A suspect is accused of spray-painting a Nazi swastika on a political sign supporting former President Donald Trump in Cohasset, Massachusetts, the incident happening as Election Day approaches.
The suspect in the case was identified as 74-year-old Frederic Laidlaw, NBC Boston reported Thursday. Video footage shared on the social media site NextDoor reportedly showed the man painting the symbol on the sign that sits on Route 3.
A police report said officers made contact with the suspect at his home on Thursday. Laidlaw allegedly told them, “Guilty,” before asking, “What took you so long?”
Officers reportedly found a can of black spray paint next to his vehicle, and Laidlaw allegedly apologized. In a social media post on Thursday, police said, “Cohasset police detectives arrested Frederic LAIDLAW, 74 years of age, of Cohasset, for vandalism of a political sign located on Route 3A”:
“Cohasset police allege that Laidlaw painted a swastika on a political sign on 10/30. Laidlaw will be arraigned on a felony charge of defacement of property in violation of MGL. The AGs Office, Civil Rights Division, has been notified of the arrest. Investigation remains open,” the agency continued.
The political sign belongs to Kevin O’Donnell, who is chair of the Cohasset Republican Town Committee.
“I just thought we were above that. I just thought that wouldn’t occur in this election, or any election — there’s no Nazis in America,” he said.
Leftists have tried and failed to link Trump, who is running against Vice President Kamala Harris (D) for the White House, to Nazis.
In October, Harris’s running mate, radical leftist Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN), claimed the recent Trump rally in Madison Square Garden was a reenactment of a Nazi rally from the 1930s, Breitbart News reported.
However, the outlet’s fact check of his claim found it to be false. “The claim is so absurd as to be disqualifying, and suggests a desperate, and losing, campaign,” the report said.
“Walz was citing a conspiracy theory first floated by Democrat strategist James Carville, and repeated by him and former nominee Hillary Clinton,” the article read, adding that many Jews attended the recent rally.
Meanwhile, a man in Bath, New York, has been accused of brutally beating a stranger on Friday who was wearing a Trump 2024 hat, per Breitbart News.