Surely they weren't being suggestive or indecent in front of kids at a restaurant. But, that reminds me...DeSantis in the complaint filed Tuesday against R House, which hosts drag brunch events, alleges the restaurant violated state law and cites a 1947 state Supreme Court ruling that “men impersonating women” in a “suggestive and indecent” fashion constitutes a public nuisance.
The Hill
Again...surely their purpose was not lewdness.In hosting drag performances in the presence of young children, the restaurant has also violated a state disorderly conduct statute and a separate statute prohibiting the operation of a business “for the purpose of lewdness,” according to the complaint, a copy of which was obtained by Changing America.
OK, yeah, not appropriate.“The video shows what appears to be a transgender dancer leading a young girl by the hand and walking through Respondent’s dining area,” the complaint states. “The dancer’s buttocks were fully exposed, and his ‘g-string’-style bikini bottom was stuffed with dollar bills — a practice that is commonly known to occur at strip clubs. The dancer’s breasts — unmistakably female in appearance — were also fully exposed except for the nipple and areola, which were covered with adhesive ‘pasties.’”
“That is not the way you look out for our children,” DeSantis continued. “You do not expose them to things that are inappropriate.”
He lost anyway. So it's maybe unlikely that this will be taken to the Supreme Court where it might be expected the appeal decision will be overruled.People who take part in insurrections against the US government can be barred from office, an appeals court said on Tuesday, reversing a ruling in favor of Madison Cawthorn, an extremist Republican politician from North Carolina.
[...]
The challenges cited the the 14th amendment to the US constitution, passed after the civil war.
It says: “No person shall … hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state, who, having previously taken an oath … to support the constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.”
Guardian
I await appeals.Hailing a “major victory”, Free Speech For People, the group which brought the case, said: “This ruling cements the growing judicial consensus that the 1872 Amnesty Act does not shield the insurrectionists of 6 January 2021 – including Donald Trump – from the consequences of their actions.”
[...]
It also brought cases against Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, two Arizona Republicans, Paul Gosar and Andy Biggs, and an Arizona state representative, Mark Finchem. All have been unsuccessful.
Trump is reportedly telling his preferred candidate, Mehmet Oz, to just claim victory. Which is what Trump did in 2020.State Sen. Doug Mastriano appears to have blown up GOP plans in Pennsylvania.
A far-right election denier and a leading force in the effort to overturn the 2020 election results, Mastriano is viewed by many Republican operatives as a liability in a critical swing state, likely headed for a thrashing in the suburbs in November. Some state Republicans are considering publicly supporting the Democratic nominee, Josh Shapiro, while the Republican Governors Association may not even put money into the race.
[...]
Everything about Pennsylvania’s swing state electorate suggests Mastriano is a dead man walking.
[...]
The most surprising thing about Rep. Madison Cawthorn’s demise on Tuesday was not that he lost, but that he admitted it.
Politico
He's been bragging about his win record in Ohio where all of his endorsed candidates won. But that was Ohio. And for most of those 22 races, he endorsed whoever was running ahead in polls or had no challengers just before the voting started. Obviously, so he could brag about his endorsement record.In North Carolina, Trump’s support pulled Bo Hines, a 26-year-old who came out of nowhere, to a House primary victory. The endorsement was a show of Trump’s force, but some Republicans view Hines as a vulnerable general election candidate, and the endorsement infuriated some local Republicans who have toiled in the party vineyards for years.
[...]
But that isn’t as important for Trump, politically, as burnishing his win-loss record and nurturing adherents to his own cause. Ultimately, the outcome in November doesn’t matter.
[...]
In Idaho, where Trump’s endorsed candidate in the gubernatorial race, Janice McGeachin, lost badly on Tuesday, Trump’s needless intervention did nothing other than fuel an intraparty civil war. Same story in Georgia, which holds its primary next week.
[...]
For Trump, the win-loss record in the primaries has become something close to an obsession. But it is designed to be a game that Trump cannot lose. As one Trump adviser said, even a primary loss is not a “loss-loss.” That’s because he’ll get another crack at it in November. He can always endorse a nominee then.
