US: Ex-Obama adviser arrested after viral video shows Islamophobic comments hurled at food vendor

Stuart Seldowitz, an ex-adviser to former US President Barack Obama, has been arrested aftervideos emerged showing him hurling a racist and Islamophobic tirade against a food cart vendor in New York.

Seldowitz arrested

The 64-year-old, said to be a resident of Manhattan, was arrested on Wednesday (Nov 22) on preliminary charges of second-degree aggravated harassment and three counts of stalking – stalking causing fear, stalking at employment, and stalking as a hate crime – according to the New York Police Department (NYPD).

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The NYPD also said that Seldowitz was accused of approaching the 24-year-old at his workplace several times and making hate-laden and Islamophobic remarks.

Gotham Government Relations sacks former adviser

The former national security adviser’s arrest took place a day after he was fired from his company, Gotham Government Relations.

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“Gotham Government Relations has ended all affiliation with Stuart Seldowitz, an individual who hasn’t contributed to our work in years,” the lobbying firm said in a statement.

It added, “The video of his actions is vile, racist, and beneath the dignity of the standards we practise at our firm.”

The firm has since removed Seldowitz’s page from its website.

Seldowitz was hired by the firm last year as its foreign affairs chair.

He had served as the acting director for the National Security Council South Asia Directorate in the Obama administration.

From 1999 to 2003, he was also the deputy director/senior political officer in the US State Department’s Office of Israel and Palestinian Affairs.

Seldowitz’s remarks

In the video, Seldowitz starts off by saying that the Egyptian intelligence agency will get hold of the cart vendor’s parents and torture them.

“The Mukhabarat wants your picture. The Mukhabarat in Egypt will get your parents. Does your father like his fingernails? They’ll take them out one by one,” said the former advisor, in one of the videos, while the man he’s addressing repeatedly tells him to leave and says he doesn’t speak English.

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To which Seldowitz responds by saying, “Why should I go? Tell me why I should go? I’m standing here. I’m an American. It’s a free country. It’s not like Egypt.”

He was also seen mocking Islam and accusing the 24-year-old employee of supporting the Palestinian militant group Hamas amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war. “You support killing little children,” Seldowitz could be heard telling the vendor in one of the videos.

‘I do regret’

In a telephonic interview with The New York Times, on Tuesday (Nov 21), Seldowitz said he had not seen the videos but added that the incident began with him asking the vendor if he was Egyptian.

Subsequently, as the conversation progressed the 24-year-old expressed support for Hamas, Seldowitz told the NYT.

“At that point, I got rather upset and I’ve said things to him, that in retrospect, I probably regret, though – that I do regret,” said Seldowitz.

He also went on to admit saying that instead of focusing on him and his remarks he“expanded into insulting his religion and so on.”

(With inputs from agencies)