Search Results for “Salmon” – Friends For Fullerton's Future

May 9, 2026May 12, 2026About Us

Opinion: Fullerton Residents Deserved Better Than Zahra’s Shady and Opaque History

Now, finally in his last year of public preening and pontificating on our dime, Fullerton Councilmember Ahmad Zahra deserves an appropriate retrospective from FFFF. And this backwards look is colored by Zahra’s own continual critique of his colleagues for their lack of transparency. His claque, in particular the lonely old Kennedy Sisters of the Fullerton Observer, are willing to pass along these accusations without a shred of curiosity about their own hero.

Transparency.

Mug shot of the one-time Mrs. Ahmad Zahra.

Back in mid 1990s the immigrant Zahra came to America with a dream in his heart. That dream was stay here. To that end he quickly married a woman in Arkansas named Michelle Salmon in order to jump the green card line. In Zahra’s case the marriage fraud takes on a pungent charm since Zahra is proudly gay and has said in print that he has always known he was gay.

The newly minted husband left right away for the sunshine and beaches of California, leaving his unheartbroken and probably a little wealthier bride in Little Rock. When the statutory time obligation passed he divorced his abandoned wife, and here he remained. Zahra has never bothered to share his brief sojourn in Arkansas in any of various biographies, and why would he? That would be transparent.

Zahra claims he is a medical doctor although he certainly didn’t attend any medical school in the First World. Maybe in the Third World? There is no record of his practicing medicine anywhere, and he has never even bothered to share his medical school diploma. That would be transparent.

Sometime in the 2000s he says, Zahra, claiming to be a “film maker,” washed up on Fullerton’s shores. Zahra still claims film making as his job, even though no one can find any recent cinematic work to his credit. How he makes ends meet is a mystery and the wherewithal for his trips abroad (he says they are) is a matter of conjecture. Zahra never explains where he gets his income. It certainly isn’t from making movies. The public has the right to know how he supports himself. That would be transparent.

Zahra’s first action on the City Council was a cheap flip-flop that you never read about in the Observer. Despite his call for an election to replace Jesus Quirk Silva’s citywide seat, he soon voted to disenfranchise Fullerton voters and appoint the old retread Jan Flory; in return he got a great paying seat on the Orange County Water District Board where he pulled in $70,000 over a couple years. Zahra never talks about his decision reversal, nor do his followers. That would be transparent.

While on the Water Board, Zahra published three articles under his own name in the Fullerton Observer about water-related issues. It was later discovered that the articles weren’t written by Zahra at all, but rather by an OCWD PR hack. Zahra didn’t care and neither did the Observer Sisters, who tried to explain the plagiarism as some sort of amateur error by somebody, probably Jesse Latour. Transparency?

In the middle of Zahra’s first term on the City Council, he was busted and charged by the District Attorney for battery and vandalism. The case vanished as happens when somebody pleads guilty, pays a fine and does some community service. That gave Zahra the chance to falsely claim that he had been “exonerated” and offered to show evidence of that claim. But he never did. That would be transparent.

Zahra has been a cheerleader for legalized marijuana dispensaries in Fullerton. He had recommended the services of the later-convicted dope lobbyist Melahat Rafiei. He appointed Derek Smith, an MJ union lobbyist and peripheral character in the Anaheim Cabal crew to be his representative on the Budget Sustainability Committee. Zahra has never revealed his ties to the legalized marijuana cartel and what was in it for him. That would be transparent.

In Zahra’s worst offense against the people of Fullerton, he voted over and over again to sue David Curlee, Joshua Ferguson and FFFF. That flagrant abuse of power cost the public hundreds of thousands of dollars in a settlement. Zahra was aided and abetted by the Fullerton Observer’s Sharon Kennedy who actually employed an “expert” family member to assist City Hall’s reckless lawsuit. Zahra lied to the Voice of OC, claiming he was a “fan” of settling the lawsuit from the beginning, even though he voted against the final settlement. No explanation for this disaster was ever forthcoming from Zahra or his accomplice, Sharon Kennedy. That would be transparent.

