Brevard County Commissioner Bryan Lober recently battened down the hatches on his Facebook profile, which is odd considering how screenshots show he’s used social media to joke about snow plows and protesters.
According to one screenshot from a comment on a thread within a Facebook page called "The Political Voice of Brevard County," a Facebook user named Vic Luebker suggested that Brevard County Democrat Stacy Patel needed donors to pay for a bus to protest Donald Trump.“#socialism can’t [sic] even fund a protest,” the post said. A user named Bob Shafer left comment offering a, “Word of wisdom to the protesters Beware of the Dodge Chargers!”
A Dodge Charger was used to run over protesters at the Charlottesville Unite The Right Rally, which resulted in the death of Heather Heyer.
Another user, Colby Karen, suggested that “if you hit one back up and go again. (just kidding).”
That’s where Lober, who is the vice chair of the county commission, jumped in with this zinger: “I wouldn’t recommend using a snow plow. It might look intentional.”
A winky face emoji adorns the end of the comment.
Unfortunately, the sick jokes don’t stop there.
On a separate comment on a now-deleted thread on "The Political Voice of Brevard County," a Facebook user dropped a screenshot of a comment that Lober — who also shared a post from neo-Nazi-sympathizer Steve King — said about Patel, who serves as the Chair of the Brevard Democratic Executive Committee.
In it, Lober says that he’s “typically not a big abortion proponent,” before adding that he “might just be willing to look the other way as I can only imagine what a scourge on humanity (and on our economy) her offspring would prove to be given that her litter would likely be raised with an entitlement mentality, zero work ethic, and taught the hypocritically racist and sexist position that the white man is evil."
“Unfortunately those least capable of properly raising children typically procreate without a second thought and society is left dealing with the repercussions,” Lober added.
CL Tampa left a voicemail for Lober on Friday afternoon. The Chief of Staff at Brevard County Commission District returned the call and informed us that Lober has been out of the state on vacation “for a couple of weeks” and that he’d “be back in the office on Monday.”
However, in an email to FlaPol, Lober defended his social media habits. “First and foremost, my comments on Facebook are made in my individual capacity, not in my capacity as an elected official,” Lober said. FlaPol says that he argued that the comments were meant to be in jest. “As to Patel, she has continually engaged in objectively dishonest and hypocritical attacks against me — many pertaining to my level of respect for the first amendment. As a direct result, I made it a point to criticize the blatant double standards and bigotry, including racism and sexism, repeatedly employed by Patel.”
Lober and Patel have exchanged un-pleasantries in the past over Lober’s use of social media, but making jokes about running people over with snow plows deserves some kind of attention from the Florida GOP.
Then again, why would anyone expect a party that seems OK with giving hater-blocker Mike Hill (who plans a rally to support his right to laugh at killing gay people) a slap on the wrist to do anything about Lober?
The president can just move around social media without consequence, so why can’t the rest of the party, right?
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This article appears in Jun 13-20, 2019.