Trumpification of all politics: The Lee Zeldin mess should be a career ender. Instead it's a boost.
I’m not a fan of the idea that “Republicans used to have integrity” before Donald Trump, but man … back in my day, Republicans used to exploit veterans for political gain by lionizing them, not maligning them and destroying their lives to smear opponents.
Let’s review the Lee Zeldin controversy. A disturbed Iraq war vet barged onto the stage at a campaign event Thursday. He appeared to try and grab the mike, and when Zeldin pushed him back, the vet responded by poking his “My Kitty self-defense key chain” towards Zeldin. He was promptly taken down and handcuffed.
The vet, 43-year-old David Jakubonis, was charged with attempted second-degree assault and released on his own recognizance that day.
Zeldin and his fetid coterie of right-wingers, in addition to acting like the candidate had nearly been beheaded, blamed bail reform and his opponent, Gov. Kathy Hochul, for his release. “It was within about six hours that this attacker was released,” Zeldin said Monday “His words to me were, ‘You’re done. You’re done. You’re done.”
“It is imperative that we repeal cashless bail in the state,” he concluded.
“If they’re trying to kill you, you must be winning,” tweeted Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene. “They” being the powerful “Veterans for Political Violence With Kitty Keychains,” backed by George Soros and the Hello Kitty industry. Jakubonis told police that he had no idea who Zeldin was, that he’d had an alcoholic relapse, and that he thought he overheard Zeldin smearing veterans.
His release has nothing to do with Kathy Hochul or bail reform, and everything to do with Sandra Doorley, Monroe County District Attorney, who was a co-chair of Zeldin’s campaign and reportedly attended the rally. It’s her office that chose to accept the second degree attempted assault charges.
When I reached out, her spokesperson said police decided on the charges. “Unlike other jurisdictions, in Monroe County police agencies file criminal charges and we receive paperwork after the charges are filed,” Doorley’s spokesperson told me.
Politics reporter Morgan McCay says the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office told her they did not get approval first from the Monroe County District Attorney’s office before they brought forward charges against Jakubonis.
But then the story changed again.
“Update to the update: A Monroe County Assistant District Attorney did agree to the nonviolent felony charges filed by the Monroe County Sheriff's Office before David Jakubonis' arraignment,” McCay wrote on Twitter.
So, a D.A. with personal and professional ties to Zeldin approved low charges guaranteeing Jakubonis would get out. And almost immediately after barely surviving an assassination, Zeldin was frenetically tweeting that his attacker would likely be released because of bail reform. And then when he was released not because of bail reform, but because of the charges processed by DA Doorley’s office, Zeldin continues to double down, blaming bail reform and Hochul.
In all this, a vet who’s clearly having a mental health breakdown, after god knows what he endured in Iraq, has had his face plastered on every tabloid rag in the state and all over cable news. Since the story blew up, he’s been rearrested and faces federal assault charges.
Wow, Democrats must be salivating over the opportunity to tie the national GOP to this lying scumbag who’s abusing an Iraq war veteran to score cheap political points.
If the tables were flipped, and a Democrat had been attacked with a My Kitty Self-defense key chain, Republicans would relentlessly mock him for, well, being a giant pussy.
Hahahhaa. Nope, they’re calling for “civility” and decrying violence in politics.