Baugh’s campaign doubled down on comments just days away from 9/11 anniversary
This morning, the Huffington Post broke news that Scott Baugh, Republicans’ top choice for California’s 47th Congressional District, said that “wokism” is more threatening to the country than the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, both world wars and the Civil War.
Instead of apologizing, Baugh’s campaign doubled down on his horrific comments and said nothing of the loss of life during the 9/11 terrorist attacks with the anniversary just days away.
Scott Baugh, a Republican attorney hoping to flip a Democratic-held U.S. House seat in Orange County, California, said that “wokism” is more threatening to the country than the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, both world wars and the Civil War.
Baugh, a former GOP leader in the California State Assembly, made the remarks while speaking in June to the International Christian Ambassadors Association, an ecumenical Christian nonprofit.
“What’s the greatest threat to religious freedom? We were born in the Revolutionary War. We survived civil wars, World War II, World War I, a lot of wars, 9/11,” Baugh said. “None of those were that threatening to our country compared to the war that we’re fighting now. That war is about wokism and the lack of common sense.”
“That wokism ― it’s communism, wokism, whatever you want to call it ― it’s infected our churches. I like to tell some of our pastors that Jesus came to offend. That was his purpose,” he added. “How would you know you needed a savior unless your sins were pointed out? And our churches aren’t doing that.”
House Democrats’ campaign arm, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, condemned Baugh’s remarks, calling him a “perennial loser” who would fail again in 2024. (Baugh ran unsuccessfully for the seat in 2022 and lost in the primary for a neighboring seat in 2018.)
“Scott Baugh’s disgusting culture war nonsense has gone too far,” DCCC spokesperson Dan Gottlieb said in a statement. “Service members and veterans deserve better than this offensive propagandist, and so does California’s 47th District.”
Baugh’s campaign insists that he was referring exclusively to the threat that he believes “wokism” poses to religious freedom.
“When Scott said those words, he knew that a handful of liberal groups and media outlets would react when they saw it,” Baugh campaign spokesperson Zach Freimark said in a statement. “The loss of life in any traditional war is tragic and should be honored and respected.”
