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Violence Unfolds At Trump Rally: African American Protester Blindsided By White Trump Supporter

By William Gomez
Published on: 16:42 PST, Mar 10, 2016

It’s nothing new to be blindsided by the ongoing campaign circus of business mogul turned presidential candidate Donald Trump.

For months now Trump has bullied his way through the GOP race denouncing minorities and any who dare to question his competence to run for the position of president.

His campaign is simple: “Make America Great Again.” How exactly? Many are still trying to wrap their heads around that logic.

Just last week the billionaire GOP frontrunner labeled himself a “unifier” in an interview on CBS’s Face The Nation; and after another report of violence erupting at one of his rallies, it’s becoming more fitting to peg The Donald an agitator.

According to Washington Post, a protester at a North Carolina Trump rally was sucker-punched by an elderly Trump supporter as he was escorted out of the rally by officials.

Multiple videos of the incident have since made the rounds on the internet, and give us a clip into the incivility that has started to become a common theme at Trump rallies.

Videos of the incident appeared on social media early Thursday and show a group of individuals being escorted up the stairs of a stadium towards an exit. One of the African American individuals being escorted out makes a gesture towards the crowd and a few steps later he receives an elbow to the face by an elder white male, which is then followed by cheers from the surrounding supporters.

The protester stumbles onward and turns back to react to the white assailant, but is detained by a number of uniformed officers who then take him to the ground with full force, while the attacker goes on supporting the man behind his current purpose.

The individual that took the hit was Rakeem Jones, a 26-year-old from Fayetteville.

“Boom, he caught me,” Jones told the Post. “After I get it, before i could even gain my thoughts. I’m on the ground getting escorted out. Now I’m waking up this morning looking at the news and seeing me getting hit again.”

Cumberland County Sheriff’s Office spokesman Sean Swain confirmed that the assaulter, John McGraw (78), was eventually charged with assault and disorderly conduct. McGraw acknowledged that he had no regrets about his actions and warned any other protesters of what might ensue next time around.

“We don’t know who he is, but we know he’s not acting like an American. The next time we see him, we might have to kill him.”

The quote alone speaks on McGraw’s character along with the level of separation–not unification– some of these Trump rallies are beginning to display.

Jones admitted that he and a group of four others — which included a white woman, a Muslim, and a gay man — attended the Trump rally as a “social experiment.” He went on to blame the Cumberland County officers who escorted the group out of the rally for failing to control the situation and questioning their decision to detain him instead of the individual who struck him.

The attack is the latest piece of violence to unfold at a Trump rally. CBS New York has reported that police are still investigating two alleged assaults at a recent Kentucky rally. One of those incidents involved a young African American woman who was continually shoved and called offensive names as she was led out of the rally.

Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton — who many believe will be running against Trump for the ’16 presidential election — chimed in on the incident in an interview with MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow, acknowledging her disgust of the events that have began to transpire during these Trump events.

“You know, you don’t make America great by, you know, dumping on everything that made America great, like freedom of speech and assembly and, you know, the right of people to protest.”

(AP Photo/Gerry Broome)

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