In 2021 Zahra tried to privatize the UP Park and turn it into a commercial events center masquerading as a non-profit fish farm. The move was illegal as hell, but none of his friends cared so why should he? Zahra never reminds anyone of that harebrained scheme, but loves to talk about how his district is park poor. Transparency?

Tony Castro. Staying out of jail long enough to be of use to the Democrat Party of OC.

In his 2022 reelection campaign, Zahra spent $120,000 to keep a job that pays a thousand bucks a month. Part of this campaign involved the Democratic Party’s creation of a patsy candidate with a shady past but with a Latino name, Tony Castro, to beat his real opponent, Oscar Valadez. How much did Zahra know about this phony candidacy? Come to think of it, how much did Zahra know about the perjury of another fake candidate in 2024, Scott Markowitz, recruited by north county Dems in order to elect Cannabis Kitty Jaramillo. Once again Sharon Kennedy of the Observer not only ignored the story but ran interference. More transparency.

In October of 2021 Zahra filed a false police report against his colleague, Fred Jung. The cops interviewed other councilmembers who denied Zahra’s tall tale. End of story. Except that the story has never been reported by Zahra’s Observer friends and of course never discussed by Zahra. That would be transparent.

Zahra’s campaign finance reporting has been the subject of an FPPC investigation. First reported in August of 2025, it still seems not to have been resolved. A credit card payee, not vendors was routinely reported, leaving an unclear record of who was the beneficiary of these payments, payments that might have benefitted Zahra personally. Zahra has said nothing about this complaint. His friends at the Observer don’t seem interested, either. So why would he? That would be transparent.

That’s quite a list of misfeasance and malfeasance. Transparency? Not so much. Zahra has had the good fortune of having bamboozled the simpletons at the Fullerton Observer. And he has groomed a stable of eager young fellows who appear to be interested in political upward mobility and are happy to parrot the transparency schtick. To these followers and acolytes there is no reason to delve into their hero’s own extensive catalog of lies, secrets, hypocrisy and plagiarism.

November 6, 2025November 6, 2025Ahmad Zahra

I Pity the Poor Immigrant, Part 3. City Council Dropkicks Financial Aid Plan for Undocumented

by The Fullerton Harpoon42 Comments

On Tuesday the Fullerton City Council killed a plan by Ahmad Zahra and Shana Charles to dole out $200,000 to the victims of Immigration and Custom Enforcement depredations.

The item was “tabled,” meaning it isn’t coming back. Fullerton does this because two councilmembers can keep bringing something back ad infinitum unless a majority makes a positive vote that it not come back. Fred Jung, Jamie Valencia and Nick Dunlap voted in the affirmative.

The idea itself, as with most squishy-feely liberal brainstorms, was based on the supposition that the people of Fullerton should pay for legal help and “basic necessities” i.e. food, rent, etc., for people harassed by ICE – even and especially undocumented immigrants, i.e. Illegal aliens.

The idea was to toss the money into the caring hands of non-profit entities who would then distribute the largesse, somehow, somewhere, to somebody. Deduct administrative overhead all around. The opportunity for waste, even if the cause were just and appropriate, should be obvious to anybody with sense.

Sense. Therein lay a problem.

As usual with this sort of thing, the council chamber was packed with pro-government giveaway types, many from outside Fullerton – people who believe it is the taxpayers job to subsidize their charitable impulses. This attendance will be misrepresented by the Fullerton Observer Kennedy Sisters and other boohoos, of course, as “the People” want this or that; or “the People have spoken;” or “listen to the People;” or to be more precise “Fred Jung failed to listen to the People.”

What the majority of people in Fullerton really think about this Berkeleyesque scheme isn’t known, but I bet eight or nine in ten would be against jumping this issue up to first in line.

The discussion did give opportunity for a budget discussion that proved more cloudy that clear. Shana Charles seemed to think she had discovered a vein of gold somewhere in the give-and-take, but of course didn’t have a clue about what she had heard. To her and her playmate, Zahra, $200,000 is just a drop in the proverbial bucket and of no real concern.

The funnest part of the evening came when the serial liar Zahra told his own immigration tale of hardship getting a green card.

This is fabulously disingenuous because we all know now that he got his green card through marriage fraud with one Michele Salmon, an Arkansas woman whom he married, then quickly abandoned in Little Rock as he went to pursue his Hollywood Dream. FFFF will be sharing a video clip of this newest chapter in Zahra’s chameleon-like origin story, when the City puts it on online.

