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MISHAWAKA, Ind. — South Bend news outlet ABC57 aired a false story regarding a Penn Harris Madison School Corporation Parent who created a meme. The story appears to be running interference for the wife of the station’s General Manager who happens to be an high ranking administrator for PHM, who is also implicated in several potential criminal acts.
The story revolves around parent Ben Dallas who was banned from school grounds for nearly three months for creating a meme in which he superimposed the face of PHM School Board President Chris Riley onto the face of Neo from the movie The Matrix. Riley falsely claimed the meme was a threat and later secretly and illegally directed PHM Communications Director Lucha Ramey (wife of ABC57 General Manager Aaron Ramey) to dig through years of the parent’s social media feeds. Following a quick investigation by the PHM safety team and the St. Joseph County Police Department, it was determined Dallas did not threaten anyone. However, in a story last night, ABC57 falsely claimed Dallas created a video showing blood, guns and bullets directed at school board personnel. ABC57 did not show the video, did not contact the parent, did not mention anything about the police investigation or its findings and, instead, aired a slanderous interview from the PHM President who is now being asked to resign by members of the board for his potential illegal actions taken against the parent.
In OUR detailed story, RNM shows you the video, the entire police investigation and emails showing illegal actions taken by PHM against a parent of the district.
It’s important to note, the parent, Ben Dallas, has been extremely critical of Lucha Ramey in the past. Ramey is a radical Critical Race Theory enthusiast who has been the recipient of several complaints made by PHM stakeholders. Below is a video Dallas made criticizing Ramey and her role in the illegal actions taken against him.
BACKGROUND
Documents uncovered by REAL News Michiana earlier this month show the President of the Penn Harris Madison School Board secretly ordered and directed school employees to investigate and harass a parent who has been critical of him, while at the same time threatening his fellow board members with felonies if they intervened. Emails show Board President Chris Riley directed PHM Communications Director Lucha Ramey (wife of ABC57 General Manager Aaron Ramey) to dig through nearly three years of the parent’s social media posts which were then submitted to the St. Joseph County Police department, where the district falsely accused the parent of threatening the school district, teachers and staff. While investigators determined there were no threats, they were forced to spend months looking through all of the information — which provided cover for the school district to ban the parent from school grounds for months due to a false “criminal investigation.” All of which is a violation of the Indiana Attorney General’s Parents’ Bill of Rights.
During that time, School Board Vice President Ryan McCullough also attempted to get the parent fired from his private sector job by sending messages to his employer on LinkedIn. (A video from the parent describing the entire timeline of events can be viewed at the bottom of this story.)
PARENT BANNED FOR MEME
The parent, Ben Dallas, was banned from school property from mid-September of 2023, until early December. According to a letter Dallas received, the ban stemmed from a video he created and posted to YouTube in which he uses a popular meme from the movie The Matrix. The meme shows the main character, Neo, dodging bullets being fired at him. In the meme created by Dallas, Neo is depicted as school board president Chris Riley. Instead of dodging bullets, Riley is dodging words that come across the page. Those words include “accountability,” “hiring sex workers” and “implicit bias” — all issues Riley has been accused of ignoring in the PHM School Corporation.
In September, Chris Riley also submitted a report to the St. Joseph County Police Department claiming the above video was threatening gun violence against him and PHM. Investigators concluded their investigation on October 5th, determining no crime was committed. However, the ban on the parent remained.
INVESTIGATION REOPENED
For nearly a month, a minority of board members along with Indiana State Representative Jake Teshka questioned school leadership about the continued no-trespassing order with little to no response. Finally, on November 3rd, Superintendent Jerry Thacker told board members that the ban remained because the St. Joseph County Prosecutor’s Office was investigating. However, inquiries to the prosecutor’s office by both Teshka and School Board Member Matt Chaffee show the Prosecutor’s Office never received a report and were not involved in any investigation. And several requests by 2-3 board members at multiple meetings to investigate the re-opening were denied by President Riley.
Three days later, on November 6th, Lucha Ramey sent the St. Joseph County Police Department a PDF file with 80 links to videos Dallas had created dating back several years. This action caused SJCPD to reopen its investigation more than a month after the initial investigation had been closed. All of this was directed by Board President Chris Riley in secret, which is a violation of school board policies and a potential felony falling under Indiana’s Criminal Code for Official Misconduct.
According to the police report, nothing provided by the school corporation contained threats, however, detectives were forced to view all of the videos.
“I did not find any threatening content posted by (the parent).” The SJCPD detective wrote in his report regarding the parent’s YouTube videos sent to him by Ramey. “While watching the videos of (the parent) speaking at board meetings I did not hear any threats made by (the parent).”
Despite the findings of the detective, PHM banned the parent from school property for nearly three months while falsely claiming he made threats against PHM.
OBVIOUS RETALIATION
Dallas has been extremely vocal and critical of PHM, its administration and school board members for several years. He has spoken out about Critical Race Theory, Diversity Equity and Inclusion, radical gender theory and the district’s employment of a drag queen who works as a paraprofessional with developmentally disabled children.
While the district claims Dallas was banned from school property for the “threatening” meme, the banishment came only ONE DAY after the US Department of Education came down with a ruling showing the school district violated the civil rights of straight white students — all stemming from a formal complaint filed by Dallas.
