A staffer for Ohio Democrat Sen. Sherrod Brown and Rep. Emilia Sykes (D-Ohio) was caught on camera going off on an expletive-laden tirade accusing Ohioans of “pure racism” for wanting to secure the border.
Kevin Oyakawa, the Regional Organizing Director for the Ohio Democratic Party, was seen on video obtained by Ohio.news calling for the southern border to be completely open and abolishing the border patrol.
“Like me, I’m out there just like, open the fu**king border, I don’t give a s**t who the f**k comes in here,” Oyakawa can be heard casually saying, adding, “We don’t need border patrol.”
VIDEO: Sherrod Brown, Emilia Sykes Operative Accuses Ohioans of ‘Pure Racism’, Wants Border Wide Open pic.twitter.com/dykjrZTwc2
— Ohio.news (@RealOhioNews) October 24, 2024
Oyakawa lamented that the only reason Democrats weren’t winning on the border issue was Ohioans’ “pure racism.”
“The issue with even talking about immigration here in Ohio is that it’s a losing issue for Democrats here, for like no f**king reason other than people’s pure racism,” Oyakawa went on to claim.
Oyakawa also admitted that Rep. Sykes, who is running for re-election representing Ohio’s 13th Congressional District, is quiet on immigration because “if she starts talking immigration, she starts losing.”
The Democrat operative announced on Facebook in April that he was joining the Brown and Sykes campaigns to lead field organizers in the Summit/Stark counties.
The border issue has led to Sen. Brown and Sykes to be statistically tied with their Republican opponents.
From Ohio.news:
Sykes’ district, which includes Akron and parts of Canton, is a tossup. Her opponent, Republican Kevin Coughlin, has called for securing the border.
An August poll showed Sykes narrowly leading Coughlin, but 14% of the district remained undecided at that point—with the poll’s margin of error, the race is statistically tied.
Meanwhile, Bernie Moreno has utterly erased Sherrod Brown’s previously comfortable lead to 0.6%. The race for Brown’s vulnerable Senate seat maintaining Democrats’ slim majority is a dead heat.
As the election approaches, Democrat presidential candidate Kamala Harris and other lawmakers up for reelection have distanced themselves from the party’s open-border policies, with Harris herself claiming she’d adopt several of her opponent Donald Trump’s hardline policies to secure the border, including building a wall and hiring more border patrol agents.
But if Oyakawa’s subversive remarks are any indication, the Democrats’ change of rhetoric is simply a bait-and-switch tactic to attract moderate and undecided voters.