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New reporting revealed that Sandy Smith may have given her daughter a black eye during the physical fight that caused her daughter to file a domestic violence protection order against her, according to The Daily Beast.
The Daily Beast reports seeing pictures taken at a domestic violence agency that “appear to show Smith’s daughter with a swollen left eye and bruising around her left temple, suggesting that she had been punched.” The photos were taken two days after a physical fight where Sandy Smith allegedly punched her daughter in the face with a closed fist, leading to her daughter being taken to the emergency room.
The new reporting from The Daily Beast also reveals that Smith lost custody of her daughter when “the teen went into foster care” following the protective order, and that Smith had a fourth marriage – despite repeatedly claiming to press that she’s only been married three times.
Read the report below:
The Daily Beast: Scandal-Plagued MAGA Candidate Has Even More Wild Secrets
By Jeffrey Billman & Leigh Tauss
October 30, 2022
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During an Oct. 6 interview with Henry Hinton, Smith—amid her own complaints about the “Soros media” and her “psychotic” ex-husband—exclaimed: “Last week, I was notified that I’d been married seven, 10 times!” “How many times have you been married?” Hinton asked. “Three times,” Smith said.
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In fact, Smith has been married at least four times, The Daily Beast has learned. The Republican congressional candidate’s current marriage to businessman William Smith and two earlier marriages—to Randall Auman Jr. from 1995 to 2001 and Eric Goranson from 2007 to 2010—have previously been reported. But Washington State family court records obtained by The Daily Beast reveal that Smith also married a man named Ken Davis on Dec. 23, 2003, then divorced him a year later.
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But that’s not the only scab that Smith picked at in that interview—nor the most serious.
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A week before an election that could—in a large-enough Republican wave—catapult Smith to Washington, D.C., interviews and police reports unearthed by The Daily Beast raise fresh questions about Smith’s past. They also underline the concerns establishment Republicans have harbored about Smith’s viability.
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But Smith is an unapologetic extremist. She participated in the Jan. 6 “Stop the Steal” rally that preceded the deadly attack on the U.S. Capitol, and—like many MAGA Republicans—she has a long history of unhinged social media posts. They include calling for the “trails [sic] and executions” of those she believes treasonously denied former President Donald Trump a second term.
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Most importantly, Smith has repeatedly been accused of domestic violence.
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After an argument on July 9, 2012, Smith’s then-17-year-old daughter sought a protective order against her mother in Lenoir County, North Carolina, alleging that she “held me down by my hair and punched me in the face with a closed fist.” Her daughter, whom The Daily Beast is not naming, also said Smith called her a “slut, c–t, b—h, whore, tramp, loser, crackhead, trailer park trash, etc.,” according to the request for a protective order she filed two days later.
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A district court judge granted Smith’s daughter a temporary domestic violence protective order on July 11, 2012, ruling, “It clearly appears that there is a danger of acts of domestic violence against [Smith’s daughter].”
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In separate interviews on Friday, the Suggs said their prosecutions were payback for Terry Sugg helping Smith’s daughter seek a protective order, which they both claimed caused Smith to briefly lose custody of her when the teen went into foster care until the order was rescinded.
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The Suggs’ version of events could not be independently verified. But their accounts reflect what Smith’s daughter wrote in her request for a protective order: Both Terry and Nick Sugg said Smith called her daughter a “whore” and a “c–t.” And both recalled Smith’s daughter having a black eye after the argument on July 9, 2012.
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Terry Sugg sent The Daily Beast pictures that appear to show Smith’s daughter with a swollen left eye and bruising around her left temple, suggesting that she had been punched. She said she took those pictures two days after the fight—when “the bruises were already changing color,” she recalled—at the domestic violence agency where she worked at the time.
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(Smith told sheriff’s deputies that night that during an argument, she “grabbed her daughter to keep her from hitting her,” according to an incident report. Shortly after The Daily Beast asked her to comment on the Suggs’ story Friday night, Smith blocked a reporter on Twitter.)
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It’s hard to tell how much Republican support Smith’s past will cost her. But although Terry Sugg has moved out of the 1st District since her son and Smith’s daughter broke up nearly a decade ago, if she’s any indication, Smith’s history might doom her second bid for Congress.
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“You know what’s so funny about it?” Terry Sugg said. “She’s running as a Republican, and, well, I’m gonna vote Republican. But that woman is a witch. I don’t care if she is running as a Republican. I would never vote for her. I wouldn’t let her run the dog pound.”
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