Politico
It could be that Trump endorsements for congressional seats works because people aren't as familiar with congressional aspirants as they are with their governors.[T]he Trump-backed effort to unseat incumbent Gov. Brad Little was a fairly good test of Trump-ism, its flop a demonstration of Trump’s limits. Trump’s vehicle in Idaho, Lt. Gov. Janice McGeachin, was far from a perfect candidate. But she had some credibility by virtue of her office. And she knew how to make a splash, using her power to issue executive orders, including banning mask mandates, when Little traveled out of state.
It wasn’t enough. In a state where Trump beat Biden by 30 percentage points and carried all but three counties in 2020, Little was crushing McGeachin when the race was called.
And it’s just a warmup. Next week, in a much higher-profile contest in Georgia, Gov. Brian Kemp is widely expected to finish first in the primary, ahead of Trump-backed Sen. David Perdue.
[...]
Trump’s endorsement is still the most coveted currency in Republican primary politics. His preferred candidate in an open gubernatorial primary on Tuesday, Mastriano, won. But sitting governors have brands of their own and a familiarity with voters that may matter more than outside intervention — even from the former president. In a party dominated by Trump, it’s an office even Trump is having difficulty figuring out how to crack.
This kind of thing makes you wonder about Democratic leaders and pundits claiming that progressives are bringing down the party, and that's why Joe Biden is losing support. I keep wondering if they haven't got it backwards: maybe Democrats are souring on Joe because he's not progressive enough.John Fetterman was expected to win the Democratic Senate primary in Pennsylvania for so long that it could be easy to overlook how big a win it was for the progressive wing of the Democratic Party.
And the evening got better after that.
In Oregon, first-time candidate Carrick Flynn, who had the support of the leadership-aligned House Majority PAC, conceded to Andrea Salinas, a progressive state lawmaker endorsed by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), in the open 6th Congressional District. In the state’s 5th District, moderate incumbent Rep. Kurt Schrader (D-Ore.) was trailing progressive Jamie McLeod-Skinner by a wide margin with 46 percent of the expected vote in.
[...]
In North Carolina, two progressives, Nida Allam and Erica Smith, went down in open seat House primaries. But even with those losses — and even if the results in Oregon and Pennsylvania turn — it will go down as a good night for the left.
[...]
Next week comes another big test for the left — and one where internal polling suggests progressives are in a strong position. That’s in Texas, where supporters of Jessica Cisneros are rallying around the revelation of a Supreme Court draft opinion overturning Roe v. Wade, in an effort to unseat Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas), an anti-abortion Democrat.
So now is he free to name names about those orgies and drug use he claimed?Rep. Madison Cawthorn, a freshman Republican who's been beset by scandal since taking office last year, has been ousted in a heated primary in North Carolina's 11th Congressional District, according to a race call from The Associated Press.
Cawthorn lost to state Sen. Chuck Edwards, who had received the backing of some Republicans who had tired of Cawthorn's controversies.
[...]
The result is a stunning defeat for Cawthorn, who is a fervent supporter of former President Donald Trump — and who had Trump's endorsement.
NPR
[A] roughly 30-second clip shows what appears to be a nude [Madison] Cawthorn in a bed thrusting with his groin near the head of an unidentified person. A male voice can be heard saying, “Oh ma yah yah oh” repeatedly. A male voice can also be heard laughing and saying, “stick it in his face.”
The video footage emerged after photos surfaced showing Cawthorn wearing women’s lingerie ― images he said were from a “goofy” game on a cruise ― and a video that showed one of his male staff members grabbing his crotch. The latter video has sparked an ethics complaint, The Washington Times reported.
[...]
The North Carolina Republican has also made headlines over allegations of insider trading, trying to bring a loaded handgun onto a plane for the second time and having to surrender his driver’s license after driving with a suspended license. In late March, he also raised some eyebrows when he claimed that the D.C. elite had previously invited him to orgies and done cocaine in front of him.
Yahoo News
'Fraid so, Skippy. You're not Brett Kavanaugh.Cawthorn acknowledged the photos in a tweet Friday, saying they were from a vacation on a cruise and were taken before he ran for Congress.
“I guess the left thinks goofy vacation photos during a game on a cruise (taken waaay before I ran for Congress) is going to somehow hurt me?” Cawthorn said.
