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Micah-Shalom Kesselman clapped back at Medford Mayor Breanna Lungo-Koehn during a recent City Council meeting, during which he said statements she made against him were wild, crazy, inaccurate, complete falsehoods, incredibly defamatory and of a dangerous nature.
“It is atrocious and reprehensible that she would make such allegations in the public press,” he said during public comments near the end of the October 13 City Council meeting.
Kesselman was referring to an article published in the Tufts Daily on Wednesday, Sept. 30, that focused on a federal lawsuit filed in regard to the Values-Aligned Local Investments Ordinance, which the City Council passed and Lungo-Koehn vetoed. Subsequently, two residents filed a lawsuit over it stating the ordinance violates state and federal law.
According to the Tufts Daily article, Lungo-Koehn said Kesselman offered himself up as a pro-bono attorney for the City Council but they ultimately did not go with him, “because he stated in a people power/Safe Medford meeting that he wanted to throw me off a cliff.”
The Tufts article also states that a February police report obtained by Kesselman states that another individual said he wanted to push the mayor “off a cliff” but there was no evidence of any direct threats being made toward the mayor and the case was closed.
Why bring it up again?
Kesselman said he wanted to fully air the issue at City Council because it was important to him that the people he works with and live with understand what transpired so they can feel safe around him – so they can trust him. It would take longer to break down the issues than it took for Lungo-Koehn to fabricate them, he said, but he was committed.
Issue 1
Kesselman said Lungo-Koehn claimed he offered to represent the city pro bono in the fight to uphold the ordinance. He countered that he is an advanced software and intellectual property attorney, not a municipal law attorney or litigator.
“Nor do I have the time or energy to deal with what would clearly be an exceptionally hostile client,” he said.
Kesselman said that when he did enter the fray in a professional pro bono way, it was on behalf of the interveners, not the city.
Issue 2
Kesselman acknowledged that it might be petty, but he called Lungo-Koehn out for misspelling his name.
“I think it’s rude to not know the last name of the person you are actively defaming,”he said.
Issue 3
While he is a Medford resident, Kesselman said he is not a member of any particular activist group, and he called out the mayor for claiming in the Tufts Daily that he was affiliated with Our Revolution, which is a different organization separate from Our Revolution Medford.
“I rally and work with a litany of municipal groups in Medford because the current situation of the city, largely due to historic incompetence from the executive branch leadership, is so catastrophic that it has largely fallen upon residents to take up the necessary work to protect our neighbors and help them thrive,” he said.
Kesselman said he does work with Our Revolution Medford, when their goals align, but he also works with Medford for Palestine, Luce Medford, Hub Medford, Medford People Power, Safe Medford, Medford Community Response Network and many others. And, that includes his neighbors, he said, “because I give a damn about them.”
Issue 4 – The police report
“Now we come to the especially brazen, defamatory, and uncalled-for nonsense,” Kesselman said.
Kesselman said that earlier this year Lungo-Koehn did in fact “initiate a clearly politically motivated and spurious police investigation into myself and others with whom I organize.”
Kesselman admitted that in response to something totally unrelated to what Lungo-Koehn noted, he did say something along the lines of “I’m happy to push, keep pushing the mayor right to the edge of a cliff, but I don’t think it’s worth spending energy pursuing her support on this one.”
He said it was very much a paraphrase because it was also an “incidental, arbitrary aside that literally no one thought anything of.” He said the police report also makes it clear that the entire investigation was baseless and politically motivated.
The worst of it
Kesselman was incensed, however, that Lungo-Koehn would accuse him of actual violence.
“I want to be clear about this,” he said. “I have never advocated for or supported violence against any of our elected officials and would never condone such.”
Kesselman admitted he could be less than nice but insisted no one would sincerely accuse him of being unkind or advocating political violence. He also said when he and colleagues in Medford People Power were first targeted by the mayor, they decided to keep it on the down-low because the work was too important. He said such distractions or intimidations at the end of the day were “utter nonsense from a petty, flailing individual with an unfortunate amount of power for the time being.” But, Kesselman said that since the latest shots at him were made publicly with an aim at slandering him, it was time to engage.
He also said the current issue highlights two problematic behaviors of the mayor. First, he said, Lungo-Koehn has often engaged in borderline, “or at this point I would say well over the border,” disparaging speech about those who politically oppose her, particularly if they are vocal and unapologetic. And, he said, she has been willing to abuse her position and municipal resources to engage in what amounts to political bullying and intimidation.
“For whatever reason, it is clear that she has decided to target specifically me, and now is doing whatever she can to harm me, personally, professionally, and socially,” Kesselman said. “Even if it puts bystanders like my fellow organizers or my family, or even the fundamental democratic systems and axioms of our city itself, in danger.”
Kesselman said everything about the mayor’s conduct was unsound and he urged her to take a long look at herself and work toward a more healthy, reasonable pattern of behavior.
“For her own sake and the sake of the city, if not for me,” he said.
Responses from mayor and councilors
When Gotta Know Medford contacted the mayor for a response, Lungo-Koehn said simply that she stands by the Tufts Daily article and that she did in fact file a police report.
City Councilor Zac Bears called Kesselman’s statement possibly “the most important thing we heard all night.” He said every meeting the City Council has lately seems to be about how the mayor is hurting people.
“Have you no decency Breanna … please stop what you’re doing,” he said.
Councilor Justin Tseng called the issue “deeply messed up.”
Tseng said there were certainly more civilized ways to disagree on an issue than launching a police investigation. He likened Lungo-Koehn’s actions to the type of thing one would expect from Soviet Russia.
“This is craziness, utter madness,” he said. “We should never stand for that.”
