The “magenta pink” powdered tempera paint scattered by two climate change activists on Wednesday posed no threat as it fell upon the helium-filled glass encasements that protect the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution, and the Bill or Rights on display in the rotunda at the National Archives in Washington, D.C.
The two vandals, identified in court papers as Donald Zepeda and Jackson Green, were arrested for destruction of federal government property, though the only significant damage was to the plans of the tourists who were turned away when the rotunda was closed for cleaning.
But that did not stop a Republican party official who is among Donald Trump’s most passionate supporters from calling for the protesters’ immediate execution.
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“Hang them—and then display their lifeless bodies as a warning to others,” Anthony Sabatini, a congressional candidate and the GOP chair in Lake County, Florida, declared on X.
Sabatini actually told The Daily Beast on Thursday that capital punishment should apply to anybody who even attempts to destroy “an original founding document.”
“I think any sane, self-respecting country would assign the death penalty to a crime like that,” he said, sounding something quite far from sane.
In his view, that should apply to the duo in the rotunda even though the precious parchment was not in any danger.
“If the glass or the structure which holds the Constitution is so strong that it did not damage the U.S. Constitution, I don’t think those guys would’ve known that,” he said. “They wouldn’t have been able to predict that.”
Yet while he calls for the execution of Zepeda and Green for scattering harmless powder at the Charters of Freedom display, Sabatini is demanding the immediate release of a teen who defaced an expression of certain rights protected by the Constitution.
On Feb. 4, 19-year-old Dylan Brewer was arrested for using the tires of his pick-up truck to inscribe what the Delray Beach, Florida, police called “multiple burnouts” in an intersection painted with an LGBTQ pride flag.
“The reckless action caused significant damage to the streetscape painting, which serves as a symbol of unity and inclusivity for the LGBTQ community,” the police said in a Feb. 12 statement.
Two days later, Sabatini posted a statement of his own. He demanded that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis “ISSUE AN IMMEDIATE FULL PARDON TO POLITICAL PRISONER DYLAN BREWER, WHO HAS BEEN ARRESTED FOR THE FAKE CRIME OF DRIVING OVER LGBTQ GRAFFITI PAINTED ON OUR CITY STREETS.”
“DESANTIS & THE FLORIDA LEGISLATURE HAVE ALLOWED FAR LEFT CITIES TO PAINT LEFTIST GRAFFITI ON OUR STREETS & TO ARREST THOSE WHO DISAGREE,” Sabatini continued. “FLORIDA LEGISLATORS—DO SOMETHING FOR ONCE & SPEAK UP!.”
In his mind, Brewer was just protesting. But Sabatini has shown no such tolerance toward other demonstrators. In June 2020, he posted a photo of an AR-15 with a menacing message: “Attention potential ‘protesters’ coming near Lake County, FL. This is an AR-15—this will be a very common sight upon illegal entry at any Lake County business—FYI!”
That November, he tweeted about a teen who had fatally shot two unarmed protesters with an assault rifle in Wisconsin: “KYLE RITTENHOUSE FOR CONGRESS.”
Sabatini has experience with protesting himself. His first child was 3 weeks old when he left his wife and newborn to drive to New York, where Donald Trump was being arraigned for paying hush money to a porn star. Sabatini stood outside the courthouse in downtown Manhattan in support of the disgraced ex-president.
“It’s a bad day for America, one of the worst days in American history,” he told reporters.
When the judge in the hush money case announced on Thursday that the trial will begin on March 25, Sabatini was back home in Florida. He had polished his MAGA credentials there by becoming one of the first GOP officials to buck DeSantis and come out for Trump in the 2024 campaign.
Sabatini is now challenging a relatively moderate Republican, U.S. Rep. Daniel Webster, in this year’s primary. He has denounced Webster for voting to expel George Santos from Congress—thereby “handing his seat to a radical leftist Democrat & narrowing our majority—a huge win for Biden.”
“EVERY Republican that voted to expel Santos played into the Democrat’s hands and must be removed from Congress!” Sabatini said on X.
Never mind that Santos had besmirched his oath to “support and defend the Constitution” and “bear true faith and allegiance to the same.” Also never mind that Trump has continually violated his oath to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States” and now wants to come back for another term.
Sabatini was asked by The Daily Beast about those of us who feel Trump undermines the principles displayed on parchment in the National Archives. “I obviously disagree with them,” Sabatini said. “I’m a conservative Republican.”
Zepeda and Green, whom Sabatini wanted executed for scattering harmless powdered paint at the Charters of Freedom, were questioned by the FBI at a D.C. lock-up late Wednesday. Court papers say Green told the agents he was with a group called Declare Emergency and his actions were meant to “bring awareness.” The court papers note that the FBI “immediately took notice that Green was covered head to toe with magenta-colored powder, some of which rubbed off on the Miranda rights form he signed.”
But not a speck of it had fallen on the sacred documents Trump and his followers routinely desecrate in spirit.