The whole scenario was another one of those Zahra/Charles performative, made-for-effect gatherings to promote themselves, and no doubt to try to make the council majority look bad. That’s a poor political strategy. It’s going to backfire badly on Zahra, if he decides he still needs a councilman’s income after 2026; and just as disastrous for Shana Charles who has already announced her continuing “journey.”

“Charles Voted to give $200,000 to Illegal Aliens.” And so on.

July 23, 2025July 23, 2025About Us

The Latest in Fullerton Fashion

by Jan Florys Dog28 Comments

A Friend has sent in some images to FFFF of summer wear that may become a fad in Fullerton. Obverso we find pictures of Fullerton City Councilman Ahmad Zahra, the first gay, Muslim councilman in the history of the USA, so he says. Pictured next to him is his one-time wife, Michelle Salmon, the Arkansas woman he married just after coming to the country.

We are reminded of the strange case of a gay, penniless, Syrian immigrant with no job and no prospects hooking up an American woman. Naturally, it didn’t work out.

Verso we discover a facsimile of the happy newlyweds’ marriage license hot off the Pulaski County press.

Will these be appearing at council meetings this summer? They won’t work for me because I have four legs, but they sure look good enough for me to pee on.

July 17, 2025July 17, 2025About Us

The Immigration Game & The Phony Zahra Origin Narrative

by The Fullerton Harpoon48 Comments

At Tuesday’s Fullerton City Council meeting both Ahmad Zahra and Shanna Charles went to great lengths to decry the current rampage of ICE goons in our community. While there should be no support for the current administration’s unconstitutional activities anyplace, Zahra’s oratory struck me as ironic.

Poor Michelle. Abandoned by her once loving husband…

How come? Because we know that the openly gay, Zahra came to America from somewhere in the mid 1990s and immediately hoofed it on down to Arkansas where he married an American female, a woman named Michelle Salmon. Zahra told Vern Nelson of the Orange Juice blog that they liked each other but it didn’t work out.

That was a Zahra lie.

The illegal marriage fraud scam did work out, just as planned.

Just contemplate the ridiculousness: here’s a new, gay immigrant without his own address and with no work permit. What a catch for the young Arkansan woman.

Very soon after Zahra’s nuptials, he lit out for California to pursue his dream of becoming a filmmaker, abandoning his new bride in Little Rock. Five years or so later Zahra divorced Salmon, and with the help of a green card, no doubt, stayed in the country paving the way for ultimate citizenship.

Most immigrants that come here are damn hard working people doing jobs that Americans have become unwilling to do. Zahra, on the other hand appears to be virtually unemployed. Check out his 2023 economic interest Form 700, for example.

It looks as if Ahmad is doing a lot more political schmoozing and manipulating than he has been actively engaged in gainful employment. For a while he was collecting four grand a month going to Orange County Water District meetings, but that gravy train came to a screeching halt four years ago. It’s anybody’s guess how he pays his rent. A real audit of his campaign finances might be useful.

Then there’s the problem of Zahra’s assault and battery case against a Fullerton woman, a case that disappeared. Zahra says he was exonerated, but that’s was a lie, too.

US Immigration policy should be focused on keeping out deadbeats and bums and assaulters, not harassing people who want to work, and who do.

April 15, 2025April 15, 2025Ahmad Zahra

George Bushala Strikes Back

by The Fullerton Harpoon30 Comments

I’m really starting to like George A. Bushala, the guy who is standing up in public and saying the things that need to said about the fraudster councilman, “Dr.” Ahmad Zahra. At the April 1st Fullerton City Council meeting he also added the scalps of the Fullerton Observer and its two sister “editors” to his collection.

A couple days later, as FFFF shared, Skasika Kennedy recreated public comments (erroneously, of course) and added her typical “editor’s note” at the end of Bushala’s statement, bragging about standing up to his falsehoods.

It turns out that Bushala is not going to take this defamation lying down, and has retained counsel by the name of Briggs Alexander. This firm sent the following letter to Skakia Kennedy yesterday calling out her failure to show wherein Bushala had lied, and demanding that she reproduce (without editorial comment) a letter from young Bushala in lieu of facing legal action for libel.

