Black Gay Republican Harassed with Racist, Homophobic Slurs
Rob Smith says he was accosted by "soulless, dead-eyed white supremacists" who heckled him at a Republicans for National Renewal event.
A Black, openly gay conservative influencer claims he was accosted by a group of people who heckled him with racist and homophobic slurs during an event held by a right-wing group in Phoenix.
“Last night in Phoenix, I was confronted and surrounded by some White Supremacists that don’t like gays or Blacks in the Republican Party,” Rob Smith, an Army veteran, political activist, and author, wrote in a post on X on December 18.
“They shouted ‘n*****’ and ‘f****t’ at me to make their point. However, I served in Iraq. I never back down. Ever,” he wrote.
Video of the altercation shows Smith being surrounded by people who appear to be chanting “gay sex” before hurling homophobic slurs at him.
They then begin to chant, “America first,” but no racial slurs are heard in the video.
At one point, Smith shouts back at the crowd of people, “Yes, Nick Fuentes loves gay sex,” referring to a far-right political commentator who founded the America First Political Action Conference, and has been criticized for espousing white supremacist views.
The incident occurred at a bar where Republicans for National Renewal, a pro-Trump conservative advocacy group, were holding an event.
A separate video that appears to have been shot just before the altercation in Smith’s post shows an unseen person trying to confront Smith, following him around a bar, asking him, “How does anal sex help us win the culture war? How are you conservative and also a homosexual? How does that work here?”
Speaking with CNN’s Abby Phillip during a December 19 broadcast, Smith explained why he attended the event.
“I was in Phoenix, Arizona, for an event called America Fest, which is held by Turning Point USA,” he told Phillip. “I went to this [Republicans for National Renewal] event because I saw that a lot of other conservative influencers would be there. I actually DM’d with this group. I said, ‘Hey, I’m going to come. Can you put me on the list?’ They said, ‘Sure.’ So that’s how I ended up at the event. I had no idea that it was going to be infested with these people.”
He also pushed back preemptively against those who might claim the altercation was staged or fake.
“The first thing that I want to say is that anybody that thinks that this is somehow in some way fake or staged, I wanted to tell them that the hate crime that happened to Jussie Smollett was fake. This hate crime was very real.”
He continued to insist that some members of the crowd of 20 to 25 people hurled racist slurs at him, even though it was not caught on video, according to Mediaite.
He told Phillip he was aware of the existence of white supremacists in the Republican party, but added that they exist on both end of the political spectrum. He claimed to have also received racist and homophobic comments on some of his social media postings people associated with the political Left.
“Do you blame people of color or LGBTQ people who say, ‘I can’t be a part of that?'” Phillip asked, referring to some Black and LGBTQ people’s reticence to associate themselves with the Republican Party.
“Well, first of all, I don’t say LGBTQ. I say gay or lesbian, and I don’t blame gay or lesbians or Black people for saying that they can’t be a part of it,” Smith said.
“What I will say is that a lot of people want to ask me these questions about what’s going on with the movement. They want to ask me the questions about what’s going on with, like, let’s say, Donald Trump. And what I say is this: is that I don’t focus on what people say. I focus on what they do.
“And when it comes to Trump, when it comes to the mainstream Republican Party right now, I have seen Donald Trump be the first Republican to ever — excuse me, the first president to ever in office supporting marriage equality, either Democrat or Republican. I saw him partner with the RNC in the Log Cabin Republicans, who spent over $1 million in a ‘Get Out The Vote’ effort, specifically targeting gays and lesbians in this country…. I look at what people do.”
Smith added that, unlike other Republican candidates for the presidency, he has seen former President Donald Trump denounce white supremacy. He reiterated that the existence of white supremacists is real, calling those who surrounded and heckled him “soulless, dead-eyed white supremacists” who “could have bashed my brains in had they gotten the chance.”
“Do I think that this stuff is coming from the millions of people that voted for Trump? I do not,” he said. “Do I think that it’s something that the Trump campaign endorses or the Republican Party endorses? I do not.”
Republicans for National Renewal denounced the harassment of Smith, telling CNN in a statement, “The individuals involved were members of the public without any association with us, and we were actively involved in defusing the situation and ensuring attendee safety. These sorts of actions are not welcome at our events and the individuals involved will be excluded from future events.”
A spokesperson for Turning Point USA — whose America Fest conference is separate from the event Smith was attending — also commented on the incident, telling Newsweek in a statement, “This did not occur at our event. Regardless, their behavior is disgusting and if it had happened here, these individuals would have been promptly removed.”
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