Remarks made by Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin at the annual Values Voter Summit in Washington, D.C. over the weekend are drawing heavy fire from Democratic quarters.
Addressing a hypothetical Hillary Clinton presidency, Bevin told the audience of social conservatives he thinks the country could survive – but, channeling Thomas Jefferson, wondered aloud about whether the “roots of the tree of liberty” would again need to be watered with the blood of tyrants and patriots.
"I have nine children. It breaks my heart to think that it might be their blood that is needed to redeem something, to reclaim something that we, through our apathy and our indifference, have given away," he said.
In a statement Monday, the governor said “any intelligent person” should easily understand his message, which he linked to military service and the need to guard against radical Islamic extremists and any homegrown passivity that could cause our culture to “crumble from within.”
But many opponents detected a different, far more inflammatory sentiment at work.
Kentucky Democratic Party spokesman Daniel Lowry questioned the intended meaning of various phrases in the speech while 6th district congressional hopeful Rev. Nancy Jo Kemper leveled perhaps the most serious charge – describing the governor’s “call to shed the blood of fellow Americans" as unconstitutional and grounds for impeachment.
"Words matter," she told reporters. "Words can be used to incite violence. Words have incited insurrection. This is a call to insurrection."
Immediately following Kemper's hastily arranged press conference, Republican Party of Kentucky spokesman Tres Watson dismissed the impeachment noises as “nothing more than a desperate act by a desperate candidate who trails badly in the polls.”
Asked whether voters can expect the clip to reappear in ads this fall, Lowry responded that even religious and fiscally conservative Democrats would likely agree that "Bevin's comments are something that will hurt Republicans in the race in November."
