Dan_Bongino_watching_election_results
2012 photo of Dan Bongino

For those that may have missed this…here is the story from the Huffington Post (slightly edited to censor the “bad words”):

GOP Congressional Hopeful Dan Bongino Launches Profanity-Laced Tirade Against Politico Reporter

“I’m going to make you an example. You will regret the day we had this conversation.”

08/23/2016 01:32 am ET

A Republican candidate for Congress in Florida launched a profanity-laced tirade at a Politico reporter during a recorded interview over the weekend.
“You’re a real disgusting piece of s***,” Dan Bongino, a former Secret Service agent who’s in a primary race for a district in southwest Florida, told Politico’s Marc Caputo on Sunday.
The dispute erupted after Bongino objected to a report in the Naples Daily News that claimed most of his campaign donations came from outside the district. He told Caputo it was a “wholly inaccurate story,” and after several minutes of trying to explain why, the two got testy with each other.
Bongino seemed to say that many of the contributors within his district were small donors and didn’t have to be disclosed, although his exact words were difficult to understand as the two repeatedly spoke over each other. Then, Caputo said, “Let me ask the questions ― I’ll handle the questions and you handle the answers.”
That set Bongino off.
“You don’t give me orders, you piece of s***, you understand?” he yelled. “You piece of s***.”
They also sparred over Bongino’s two failed campaigns ― running unsuccessfully for both the House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate ― in Maryland before moving to Florida.
“Marc, I am going to humiliate you from this point,” Bongino promised. “I’m going to make you an example. You will regret the day we had this conversation.”
As he lost his temper, Caputo goaded him, calling Bongino a “professional political candidate who loses.”
“Hey, shut the f*** up,” Bongino yelled back. “Go f*** yourself, you piece of s***.”
Shortly after the tirade, Bongino hopped online and went after Caputo for his use of the word “dude.”
“I can be a little salty on Twitter,” Bongino said in a Facebook video. “But I’m not a reporter and I don’t call people ‘dude’ when I want to comment.”
Bongino also said he didn’t see Caputo’s declaration on Twitter that he would record the conversation because he had blocked the reporter.
The Naples Daily News also reported that Bongino recently got into an argument at a campaign event that was so heated the organizers had to intervene.
Bongino’s primary is next week, where he will face off against two other Republicans for the seat currently held by GOP Rep. Curt Clawson, who is not seeking reelection. Robert Neeld is the only Democrat running in a district Ballotpedia calls “safely Republican.”

Here is the YouTube video of the conversation. It is 17 minutes and 10 seconds long. It gets really bad for the final two minutes. (NOTE – This is very NSFW and you should not listen to it around young children).

My daughter (17 years old) and I listened to this interview yesterday. I was cringing a lot through the conversation. This just didn’t sound like the Dan Bongino I knew here in Maryland. It is no secret that I was a big supporter of Dan during his campaigns over the last two election cycles here in Maryland.  I even had the opportunity to get my daughter interested and involved in the campaign. It was a great learning experience for her.
2012
I was pretty disappointed after listening to interview. Now I spent nine years in the US Navy and have heard it all, so the language was not my big issue, just the context of how and when it was used. You are running for office and using that kind of language when speaking to anyone is not smart.
I was not surprised that he did not apologize to the reporter (the reporter was trying to push his buttons and he succeeded in spinning Dan up).  I was hoping to hear him apologize to his followers and supporters for the language used in the conversation. Here is some of the text from his Facebook video:
…And I’ll say this folk, I know a lot of you have kids, I got daughters too right, you know should you be dropping F bombs on the call, nahh. I’ve been doing…I have two daughters and I don’t want them hearing me talking like that but apologize to this guy, he can go pound sand. He’s got zippo shot of that happening, OK. I don’t like using that kind of language, it’s just not right, I mean I have laughers too, again it is not the right thing to say, shouldn’t be dropping F bombs but you should probably tell someone when you are recording them and you shouldn’t imply that is it some kind of private conversation and then disclose it to be some kind of publicity crown…
OK…not as far as I would have hoped for but it was something.
I don’t follow Florida politics and have no clue if Dan is going to win his Primary or not. I still wish Dan and his family the best (even if I am blocked by him on Twitter – apparently I am part of an ever growing list of ex-supporters that have been blocked). Hopefully he makes better choices in the future when speaking to reporters or anyone else. I agree that he should not take any “crap” from reporters, but there are many more professional ways to handle those situations. Everything can be a life lesson and hopefully Dan learned something from this recent engagement.
I have no idea if Dan will ever read this, but if he does I wish him much luck in the upcoming Primary.
Scott E

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