Madison Cawthorn, the young conservative congressional candidate in North Carolina who has become somewhat of a media sensation, met his first controversy this week after his Democratic opponent U.S. Air Force Col. Moe Davis pounced on some old Instagram photos of him in Germany. In 2017 he visited the German mansion the Eagle's Nest, or as he wrote in his caption, "the vacation house of the Führer."
As Cawthorn and his supporters have pointed out, he posted those photos to celebrate the Allied victory over the “supreme evil" of the Nazis. Nevertheless, the Davis campaign is using the photos in their personal and political attacks. The Democrat also launched an outlandish suggestion that Cawthorn's company, SPQR Holdings, LLC, a real estate investment firm, is white nationalist because of its name.
"The name of his company, you know, is SPQR, which is a symbol that's associated with white nationalists," Davis claimed.
The campaign was obviously way off base, to the point that even CNN reported on it with sympathy for Cawthorn. As CNN reporter Sunlen Serfaty noted, she spoke to the Anti-Defamation League and they "did not see much merit" to Davis's attacks, concluding that Cawthorn was certainly "not" sympathizing with Nazis.
You know it's bad when CNN thinks your democratic opponent is launching dangerous and baseless attacks. pic.twitter.com/NBsoL9HkDr
— Madison Cawthorn (@CawthornforNC) August 14, 2020
A few of Cawthorn's influential friends spoke up on his behalf as well.
There is not a racist bone in @CawthornforNC body. I know Madison.
— CJ Pearson (@thecjpearson) August 11, 2020
The Left will do anything, including LIE, to bring down any good man who refuses to buckle in the face of the radical Left. Or any person - period - with the audacity to think for themselves.
Cawthorn himself, who is wheelchair-bound, made one of the most somber observations.
The only bigots in this race are my opponents and the disgusting members of the media who would try and affiliate a disabled man, like myself, with a movement that would have had me exterminated.
— Madison Cawthorn (@CawthornforNC) August 11, 2020
The race to represent North Carolina's 11th congressional district will conclude in November.