Well, it turns out DeSantis and his Never Back Down campaign fears more than a fictional mouse. Teenage political junkies who see it as their civic duty to show up at campaign events and ask actual good questions during Q&A time are something to be feared too. Look, like so many others I’ve had issues with Iowa and NH, two relatively lightly populated and not at all demographically mixed enough to represent the broader United States having such an outsized role in the Presidential primary selection process. Still, there’s a value to what’s known as “retail politics” where candidates wind up being forced sometimes into unscripted moments with voters. It gives us a sense of how/whether they truly can empathize with the public they claim they want to serve.
New Hampshire is particularly quirky, and also geographically small. I’ve only been there once and found it to be a beautiful place, with down to earth people yet people who are strong minded and tend to not simply go along with what they are told. Having grown up eight miles from the Mississippi River with Missouri on the other side after spending almost a week in NH I’ve often thought Missouri’s “The Show Me State” motto applied more to NH. People want to meet candidates up close and interact with them. They take their role in vetting candidates, how genuine they are seriously.
“People” includes teenagers, and sometimes even a bit younger than that.
This brings us to the story you can read in The Daily Beast of now fifteen year old Quinn Mitchell of New Hampshire. Mitchell started showing up at campaign events back in 2019 and has seen/interacted with several dozen Presidential candidates. It seems he does his homework and asks good questions. Over the years he’s kind of become known for it and candidates have tended to give him his due. No one had thought he was a threat. At least no one before Ron DeSantis came around. As noted in the article:
It all started with a straightforward question. In June, when DeSantis stopped for a town hall event in Hollis, Mitchell raised his hand in the crowd.
“Do you believe that Trump violated the peaceful transfer of power,” the teenager asked the governor, “a key principle of American democracy that we must uphold?”
To you or me, and most people it’s a reasonable question although GOP candidates would prefer to avoid answering. However, DeSantis is terrified of that question, viewing it the way a vampire would react to being dragged out into the sunlight or dangled over a pool filled with holy water.
Now, a good politician who was good at interacting with the public would attempt to dodge it as DeSantis did, in this case with a stock non-answer answer which in this case was to say Americans shouldn’t get caught up in the past. By quickly calling on someone else that would have been the end of it but noooooo. DeSantis had to add in what was described as an “incredulous” tone “Are you in high school?” Well, that caused the whole thing to go viral. Another in what’s been a string of awkward and embarrassing interactions between DeSantis and regular folks (including kids) out on the campaign trail. However DeSantis is the political version of Yosemite Sam and couldn’t help jumping around and blasting his guns and shooting himself in the foot multiple times.
Oh, he did sort of try to make up for his gaffe, but he wasn’t concerned enough to make sure his campaign staff got the memo. Or he was never sincere (I know, it’s SHOCKING to think DeSantis might be insincere!) in the first place. Because as the article notes at subsequent events Never Back Down folks literally manhandled this young man and made him feel threatened. I’m a grown man, a cranky old fart who’s broken down physically but I’m still a tall and imposing one and I’d think they were trying to threaten me. Of course, I’d tell them to go f**k themselves but back when I was a teenager I’d have been pretty damned shaken.
In his interview with The Daily Beast Mitchell said at two subsequent DeSantis events he was grabbed and physically intimidated by DeSantis’ security and monitored in what he perceived to be a hostile manner. And, as I noted while DeSantis seems to have made noises about “getting to the bottom” of Mitchell’s treatment wife Casey got in on the act and pretty much told Mitchell’s mom her son was a liar!
At a Fourth of July parade DeSantis attended, Mitchell was swarmed by security and physically restrained after a brief interaction with the governor—with his private security contractors even demanding Mitchell stay put until they said so.
With his mother alarmed, the situation escalated to such a degree that the candidate’s wife, Casey, spoke directly with her—but to suggest her son was being dishonest about what happened, according to Mitchell.
It should be noted a reporter from the Boston Globe witnessed Mitchell being pulled away by security, although not the part with Casey DeSantis. However others saw the young man being manhandled and ordered to stay in place. But being a teen he texted his mom who was nearby, which led to the interaction with Casey but you have to wonder what caused HER to get involved. You’d think word was out to keep an eye out for Quinn Mitchell complete with his photo and a physical description or something. Now that would be quite the “BOLO” (Be On Look Out) for Never Back Down staff and security. “BOLO. White teen approximately 15-16 years old. Polite and serious looking. Asks questions dangerous to the Gov. political campaign. Stop on sight and detain until the Gov. is safely away. Use of force in addition to threats authorized.”
It’s not as crazy as it sounds. At yet another event Michell, who’d been invited by the campaign found himself being monitored and photographed by Never Back Down staff, even learning one had sent out word “we’ve got our kid.” To his credit Mitchell feels badly this all blew up the way it did. And while he seems to be handling it ok he also indicated had it happened a few years ago he might have reconsidered becoming active in politics and trying to take advantage of his ability (given where he lives) to help screen Presidential candidates. In the end his take is simply “I just want to ask my question.” Seems reasonable enough to me.
Never Back Down/the DeSantis campaign was asked to comment and guess what? Crickets. However, Michell intends to keep doing what he’s done for years now. What he considers his civic duty, which is to whenever he can ask Presidential candidates in his neck of the woods clear, relevant questions. In the meantime as you can imagine DeSantis has done himself no favors in NH with this crap. This teenager knows his state and how politics works there as well as anyone so I’ll conclude with his take on how DeSantis misplayed this:
As astute an observer of the state’s politics as any, Mitchell had a blunt assessment of the fiasco over DeSantis’ treatment of him. “Really stupid,” he said, “in a small state like New Hampshire.”
One of the stupidest things to do as a campaigning pol is to alienate young, future voters. Alienate an adult and you mostly just have an adult who just won’t vote for you. Alienate a teen who actually will be voting in a couple/few years and you’ve alienated someone who not only won’t vote for you but who will tell all his/her friends not to vote for you. A young person is also energetic enough to put together a “stop xxxpol now” group or go out and canvas for another candidate. Point is there is a difference between pissing off older voters and pissing off young, future ones if only because the young ones aren’t quite as tired as the rest of us. Most of the time I wonder if young adults will pull themselves away from their phones/devices but I think pissing one off at a campaign event (they’re already politically involved at that point) and possibly humiliating the kid is a real bad move. You’re asking for them to become even MORE politically involved-against you.
Thinking it makes a difference in a small state like NH is less important than how tech-savvy kids are. This could be another very embarrassing viral moment for ronny and casey.
That death sentence did something this stupid not only doesn’t surprise me, I kind of expect this sort of thing from him.
Scott Walker 2.0? Heh, The Marquis DeSantis campaign is resembling Good Ole’ Ed Muskie, Might be time again to reread Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail 1972 again. Shame that Hunter S. isn’t around for his take.
Remember that phrase: “It writes itself?” The days, investigative journalism is always needed for guys like DeSantis. OTOH, we do need more investigative journalism, more of it earlier and more of it daily, to wheedle its way into daily reportage to get rid of that dreaded bothsiderisms.
” if there were any true justice in the world, Richard Nixon would be in the belly of a hammerhead shark headed south of Easter Island.” Different a$$hole, same sentiment! Right Hunter? You betcha!
Pretty soon Casey DeSatan is gonna get tired of defending the stupid ….”watch this space.”