EXCLUSIVE: Democrat NC State professor caught removing Trump signs near early voting site
David Ambaras, a Professor of History, was recognized in the viral Wake Co. video shared by Libs of TikTok on Twitter/X
UPDATE: NC State University has requested the retraction of this story, asserting that the professor denies involvement in this incident. Read my response here.
An NC State professor who believes in the "complete deplatforming" of the "fascist-in-chief" has been caught on video removing Trump signs near an early voting site in Wake County.
David Ambaras, who has been teaching history at the North Carolina State University for over twenty-five years, has been identified as one of the sign-stealing culprits in the video by a current or former student, which has been exclusively confirmed by the passerby also captured in the video attempting to stop them.
The video, which was obtained and published by Libs of TikTok, shows a bald white man and an Asian woman with handfuls of Trump signs at the intersection of High House Road and Bond Park Drive in Cary, approximately 500 yards from one of Wake County's twenty-two early voting sites at the Cary Senior Center.
According to the passerby captured confronting the pair (who will be referred to as "Joe" due to his desire to avoid future harassment), their excuse for removing the pro-Trump signs was that they were "damaged".
The video does show two of the signs held by the pair had been vandalized with black spray paint, in a manner apparently consistent with Trump signs which had previously been vandalized at the same site last week; however, the other signs held by the pair appear to be undamaged.
After being confronted, the video shows the pair setting the signs down, and placing one of the signs reading "Trump Low Taxes | Kamala High Taxes" back into the ground, only for them to pick the rest of signs back up and walk away with them.
During the interaction, "Joe" can be seen unsuccessfully attempting to get the attention of a Cary Police officer parked nearby, which he says was present to direct traffic on the road for a funeral procession. (Stealing, defacing, vandalizing, or unlawfully removing a political sign is a Class III misdemeanor under North Carolina law).
When shown a picture of Ambaras, who was initially identified in the video by a current or former student, "Joe" indicated he was "99% sure" he was the man he attempted to stop from taking the signs.
Professor David Ambaras
Ambaras has been teaching at North Carolina State University in Raleigh since 1998, where he has risen to Professor of History at the school's College of Humanities and Social Sciences
On the university's website, Ambaras' areas of expertise are listed as modern Japan in global historical contexts, imperialism and colonialism, spatial history and mobilities, urban history, deviance and social problems, and gender
.Voter registration records show Ambaras is registered as a Democrat in Chapel Hill, two counties over from where the video was captured, where he has voted in 36 elections since registering in 1999.
According to FEC records, Ambaras is also a regular political donor, giving $1,487.50 over 108 contributions since 2021 to exclusively Democrat recipients, with the majority going to Senator Elizabeth Warren.
Beyond merely his political affiliation, social media posts by Ambaras reveal a more explicit antifa motivation for committing this crime, referring to President Trump as the "fascist-in-chief" and agreeing "1000x" with a post suggesting "complete deplatforming of fascists".
Ambaras also shared a quote from an op-ed titled "CNN's Trump town hall was a fascist ritual", posting that the author "nail[ed] it" when writing that "CNN’s town hall was a reminder that Trump supporters are in fact bad people".



Ambaras did not respond to a request for comment by the time of publication; the woman also pictured in the video remains unidentified.