“The Thump Thump Act will allow Americans to run over these Muslim Terrorists. They don’t try this in Florida because of the bill I helped pass in the Legislature to allow them to be run over,” said U.S. Rep. Andy Fine (R-Fla.) in a Sunday X post. “It’s time to take it national. Thump thump.”
This isn’t the first time that the Florida lawmaker has made controversial statements online. This month alone, Democratic leaders issued a statement denouncing other comments he made and The New Republic noted that the American Israel Public Affairs Committee dropped his name from its list of pro-Israel politicians.
That all came after Fine posted on X in response to U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) calling Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a “war criminal.”
“I’m sure it is difficult to see us welcome the killer of so many of your fellow Muslim terrorists. The only shame is that you serve in Congress,” he said.
“The unhinged, racist and Islamophobic comments made by Randy Fine about Rep. Ilhan Omar are bigoted and disgusting,” said the joint statement published by House Minority Leader Hakeem Jefferies (D-N.Y.)’s office. “We are just weeks removed from heinous acts of political violence targeting elected officials in Minnesota for assassination. This is an incredibly difficult time for our nation and Members of Congress should be solving problems for the American people, not inciting violence. Randy Fine must apologize immediately.”
Fine’s response?
“The Hamas Caucus is upset. Boo hoo. I guess they weren't listening when I said the Hebrew Hammer was coming,” he said on X.
Since a terrorist attack by the Palestinian group Hamas in October 2023, Israel has been at war against the group in Gaza. Israel’s actions under Netanyahu have been called into question and criticized as the reported civilian death toll rises. On Sunday – the same day Fine posted on X about allowing Muslims to be “run over” – the United Nations issued a warning about “catastrophic hunger” in Gaza amid pauses in humanitarian aid.
“Release the hostages. Until then, starve away,” said Fine in post last week regarding the conditions in Gaza and referring to Israeli hostages still held by Hamas (an estimated 50 remain in Gaza, Time reported Wednesday). He then went on to say reports of malnutrition in Gaza were “all a lie.”
Fine is a third generation Floridian who graduated from Harvard College and Harvard Business with an MBA. He worked in the private sector before beginning his career as a lawmaker and was elected this April as a U.S. Congressman after previously serving in the Florida Senate. He has also been appointed to the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
“Senator Fine sponsored and passed over forty bills including the toughest anti-illegal immigration law in America, which provided the legal authority for ‘Alligator Alcatraz,’ the largest school choice expansion in American history, and the Florida law outlawing the practice of mutilating and castrating children on the altar of fake transgender science,” according to his biography. He’s also the only Jewish Republican in the Florida Legislature and has sought to criminalize antisemitic actions.
Last week, Fine also introduced a bill to “designate the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) as a foreign terrorist organization,” according to a press releasee from his office. It would direct the Department of State to investigate assigning the designation. Per Fine’s office, he “passed a similar bill in Florida, H.R. 1209, that ordered all executive agencies of the State of Florida, law enforcement agencies, and local governments to suspend their relationship with CAIR,” last year.
Now, back to his Sunday claim about legislation that would allow people to run each other over. It was in response to another X post by an account called LibercratTM that claimed “Muslims in Brooklyn blocked a highway, exited their vehicles and began chanting, ‘globalize the intifada.’”
A community note on Fine’s post reads: “The 2021 ‘Combatting Violence, Disorder and Looting and Law Enforcement Protection Act’ does not give drivers the freedom to run over peaceful protestors blocking traffic without consequence. It creates a defense for drivers facing civil lawsuits from violent ‘rioters.’”
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis also referenced that legislation this year in an interview with “The Rubin Report”, according to WFLA.
“If you are driving on one of those streets and a mob comes and surrounds your vehicle and threatens you, you have a right to flee for your safety, and so if you drive off and you hit one of these people, that’s their fault for impinging on you,” DeSantis said.
A fact-check report from WLRN found that “the law does not bar such a driver from being criminally prosecuted.”
Despite facing backlash for aggressive comments in the past, Fine did not seem deterred from making more controversial statements on X this week.
“This man has caused more division, hate, racism, and antisemitism than any American in history. He executed an attempted coup against President Trump and now spreads a blood libel against the Jews in order to support Muslim terrorists. He is evil. And should be in jail,” he said of former President Barack Obama in another Sunday post. President Donald Trump has also called for Obama to be arrested for treason, Audacy reported last week.
Then, Fine posted this on Wednesday: “Elite universities should be more focused on giving American students a good education than spending money and time on foreigners. Americans deserve better.”