Conservative Activist Assaulted on UC Berkeley Campus

Conservative Activist Assaulted on UC Berkeley Campus
The man, later identified as Zachary Greenberg, who attacked conservative activist Hayden Williams at the University of California at Berkeley on Feb. 20, 2019. (Courtesy of Brad Devlin, @bradleydevlin/Twitter)
Ivan Pentchoukov
2/22/2019
Updated:
3/1/2019

Conservative activist Hayden Williams was punched in the face and shoved by an unidentified man on the campus of the University of California at Berkeley on Feb. 19, according to video footage filmed at the scene.

Williams was attacked while recruiting for Turning Point USA, a conservative activist group, according to group President Charlie Kirk.

“While recruiting for our group at UC Berkeley a leftist thug comes & assaults our activists punching him in the face & hitting him repeatedly. Imagine if the attacker was wearing MAGA hat, would be national news!” Kirk wrote on Twitter. “This is the violent left!”

In the video footage, a young man dressed in black pants and t-shirt is seen shoving, dragging, and punching Williams. He then calls him a “racist” in an expletive-laden rant before throwing a vicious punch in the victim’s face.

The video has been viewed more than a million times since it was posted on Feb. 21.

Members of Turning Point USA had a small table set up on campus and held signs supporting Trump and condemning racism. The assailant approached the table and assaulted Williams physically and verbally before taking off on foot.

A UC-Berkeley spokesman told Campus Reform on Feb. 20 that the attack is being investigated.

Dan Mogulof, assistant vice chancellor for the Office of Communications and Public Affairs for UC-Berkeley condemned the behavior.

“Let me state in no uncertain terms that this university strongly condemns violence and harassment of any sort, for any reason. That sort of behavior is reprehensible and intolerable,” Mogulof told Campus Reform. “We have, in recent years, spent millions of dollars to ensure that students from across the ideological/political spectrum can safely and successfully promote and discuss their beliefs. Our commitment to freedom of expression and belief is unwavering.”

University of California Police Department in Berkeley put out a request on Feb. 20 for the public to help identify the attacker.

“UCPD Officers found an injured male on the Plaza who reported he had been assaulted. The victim reported he had been ‘tabling’ for the group Turning Point when two males approached the table. When a verbal altercation started, the victim began filming the interaction with his phone,” the police stated.

The person who attacked conservative activist Hayden Williams at the University of California at Berkeley on Feb. 20, 2019. (University of California Police Department, Berkeley)
The person who attacked conservative activist Hayden Williams at the University of California at Berkeley on Feb. 20, 2019. (University of California Police Department, Berkeley)

“A physical confrontation ensued when one of the two men slapped the phone out of the victim’s hand. The suspect then knocked over the table the victim was at and the two men struggled over the phone. During the incident, the suspect punched the victim several times causing injury to the victim’s eye and nose.”

The attack is the latest in an epidemic of assaults on supporters of President Donald Trump. Breitbart’s John Nolte had tracked 639 such attacks by July last year.

The attacker’s use of the “racist” term is particularly poignant because Trump supporters were falsely accused of racism as a result of the attack on actor Jussie Smollett, which police now say was orchestrated by the actor himself. The media used Smollett’s allegations to attack Trump supporters and the president himself.

There is no evidence that Trump supporters are racists. The label is nevertheless perpetrated by establishment media outlets that have repeatedly rushed to report unverified hoaxes without corroborating the facts.

Prior to the Smollett incident, the media falsely reported on the encounter between Covington high school students and a Native American man who waded into their space beating a drum. One of the children, Nick Sandmann, sued The Washington Post for $250 million over the incident.

Epoch Times reporter Petr Svab contributed to this report.
Correction: A previous version of this article incorrectly stated the date when the incident at UC Berkeley happened. It was on Feb. 19. The Epoch Times regrets the error.
Ivan is the national editor of The Epoch Times. He has reported for The Epoch Times on a variety of topics since 2011.
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