Social media erupted on Friday after the Jury in the Kenosha shootings trial acquitted teenage defendant Kyle Rittenhouse on all counts.
Rittenhouse, 18, was found not guilty on all charges, including reckless and intentional homicide, after shooting three men, killing two, during racial justice riots on the night of August 25, 2020.
The youth had travelled with others to the Wisconsin city of Kenosha, where his father lives, to help guard local businesses against looters and arsonists after several nights of rioting following the police shooting of Black man Jacob Blake.
New York Mayor Bill de Blasio was one of the first on the attack risking a libel suit when he called Rittenhouse, who was legally a minor at the time of the shooting, a "violent, dangerous man", while defending convicted child abuser Rosenbaum and wife-batterer Huber as "victims".
And New York Congressman Adriano Espaillat also opened himself up to litigation, while indulging in race-baiting.
The liberal intelligentsia were enraged, claiming the verdict showed "white supremacy" was ascendant — even in Democrat-governed Wisconsin — and "vigilantism" had returned to the streets.
The fact that the three men Rittenhouse shot were all white still had to explained away.
Some clearly wanted retribution against Rittenhouse under any circumstances.
But conservatives celebrated Rittenhouse's acquittal — and accused the mainstream media and President Joe Biden of orchestrating a campaign against him, led off by the son of former president Donald Trump.
Others expressed fears of renewed rioting in the midwestern city, where Democrat state Governor Tony Evers had already put 500 National Guard troops on standby.