Yup a few Republicans are going to start running and hiding next week
Joe Biden is now POTUS
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How the Christian Right Helped Foment Insurrection
Trump administration loyalists launched their own Christian organization to “stop the steal,” an act of loyalty to their divine leader.
www.rollingstone.com
How the Christian Right Helped Foment Insurrection
Christian-right activists inside and outside of government promoted the election fraud lie and claimed God told them to “let the church roar”
By
SARAH POSNER
Brent Stirton/Getty Images
This story was produced by Reveal from the Center for Investigative Reporting, a nonprofit news organization. Get their investigations emailed to you directly by signing up at RevealNews.org/newsletter.
The January 6th Save America March, where then-President Donald Trump incited a crowd to attack the U.S. Capitol, opened with a prayer. Trump’s longtime spiritual adviser and White House adviser, the Florida televangelist Paula White, called on God to “give us a holy boldness in this hour.” Standing at the same podium where, an hour later, Trump would exhort the crowd to “fight like hell,” White called the election results into question, asking God to let the people “have the assurance of a fair and a just election.” Flanked by a row of American flags, White implored God to “let every adversary against democracy, against freedom, against life, against liberty, against justice, against peace, against righteousness be overturned right now in the name of Jesus.”
Within hours, insurrectionists had surrounded the Capitol, beaten police, battered down barricades and doors, smashed windows and rampaged through the halls of the Capitol, breaching the Senate chamber. In video captured by The New Yorker, men ransacked the room, rifling through senators’ binders and papers, searching for evidence of what they claimed was treason. Then, standing on the rostrum where the president of the Senate presides, the group paused to pray “in Christ’s holy name.” Men raised their arms in the air as millions of evangelical and charismatic parishioners do every Sunday and thanked God for allowing them “to send a message to all the tyrants, the communists and the globalists, that this is our nation, not theirs.” They thanked God “for allowing the United States of America to be reborn.”
White evangelicals have been Trump’s most dedicated, unwavering base, standing by him through the cavalcade of abuses, failures and scandals that engulfed his campaigns and his presidency — from the Access Hollywood tape to his first impeachment to his efforts to overturn the election and incite the Capitol Riot. This fervent relationship, which has survived the events of January 6th, is based on far more than a transactional handshake over judicial appointments and a crackdown on abortion and LGBTQ rights. Trump’s white evangelical base has come to believe that God anointed him and that Trump’s placement of Christian-right ideologues in critical positions at federal agencies and in federal courts was the fulfillment of a long-sought goal of restoring the United States as a Christian nation. Throughout Trump’s presidency, his political appointees implemented policies that stripped away reproductive and LGBTQ rights and tore down the separation of church and state in the name of protecting unfettered religious freedom for conservative Christians. After Joe Biden won the presidency, Trump administration loyalists launched their own Christian organization to “stop the steal,” in the ultimate act of loyalty to their divine leader.
Since even before Trump took office, his cry of “fake news” was embraced by GOP leaders and leaders on the Christian right, who reinforced their followers’ fealty by seeking to sequester them from reality and training them to dismiss any criticism of Trump as a witch hunt or a hoax. At the 2019 Faith & Freedom Coalition conference, held just months after special counsel Robert Mueller released his report on the Russia investigation, then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell accused the president’s critics of “Trump derangement syndrome,” and Sen. Marsha Blackburn, a Republican from Tennessee, urged the audience to disregard mainstream news and turn instead to the “most important name in news” — “you and your circle of friends.” A few months later, amid Trump’s first impeachment hearings, then-Rep. Mark Meadows, who would go on to become Trump’s chief of staff, encouraged Christian-right activists at a luncheon at the Trump International Hotel in Washington to counteract news reports by retweeting him and other Trump loyalists in Congress. He underlined the power of this alternative information system, claiming that recent tweets from himself and Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio — who would later vote to overturn the results of November’s election — had received 163 million impressions, “more than the viewership of all the networks combined.”
Over the course of 2020, those circles of disinformation became infested with QAnon conspiracy theories about a satanic, child-sex-trafficking “deep state,” priming Trump’s White evangelical shock troops for his ultimate conspiratorial lie: that the election was stolen from him and that Biden’s victory was the result of fraud. As Trump and his legal team fanned out across the country’s courthouses and right-wing airwaves, insisting that they would prove voter fraud and reverse the results of the presidential election, Christian-right leaders and media picked up the rhetoric and ran with it. By Thanksgiving, the lie that the election had been stolen from Trump had become an article of faith.
Coverage of the Capitol insurrection has focused on such far-right instigators as the white supremacist Proud Boys and the Three Percenters, a militia group. But a reconstruction of the weeks leading up January 6th shows how a Christian-right group formed to “stop the steal” worked to foment a bellicose Christian narrative in defense of Trump’s coup attempt and justify a holy war against an illegitimate state. In late November, two federal workers, Arina Grossu — who had previously worked for the Christian-right advocacy group Family Research Council — and Rob Weaver, formed a new Christian right group, the Jericho March. The new group’s goal, according to a news release announcing its launch, was to “prayerfully protest and call on government officials to cast light on voter fraud, corruption, and suppression of the will of the American people in this election.” In fact, the Jericho March would help lay the groundwork for the insurrection.
The group held its first rally in the nation’s capital December 12th, the same day other protests against the democratic process took place there. That night in Washington, the protests devolved into violence as armed members of the Proud Boys roamed the city’s streets looking to fight, stole a Black Lives Matter banner from a historic Black church and set it on fire. The Jericho March rally, which had run most of the afternoon on the National Mall, featured a lineup of some the right’s most incendiary figures, blending conspiracies and battle cries with appeals to Christianity. Eric Metaxas, a popular author, radio host and unrelenting promoter of the false claim that the election was fraudulent, was the emcee.
