St. Louis homeowner Mark McCloskey said Tuesday night it’s ridiculous for CNN’s Chris Cuomo to call him the “face of political resistance to the Black Lives Matter movement” for defending his private property.
Mr. McCloskey and his wife Patty — armed with a rifle and pistol — made national headlines over the weekend when they warned off a throng of chanting and screaming activists who funneled into a gated community.
“That’s a completely ridiculous statement,” Mr. McCloskey told the “Cuomo Prime Time” host. ” I am not the face of anything opposing the Black Lives Matters movement. I was a person scared for my life who was protecting my wife, my home, my heart, my livelihood, I was a victim of a mob that came through the gate. I didn’t care what color they were. I didn’t care what their motivation was. I was frightened.”
The homeowner stressed that context is important, given that he witnessed business owners earlier in the month who were forced to fend for themselves when activists brought chaos and destruction to the area.
“I watched the city burn. I watched the 7-Eleven get smashed in, looted and burned for 40 minutes on live television with nobody showing up to do anything,” he continued. “I realized at that time, we’re on our own. When bad things happen, they unpredictably turn real bad, real fast. That same night, retired St. Louis police captain David Doran was murdered. These things get very bad very quickly. When those people came through the gate, when it was a mob, I didn’t take the time to see their birth certificates or anything else, I was defending my — my house, my life, my wife and what I spent 32 years building there.”
Mr. Cuomo responded by suggesting that brandishing weapons prior to incurring property damage was unnecessary.
“I understand what you said your rationale was,” the host replied. “To be clear, did anything happen to you or your property?”
“My life has been ruined. I’ve been target—,” the guest responded before being cut off.
“We’ll get to that, Mr. McCloskey,” Mr. Cuomo said. “I don’t mean to cut you off, but I’m saying that night, did anything happen to you, your family and your property?”
“Yeah, it’s called social intimidation,” the guest replied. “It’s terrorism. Chris, what’s the definition of terrorism? To use violence and intimidation to frighten the public. That’s what was happening that night. That’s what happened to me, and that’s the damage I suffered.”
Mr. McCloskey then blasted Mr. Cuomo for forwarding the notion that BLM activists were only “looking for the mayor’s house.”
“Chris, that’s an entirely false concept,” the guest said, NewsBusters reported. “No single media outlet has ever mentioned the complete falsity of that statement. The mayor’s house cannot be reached through my neighborhood. Lyda Krewson lives up on a road called Lake and Washington. That’s three blocks north and a half a mile west of my house. … They were going through a private neighborhood for the intention of going through a private neighborhood, in my humble opinion.”
Mr. Cuomo insisted that he was being fair and not using his guest “as a pawn to advance my own agenda.”
This is an absolutely perfect shredding of Cuomo’s idiotic and insulting narrative. pic.twitter.com/FM5A5wOOZX
— Jenna Ellis (@JennaEllisEsq) July 1, 2020
• Douglas Ernst can be reached at dernst@washingtontimes.com.
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