Tom Cotton’s tweets about violence against protesters are alarming

Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton is facing backlash for a post on X that appears to encourage people to carry out violence against pro-Palestinian demonstrators.

Since Israel initiated its bombardment of Gaza, following a Hamas-led terrorist attack on Oct. 7, Cotton has had no qualms airing his illiberal bigotry on the subject. The senator has advocated for Israel to “bounce the rubble” in Gaza, endorsing an indiscriminate bombing campaign by suggesting “anything that happens in Gaza is the responsibility of Hamas.” And he’s called for foreign nationals to be deported from the United States if they protest Israel’s assault on Gaza, which has garnered worldwide criticism. 

Cotton’s disturbing rhetoric about the conflict continued with a post on X Monday night in which he encourages people “stuck behind pro-Hamas mobs blocking traffic” to “take matters into your own hands to get them out of the way.” The senator said “it’s time to put an end to this nonsense.”

The statement was met with backlash for its apparent encouragement of violence against protesters. Yet, in a statement to NBC News on Tuesday, Cotton doubled down on the tweet, affirming his belief that people should physically move pro-Palestinian demonstrators if they happen to be blocking traffic.

“Absolutely, I support people, if they’re blocked by traffic, by pro-Hamas vigilantes in the street, they should get out of their cars, they should move them to the side of the road, and they should let traffic continue,” Cotton said.

NBC News also reported that “Asked whether he was calling for violence against protesters, Cotton said he wasn’t.” And while it’s good that the senator cleared that up, it’s a bit mysterious to me how a driver physically removes a protester who does not want to move except with violence?

And as NBC News notes, Cotton’s tweets were posted around the same time that he appeared on Fox News to suggest that protesters who demonstrate on bridges should fear being thrown over the side if they were to block traffic in his home state of Arkansas.

In recent years, conservative governors and legislators in states like Oklahoma and Iowa have passed laws that shield people from punishment if they hit demonstrators with their cars. Cotton’s posts are of a piece with a movement that has sought to justify — and even glorify — violence against liberal activists and other people seen as enemies to the conservative cause.

Cotton has arguably become the GOP’s most outspoken congressperson on the topic of meting out punishment to protesters. In 2020, The New York Times published a controversial op-ed written by Cotton that called for then-President Donald Trump to deploy the military to quell racial justice protests that summer.

Civilian crackdowns seem to be his … thing.

For that reason, I think of Cotton as a mouthpiece for the conservative movement’s violent fantasies. No Republican lawmaker in Washington has been more forthright in laying out a vision for how private citizens and government can work hand-in-hand to attack and intimidate those who oppose their agenda.