Senator George Allen, (R) made a campaign stop in Charlottesville Tuesday morning and it was met with controversy.
As Senator Allen was exiting a ballroom, coming to talk to the media, a protestor started yelling and asking, "Why did you spit on your first wife?". He wasn't able to get near the senator as he was tackled by three men wearing Allen stickers, presumed to be staffers. He was pushed and manhandled and ended up on the floor, near windows at the Omni.
Senator Allen went back into a conference room and after the man was removed from the building, we were able to talk to Allen and asked him what he thought of the incident. He responded saying stuff like that happens.
Here is the video link through YouTube.
What I find really disturbing about this incident is that the protestor was pushed and manhandled by three Allen staffers. These staffers had no business in attacking this protestor. These staffers were a part of the hotel security staff, nor were they police officers. These Allen staffers just went in and started attacking this guy.
The Associated Press has some more information regarding this incident. Apparently Allen was attending a campaign event there with North Carolina Sen. Elizabeth Dole. The protester has been identified as Mike Stark, a first-year law student at the University of Virginia. According to the AP story:
On the video, three men, all wearing blue Allen lapel stickers, immediately grabbed the man, dragged him backward and slung him to the carpet outside a hotel meeting room. The video showed one man tackle him. The men are presumed to be staffers, according to Charlottesville TV station WVIR.
The man who tackled the protester said, "Now you're getting personal."
The protester answered by saying he hadn't touched anybody.
From looking at the video, I can't say if the protestor had even touched Senator George Allen or not. What I do see are three staffers assaulting this protestor. This protestor asked a question to Allen of why did Allen spit on his wife. Talking Points Memo has been looking into this part of the story, regarding Allen's divorce to Anne Patrice Rubel in 1983. The records of Allen's divorce have been sealed. TPM Cafe reports that a summons or an arrest warrant was issued to a George Felix Allen by the Albemarle Circuit Court back in 1974. TPM Cafe obtained photos of the arrest warrant log entries through Daily Kos poster CrellMoset. There is no way to know if this "George Felix Allen" is the same Senator Allen of today. All other court records regarding this particular case--which is registered as Case No. 7516K--have been destroyed ten years ago by statute. TPM does say that Senator George Allen was attending the University of Virginia in 1974, located in Charlottsville, VA. Charlottsville is also a part of Albemarle County.
So what does this all mean? Someone named George Felix Allen was issued either a summons or an arrest warrant back in 1974 through the Albermarle County Court. We don't know what this was for. There are no further records.
But there is more here. According to a September 26, 2006 Washington Post article:
RICHMOND, Sept. 25 -- Virginia Sen. George Allen on Monday denied allegations by a college football teammate and another former acquaintance that the senator used a racial epithet to refer to blacks during and after his time at the University of Virginia in the early 1970s.
The accusations by R. Kendall Shelton, 53, a radiologist in North Carolina, and Christopher C. Taylor, 59, an anthropologist at the University of Alabama, reignited questions about Allen and race as he campaigns for reelection against Democrat James Webb.
Shelton said Allen frequently used the "N-word" to describe blacks and nicknamed him "Wizard" because of the similarity of his name to that of Robert Shelton, a former imperial wizard of the Alabama Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. He also recounted an event from 1973 or 1974 in which he, Allen and a third friend, were hunting deer. After the deer was killed, Shelton said, Allen cut off the doe's head, asked for directions to the home of the nearest black person and shoved the head into that person's mailbox.
So even back in 1974, not only are there allegations of Allen using racial slurs, but there is this report of Allen cutting off a deer's head and stuffing into a mailbox of a black person's home. This incident could show that Allen has not only has a racial streak within him, but he could also have a violent streak--a violent streak that may have required the Albermarle County Court to issue an arrest warrant back in 1974? And if so, what could have caused this streak of violence?
Update: The Washington Post is now picking up this story:
Democratic activist who verbally confronted U.S. Sen. George Allen (R) at a campaign rally in Charlottesville today was shoved, put into a chokehold and thrown against a window by three men wearing Allen stickers, according to a widely disseminated video of the incident.
W. Michael Stark, who identified himself in an e-mail after the incident as a law student, yelled a question at Allen about whether he had ever spit on his first wife, an unsubstantiated charge that has been circulating on liberal blogs on the Internet. Allen supporters hauled him away from the senator as television cameras rolled.
"I demand that Senator Allen fire the staffers who beat up a constituent attempting to use his constitutional right to petition his government," Stark wrote in an e-mail. He did not answer his phone or return several messages.
Charlottesville Police Lt. Gary Pleasants said Stark reported the incident today and indicated he wanted to press assault charges against the men. Pleasants said police are investigating and trying to determine the names of the Allen staffers involved.
"We will find out who the people are, give him the information and he can go to the magistrate and try to obtain a warrant for them," Pleasants said.
[....]
Allen aides accused Democrats and the Webb campaign of orchestrating the event as a way of getting news organizations to write about the Internet rumor. "These are the typical Jim Webb tactics," said spokesman Dan Allen, no relation to the senator. "It was disappointing to see, and this certainly has no place in Virginia politics."
Kristian Denny Todd, a Webb spokesman, said Stark has no affiliation with the Webb campaign. "I have no idea who this guy is or what he was trying to accomplish," she said. "I saw the video and from what I saw, he was wrestled to the ground by a bunch of Allen supporters so that is not very nice behavior."
I figured it was a matter of time before the Charlottesville Police would get involved in investigating this incident--especially since there is a video of the assault. It also doesn't surprise me that the Allen campaign is trying to blame this incident on Democratic challenger Jim Webb--gee, is that the same Jim Webb tactic that caused George Allen to make the "Macaca" slur?
And all of this is coming out just one week before election....
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