It's been months since a mob of pro-Trump extremists stormed the United States Capitol to prevent the peaceful transfer of power, but an unignorable faction of the Republican party continues to endorse taking arms against a functional democracy.
Republican Steve Lynch—a candidate in for Northampton County executive—is just the most recent Republican to call for the intimidation of municipal elected officials.
Amid a growing wave of right-wing disinformation regarding the pandemic that's killed over 600 thousand Americans, school board members across the country have faced unhinged diatribes and threats of violence from their communities in response to basic pandemic safety guidelines, such as the wearing of masks in schools.
In a speech to supporters, Lynch vowed to assemble "strong men" to intimidate school board members into resigning.
Watch below.
Lynch said:
"I'm going in with 20 strong men, I'm going to speak to the school board and I'm going to give them an option. They can leave or they can be removed. And then after that we're going to replace them with nine parents and we're going to vote down the mask mandates that evening."
He went on to publicly fantasize about fighting imaginary criminals supposedly targeting his family:
"When I see criminals trying to take my wife and my beautiful children, everything that they're gonna do, you're gonna have to take my life. There's no way. I'll die on this hill. There's no way. No way."
Lynch was met with cheers from the crowd.
But social media users found his tirade alarming.
People deemed Lynch a fascist.
Chilling.
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