In an interview from the rally posted on the influential disinformation site The Epoch Times, Weaver compared the marchers he enlisted to the capital to the story of Joshua’s army in the Bible, which encircled the city of Jericho as priests blew trumpets, causing the walls to tumble down so the army could invade. Grossu told an interviewer that the election had been “stolen” from Trump, citing Trump lawyer Sidney Powell’s baseless claims about voting irregularities. Grossu promised, “God can reveal all the election fraud and corruption that stole the election from him.”
Other Jericho March speakers linked to the Trump administration pressed themes of biblical war and Christian redemption. Michael Flynn, Trump’s former national security adviser who pleaded guilty to lying to federal investigators, described the walls of Jericho as a metaphor for the walls around the “deep state” and pledged, “We’re going to knock those walls down.” Trump campaign adviser Roger Stone, who claimed to have been born again since his conviction for obstructing the Mueller investigation, told the crowd in a recorded message: “It was Jesus Christ who gave our president, Donald Trump, the courage and the compassion to save my life when I was unfairly and illegally targeted in the Mueller witch hunt. … My faith is in Jesus Christ, and we will make America great again and we will stop the steal.” These testimonies were punctuated with the blowing of shofars, traditionally Jewish ritual objects, to echo the trumpets sounding outside Jericho that summoned an invasion.
Gallery: Attack on the U.S. Capitol
Among the speakers were leading figures in the subsequent insurrection. Weaver and Grossu, the rally’s organizers, sang “God Bless America” with Ali Alexander, founder of Stop the Steal and a prominent organizer of the January 6th rally. Alexander had previously attracted attention in Trump circles – he was invited to a 2019 social media summit at the White House and appeared with GOP figures such as Rep. Paul Gosar at previous Stop the Steal rallies — and has said he worked with Gosar and Republican House members Andy Biggs and Mo Brooks to plan the January 6th rally. He rallied the December 12th Jericho March crowd, declaring that the event “is only the beginning.” He urged them to return to Washington on January 20th — Inauguration Day — to “occupy D.C.” According to an archived page from the Jericho March website, organizers took up the call, planning several subsequent rallies and marches, including mobilizing for Stop the Steal’s “Wild Protest” on January 6th.
Stewart Rhodes, founder of the militia group Oath Keepers, also appeared, vowing that if Trump did not “show the world who the traitors are and then use the Insurrection Act to drop the hammer on them,” then “we’re going to have to do it ourselves later in a much more desperate, much more bloody war.” Oath Keepers have since been arrested and charged with conspiracy for allegedly helping to coordinate movement inside the Capitol siege.
Alex Jones, the far-right conspiracist radio host and Trump booster, electrified the Jericho Marchers with his invocation of the Book of Revelation, thought to prophesy Christ’s return. “Christ’s crucifixion was not our defeat, it was our greatest victory,” he shouted. “The state has no jurisdiction over any of us. Our relationship with God is sacred and is eternal.” He vowed that Biden “will be removed, one way or another.
Grossu and Weaver, though, were more than just Trump fellow travelers. They were on the payroll of the federal government, which constrains employees from engaging in certain partisan political activities. Grossu was a contractor in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Civil Rights, on a contract from November 6th, 2017, through January 30th, 2021, according to an agency spokesperson. For his part, Weaver was named an adviser in the department’s Center for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships in July 2020 and served, according to the spokesperson, through January 8th, 2021. Earlier, in 2017, Trump had nominated Weaver to serve as director of the agency’s Indian Health Service. But the nomination was withdrawn after The Wall Street Journal reported that Weaver had misrepresented his experience on his resume. Weaver leveraged his new health department role at the Jericho March, saying in the live interview that day that he worked for the federal government and claiming, without providing any details, to have “seen a lot of really hidden things that I just can’t stand.” The country, Weaver said in the interview, “stands on the shoulders of Jesus. He’s the real government.”
Weaver went on, “God told me to let the church roar.”
Grossu did not respond to a request for comment, and Weaver’s email at the Department of Health and Human Services was no longer functioning; the public relations firm that handled Jericho March media relations also did not respond to requests for comment.
Speakers at the December 12th Jericho March continued to show up at protests decrying the election as fraudulent. Jones, for example, returned to Washington on January 5th for a rally at Freedom Plaza, near the White House. That rally, according to the permit, was hosted by a group called the Eighty Percent Coalition, an apparent reference to a Gallup poll that showed more than 80 percent of Republicans did not trust the results of the election. That evening, Jones reprised his Christian nationalist bombast. Employing apocalyptic language about a coming “new world order,” he called Biden a “slave of Satan” and warned that “things are going to be rough, things are going to get bad in the future.” He added that “not everybody is going to make it, but that’s OK, because in the end, God will fulfill his destiny and will reward the righteous.”
Then he turned to the next day’s events. “Tomorrow is a great day,” he shouted. “We don’t quietly take the election fraud, we don’t quietly take the scam and believe their BS. We’ve seen the evidence. The system has had to desperately engage in this gambit to maintain control, but this will be their Waterloo, this will be their destruction.”
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Trump supporters demonstrating against the election results march to the Supreme Court to protest against the Court’s decision not to overturn the election, on December 12, 2020 in Washington, D.C.
Andrew Lichtenstein/Corbis/Getty Images
The next day, Trump goaded protesters to march to the Capitol. Jones is seen in video footage of the insurrection scraped from Parler and other social media giving directions to rioters through a bullhorn. The day after the insurrection, Jones claimed the White House had asked him to lead the march to the Capitol.
