GOP Rep. Don Young Shoves a Female Reporter And It Isn’t His First Time Putting His Hands On Women

Last updated on April 8th, 2019 at 07:43 am

Politico reporter Melanie Zanona reported Thursday that Republican Representative Don Young of Alaska physically shoved her and told her to get out of his way, “Damnit” as she was interviewing a differing lawmaker outside the House chamber.

Apparently this isn’t his first rodeo at shoving female reporters, NBC‘s Rebecca Shabad noted that he had done this to her as well.

To get more stories like this, subscribe to our newsletter The Daily.

And Buzzfeed‘s Paul McLeod says he’s seen Young do this multiple times:

Josh Jakob reminded everyone that his is a “running theme for GOP congressmen”:

RealMGrimm is a MAGA supporter, who describes himself thusly: “Marine combat veteran, former FBI Agent and proudly served NY-11 in Congress 2011-2015, #MAGA #AmericaFirst”. The House’s wealthiest representative, Republican Greg Gianforte of Montana, got elected after he body-slammed reporter Ben Jacobs of Britain’s Guardian newspaper, on May 24, 2017.

President Trump praised Gianforte for body-slamming the reporter.

“Any guy that can do a body-slam … is my guy,” Trump told supporters at the rally, adding that he was concerned at first that the incident would jeopardize Gianforte’s campaign.

“I said: ‘Oh, this is terrible, he’s going to lose the election.’ Then I said: ‘Well, wait a minute, I know Montana pretty well, I think it might help him,’ and it did,” Trump said.

There is no video of the incident because taping video isn’t allowed in that hall, but Zanona reports that she does have audio.

People couldn’t help but observe that this kind of violence seems to get ignored while the media focuses on smelling of hair:

Here’s a video someone linked to of Young’s “best hits:”

Is he above the law as a 24th term representative? No.

It’s very odd how our media hyper focuses on non-violent encounters while these very dangerous episodes seem to pass without much fanfare.

It’s not okay to abuse the press. It’s not okay to shove women. It’s not okay to push anyone.

The press is part of our democracy, it is part of our freedom. All politicians are annoyed by the press, but they don’t use or call for violence against the press. This reporter wasn’t even questioning Young. She was interviewing someone else. He viewed her as okay to be shoved just for doing her job.

This is part of an ongoing escalation against the freedom of the press, led by Republicans and emboldened by the Republican president’s relentless hate speech against the press.

Image: Rep. Young yells out “Yeah!” during President Trump second State of the Union address.

Sarah Jones

Listen to Sarah on the PoliticusUSA Pod on The Daily newsletter podcast here.

Sarah has been credentialed to cover President Barack Obama, then VP Joe Biden, 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and exclusively interviewed Speaker Nancy Pelosi multiple times and exclusively covered her first home appearance after the first impeachment of then President Donald Trump.

Sarah is two-time Telly award winning video producer and a member of the Society of Professional Journalists.

Connect with Sarah on Post,  Mastodon @PoliticusSarah@Journa.Host, & Twitter.