County Democrats Host Senator Tim Kaine and 6th District Candidate Ken Mitchell in Pre-Primary Event at Vibrissa

You may be a minority in your home community but in statewide and national elections every vote is very important. — That was one of the messages conveyed by Virginia’s U.S. Senator Tim Kaine during a luncheon gathering on the outdoor deck patio of Vibrissa Beer and Kitchen in Front Royal’s Historic Downtown Business District Tuesday, June 11. Also appearing, and responding to questions along with Senator Kaine, was Democratic candidate Ken Mitchell, who will challenge Republican incumbent Ben Cline in Virginia’s Sixth District Congressional race this year.

The WC Democratic Committee promotional for Senator Tim Kaine and 6th State Congressional District challenger Ken Mitchell’s visit to Historic Downtown Front Royal. And we were informed the promised coffee was provided by Doppio Bunny Coffee – a little more caffeine on the side, please. Graphic courtesy WC Democratic Committee

And while every vote is important, it appears that for local Democrats that vote won’t come until the November general election. For as Warren County Democratic Committee Vice-Chair Jessica Reynolds explained to us, neither Mitchell or Kaine faces primary challenges from within the Democratic Party on June 18. However, five Republicans are vying to challenge Kaine for his U.S. Senate seat. They are: C.L. “Chuck” Smith Jr., Edward “Eddie” C. Garcia Jr., Hung Cao, Jonathan Emord, and Scott Thomas Parkinson.

Kaine stressed the importance of the coming national Presidential and Congressional elections as the very concept of our democratically based Constitutional Republic form of government seems to increasingly be at issue. That appears to be based on acceptance by some Republicans of Donald Trump’s claim that his recent Stormy Daniels hush-money payment, election-interference criminal jury trial and conviction in New York City was a politically manipulated fraud, as opposed to a trial based on legitimate evidence that would have brought any American citizen to trial before a jury of their peers, including an ex-president of the United States.

Describing his experience as a young man in Honduras when there was a non-elective dictatorship in place, Kaine said, “I was naive but at the end of the year I wasn’t naive. I was like, wow, dictators are real, authoritarians are real. You can’t just take for granted that you can vote because in Honduras when I lived there, you couldn’t vote. And people I lived with prayed for the day when they might be able to choose their leader. So, I came back in 1981 feeling like, okay now I’m not naive. I understand what’s out there in the world.

‘But I was still naive’

“But I was still naive, because I never would have thought that I’d see that same authoritarian impulse here in this country. And yet we’re seeing it all around the world, we’re seeing it in Hungary, in El Salvador, in the United States. The battle between democracy and authoritarianism is not like a settled issue. No, it is a live issue. And we are on the verge of celebrating 250 years as a nation in 2026. And the burden and responsiblility and opportunity has been placed on our shoulders to be a generation that revitalizes and then puts the functioning democracy we have at the time in the hands of our kids and grandkids.

Tim Kaine and Ken Mitchell, the latter speaking below, on the primary stump, but pointing for November with no primary challenges for either Democratic candidate on June 18. – Royal Examiner Photos Roger Bianchini

“And I believe we’re up to it, Virginians are up to it, I think Americans are up to it, and I think that’s why we’re going to be successful come November,” Kaine told his audience of Democrats and independent voters, drawing applause.

The Democratic candidates also faced some tough questions about the Biden Administration’s apparent support of Israel’s ongoing counter-attack on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip where they have been relocated as a stateless people with no military defense system, only a rogue, minority terrorist organization, Hamas, which claims, questionably many Palestinian might suggest, to act in the interest of Palestinians. Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel resulted in 1200 Israelis reported killed and 250 taken hostage. The consquent Israeli military actions, which still continue, are generally being defined internationally as a genocide, with Palestinian casualties estimated at least at 38,000, now approaching 40,000 or more. A woman questioning Kaine on the Israeli/Palestinian situation, cited 14,000 children among those Palestinian casualties.

The ‘situation’ in Gaza

“What you call a ‘situation’ in Gaza is more than 14,000 children killed. I have a 5-year-old. I see my kid in every one of those children,” she began emotionally, adding, “And I’m going to tell you, yes, talking about a two-state solution where Palestinians and Israelis can live in peace would help. But I don’t know if that would be enough for me to be able to vote Democratic on the ballot,” she said of the coming November election.

“I am completely conflicted because it’s the lesser of two evils, we are still supporting genocide. And how can you support and be behind people that have not yet put an end to this but have the power to do so?” she asked, apologizing for her nervousness. “But I had to be here to tell you this in person,” she added, pointing to frustration at seeing no result from “calling the White House, sending emails, going to protests.

“It is not enough when you’re seeing children just like my child that just had the privilege to be born in this country versus being born there. There’s nothing different between her and the children of Palestine,” she concluded, drawing applause from much of the audience.

Kaine did not back away from a meaningful exchange with a mother, pictured below, critical of the Biden Administration’s stance on the Israel/Palestinian Gaza situation. It is a ‘situation’ that has resulted in what has been reported at over 14,000 children killed, she said, of approaching 40,000 Palestinian deaths over the 8-month Israeli response to the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack that killed 1200 Israelis, with another 250 kidnapped.

“And that’s true. I’ve spent time with hostage families who’ve had their loved ones kidnapped and brutalized,” Kaine began in response. “And I’ve spent time with Israelis who’ve lost families, and I’ve spent time with a lot of Palestinians. And Americans who’ve been in Palestine like doctors on medical missions who are coming back with heartbreaking accounts. It is just, it is heartbreak, it is absolute heartbreak,” Kaine said, adding the observation, “And the U.S. doesn’t have the complete ability to just change the situation in another part of the world. We have influence, we have leverage, more than most,” he admitted, adding, “And it’s taken too much leverage, frankly, for us to get Israel to up the pace of humanitarian aid …

“But Israel does have actors in the Middle East: Hamas, Iran, Hezbollah, who want to wipe it out,” Senator Kaine observed of the multi-faceted Middle Eastern political chess board. However, the senator added, “That doesn’t excuse similar violence against Palestinians on the West Bank. That doesn’t excuse throttling humanitarian aid into Gaza. That doesn’t excuse indiscriminate activity that it might get somebody in Hamas, but also wipes out lots of civilians,” Kaine observed of what a majority of the UN Security Council nations appear to define as genocide of Palestinians in Israel’s response to the October 7 Hamas attack.

“And so, it’s very hard to figure out how do we stand to defend Israel at the same time leveraging what we hope would be better behavior” by Israel’s leadership, Kaine asked rhetorically of a situation he observed has been evolving problematically since 1948 in the wake of World War II and the West’s response to the Nazi holocaust of European Jews.

Kaine cautiously noted some developments over the past few days that gave him some hope for progress toward resolution of the now one-sided conflict moving into its eighth month of Israel’s reaction to the October 7 Hamas attack. However, in response to a related question from another person, Senator Kaine observed that from his past statements and actions, current Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appears not to favor the two-state solution that would establish a Palestinian nation that could coexist on equal terms with its neighbors, including Israel.

This reporter is reminded of the comment he read a number of years ago from an Israeli peace activist after the first three or four years of Netanyahu’s leadership and his treatment of Palestinians: “Israel is like the abused child who grows up to be the abuser,” she lamented.

With a world in escalating turmoil, welcome to national election year 2024 in America.