A top Democratic flack in one of the country’s most Democratic state capitals became the first victim of the Obamacare defunding campaign Friday night when he was fired for filthy and reckless tweeting.
Allan Brauer, Communications Committee chairman for the Democratic Party of Sacramento County (DPSC) had his resignation accepted Friday following a series of unhinged tweets directed at an aide to Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz.
“@amandacarpenter May your children all die from debilitating, painful and incurable diseases,” Brauer tweeted to Cruz speechwriter and senior communications advisor Amanda Carpenter early Friday afternoon, after Carpenter tweeted a gung ho message in support of using the Congress’ power of the budget to shield the American people from the ill effects of the unpopular 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
Ten minutes later Brauer hinted that the first attack had proven to be taxing work, tweeting, “Busy blocking the tapeworms that have slithered out of hellspawn @amandacarpenter’s asshole. How’s your day so far?”
But within another four minutes, all the laughter had died in sorrow as Brauer reported, “I’m being attacked on Twitter for wishing one of Ted Cruz’s pubic lice to experience the pain her boss is inflicting on Americans.”
Independent Journal Review collected some prior work from Brauer, highlighting the public relations specialist’s use of the epithet “cumrag” to describe an interlocutor who was guilty of tweeting while female.
California Democratic party communications director Tenoch Flores initially fed the trouble by telling Yahoo’s Chris Moody, “The problem with this kind of rhetoric is that it lets fringe characters—those who are actively trying to shut down the government—like Ted Cruz, off the hook.”
But by sunset on the West Coast, Brauer’s flagrant violation of the public relations code of honor could no longer be ignored. He had brought scandal to his client and had to be dismissed.
“The comments by our volunteer communications chair are appalling and inexcusable,” DPSC chairwoman Kerri Asbury announced early Friday evening. “No matter what our political disagreements may be, wishing harm is never an acceptable response during heated public debate or any other time. Mr. Brauer has apologized for his comments and expressed his remorse.”
Sacramento County is slightly less monolithically Democratic than most of California. In the 2012 election, President Obama carried the county by 58 percent to Mitt Romney’s 39 percent, while incumbent Sen. Dianne Feinstein got more than 60 percent in her race against novice Elizabeth Emken. However, two out of the county’s four U.S. congressmen are Republicans, as are all of its state senators.