OMAHA - State Sen. Ernie Chambers staged a one-man protest in downtown Omaha on Friday to object to Mayor Jean Stothert’s decision to remove a member of a city advisory board over comments he made about a man who killed five police officers in 2016.

Stothert said Friday that Marty Bilek, her chief of staff, told Ja Keen Fox on Thursday that he was no longer a member of the city’s LGBTQ+ Advisory Board. Fox recently tweeted “Rest in Power Micah X Johnson,” who fatally shot five Dallas police officers.

In an interview Friday, Stothert said she would have made the same decision if someone on another city board, such as the Planning Board or Omaha Airport Authority, had made a similar comment.

She called Fox’s statements “egregious,” saying that if he felt that what happened in Dallas was acceptable, “I’m going to assume Ja Keen feels that it’s OK to do the same in Omaha.”

Chambers, who said he doesn’t know Fox, questioned why Fox should be punished for exercising his First Amendment rights when police officers who assault or kill people of color are “praised generally.”

“Mere words result in a man being kicked off this (advisory board), but cops are not punished when they kill people? When they brutalize people? When they make false arrests?” he said.

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