As Tuesday night’s St. Louis County Council meeting continues to receive national media attention, the council’s chairwoman spoke out Friday about her handling of the raucous crowd.
The meeting made national headlines after acting Health Director Dr. Faisal Khan wrote a public letter to St. Louis County Council Chairwoman Rita Heard Days, D-1st District, outlining the racist harassment and threats he said he faced during the meeting and as he was leaving. He asked that she investigate the matter.
In the letter he detailed his departure from the meeting:
“On more than one occasion, I was shoulder-bumped and pushed. As I approached the exit and immediately outside the chambers, I became surrounded by the crowd in close quarters, where members of the crowd yelled at me, calling me a “fat brown cunt” and a “brown bastard.” After being physically assaulted, called racist slurs, and surrounded by an angry mob, I expressed my displeasure by using my middle finger toward an individual who had physically threatened me and called me racist slurs. …. I have to say, however, that when faced with the racist vitriol that Councilman [Tim] Fitch has been privately and publicly stoking against me since my appointment, I cannot say I am sorry.”
“I think that they were simply exercising their right to not believe what he was saying, and it could have come across as intimidation.” — St. Louis County Council Chairwoman Rita Heard Days
Days told The St. Louis American on Friday she believes the meeting went well and she maintained control of the raucous, mainly white crowd. She said she did not hear any disparaging remarks made toward Khan while he stood before the council.
“I’m looking at the person at the podium,” she said. “I’m not necessarily looking at the audience or anything like that — but I did not hear anything at all. The crowd was very excited, I will say that.”
She added that she admonished the crowd on several occasions for being loud, but did not appreciate Khan telling her how to run the meeting when he said, “Madam chair, if you do not restore order I will walk away and we will have to have this conversation [later].”
Days confirmed no audience members were kicked out of the chambers during the four and a half hour meeting. She said the loud group of people were simply expressing their beliefs.
“I did not think that there was an intimidation factor,” Days said. “I think that they were simply exercising their right to not believe what he was saying, and it could have come across as intimidation. But we are professionals, we deal with this kind of behavior all the time. And I’m not sure why this would be that much different.”
When Khan first took to the podium, Councilman Tim Fitch, R-3rd District, appeared to start off his questioning with what Khan and many are calling a dog whistle, which is racist rhetoric coded or disguised to appear innocuous.
“Can you tell us why you’re called Dr. Khan — are you a physician in the United States?” Fitch asked.
Days said on Friday that she had not heard of the term dog whistle before this week, and she said she understood Khan felt it was an insult to his heritage.
“That’s a question that you have to ask Councilman Fitch …. I did not take it as any kind of derogatory action at that particular time, because the questions were good questions and they needed to be answered,” Days said. “Because we have not had an opportunity before Dr. Khan came to the meeting … to come to him about the potential mandate.”
Khan also wrote in his letter that while presenting, two politicians (Mark McCloskey and Paul Berry) seated right behind Khan consistently berated him and tried to distract him.
“When I asked you to intervene to prevent Mr. McCloskey and Mr. Berry from interfering with my presentation, you lectured me – not them. Such demeaning treatment was surprising to me, as I had heard that you were sensitive to issues of race and treating people equitably,” the doctor wrote to Days.
Khan was there to answer questions about the mask mandate reinstated by Page and St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones on Monday. St. Louis County Council voted 5-2 to strike down the public health order and admonish Page for failing to consult them before issuing the mandate, arguing that it’s a requirement under a new state law.
Eric Schmitt, attorney general of Missouri, took the matter to court seeking a temporary restraining order to stop the mandate in the city and county. St. Louis County has moved the case to federal court, which delayed the proceedings.
This comes as a federal appeals court on Friday sided with St. Louis County in a lawsuit alleging that a county stay-at-home order issued in 2020 had violated free exercise of religion, amongst other allegations.
Days was one of the five council members who voted to strike down the mandate, saying Friday that she did so because there was no way to enforce it.
The office of County Executive Dr. Sam Page confirmed with local outlets that he has already launched an investigation into Khan’s allegations of what happened Tuesday.
Days recently took over as chair of the council in March after a contentious, near two-month legal battle over a procedures’ rule on when the term, responsibilities and voting privileges of a defeated council member ends.
When asked if, in hindsight, she would do anything differently Tuesday night Days said no, she felt she handled the meeting very well.