Author: clearandpresentdanger

Illinois Governor lays it on the line . . . “Give me one example of the Republican Party showing up for life”

Illinois’ Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker delivered a blistering speech in Tampa Saturday equating Florida’s Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis with former president Donald Trump and condemning him for doing more to “protect” Floridians from LGBTQ children and immigrants than from white nationalism and gun violence.

As keynote speaker at the Florida Democratic Party’s annual leadership conference, Pritzker urged Democrats to call out white nationalism and gun violence as domestic terrorism and to campaign against Republican candidates — including DeSantis — who do not.

“This pattern is a clear domestic terrorism threat,” Pritzker said. “He is happy to pick on LGBTQ kids and immigrants, but God forbid he calls out what the FBI refers to as our most pressing security threat: the rise of white extremism.

“Ditch cautious rhetoric and even more cautious electoral strategy, and start speaking honestly … about the dangers democracy is facing from the MAGA Republican party,” Pritzker said, prompting a standing ovation from the audience, estimated at 2,000 at the sold-out event.

Pritzker, governor of the state where a gunman murdered seven people and wounded scores more on July 4 at a parade in Highland Park, on the North Shore of Chicago, said it is true that preventing violence crime requires investments in intervention programs, mental health, and law enforcement, but he said those are not enough.

“Make no mistake, dealing with crime also involves getting guns off the streets. Ultimately, we need a federal assault weapons ban,” the governor said, also calling for national attention to “an epidemic of young men enamored with white nationalism” killing people en masse with assault weapons.”

Pritzker said the national Republican Party is “obsessed” with MAGA politics and weakening support for Democrats by ginning up fury and fear over problems that pale in comparison with gun violence and loss of abortion rights.

“Here is where the Republican game plan is the most audacious: They want to distract you into believing that gay marriage, black history, Disney World and library books are more of a threat to our children than AR-15s,” Pritzker said, and the audience rose to its feet in applause. “Don’t tell us that a 10-year-old is too young to learn about the history of slavery but not too young to run active-shooter drills when she learns how to play dead.”

Citing the U.S. Supreme Court ruling striking down abortion rights in place for nearly 50 years under Roe v. Wade, Pritzker called the Republican Party hypocritical for seeking that outcome in the name of “pro-life.”

“No part of the Republican agenda is about life. Give me one example of the Republican Party showing up for life in this country,” Pritzker said, arguing that it is the Democratic Party that supports life by expanding health care, supporting reproductive freedom, supporting humane immigration policies, and promoting diversity in American society.

“Get ready, because the next thing on their to-do list is a nationwide abortion ban,” Pritzker said.

To stop the “GOP insanity” of the MAGA agenda, he said, Democrats such as he, Stacey Abrams of Georgia, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and President Joe Biden should stand firm for Democratic principles and elect more Democrats, especially to the U.S. Senate and the presidency.

U.S. Rep. Val Demings spoke Saturday at the FL Democratic Party’s annual Leadership Blue weekend. Demings is challenging U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio for the Senate seat in 2022. Credit: FL Democratic Party.

“Floridians, you can stop national Republicans in their tracks if you elect Val Demings to the U.S. Senate,” Pritzker said, and the room burst into cheers, sign-waving and noise-making.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Demings, an Orlando Democrat challenging Republican Sen. Marco Rubio, also delivered a rousing speech, citing Trump’s “big lie” about election fraud to attack voting rights, the Supreme Court’s anti-abortion ruling after Trump appointed three conservatives to the bench, and Rubio’s record of opposing abortion rights and gun-violence prevention.

“Ours is the only party fighting for the Constitution, rule of law, and our democracy,” Demings said, brandishing a fist.

Demings, former police chief in Orlando, was on the House Democratic team that impeached President Trump in 2019 for using his role as U.S. president to pressure the president of Ukraine for political favors. (The Republican-led Senate did not concur in the impeachment). She said those are “tough jobs” that she chose to do and of which she is proud.

Demings said she and other Democrats face formidable odds and that the stakes are high.

“We’re not going back. We’re not shutting up. We’re going to fight,” she said.