The events of January 6th shook the nation, but they appear to have done little to weaken Trump’s White evangelical support. A Marist College/PBS/NPR poll, conducted after January 6th, found that 63 percent of White evangelicals did not trust the election results were accurate, and a similar number, 65 percent, did not believe Trump was to blame for the violence at the Capitol. A poll conducted by the Public Religion Research Institute found that while Trump left office with his lowest overall favorability rating since his 2016 campaign — 31 percent — his approval rate was twice as high among White evangelicals.
The Sunday after the insurrection, Trump’s spiritual adviser Paula White was back in the pulpit at City of Destiny, the church she pastors in Apopka, Florida. Trump and White have been friends since the mid-2000s, when he invited her for a meeting after he spotted the blond televangelist while channel surfing. White briefly condemned “lawlessness,” but then mounted a strong defense of free speech rights and assured her congregation that “God is still at work.” She recounted the story in the first Book of Samuel, in which the Philistines stole the Ark of the Covenant. In the biblical story, the ark is considered too holy for the apostate Philistines, “the eternal enemies of God,” as White described them, to handle, and God returns it to the Israelites — evidence that, in White’s view, God will restore America to its rightful inheritors, too.
Other evangelical leaders sought to deny reality, blaming the violence of that day on antifa or Black Lives Matter protesters who they falsely claimed had posed as Trump supporters. Michele Bachmann, the former Republican congresswoman who is now a dean at Regent University, had been inside the Capitol during the January 6th siege. Speaking to a prayer call with other Christian-right leaders that evening, she said: “You know the kind of people that we were with. The nicest, friendliest, happiest — it was like a family reunion out there. It was incredible, it was wonderful, and then all of a sudden, this happens.” Of the rioters at the Capitol, Bachmann insisted that “this wasn’t the Trump crowd, this didn’t look anything like the Trump crowd or the prayer warriors.”
Lance Wallnau, a popular evangelical author, speaker and Trump loyalist who attended the January 6th protest, echoed that same theme. “This is not your typical evangelical, I’m telling you right now,” he told Metaxas on his radio program the day after the insurrection, “and they’re banging on the hoods of the police and they’re creating a scene, I said, ‘This is the local antifa mob and this is like from the playbook 101.’ ”
By January 8th, the Jericho March had posted a statement denouncing violence and scrubbed any reference to Stop the Steal’s January 6th protest.
Accountability for the former president was not on the table. Pastor Robert Jeffress of First Baptist Church of Dallas has been close to Trump for years, as one of the first evangelical leaders to endorse his candidacy in 2016. He condemned the violence but stopped short of blaming it on Trump, telling Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting that while he accepts the election results, Trump “has a right to believe” that it was stolen.
Another influential Trump ally, Franklin Graham, head of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, sent an unmistakable signal to Republican lawmakers that their White evangelical base would not tolerate a second impeachment. In a Facebook post, Graham compared the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump to Judas, whose betrayal of Jesus led to his crucifixion. “It makes you wonder,” he wrote, “what the thirty pieces of silver were that Speaker [Nancy] Pelosi promised for this betrayal.”
Meanwhile, the Christian right is readying its troops for an escalation of the culture war: a campaign to delegitimize not only Biden’s presidency, but any Democratic election victory. Bachmann, during the prayer call just hours after the insurrection, claimed that Democrats also “stole” control of the Senate when Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock won their seats in Georgia — a development Bachmann repeatedly called a “coup.”
That narrative means that Republican lawmakers can rest assured that their most loyal base will have their back as they reject Trump’s second impeachment, obstruct the Democratic legislative agenda and refuse to accept the legitimacy of the Democratic president and Democratic leadership of Congress. The movement’s new jeremiad, a battle against the democratic process itself, is just getting started.
On Wednesday, the Department of Homeland Security issued a terrorism advisory bulletin that warned of the potential costs of the false claims at the heart of that battle: “Information suggests that some ideologically-motivated violent extremists with objections to the exercise of governmental authority and the presidential transition, as well as other perceived grievances fueled by false narratives, could continue to mobilize to incite or commit violence.”
And of course, not all will condemn MTG. Some will try to see her as a voice to reason with just like they saw Trump....The Grinch though?
Randy Rainbow a damn fool lol
Trump and his brand are singlehandedly destroying people's lives, means of livelihood, futures, businesses, careers, political objectivity, congress, senate, Republican Party, American brand democracy, two party systems, racial tolerance, international relations, and inter-party cooperation and collaboration.
Just one man did all this to damage America, not sure how to recover from each one of these attributes. Biden won't be able to do it all in four years.
Just one man did all this to damage America, not sure how to recover from each one of these attributes. Biden won't be able to do it all in four years.
The GOP won't compromise, because they don't know how. Their ideology is based around being intolerant and intransigent.
Dems need to realize that they're trying to protect something that they'll probably lose anyway. Better to go down installing things that will genuinely help people and making the country a better place than to go down flailing and trying to look like "the good guys".
Exactly. It's much easier for Republicans to block things than to try to take them away from voters.
While he can automatically erase student debt just as he's suspended student payments and interest, he cannot miraculously reverse the tax cuts. Remember how long that took and how they did it.
Day One Agenda
The president can use laws already on the books for constructive change without abusing executive power
prospect.org
They stormed the Capitol to overturn the results of
an election they didn't vote in
By Blake Ellis and Melanie Hicken, CNN
Updated 1354 GMT (2154 HKT) February 1, 2021
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/02/01/us/capitol-rioters-non-voters-invs/index.html
(CNN)They were there to "Stop the Steal" and to keep the President they revered in office, yet records show that some of the rioters who stormed the US Capitol did not vote in the very election they were protesting.
One was Donovan Crowl, an ex-Marine who charged toward a Capitol entrance in paramilitary garb on January 6 as the Pro-Trump crowd chanted "who's our President?"
