Some of you may remember back in February a little controversy about comments made by Fredy Burgos on Facebook about Christians having a duty to vote for other Christians. That wrong-headed comment sparked a furious uproar across Virginia, leading to near universal condemnation, as well as Mr. Burgos’ removal from RPV State Central Committee. I myself wrote about the incident where I called upon Mr. Burgos to take responsibility and resign his position.
Nowhere, however, was the outrage more vociferously expressed about this than at Bearing Drift, where they wrote piece, after piece, after piece, after piece, after piece, after piece…after piece calling for condemnation of Mr. Burgos and his removal from a place of authority in the Republican Party of Virginia.
Now, however, the shoe is on the other foot, and the silence from certain corners is deafening.
Mat Colt Hall is a senior writer for Bearing Drift, a Ben Cline campaign supporter, and member of Ben Cline’s secret Facebook “nerve center.” On April 27th Matt was on the John Fredericks show talking about the 6th District convention, and referred to Cynthia Dunbar supporters as coming from “narrow-minded, far right church groups.” Here is the audio of those comments:
I would be lying if I said I was surprised about Mr. Hall’s attitude towards Christians. What is surprising, however, is the complete and total lack of reaction from John Fredericks or 6th District Chairman Candidate, Jennifer Brown, who are both sitting right beside Mr. Hall as he makes his salacious insults. Jennifer Brown is a candidate in the upcoming convention and just listened to a huge contingent of the people she is asking to vote for her be insulted for their faith, and she says…nothing.
John Fredericks, who spent nearly 15 minutes on his radio show excoriating Fredy Burgos for his comments, listens to Matt Hall call people of the Christian faith narrow-minded, and says…nothing.
I have added John’s entire comments here so you can listen for yourself. You should really listen to the entire thing. He not only takes Fredy Burgos to task, but he also attacks Tim Hannigan for not coming out immediately and completely condemning Fredy for his comments. He says that Hannigan was not showing leadership, and he withdrew his endorsement of Tim over this issue.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LObUxFSN4TE
Matt Hall is working on behalf of the Cline campaign. By Mr. Frederick’s own standards, shouldn’t Ben Cline immediately condemn this outrageous attack against Christians? Furthermore, where is John’s outrage? Matt Hall said this during a conversation he was having directly with John on his radio show.
So what has the response of the Cline campaign been so far? Here’s Ben Cline Regional Director, Josiah Tillet, on the issue:
and again:
Here is Vice Chairman of the Harrisonburg Republican Committee, and Ben Cline supporter, Jeffrey Mayfield:
Denials to the contrary, Matt Hall seems to be a lot closer to the Cline campaign than Mr. Tillet or Mr. Mayfield would lead you to believe:
So just what is the meme that has these poor snowflakes so triggered?
Whether they like Matt Hall being associated with the Cline campaign or not, this meme is nowhere near as offensive as this one, which is just a sample of things posted by another Ben Cline supporter:
What you don’t see in these statements by Tillet and Mayfield is any condemnation for what Matt actually said. In fact, there has been no condemnation for any of the horrible things said or done by supporters of the Cline campaign.
Is the condemnation of anti-religious statements only limited to when a Christian says something stupid about non-Christians? Are the demands for removal of the offender from a campaign only applicable when it is the campaign of someone the person who is claiming offense by these statements doesn’t support? Is there a double standard at work here for the “right kind of people” who are working for the “right kind of campaigns?”
Whether they are on the payroll or not, whether they are part of a secret, Ben Cline “nerve center” Facebook group or not, there has been a sea of sludge pouring out of people who support Ben Cline for Congress and it has all been pointed at Cynthia Dunbar. At some point Mr. Cline needs to step forward publicly and either condemn the nasty and offensive statements, memes, and tactics waged on his behalf, or he needs to own them. If he doesn’t support these things, then he needs to tell his supporters to knock it off. I imagine if Ben made a public statement calling for his supporters to run a clean campaign, they would do it.
After all, if people can try to hold Tim Hannigan responsible for the statements of his supporters, Ben Cline can be held responsible for the statements and actions of his.
One more double standard to throw onto the heap before I end this. Bearing Drift posted all of their pieces on the Burgos affair anonymously, simply using “Bearing Drift” as the author, or even in one case using “Publius” as a moniker. For all we know, Matt Hall could have written them all himself. Well here is what Mr. Hall had to say about the use of “anonymous sources” back in 2017:
I guess that doesn’t apply to Bearing Drift when they are attacking other Republicans, or allowing rival campaigns to post over half a dozen hit pieces against Cynthia Dunbar under a fake name.