How it started

 

 

Meanwhile, there’s this:

The board that administers the Pulitzer Prizes rejected former president Donald Trump’s request to rescind the 2018 prizes awarded to The Washington Post and the New York Times for their reporting about his campaign and administration’s connections to Russia election interference.

Trump challenged the awards on three occasions, including last year, arguing that the articles were based on “false reporting of a non-existent link between the Kremlin and the Trump Campaign.” He called the stories “no more than a politically motivated farce which attempted to spin a false narrative that my campaign supposedly colluded with Russia despite a complete lack of evidence underpinning this allegation.”

The Pulitzer board rejected that claim on Monday after undertaking the journalistic equivalent of a state election recount. In an unusual move, it authorized two independent reviews of the articles submitted by the newspapers — and essentially recertified the results.

“The separate reviews converged in their conclusions: that no passages or headlines, contentions or assertions in any of the winning submissions were discredited by facts that emerged subsequent to the conferral of the prizes,” it said in a statement.

Are you “pro-life”? If so, please go slit your wrists, jump off a bridge, or do something to end your worthless life.

This story will repeat and repeat and repeat now that the “pro-life” ghouls and “christians” have obtained the Supreme Court decision they want.

CNN on Monday profiled a mother in Texas who went through what the network described as a “nightmare” after being denied treatment after suffering a miscarriage because her doctor feared being sued under Texas’s anti-abortion law.

In an interview with CNN, Texas mom Marlena Stell explained that her suffered a miscarriage after becoming pregnant last year, but that her doctor would not perform an operation to remove the dead fetus from her body because they could be targeted by anti-abortion activists who have been empowered by a law passed last year that allows ordinary citizens to sue anyone who helps in delivering an abortion.

Stell said the fetus stuck inside her was causing her increasing pain to the point where she had difficulty walking. She eventually found a doctor willing to perform the procedure to remove it, but only after undergoing yet another ultrasound to ensure that the fetus was actually dead.

Stell also told CNN that she does not want to try to have another child so long as she’s living in Texas.

“I’m worried about getting infected, have something happen to me and then my daughter is left without her mom,” she said of the prospect of suffering another miscarriage that would not be treated.

 

I really, really do hope that every one of you “pro-life” motherfuckers has a daughter or granddaughter or niece or grandniece who dies of a miscarriage that cannot be treated because of your anti-abortion laws.  And I hope they die screaming and crying in pain.

What has DOJ been doing the past few months?

I have to confess that I have been one of the multitude complaining loudly that Dept of Justice under AG Merrick Garland seems to be letting Trump and his band of fascist coup plotters go untouched while prosecuting only the low-level thugs who attacked the Capitol on Jan 6.

However, it appears as though DIJ is moving along . . . here’s a compilation of DOJ activity involving Trump’s inner circle . . . the noose may be tightening around Trump.  Remember:  Trump has been the head of a criminal enterprise for 40 years, similar to a Mafia family, so, there’s no reason to believe his political “family” is no different.  When DOJ goes after the Mob, they start at the bottom and work up, which appears to be exactly what’s going on here.

RUDY GIULIANI

April 13, 2021: SDNY obtains historic and prospective cell site warrant for Rudy.

April 21, 2021: Warrants for Ukraine-related investigation approved. This was Lisa Monaco’s first day as Deputy Attorney General. The temporal scope on the Ukraine warrants extends from August 1, 2018 through May 31, 2019.

April 28, 2021: Warrants executed. Around 18 devices seized, of which 16 can be cracked.

September 3, 2021: SDNY argues that the privilege review for Rudy’s devices must be conducted pre-scope (meaning, before just the information on Ukraine is identified) and generously offers to limit temporal range of review to items post-dating January 1, 2018, significantly expanding the temporal scope of the privilege review vis a vis the known warrants.

September 16, 2021: Judge Paul Oetken approves SDNY’s desired treatment of Rudy’s phones, meaning anything that post-dates January 1, 2018, regardless of topic, will be reviewed for privilege.

November 2, 2021: Special Master releases contents of 7 devices, for which privilege review extended through seizure. 2,223 items were provided to the government.

January 15, 2022: WaPo quotes Rob Jenkins, who represents a number of Proud Boy defendants, explaining that DOJ is asking about Roger Stone and Rudy Giuliani’s ties to militia members.