Wow. Suggesting that the Kennedy Sisters behave like responsible journalists and quit defaming citizens. What a novel concept.

It’s pretty sad when it takes this sort of effort to get people who call you a liar to prove where the lies are. In this instance there are no lies since the documents detailing Zahra’s dubious slime trail across the United States have been published right here on FFFF. Of course the Kennedy’s have no interest in the truth and are completely enveloped by their ideological miasma in which truth is whatever helps you feel good about your cherished ideals; okay for private rumination, possibly costly in a public forum.

May 5, 2024May 5, 2024Ahmad Zahra

Zahra’s Past Catching up Quick

by Mr. Peabody34 Comments

The other day FFFF related a story told on the Orange Juice Blog about Fullerton City Councilman Ahmad Zahra having been married to a woman in Arkansas in the late 1990s. It’s always been a blank time in Zahra’s otherwise detailed autobiographies.

The problem is that Zahra has been very clear about being a gay man and “always” knowing it. The unambiguous statements asserting his self-awareness are published in interviews. So how and why did he come to marry a woman?

According to the OJB story, Zahra tells of his arriving in the United States (no mention of what sort of visa he held); and, not knowing a blessed soul, heading to Little Rock, Arkansas where he claims a friend of his father lived. There, says Zahra, he met a woman whom he says he “liked” and who liked him in return. This tepid romance led to a marriage, dissolved a few years later after Zahra had made his way to Los Angeles to learn the movie trade.

The story is so outlandish that it stretches credulity far past the snapping point. The OJB forewent an opportunity to delve farther into the strange tale, but the obvious difficulties emerge with startling clarity.

An immigrant to the United States of America shows up for some reason, not knowing anybody. Is he a tourist? Maybe. But if so he decides to go to Arkansas, of all places – not exactly a well-know tourist destination. Well, there he is in Little Rock. Where does he live? How does he get by? He can’t get a job, at least not legally, so he must have a little something stored up for a rainy day Stateside.

Enter Michelle Salmon, stage right. Somehow our eager young visitor crosses paths with Ms. Salmon. How and where they meet is at the heart of this mystery and is open to some interesting conjecture. Inexplicably the relationship leads to matrimony at the Pulaski County Courthouse where a marriage license is obtained.

Michelle has hooked herself quite a prize catch: a 27 year-old foreigner with no job (legal anyway), no job prospects, and, according to Zahra himself, completely aware of his homosexuality. On the surface he seems like pretty poor husband material for an Arkansas gal, so we have to wonder if poor Michelle was either mentally challenged or perhaps in need of financial assistance.

Zahra makes no mention of his visa status in his story to the OJB, but we have to assume that he received either a work visa or permanent residency status because not long after his connubial union he goes to LA, bravely living in a car on the streets of Hollywood (so he says). His visa would have been helped along by a marriage certificate to a citizen and it’s safe to say he got one that permitted him to stay in the US.

Well, says Zahra cavalierly, the marriage thing didn’t “work out,” what with the husband living in a car in Southern California, and with Michelle deciding to remain in Arkansas “with her family.” Divorce ensued and Ahmad’s new life journey had begun. He became a citizen in the course of time, a fact he shares as if this simple fact absolves him of any impropriety in the acquisition thereof.

Naturally, Zahra tried to paint this ludicrous picture to the OJB as his “coming out” portrait, and invited homophobic and Islamophobic FFFF to “make fun” of the narrative. The old dodge. Homophobia. Islamophobia. Be a victim.

I’m not the least bit interested in making fun of anything relating to Zahra’s gay coming out story – whichever variation he is selling at any given time; except when the story is cooked up to obfuscate what looks like a serious and likely problematic question. To wit: did Ahmad Zahra commit Marriage Fraud to expedite the legal requirements for him to stay in this country?

May 2, 2024May 2, 2024Ahmad Zahra

Zahra Was Married in Arkansas. To a Woman.

by The Fullerton Harpoon74 Comments

Our friends at the Orange Juice Blog published a story yesterday about Fullerton City Councilman Ahmad Zahra having been married in Arkansas, of all places, in the late 90s. And to an American woman named Michelle Salmon.

