After information broke Friday morning that Paul Pelosi was violently assaulted, Fox Information wasted no time in pushing the GOP’s midterm message that crime is random and will strike at any second — even for what turned out to be a focused assault on the house of Home Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).
With scant public particulars on what precisely occurred to Paul Pelosi, Fox Information host Invoice Hemmer stated it was essential to speak about how rampant crime is generally.
“Crime hits all people,” Hemmer stated, including moments later, “This could occur anyplace, crime is random and that’s why it’s such a big a part of this election story.”
Fox Information later brought on Michael Shellenberger, an writer who claims progressivism is linked to drug dependancy and psychological sickness. He stated the assault on Paul Pelosi needs to be seen as “a wake-up name” that crime impacts all people.
“We’re in a criminal offense disaster in our nation as a result of we demoralize the police,” stated Shellenberger, rattling off San Francisco crime statistics. “We now have mainly stated to police that they’re the enemy.”
Fox Information host John Roberts chimed in, “This particular person isn’t protected in opposition to being assaulted, what are common people there in San Francisco to do?”
In one more section, a Fox Information panelist wondered aloud why President Joe Biden condemned the assault in opposition to Paul Pelosi, which concerned a hammer, however didn’t condemn “1000’s” of different hammer assaults within the metropolis.
That is exactly the political message that Republicans have settled on for the midterm elections. Home GOP leaders routinely accuse Democrats of driving up crime. Republicans have turned to crime fear-mongering to carry weak Senate seats in states like Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, the place the GOP has deserted any promoting on financial points in favor of over-the-top and generally deceptive advertisements about crime.
Within the week of Sept. 10-17, a full 48% of the GOP’s digital promoting in battleground states handled crime, based on knowledge compiled by Priorities USA, a Democratic tremendous PAC.
Man Cecil, the chair of the Democratic tremendous PAC Priorities USA, instructed HuffPost final month that the GOP’s bid to usually scare folks about crime is a tried and trusted technique.
“This isn’t a brand new method for the Republican Social gathering,” Cecil stated. “It occurs each single election: race-baiting, fear-mongering, divisive ways.”
The assault on Paul Pelosi will not be an instance of a random crime. A person broke into the Pelosi dwelling in the course of the night time shouting, “The place is Nancy? The place is Nancy?” based on studies. When the person found the Home speaker was not there, he reportedly attacked Paul Pelosi with a hammer, tried to tie him up and stated he would wait “till Nancy obtained dwelling.”
Regulation enforcement officers have recognized the suspect within the assault as 42-year-old David DePape of Berkeley. Weblog posts that look like from DePape recommend he underwent right-wing radicalization in current months.
The Home speaker has lengthy been the topic of ire from the proper and was focused when a mob of former President Donald Trump’s supporters broke into the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.), whose district consists of a part of San Francisco, appeared to recommend Friday morning that the assault could have come from a Trump supporter.
“Whereas the motive continues to be unknown we all know the place this type of violence is sanctioned and modeled,” Speier tweeted.