As of today, the big news is still the Florida shooting and the Mueller indictments and the resulting chaos emanating from an incompetent and unprepared Trump administration. Hopefully the GOP’s lack of urgency will echo until November and the country can elect enough responsible and ethical people who will take gun control seriously as a solution to the problem of too many people having easy access to too many guns. The Mueller indictments are just a prelude to the actual crimes that will be eventually be uncovered (even if not prosecuted) over the next year. I wrote about Joe Wilson’s history with Russia here if you care to read it; he has a long history of defending Russia and Putin that makes me feel uncomfortable.
But for now, I’d like to go through some press updates, public statements and news stories from the past week on the Democratic candidates, Annabelle Robertson and Sean Carrigan, running in the June primary and the current Republican Representative Joe Wilson against whom one of the Democrats will be running. I plan on doing this regularly up until the November election.
Annabelle Robertson:
On Twitter: Robertson hit Trump hard early in the week on multiple issues, including DACA, the Trump budget cuts and of course the Rob Porter/domestic violence disaster. Unfortunately, she tapered off and only indirectly mentioned the Parkland shooting while completely ignoring the Mueller indictments. With Wilson’s long association with Russia, it might have benefited her with South Carolina voters to come out stronger than this against the election interference.
On Facebook: Again, early in the week, there was a very strong statement against Rob Porter and domestic violence but not much else. On Saturday, Robertson had a minor event at the Aiken Black History parade on Saturday, meeting with the public and spreading the word.
Sean Carrigan:
On Twitter: At the start of the week, Carrigan had firm posts on the Trump budget cuts but really opened up on the Parkland shooting and the GOP’s resistance to taking action on gun control, including an actual plan for addressing gun violence. He also directly went after Joe Wilson for bragging about receiving a 100% from the Family Research Council (see below for more on that) in multiple tweets, which sparked some real interest. Connecting Wilson to trending topics like Russia, LGBTQ issues and gun control could generate an uptick in national donations so this is encouraging.
On Facebook: Carrigan had quite a few posts on Facebook this week, including some on domestic violence, Parkland, and the FRC’s 100% rating for Joe Wilson. He picked up an endorsement from Demand Universal Healthcare, an advocacy group for “National Improved Medicare for All”. He also attended meetings with the Richland Democratic Women’s Council and the Irmo Dems, while managing to hit both the Richland County and Lexington County Democratic Party conventions.
Joe Wilson:
On Twitter: Wilson spent the early week visiting local businesses in an effort to push the narrative the the Tax Cuts and Jobs act is not just a tax cut for the wealthy but had time to praise the Trump budget for everything except the South Carolina cuts. He was “deeply saddened” at the Parkland shooting and said “words will never be enough”...then remained silent up until today. Even though Wilson has not received a huge amount in donations from the NRA, he has a horrible voting record on gun control legislation. He did have time to brag about receiving a 100% rating from the Family Research Council (which has been classified as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center) and complain that America isn’t doing enough to fight China as a global rival (Did I mention Wilson has a real problem making negative statements about Russia?). Wilson did not mention the Mueller indictments at all, which should be no surprise either; I predict Wilson will never go against Russia due to his long-term connections there.
On Facebook:
Pretty much a carbon copy of the Twitter feed. Trump budget praise, trying to convince people they aren’t getting screwed by the GOP tax cuts, the Parkland shooting, and bragging about a hate group endorsing him 100%. No ideas for addressing gun violence, no condemnation of domestic violence, no outrage (pretend or otherwise) over Russian interference in the election. To be honest, I believe Wilson thinks he can fly under the radar and so long as he does not have some sort of interaction that goes viral (Chaffetz and the I-Phone, Ryan and $1.50 tweet, etc.), he will be able to outlast any Democratic challenger in November due to gerrymandering, suspicious social media assistance and a huge advantage in funding due to both his corporate and wealthy private donors.
As always, I encourage everyone to do some research into both Annabelle Robertson and Sean Carrigan; figure out which one suits you and decide in the June primary election. After that, support WHICHEVER Democratic candidate wins the primary!!! Joe Wilson already has a huge advantage by being the incumbent and having a vastly superior supply and source of funds. The only way to beat him is through grassroots action and community efforts and that means YOU!