Apparently 38th Virginia Senate District Democrat nominee Mike Hymes has supporters inside the Tazewell Sheriff’s Department. How do we know? Because the geniuses linked to a Mike Hymes hit piece from their official Twitter account, digging the hole a little deeper on his support for gun control.
Hymes and his supporters are desperate to undo the self-inflicted gun rights wound Hymes’ own words have caused. As Norm Leahy at Bearing Drift and Justin Higgins at JHPolitics both posted yesterday, Hymes says one thing publicly about his stance on the Second Amendment, and another thing entirely when in private conversation:
I don’t think you ought to be able to sell somebody an AR-15, either. Because, you know law enforcement should have those kinda things. We’ve had to give our law enforcement in Tazewell County AR-15s because, you know, they go up a holler, some guy’s got one. He’s bought one. Virginia’s gun laws are pretty doggone liberal.”
“I do believe you ought to register handguns, we ought to have something. If they had not let that assault rifle ban drop, then that probably wouldn’t be a problem. So that’s kinda where I am.”
(Emphasis added). Clearly this all by itself is a problem for Hymes in this southwest Virginia district where gun rights are cherished. Making it worse, as Justin points out, is the fact that he appears to have lied to the NRA and the Virginia Citizens Defense League when answering their questions on his positions.
But that doesn’t slow down his supporters one bit…especially, apparently, the same Sheriff in Tazewell County that Hymes made sure got his new AR-15s. The following Tweet appeared on the official Twitter account of the Tazewell Sheriff’s Department (@TazewellSheriff):
Ben Chafin doesn’t know the difference between a rifle and a shotgun http://t.co/e4bnoittOV
— Tazewell Co Sheriff (@TazewellSheriff) July 27, 2014
The link is to a disingenuous hit piece against Hymes’ Republican opponent, Del. Ben Chafin, from a Twitter feed that usually focuses on Amber alerts, Most Wanted photos, and other legitimate law enforcement communications.
If these paragons of public virtue wise up and decide to scrub this blatant electioneering under cover of a constitutional office, you can click here to see a screen capture.
In the meantime, the voters of Tazewell can be grateful about how much easier their choices just got…both for Virginia Senate, and for next year’s Sheriff’s election.
[H/T to Matt Colt Hall]
4 comments
“Ben Chafin doesn’t know the difference between a rifle and a shotgun”
And Tazewell’s Sheriff makes no distinction between public funds and his own. Which is worse?
Just another example of a Democrat who will say anything to anyone to get elected – “If you like your doctor”….
Mike Hymes is running a smear campaign and using lies to do it.
Tsk. I’m no lawyer but isn’t the sheriff’s office use of their county twitter account for personal attacks on political opponents an improper and unlawful use of county resources? BTW they’ve since pulled the tweet down, good foresight on your part to capture and post it!!
Hope Ben Chaflin’s campaign takes full advantage of this gold mine here of the dems’ public stupidity and sliminess.
The voters of Tazewell and Virginia can also be grateful to the Bull Elephant for continuing to bring these matters to our attention; I know I sure am.
As the Tazewell Sheriff’s twitter account is likely maintained by government officials, the time spent to utilize the account for electioneering is a misuse of public property. There is no *minor* violation under Virginia law for misuse of government funds, even for electioneering. Instead there is only a major criminal violation but it requires misuse of over $1,000.00 worth of public property.