Home Minority Chief Hakeem Jeffries on Sunday dodged key questions about scandal-scarred Maine Senate hopeful Graham Platner, saying the man Dem and sexy oyster farmer has to reply for himself.
Platner, who’s married and faces a primary-election race Tuesday, was hit early on with revelations of a Nazi-linked tattoo and cheating-by-sext. Then final week got here allegations of deeply disturbing conduct towards feminine companions and him harboring fantasies about raping residence intruders.
“I haven’t adopted these allegations carefully, however what I’ve stated is that violence towards ladies in any manner, form or type is unacceptable,” Jeffries (D-NY) instructed Fox Information’ “The Sunday Briefing,” referring to a few of the explosive accusations towards Platner that grabbed nationwide headlines.
“It’s a pink line, and no person ought to cross that,” Jeffries stated. “Any accuser who comes ahead must be handled with dignity and respect.”
Pressed on the host of Platner’s different scandals, the Brooklyn Dem demurred.
“He’s going to have to talk for himself, and that’s what any candidate, notably in a high-profile race, goes to be referred to as upon to do,” Jeffries stated.
The New York Instances detailed final week’s disturbing accusations from a number of former girlfriends that Platner was very poisonous towards them throughout their time collectively, with one alleging his twisted rape threats.
Ex-gal pal Lyndsey Fifield claimed that the Dem pol yanked her out of a cab throughout an argument and later “twisted her arm behind her again” earlier than locking her in a bed room for an evening.
Fifield, 40, additionally alleged that Platner boasted how he would rape anybody who broke into his residence.
“He stated this loads: ‘If anyone ever broke in right here, I might rape them,’ ” stated Fifield, who dated the Maine candidate from 2013 to 2015.
“He was like, ‘I might rape them to point out them that I’m dominant,’ ” she instructed the Instances, including that Platner would make clear that he wouldn’t be raping the hypothetical intruders in “a sexual manner, not in a homosexual manner.”
He would make the statements whereas watching tv and sharpening an ax, in response to the ex.
Platner has additionally confronted controversy over the tattoo he as soon as had on his chest that resembled a Totenkopf or “demise’s head” image utilized by the Nazi SS. The Marine veteran claims he acquired that whereas drunk in Croatia, didn’t know of its Nazi ties and has since inked over it with a “Celtic knot with some imagery round canine.”
The Instances reviewed personal messages from Fifield in August the place she talked to associates about how Platner “has a Nazi tattoo on his chest.
“I might by no means have recognized what that was,” she instructed the outlet — however Platner would consult with it as “my Totenkopf” and “joke about it being a Nazi tattoo.”
Platner has additionally confronted a torrent of different controversies.
On Reddit, he blasted “all” cops as “bastards,” stated rural white Individuals “truly are” racist and silly, stated a Purple Coronary heart veteran deserved to die and defended urinating on lifeless Taliban our bodies.
Jeffries not less than careworn the significance of combating anti-semitism within the US when pressed about Platner’s current suggestion that his foe, Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) “is purchased and paid for by [Israeli Prime Minister] Benjamin Netanyahu.”
“Hear, the hassle to crush anti-Semitism in America shouldn’t be a partisan situation,” Jeffries stated when grilled about Platner’s railing towards the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC.
“It may’t be a pink or blue situation. It’s a pink, white and blue situation.
“It’s an American situation, and we should always all be dedicated to crushing anti-Semitism and all different types of hatred into the bottom, bury it and ensure it may possibly by no means rise once more,” Jeffries stated.
Platner has a 7.4 proportion level lead over Collins within the newest RealClearPolitics polling combination, though Collins has a historical past of outperforming the polls.