Federal authorities later identified Crowl, 50, as a member of a self-styled militia organization in his home state of Ohio and affiliated with the extremist group the Oath Keepers. His mother told CNN that he previously told her "they were going to overtake the government if they...tried to take Trump's presidency from him." She said he had become increasingly angry during the Obama administration and that she was aware of his support for former President Donald Trump.
Donovan Crowl was one of the members of an Ohio militant group charged in the Capitol riot.
Despite these apparent pro-Trump views, a county election official in Ohio told CNN that he registered in 2013 but "never voted nor responded to any of our confirmation notices to keep him registered," so he was removed from the voter rolls at the end of 2020 and the state said he was not registered in Ohio. A county clerk in Illinois, where Crowl was once registered, also confirmed he was not an active voter anywhere in the state.
Crowl was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of destruction of government property and conspiracy for allegedly coordinating with others to plan their attack. He remains in custody after a judge said, "The suggestion to release him to a residence with nine firearms is a non-starter." In an interview cited by the government, Crowl told the New Yorker that he had peaceful intentions and claimed he had protected the police. Crowl's attorney did not provide a comment about his client's voting record.
Donovan Crowl was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of destruction of government property and conspiracy.
Many involved in the insurrection professed to be motivated by patriotism, falsely declaring that Trump was the rightful winner of the election. Yet at least eight of the people who are now facing criminal charges for their involvement in the events at the Capitol did not vote in the November 2020 presidential election, according to an analysis of voting records from the states where protestors were arrested and those states where public records show they have lived. They came from states around the country and ranged in age from 21 to 65.
To determine who voted in November, CNN obtained voting records for more than 80 of the initial arrestees. Most voted in the presidential election, and while many were registered Republicans, a handful were registered as Democrats in those jurisdictions that provided party information -- though who someone votes for is not publicly disclosed. Public access to voter history records varies by state, and CNN was unable to view the records of some of those charged.
Among those who didn't vote were a 65-year-old Georgia man who, according to government documents, was found in his van with a fully-loaded pistol and ammunition, and a Louisiana man who publicly bragged about spending nearly two hours inside the Capitol after attending Trump's "Stop the Steal" rally. Another was a 21-year-old woman from Missouri who prosecutors say shared a video on Snapchat that showed her parading around with a piece of a wooden sign from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office. And a Florida man previously convicted of attempted murder who was accused by the government of refusing to leave the Capitol likely did not have the option to cast a ballot because of his unpaid court fines.
Jessica Stern, a Boston University professor who has spent around 30 years researching extremists, said that while she hasn't spoken with the individuals involved in the events at the Capitol, from her interviews with other violent extremists, she believes a number of factors could have been at play. They could have believed the system was rigged, as the "Stop the Steal" movement claims, in which case there would be no point in voting. They could be more attracted to the theater, violence or attention they would get from a demonstration like the one at the Capitol than to actually achieving their purported goal -- in this case, different election results.
Stern speculated that it was a combination of these reasons, adding that feelings of anger and humiliation often draw people to extremist groups and violence. She said that for someone to actually cast a vote, "you would have to believe in the ethic of voting more than you thought it was a waste of time...and see it as a moral imperative. You have to believe the system works for everyone, that it's for the good of the country."
Jack Griffith, a 25-year-old from Tennessee, trumpeted his arrival in Washington DC with a Facebook post saying, "THE CAVALRY IS COMING!!!!," using the hashtag "#MAGA," according to court documents. Shortly after leaving the Capitol on January 6, he posted a message of disappointment. "I hate to be that guy, but The New World Order beat us," he wrote. "Trump was our greatest champion, and it still wasn't enough. He tried his very best. He did so much, but he's only one man...I even helped stormed(sic) the capitol today, but it only made things worse...Why, God? Why? WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN US? Unless...Trump still has a plan?"
"THE CAVALRY IS COMING!!!!," Jack Griffith posted on Facebook about going to D.C., according to court records.
These online missives describing his participation in the Capitol siege were later used by the Department of Justice to build a criminal case against him. Griffith faces a number of charges, including violent entry or disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds.
Election data from Tennessee and Alabama, where public records show Griffith had lived, showed that he had voted in the 2016 and 2018 elections but not the 2020 presidential election. The public defender who initially represented him declined to comment. Another attorney listed as representing him now did not respond to requests for comment.
Jack Jesse Griffith is facing federal charges in relation to the Capitol riots.
Court records detail how University of Kentucky senior Gracyn Courtright posted a series of images on Instagram showing herself marching with a large American flag and another with her arms raised in triumph outside the Capitol, with the caption, "can't wait to tell my grandkids I was here." Later, she posted a photo of herself in a belly baring shirt with the caption, "Infamy is just as good as fame. Either way I end up more known. XOXO."
An Instagram photo posted by Gracyn Courtright shows her on Capitol grounds and was included in federal court records.
Courtright, who was charged with crimes including knowingly entering a restricted building, was also identified on surveillance footage lugging a congressional "Members Only" sign around the Capitol, according to court records. "idk what treason is," she wrote in a conversation shared with the FBI by a tipster, who had confronted the college student in a series of Instagram messages. Courtright is not registered in Kentucky, where she attends school, according to election officials. She is registered in her home state of West Virginia, but records show she did not vote in the 2020 election. Her attorney told CNN that Courtright did not dispute the fact that she did not vote in the election but declined further comment.
In an image taken from surveillance video, Gracyn Courtright is seen walking up the steps near the Senate Chamber carrying a "Members Only" sign.
