Man Charged With Terrorist Threat After Threatening to Kill GOP Congressman and Trump Supporters

  |  
Jul 10, 2018

A New York man has been arrested after he attempted to run over a Republican campaign volunteer and threatened to kill a Republican Trump supporting Congressman from New York.

On Friday, Martin Astrof, 75, took Maxine Waters’ call to confront and attack Trump supporters in public seriously when he confronted Donato Panico, a campaign worker at Rep. Lee Zeldin’s campaign headquarter office in Long Island, New York.

The violent encounter occurred around 11:15 am on Friday morning, which resulted in a police response. “After threatening to kill the campaign worker and other supporters, Astrof backed his car up in an aggressive manner nearly striking the worker,” a police statement from Suffolk County police read.

Police say Astrof left the campaign office after almost running over the campaign worker, but he was later arrested at his home. Astrof has been charged with making a terroristic threat and reckless endangerment.

Rep. Zeldin took to Twitter on Friday to condemn the attack against his campaign worker and the increase in political violence against the right.  “In the US, political scores are settled at the ballot box, not by trying to kill your political opponents. Donato Panico is a great American, supporter of @realDonaldTrump & one of my campaign vols. He shouldn’t have been targeted like this today for his passion & involvement”, he tweeted.

Zeldin is running for a third term against Democratic challenger Perry Gershon.

Two weeks ago, Congresswoman Maxine Waters called on her supporters and all Democrats to publicly harass and attack Trump administration officials and conservatives in public. Since her call to harass Trump supporters, there has been an increase in public confrontations, death threats, and harassment against Trump supporters and Republican politicians. Within the past month, Donald Trump Jr.’s 4 year old daughter has received death threats, a Hollywood liberal said he wanted Barron Trump to be attacked by violent pedophiles, a Democrat threatened to murder Republican Congressman Brian Mast (R-FL) and his young children, a Democrat threatened to kill Senator Rand Paul (R-KY), and Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and his wife Elaine Chao were surrounded by a mob of left wing protesters as they left a meeting, and numerous Trump administration officials have been harassed by leftists while dining out.