Another leftist race narrative bites the dust: Mississippi hanging edition

A recent death in Mississippi, which Democrats and leftists across the country claimed was a racially-motivated hanging, was recently determined to not be, in the latest instance of political partisanship and race-baiting being used to exploit tragedy. 

"When you pull the race card, especially when there's not the facts to back it up, it just tells me that you don't have facts on your side, and that you're really trying to engage in what I call angertainment," Rep. Kat Cammack, R-Fla., told Just The News.

"It really does a disservice to so many people because they're clearly using race as a means to achieve a political end, and that is really a short-sighted strategy."

Tasia Fortune, 29, a mother of four, was discovered Aug. 3 hanging from a tree behind a vacant house in West Jackson. The scene immediately drew comparisons to the state's history of racial lynchings and prompted national attention. 

Following Fortune's death, nearly 60 Democratic members of Congress, led by Massachusetts Rep. Ayanna Pressley, sent a letter to Attorney General Todd Blanche and FBI Director Kash Patel. 

The letter cited Fortune’s death and nine other recent incidents of black people found hanging from trees, stating the deaths “raise significant suspicion of foul play given the role of lynching in our nation’s history.” 

Signers also included Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, of New York; Jasmine Crockett, of Texas; and Bennie Thompson of Mississippi. They demanded federal investigations of every such hanging death of a black person and invoked the 2022 Emmett Till Antilynching Act.  

Reality collided with their narrative, however, when, in addition to most of those hangings being ruled suicide, investigators announced that Fortune was killed in a drug dispute and that her body was later placed in the tree in a staged scene, according to court testimony Friday. 

On Friday, Jackson Police detective Samuel Dukes testified at a preliminary hearing that investigators think Fortune was killed elsewhere in a dispute over missing illegal narcotics and that the hanging itself was “staged,” citing the examiner’s findings.

Democrats' addiction to race narratives

The case is one of several alleged hanging deaths of black people in recent years that have drawn activist and political scrutiny. 

In September 2025, Delta State University student Demartravion “Trey” Reed, 21, was found hanging from a tree on campus in Cleveland. Local and state officials, including the Mississippi state medical examiner, ruled that death a suicide with no evidence of foul play or injuries consistent with assault. Family members and some civil-rights groups disputed the finding and called for further review.

In the 2006 Duke lacrosse case, a black dancer accused three white Duke players of rape, a claim media and Democratic District Attorney Mike Nifong framed as privileged whites targeting a poor black woman. 

Nifong pursued charges despite shifting stories and no matching DNA. Attorney General Roy Cooper, now the state's Democratic nominee for Senate, dropped all charges and declared the players innocent; accuser Crystal Mangum admitted in 2024 she fabricated the rape.

In June 2020, a noose-shaped garage-door rope was found in NASCAR driver Bubba Wallace’s Talladega stall, treated by officials and commentators as a racist threat. The FBI concluded the rope had been there since October 2019 – before Wallace was assigned the stall – and no hate crime occurred.

A 2019 clip of Covington Catholic students in MAGA hats near Native activist Nathan Phillips was presented by media and Democrats as white teens harassing an elder. Longer video showed the students were first taunted by Black Hebrew Israelites and Phillips approached them. Nick Sandmann later won settlements from CNN and The Washington Post.

Authorities have charged three black men with Fortune's murder: Jarques Ratliff, 51, whom police said had a friendship and intimate relationship with Fortune; Earnest Lloyd Jr., 25; and Eric Clark, 45, who surrendered Friday. Ratliff and Lloyd have pleaded not guilty and are being held without bond. Police have not described the killing as racially motivated.