Sharpton and Central Park Five members get out the vote in battleground Pennsylvania

NEW YORK (AP) — A few dozen New Yorkers boarded a bus in Harlem on Friday with civil rights leader the Rev. Al Sharpton and members of the group formerly known as the Central Park Five, bound for Philadelphia, where they toured the city hoping to energize the youth vote ahead of the 2024 election.

With less than 40 days until Election Day, the choice of a battleground state for a get-out-the-vote bus tour made sense: whichever presidential candidate wins Pennsylvania is likely to do so by a slim margin and with a lion’s share of the Black vote. But it was a strategic choice to recruit speakers who many first knew as Black and Latino teenagers wrongly convicted in a case that former President Donald Trump supported so vociferously, Sharpton said.

“There are polls saying that some Black men are moving toward Trump,” he told The Associated Press on Friday. “I don’t know if that’s true or not. But Black men need to hear some Black men saying, ‘Let me tell you about the Trump I know.’”

The Trump that the Central Park Five knows is the one who took out a newspaper ad in New York City, in the aftermath of the 1989 attack on a white female jogger, calling for the teenagers’ execution. The case roiled racial tensions locally and later became a national symbol of racism in the judicial system.

And more than 34 years later, the group of men, now known as the Exonerated Five, see the former president as a convicted felon who passed through the same courthouse hallways when he was found guilty in a hush money trial in June.

Yusef Salaam, one of the exonerated men, said Friday that using his voice to encourage voter participation lines up with lessons his mother taught him as a teenager. His message to voters in Philadelphia was part condemnation of Trump and part championing doing one’s civic duty.

“We have to fight like the lives of our children’s, children’s children depend on it,” said Salaam, who won a seat on the New York City Council last year. “Will we be allowed to somehow appreciate the American dream, or will we be plunged further into the American nightmare?"

The jogger case was Trump’s first foray into tough-on-crime politics that preluded his full-throated populist political persona. Since then, dog whistles as well as overtly racist rhetoric have been fixtures of Trump’s public life.

But the Republican presidential nominee has been supportive of reforms that speak to flaws in the criminal legal system. As president, Trump signed a law eliminating harsh sentences for non-violent drug crimes that had filled the nation’s prisons and exacerbated racial disparities in incarceration. In 2018, he used his power to commute the sentences of people like Alice Marie Johnson, who served 21 years in federal prison on a drug trafficking conviction.

Salaam and the other wrongly convicted young men had their convictions vacated in 2002 after evidence linked another person to the brutal beating and rape of the Central Park jogger. Trump in 2019 refused to apologize to the exonerated men, and again defended his position on the case during a debate with Vice President Kamala Harris earlier this month.

Of the Exonerated Five — which includes Salaam, Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Raymond Santana and Korey Wise — just Salaam and Wise boarded the bus to Philadelphia. With Sharpton and more than 50 supporters, Salaam and Wise engaged residents and students at Sharon Baptist Church, the University of Pennsylvania and the Community College of Philadelphia.

Wise said the message he was bringing to Philadelphians was simple: “Get out the vote, while we’re still here and while we’re still alive.”

Of the Exonerated Five, Wise spent the most time in prison before his conviction was overturned. He wants people to vote as a way of preventing any other young person from experiencing what h did.

“I’m not doing this for me, I’m doing this for little Korey who’s not here no more,” he said. “I’m representing him.”

The bus tour was sponsored by Sharpton’s National Action Network, a nonprofit civil rights group that does not endorse political candidates. But Sharpton and the exonerated men have been outspoken this election year, calling out Trump’s rhetoric around the Central Park jogger case, as well as his record on matters involving race.

In August, during the final night of Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Sharpton shared the stage with members of the Exonerated Five. From the stage, Salaam called out Trump’s failure to apologize for his harmful rhetoric in the Central Park jogger case.

Weeks later, during the debate, Harris evoked the exonerated men in her own critique of Trump’s decades-long history of stoking racial division. In the spin room after the debate, as Trump walked through speaking to journalists, Salaam flagged down the former president and confronted him.

Trump mistook him for a supporter, a moment that Salaam found bizarre. But he still walked away feeling proud, the councilman said.

