Hispanic woman assaulted, choked by male Hochul supporter at protest

A Hispanic female supporter of New York Republican gubernatorial candidate Lee Zeldin was assaulted by an unidentified man Saturday during a protest against incumbent Democratic Governor Kathy Hochul. 

The altercation, captured on video by Viral News NY, occurred outside Stonewall Inn in Manhattan where Hochul was making a campaign appearance. The footage shows a large man grabbing the woman by the neck and choking her before violently pushing her into the crowd. 

The woman, identified as Zeldin supporter Angelica Torres, says it began when her sign was suddenly taken from her. 

“I was here holding my sign, and . . . peaceful[ly] protest[ing], against you know, Gov. Hochul, and a woman — a very large heavyset woman, I’m assuming, you know, might have been a man — came and took my sign,” Torres told Viral News NY in a video tweet. 

Torres tried to retrieve her sign, which is when the man choked her. 

“Never wanted to get physical with anyone, I was just there peacefully — just holding my sign — and you know, they didn’t want to hear what I had to say,” she added. 

Video also shows New York Councilwoman Crystal Hudson, a Democrat who represents Prospect Heights in Brooklyn, tussling with Torres, according to the New York Post. 

Violent attacks on Republicans have been escalating amid militant rhetoric by Democrat leaders, including Biden himself.  

Last month, a campaign canvasser for Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) Sunday was brutally attacked by four men for being a Republican while knocking on doors and handing out fliers in Hialeah, Florida. The canvasser was wearing a DeSantis hat and Rubio t-shirt.  

Also last month, two volunteers for GOP Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s gubernatorial campaign were attacked when an unidentified man chased them and tried to drag them out of their car, breaking both side mirrors in the process.  

The incident comes just days after a 41-year-old North Dakota man murdered a teenager because the latter was Republican.    

Shannon Brandt told police that he deliberately ran down 18-year-old Cayler Ellingson with his car because Ellingson was part of a “Republican extremist group,” a phrase Joe Biden and other Democrat officials have been repeating often in recent weeks with increasingly threatening and violent rhetoric.   

Biden has been tweeting relentlessly about “MAGA extremists” and “MAGA Republicans” and declaring them enemies of the state. In an August speech being referred to by some as a “Hitler impression,” Biden stood against a blood red backdrop flanked by US Marines and lashed out against the “threat” of Trump supporters.     

“Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.”     

“But there is no question that the Republican Party today is dominated, driven, and intimidated by Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans, and that is a threat to this country.”     

“MAGA forces are determined to take this country backwards — backwards to an America where there is no right to choose, no right to privacy, no right to contraception, no right to marry who you love. They promote authoritarian leaders, and they fan the flames of political violence that are a threat to our personal rights, to the pursuit of justice, to the rule of law, to the very soul of this country.”     

“They spread fear and lies –- lies told for profit and power.”     

“MAGA Republicans do not respect the Constitution.  They do not believe in the rule of law.  They do not recognize the will of the people.”      

“[They] believe that for them to succeed, everyone else has to fail,” he continued, adding that if not properly dealt with, "MAGA extremists” will turn the country into “a nation of fear, division and darkness.”       

Biden also accused his political opponents of having placed a “dagger to the throat” of the country’s way of life and urged the masses to “stop the assault” being perpetrated by “MAGA Republicans”.     

Last month, Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH), urged people to “kill and confront” the “MAGA movement," and Senator Mazie Hirono (D-HI) called for a literal “call to arms” against Americans who are pro-life.     

“The word ‘hypocrites,’ it doesn’t even go far enough to call them out on what they’re doing,” said Hirono before calling for “literally a call to arms in our country.”