Janelle Irwin Taylor
Hillsborough County Republican Party Chair Jim Waurishuk has spent the past several days rallying against protesters speaking out against police brutality and systemic racism following George Floyd’s murder in Minneapolis, prompting calls to resign from within his own party.
On Tuesday, Waurishuk shared an article about former President Barack Obama’s statements on the protests calling them “a real turning point” in the fight for police reform.
His post was full of fiery rhetoric and claims that protesters were bent on murder. Waurishuk said the post was not aimed at all protesters, just “violent hard core radical political left extremists.”
“Every American better wake up. If we loose (sic) this country you will loose (sic) your life. If you’re a Republican, Conservative, Democrat Trump supporter, etc. — you will be murdered. You will be dragged from your burning home and be beat to death. This is a fact. This what they stand for,” Waurishuk wrote about protesters.
The post claimed Obama admitted “that the coordinated mayhem was all about energizing their base to get out the vote … by any means necessary.”
“This leaves no doubt remaining that the Progressive Political-left Commies are willing t destroy and kill to achieve their goals,” Waurishuk wrote.
The post drew praise from likeminded individuals commenting, but rebuke from the local Republican establishment officials seeking to unite in a time of mass division.
“It seems there was no purpose to that post,” former Hillsborough County Republican Party Chair Deborah Tamargo said. “How does this address issues we’re dealing with today?”
She called his comments “heartbreaking.”
Rep. Jackie Toledo simply called the comments “absolutely unacceptable.”
She wants him to apologize and resign. So does Rep. Jamie Grant.
“I’ve made it clear I’m not going to be a part of the Republican Executive Committee if he’s there,” Grant said. “If the leadership of an organization continues to make provocative statements and I’m affiliated with that organization, at what point are those comments are mine?”
Rep. Lawrence McClure stopped short of calling for his resignation. He figures plenty of others are already doing that, but said the comments were troubling in a time when healing, not division, is needed.
“We need to be having a holistic conversation about how to heal our community,” McClure said. “We don’t need to be putting proverbial gas on the fire.”
It’s no secret Obama is universally loathed within certain sects of the Republican Party. But Waurishuk didn’t stop there.
“Democrats just realized the riots aren’t going to last forever and the economy has already started to rebound. Now they need a new hoax,” he wrote Friday night.
An hour before that he posted an image of rifle bullets with the words “Welcome to rural America. We don’t use rubber bullets.”
In another post, he called protesters “pathetic low-life cowards.”
The same day he said former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, former FBI Director James Comey, former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, former FBI agent Peter Strzok, former FBI attorney Lisa Page, Hillary Clinton, former Attorney General Loretta Lynch, former CIA Director John Brennan, former National Intelligence Director James Clapper, former Fusion GPS contractor Nellie Ohr and “a host of others” should be “remanded into custody to swing on the gallows in the public square.”
“With everything going on in the world today, we need real leaders to call for calm, bring people together and find solutions. Jim’s posts are unbecoming of a leader of the Republican Party. They are symptomatic of a total lack of understanding and leadership. It’s sad his lack of judgement has further weakened us, here locally,” Republican political consultant Anthony Pedicini said.
It’s not the first time Waurishuk has faced criticism and calls to resign within his own party. In 2018, party leaders wanted him to resign after lackluster performance in the midterm elections.
Not only did Waurishuk resist calls to resign, he continued his divisive rhetoric into 2019, posting images and statements on social media that prompted criticism, and in some cases, posts actually being removed. Some of those included images of nooses and actual lynchings, made in reference to the President Donald Trump impeachment hearings, according to Creative Loafing.
Waurishuk did not respond to a request for comment.
11 comments
NoMoTrump
June 6, 2020 at 2:52 pm
How sad, but not surprising, that such a vile person could be voted into public office.
Sam
June 6, 2020 at 4:56 pm
republicans are bat shit crazy, it seems to be the rule not the exception.
Sonja Fitch
June 6, 2020 at 5:02 pm
Omg has this white man od on “Roxie” of the goptrump cult? How does someone in a leadership role be so out of touch with reality? Omg
Jim Donelon
June 6, 2020 at 6:13 pm
This IDIOT is only expressing publicly what most, if not all, Trumpers believe and think. The sadness of this is the result will be the death of the party opposite.
Jim Donelon – President – Democratic Club of St. Petersburg
Puddin
June 6, 2020 at 8:39 pm
From all the comments being made here, y’all are doing the same thing this guy is doing only not on a national scale…hmmmm calling the kettle black are we folks. Just shhhh and look in the mirror. He told some truths in there but the way he did it may not be the best. Question…where is the outrage at the looters??? I’m sure everyone if those people are mourning Mr Floyd right?? By stealing and breaking things that aren’t theirs. Where’s the outrage at the black on black crime??? Oh I can answer that one…..it doesn’t fit the narrative if the blm now does it….talk about racist. Why do they riot in their own communities where black folks own businesses…oooops wrong again predominately other than black businesses are being destroyed…. Why not go after the police departments instead one might ask…. they actually fight back that’s why. Typical good/ thug types is what they are. ….. Now on to the blm… Civil marches… Awesome I agree… There needs to be something done about bad cops period. Aaaahhhh but there is…. He has been arrested. Hmmm system works. Four more year ….four more years….four more years…. It’s coming liberal panty waisting tide pod eating snowflakes…..it’s coming
Rolling My Eyes At The Cuck-A-Luck
June 7, 2020 at 7:13 pm
You’re lucky English isn’t the official language of the United States.
Andrew Nappi
June 7, 2020 at 10:13 am
When will it dawn on all good people that giving your freedom, rights and money to a political party to safeguard has resulted in your having less of all three? Stop being the court jester for the Blue and Red Crime Family game of thrones Florida edition. They are both horrible, horrible organizations who’s only goal is to enforce their brand of authoritarianism on us.
Kevin O'Neill
June 7, 2020 at 10:58 am
Jim Waurishuk might need a PR volunteer, not Peticini, to better deal with the state of American politics, but the mob is murder, not way around that. In artful, I read, but to finally awaken to the stakes at risk at this time, 100 years after the progressive and oligarchs took over US coining via tbe Federal Reserve Act, the non-collateralized currency, the un ending Us Congress spending, the US debt – which will not be paid back, and now, a nationwide riotous rally to “build the Blue Team base”, I would say JimW has awoken. We are at a turning point, and this happends right after the fake pandemic, AKA bad flu. Insanity run wild.
We need to defund all of government, they have destroyed our nation, and otbers, and this needs to stop. Tax Revolt Starts Today!!!
Nancy Pelosi
June 7, 2020 at 4:10 pm
Not all Trump supporters are racists but all racists are Trump supporters! Bat shit crazy doesn’t begin to cover how these white privileged jerks think! Well it is not really thinking – they gave up that when the elected the stupidest man in the world president. Vote the GOP out of every elected office in the state!
Derek
June 8, 2020 at 7:22 am
“Dragged from your burning home and beat to death”. There’s only one group that has used this tactic, the KKK. He’s describing this from the history of what je knows to be true. So he’s speaking on the strategy of terror implemented by the Klan against black communities for decades, so he understands how to incite fear because of what he knows, he’s heard the stories from his KKK friends and ancestors.
Phlunge Pleifmeist
June 8, 2020 at 12:07 am
What an incredible imbecile. A piece of human garbage who is unfortunately, a reflection of his constituency. The really horrifying thing about the Trump phase of American history, is that the least intelligent President in our history has as his rock-solid base, people even less intelligent than he is. Waurishuk is undeniable proof of this.
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