Two candidates for City Council in Cambridge named as the focus of rally to ‘oppose bigotry’
A campaign sign for Carrie Pasquarello along Massachusetts Avenue in North Cambridge. (Photo: Marc Levy)
Two candidates for City Council are named as the focus of a rally planned for Sunday to “oppose bigotry” in Cambridge. The city’s branch of the Democratic Socialists of America have organized it to express concerns about challengers Robert Winters and Carrie Pasquarello.
Attendees are expected to meet at 4 p.m. in Inman Square – chosen by the DSA, organizers said, because it’s the same time as a celebration for Pasquarello, Winters and nine other candidates endorsed by a group called the Cambridge Citizens Coalition.
Late Saturday, Winters said he became aware that the rally would march from Inman to where the coalition was celebrating. Police have been notified, he said, and without knowing the DSA’s intentions, the location for the event might change.
“In all my years in Cambridge, I have never seen anything like this,” Winters said. “I am bracing for even greater attacks against me and my property.”
Robert Winters listens to former city councillor Nadeem Mazen speak June 6, 2022, in Cambridge City Hall. (Photo: Marc Levy)
A signup sheet from the DSA shared with Cambridge Day confirms the outlines of what Winters learned about the Sunday rally but says only that attendees would march to the event.
“Hate has no home here in Cambridge, and we will not let CCC celebrate candidates who don’t support all of us here in Cambridge regardless of our race, religion or gender identity,” according to the online signup sheet.
Winters and Pasquarello “have written and liked right-wing, racist, Islamophobic and transphobic tweets,” the document says, and “CCC and their endorsed candidates have made no statements condemning the rhetoric.”
A look for motive
Winters, a math lecturer and longtime politics watcher who runs the Cambridge Civic Journal website, ran unsuccessfully for the council four times in the 1990s. Pasquarello, who owns a security consultancy, is a first-time candidate.
A voice mail was left with Pasquarello that was not immediately returned. In an emailed response to questions by Winters, he said that the “substance of the assertions, they are all misrepresentations.”
“Several people, including some of the other candidates, have informed me of some of the chatter” about his social media presence, and fellow council candidate Dan Totten – a democratic socialist who is endorsed by the DSA – confronted him after a Tuesday political forum at Harvard to say “that he was going to go after me and anyone who didn’t join in with him,” Winters said. “This is Totten’s handiwork – the innuendo, the false assertions.”
Winters wondered at other factors for the conflict, such as Pasquarello’s sons being police officers or his own “disdain for DSA in addition to the animosity between me and Totten.”
Totten and DSA respond
Totten, who was texted Saturday with an opportunity to respond to Winters, said any reading beyond what was stated – concern about bigotry – was false. “It is pathetic that he is trying to escape accountability by attacking one of the only openly queer candidates in the race,” Totten said. “He is fuming in embarrassment now that a light is being shone on his hateful content.” Totten also clarified that he has not been in DSA leadership since 2021, and said that at the Tuesday forum it was Winters who interjected himself into a conversation Totten was having with someone else.
A DSA representative said the organization would be talking about Pasquarello and Winters “regardless” of Totten’s membership or his candidacy.
“These are some pretty virulently Islamophobic, racist, transphobic tweets and likes that these candidates have put out, and the public deserves to be aware of it so that they can make an informed choice,” said DSA organizer Willow Carretero Chavez, a resident of Somerville and an undergraduate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
A letter to Cambridge Day received Saturday from resident Ari Ofsevit went over much the same ground about Pasquarello and Winters, which Winters believed was a “parallel email campaign initiated by Totten to disparage me.” Carretero Chavez said the DSA had no public-facing email campaign on the topic. Separately, Totten also said he was unaware of any letter-writing campaign.
Raised at Tuesday forum
In packets of screen captures of social media posts and likes, an account identified as Winters’ hashtags Black Lives Matter as #stupidlivesmatter and makes quippy replies to posts making fun of a plus-sized mermaid or saying resigned U.S. attorney Rachael Rollins is headed to “professional wrestling.” He was asked about his social media presence by an audience member during the Harvard forum, with the Harvard Crimson quoting a question about “posts on Twitter that oppose trans rights, including one that calls transgenderism like a pedophilic ideology.” (Pasquarello didn’t attend the Harvard forum.)
