Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
Leach pushes state Senate to condemn white supremacists, violence
The events from last weekend in Charlottesville, Va., continue to reverberate hundreds of miles away here in the Philadelphia suburbs, with a state senator now calling for the Legislature to pass a resolution condemning bigotry and violence.
“Fear and silence will not save our country. Only clear action will. The time for timid silence is over,” said Sen. Daylin Leach, D-17 of Haverford/Lower Merion, who on Wednesday released a memo asking his 49 fellow state senators to sign on to a resolution condemning “bigotry, violence, and the warped philosophy of neo-Nazis and white supremacists.”
“As elected leaders, we are expected to lead. And if leadership means anything, it has to mean forcefully and unambiguously renouncing the repugnant bigotry of white supremacists and Neo-
Nazis,” wrote Leach, who is running for Congress in the 7th District next year against incumbent Republican Patrick Meehan. “The views of these extremists are an abomination, and repugnant to everything America stands for.
“All decent people must stand united in condemning these bigots and those who enable them, encourage them, or wink and nod as they spew their hate.”
The “Resolution Condemning White Supremacy and Neo-Nazism” was introduced Wednesday as a non-controversial resolution that speaks for all
Pennsylvania state senators to join in “sharp disagreement with the dehumanization of any people based upon their race, religion or ethnicity,” he wrote.
State Sens. Tom Killion, R-9 of Middletown, and Tom McGarrigle, R-26 of Springfield, both plan to sign on to the resolution.
“The hatred and bigotry perpetrated by white supremacists in Charlottesville was atrocious and cannot be tolerated. I condemn such repulsive behavior,” Killion said in a statement. “The diversity of the people of this country is what makes us great.”