January 19, 2022: Special Master releases contents through April 2021 of one phone amounting to over 25,000 items, as well as eight other devices for which the privilege review extended from December 1, 2018 through May 31, 2019.

April 12, 2022: In guise of coming to a final decision on the Ukraine influence-peddling that hasn’t happened yet, DOJ asks Rudy to unlock last several devices.

May 26, 2022: Subpoenas (CNN, NYT) relating to the fake elector plot ask for information on:

  • Rudy Giuliani,
  • Boris Epshteyn
  • Justin Clark
  • John Eastman
  • Bernard Kerik
  • Joe diGenova
  • Victoria Toensing
  • Jenna Ellis
  • Kenneth Chesebro

ROGER STONE

March 17, 2021: In response to motion for bail for Connie Meggs, DOJ includes picture showing both she and Graydon Young worked a Roger Stone event on December 14, 2020.

June 23, 2021: Oath Keeper Graydon Young, who interacted with Stone in Florida in December 2020, enters into a cooperation agreement.

June 30, 2021: Oath Keeper Mark Grods, who worked the Willard the morning of the insurrection, enters into a cooperation agreement.

September 15, 2021: Oath Keeper Jason Dolan, who guarded Stone in both Florida and DC, enters into a cooperation agreement.

January 15, 2022: WaPo quotes Rob Jenkins, who represents a number of Proud Boy defendants, explaining that DOJ is asking about Roger Stone and Rudy Giuliani’s ties to militia members.

March 2, 2022: Oath Keeper Joshua James, who oversaw security of Stone on the morning of January 6 and reported back frequently, enters into a cooperation agreement. James also provides statement to NYPD inquiry of Stone associate Sal Greco.

March 4, 2022: WaPo describes hours of documentary video tracking Stone’s events leading up to the attack, including details from a Friends of Stone list on which Stone started planning Stop the Steal immediately after the election. Both DOJ and January 6 obtained the video.

May 2022: NYT describes more about the FOS list, confirming that Owen Shroyer, Enrique Tarrio, Stewart Rhodes, and Ivan Raiklin took part. By June 23, 2022, DOJ had extracted the contents of Shroyer, Tarrio, and Rhodes’ phones.

SIDNEY POWELL

June 2021: Nikki Fried announces Sidney Powell’s Defending the Republic had been raising funds in Florida without registering as a charity.

August 24, 2021: Powell’s fund settles with Florida.

September 2021: AUSA Molly Gaston issues subpoena for records relating to Sidney Powell’s grift going back to November 2, 2020.

November 30, 2021: Several outlets report on subpoenas relating to Powell. (WaPo, Daily Beast)

January 22, 2022: Powell’s attorney claims to be “cooperating” with DOJ investigation.

June 22, 2022: Months after BuzzFeed and Mother Jones report on the scheme, DOJ asks Judge Amit Mehta to conduct conflict inquiry regarding Powell’s funding of Oath Keeper defendants’ defense.

ALEX JONES

April 13, 2021: Jones videographer Sam Montoya arrested on trespassing charges related to January 6.

August 19, 2021: Jones sidekick and January 5 speaker Owen Shroyer arrested for violating a non-prosecution agreement by trespassing; Shroyer did not enter the Capitol.

January 20, 2022: Judge Tim Kelly denies Shroyer’s motion to dismiss, effectively agreeing with DOJ that Shroyer (and so Alexander and Jones) weren’t invited by cops to the East steps and didn’t de-escalate the crowd.

May 5, 2022: Montoya asks for 60 day extension to discuss plea deal.

May 9, 2022: At status hearing, Shroyer attorney Norm Pattis describes talks of a plea deal.

June 14, 2022: Long-time Jones attorney Norm Pattis, who is representing Owen Shroyer, joins Joe Biggs’ defense team.

June 23, 2022: DOJ provides Shroyer unscoped contents of his phone, to provide scoped contents later.

ALI ALEXANDER

January 25, 2021: Brandon Straka arrested for trespassing and civil disorder. Straka was a key player in the Stop the Steal movement, playing a key role at the riot at the TCF vote counting center in Michigan after the election, spoke at the January 5 rally, sat next to Mike Flynn at Trump’s speech, and stopped at the Willard before heading to the riot. Straka was also on Alexander’s Stop the Steal LISTSERV.

