We May Disagree, But We Need To Remember Our Manners

Former Navy SEAL Jonathan Gilliam is someone who occasionally fills in for David Webb on the David Webb radio show. He is a former Navy SEAL who is well trained in the art of self defense. Recently he was asked to speak in Washington to a group called Women for America First.

The Gateway Pundit posted an article today about what happened next. The quote below is included in the article (the quote is originally from a Breitbart article):

Andrew James Ruder, 37, of Charleston, South Carolina, was arrested for simple assault by the District of Columbia Metropolitan Police Department on Saturday for allegedly hitting and choking a man who attended a pro-President Donald Trump event at the Willard International Hotel, according to a police report obtained by Breitbart News and a spokesperson for the Metropolitan Police Department.

Jonathan Gilliam, a retired Navy SEAL and former FBI special agent who was a speaker at the Women for America First event, is named as the victim of the alleged assault in the police report.

…The police report said Ruder used “Personal Weapons (Hands / Feet)” in the attack: On listed date time and location S-1 lunged in a aggressive manner towards V-1 in which S-2 joined and assaulted V-1 by grabbing his neck causing the listed injury. V-1 was able to defend himself and strike S-1 on the face with a closed fist. S-1 was placed under arrest and transported to the Second District for processing.

Please follow the link above to read the entire article. It details harassment by people who do not support President Trump attending a wedding in the same hotel . We are all entitled to our opinions, but certain behavior needs to be simply out of bounds.

The article reports:

Our event on Saturday evening was rudely disrupted when attendees from a high-profile democrat wedding in the adjacent ballroom repeatedly stalked, harassed, and both verbally and ultimately physically attacked our guests. Throughout the evening, on at least 30 different occasions, our private event was interrupted. One group of our guests trying to locate our event was invited into the room the wedding was being held by a group of women attending the wedding. Once inside, they realized it was the wrong room, but the women told them they should stay because it was a Biden rally and they simply shouldn’t support President Trump. Our guests were repeatedly verbally assaulted with comments such as “is this an actual thing?”, “you should be ashamed of yourselves”, “MAGA Trash”, “Nazis” and “C*nts”. Wedding guests walked into our event as if they belonged there and began bidding on silent auction items. Ultimately hotel security was placed at the door of our event at the end of the night but even that did not deter the wedding guests from antagonizing our group in the hallways or in the restrooms.

As the evening came to a close, our guest speaker, former Navy SEAL and FBI agent, Jonathan T. Gilliam, helped escort our guests out of the venue. During this time, the alleged best man refused to allow people on the elevator saying, “you’re only allowed in if you respect your ovaries”. As Jonathan escorted approximately five of our guests to the lobby of the hotel via the stairs so they could exit the hotel, the alleged best man in the wedding party and several other individuals began verbally taunting him and the women he was protecting, resulting in an altercation. Subsequently, Jonathan was physically attacked by approximately 4-6 other attendees of the wedding party who piled on attempting to choke and beat him, before he was able to break free and counter the attack. After others intervened, including a plain clothed officer, the fight was broken up. Metro DC police responded to the assault within minutes and the alleged best man was arrested.

The abuse by the wedding guests did not stop there. After the police arrested the man, the wedding guests proceeded to confront our guests and screaming to “make things right”. The wedding guests proceeded to the Round Robin Bar where they continued to intimidate members of our group to the point where our members retreated to their rooms to avoid any further attacks.

This is not acceptable behavior by any standards, and the hotel security should have stopped it on the spot by removing anyone harassing the guests. It is my hope that the men guilty of the assault will do some serious jail time and not just a slap on the wrist.