The Hill
You could have bet your life on it.
His comments about “the sexual perversion” in Washington made on a podcast, which he later admitted were exaggerated, drew the public disapproval and disavowal of Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy as well as other Republican leaders including those in his North Carolina congressional caucus.
[...]
Cawthorn, who was paralyzed from the waist down as a passenger in a car accident in Florida in 2014, in recent months has called Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy a “thug,” suggested teetotaling Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi has a drinking problem, and racked up a collection of traffic transgressions including speeding, driving with expired tags and driving with a revoked license. He has court dates in May and June.
[...]
Cawthorn, 26, was raised in a conservative Baptist community in Henderson County, North Carolina, and has staked his political persona on arch-traditional Christian principles and the insistence of the importance of a kind of hypermasculinity.
Politico
Yes, the Bible is full of stories about Jerusalem parties in panties.“I subscribe to Judeo-Christian beliefs,” he continued. “I have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. I think if you think about my political ideology, where it really stems from, you know, my ethics and my morals and what I think is right and wrong, you look to ancient Jerusalem, you got ancient Judeo-Christian values. So right and wrong,” he continued. “I also cling to a lot of traditional values and a lot of traditional ideas, because they’ve worked in the past.”
Nothing says manliness like a photograph of a guy in ladies' lingerie.“I think that we have bred a generation of soft men and that generation has created a lot of problems in our society and our culture,” he said in March 2021 on a podcast “designed to reclaim and restore masculinity in a society that is ever more dismissive of what it means to be a man.”
He'll have more "vacation" time once he gets dumped from Congress (also in May).POLITICO could not independently verify the photos, which are screenshots of original images. They were provided to POLITICO by a person formerly close to Cawthorn and his campaign. A second person formerly close to Cawthorn and his campaign confirmed the origin of the photos. The date the photos were taken is unclear, though they appear to show Cawthorn sitting in a wheelchair, indicating the event happened after his accident. In the photos, he is wearing a distinctive pendant necklace that has appeared in other images and videos of Cawthorn. The photos have started to circulate among political rivals.
I'd laugh, but there are some ignorant MAGAts out there who are stupid enough to do it.After this story published, Cawthorn tweeted that the photos were taken of him during a game on a cruise before he was elected to Congress. “I guess the left thinks goofy vacation photos during a game on a cruise (taken waaay before I ran for Congress) is going to somehow hurt me? They’re running out of things to throw at me... Share your most embarrassing vacay pics in the replies.”
He probably don't. Maybe Hines was Ginni Thomas' recommendation.Through newspaper advertisements, email blasts and door-knocking, some local Republicans are trying to spread the word that [Bo Hines, a 26-year-old candidate who doesn’t live anywhere near the congressional district he’s running in], Trump’s favored candidate in the 13th Congressional District, is a carpetbagger. In their view, the former president was misguided in endorsing Hines over homegrown conservatives invested in local party politics.
[...]
[Linwood Parker, chair of the Johnston County Republican Men’s Organization and former mayor of Four Oaks] said Johnston County Republicans activists were “surprised” Trump felt the need to bring in an outside candidate for a primary “in an area where he had good support before.”
“This thing was disappointing. I’m sure Trump doesn’t know,” Parker said of Hines’ lack of local roots. “He probably don’t realize it. That’s the reason we’re doing the ads.”
Politico
“[Hines is] coming in, just trying to cherry pick a district he can win."
[...]
Earlier in the election cycle, Hines campaigned for other congressional seats elsewhere in the state. He filed to run in the newly redrawn 13th district on March 2; less than two weeks later, Trump issued his endorsement, describing the 26-year-old as an “unwavering America First patriot.”
[...]
Asked why Hines decided to run in a district where he has no obvious connections, spokesperson Rob Burgess provided a statement calling Hines “the only true America First, social conservative endorsed by President Donald Trump in this race.” He noted that Hines lived in Wake County, part of which is within the district, while attending North Carolina State University, where Hines played football for the 2014 season before transferring to Yale.
[...]
Hines is in the process of moving to Fuquay-Varina, located in southern Wake County, according to his campaign spokesperson. He intends to update his voter registration in time to vote in the upcoming primary.