“I actually don’t remember if I put a like on something I thought was funny or something,” Winters said, according to Crimson reporters Muskaan Arshad and Julian J. Giordano. “That is certainly possible, but I certainly don’t remember doing anything particularly controversial in that regard.”
When audience member Aanchal Manuja followed up by saying it wasn’t just one liked tweet, Winters said, “I don’t agree with that,” the Crimson reported.
Candidate and politician reactions
The DSA document links to unhappy reactions by candidates and sitting councillors: Totten, Ayah Al-Zubi, Burhan Azeem, Marc McGovern, Vernon Walker, Jivan Sobrinho-Wheeler and Quinton Zondervan. In general, those quoted are also aligned politically. On Saturday, candidate Ayesha Wilson added her name to those disturbed by questions raised about Pasquarello and Winters. Wilson is a School Committee member seeking to move to the council; she is also endorsed by the groups A Better Cambridge and the Cambridge Residents Alliance.
“Every candidate should join the seven of us who have condemned this abhorrent behavior, and the CCC should immediately cut ties with Robert and Carrie,” Totten said.
Winters said Saturday that he would reply at length on his website to the accusations of transphobia and hate.
Responding to Winters’ answer Tuesday about liking a tweet he thought was funny, Carretero Chavez said: “He thinks that trans people are a joke, which to me as a trans person is infuriating, just because of how afraid I am right now. I’m lucky to be in Cambridge, which I have until now experienced as a pretty welcoming place. But just seeing somebody running for Cambridge City Council making these points, flagging queer events in Cambridge to an account that can be characterized as inciting terrorism is just really jarring to me, and quite frightening.” A screen capture shows Winters’ account engaging with the group Libs of Tiktok, which the Anti-Defamation League calls a “popular anti-LGBTQ+ Twitter account” that puts attention on individuals, events and organizations that frequently then become targets of “harassment, threats and violence.”
Concerns were raised previously
This isn’t the first charge of Winters promoting transphobia, “hatred against the LGBTQIA+ community” and hate groups online: Loren Crowe, himself a controversial figure in Cambridge politics but now a New York resident, posted on the topic in June 2022 with a different set of screen captures purporting to show likes and comments from Winters’ account. “Liking tweets by alt-right Pizzagate conspiracy theorist and InfoWars host Mike Cernovich is more than a red flag. It’s an air raid siren,” Crowe said.
Some of the material can’t be found now among Winters’ online history. His account on X, the site formerly known as Twitter, is now mainly Wordle game shares, animal videos and sports and Hollywood trivia.
“I have not scrubbed any posts,” Winters said. “Some have suggested that I should do so, but I do not believe I have made any statements that can in any way be interpreted in the manner in which Dan Totten and others are doing.”
Pasquarello’s social media
Screen captures of likes by Pasquarello, according to the images supplied by the DSA, show follows of far-right personalities such as Jack Posobiec, whom the race justice group the Southern Poverty Law Center describes as an anti-democracy activist “known primarily for creating and amplifying viral disinformation campaigns.” Other likes are for tweets by Andy Ngô and Ian Miles Cheong, who have similar reputations. A tweet of her own from June 3, 2020, warns about “The horrid situation in communities around our country” as “These Democrat-led areas are sinking into the sewer,” according to screen captures provided by the DSA – an interesting remark made by the resident of one of the richest cities in the country with some of the highest real estate costs, but where 91 percent of voters chose Joe Biden in the 2020 election and only 6 percent chose Donald Trump.
That tweet couldn’t be found Saturday in a search of Pasquarello’s profile, but it has become less reliable since the site’s purchase by right-wing billionaire Elon Musk. A similar search also couldn’t find Pasquarello’s own pinned tweet.