In a string of social media posts he shared straight from the Capitol, Edward Jacob Lang of New York portrayed himself as ready for a revolution. "1776 has commenced," he wrote in one that was cited by the government, showing him standing on the steps of the Capitol. "I was the leader of Liberty today. Arrest me. You are on the wrong side of history," read another. After leaving the Capitol, he continued to encourage followers to join the "patriot movement" with him. "GIVE ME LIBERTY OR GIVE ME DEATH," he posted.
Federal prosecutors said that video footage from January 6 shows Lang attempting to attack police officers with a baseball bat, donning a gas mask and riot shield. He now faces a variety of federal charges, including assaulting, resisting or impeding certain officers or employees, civil disorder and violent entry. A recent ProPublica story also revealed how Lang had used the online messaging app Telegram in an attempt to radicalize "normies" and convince them to join local militia groups -- encouraging people in the days after the Capitol riot to stock up on guns and prepare for war.
Prosecutors said in court documents that the man pictured in a gas mask appears to be Lang.
Though state records show that Lang is registered to vote and had participated in a couple of past elections, county and state officials confirmed to CNN that he did not vote in the November election. Lang's attorney said in a statement that Lang claimed from jail that he submitted an absentee ballot, saying, "Mr. Lang has always represented himself as a Libertarian...He is not a devout Trump supporter, but believes that those taking office will not uphold citizens' First and Second Amendment rights."
Insurrection fueled by conspiracy groups, extremists and fringe movements
New York law requires absentee ballots to be postmarked by election day and received within the following week in order to be counted. When asked about Lang's claim that he sent in an absentee ballot, the Sullivan County Board of Elections directed CNN to file an open records request in order to receive any information. The request had not been responded to before the time of publishing.
Lang's attorney also said the 25-year-old was a "naive, impressionable young man" who had been provoked by Trump's rhetoric. He cited Senator Mitch McConnell's statement that "the mob was fed lies" and said he hoped that Lang and others would not be considered guilty "due solely to their associations, beliefs and presence."
A man who identified himself with the name of Lang's father refused to talk with a reporter, saying, "We hate CNN. We're pro Trump, goodbye." In a statement to a local newspaper, Lang's father attributed his son's actions at the Capitol to "a substance abuse problem."
Edward Jacob Lang posted a string of social media posts from the Capitol riots that were cited by prosecutors.
Arie Perliger, a professor at University of Massachusetts Lowell who specializes in right-wing domestic terror, said that he was not surprised to hear some of the rioters had not voted, particularly militia members like Crowl, since militia membership is often rooted in a distrust of government. Still, he said he was concerned that it could reflect a growing erosion of faith in the American democratic process, which is a "risk we need to think about."
"When we see that significant ideological groups are stopping participating in the Democratic process, that may mean they are looking for other ways to participate, and those other ways could be more violent," said Perliger, who oversees a database of right-wing extremist acts of violence in the United States. "We should be concerned if we see a growing number of ideological groups are reducing their involvement in electoral politics."
But he said the opposite when he wanted ya votesWhile he can automatically erase student debt just as he's suspended student payments and interest, he cannot miraculously reverse the tax cuts. Remember how long that took and how they did it.
Day One Agenda
The president can use laws already on the books for constructive change without abusing executive power
You are a troll.
"Move to" and "complete" are two totally different things.
Cot damn you russian motherfuckers rely on the ignorant and vulnerable to advance your bullshit.
But you find it hard to sway Black folks cause in order for us to survive, let alone prosper we HAVE to be smarter than you.
I said all that to say this: fuck you.
put supersav on ignore »here«.
Trump is out, biden was hamstrung for two months and is still actively being sabotaged, has been vocal and active on 1000% more pro black shit already with the seat barely warm, and all these niggas are talking about is fuck biden watch how he gon fuck us instead of okay we got him where he want him, how can we leverage that to get him to deliver.
That shit is WILD transparent
This shit reminds me of the Northam blackface story. Many people was asking for him to resign. My girlfriend brought up an interesting point. Why not let him stay on and work his ass off to fix his reputation because he's going to work even harder now. She was right. Let Biden continue to fix his wrongs for his own family legacy. We already seen a President how won't admit he's wronged black people.
And going to prison for being some dumbazz Cacs
They stormed the Capitol to overturn the results of
an election they didn't vote in
By Blake Ellis and Melanie Hicken, CNN
Updated 1354 GMT (2154 HKT) February 1, 2021
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/02/01/us/capitol-rioters-non-voters-invs/index.html
(CNN)They were there to "Stop the Steal" and to keep the President they revered in office, yet records show that some of the rioters who stormed the US Capitol did not vote in the very election they were protesting.
One was Donovan Crowl, an ex-Marine who charged toward a Capitol entrance in paramilitary garb on January 6 as the Pro-Trump crowd chanted "who's our President?"
Federal authorities later identified Crowl, 50, as a member of a self-styled militia organization in his home state of Ohio and affiliated with the extremist group the Oath Keepers. His mother told CNN that he previously told her "they were going to overtake the government if they...tried to take Trump's presidency from him." She said he had become increasingly angry during the Obama administration and that she was aware of his support for former President Donald Trump.
Donovan Crowl was one of the members of an Ohio militant group charged in the Capitol riot.
Despite these apparent pro-Trump views, a county election official in Ohio told CNN that he registered in 2013 but "never voted nor responded to any of our confirmation notices to keep him registered," so he was removed from the voter rolls at the end of 2020 and the state said he was not registered in Ohio. A county clerk in Illinois, where Crowl was once registered, also confirmed he was not an active voter anywhere in the state.
Crowl was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of destruction of government property and conspiracy for allegedly coordinating with others to plan their attack. He remains in custody after a judge said, "The suggestion to release him to a residence with nine firearms is a non-starter." In an interview cited by the government, Crowl told the New Yorker that he had peaceful intentions and claimed he had protected the police. Crowl's attorney did not provide a comment about his client's voting record.