[...]
A second local group, Citizen Advocates for Accountable Government, is also trying to leverage its network of hundreds of local conservative activists to turn voters away from Hine
[...]
“We’re all America First people, but we don’t need Mr. Trump or anybody else bringing candidates in who don’t know nothing about farming, don’t know anything about agriculture and the roads here and the needs we have,” [the group's founder Dale] Lands said.
[...]
Trump is set to appear in the eastern North Carolina county this weekend to rally on behalf of Hines and two other endorsed candidates ahead of the state’s May 17 primary. For Senate, Trump’s support is behind Rep. Ted Budd, who struggled in recent months to take the lead over former Gov. Pat McCrory, but has turned a corner as outside spending has skyrocketed in his favor. Also booked for the rally is Rep. Madison Cawthorn, the freshman congressman from the western part of the state who has angered top House Republicans after talking about orgies and cocaine.
[...]
The chair of the Johnston County Republican Party, meanwhile, said he still hasn’t decided whether he’ll attend Trump’s rally, which is being held a few miles away from his house. Darryl Mitchell, the chair, said there has “been very little communication at all” with the local party about the rally, and that he is not aware of any locals who are scheduled to speak.
[...]
The revolt against Trump by conservatives who adore him, while rare, isn’t the first of its kind this year. Trump has issued scores of midterm endorsements, in some cases for candidates who are all but unknown to local GOP officials and activists.
[...]
In a midterm election year when Trump is attempting to assert his influence through a flood of primary endorsements, North Carolina isn’t the only place where local conservative activists are trying to stop his endorsed candidate from securing the Republican nomination on the grounds of carpetbagging.
In Tennessee, the Republican-controlled legislature gave final approval last week to a bill that would effectively disqualify Trump’s pick in the 5th Congressional District, Morgan Ortagus, [a former Trump State Department spokesperson,] because she only moved to the state last year.
[...]
In Georgia, a Republican effort is underway to try to drive down support for Trump’s Senate pick, retired football star Herschel Walker, who returned to the state last year after decades away.
In a word, no.Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.), who chairs the ultra-conservative House Freedom Caucus to which Cawthorn belongs, said he plans to speak to the North Carolina Republican one-on-one about the incendiary comment. Perry further indicated that Cawthorn should identify the individuals he alleges engaged in that behavior.
[...]
Cawthorn’s claims caused an internal uproar at Tuesday’s conference meeting. But as aggravated as Cawthorn’s colleagues may be by his salacious tales, they also know that digging more deeply into his stories may cause them more political problems.
[...]
When asked whether they would reconsider Cawthorn’s membership in the group if he didn’t make clear whom he has evidence of taking part in group sex and drug use, Perry wouldn’t say either way: “We will discuss that when we get to it,” he replied.
Politico
Sorry I missed that.Cawthorn first raised observing “sexual perversion” since he came to Washington during a podcast interview in which he was asked whether the TV show “House of Cards” — which features an ambitious, corrupt congressman trying to rise to power — is “fictitious” or more like a “documentary.”
It was a realistic depiction, Cawthorn suggested to the interviewer, claiming he had gotten sexually pursued and observed cocaine use since his election in 2020.
[...]
[S]ome members point[ed] to how he has faced media reports detailing sexual misconduct allegations against him before he was elected to Congress.
Just an all-around swell guy.McCarthy met with Cawthorn for about 30 minutes Wednesday morning, and later told reporters the 26-year-old freshman congressman needs to make life choices to "turn himself around."
McCarthy added Cawthorn admitted his allegations were exaggerated, saying Cawthorn drew his conclusion about cocaine use, for example, because he "thinks he saw maybe a staffer in a parking garage maybe 100 yards away" potentially consuming an unknown substance.
[...]
[McCarthy]did not rule out stripping Cawthorn of committee assignments when asked about the issue.
[...]
McCarthy earlier this month denounced Cawthorn after a video surfaced in which he called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky a "thug" in charge of an "incredibly evil" government. Cawthorn has also faced numerous allegations of sexual harassment and was widely condemned for a 201Cawthorn is a staunch supporter of former President Donald Trump, and the ex-president has spoken admiringly of the congressman, whom he endorsed in 2020.