The CCC was the only civic group to endorse Winters and Pasquarello. A message was left Saturday afternoon with president Suzanne Preston Blier to learn if the group was familiar with the allegations against their endorsed candidates and had a comment on them, but there was no immediate reply.
Joe McCarthy is evidently alive and well in Cambridge. How ironic that people allegedly associated with a group calling itself “Democratic Socialists of America” [!!] would resort to these sorts of smear tactics made infamous by that ignominious and eventually disgraced poseur, Joseph McCarthy. Dan Totten will no longer be getting my vote, and I urge others to carefully consider whether he now deserves any support at all after such unsubstantiated, scurrilous and shameful attacks. (Shame on you, Dan.) Should we now demand that anyone associated with Totten distance themselves from him for resorting to these despicable McCarthyite tactics, dis-endorse him, and publicly denounce his unseemly deployment of McCarthyite tactics in a Cambridge election?? Should we now reject all candidates endorsed by the Cambridge Residents Alliance, for instance, for consorting with a clearly troubled and unscrupulous individual who stoops to these sorts of tactics?? (You decide.) A friend of Bono used to say, about electoral politics, “If you don’t have ideas, throw mud.” Congratulations, Dan, you’ve now joined the electoral dishonor roll of despicable mudslingers. (I hadn’t necessarily been planning to vote for the two candidates targeted by this unscrupulous hate campaign, but I will now have to seriously consider it. C’est la vie. Thanks, Dan, good job!)
Bono has now had a chance to review the Twitter “likes,” along with a few posts – by Robert Winters, in particular – posted at the DSA protest sign-up page. I, too, find much of this material rather troubling. I can easily see how some people would be offended. In this day and age, it’s not to hard to scour the internet and find damaging material about almost anyone in these freewheeling, fast-draw times. Yes, it’s fair to hold candidates for public office accountable for their online “behavior,” but only when coupled with an opportunity to explain, and offer apologies where necessary. And the “guilt-by-association” tactics deployed by political opponents eager to find and throw dirt ought to be, at least, equally troubling. This is the McCarthyism to which Bono strenuously objects. “Guilt by association.” Any thoughtful person should find these carefully cherry-picked instances of offensive online “speech” – taken largely out of context – troubling, but we should also be prepared to admit to our own imperfections and allow for, and even welcome, opportunities for redemption. It’s not simply about “freedom of speech” – which is obviously important and should be defended – but about the unseemly “holier-than-thou” self-righteousness of the witch hunting lynch mob. If you don’t like that Robert Winters “liked” some tweet you find abhorrent, feel free to criticize, and refrain from voting for him. But, also, in the great American tradition, “Let Freedom Ring!” Oh, and by the way, “Let whoever is without sin cast the first stone…”
The Democratic Socialists of America?!
What a bunch of splitters!
We’re the American Socialists of Democracy!
Splitters!
Comparing opposition to explicit bigotry to McCarthyism is profoundly unserious.
“unsubstantiated” – Totten provided evidence of his claims and there is evidence provided here as well. Your refusal to look doesn’t mean it isn’t there.
“scurrilous” There is nothing slanderous or obscene about these remarks. that word far better describes the type of things Winters shared from libs of Tik Tok about various LGBT teachers and what he’s said in general about Muslims.
“shameful”again a better description of the bigotry than the pushback against it.
“I hadn’t necessarily been planning to vote for the two candidates targeted by this unscrupulous hate campaign, but I will now have to seriously consider it”
Finding out that someone is a bigot makes you more likely to vote for them… You really are contemptible.
Thank you for writing this up, and thank you for asking Suzanne what the CCC has to say about this. It’s really important for us all to know what she thinks about this – she is the de facto leader of a nearly-$20K PAC, the richest PAC in the city, and is herself a donor to Carrie Pasquarello as the Day noted a couple days ago – so I hope we as a city won’t let her strategy of silence continue. Does she stand by her support of Winters and Pasquarello?
(https://www.cambridgeday.com/2023/09/29/group-endorsements-for-cambridge-city-council-have-few-points-of-overlap-as-housing-stays-key/)
Defending someone who follows a “neo-Aryan” Twitter account and calling it McCarthyism is… wow.
