Kansas GOP leaders criticized for event in which donors kicked, beat Biden effigy

March 11 (UPI) -- A group of Republican leaders in Kansas are objecting to scenes from a fundraiser held by the state's GOP chairman in which party donors are seen kicking and beating an effigy of President Joe Biden with a bat.

Former Kansas GOP Chairman Mike Kuckelman on Saturday posted images and a video of the event held in Overland Park, Kan., on his personal Facebook page, calling the display by the party's leadership "shameful" and "wrong."

Kuckelman called for the jobs of state GOP Chairman Mike Brown, who succeeded him early last year, and Maria Holiday, leader of the Johnson County, Kan., Republican Party, which sponsored Friday's "Road to Red" event near Kansas City.

"Please join me in condemning last night's baseball bat beating of the effigy of President Biden, and join me in calling for resignations of Mike Brown and Maria Holiday," Kuckelman wrote. "We are Republicans, and we are better than this."

He added, "I don't agree with President Biden's policies, but he is a fellow human being. No one should condone or defend this horrific and shameful conduct."

In the posted images, a torso dummy is seen outfitted with a rubber mask of Biden's face as well as a T-shirt reading, "Let's Go, Brandon," a conservative meme meant as an insult to the Democratic president.

Several people are shown trying to deliver roundhouse kicks to the dummy, while one woman is shown beating the effigy's head with a bat.

The former GOP leader said people paid donations to bash the Biden at the event, which was highlighted by an appearance by 1970s rocker and conservative firebrand Ted Nugent.

In the responses to Kuckelman's post, several other Kansas GOP officials similarly voice outrage over the scenes, according to the Lawrence, Kan., Journal World.

"We fight with our votes, NOT fists and bats. This is disgraceful!" wrote Julie Roller Weeks, vice chairwoman of the Dickinson County Republicans, while Brandon Kenig, a former chairman of the Kansas Young Republicans, called the episode "not surprising at all.

"It's the logical extension of a cult-like mentality," he wrote. "When a majority of the party base sees the opposition as inherently evil and dehumanizes them repeatedly over policy disagreements, it's only a small step to simulated political violence and then actual political violence."

Kansas GOP spokesman Dakotah Parshall denied the state party had anything to do with the dummy kicking incident in a statement issued to KSNT-TV in Topeka, Kan., instead blaming it on "the poor judgement of the outside exhibitor. No one from KSGOP leadership or staff attended the event or had input on exhibitors."