Donovan Crowl was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of destruction of government property and conspiracy.
Many involved in the insurrection professed to be motivated by patriotism, falsely declaring that Trump was the rightful winner of the election. Yet at least eight of the people who are now facing criminal charges for their involvement in the events at the Capitol did not vote in the November 2020 presidential election, according to an analysis of voting records from the states where protestors were arrested and those states where public records show they have lived. They came from states around the country and ranged in age from 21 to 65.
To determine who voted in November, CNN obtained voting records for more than 80 of the initial arrestees. Most voted in the presidential election, and while many were registered Republicans, a handful were registered as Democrats in those jurisdictions that provided party information -- though who someone votes for is not publicly disclosed. Public access to voter history records varies by state, and CNN was unable to view the records of some of those charged.
Among those who didn't vote were a 65-year-old Georgia man who, according to government documents, was found in his van with a fully-loaded pistol and ammunition, and a Louisiana man who publicly bragged about spending nearly two hours inside the Capitol after attending Trump's "Stop the Steal" rally. Another was a 21-year-old woman from Missouri who prosecutors say shared a video on Snapchat that showed her parading around with a piece of a wooden sign from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office. And a Florida man previously convicted of attempted murder who was accused by the government of refusing to leave the Capitol likely did not have the option to cast a ballot because of his unpaid court fines.
Jessica Stern, a Boston University professor who has spent around 30 years researching extremists, said that while she hasn't spoken with the individuals involved in the events at the Capitol, from her interviews with other violent extremists, she believes a number of factors could have been at play. They could have believed the system was rigged, as the "Stop the Steal" movement claims, in which case there would be no point in voting. They could be more attracted to the theater, violence or attention they would get from a demonstration like the one at the Capitol than to actually achieving their purported goal -- in this case, different election results.
Stern speculated that it was a combination of these reasons, adding that feelings of anger and humiliation often draw people to extremist groups and violence. She said that for someone to actually cast a vote, "you would have to believe in the ethic of voting more than you thought it was a waste of time...and see it as a moral imperative. You have to believe the system works for everyone, that it's for the good of the country."
Jack Griffith, a 25-year-old from Tennessee, trumpeted his arrival in Washington DC with a Facebook post saying, "THE CAVALRY IS COMING!!!!," using the hashtag "#MAGA," according to court documents. Shortly after leaving the Capitol on January 6, he posted a message of disappointment. "I hate to be that guy, but The New World Order beat us," he wrote. "Trump was our greatest champion, and it still wasn't enough. He tried his very best. He did so much, but he's only one man...I even helped stormed(sic) the capitol today, but it only made things worse...Why, God? Why? WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN US? Unless...Trump still has a plan?"
"THE CAVALRY IS COMING!!!!," Jack Griffith posted on Facebook about going to D.C., according to court records.
These online missives describing his participation in the Capitol siege were later used by the Department of Justice to build a criminal case against him. Griffith faces a number of charges, including violent entry or disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds.
Election data from Tennessee and Alabama, where public records show Griffith had lived, showed that he had voted in the 2016 and 2018 elections but not the 2020 presidential election. The public defender who initially represented him declined to comment. Another attorney listed as representing him now did not respond to requests for comment.
Jack Jesse Griffith is facing federal charges in relation to the Capitol riots.
Court records detail how University of Kentucky senior Gracyn Courtright posted a series of images on Instagram showing herself marching with a large American flag and another with her arms raised in triumph outside the Capitol, with the caption, "can't wait to tell my grandkids I was here." Later, she posted a photo of herself in a belly baring shirt with the caption, "Infamy is just as good as fame. Either way I end up more known. XOXO."
An Instagram photo posted by Gracyn Courtright shows her on Capitol grounds and was included in federal court records.
Courtright, who was charged with crimes including knowingly entering a restricted building, was also identified on surveillance footage lugging a congressional "Members Only" sign around the Capitol, according to court records. "idk what treason is," she wrote in a conversation shared with the FBI by a tipster, who had confronted the college student in a series of Instagram messages. Courtright is not registered in Kentucky, where she attends school, according to election officials. She is registered in her home state of West Virginia, but records show she did not vote in the 2020 election. Her attorney told CNN that Courtright did not dispute the fact that she did not vote in the election but declined further comment.
In an image taken from surveillance video, Gracyn Courtright is seen walking up the steps near the Senate Chamber carrying a "Members Only" sign.
In a string of social media posts he shared straight from the Capitol, Edward Jacob Lang of New York portrayed himself as ready for a revolution. "1776 has commenced," he wrote in one that was cited by the government, showing him standing on the steps of the Capitol. "I was the leader of Liberty today. Arrest me. You are on the wrong side of history," read another. After leaving the Capitol, he continued to encourage followers to join the "patriot movement" with him. "GIVE ME LIBERTY OR GIVE ME DEATH," he posted.
Federal prosecutors said that video footage from January 6 shows Lang attempting to attack police officers with a baseball bat, donning a gas mask and riot shield. He now faces a variety of federal charges, including assaulting, resisting or impeding certain officers or employees, civil disorder and violent entry. A recent ProPublica story also revealed how Lang had used the online messaging app Telegram in an attempt to radicalize "normies" and convince them to join local militia groups -- encouraging people in the days after the Capitol riot to stock up on guns and prepare for war.
Prosecutors said in court documents that the man pictured in a gas mask appears to be Lang.
Though state records show that Lang is registered to vote and had participated in a couple of past elections, county and state officials confirmed to CNN that he did not vote in the November election. Lang's attorney said in a statement that Lang claimed from jail that he submitted an absentee ballot, saying, "Mr. Lang has always represented himself as a Libertarian...He is not a devout Trump supporter, but believes that those taking office will not uphold citizens' First and Second Amendment rights."
