Driver Plows Through GOP Tent Registering Voters in Jacksonville, Florida

GOP Voter Registration Tent Attacked
Twitter/@DuvalGOP
Hannah Knudsen

The Republican Party of Duval County was left shaken Saturday after a man allegedly drove his van through its voter registration tent in a Walmart parking lot, took a video of what he had done, and flipped off volunteers before fleeing the scene.

The Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office (JSO) is investigating the incident that transpired at the Kernan Village shopping center, in Jacksonville, Florida, where six volunteers were running a voter registration drive. According to the police department, a white male in his early 20s approached the table and tent Saturday afternoon in what Action News Jax describes as an “older brown van.” He proceeded to drive through the table and tent, took a video, and flipped off the victims, none of whom were injured.

“JSO is saying that intelligence detectives will be looking into this as an aggravated assault case, as several people could have been seriously hurt,” the local media outlet reported:

Action News Jax reports that authorities “do not know if the motivation of the suspect was political in nature” due to the early stages of the investigation. He has yet to be identified.

The Republican Party of Duval County said it will “redouble its efforts to register voters and will continue it’s [sic] fight with renewed intensity to re-elect President Donald Trump”:

Florida Sens. Rick Scott (R-FL) and Marco Rubio (R-FL) responded to the incident on social media.

Scott shared the Duval County GOP’s post on Twitter, noting that it “appears to be a politically-motivated attack on hard-working volunteers in Duval County.”

“Thankful that no one was hurt. @DuvalGOP will not be silenced or intimidated. They will redouble their efforts to support strong Republicans in NE Florida and around the state!” he said:

“Thanking God that no one was injured in today’s politically motivated attack against @DuvalGOP volunteers today,” Rubio wrote:

“We are outraged by this senseless act of violence toward our great volunteers,” Duval GOP Chairman Dean Black said, according to Action News Jax.

Black added:

The Republican Party of Duval County will not be intimidated by these cowards and we will not be silenced. I call on every Republican in our great city to stand up, get involved, and show these radicals that we will not be intimidated from exercising our Constitutional rights.

Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry also condemned the attack and “toxic and dangerous” hate that led to it.

“I just spoke to the local GOP chair. This is outrageous. The hate is toxic and dangerous. Thankfully no one was injured but certainly, they are shaken after being targeted because they were registering voters,” he wrote.

“I’ve spoken to the Sheriff and of course his team is on top of this,” he added:

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