CenLamar

As former Senator George Allen taught us, when you’re on the campaign trail, you should be mindful and respectful of people who are attending your public events, even when they are there to document your speeches on videotape and even if they may not support you.

Campaigns should also make a concerted effort to tell supporters to be mindful and respectful of everyone in the audience. In Allen’s case, no one pushed or shoved the young man who was recording; Allen himself attempted to publicly humiliate the young man, an Indian-American, by referring to him as “macaca,” an obvious ethnic slur.

Campaign events are typically free and open to the public. They typically encourage people to bring video and photographic cameras; they want people to document the event. It has become an important component of the campaign process: documentation, uploading campaign photos onto the Internet, viral videos.

And because campaign events are often free and open to the public, they are also free and open to people who wish to document the event, like the young man at the Allen event, to help the opposition. Allen had known this young man was there at the behest of Jim Webb, but he also understood that it was the right of this young man to document a public event held by a sitting United States Senator.

But, in this year’s race for governor, there have been at least two instances of Democrats either being harassed or thrown out of Jindal’s events, events that were free and open to the public, events that featured an elected Representative of the State of Louisiana, for simply attempting to document what was being said. It is important to note that other people were allowed to take photographs or videotape, and the media had been invited so that they too could document these events.

Five days ago, the Louisiana Democratic Party uploaded a series of three videos documenting a young woman who attended a public event in Lake Charles at Barney’s Police and Hunting Supply on April 5, 2007. This young woman had been somehow identified as a member of the Democratic Party. I do not know this young woman, but I am told that she is petite and that during this event, she was pushed, blockaded, and stepped on by NRA supporters at a public event featuring at least two elected officials, Bobby Jindal and David Vitter.

The footage is somewhat jumbled. At the 46 second mark of Volume One, the young woman whispers, “They pushed me into the guy behind me.” At 2 minute and 38 second mark, we hear another voice tell someone nearby, “You gotta move over, tiger. This young lady behind you can’t see.”

Volume 3 shows the comical efforts of these supporters to prevent this young woman from capturing any footage. Notice the way in which two people hold up clipboards in order to purposely block this young woman’s view. Such actions were meant to be intimidating, and much like the story of the LSU student removed from the Jindal rally (more on that later), this type of behavior should not be endorsed or tolerated by any candidate or elected official, regardless of their party affiliation.

Ironically, during this event, we hear Senator Vitter speak about our fundamental freedoms and “the core of our personal liberty as Americans.” I wonder whether Vitter, Jindal, or the NRA have the same passion for the First Amendment as they apparently have for the Second Amendment.