A HISTORY OF VIOLENCE MARCH 11, 2016 9:43 AM
BY TINA NGUYEN
http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/03/donald-trump-protesters-rally-violenceTo understand the culture of violence surrounding Donald Trump’s campaign, look no further than his surrogates. Asked about a video showing an elderly Trump supporter sucker-punching a black protestor in the face during a rally, Andy Dean, a Trump super-fan and former Apprentice contestant who frequently appears on cable news to sing the candidate’s praises, had nothing but good things to say Thursday about the assault. “That guy’s 78 and throwing a punch like that?” Dean enthused to an aghast CNN panel. “At his age, we must say that that is very, very interesting.”
The assault by John McGraw, who was later arrested after bragging to Inside Edition shortly after the confrontation that the protester "deserved it" and "next time, we might have to kill him," is only the latest in a series of violent and frightening incidents at Trump rallies of late. Last week, some two dozen Black Lives Matter protesters were forcibly expelled from a Trump event in New Orleans, following a week in which the Republican front-runner initially refused to condemn the Ku Klux Klan and former K.K.K. leader David Duke. The week before, about 30 black student protesters were ejected from another Trump rally in Georgia (local police said they were directed to remove them at the campaign’s request); a similar incident occurred the next day in Louisville as supporters who identified as members of a white nationalist group aggressively shoved a black protester toward the door as she was reportedly called racial slurs. Two weeks earlier, Trump had suggested to his supporters at a rally in Las Vegas that he’d like to punch one protester in the face, reminiscing about the “good old days” when agitators would be carried out on a stretcher.
“So if you see somebody getting ready to throw a tomato, knock the crap out of ’em, would you?” he urged the crowd at another rally last month in Iowa. “I promise you, I will pay for the legal fees. I promise. I promise.”
Bodily violence, whether real or suggested, has been a recurring theme of Trump’s rallies since the early days of his campaign, when he instructed his personal security detail to forcibly remove Univision anchor Jorge Ramos from a press conference. Journalists who are allowed into Trump’s events are consigned to designated press pens, which the candidate frequently points to during rallies, inciting jeers from the crowd. In late February, Trump took his hostile relationship with the press further, openly floating the idea of expanding libel laws to make it easier to sue the media and “make lots of money” doing so. Last week, a Time photographer was choked and slammed to the ground by a Secret Service agent for drifting outside the designated media zone. Trump, meanwhile, has begun asking his supporters to raise their hands and recite loyalty pledges in moments that recall Leni Riefenstahl. The laundry list of violence has grown so long that The New York Times dedicated an entire article to the dangers of protesting a Donald Trump rally.
Physical altercations at Trump campaign events have not been limited to violent interactions between Trump supporters and protesters, or security and journalists, either. On Tuesday, Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski allegedly injured Breitbart reporter Michelle Fields when he grabbed her arm as she attempted to ask Trump a question. The Daily Beast reported his grip was hard enough to leave a “purple bruise.” Lewandowski, according to the outlet, told Breitbart’s Washington political editor, Matthew Boyle, that “he and Fields had never met before and that he didn’t recognize her as a Breitbart reporter, instead mistaking her for an adversarial member of the mainstream media.” In a statement, Larry Solov, the C.E.O. of the right-wing news site, called on Lewandowski to apologize to Fields if he had in fact been the one who grabbed her. Breitbart editor-at-large Ben Shapiro went one step further, demanding that Lewandowski be fired and urging Fields to file a police report. “By the way, ‘we didn’t know she was Breitbart’ is an insane excuse,” said Shapiro. “So you now get to assault journalists from other outlets? What the hell?”
When asked for comment, the Trump campaign called the allegations “entirely false” and implied that Fields had a history of “exaggerating incidents.” (Update: 3:00 P.M.: A new report from Breitbart, published Friday afternoon, suggests the man who grabbed Fields was a member of Trump’s security team, rather than Lewandowski, although the exact details of the altercation remain unclear from recently released video.)
Although Politico published a transcript later Thursday of an audio recording allegedly documenting the incident, Donald Trump personally dismissed Fields when asked about the incident. “Everybody said nothing happened,” Trump told reporters after Thursday night’s CNN debate. “Perhaps she made the story up, I think that’s what happened.”
Trump’s know-nothing attitude extended to the debate itself, during which CNN’s Jake Tapper asked him if he bore responsibly for creating an environment in which violence is encouraged. “I hope not,“ Trump responded, then quickly pivoting, saying, “They see what’s going on in this country, they have anger that’s unbelievable.” And when he was pressed to account for his own statements appearing to encourage violence at his rallies, Trump suggested the protesters were asking for it. “We have some protesters who are bad dudes, they have done bad things,” he replied. “They are swinging, they are really dangerous and they get in there and they start hitting people. . . . And if they’ve got to be taken out, to be honest, I mean, we have to run something.”
Marco Rubio, whose campaign is clinging to life and desperately needed a big moment against Trump, remained silent, while John Kasich quietly acknowledged the violence and offered a mild rebuke. Ted Cruz, on the other hand, seemed to embrace it, blaming Americans’ rage on Barack Obama, who he called an emperor. “How many of y’all feel disrespected by Washington?” he said, turning to the television camera to address the audience watching at home.
Update (4:50 P.M.): On Friday, a Trump rally in St. Louis turned violent, as supporters waiting in line to see the candidate clashed with protesters outside. At least one protester was bloodied in a physical altercation, according to MSNBC reporter Trymaine Lee, who videotaped the man being led away by police.
Inside the rally, Politico reported, Trump called the protesters “so bad for our country," and recalled a time where “there used to be consequences" for protestors.
Update (9:29 P.M.): Trump was forced to postpone a Chicago rally after thousands of protestors flooded the University of Illinois-Chicago to shut it down, with violence breaking out on the stadium floor between security personnel, police, Trump supporters, and demonstrators.
Cable news captured the agitation as it erupted on the floor and spilled outside the stadium, and according to the New York Times, several Trump supporters, some who had traveled for hours to attend, were "stunned" when the campaign made the announcement that the rally was canceled. "Thank you very much for your attendance and please go in peace,"
In a call to CNN, Trump said that his campaign had made the "wise decision" to postpone the rally "even though our freedom of speech was violated, totally."
"I don't have regrets" about his rhetoric, Trump said, and argued that the protesters themselves were "very, very bad protesters...nobody mentions when the protesters are violent protesters. It happens. Not often but it happens."
John Kerry after the Democratic National Convention at the University of Massachusetts Boston, on July 29, 2004.
