Rev. Raphael Warnock, a Democrat running for Senate in Georgia, called Republican senators “gangsters” and “thugs” and accused them of “killing children” after they voted to pass over a billion dollars in tax cuts.
Warnock made the comments in late 2017, after the GOP, along with the Trump administration, made sweeping changes to the tax code, resulting in around $1 trillion in across-the-board tax cuts, a move that financial experts contend boosted the economy and may have prevented major, lasting declines following a series of coronavirus pandemic-related lockdowns.
Warnock wasn’t simply opposed to the tax cuts, as he noted in a sermon to Atlanta’s Ebenezer Baptist Church, he saw them as evil and, in some cases, murderous.
“While others were sleeping, members of the United States Senate declared war, launched a vicious and evil attack on the most vulnerable people in America,” he said, according to Fox News and the Washington Free Beacon, which first found the comments.
He went on to compare Senate Republicans to King Herod, the Bible despot who hunted the baby Jesus and his parents, St. Joseph and the Virgin Mary, shortly after Jesus’ birth, to prevent Jesus from usurping his throne. Herod declared that all male children under the age of two be put to death after he received word that Jesus had been born near Bethlehem.
“Herod is on the loose,” Warnock said, referring to the slaughter. “Herod is a cynical politician, who’s willing to kill children and kill the children’s health program in order to preserve his own wealth and his own power. Hope is in the air, but Herod is on the loose.”
The sermon, Fox News notes, came shortly before Christmas.
Then, he called Senate Republicans “gangsters” and “thugs.”
On Friday night, the United States Senate decided by a slim majority, to pick the pockets of the poor, the sick, the old, and the yet-unborn, in order to line the pockets of the ultra-rich,” Warnock said. “Don’t tell me about gangsters and thugs on the streets. There are more gangsters and thugs in Washington, D.C.”
Warnock’s comments are just the latest to be revealed; the Atlanta, Georgia pastor has a history of making incendiary and, occasionally, anti-Semitic comments. On Monday, The Daily Wire reported that Warnock had effusive praise for Nation of Islam leader — and noted anti-Semite — Louis Farrakhan, calling him an “important voice” and a “witness” for the black community.
In 2015, in a Palm Sunday sermon, Warnock made his own anti-Semitic comments, comparing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to former Alabama governor, noted segregationist George Wallace, and called Netanyahu“racist and vicious.” Jewish groups demanded Warnock apologize for the comparison.
“During his 2015 Palm Sunday Sermon, Dem. Raphael Warnock explicitly called Israel an ‘Apartheid’ State, describing it as ‘a land of violence and bloodshed and occupation’ and he referred to Israeli leaders as ‘clever politicians,’ and accus[ed] them of being ‘racist and vicious,'” the Daily Caller reported.
Warnock will face off against Republican Senator Kelly Loeffler in a January runoff election for one of the state’s two Senate seats. If Loeffler maintains control of the seat, the Republicans will likely retain control of the Senate.