Freitas blasts Democrats during Trump rally in Newport News

Speaking at a rally Friday night in Newport News for President Donald Trump, Republican Delegate Nick Freitas accused Democrats of trying to change the core principles of the United States, saying that it was difficult for him to watch while he served in the military overseas.

Freitas, the Republican nominee for Virginia’s Seventh District seat in Congress, accused Democrats of being the party of slavery, Jim Crow, women’s voter suppression, and Japanese internment camps. He also called the Democrats ‘authoritarians,’ saying that they will shut down a business if they do not agree with what that business says or does.

Freitas told an enthusiastic crowd at the Newport News/Williamsburg International Airport that it is “outstanding” that he gets to run on the same ticket as Trump.

Speaking only briefly, Freitas also highlighted his service as a Green Beret and told Republicans in the crowd that they will have to fight to keep the Democrats from stealing the country. He urged attendees to find one motivating factor that they need to help deliver Republican wins, saying that when they believe they have done enough, that they should still do more.

Freitas’s partisan tone seemed to have carried over from a conference call with journalists a day earlier, when he struck a harsh tone toward the Democratic Party. In that call, he said that he believes Democrats have been encouraging voter fraud.

“We are not the party with a history of voter suppression in this country,” he said, suggesting that it is a form of suppression to make it easy to vote, so that people think their real vote will not matter and then don’t vote at all.

On stage Friday, he praised Trump for producing what he termed comprehensive criminal justice reform, echoing a message he had shared during the conference call the day before.

“We are very grateful that the president has given us a record to run on,” Freitas said on that Thursday call.

Freitas said when he or any Republicans try to discuss the policies that Democrats are pushing, they are accused of being racists.

“They don’t want to engage in debate because they can’t,” Freitas said.

At Friday’s rally, attendees were surprised by Vice President Mike Pence, who showed up to speak ahead of Trump. He fired up the crowd by telling attendees that the road to victory “goes through Tidewater.”

Trump arrived shortly after Pence spoke and almost immediately began criticizing Virginia Governor Ralph Northam, proclaiming that he would take every gun in Virginia if Trump loses to Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden.

Trump told the crowd that he would be naming a replacement for the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg Saturday at 5 p.m. While the New York Times has reported that Trump will be nominating Amy Coney Barret, Trump did not confirm that report at the rally, but he did say that he will nominate a woman.

Trump lost Virginia to Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016, and the state has become more solidly blue since then, making it difficult to know whether turnout for the presidential election will give Freitas the boost he needs to flip the historically Republican Seventh District back to red. Spanberger squeezed out a win in 2018 when Democrats across the country flipped a number of Republican-held districts to take back the House of Representatives.

Republicans have not won a statewide election in Virginia since 2009 and have lost control of both chambers in the General Assembly. Even so, Trump was insistent that he believes he can win the commonwealth.

“Let’s give Virginia a shot,” he said about campaigning in Virginia. “We are nearby.”