February 17, 2021: First FBI interview with Straka.

March 25, 2021: Second interview with Straka.

December 8, 2021: In released testimony for an appearance before J6C, Alexander told a story that DOJ had already debunked in the Owen Shroyer case. For this and other appearances, Alexander was represented by Paul Kamenar, the same attorney that guided Andrew Miller through stalling the Mueller investigation for a year.

January 5, 2022: Third interview with Straka.

January 13, 2022: DOJ includes sealed cooperation memo in Straka’s sentencing memo.

June 24, 2022: Ali Alexander testifies before grand jury.

June 28, 2022: Alexander returns to DC.

JEFFREY CLARK

January 25, 2021: DOJ IG Michael Horowitz opens probe into whether current or former DOJ officials attempted to overturn the election.

July 26, 2021: Associate Deputy Attorney General Bradley Weinsheimer writes former top Trump DOJ officials permitting them to testify on efforts, led by but not limited to Clark, to involve DOJ in an attempt to overturn the election. This was the first of a series of Executive Privilege review waives DOJ asked Biden to make and roughly coincided with the delayed institution of a Contact Policy preventing Biden from learning about investigations.

June 22, 2022: Agents search Clark’s home and seize his devices. Per CNN, DOJ IG coordinated with the wider investigation into January 6.

JOHN EASTMAN

March 28, 2022: Judge David Carter rules it is more likely than not that Eastman and Trump conspired to obstruct the vote certification.

May 26, 2022: Subpoenas (CNN, NYT) relating to the fake elector plot ask for information on:

  • Rudy Giuliani,
  • Boris Epshteyn
  • Justin Clark
  • John Eastman
  • Bernard Kerik
  • Joe diGenova
  • Victoria Toensing
  • Jenna Ellis
  • Kenneth Chesebro

June 28, 2022: FBI seizes Eastman’s phone, gets him to unlock it.

FAKE ELECTORS

Fall 2021: According to NYT, Thomas Windom assigned, “to pull together some of the disparate strands of the elector scheme.”

January 25, 2022: Lisa Monaco confirms on the record that DOJ is investigating the fake elector scheme.

May 26, 2022: Subpoenas (CNN, NYT) relating to the fake elector plot ask for information on:

  • Rudy Giuliani,
  • Boris Epshteyn
  • Justin Clark
  • John Eastman
  • Bernard Kerik
  • Joe diGenova
  • Victoria Toensing
  • Jenna Ellis
  • Kenneth Chesebro

June 22, 2022: DOJ takes a slew of overt steps in their investigation into the fake electors:

  • WaPo: Law enforcement activity targeting GA lawyer David Carver and Trump staffer Thomas Lane, subpoenas for GA GOP Chair David Shafer and Michigan fake electors
  • NYT: Subpoenas to Trump campaign aide in MI, Shawn Flynn, as well as Carver, Lane, and Shafer
  • CBS: Search warrants for NV GOP Chair Michael McDonald and Secretary James DeGraffenreid
  • CNN: Subpoena for Shafer, a warrant for David Carver’s phone, information on a GA Signal chat

ALSO — MORE GOOD NEWS:  On July 15, we learned that DOJ has rented office space and is bringing in assistant federal prosecutors from around the country to beef up their group that is investigating the Jan 6 attempted coup.

DOJ takes aim at Trump world — Brings in more firepower!!

The bombshell revelations of the House’s Jan. 6 hearings have the Department of Justice putting more manpower—and more real estate—toward its investigations of figures close to ex-President Donald Trump, according to The Wall Street Journal. The paper revealed the law enforcement agency has expanded the roster, office space, and mission of the band of attorneys digging into Republicans potentially complicit in the bloody attack on the Capitol last year. The news comes after the latest rounds of congressional hearings disclosed that a host of GOP congressmen sought pardons in connections with their activism to overturn President Joe Biden’s 2020 victory, and after feds raided the home of ex-DOJ lawyer Jeffrey Clark, who the House committee found had assisted Trump in pressuring the agency to falsely claim fraud in the Georgia election results. But the Journal also reported DOJ had grown frustrated with the committee for failing to turn over transcripts of its interviews, particularly with Republicans who participated in false pro-Trump elector slates in states Biden won.