FFFF was sent of a copy of the marriage license.

Now this would normally not be of interest to anybody, except that Mr. Zahra has branded himself as the first gay Muslim, etc., etc. – brave hero, in fact. However, his self-propagated biography, such as it is, has never discussed a sojourn in the state of Arkansas, let alone having a wife there.

How a Syrian immigrant ended up in Arkansas, married, sounds like an interesting tale in itself.

According to an interview with Zahra, the OJB reports his version of how he ended up in hillbilly country:

“I got to this country and I didn’t know anybody, but my father had a friend in Little Rock, so that’s where I went first. I met Michelle, and we liked each other and thought we could work things out, but it didn’t work out. She was even going to go to LA with me but she decided to stay with her family.”

Wow, that’s pretty damn thin. Personally, I “like” all sorts of folks without feeling the least bit inclined to get married. Not surprising “it didn’t work out.”

Zahra’s would-be explanation falls flat given his previous statements. Like these:

Zahra, 52, did not have one specific moment when he came out as gay. He always knew he was, but it would be decades until his family would know.

In fact, when Zahra did finally come out to his friend, he was not entirely surprised, saying, “That explains a lot.” Zahra had never dated girls.

So why does a gay, Muslim immigrant marry an American woman in Arkansas? That’s a good question. Was Zahra giving the hetero deal one last swing at the plate? No need for marriage to do that, especially in Arkansas.

The Orange Juice suggests another reason:

Okay, well, the suspicion arises that this was a marriage to get citizenship, which is illegal under the Immigration Marriage Fraud Amendments Act of 1986. But Ahmad tells us he didn’t become a citizen until long after their 2001 divorce, in 2008.

Um, we always know that when somebody provides irrelevant information, he’s likely avoiding something. In this case the year of Zahra’s actual citizenship (even if true) isn’t the issue. The issue is whether he tried to accelerate permanent residence status by virtue of a phony marriage. And as OJB observes, that is illegal.

The fact is that nobody cares about Zahra’s sexual orientation, or his “heroic” coming out narrative, real or otherwise. What I (and others, no doubt) care about is his pattern of untruths including his tale that he was “exonerated” by the District Attorney in a case of battery; his phony accusation of assault against Fullerton council colleague Fred Jung; his disappearance from a council meeting for a photo-op, etc. And naturally, if an immigrant’s first official act in America is to break the law, then the public deserves to her about it.

June 7, 2010June 7, 2010OC's Fourth District

Hold Your Breath. Or Don’t.

by English Major50 Comments

Tomorrow you will know if your electoral politics will be bought and sold like a cut up salmon at a fish market.

In the 4th District Supervisor race in the past several months we’ve seen it all: two candidates – Galloway and Sidhu who both conjured up several addresses in order to favor us with their candidacy. One, the arrested adolescent Galloway, wanted so much to be the union stooge; yet it was the ignorant, incomprehensible, buffoonish Sidhu who grabbed the union brass ring.

Lorri Galloway seems to think she has Jesus Christ on her side. Well, okay; but Sidhu’s union pals spent almost $1.5 million to beat a solid candidate, Shawn Nelson, who actually lives in our district. Galloway has not yet submitted campaign contributions from the Almighty.

What will happen? I really believe that the voters will see through the phony crap laddled out by Hide and Seek Sidhu and his self-seeking tools, some of whom have trolled this blog. And there is no chance anybody who has seen the Precious Princess in action can come away from the experience with any other emotion than revulsion. Come to think of it, anybody who has seen the videos of Harry Sidhu will be able to do anything except repress a contemptuous chortle.

Frankly, the very idea that either of the two candidates, Galloway and Sidhu, who both commenced their candidacies with blatant lies, could be received with anything other that disdain by the electorate. These two miscreants have set the political bar very low indeed.

I have never voted for a Republican before. But tomorrow I will. I will vote for a guy who lives in the district; for a guy who will represent us, not the unions; for a guy who will take back control of County government from the amoral lobbyists for whom the apparatus of government has become nothing other than a nearly exhausted cash cow.

I am voting for Shawn Nelson.