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TRIGGER WARNING: We have received multiple comments and even complaints on this story from individuals since it first appeared early on Saturday. One simply went so far as to have it "Flagged as unverified." Having spoken directly to two direct participants and Mr. Kalkut, the other candidate, and exchanged emails with his supporters AND solicited privately a general review from a prominent area African-American who lived through the Civil Rights Struggle of the 1960s and was also a participant in America's difficult attempt at self-reformation, we are highly confident of the essential correctness of the story below.
UPDATED 10-29-22 2 pm , 10-30-22 amd 11-7-22 (above image from Marcus Vaughn video)
Yesterday was supposed to be about a frank exchange of views – in the context of a debate hosted by the Norfolk Cable Access station. On the Democrat side, Kevin Kalkut and on the Republican side, Marcus Vaughn were supposed to exchanges views. Both are candidates in the Ninth Norfolk District to succeed Shawn Dooley who is running for State Senate.
That was the plan. But, as Vaughn tells it, when he arrived, about 30 minutes early, things got strange – and unpleasant. There was a crowd of Kalkut supporters, about 10 he estimated, some with signs. No problem, he thought. After months of campaigning he is accustomed to ‘meet and greet’ and even handle an occasional barb or criticism.
So, he grabbed his notebook and headed toward the station, stopping to say hello, introduce himself, and shake hands to each of those present – a positive experience, until he reached the head of the line. There, one Thomas Brown, the chair of the Wrentham Democrat Town Committee, took Vaughn’s proffered hand and then locked it in a iron grip and proceed to loudly harangue and attack Vaughn.
In a few more minutes, as Brown went through a catalog of negative things that he thought Vaughn represented. Still holding unyieldingly to Vaughn’s right hand, Brown was joined by another older “gentleman” [later identified by Vaughn as King Philip School Board member REDACTED* who also began condemning Vaughn, while the other Kalkut supporters just watched. In particular, based on comments Vaughn said he had made at a school board meeting expressing concern about highly provocative literature being assigned to fourteen-year-olds, REDACTED proceed to accuse him of being a book banner (or burner).
And, according to Vaughn, Brown still wouldn't release his grip.
In frustration, Vaughn, who is black, finally asked both men, “Why are you doing this to me, is it because I am black”?
That question paused the action for a brief second or two, Vaughn said, and then one of the men said, “Yes, yes it is. How can you be black and be a Republican?”
Vaughn turned to him and said, “That’s the most racist thing anyone has ever said to me.” At about that time, Brown finally let go of the hand of the black man he scorned, and Vaughn, badly shaken went into the studio and tried to compose himself.
[EDITOR'S NOTE: Most of this article was composed in the hours after first hearing from Mr . Vaughn and with some input from Kalkut and Brown. Mr. Brown has composed a lengthy rebuttal in which he differs from this account in many particulars.]
A few minutes later, according to Vaughn, Kalkut arrived and came immediately to Vaughn and said he had heard things had happened outside – and he apologized to Vaughn, which Vaughn said he appreciated, but he also wondered whether Kalkut could have been more proactive in vetting his supporters.
As far as his debate performance, Vaughn rated it as “terrible.” He was so badly shaken, in fact, he confessed he broke down -- for the first time in years -- when he eventually got home.
Reached a few hours after the fact by telephone, Kalkut confirmed that an incident had happened but not having witnessed it could add nothing to the narrative. But he did say, in no way does he condone what happened. And, he noted, he and Vaughn had both worked to maintain a constructive tone throughout the campaign.
“I will say that since we identified the individuals, we told them this was inappropriate and we asked them not to attend our events for the rest of the campaign,” said Kalkut. “From my perspective this has no place in a campaign; it is unfortunate that this person did something grossly inappropriate,” he added.
Also reached by telephone, Brown, a retired academic, most recently an associate professor at Bridgewater State University, according to online sources, at first indicated he didn’t really want to talk about what happened. Asked if he was the chair of the Wrentham Democrat Committee, he said, “I was, but I resigned today.”
“I will say that I think it was just a conversation between two gentlemen and it involved questions about his position on issues,” he added.
The worst part, said Vaughn, was that no one else in the crowd of Kalkut supporters did anything, they didn’t try to calm things or react to the fact that he clearly felt increasingly uncomfortable and trapped.
Told of the incident, Wrentham resident Chris Doughty, a former Republican candidate, said it was sad. He said it reminded him of a quote from Martin Luther King that he recently discovered: “In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”
Vaughn also posted a video describing the incident in his own words here.
* * * *
* 11-2-22 Vaughn identified Mr. REDACTED as the second man who 'cornered' and abused him when we originally spoke to him Friday afternoon. The person who flagged the story for inaccuracies questioned whether MrREDACTED was in fact present, but did not explain why that was in doubt. We sent an email to the KP School Committee where REDACTED serves, and asked for contact information so we could ask him whether he was in fact a participant. After no response for 3 days, we contacted the superindentent's office and requested and received REDACTED's email. We sent an email inquiry to him early Nov. 2 and have received no response as of 10 pm on Nov 2.
11-3-22 Still no word from Mr. REDACTED. But his self-described friend, continues to make threats and talk about involving an attorney. Oh, well. It seems to me the most important part of the story is being ignnored. However, we are in receipt of a well-written and thought-provoking "rebuttal" from Mr. Brown. We look forward to posting that soon.
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Later on Saturday, [10-29-22]we received a series of emails from Susan Klein, a Kalkut supporter, who expressed disapproval about what happened but had a differing perception of some parts of the story. She wrote, in part:
I was there for the debate but arrived after the event occurred. I was not made aware of what happened until after the debate. Marcus and I spoke at length and the entire team expressed to Marcus how sorry we were that it happened and that we weren’t there to address it with the individual in person. I spoke to several others who were there and they all said they didn’t hear it happen at the time but heard about it after and how they would have spoken up had they heard it. Kevin asked the individual to no longer attend any campaign events or sign hold outs and made it clear to him that the campaign does not condone what he said. There was no yelling or talk of book banning (per Marcus when he spoke to us about it at the time)[In our response to Klein, we noted that Marcus was very stressed and might have recounted the story differently simply because he was still trying to process -- Franklin Observer[
Klein continued, "Did the original comment happen? Yes absolutely we don’t dispute that. Did we act immediately? Yes we did, as I said Kevin apologized to Marcus directly in person, he called Tom and told him he was no longer welcome and we issued a public apology all within 15 mins of the debate ending. I am not sure how we could have handled it any better. We can’t control what one person (not affiliated with our campaign) has done. Other than to break off all ties which we did.
The spin and way the story has changed is what I have issue with. We feel terrible and have denounced the comments completely.
Kevin is a good man and he and Marcus have both ran solid campaigns with no drama.
It’s the people outside of their campaigns causing drama."
Susan, Thanks for adding your voice! -- Alan Earls