 

 

Have you heard about the BLM, antifa crime wave? You haven’t heard about it because it never happened.

In September 2020, a Minneapolis Trump supporter’s home was savagely attacked by antifa. Or possibly by BLM supporters. Or by Biden-supporting anarchists? In any event, somebody painted “Biden 2020 BLM (A)” on Denis Molla’s garage doors and set fire to his camper. That fire spread significantly, damaging other vehicles and his home.

Federal investigators have found the culprit and, surprise, they say it was Molla himself. CBS Minneapolis reports that Molla now faces two counts of wire fraud for setting the fire, then filing insurance claims for $300,000 in damages. He was graciously hosted in a Minneapolis courtroom last Tuesday for the beginning of his federal trial, and it’s very unlikely he’ll be scoring a Trump pardon like Trump’s more (ahem) significant allies did, because Trump no longer has the power to do that.

There are many lessons we can learn here, and even more lessons than that if we want to be jerks about it, which we absolutely do. Once again it appears that nearly all politically motivated crimes against Trump supporters are self-inflicted, suggesting that Trump voters are, broadly speaking, so prone to criminal behavior that not even they are safe from themselves. The vast majority of incidents of proven election fraud, for example, have turned out to be Trump supporters voting for dead relatives, Trump supporters giving conspiracy theorists unauthorized access to voting machines, Trump supporters faking signatures to get their names on the ballot, Trump supporters financing private detectives willing to run random repairmen off the road on the off chance their work trucks are stuffed with secret ballots, or just straight up ballot-box stuffing.

Similarly, we may yet learn that half or more of the shadowy not-organization known as “antifa” actually consists of Trump supporters viciously attacking themselves in order to put themselves in their place. In any event, Trump supporters seem to think that both antifa and their local Black Lives Matter movements exist primarily to harass them, personally, by forcing them to read things written on their house.

I imagine many of you are rather tired of this at this point. Many of us around these parts are members of “antifa,” at least for all Trump supporters know, but if Trump’s supporters are going to go around pretending to be pro-Biden provocateurs, they should at least do enough damn research to know how secret pro-Biden cells actually target and take down individual nobodies who have gotten on The Big List of Trump Supporters To Annoy.

Trump supporters, do you really think that “what if we paint on this guy’s house” is the grand master plan of the police reform movement and antifascist cells nationwide? Really? Or is that just the easiest thing to fake? And if Biden 2020 supporters were going to burn down your past-its-prime recreational camper, don’t you think they’d do a thorough evaluation of the surrounding terrain so as to prevent the blaze from spreading to other, unrelated vehicles? That’s arson 101, right there. No Biden voter worth their salt would burn your camper down without doing at least a cursory environmental impact report.

Please start faking better crimes. Please. Here are some tips for how Black Lives Matter protesters, anarchists, antifascists, and Donald Trump’s other various enemies actually harass podunk Trump supporters. If you want people to believe you’re a victim of any of these groups, you can start by mimicking the crimes they’re actually responsible for.

Anarchists are a tough crowd known for despising authority and all its symbols, and there is no more flagrant symbol of government authority than government-issued money. Anarchists are therefore well-known for something called “twentybombing.” In the dark of night, anarchist agents enter the homes of Trump supporters looking for $20 bills. If they find any, they will steal them. The anarchists will then go to the nearest public library and shove your $20 bills through the book deposit slot.

It’s a perfect crime. Nobody in these pro-anarchy groups goes around painting circled “A”s on people’s houses, that’s just ridiculous. But every day in America, Trump supporters wake up to find they have $20 less than they thought they had, while local librarians gasp in confusion on seeing their library’s book deposit bins overflowing with loose Andrew Jacksons.

Want to fake a crime against you perpetrated by anarchists? Take all your $20 bills and shove them through the little library slot. Go home, call up the local news, and claim anarchists did it. There ya go, sport, you’re on television.

