SAGE’s April Howell City Council speech

We obtained a copy of the powerpoint presentation from March 2025, the purpose of which City Manager Erv Suida stated was to justify the public statement that the city of Howell made basically denounces sage as a hate group. Three quarters of that presentation was solely focused on Jeff Amayo even though Jeff wasn’t a SAGE member or a part of the safety team. The majority of that public presentation focused on attacking this Black Howell resident. 

The City put Jeff’s full name on the slides and said things like he was antagonizing white supremacist Eric Cooper when Jeff never says his name. They played Jeff’s video clip from social media which Erv Suida stated was the reason White Lives Matter (WLM) showed up. Erv Suida straight up said that WLM was not coming to protest that night, that they only came because of Jeff’s video that was posted outside the theater 30 minutes prior to the event. However, Jeff’s video literally proves the city of Howell wrong. Jeff says in it that the white supremacist were ‘Talking all kinds of shit online that they were going to be there”  

Jeff’s video is the direct result of unchecked and escalating racial harassment in his community (4 different hate incidents involving neo-Nazis in the past seven months, one being just four days prior to the film event). Jeff’s video that night was literally a RESPONSE to the online threats these white supremacists made prior when they demonstrated on Chilson Rd on 2/2 saying “warming up for the real confrontation” and that they’d “beating an N-word with my flag pole” 

The City and Howell police department (HPD) blamed Jeff in that presentation for inviting the white supremacists when even though SAGE was at the HPD the day prior to the film event sharing those threats with the sergeant in charge (as police chief Dunn was out at a conference).  

That powerpoint presentation goes on with 8 slides -out of 15- that have police cruiser footage including audio all focused on Jeff. In one of them the police state during the assault where white supremacists Seth Holland - why you don’t they tell people these white supremacists names? Trevor Raein was the leader that night on the bullhorn. Why dont they publicly put the white supremacists on blast? Anyways, during the assault on Jeff the officer states “If they are just doing light pushing  we aren't going to do anything with that. If things get out of control then we’ll go deal with that.” Local law enforcement’s strategy for dealing with the white supremacists, who had made previous direct threats towards “n-words”, putting hands on a Black resident was to wait until things got out of control. They continuously refer to Jeff as “the victim” because it’s obvious that they pushed him first with him never pushing back.

After it escalates Jeff walks away and the police call him over - they ID and pat Jeff down, but don’t the white supremacists. The police claimed Jeff posted online that he had a gun (he didn’t). The cop asked him why he’s “stirring shit up” that Jeff is “feeding the fuel for no fucking reason” Jeff replied;

“I served this country for them to have their right to freedom of speech, but they don’t have the right to be listened to. And.. Im done! These people went to the American Legion, they scared and intimidated people- I have a reason for doing what i'm doing. So Im going to show that these people are nothing but fucking cowards.”

The cop reminds Jeff that he has a record which is what they used over him to not press charges because “you know they (the white supremacists) will then want to also press charges on you”

Jeff: “He did touch me four fucking times, I had the right to defend myself so keep that in mind, sir.”  

Cop: “I know… Let them do what they’re going to do. They have every right to be here.”

Jeff: “Right, but my point is that you say they can press charges, but they can’t. He put his hands on me first.”

Cop repeats again to stop “stirring shit up” “don’t screw up the good life you’ve got going on”

Jeff: “Listen. I’ve been a coward all my life, I’ve been scared, I've been intimidated, I was picked on, I was bullied.. and it took me a minute to find my voice. You want to know how I found it? By going to church and learning that Jesus said, “love others” and that's what I'm doing.”

This audio is available via the city’s Power Point presentation -available upon request.