False Narratives Fuel Harassment of Republican Leaders, Says Black Vet

Journalist and political commentator, Rob Smith has joined the #WalkAway from the Democratic Party movement. (Courtesy of Rob Smith)

NEW YORK—The trend of liberal protestors publicly heckling Republican leaders could lead to more excessive and dangerous attacks, says a former Democrat.

The verbal assault of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, while he was eating at a restaurant with his wife on Oct. 19, was the latest in a string of similar public humiliations in recent months.

Political commentator and journalist, Rob Smith says the narrative that “everybody who voted for the president is a racist or hates gay people, or hates women,” is the excuse liberals give for their uncivil behavior towards McConnell and other Republicans.

This can lead to the dangerous situation of “prominent conservative voices getting doxed”—where their address, telephone number, and other personal information is publicized, usually though social media. “If you keep going [down] this route, it becomes anarchy,” said Smith.

Smith is part of the #WalkAway movement—a grassroots campaign of people traditionally on the left, who are rejecting the “current ideology of liberalism and what the Democratic Party has become,” says the movement’s website. Many participants have posted video testimonies detailing their reason for renouncing their liberal-democratic identities.

Smith’s case of renouncing the Democratic Party is among one of the most publicized, largely due to his identity as a gay, black man—characteristics that he says are unjustifiably married with democratic liberalism.

A five-year U.S. Army veteran, Smith once chained himself to the White House fence to protest against the military’s “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, which required service personnel not to disclose homosexual identity.

In recent years, he aligns more with the political right of center. He likens the recent harassment tactics against Republican leaders to “spoilt kids who don’t get their way.”

Incivility Growing

McConnell was dining with his wife, Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao at a restaurant in Louisville, Kentucky, when he was aggressively challenged by a group of men regarding the Republican Party’s social security and healthcare policy.

After telling McConnell to get out of the country, one protestor is seen, in the captured video, telling other diners, “They’re going to come for Social Security.”

Left-wing activists challenged Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) even more aggressively in September at a Washington restaurant that he and his wife had just entered.

They demanded to know his stance on the confirmation of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh—who faced sexual assault allegations that that FBI ultimately deemed unsubstantiated.

Speeches made by Democratic officials, such as Hillary Clinton, appear to encourage this mob behavior.

Clinton told CNN that civility toward Republican could only start again if Democrats won back control of the House and/or the Senate.

“You cannot be civil with a political party that wants to destroy what you stand for, what you care about,” she said.

Smith said such statements are attempts by the Democrats stir up resentment in order to get back into power. They will ultimately be unsuccessful, he added. Suspicious About Motives Behind Illegal Immigration Policy Smith said that it was seeing through the Democrats stance on illegal immigration which spurred his walkaway from the party.

Their “sanctuary cities, sanctuary states, and open borders” policy is an example of using identity politics—political identification by race, gender, sexuality, and so on—to frame minorities as oppressed peoples, which the Democrats purport to stand up for. This is how they expand their voter base, he said.

“When I realized as a black man that they were completely selling out my community in order get those new voters, that’s when I was done with it. Because nobody’s hurt by unchecked illegal immigration more than working-class African Americans.”

Smith said that he had “seen the left go so off the ledge” on issues like this. “If you don’t have borders, you don’t have a country.

“As a veteran, as somebody that has served, I have a respect and love for America,” he added.