ON GUARD

‘You keep speaking, and I’ll stand guard.’ 

The Morning Dispatch
21 February 2024

Threats of political violence are more common than you think, old friend David French argued in the New York Times, but all hope is not lost. “The intimidation is systemic and ubiquitous, an acknowledged tactic in the playbook of the Trump right that flows all the way down from the violent fantasies of Donald Trump himself,” he wrote. “In the summer of 2021, I received a quite direct threat after I’d written a series of pieces opposing bans on teaching critical race theory in public schools. My wife and I knew that it was almost certainly a bluff. But we also knew that white nationalists had our home address, both of us were out of town and the only person home that night was my college-age son. 

So we called the local sheriff, shared the threat, and asked if the department could send someone to check our house. Minutes later, a young deputy called to tell me all was quiet at our home. When I asked if he would mind checking back frequently, he said he’d stay in front of our house all night. Then he asked, ‘Why did you get this threat?’ I hesitated before I told him. Our community is so MAGA that I had a pang of concern about his response. ‘I’m a columnist,’ I said, ‘and we’ve had lots of threats ever since I wrote against Donald Trump.’ 

The deputy paused for a moment. ‘I’m a vet,’ he said, ‘and I volunteered to serve because I believe in our Constitution. I believe in free speech.’ And then he said words I’ll never forget: ‘You keep speaking, and I’ll stand guard.’ I didn’t know that deputy’s politics and I didn’t need to. When I heard his words, I thought, that’s it. That’s the way through. Sometimes we are called to speak. Sometimes we are called to stand guard. All the time we can at least comfort those under threat, telling them with words and deeds that they are not alone. If we do that, we can persevere. Otherwise, the fear will be too much for good people to bear.”