Turns out Cambridge does have a MAGA constituency.
Trodden likes to make assumptions about things he knows nothing about. He’s a clone of counciler QZ which is not a good thing. . And Let us, citizens of Cambridge decide who we want. He’s just being nasty!
“but only when coupled with an opportunity to explain, and offer apologies where necessary.”
Winters was offered this opportunity his response was ““sorry if I liked something I found funny.”
it also isn’t “Guilt by association.” when you are criticizing a group for its decision to publicly endorse and support someone despite this, especially when they have still done nothing at all to push back against it or distance themselves from it, and especially when the group in question has a history of public homophobia.
” If you don’t like that Robert Winters “liked” some tweet you find abhorrent, feel free to criticize, and refrain from voting for him.”
Isn’t that exactly what the people you accuse of running a “Lynch mob”? Freedom of speech also includes the right to freely criticize the speech of others.
The evocation of “McCarthyism over opposition to fascism and racism, and the evocation of “Lynch mobs” over criticism of a white man for among other things being extremely racist is a complete inversion of the actual meaning of those terms and only serve to poison debate.
Stop the mudslinging and talk about the issues.
Neither the Left or the Right is immune to infantile behavior — you folks have made that clear.
Folks: those of you slinging mud and those of you slinging mud back are killing your chances of getting elected. If Winters and Pasquarello need to explain themselves or their values, so be it. The public will take note. But to hijack a city’s local electoral conversation away from what the public needs to know about (housing, transportation, energy and sustainability, education, and public safety) smacks of toxic narcissism and embittered self-interest. For one: let he who is without sin cast the first stone. Totten and Co. have surely effed up in life, or are they demigods? For two: the internet, to quote Avenue Q, the superb gay muppet musical, “is for porn”. A wasteland. Last night I went to see the 4-hour Angels In America / Perestroika at the Central Square Theater. Tony Kushner’s (Lincoln, Munich, and other Spielberg efforts) masterful and politically literate play about AIDS (and more) has a character identified as the “world’s oldest Bolshevik” asking the audience: “Can we change?” How about it, folks? Can we?
Federico Muchnik
federicoforcouncil.net
“Stop the mudslinging and talk about the issues.”
“But to hijack a city’s local electoral conversation away from what the public needs to know about (housing, transportation, energy and sustainability, education, and public safety) smacks of toxic narcissism and embittered self-interest”
Spreading racist, transphobic, and Islamophobic vitriol is a relevant issue. These are also ongoing crises in our country and pointing out that candidates are on the wrong side of history on these issues is relevant in Cambridge. saying it isn’t is saying you think bigotry is fine.
“Can we change?” How about it, folks? Can we?
These candidates and the CCC has demonstrated no desire to change so this is a bizarre defense. They were homophobic last year they are showing a lot more of their bigotry this year. They have not apologized, they have not retracted past statements, they have not made amends, they have not meaningfully demonstrated a desire to change in any way, they are currently running for a position of power in this city while spreading outright nazi propaganda.
What is wrong with you if you can’t see why people might think that matters?
Winters set up queer people in Cambridge to potentially become targets of violence, he has no place in office. If you don’t agree with that, neither do you.
These personal attacks are so replusive. You can’t win and argument or debate on issues than resort to name calling. If you don’t like a candidate then don’t vote for him/her. To shout people down with an angry mob is a complete turn-off and repugnance. Not only will I not vote for Dan Totten, I will make sure friends and neighbor know about these kinds of abborant tactics.
You know what is a “personal attack”? winters giving information about a drag queen story hour at a local library to libs of Tim Tik resulting in online abuse, the potential of actual violence, and the necessity for the library to add additional security.
You know what isn’t a personal attack? Criticism of that.
According to the CCC website, Robert Winters and Federico Muchnik are both members of the CCC Research and Consultation team who are “on sabbatical” for their City Council runs.
https://www.cccoalition.org/who-we-are.html
Having someone with bigoted views on the council, _especially_ in a time when those particular types bigoted views are getting people attacked and killed, would be a bad thing.