Insurrection fueled by conspiracy groups, extremists and fringe movements
New York law requires absentee ballots to be postmarked by election day and received within the following week in order to be counted. When asked about Lang's claim that he sent in an absentee ballot, the Sullivan County Board of Elections directed CNN to file an open records request in order to receive any information. The request had not been responded to before the time of publishing.
Lang's attorney also said the 25-year-old was a "naive, impressionable young man" who had been provoked by Trump's rhetoric. He cited Senator Mitch McConnell's statement that "the mob was fed lies" and said he hoped that Lang and others would not be considered guilty "due solely to their associations, beliefs and presence."
A man who identified himself with the name of Lang's father refused to talk with a reporter, saying, "We hate CNN. We're pro Trump, goodbye." In a statement to a local newspaper, Lang's father attributed his son's actions at the Capitol to "a substance abuse problem."
Edward Jacob Lang posted a string of social media posts from the Capitol riots that were cited by prosecutors.
Arie Perliger, a professor at University of Massachusetts Lowell who specializes in right-wing domestic terror, said that he was not surprised to hear some of the rioters had not voted, particularly militia members like Crowl, since militia membership is often rooted in a distrust of government. Still, he said he was concerned that it could reflect a growing erosion of faith in the American democratic process, which is a "risk we need to think about."
"When we see that significant ideological groups are stopping participating in the Democratic process, that may mean they are looking for other ways to participate, and those other ways could be more violent," said Perliger, who oversees a database of right-wing extremist acts of violence in the United States. "We should be concerned if we see a growing number of ideological groups are reducing their involvement in electoral politics."
They stormed the Capitol to overturn the results of
an election they didn't vote in
By Blake Ellis and Melanie Hicken, CNN
Updated 1354 GMT (2154 HKT) February 1, 2021
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/02/01/us/capitol-rioters-non-voters-invs/index.html
(CNN)They were there to "Stop the Steal" and to keep the President they revered in office, yet records show that some of the rioters who stormed the US Capitol did not vote in the very election they were protesting.
One was Donovan Crowl, an ex-Marine who charged toward a Capitol entrance in paramilitary garb on January 6 as the Pro-Trump crowd chanted "who's our President?"
Federal authorities later identified Crowl, 50, as a member of a self-styled militia organization in his home state of Ohio and affiliated with the extremist group the Oath Keepers. His mother told CNN that he previously told her "they were going to overtake the government if they...tried to take Trump's presidency from him." She said he had become increasingly angry during the Obama administration and that she was aware of his support for former President Donald Trump.
Donovan Crowl was one of the members of an Ohio militant group charged in the Capitol riot.
Despite these apparent pro-Trump views, a county election official in Ohio told CNN that he registered in 2013 but "never voted nor responded to any of our confirmation notices to keep him registered," so he was removed from the voter rolls at the end of 2020 and the state said he was not registered in Ohio. A county clerk in Illinois, where Crowl was once registered, also confirmed he was not an active voter anywhere in the state.
Crowl was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of destruction of government property and conspiracy for allegedly coordinating with others to plan their attack. He remains in custody after a judge said, "The suggestion to release him to a residence with nine firearms is a non-starter." In an interview cited by the government, Crowl told the New Yorker that he had peaceful intentions and claimed he had protected the police. Crowl's attorney did not provide a comment about his client's voting record.
Donovan Crowl was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of destruction of government property and conspiracy.
Many involved in the insurrection professed to be motivated by patriotism, falsely declaring that Trump was the rightful winner of the election. Yet at least eight of the people who are now facing criminal charges for their involvement in the events at the Capitol did not vote in the November 2020 presidential election, according to an analysis of voting records from the states where protestors were arrested and those states where public records show they have lived. They came from states around the country and ranged in age from 21 to 65.
To determine who voted in November, CNN obtained voting records for more than 80 of the initial arrestees. Most voted in the presidential election, and while many were registered Republicans, a handful were registered as Democrats in those jurisdictions that provided party information -- though who someone votes for is not publicly disclosed. Public access to voter history records varies by state, and CNN was unable to view the records of some of those charged.
Among those who didn't vote were a 65-year-old Georgia man who, according to government documents, was found in his van with a fully-loaded pistol and ammunition, and a Louisiana man who publicly bragged about spending nearly two hours inside the Capitol after attending Trump's "Stop the Steal" rally. Another was a 21-year-old woman from Missouri who prosecutors say shared a video on Snapchat that showed her parading around with a piece of a wooden sign from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office. And a Florida man previously convicted of attempted murder who was accused by the government of refusing to leave the Capitol likely did not have the option to cast a ballot because of his unpaid court fines.
Jessica Stern, a Boston University professor who has spent around 30 years researching extremists, said that while she hasn't spoken with the individuals involved in the events at the Capitol, from her interviews with other violent extremists, she believes a number of factors could have been at play. They could have believed the system was rigged, as the "Stop the Steal" movement claims, in which case there would be no point in voting. They could be more attracted to the theater, violence or attention they would get from a demonstration like the one at the Capitol than to actually achieving their purported goal -- in this case, different election results.
Stern speculated that it was a combination of these reasons, adding that feelings of anger and humiliation often draw people to extremist groups and violence. She said that for someone to actually cast a vote, "you would have to believe in the ethic of voting more than you thought it was a waste of time...and see it as a moral imperative. You have to believe the system works for everyone, that it's for the good of the country."
