By Adam Zielonka - The Washington Times
Wednesday, August 14, 2019

Washington Redskins cornerback Josh Norman helped pay the bail for a 22-year-old immigration rights activist who was put in prison in May after publicly reading a poem that criticized U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Norman and New Orleans Saints linebacker Demario Davis, who are both members of the Players Coalition that seeks to work on issues of social justice, helped make part of Jose Bello’s $50,000 bail.

Reports said ICE came to Bello’s home and arrested him two days after he read his poem at a meeting of the Kern County Board of Supervisors in California.

Norman gave a statement about the situation to the American Civil Liberties Union.

“Jose Bello was exercising a fundamental right that we pride ourselves on as Americans,” the statement said. “If he was detained for reciting a peaceful poem then we should really ask ourselves, are our words truly free? This is America right? Where the 1st Amendment is freedom of speech unless I missed the memo somewhere. He was exercising that right.”

Norman also took to Twitter to speak his mind on the situation, criticizing ICE and saying some fellow U.S. citizens were committing “atrocities” that impeded others’ freedom.


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