WASHINGTON - A Republican party official from Virginia, a southern US  state, has resigned after penning a controversial Facebook post, in which he questioned whether Muslim Americans have made positive contributions to the American society.
Bob FitzSimmonds, treasurer of the party’s Virginia state branch, stepped down Wednesday night, the Washington Post reported on Thursday, more than a week after he took to Facebook to blast President Barack Obama for praising Muslim-Americans for their positive role in American society. ‘This is pure nonsense. Exactly what part of our nation’s fabric was woven by Muslims?’ FitzSimmonds wrote on his Facebook wall on July 29. ‘What about Sikhs, Animists, and Jainists? Should we be thanking them too?’
FitzSimmonds, who has come under fire in the past for outrageous comments, was apparently responding to a speech Obama made to mark the end of Ramadan, in which he thanked Muslim Americans for their ‘many achievements and contributions … to building the very fabric of our nation and strengthening the core of our democracy.’ After a week of increasing criticism, FitzSimmonds issued an unapologetic resignation statement to state party officials Wednesday evening. ‘It seems that no matter how careful I might be, I will periodically give occasion for others to portray the party in a bad light, so long as I am a party official,’ he wrote. ‘After discussion with several party leaders it seems clear that I will either need to stop posting on social media or step down from my party office.