Jack Griffith, a 25-year-old from Tennessee, trumpeted his arrival in Washington DC with a Facebook post saying, "THE CAVALRY IS COMING!!!!," using the hashtag "#MAGA," according to court documents. Shortly after leaving the Capitol on January 6, he posted a message of disappointment. "I hate to be that guy, but The New World Order beat us," he wrote. "Trump was our greatest champion, and it still wasn't enough. He tried his very best. He did so much, but he's only one man...I even helped stormed(sic) the capitol today, but it only made things worse...Why, God? Why? WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN US? Unless...Trump still has a plan?"
"THE CAVALRY IS COMING!!!!," Jack Griffith posted on Facebook about going to D.C., according to court records.
These online missives describing his participation in the Capitol siege were later used by the Department of Justice to build a criminal case against him. Griffith faces a number of charges, including violent entry or disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds.
Election data from Tennessee and Alabama, where public records show Griffith had lived, showed that he had voted in the 2016 and 2018 elections but not the 2020 presidential election. The public defender who initially represented him declined to comment. Another attorney listed as representing him now did not respond to requests for comment.
Jack Jesse Griffith is facing federal charges in relation to the Capitol riots.
Court records detail how University of Kentucky senior Gracyn Courtright posted a series of images on Instagram showing herself marching with a large American flag and another with her arms raised in triumph outside the Capitol, with the caption, "can't wait to tell my grandkids I was here." Later, she posted a photo of herself in a belly baring shirt with the caption, "Infamy is just as good as fame. Either way I end up more known. XOXO."
An Instagram photo posted by Gracyn Courtright shows her on Capitol grounds and was included in federal court records.
Courtright, who was charged with crimes including knowingly entering a restricted building, was also identified on surveillance footage lugging a congressional "Members Only" sign around the Capitol, according to court records. "idk what treason is," she wrote in a conversation shared with the FBI by a tipster, who had confronted the college student in a series of Instagram messages. Courtright is not registered in Kentucky, where she attends school, according to election officials. She is registered in her home state of West Virginia, but records show she did not vote in the 2020 election. Her attorney told CNN that Courtright did not dispute the fact that she did not vote in the election but declined further comment.
In an image taken from surveillance video, Gracyn Courtright is seen walking up the steps near the Senate Chamber carrying a "Members Only" sign.
In a string of social media posts he shared straight from the Capitol, Edward Jacob Lang of New York portrayed himself as ready for a revolution. "1776 has commenced," he wrote in one that was cited by the government, showing him standing on the steps of the Capitol. "I was the leader of Liberty today. Arrest me. You are on the wrong side of history," read another. After leaving the Capitol, he continued to encourage followers to join the "patriot movement" with him. "GIVE ME LIBERTY OR GIVE ME DEATH," he posted.
Federal prosecutors said that video footage from January 6 shows Lang attempting to attack police officers with a baseball bat, donning a gas mask and riot shield. He now faces a variety of federal charges, including assaulting, resisting or impeding certain officers or employees, civil disorder and violent entry. A recent ProPublica story also revealed how Lang had used the online messaging app Telegram in an attempt to radicalize "normies" and convince them to join local militia groups -- encouraging people in the days after the Capitol riot to stock up on guns and prepare for war.
Prosecutors said in court documents that the man pictured in a gas mask appears to be Lang.
Though state records show that Lang is registered to vote and had participated in a couple of past elections, county and state officials confirmed to CNN that he did not vote in the November election. Lang's attorney said in a statement that Lang claimed from jail that he submitted an absentee ballot, saying, "Mr. Lang has always represented himself as a Libertarian...He is not a devout Trump supporter, but believes that those taking office will not uphold citizens' First and Second Amendment rights."
Insurrection fueled by conspiracy groups, extremists and fringe movements
New York law requires absentee ballots to be postmarked by election day and received within the following week in order to be counted. When asked about Lang's claim that he sent in an absentee ballot, the Sullivan County Board of Elections directed CNN to file an open records request in order to receive any information. The request had not been responded to before the time of publishing.
Lang's attorney also said the 25-year-old was a "naive, impressionable young man" who had been provoked by Trump's rhetoric. He cited Senator Mitch McConnell's statement that "the mob was fed lies" and said he hoped that Lang and others would not be considered guilty "due solely to their associations, beliefs and presence."
A man who identified himself with the name of Lang's father refused to talk with a reporter, saying, "We hate CNN. We're pro Trump, goodbye." In a statement to a local newspaper, Lang's father attributed his son's actions at the Capitol to "a substance abuse problem."
Edward Jacob Lang posted a string of social media posts from the Capitol riots that were cited by prosecutors.
Arie Perliger, a professor at University of Massachusetts Lowell who specializes in right-wing domestic terror, said that he was not surprised to hear some of the rioters had not voted, particularly militia members like Crowl, since militia membership is often rooted in a distrust of government. Still, he said he was concerned that it could reflect a growing erosion of faith in the American democratic process, which is a "risk we need to think about."
"When we see that significant ideological groups are stopping participating in the Democratic process, that may mean they are looking for other ways to participate, and those other ways could be more violent," said Perliger, who oversees a database of right-wing extremist acts of violence in the United States. "We should be concerned if we see a growing number of ideological groups are reducing their involvement in electoral politics."
Wow. We may have had BGOL members at the capital. Any of the no vote crew not post or post lighter on the 6th?
unfortunately there are too many people that don't educate themselves that fall for this shit.
OMFG!!!! Did a Dem strategy to bring their message to West Virginians change the fucking tide!?!?!??!? I dare Manchin speak up and against. Shame em all the way to 3k a month for the people. Fuck it.
The fact that the Democrats are not taking their majorities for granted is
refreshing and might win them expanded majorities. They are running
things like they expect to lose next year, do not give a fuck, and are gonna
get what they want right now. I love it.
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