Rokita’s Comments

Editor, Times-Union:
Today I have sent a letter to Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita, in response to comments he made at the Republican Party event at Center Lake Pavilion on Monday, evening, October 6. I was one of the persons demonstrating against some of the current Republican Party policies outside, in front of the pavilion. And I found AG Rokita’s comments about us demonstrators to be both false and deeply disrespectful. The text of my letter to AG Rokita follows. But I wonder if any local Republicans care to disassociate themselves from these sorts of false and demeaning comments about their fellow citizens. If not, why not?
Here’s the text of the letter:
Dear Mr. Rokita:
On Monday evening, October 6, you attended a Republican Party fundraiser and political endorsement event at the Center Lake Pavilion in Warsaw. According to a press report by NewsNowWarsaw, you said, in regard to persons demonstrating outside the pavilion: “Who rented the protesters? These people put illegal aliens above you. These people put criminals on the street above you. They do not like America as we know it. And it’s time to stop coddling.”
I was one of the ca. 30 persons who comprised the “protest” or demonstration. Your comments as quoted by the press are demeaning of your fellow citizens, people like me who love the U.S.A. but who have a different belief about what love of country entails and what it calls for.
No one rented any of the protestors. We are all local residents; no one paid us; we did this on our own time. Your reference to the idea that someone hired us is deeply disrespectful of who we are as loyal citizens of this county and this country. Your implication is untrue.
No one in the group of protestors is putting “illegal aliens” let alone “criminals on the street” above anyone in the pavilion, or, for that matter, anyone else in our community. That’s false.
We demonstrators love the U.S.A. We “like” the U.S.A. and the basic principles under which it was founded as encapsulated in the Constitution. Your claim is false.
What does “stop coddling” imply? Who is no longer to be coddled? This threat is completely inappropriate your office as the chief law enforcement officer of the State of Indiana.
If our country is now a deeply polarized country, and if you wish to work against that polarization, you would apologize to the citizens of Warsaw and Kosciusko County for characterizing those who disagree with you in ways that are simply false. I am afraid, however, that you, sir, are a part of the polarization problem in our state and in our nation.
Jim Eisenbraun
Warsaw, via email