* From Raja Krishnamoorthi’s spokesperson…

Rich- Last night, during the League of Women Voters Candidate Forum between Raja Krishnamoorthi and Junaid Ahmed, Raja asked Junaid to please stop promoting hate speech against him and our office. Per our last convo, please see the attached document which includes a link to the recent protest and some supporting information to contextualize Pieter Friedrich and to show that, unfortunately, we know that Junaid has been intimately involved in promoting this sort of rhetoric.

Importantly, Secretary of State Jesse White and Reverend Jesse Jackson Sr. have issued statements.

* From the document…

Ahmed Promotes Violent Hate Speech Against Congressman Raja

• At a recent protest (on 5/21/22) outside Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi’s District Office, Pieter Friedrich led a group of Junaid’s campaign staff and supporters in chanting “Nazi’s out, Raja must go” and “death to Krishnamoorthi.” The video can be viewed here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1q6uXSsRC3t02IEpLJjnRpQvzMAMZgJXE/view
• Instead of condemning the speech, Junaid repeatedly promoted the protest on social media (before, during, and after), its leader, Pieter Friedrich, and the hate speech used at the protest

Pieter Friedrich

• Pieter Friedrich is a highly controversial lifelong provocateur who spent much of his life as an anti-gay, anti-abortion advocate. He opposed gay marriage and said that gay rights and homosexuality should be illegal by default. (“08/25/2003: “Why I Hate Democracy”,” Pieter Friedrich, Deus Ego, 8/25/2013)

o Specifically, he said: “as for ‘gay’ rights and abortion, those should never have become issues in the first place. The people and the representatives should be restrained by unchangeable laws from even messing with issues like those. Those things ought to be illegal by default.” (Ibid)

• In 2017 and as recent as 2020, Friedrich has led calls to tear down Gandhi statues, comparing them to Confederate Monuments (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fclbrN72ctE)
• Various reporters and intelligence experts question his source of income and affiliations (Michael Rubin, Washington Examiner, 2022)

Statement from Secretary of State Jesse White
6/2/2022

“I know Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi to be an outstanding Member of Congress and leader in our state. I was deeply disturbed that anti-gay and anti-abortion activist Pieter Friedrich used violent, extremist, and racist language toward Congressman Raja, and that his opponent, Junaid Ahmed, promoted Friedrich’s activities,” said IL Secretary of State Jesse White. “As an African-American who grew up in the Jim Crow era, I know what it’s like to have your motives unfairly questioned based on the color of your skin or where you were born. This form of stereotyping people of color and minorities, along with Friedrich’s vile rhetoric, have no place in the Democratic Party or in our broader political system, period. This is the Trump playbook, and we are much better than this.”

Statement from Reverend Jesse Jackson Sr.
6/3/2022

“The days of people like Friedrich making threats against non-white people, especially because of the color of their skin, their religious affiliation, or their country of origin must remain behind us. To put it bluntly: saying ‘Nazis out, Raja must go’ and ‘Death to Krishnamoorthi’ is racist, bigoted, incendiary rhetoric that does not belong in our political or civic discourse. I condemn Pieter Friedrich and others who engage in bigoted extremist rhetoric, and I condemn Junaid Ahmed’s actions in continuing to promote Pieter Friedrich, this event, and sharing this hate speech publicly and on social media. In the strongest possible terms I urge all candidates for elected office to use your platform to unite us, not divide us, and to refrain from using hate as a means to scoring cheap political points.”

I’ve asked the Junaid Ahmed campaign for a response.