There’s a question that Donald Trump needs to answer immediately, and here it is: Why in the world did he recently hold a campaign event at a location in New York that was once the scene of a hate crime perpetrated against an immigrant from Ecuador? What message was he trying to send with such an appearance at such a place?
As Rachel Maddow pointed out last night on her show:
“In presidential politicking, symbolism is a deliberate choice. And racial provocation is something with a deep and resonant history. It is one thing to do that as a small-fry politician; it is another thing to do it as a front-runner for a major party’s presidential nomination. Being a presidential front-runner is a powerful thing. It can also be a dangerous thing if you want it to be.”
Some background will help to better understand exactly what Trump did with his campaign rally in Patchogue, New York: In 2008, a young Ecuadoran immigrant, Marcelo Lucero, was attacked by a group of seven teenagers and stabbed to death. Jeffrey Conroy, who was 17 years old at the time of the attack, was convicted of first-degree manslaughter and sentenced to 25 years in prison. The attack was also classified as a hate crime and Conroy was prosecuted under that statute as well.
Shortly after Lucero’s brutal death, Latino residents of Patchogue confirmed that the attack against him one of several that had taken place in the town. So why would Trump dare to appear at a Suffolk County Republican Party fundraiser located not far from the train station where Lucero was killed in cold blood? What is the larger message being sent by Trump to his fellow New Yorkers and Americans?
Maddow has an idea:
“Patchogue’s history of racist and fatal hate crimes against Latino immigrants is not necessarily a nationally-famous story. But it is a New York-famous story. Donald Trump has not yet won the Republican nomination — he’s still trying to win the New York primary — but campaigning in Patchogue today on the street where Marcelo Lucero was murdered, it means something specific in New York.”
Allow me to be a bit more specific than Rachel Maddow was. The message Trump is sending is this one: I want to do the same thing to all the Hispanics in this country. If they don’t like it, we’ll just kill them all.
Trump may talk about building a wall, but what he really wants to do is use an iron fist–or a knife, a gun, a metal pipe– to beat down and destroy everyone he dislikes or dares to oppose him.
Watch the Segment From Last Night’s “Rachel Maddow Show”
Featured Image Via Flickr available under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic License