“These moments of standing for yourself, of speaking for yourself, also speaks life into others,” Salaam told AP. “It gives others the opportunity to see, if he could stand up, I could stand up. If he could still be here, I could be here.”

Sharpton said Philadelphia was the first of other planned legs of his organization's voter engagement tour. In the coming weeks, he said he would make appearances in the battleground states of Ohio, Wisconsin and North Carolina.

The effort’s success will be judged not just by the outcome of the election, but by the community’s turnout on Nov. 5, said Malcolm Byrd, National Action Network’s chief operating officer.

“This is not just a mobilization effort, just for us to go to say we did something,” he said. “We want to plant a fire in Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia. … We’re going with a spark, with the hope that by Election Day it’ll be an inferno of justice.”

Korey Wise, one of the members of ‘The Central Park Five,’ sits on a bus outside the National Action Network headquarters in the Harlem neighborhood of New York as members of the organization prepare to depart on a Get Out the Vote bus tour on Friday, Sep. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Noreen Nasir)

Yusef Salaam, New York City Council member and a member of ‘The Central Park Five,’ poses for a portrait at the National Action Network headquarters in the Harlem neighborhood of New York as members of the organization prepare to depart on a Get Out the Vote bus tour on Friday, Sep. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Noreen Nasir)

Korey Wise, one of the members of ‘The Central Park Five,’ sits on a bus outside the National Action Network headquarters in the Harlem neighborhood of New York as members of the organization prepare to depart on a Get Out the Vote bus tour on Friday, Sep. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Noreen Nasir)

An organizer with the National Action Network signs people in ahead of a Get Out the Vote bus tour toward Philadelphia in the Harlem neighborhood of New York on Friday, Sep. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Noreen Nasir)

An organizer with the National Action Network signs people in ahead of a Get Out the Vote bus tour toward Philadelphia in the Harlem neighborhood of New York on Friday, Sep. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Noreen Nasir)

Yusef Salaam, New York City Council member and a member of ‘The Central Park Five,’ poses for a portrait at the National Action Network headquarters in the Harlem neighborhood of New York as members of the organization prepare to depart on a Get Out the Vote bus tour on Friday, Sep. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Noreen Nasir)

Organizers with the National Action Network put up banners for a Get Out the Vote event as the prepare to depart on a bus tour toward Philadelphia in the Harlem neighborhood of New York on Friday, Sep. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Noreen Nasir)

Smoke rose from Beirut’s southern suburbs Saturday morning and the streets were empty after the area was pummeled overnight by heavy Israeli airstrikes.

Attacks on Hezbollah targets by fighter jets Friday continued into the early hours Saturday after the army said it told residents to evacuate three buildings it was targeting.

Hours before the strikes, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the United Nations, vowing that Israel’s campaign against Hezbollah would continue — further dimming hopes for an internationally backed cease-fire. Netanyahu abruptly cut his United States visit short and returned to Israel.

More than 720 people have been killed in Lebanon since the conflict escalated Monday, according to Lebanon’s health ministry.

The United Nations says the number of those displaced by the conflict from southern Lebanon has more than doubled, with more than 211,000 people now displaced. At least 20 primary health care centers have shut down in hard-hit areas of Lebanon, the U.N. Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said.

Hezbollah began firing rockets into northern Israel in support of Hamas after it stormed into Israel, sparking the Israel-Hamas war. Top Israeli officials have threatened to repeat the destruction of Gaza in Lebanon if the Hezbollah fire continues, raising fears that Israel’s actions in Gaza since Oct. 7 would be repeated in Lebanon.

Here’s the latest:

CAIRO — An Israeli airstrike killed at least two people and wounded 11 others in the central Nuseirat refugee camp in Gaza, the Awda hospital said.

The strike hit a house late Friday in the camp, according to the hospital which received the casualties in the first hours of Saturday.

More than 41,000 Palestinians have been killed in the nearly year-long war. Over the past few days, the Israeli military has carried out strikes in northern and central Gaza, which they said were targeting Hamas militants operating from civilian areas.

TEL AVIV — Hezbollah launched more than two dozen projectiles toward Israel Saturday morning, triggering sirens in more than 100 cities and towns across Israel and the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

The Israeli military said a surface-to-surface missile was fired from Lebanese territory and fell in an open area in central Israel. Israeli media said the missile fell in the sea.

