Cotton: People trapped behind Gaza ceasefire protesters should ‘take matters into their own hands’

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) raised controversy Monday after encouraged those who deal with streets blocked by protesters to “solve the problem”, appearing to encourage violence.

Protesters against the American response to the Israel-Hamas war closed several highways across the country on Monday, including blocking the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco and the Brooklyn Bridge in New York, as well as near O’Hare Airport in Chicago.

Protesters delayed traffic for miles and created rush-hour headaches for Americans as they defended against the Biden administration’s support for the Israeli military offensive in Gaza.

Cotton denounced the protests in a post on social platformfalsely claiming that the protesters were “pro-Hamas.”

“I encourage people stuck behind pro-Hamas mobs blocking traffic: take matters into your own hands,” he wrote on his personal account. “It’s time to end this nonsense.”

The senator edited the post minutes later, clarifying that people should “take matters into their own hands to get them out of the way.”

Former President Obama’s speechwriter Jon Favreau was among those who criticized Cotton’s post.

“Just a US senator calling for vigilante violence,” he wrote on Xlater adding that the senator’s edit “doesn’t do much to fix” the post.

The comments were compared to Cotton’s controversial 2020 op-ed in The New York Times titled “Send in the troops,” in which he defended the use of the National Guard to quell nationwide protests that erupted in response to the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.

After massive criticism from readers and its own staff for publishing the article, the Times later admitted that Cotton’s article “fell short of our standards and should not have been published.”

Weeks later, Cotton publicly called on the Justice Department to bring charges against what he called “mafia vigilantes”, referring to people who defaced or destroyed statues – usually statues of Confederate figures or slave owners.

“We cannot tolerate mob rule and we cannot allow it to go unpunished,” he said in 2020. “And soon, the mob could come after you, your home and your family. your faith in our government and our way of life. As the crowd grows, civilization recedes.”

The Hill has reached out to Cotton’s office for comment.