Pennsylvania Republican gubernatorial candidate Scott Wagner made a violent threat toward incumbent Governor Tom Wolf (D) in a campaign video posted to Facebook Friday morning.
Wagner is hoping to unseat Wolf in the Keystone State, which President Donald Trump narrowly won in 2016.
Note the irony of promising to stop on your opponent's face while decrying "negative ads."
“Gov. Wolf, let me tell you, between now and Nov. 6, you better put a catcher’s mask on your face because I’m going to stomp all over your face with golf spikes because I’m going to win this for the state of Pennsylvania,” Wagner said, “and we’re throwing you out of office because you know what, I’m sick and tired of your negative ads.”
Incidentally, Wagner has poured more than $10 million of his own money into the race, and on Thursday announced that he was "tapped out." The latest polls have Wolf leading Walker by more than 20 points.
Watch the full video below:
Nevermind his erratic sports references; Wagner's bluster comes as Republicans have been playing the victim card in response to Democratic opposition of Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation to the Supreme Court.
Social media isn't buying the boohooing of negative ad campaigns by Wagner.
One astute observer noted:
Yeah it is.
Where, then, is the Republican outrage?
While it's true that Hillary Clinton said this week that "you cannot be civil" with Republicans, it fell far short of calling for violence. In fact, it was in response to the constant barrage of attacks coming from Republicans.
Former Attorney General Eric Holder drew the ire of Trump when he said: "when they go low, kick 'em. That’s what the new Democratic Party is about.” But that too can and should be taken as metaphorical, because it relates to discourse, not stomping a person with golf cleats.
Wagner's ad is different and disturbingly specific.
The utter silence from Republicans when one of their own threatens a political opponent with physical harm, coupled with characterizing protests as assaults, is wholly inconsistent.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) on Monday whined that Republican Senators were "literally under assault" by protesters, whom he deemed "the mob," during the Kavanaugh nomination process (they weren't).
"These demonstrators — I'm sure some of them were well-meaning citizens, but many of them were obviously trained to get in our faces, to go to our homes up there, basically almost to attack us in the halls of the Capitol," McConnell said. "So there was a full-scale effort to intimidate as well as to eliminate fundamental notions of fairness and due process, such as the presumption of innocence."
Trump also accused protesters of inciting violence. Last Friday, the president suggested that victims of sexual assault protesting Kavanaugh were "paid professionals only looking to make Senators look bad."
You'll recall retiring Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) snubbing women asking why he won't engage in a dialogue about sexual assault, telling them to "grow up," as he entered an elevator.
Like Trump, Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) also invoked the George Soros card, without evidence, saying last week that the protest "fit his attack mode."
