The growing number of corporations boycotting the Puerto Rican Day Parade in New York next month because it is honoring former FALN leader Oscar Lopez Rivera shows "people were fed up," anti-terrorism activist Joseph Connor told Newsmax TV on Thursday.
"People started jumping on this," Connor told Newsmax TV's Steve Malzberg.
His father, Frank, was among four people killed in a bombing at Fraunces Tavern in New York City in 1975.
FALN, the Puerto Rican terrorist group formally known as the Armed Forces of National Liberation, claimed responsibility.
"It had a lot of support from the Puerto Rican community, too," Connor added. "They don't want anyone to think that they support terrorists.
"They don't. They don't."
Rivera was among 10 FALN members eventually arrested and convicted on charges from various attacks, though not the 1975 bombing, and sent to prison in 1981.
Days before leaving office in January, President Barack Obama commuted Rivera's sentence. He went free earlier this month.
Two large corporations, AT&T and Coca-Cola, said this week they were pulling out of the June 11 parade, though the beverage-maker said it would support a scholarship program tied to the event, according to The New York Times.
Other major sponsors pulling out or scaling back include the New York Yankees, JetBlue Airlines and Goya Foods Inc., which has been a supporter since the inaugural parade in 1958.
However, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio has praised the decision by parade organizers to honor Rivera.
"People have really jumped up and said, 'This is wrong and we want nothing to do with it' – and these corporations need to withdraw," Connor told Malzberg. "These politicians need to go.
"It's been a huge grassroots work here."
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