Donald Trump‘s campaign manager Corey Lewandowski has been under fire ever since he grabbed former Breitbart reporter Michelle Fields’ arm while she was covering a Trump event. Lewandowski has since been charged with misdemeanor battery for the incident, and his boss has defended him against such a charge.
Now, Trump and Lewandowski have an unlikely champion, Real Time host Bill Maher. Here’s the outrage he expressed about the incident, as shown in the video above:
“If you cut in line in a bathroom at a nightclub, and somebody did that to you, would there be an assault charge?… Nobody can take someone’s arm anymore in America? That’s assault?”
Even if Bill Maher has a point, what Lewandowski allegedly did is arguably unbecoming of a presidential candidate’s campaign manager. Also, as the Daily Beast points out, Lewandowski was charged with “simple battery,” so if the cutting in the bathroom line included intentionally touching or striking someone against their will, even if it doesn’t involve serious injury, then probably? At least under the law?
Maher also takes it to a personal level with Michelle Fields:
“And this woman said, and she was talking about the whole event, she said, ‘This has to be, aside from my father’s death, the worst experience I’ve gone through,’ and I thought, ‘What a charmed, lucky, clueless white girl life you have lived if that’s the worst thing that happened to you.’ Do we have to politicize everything?”
Again, we’re talking about a major figure in the Republican frontrunner’s presidential campaign. Sure, Fields wasn’t ultimately hurt seriously, but what she experienced is worth examining anyway, especially in the context of other violent incidents at Trump events.
(via Daily Beast)