Antifa and anarchists aren’t the same thing, and Trump supporters need to get this through their skulls if they want to fake crimes by either group. Antifa stands for “antifascist,” or an opposition to fascism, while anarchists are against whatever presents itself but tend to focus most of their rage on $20 bills. Only fascists are targeted by antifa, so if you’re going to claim you’re a victim of antifa you first need to go around saying fascist things. Already done that? Fine, now you can burn down your own camper. But don’t do that either, because that’s not how antifa operates. Antifa is a loose community of idealists with access to much better technology than your average camper owner; they specialize in attacks using ultraviolet radiation.

Let’s explain. If you’re a Trump supporter with a pro-Trump flag hanging off your house, you may notice that the colors on that flag fade rather quickly, right? It starts out looking bright and new, then begins to look tired, then begins to look washed-out. This is because local antifa cells drive around each evening looking for Trump flags; when they find one, they briefly shine a very powerful ultraviolet light at it, causing it to fade just a little bit.

While the effect of a single antifa drive-by is barely perceptible, a Trump flag left out night after night will begin to show irreversible effects. Flags targeted by elite super-antifa cells will, however, fade out completely. If you want to claim your home was attacked not just by antifa but by super-antifa, dear Trump supporters, hang a white flag outside your house. Then go to your local police station and file your report: Antifa turned my Trump flag white. You’ll have a much more believable story to tell than the “somebody drew on my house” version, and if you tell the insurance company that it was a special Trump flag signed by the big man himself, you might be able to defraud them for an extra five bucks.

There are also myriad groups that are part antifa and part anarchist—too many to go through individually. There’s anarfa, and antichist, and anar-anti, and a bunch of others. Generally these groups focus on the forceable distribution of hard candies and tend to skew older. If your parents or grandparents tend to always have butterscotch candies on hand, for example, you should be wary. Sharing hard candies is socialism. Sharing bad hard candies is anarchy.

That leaves Black Lives Matter, but that one’s easy so we can dispense with it quickly. There’s only one crime that Black Lives Matter supporters tend to target Trump supporters with, and that’s “being seen.” Black Lives Matter supporters are known for walking on sidewalks and for going shopping. Sometimes they drive, but other times they operate toll booths. If you see a person in public who is not you and is not part of your immediate family, they are likely a Black Lives Matter supporter and you should, I don’t know, wet your pants or something.

This won’t technically count as a crime, but you might be able to bilk your insurance company anyway. Like, maybe whatever you’re sitting on will suffer water damage. Oh—or you can always go to the police and file a complaint that Black Lives Matter peed on your favorite chair or whatever. Here’s a tip: When filing the report, discretely pass the officer a $20 bill. If the officer quietly accepts the bill he’s likely to file out a report that makes your chair damage seem more severe, but if the officer gets unaccountably furious about you handing them $20 you know that they’re not actually a police officer, they’re an anarchist posing as one. If that happens, you’re in trouble. It means that anarchists have captured the local police department. They’ll say they’re seizing your $20 bill for “evidence,” but we both know the truth. That bill is going to be dumped into a library’s book return slot within a day.

So go nuts, Trump supporters, but at least make your fake crimes believable. Put a white flag outside your house and claim antifa bleached it using superweapons. Hand over all your cash to local librarians while wearing a fake mustache so nobody can tell it was you.

Nobody’s going to believe anarchist Biden-supporting Black Lives Matter supporters took their rage out on your two-car garage. Everybody will believe that Trump’s enemies are going around making the colors on your Trump flags fade or giving money to public libraries, because those are crimes every other Trump supporter has also seen happen. Just remember to look sad when you’re describing it to the police officers and the local reporters and you’ll be fine. Just … enough with the spray paint and poorly planned arson already.

Talk about a freak show !!!!!

This affair is better than a circus midway freak show !!!

On Aug. 20, Trump will be traveling to Milwaukee for an “American Freedom Tour” event.

Pricing for the day-long event, which will include Trump, Mike Pompeo, Donald Trump Jr., Dinesh D’Souza, Kimberly Guilfoyle, Judge Jeanine Pirro and Sheriff Mark Lamb, of Pinal County, Arizona, ranges from $9 for seating in an overflow room to $395 for seating in the VIP section to $3,995 for seating in the “Presidential Section,” which includes a meeting with Trump Jr. and Guilfoyle.   The price is not listed for seating in the “Patriot Section,” which comes with a meeting with Trump and Pompeo.