A.k.a. “The
People’s Sheriff” (self-declared)
David
Alexander Clarke Jr. is the former sheriff of Milwaukee County, and a
personification of the concept wingnut. He has been a regular
contributor to Fox News – including being a co-host on Sean Hannity’s show – and hosts a podcast on
TheBlaze. As a sheriff, Clarke was best known for mistreatment of prisoners (and don’t confuse that with being
“tough on crime”); for abusing his office to serve
his own, personal interests (including detaining people he had personal
disagreements with over sports); and for forcing employees to
undergo fundamentalist, proselytizing “training” sessions. He also advised Milwaukee County
residents that 9-1-1 was not their best option, instead encouraging them to
pursue vigilante justice; in taxpayer-financed radio ads, Clarke urged citizens
to arm themselves and shoot people by whom they felt threatened, calling 9-1-1
only after potentially shooting and killing someone.
Clarke is
the recipient of e.g. the 2013 Sheriff of the Year
Award from the brazenly fascist Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association, and has appeared at CPAC and on the Alex Jones show. As a sheriff, he was easily
recognizable by his tendency to wear lots of pins and badges on his
uniform when in public, many with no official meaning or purpose, to bolster his fascist
credentials.
Trite
wingnuttery
A staunch
Second Amendment advocate and NRA spokesperson, Clarke has stated – in an appearance on Alex Jones’s
show – that a federal assault weapons ban could spark “the second coming of
an American Revolution, the likes of which would make the first revolution pale
by comparison.”
Being
adamantly anti-abortion, Clarke has also pushed the Black genocide
conspiracy, asserting (lamely) that Planned Parenthood should be renamed
“Planned Genocide”.
He has also
been a vocal critic of Black Lives Matter, calling them “Black Lies Matter” (he’s
got a penchant for inane wordplays) and constantly referring to BLM as a hate
group and as “subhuman creeps”. He also, for good measure, claimed that BLM
would eventually join forces with ISIS in order to destroy American society.
Part of the blame for BLM lies at the feet of Obama, of course; no fan of
Obama, Clarke has repeatedly asserted that Obama has “classic
narcissistic personality disorder” and criticized him for instance for having “pitted blacks
against whites, he’s pitted Hispanics against Americans. It just turns to crap.
But that’s part of his M.O., you know, he’s an Alinskyite.” Obama is, in fact, “a straight-up cop hater”
and the Department of Justice hates cops and is leading an “ongoing
witch-hunt” against police officers.
Here’s Clarke on why accepting Syrian
refugees is “national suicide”.
LGBT
rights
Like
wingnuts in general, Clarke is no fan of LGBT rights. After the Orlando
massacre, Clarke claimed that the massacre was a problematic “distraction”
as it provided fuel for gun-control acvocates.
Clarke
reacted to the landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling on marriage equality with
predictable idiocy: “Next is rage, then revolt,” said Clarke, adding (because details and distinctions
are irrelevant – Clarke really doesn’t care about details) “who would have thought that
in the 21st century homosexuality would come out of the closet and churches
would be forced to go into the closet?” Then he called for revolution: “If
you call yourself an American, then you have to start a revolution in this
country after what happened last week at the United States Supreme Court,”
and for “pitchforks and torches.”
Conspiracy
theories and denialism
In 2015, Clarke
called for the suspension of habeas corpus in the US to round up “internal
enemies”, because there ostensibly were “hundreds of thousands” or “maybe
a million” people who “have pledged allegiance or are supporting ISIS,
giving aid and comfort”; he promptly called for the president to imprison them
at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp “and hold them indefinitely under a
suspension of habeas corpus” (yeah, “fascism” might be a term that is
thrown around a lot, but come on). In 2018, he claimed that students calling for gun control
after the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Florida, were enmeshed in a Soros-backed conspiracy: “The well ORGANIZED
effort by Florida school students demanding gun control has GEORGE SOROS’
FINGERPRINTS all over it”, just like BLM is, ultimately, the creation of Soros.
Not one to
let the COVID nonsense denialist train leave the station without him and his
clown horn, Clarke has of course dabbled in COVID disinformation. Calling the
virus “just the damn flu”, Clarke labeled measures to
prevent the spread of the virus “an orchestrated attempt to destroy
capitalism.” He also suggested that Soros was somehow involved in the pandemic because why not, given his
audience. (“Not ONE media outlet has asked about George Soros’s involvement
in this FLU panic. He is SOMEWHERE involved in this,” asserted Clarke).
More
lately, he has (but of course) been pushing MAGA 2020 election conspiracy theories and calling for Congress to establish a
commission to investigate the FBI (and fire FBI Director Wray fired and replace
him with either Michael Flynn or Ken Cuccinelli), while seeking, according to his
spokesperson Judy Wilkinson, “to become a thought leader in the conservative
movement.”
Trump
Because he
is a wingnut moron, Trump appointed Clarke, an ardent fan, to the position of
Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security for Partnership and Engagement in the
Trump Administration. After
a bit of backlash, Clarke had to rescind his acceptance of the offer a month later. He was later a central part
of Steve Bannon and Brian Kolfage’s We Build the Wall scam.
Diagnosis:
An unapologetic fascist. Yes, that term is thrown around a lot, but it’s hard
to overlook Clarke’s willingness to “strike first” and use violence against
what he perceives to be internal enemies of the Sate, and his explicit push to
suspend due process to suppress political opponents. And he has huge audiences
who apparently share his views. Extremely dangerous.