A cannabis tax attorney running against Republican U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik in New York’s 21st Congressional District floated the notion of a “re-education camp” for “MAGA” supporters of former President Donald Trump following November’s election, Fox News reported.
Democrat Paula Collins made the comments during a public Zoom town hall this week, the cable news network said. You can listen to audio of her comments here.
‘This is yet another reason why President Trump, Elise Stefanik, and voters in Upstate [New York] and across America will clean the Democrats’ clocks at the ballot box this November.’
“Even if we were to have a resounding blue wave come through, as many of us would like, putting it all back together again after we’ve gone through this MAGA nightmare and re-educating, basically — which, that sounds like a rather, um [laughs] a re-education camp,” Collins said during the town hall. “I don’t think we really want call it that. I’m sure we can find another way to phrase it.”
Collins explained her comments in an email to Fox News Digital: “We currently have lawmakers, including Rep. Elise Stefanik, who mis-quote or mis-understand the law. Even if MAGA were to be resoundingly defeated, we would need to engage in widespread civics education, which both red and blue voters acknowledge has been slipping in recent years.”
Collins added that “the goal would be such that regular citizens could understand the process by which the state courts process matters, compared to the federal court circuit, and so forth,” Fox New noted.
“Rep. Elise Stefanik does not show a good understanding of the court structure in her home state of New York,” Collins also told the cable news network.
In addition, Fox News said Collins emphasized that Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s recent case against Trump is “a state matter, not a federal matter,” adding that Stefanik’s “outcry bespeaks a lack of basic civics education, as well as a basic lack of respect for the state supreme court system in her home State of New York.”
“Similarly, many voters have misunderstandings and lack of regard for basic judicial systems that underscore the need for civics education,” she also told the cable news network.
Stefanik’s senior advisor Alex DeGrasse hit back hard against Collins’ comments.
“This radical New York City Democrat Socialist who literally is renting a bed and breakfast room in NY-21 was caught on tape saying she wants to force Trump voters through ‘re-education camps,’” DeGrasse told Fox News, adding that “this is yet another reason why President Trump, Elise Stefanik, and voters in Upstate [New York] and across America will clean the Democrats’ clocks at the ballot box this November.”
Collins has said that before this spring, she lived full time in New York City, the cable news network said, adding that election documents show Collins is based out of her law office — the Law Office of Paula Collins, PLLC — in New York City. Fox News added that she rents a room in a rental housing unit in Canton, New York, in order to claim residency in the 21st district.
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