Dallas was also successful in another complaint that he filed against PHM in 2023 in which the school district violated Indiana open door laws. That case is currently being used as an example by the state as how school boards should not behave in an article titled “Guidance from the Public Access Counselor on Public Comment at School Board Meetings.”
One week after PHM banned Dallas from school grounds, the PHM School Board Vice President sent Dallas’ employer a message on Linkedin in an attempt to get the father of 4 fired from his private sector job.
“I thought you should be aware that one of your employees… uses these platforms to post some disturbing social media post.” PHM School Board Vice President Ryan McCullough wrote in his message on September 28th. While a screenshot of the message can be seen below, RNM has redacted portions that could identify the parent’s employer.
VETERAN DISCRIMINATION
REAL News Michiana learned from multiple sources in October of 2023, the Penn Harris Madison School Corporation had been maintaining the ban because Dallas is a combat veteran. According to two sources who wish not to be named out of fear of retaliation, Superintendent Jerry Thacker said PHM was finding ways to keep the ban against Dallas because he is a veteran and he owns guns. Dallas retired from the Army in 2016. He did two combat tours, one in Iraq and one in Afghanistan.
COMPLAINTS AGAINST LUCHA RAMEY
In 2021, parents filed multiple complaints against Lucha Ramey. In one complaint, a parent claims she was berated by Ramey for discussing an article written by RNM regarding an applicant for an open school board seat.
“Lucha Ramey Aggressively interrupted our conversation.” The parent wrote. “She was very agitated (as she was) talking down about a local journalist that (sic) wrote an article about a board applicant. I stopped her and calmly stated ‘I’m sorry but you interrupted a private conversation.’”
The parent claims Ramey became more aggressive after that.
“She pointed her finger in my face… stating ‘what you guys are doing is despicable.’” The email reads. “(The board member) told her she should not treat a parent like that. She proceeded to tell (the board member) she had corrected misinformation from an article and sent it to the board… I repeated to her that she does not get to interrupt private conversations. She said ‘I am the director of communications and it is my job to clear up misinformation.’”
RNM reached out to Ms. Ramey and Superintendent Thacker via email.
“(The comments made by the communications director are) concerning, due to the fact that nobody from PHM administration has reached out to me to request a retraction, correction or provide criticism of any kind regarding stories I have published. This is defamatory behavior toward a journalist and parent of a PHM student. Is there currently an investigation into Ms. Ramey for any of these complaints? And, does Ms. Ramey admit to making statements or claims of misinformation produced by Clifton French?”
RNM never received a response.
PREVENTING THE PUBLIC FROM SPEAKING
In another incident uncovered by RNM, a parent accuses Ramey of preventing his wife from attending and speaking at a board meeting in June of 2021. While Ramey herself took the liberty of speaking during the public comment herself.
“I’m writing to request a brief conference to discuss in greater detail an issue wherein my wife… and a handful of others were prevented by a PHM staff member from attending and
giving visitor comments to the PHM school board at their 6/21 meeting. This staff member, as you may recall, then opted to speak towards the meeting end as an in-person visitor. I was almost prevented from attending and giving comments as well.” The parent wrote in his formal complaint.
Much of the meeting discussed PHM’s stance on having Critical Race Theory included in the curriculum. While Ramey is accused of preventing the public from speaking during the meeting, she stood up during public comment and addressed the board herself — promoting CRT practicum like Microagressions.
“What I have sat here and listened to for the past 20 minutes or so, in and of itself, is the definition of microagression.” She said. “I am a person of color who is also biracial.”
“It’s the equivalent of someone coming up to you and saying, ‘I have cancer’ and you are the doctor and have to cure of cancer and you look over that person and refuse to give it to them.” Seeming to suggest that CRT is the cure for racism.
Ramey was never disciplined for her actions.
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Most people do not know the level of incest between the media and leftist politicians. This is not just happening at the local level, but also at the national level.
From 2017, printed in the Clarion Ledger:
“Jay Carney went from Time to the White House press secretary’s office. Shailagh Murray went from the Washington Post to the Veep’s office while married to Neil King at the Wall Street Journal. Neil King has left the Wall Street Journal to work for Fusion GPS. Linda Douglass went from ABC News to the White House and then the Atlantic. Jill Zuckman went from the Chicago Tribune to the Obama Administration’s Transportation Department. Douglas Frantz went from the Washington Post to the State Department and Stephen Barr went from the Post to the Labor Department.
Ruth Marcus, who heads the Washington Post Editorial Board, is married to the Obama Administration’s former Federal Trade Commission Chairman. Jonathan Allen had been at the Politico before going to work for Debbie Wasserman Schultz, then back to Politico before going to the left leaning Vox. Now he is at NBC News. Andy Barr worked for the Politico before leaving for Democrat politics. Michael Scherer was at both Salon and Mother Jones before going to Time. Laura Rozen was at Mother Jones and the American Prospect before Foreign Policy magazine. Even Nate Silver had started out at Daily Kos. Then, of course, there is Matthew Dowd, who worked for scores of Democrats before working for George Bush. That, though he later washed his hands of Bush, bought him street credibility with ABC News to become its senior politically analyst alongside George Stephanopoulos, formerly of the Clinton Administration.”