August 15, 2014
The St. Clair County Democrats had an unfortunate thing happen at our meetingin Pell City last night. A Republican-funded group, America Rising, sent a videographer to our event. This person is a paid political operative, coordinating with the national Republican Party, Luther Strange and other Republicans. His job is to tape Democratic candidates and upload the footage to the internet, often out of context, where people then post negative comments, attacks, etc.
Last night this America Rising staffer, Chris Cato, signed in to our meeting misrepresenting himself as “Chris Smith” and using the address of the Alabama Democratic Party as his own. He initially identified himself as an independent third party researcher and tried to conceal both his employer and his political affiliation. While our event was open to all persons with an interest in hearing the candidate speak, that invitation did not include political operatives with a subversive interest in smearing Democratic candidates.
Most of our people assumed “Mr. Smith” was with our speaker, Rep. Hubbard; there to film his speech. However, one of Rep.Hubbard’s people recognized the man and asked him to leave. The meeting was already under way. The man refused to leave.
When told who he was after the presentation, I went to this Mr. Smith and questioned his reason for being there. He was mad, abrasive and obviously in a huff. He explained that he worked for a company employed by the national Republican Party. He is told when and where to go and who to film. I politely asked Mr. Smith to leave and he refused, saying he would “just wait for the police.” It was obvious he wanted to incite a confrontation.
When Rep. Hubbard left, the operative left. After all he didn’t come for the coffee, cookies and conversation afterwards.
Our events are open to Democrats, Independents and other members of the public who are interested in the candidates and their positions. With that said, we want to insure an atmosphere wherea candidate can speak freely and people can ask their questions or make statements “off the record”. Our meeting was a private meeting, put on by the St. Clair County Democrat Club, which was open by invitation to the interested public. This operative, the fictional Mr. Smith, violated our privacy. He took advantage of our policy of openness and inclusion. He concealed his real identity, used a false address, and clearly wished to disrupt our assembly.
This incident was just another sneaky, underhanded attempt by the Republican Party to gain some sort of political advantage. This sort of dirty trick appears to be a common Republicantactic: sending a covert operative to sneak into a meeting under a false name and identification to try and record a candidate in an unguarded moment. The entire nation witnessed this same type of slimy practice when Republicans had their agent sneak into a nursing home in Mississippi to film a candidate’s very sick wife. And now they’ve introduced the same reprehensible behavior into our community here in St. Clair County!
We are incensed that this type of thing can happen where we live and vote. In view of this incident, we will be much more guarded in the future regarding those who attend our events. What a sad state of affairs when you have to be on the lookout for dirty tricksters like this!