Sen. Cory Booker says there is “nothing wrong with confronting” Trump administration officials in public — as long as it is done “with love.”
“If I saw an administrator out and about, there’s nothing wrong with confronting that person,” Mr. Booker said Monday on MSNBC’s “Andrea Mitchell Reports.” “But not to lead with love, and to do it in a way that is more reflective of the values that we are trying to reject in our country, is unacceptable to me.”
The New Jersey Democrat was responding to calls from within his party for a campaign of public harassment against members of the Trump administration.
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders was asked to leave the Red Hen restaurant in Lexington, Virginia, on Friday night because of her politics.
The next day, Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters of California called on her supporters to harass members of the White House everywhere from restaurants to gas stations.
“And if you see anybody from that cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out and you create a crowd and you push back on them and you tell them they’re not welcome anymore anywhere,” Ms. Waters said Saturday at a rally.
Mr. Booker, who has been rumored as a contender for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, said the president’s political foes should not be “bystanders” to injustice.
“But we have got to get to a point in our country where we can talk to each other, where we are all seeking a more beloved community,” he said. “And some of those tactics that people are advocating for, to me, don’t reflect that spirit.”
• Bradford Richardson can be reached at brichardson@washingtontimes.com.
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