Whether someone holds anti-trans views is a genuine issue that will meaningfully affect the lives of people during this council session. The Council has held multiple votes over the past couple years explicitly protecting the LGBTQ community; these candidates views would be a step backwards by comparison.
Thanks to those who continue to fight to call out bigotry and hatred. Hate has no home here.
Saying bigotry isn’t a core issue in an election is about as sad and pathetic a position as you can get from CCC.
The LGBT community Cambridge is not small and shockingly they care deeply about having representatives who don’t hate them. What an effing surprise.
Federico pandacalee how can you call it mudslinging and name calling when Winters is standing behind his own tweets? At least he is standing by what he wrote and liked on Twitter while Pasquarello is scrubbing her account. Let “woke” Cambridge interpret what they want, you guys need to read the tweets and stop pretending that Winters is some vulnerable guy who needs a “safe space” He is capable of defending himself!
Federico it sounds as if you are out of your depth. You want us to focus on policy? And you are okay being in a slate with candidates suing the city over bike lanes? People without cars can now move about the city with their children safely. That’s at risk now. Many people have reasons to feel personally under attack by the CCC slate. And you don’t want us to take any of this personally? Easy for you to be sanctimonious.
Oh the horror, it seems that “Cambridge Values” are much more elastic than some would like!
LMBRC- Yes, I can get many places in the city more easily on my bike with my kids. Yet other streets are MORE dangerous since the garden street changes, and thats just near me. Ask some parents whose kids can no longer safely walk from g&P to raymond park, or around appleton street or a myriad of other cut through areas if they feel safe with their kids out on foot or bike. (all this before the new vassal lane school opens).
The safer streets are safer for bikes, but the less safe streets are far more dangerous and congested for all. My hope is that new councilors can strike a balance, all while advocating for a functional MBTA.
Alright, pandacalee. Tired of personal attacks, how about the two attempted physical attacks of protestors by CCC party goers yesterday? One tried to take the megaphone from one protester. Half an hour later, another one attempted to intimidate the person with the megaphone by putting his hands on it. The police physically removed him from the protest. Don’t believe me, here’s a video of the police removing him.
https://www.reddit.com/r/CambridgeMA/comments/16xm347/cccrob_winters_called_cops_on_protesters_ends_up/
It’s kind of funny that Winters had the police show up to “protect” the party when in reality we needed police protection from them. I’m glad the police were there as they can vouch that we did nothing but chant from from the sidewalk.
q99– that’s not true. More bikes mean fewer cars and less congestion. Protected lanes lead to fewer accidents for everyone. It’s still early in Cambridge for massive changes but protected lanes are a first step to disincentivizing driving. Cars on city roads should be exceptions, only when needed. Unfortunately that’s too often here because of a lack of transit alternatives. But we need to get going on this transition. And I am one of those parents and know many of those parents and we must run on different circles lol. What I have seen is a massive sense of entitlement from people that drive and want a monopoly of roads. There are many entitled bikers too but a bad apple biking will annoy you whereas a bad apple driving will kill you.
I’m a socialist but I think the Cambridge DSA are mudslingers and are not willing to discuss any issues other than AHO and bike lanes. There’s a lot of other work to be done.
Funny because from my perspective DSA is addressing several axes of bigotry here while CCC is not willing to talk about anything besides opposing affordable housing and bike lanes.
As I outlined in my prior thread, it is quite astonishing that people want to ignore these reprehensible statements, and dismiss them as “name calling” or “personal attacks.” If we cannot agree to condemn those who support or amplify hateful opinions that are beyond the pale, especially people who have not apologized or express any type of remorse for them (in fact the opposite happened, where Mr. Winters insultingly wrote ““I’m sorry if anyone failed to appreciate my sense of humor.”), then where are we? There is certainly much more work to be done on many other issues – which many progressive groups in Cambridge, including DSA, do do – but I think it’s more than fair for folks to want this to be a baseline.