”/Gage Sizemore/Flickr
By Ray Stern |Arizona Republic
State Sen. Wendy Rogers drew inspiration from performer Megan Thee Stallion when she wrote about “Fed boy summer” after the May 14 Buffalo massacre, according to her lawyer.
The explanation was included in a June 17 report distributed Friday by a state Senate attorney investigating Rogers’ comment for the Senate Ethics Committee. It is up to Rogers’ fellow senators whether to take action on the report.
The report includes Rogers’ own explanation for the comment, which she claims was “greatly misinterpreted” by the news media. It doesn’t offer any opinion or conclusions about the investigation.
Rogers caused a national stir with a post on the social media app Telegram shortly after news broke about the shooting that “Fed boy summer has started in Buffalo.”
The white gunman shot 13 people and killed 10, all of whom were African American, at the Tops Friendly Markets store. Officials have said the attack was a racially motivated hate crime.
Political observers and journalists said Rogers’ statement meant she was calling the shooting a “false flag” operation by federal authorities, but Rogers didn’t initially clarify what she meant.
With news sites covering Rogers’ comment and a din of criticism, including calls by Democrats to have her expelled, state Sen. Rick Gray moved to have her investigated by the Senate Ethics Committee.
In a June 8 letter to the Senate’s attorney, Chris Kleminich, Rogers said the statement referred to what she feared would happen over the summer “due to the Federal Government’s inaction and failure to enforce our laws both at the border and regarding individuals with prior convictions.” The lack of a tough-on-crime approach by the government “could lead to riots and looting like we saw in the summer of 2020.” She noted that she later publicly denounced the shooter.
Kleminich asked for more clarification in a subsequent letter to her attorney, Tim La Sota. He wanted to know if she wrote the Telegram comment herself or if someone else wrote it and asked how the use of the term “Fed boy” constituted a critique of the government’s inaction.
