70-Year-Old Man Arrested After Slapping 18-Year-Old Volunteer Outside Laconia, New Hampshire Polling Place in Viral Video
In Laconia, a city in Belknap County, New Hampshire, an Election Day confrontation unfolded outside a polling place on November 3, the day of the midterm elections: a 70-year-old man argued with an 18-year-old Turning Point Action volunteer outside the Ward 5 polling site at Woodland Heights Elementary School and slapped him across the face. The roughly 40-second video of the encounter went viral on social media. The Laconia Police Department arrested the man on the morning of November 4.
According to a Laconia police press release, as reported by the New York Post and Fox News, the man is Stephen Redic, 70. As he was leaving the polling place, he approached the group's tent and said he wanted to read a poem about rich people; the poem does not appear in the viral video. In the footage, the volunteer tries to debate him as Redic grows increasingly agitated, shouting, "You sit there and dare to look me in the face and say I don't know anything?" He then raised his middle finger, said, "That's what I know," backhanded the volunteer across the face and walked away. The volunteer remained largely calm throughout. Turning Point Action posted on X that the 18-year-old had stood his ground at the polls and was assaulted for it.
According to the local Laconia Daily Sun, police were called to the scene shortly after 3 p.m. that day, reviewed the viral video and interviewed three witnesses, then identified Redic and obtained an arrest warrant; Redic was taken into custody at around 8 a.m. on Wednesday, November 4. Police Chief Matthew Canfield said the department had had no prior contacts with Redic and that the video supported the volunteer's account, telling local media the slap "wasn't a brush." WMUR reported that New Hampshire Secretary of State David Scanlan had visited the same polling place and spoken with the volunteer shortly before the incident.
Redic is charged with misdemeanor simple assault and violation-level disorderly conduct. He has been released pending an arraignment in Laconia on December 10. As of Wednesday afternoon, it was not clear whether he had retained a lawyer, and he did not respond to a request for comment.
Redic is a poet who published a book of poems, "Tying My Shoes," in 2023, in which he boasted of having met every U.S. president since Dwight D. Eisenhower. Reports differ on whether the 18-year-old volunteer is publicly named; police and Turning Point Action have referred to him only as an 18-year-old volunteer, and this story follows that description.
Source: Laconia Police Department
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 新罕布什尔州Laconia地区法院大楼资料图（Ken Gallager摄，公共领域，经Wikimedia Commons），非事发现场图
