It’s been a long time since Wisconsin has seen someone as vile as Paul Nehlen run for public office.
Everything about him, from his character to his policy proposals, are detrimental to Wisconsin and the U.S. His latest statements and actions only reaffirm the need to keep him out of any political office.
Last year, this candidate made his flirtations with the alt-right movement public. He retweeted images of the white supremacist rally held in Charlottesville on Twitter. He’s doubling down on his anti-Semitism — Nehlen believes in the conspiracy that the Jewish community controls the media and justified this disgusting point with a list of all his media critics in a Twitter post, claiming out of 81, “74 are Jews, while only 7 are non-Jews.”
Wisconsin GOP congressional candidate Paul Nehlen banned from Twitter, and rightfully so
This hateful tweet, among many others, led Twitter to ban his account.
This wasn’t the only sickening tweet Nehlen sent out. When the National History Museum in London released images of Cheddar Man (a dark-skinned Mesolithic man), Nehlen used them to attack the royal family. He posted the engagement picture of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle with Cheddar Man’s face superimposed on Markle’s, who is biracial. I know Queen Elizabeth II doesn’t get into modern politics, but who would be against a statement from her berating this poor excuse of a human being?
Nehlen’s commentary on race and religion should not be tolerated. Twitter took the completely rational action of banning his account. The Republican Party of Wisconsin has cut ties with Nehlen, who paid membership dues to party chapters in Racine, Kenosha and Walworth countries.
Even Steve Bannon, who has had no problem supporting highly flawed candidates, cut off his support of Nehlen. Joel Pollak, a Breitbart staffer, tweeted Nehlen has “disqualified himself.”
No. We don’t support him. Haven’t covered him in months. I had no real idea of his recent antisemitic statements when we spoke, Jamie, but I’ve since looked into it (and responded). He’s disqualified himself. https://t.co/22JyunCbr1
— Joel B. Pollak (@joelpollak) December 27, 2017
Bannon and his Breitbart team have been Nehlen’s benefactors for the last few years, giving him plenty of favorable articles, which have no doubt encouraged their readers to give him financial support. Their headline of a June article was “Paul Nehlen Launches Another Bid Against Anti-Trump Speaker Paul Ryan.”
Speaker of the House Paul Ryan has helped President Donald Trump get his agenda through Congress plenty of times, from tax reform to the border wall. The idea that Ryan has in no way helped Trump is incorrect and uninformed people are propagating this.
When Nehlen ran against Ryan in the first district Republican primary, he only received 16 percent. While he will get obliterated in this primary, his vote share needs to be far lower this time. That requires as many voters in the first district as possible to go to the polls and make sure Ryan wins by a blowout.
Once in a while, a candidate arises who is of a hateful and destructive nature. Nehlen is that exact kind of a candidate and we don’t need him representing this great state in Congress. It is the job of every Wisconsinite to make sure that those who threaten American principles never get close to power.
John Graber ([email protected]) is a senior majoring in history and political science.
