South Brunswick GOP Candidate On Statue Of Liberty Incident

SOUTH BRUNSWICK, NJ — Daryl Kipnis, the Republican candidate running to unseat longtime Middlesex County Congresswoman Bonnie Watson-Coleman this November in the mid-terms, released the following statement on the woman arrested for scaling the Statue of Liberty on July 4:

"On a day where our country owes a great deal of thanks to, among others, our veterans, our first responders, and those who secure our borders, we instead see members of the unhinged, radical Left hijacking our national monuments as thousands visit to explore our great history and meaning of our nation," said Kipnis in a statement. "This foolhardy incident at the Statue of Liberty is legitimized by radical, elected members of the Democrat party at every level of government, including Maxine Waters and Nancy Pelosi ... whose rhetoric inspires others to needlessly endanger the lives of our first responders to advance their agenda of lawlessness."

Kipnis is pictured at left, Watson-Coleman is on the right. Kipnis seeks to unseat Watson-Coleman, a Democrat who has long represented New Jersey's 12th congressional district in Congress. New Jersey's 12th district includes East Brunswick, South Brunswick and Cranbury in Middlesex County, Princeton and nearly all of Mercer County and parts of Somerset and even Union County. It is a predominantly Democratic district. Learn more about the 12th congressional district here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... Kipnis is a lawyer who lives in Franklin Township. He graduated from East Brunswick High School in 1998, then Rutgers and then Seton Hall Law School in Newark in 2005.

Therese Okoumou, 44, scaled the bottom of the State of Liberty on July 4, forcing hundreds of tourists to evacuate the statue, and was taken into custody peacefully by first responders. She was doing it to protest Trump's zero-tolerance policy on immigration, she said.

She declared she wouldn't come down until "all the children are released," a source with the New York Police Department told CNN.

"She just kind of mentioned the kids in Texas," Officer Brian Glacken said in a news conference Wednesday evening. "I guess the whole debate that's going on about that. In the beginning, she threatened to push us off, push the ladder off, but we stayed with her."

Okoumou is part of the protest group Rise and Resist, which unfurled a banner July 4 around the Statue of Liberty that read "Abolish ICE!" At least seven other protesters were arrested on Liberty Island Wednesday as well. She is facing up to 18 months in prison for federal trespassing charges.

"While the First Amendment right to protest is a very important part of what we celebrate today, the members of the so-called 'Resistance' in elected office are encouraging total willful and wanton abandon of the need to do so peacefully and responsibly so that their protests do not end up endangering other citizens or, in this case, police and rescue workers. We are, indeed, a nation of laws," Kipnis said. "Thankfully, this particular situation ended peacefully and without injury, but by failing to hold other members of their party accountable for encouraging escalating radicalism, members of the Democrat leadership condone it, and therefore own any harm to the American people that may arise out of it in the future."

"No matter what slogans or issues are put on display in any given instance, know this: These protests are ultimately about one thing and one thing only: total control of every level of government within the United States of America by a political party that has completely embraced two things and two things only: Authoritarian Socialism, and the absolute ostracism of all freedom-loving people who disagree with it," he said. "If my opponent and the rest of these elected Democrats have become so consumed by their refusal to accept the results of the 2016 Presidential election that they don’t care if their fellow Americans end up hurt, or heaven forbid, killed during these 'protests,' they must resign right now."

The midterm election is Nov. 6.