US Press Secretary, Sean Spicer, confronted in an Apple store by Indian-American woman who accuses him of racism

US Press Secretary, Sean Spicer, was harassed by an Indian-American woman, Shree Chauhan as he shopped in an Apple store on Saturday. The 33-year-old woman, who lives in Washington DC and works for a non-profit organisation, walked up to Spicer and began asking him how it feels to work with a fascist, referring to Trump.
Spicer replied her, saying,

 “We have a great country” and continued shopping, but Shree was not giving up and she shot back at him: 

“We have a great country? Have you helped with the Russia stuff? Are you a criminal as well? Have you committed treason too? Just like the president. Have you committed treason too? What can you tell me about Russia?”

Spicer answered with a smile, “It’s such a great country that allows you to be here,” before he walked out of the store.

The woman videotaped and posted the conversation on Twitter with the caption;

“Asking @PressSec questions in Apple Store since he doesn’t like the press.”

Shree took an exception to Spicer’s statement about America being a great country that allows her to be there. She sees it as a racist statement and said as much to DailyMail. She said she felt as though Spicer were suggesting that she has no right to be in the US. Refusing to accept the argument that Spicer probably meant that America was a country that allows for everyone to exercise free speech, she said:

“He’s the press secretary for the president of the United States. Don’t tell me what he probably meant because he also works for this administration that has done all of these things. He could’ve said, ‘Such a great country that allows dissent’. There’s a lot of ways that could’ve been said. To have someone who speaks for the president of the United States tell me to my face that I shouldn’t be here and I was born here – that is a real thing.”

Shree said that Trump’s election made her fear for her safety and also for her future in the US, even though she is a citizen.

“I woke up the day after the election in fear of what would happen to someone like me. And we’ve seen what happened. We’ve seen what happened to Indians,” She said, referring to Deep Rai, a 39-year-old US citizen of Sikh heritage, was shot by a gunman in the driveway of his home just outside Seattle in what is being treated as a hate crime.

She said she confronted Spicer as an act of service to the public. When asked if she thought it appropriate to confront him while he was shopping, she replied:

“Is it appropriate to ban Muslims from this country? Is it appropriate to attack the First Amendment and the freedom of the press and the right to assemble? I don’t think any of those things are appropriate and are within the bounds of the Constitution.”

She said that the Trump administration is curtailing constitutional rights and doing things to make America less free and that Spicer consistently defends the actions of Trump and even makes them into cogent policies later on, hence her behaviour towards him.

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