Gabriel Sterling has had enough.
The Voting Implementation Manager for Georgia, Sterling opened a press briefing today with a two-minute entreaty to outgoing president Donald Trump and Republican Senators to tone down their rhetoric and condemn the violence and threats being made toward election workers, Politico reports.
https://youtu.be/jxpXli3lO2Y
“Mr. President, you have not condemned these actions or this language,” he said. “Senators, you have not condemned this language or these actions. This has to stop. We need you to step up. And if you’re going to take a position of leadership, show some.”
Sterling outlined threats made against the Republican Secretary of State, as well as against a 20-year-old Dominion Voting Systems contractor who had a noose hung outside his house due to multiple debunked conspiracy theories about his employer. Sterling noted that he, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, and Raffensperger’s wife have all received death threats.
The most publicized threat was against Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency director Christopher Krebs, whom Trump lawyer Joe DiGenova said “should be drawn and quartered. Taken out at dawn and shot” during a radio interview Monday. DiGenova later tried to claim he was being hyperbolic. Krebs is looking into legal remedies for the threat.
Sterling put the blame for the violent rhetoric squarely on the shoulders of Donald Trump, whom he characterized as fostering and even encouraging the threats.
“Mr. President, it looks like you likely lost the state of Georgia,” Sterling said. “Stop inspiring people to commit potential acts of violence. Someone is going to get hurt, someone is going to get shot, someone is going to get killed. And it’s not right.”