But in a mayoral election year where candidates have largely eschewed laugh lines in favor of dry discussions of wastewater infrastructure and economic development (important, sure, but boring), candidate Paul "The Truth" Congemi's straight-outta-Breitbart antics are pretty damned eye-catching.
The latest: two vulgar, misspelling-ridden handwritten letters he penned to city officials, each dated July 25, which CL has obtained.
He penned them in the wake of his comments at a July 18 candidate forum. Then, he told the black Uhuru activists with whom candidate Jesse Nevel is associated that reparations "came in the form of a man named Barack Obama" and to "go back to Africa" if they don't like it, video of which quickly went viral. Congemi wrote a letter to the St. Petersburg City Clerk Chan Srinavasa that "clarify" those comments (pictured below). He addressed the other letter to incumbent Mayor Rick Kriseman.
The gist of the second: he didn't say those bad things because he was was racist (uh-huh), but because he thinks the two frontrunners in the race didn't have the "balls" to stand up to Nevel, whom he called a "pencil dick," among other things, and his supporters from the Uhuru movement, whom he called "black Goons [sic]."
"The remark was not intended intended at black people in our city," he wrote (extra "intended" his). "Just Nevel and his group of black Goons [sic]."
Gee, glad he cleared that up.
"If I were the Mayor [sic] I would have had Nevel and his group of Goons [sic] Thrown [sic] out side on there [sic] asses," he said, and that neither Kriseman nor former Mayor Rick Baker, the other frontrunner, "had nothing to say" about them at the event and thus are men "with no balls."
The two-page letter contains several more references to male genitalia and ends with a final "None of them have
And the nearly four-page letter to Kriseman (full PDF here): hoo, boy.
Congemi reiterates much of what he said in the above-described letter and then lets loose on a homophobic rant, given Kriseman's full-throated embrace of marriage equality.
"I am a Donald Trump Supporter [sic]," he wrote. "I left the democrat [sic] party in 2012 when Jackass Obama came out and said he supports Queer [sic] Marriage [sic]."
Blah blah blah, Sodom and Gomorrah, etc.
Again, he's obviously a fringe candidate, but one who reflects a mindset that somehow still exists (not to mention FEMA-worthy spelling and grammar).
This article appears in Aug 24-31, 2017.
