Richard Ruelas

The Republic | azcentral.com

Reality has again hit George Lindell, this time with a video of him chanting at a Donald Trump rally in Phoenix garnering multiple views, or going viral (in the parlance).

The Phoenix man spent Monday trying to explain why his chanting what sounded like “Jew-S-A” at the Saturday rally was not meant as a slur.

“I want to talk to everybody,” Lindell said Monday. He’s a painter for hire and had a job scheduled, but he put it off so he could respond. Local television stations were calling, so were national websites. He said CNN was trying to arrange something.

Lindell needed to do the interviews, he said, to counter what people are saying about him. “They’re calling me racist, calling me all kinds of names."

The Trump campaign has spoken out against the act. Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway said Sunday that Lindell's speech doesn't reflect the campaign's values.

Trump supporter's 'Jew-S-A' chant draws rebuke from campaign

“I think what he had to say is disgusting,” Conway told Jake Tapper on CNN’s “State of the Union."

Some also have accused him of being a plant, a Hillary Clinton supporter paid to chant an epithet to paint Trump supporters in a negative light.

"Do I look like I got paid?" Lindell said.

He does not. He was sitting Monday in the sparse warehouse he uses for his painting business. It is also where he lives.

Lindell insists his chant was not a reference to the Jewish people or religion. He would not do that, he said. He would not denigrate an entire group of people.

“We’re all created equal,” he said. “We’re all different.”

Lindell said he has a rational explanation for his chant. What sounded like “Jew,” was in fact, he said, a chance to show allegiance with Spanish speakers who chant the country’s initials with a heavy accent.

An earlier viral video

Five years ago, he was the subject of another viral video.

Lindell was the “Reality Hits You Hard, Bro' ” guy for a few weeks in 2011.

He had been in an accident. His van was rear-ended. The SUV that hit him then hit a curb, flipped over and knocked over some power lines. Lindell had to carefully exit his car, navigating through live wires.

But Lindell described it in a much more colorful fashion, using his arms to simulate the power poles falling, using his hands to illustrate the electrical pops in the air.

Catching his breath while being interviewed by a cameraman for the local Fox network affiliate, he summed up the experience with this phrase: “Reality hits you hard, bro'.”

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Anchors made sport of the poetic phrase. It was picked up by national websites and received hits on YouTube. Lindell’s words were synthesized for perfect pitch and set to music as part of Songify, itself an internet sensation at the time.

Lindell lined up promotional appearances. A friend created coffee mugs and T-shirts hoping to cash in on his sudden fame.

But, he said, he didn’t make money from his accidental catchphrase.

“Nothing,” he said. “I didn’t make no money. Other people probably did.”

Complex theory about an international cabal

In short, Lindell is not much better off today than he was five years ago. His painting business is still slow. He blames the economy.

Lindell has no television. He spends his nights listening to audio versions of the Bible and the Gnostic Gospels, accounts of Jesus Christ that are not in the canon.

His has developed a complex theory about the international cabal that controls the U.S. government. The corruption, he says, stretches back to the beginning of the country. Biblical clues hint at either this country experiencing sevenfold wealth with Trump's election, or disappearing.

Lindell attended the Trump rally wearing a "Hillary for Prison" shirt. He is not a fan of the Democratic presidential nominee.

He got a few glances from other attendees when he started chanting "Jew-S-A" at the rally. But no one told him to stop.

Lindell said he did not do it to taunt, but to show solidarity with Mexicans.

He said he saw a group of Hispanics, including some children, standing around him. The children, he said, began chanting U-S-A, but it came out sounding like "Joo-S-A." They soon stopped, he said.

"They felt they wouldn't fit in because of their accent," he said.

That is why, he said, he started chanting "Jew-S-A" at the rally.

Though, he said, it has been a habit of his for years, since his days of growing up around Latinos in his Maryvale neighborhood.

“That’s always the way I’ve said it: Jew-S-A,” he said. “I like the way it sounds. I like Jew-S-A because it has more flair.”

Picked up by the media

After about 45 minutes, he headed for the exit. As he did so, he passed the pen that held the media.

He started yelling at reporters and photographers that they were "going down."

And, as the crowd chanted "U-S-A" again, he started his "Jew-S-A" chant, ending it by muttering something. Lindell said he muttered, "The Jews run the country anyway."

Lindell said that phrase was "just horsing around."

Some reporters and photographers captured the incident. And Lindell went viral again.

The first time, when he was the "Reality Hits You Hard, Bro' " guy, he said, everybody loved him. This time, they're calling him names.

But Lindell said he figured he'd only be news for a few days longer. His sources on the internet tell him that Wikileaks will soon be releasing all 33,000 of Clinton's deleted emails.

"This one is going to die off quickly," he said, "then you'll never hear from me again."

Unless, of course, there is a third viral video in him.

Lindell does possess a trait that could prove useful for future viral videos.

"Every time I see a camera, I run up to it," he said. "It's my big mouth that gets me into all this."