In an interview on the Richard Urban Show on May 7, 2020, Allen Whitt, Republican candidate for U.S. Senate from West Virginia, says he’s for protecting first and second amendment rights.
In introducing himself, Mr. Whitt said he had been the President of the Family Policy Council of West Virginia, for coming up on seven years now and “we defend faith, family and freedom within the state of West Virginia down at the capital at your local county courthouse; at your city council meeting.”
“I was honored to get to grow up in a strong family. On my grandfather’s dairy farm, I learned to milk cows. From the time I was about three, one of my fondest memories is sitting on my grandmother’s lap as she milked the cow, and would squirt the cat in the face as she would come into the milking stall.”
When asked to spell out the most important platform points for his campaign, he said “Well in no particular order, the First Amendment that’s spelled out in the United States, Constitution, it unfortunately, because we live in a fallen world where man tends to look out for number one, we’d like to be able to think that we all put God first, others second and ourselves, third, but that’s just not reality. Most people are putting themselves first. It’s my needs and my wants above everybody else’s. And so therefore we have to have a form of governing people, who have that mindset.”
“So what we’re dealing with, we’re left with so we have to make the best of not a great situation, and that is trying to put good people in office to help govern. And the thing that pops up on my radar very quickly is that the Constitution says that we’ve got the first amendment right of free speech, from the very first time that our Founding Fathers had to go in and make a change or make an edit to the constitution that very first amendment said we shall protect free speech, but the Second Amendment says, well, unfortunately, because we’re dealing with some people who put themselves first we need the Second Amendment, we’re gonna have to have the right to bear arms in order to protect the first amendment. So we’ve seen a resurgence as of late, especially in West Virginia with many of our counties even smaller burgs and towns, rising up in the last few months; I was able to participate in the very first one, down in Fort Gay, West Virginia, where a local city council says, Hey, we’re gonna become a sanctuary city for the Second Amendment, You shall not infringe upon the Second Amendment, in Fort Gay West Virginia.”
In response to a question about the constitutionality of COVID-19 lock downs ordered by governors. Mr. Whitt answered “Well, we do have a Supreme Court precedent that allows governors, very specifically in times of quarantine to be able to restrict movement of state citizens. Now the President of the United States doesn’t have it, but in 1826 or 1828, I forget which date, we had a case in Pennsylvania, specifically about quarantines, and that case still looms large, so much so that they actually have a concept called the quarantine effect when something is challenged on the constitutional level, it has to work its way up to your local state courts and the federal district courts. And then all the way, hopefully the Supreme Court will take it up. So, this quarantine effect, basically means that, if a Governor puts a quarantine into place by the time someone who can challenge its constitutionality, the quarantine will likely have already been lifted. And so, most people don’t bother to follow through with the years of court cases that it would take”
I’d say during the last two decades, there have been a lot of assaults on the constitutional rights, Mr. Urban said, and I know that really recently, there was a bill to defund NSA. So my short question is, if you are elected, would you vote to defund such action like the NSA activity, surveillance activity which collects basic data on everything everybody does?
Mr. Whitt replied, “Oh, I’m gonna be absolutely on the side of defunding. Any criminal behavior in the name of the government. Our founding fathers {wrote] what I think is the second greatest document ever written behind the Holy Bible, the United States Constitution. This thing is absolutely brilliant. And it’s only been changed just 20 or some times in its history, but they could not have envisioned the technological accomplishments that digitally the society has now brought to bear. Now, virtually every American is surveiled in some way. There will be government officials that will probably watch this broadcast just to see if we’re saying anything too radical and that’s gotta stop.”
“Okay, at another related question. And this has to do with the issue of forced vaccination, which on the state level, I guess you’re aware, there’s the issue of mandating vaccines for school attendance and on the national level, especially now with a COVID-19 we’re hearing talk of having to have a card saying, you’re immunized. Would you support or oppose what I call forced vaccination?” Mr. Urban asked.
“I’ve never been the kind of the person that would just go along with the flow. I’m always a why person, I need to understand why you’re having me do this, and there certainly can be an argument made for, listen, we have known pathogens, measles and mumps and some of those types of things, that vaccinations certainly helped to defend us against but we have to look at it from a bigger perspective. Individual Freedom is, is what makes America, America. You don’t get to have individual freedom in countries like China. Matter of fact, in China they have this expression that goes something like your creativity and individuality is causing me problems. Well, that’s antithetical to Americanism, which is, hey, I came, our ancestors, our forefathers, came to this country to live freely and it’ll be up to me to take care of me, it’ll be up to me to defend myself against bears and against ruffians and against pathogens, and so I’m a big believer in individual freedom on these types of things, but I do know that with freedom comes responsibility and that’s what we call Liberty. Absolute freedom is anarchy and I’m not for that. And Liberty is kind of freedom with some guide rails on it. So I would look very carefully at anything where the government is forcing the entire populations, to engage in, and vaccination as being one of those.”
In 1986, there was the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act that has basically removed liability for pharmacy companies, from being sued and instead we have the so-called vaccine court. The intention of the law was originally that would have the vaccine Court, which has given out more than 42 billion of compensation for injury, so there’s no question that vaccines can and do injure kill, but the point about it is that there’s been a proliferation of vaccines due to the removal of liability, and that resulted from changes made through an amendment to that bill, and also a 2011 Supreme Court decision. So, the short question is, Would you support putting in the ability again to for parents or people who are injured to sue pharmaceutical companies?
Mr. Whitt: “I would, especially in scenarios or maybe just limited to scenarios where in order to access public funds like to attend a public school, you’re basically boxed into a scenario where you’re gonna have to get your child this specific vaccinations. Yeah, if there’s injury where you’ve been forced basically into a scenario where you had no other choice but to vaccinate then, sure, I would vote for that amendment.”
Mr. Whitt summarized: “We must defend small business owners, right?
First. Personal rights to free speech, freedom to be able to operate their businesses, according to their belief structures. That’s how America was founded. And right now, we have got a Senator in place that’s not willing to take the lead on any of that. As a matter of fact she’s on the wrong side of these issues.
Two. You sound like you’re a conservative guy, Richard, that you’re up on the issues you’re probably very astute and you run a media company there, and where you’re trying to spread the word to voters. You know what. That makes you a little suspicious sounding to the government and the liberals in all likelihood. And so, you’re gonna, at some point, hopefully, you won’t, but perhaps at some point you’re gonna need to defend yourself through the Second Amendment, and you maybe own firearms. I don’t know.”
Richard: “I am a firearms owner.”
Mr. Whitt continues: “Well, most certainly, you shouldn’t have your firearms removed from you because of this broadcast, because of your views, because of controversial statements perhaps you might have made, or your guests might have made and the ability for law enforcement to come over and without any due process take your firearms because someone has watched your show and raised what we know as a red flag. Those things must never happen in this country.
And my opponent Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, just as in the fall, it was after that terrible shooting out in El Paso with the Walmart and a lot of people perished. Sen. Capito was asked by a reporter, hey are we gonna pass more gun restrictions? What about Red Flag laws, where people can raise a red flag? Sen. Caputo said “We’re gonna get back as quick as we can, and we’re gonna take a really hard look at that.”