No injuries or damages were reported, according to Israel’s Fire and Rescue Services.

While Israel and Hezbollah have traded fire since Oct. 8 mostly in the area around the border, in the past weeks, the strikes have targeted much deeper into both countries.

This week, Israeli airstrikes have killed more than 720 people in Lebanon, including dozens of women and children, according to Health Ministry statistics. A number of people have been injured in Israel.

BEIRUT — Patients in hospitals in Beirut’s southern suburbs will be evacuated to medical centers in the capital and the nearby Mount Lebanon region, Lebanon’s Health Ministry says.

In a statement carried by state news agency early Saturday, the ministry called on hospitals in Beirut and Mount Lebanon to stop receiving cases that can be delayed in order to receive patients evacuating from the hard-hit southern suburb Dahiyeh.

The ministry’s decision came after a night of Israeli airstrikes on Dahiyeh, a predominantly Shiite district. The ministry also called on hospitals and medical centers to care for ill people who fled Dahiyeh overnight as a result of the airstrikes.

BEIRUT — Smoke rose from Beirut’s southern suburbs Saturday morning and the streets were empty after the area was pummeled overnight by heavy Israeli airstrikes.

Explosions rocked Beirut’s southern suburbs, with flames lighting up the pre-dawn darkness. Fire raged from at least one location, and smoke and flames were seen from above Beirut early Saturday. Residents reported jets flying overhead.

In a short statement, the Israeli military described the sites it hit as belonging to Hezbollah. Authorities there did not immediately acknowledge if there were any casualties.

Shelters set up in the city center for people displaced by the onslaught were overflowing. Many families slept in public squares and beaches, or in their cars. On the roads leading to the mountains above the capital, hundreds of people could be seen making an exodus on foot, holding infants and whatever belongings they could carry.

JERUSALEM — Israel’s military said it killed a Hezbollah missile unit commander and his deputy during a strike in southern Lebanon earlier in the week.

Israel Defense Forces said in a statement that its air forces killed Muhammad Ali Ismail, who it said was responsible for directing “numerous terror attacks” against Israel, including the firing of rockets towards Israeli territory.

The Tuesday strike also killed the commander’s deputy, Hussein Ahmad Ismail, it said.

There was no immediate confirmation from Hezbollah.

BEIRUT — The United Nations said the escalating violence between Israel and Hezbollah has forced at least 20 primary health care centers to shut down in hard-hit areas of Lebanon.

The U.N. Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, or OCHA, said in the latest escalation that began earlier in the week, Israeli airstrikes impacted 25 water facilities, affecting access to clean water for nearly 300,000 in high-risk areas.

The escalation since Sept. 23 has also more than doubled the number of those displaced by the conflict from southern Lebanon. There are now over 211,000 people displaced, some 85,000 of them now living in public schools and other shelters spread around the country’s north and east.

A new phase of escalation began Friday, when Israel targeted Hezbollah’s leader in the southern suburb of Beirut, in one of the largest blasts to hit the Lebanese capital in years. The fate of the group’s leader is still unknown. After the initial strike early Friday evening, Israeli warplanes continued to pound buildings and targets in the southern suburb for over six hours. Smoke and balls of fire covered the Beirut skyline for hours.

Flame and smoke rise from Israeli airstrikes hit a residential area that is a Hezbollah stronghold, in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

Smoke rises from an Israeli airstrike in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

FILE - In this Oct. 24, 2015 file photo, Hezbollah leader Sheik Hassan Nasrallah addresses a crowd during the holy day of Ashoura, in a southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar, File)

Palestinian supporters march near the United Nations headquarters at a protest against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during the 79th session of the UN General Assembly, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Mourners chant slogans as they carry the coffin of Hezbollah drone commander, Mohammed Hussein Surour, during his funeral procession in Beirut's southern suburbs, Friday, Sept. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)

Smoke rises from an Israeli airstrike in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

Israeli soldiers work on tanks in northern Israel on Friday, Sept. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Baz Ratner)

Smoke rises from Israeli airstrikes in Beirut's southern suburbs, Lebanon, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)

Lebanese citizens watch smoke rise from Israeli airstrikes in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

Smoke rises from Israeli airstrikes in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)