[...]
Cawthorn was also a prominent speaker at Trump's rally on January 6, 2021, before the president’s supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol.7 post on his Instagram account celebrating his visit to Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler’s retreat in the German Alps.
Forbes
Exactly the list you would predict.[S]ome of the planners of the pro-Trump rallies that took place in Washington, D.C., have begun communicating with congressional investigators and sharing new information about what happened when the former president’s supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol. Two of these people have spoken to Rolling Stone extensively in recent weeks and detailed explosive allegations that multiple members of Congress were intimately involved in planning both Trump’s efforts to overturn his election loss and the Jan. 6 events that turned violent.
Rolling Stone separately confirmed a third person involved in the main Jan. 6 rally in D.C. has communicated with the committee. This is the first report that the committee is hearing major new allegations from potential cooperating witnesses. [...] The two sources also claim they interacted with members of Trump’s team, including former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, who they describe as having had an opportunity to prevent the violence.
[...]
“I remember Marjorie Taylor Greene specifically,” the organizer says. “I remember talking to probably close to a dozen other members at one point or another or their staffs.”
[...]
These two sources also helped plan a series of demonstrations that took place in multiple states around the country in the weeks between the election and the storming of the Capitol. According to these sources, multiple people associated with the March for Trump and Stop the Steal events that took place during this period communicated with members of Congress throughout this process.
[...]
[In addition to Greene,] the pair both say the members who participated in these conversations or had top staffers join in included Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.), Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-N.C.), Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), and Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas).
Rolling Stone
Planning the protests against the election isn't illegal. The problem is with planning the break-in.Gosar, who has been one of the most prominent defenders of the Jan. 6 rioters, allegedly took things a step further. Both sources say he dangled the possibility of a “blanket pardon” in an unrelated ongoing investigation to encourage them to plan the protests.
“Our impression was that it was a done deal,” the organizer says, “that he’d spoken to the president about it in the Oval … in a meeting about pardons and that our names came up. They were working on submitting the paperwork and getting members of the House Freedom Caucus to sign on as a show of support.”
[...]
The rally planner describes the pardon as being offered while “encouraging” the staging of protests against the election. While the organizer says they did not get involved in planning the rallies solely due to the pardon, they were upset that it ultimately did not materialize.
[...]
Rolling Stone has separately obtained documentary evidence that both sources were in contact with Gosar and Boebert on Jan. 6. We are not describing the nature of that evidence to preserve their anonymity
[...]
Nick Dyer, who is Greene’s communications director, said she was solely involved in planning to object to the electoral certification on the House floor. Spokespeople for the other members of Congress, who the sources describe as involved in the planning for protests, did not respond to requests for comment.
[...]
In another indication members of Congress may have been involved in planning the protests against the election, Ali Alexander, who helped organize the “Wild Protest,” declared in a since-deleted livestream broadcast that Gosar, Brooks, and Biggs helped him formulate the strategy for that event.
“I was the person who came up with the Jan. 6 idea with Congressman Gosar, Congressman Mo Brooks, and Congressman Andy Biggs,” Alexander said at the time. “We four schemed up on putting maximum pressure on Congress while they were voting so that — who we couldn’t lobby — we could change the hearts and the minds of Republicans who were in that body hearing our loud roar from outside.”
That needs to be done ASAP, or perhaps - for the most political impact - closer to the 2022 elections.The two potential witnesses plan to present to the committee allegations about how these demonstrations were funded and to detail communications between organizers and the White House. According to both sources, members of Trump’s administration and former members of his campaign team were involved in the planning. Both describe Katrina Pierson, who worked for Trump’s campaign in 2016 and 2020, as a key liaison between the organizers of protests against the election and the White House.
[...]
Both sources also describe Trump’s White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, as someone who played a major role in the conversations surrounding the protests on Jan. 6.
[...]
“Meadows was 100 percent made aware of what was going on,” says the organizer. “He’s also like a regular figure in these really tiny groups of national organizers.”
[...]
While it was already clear members of Congress played some role in the Jan. 6 events and similar rallies that occurred in the lead-up to that day, the two sources say they can provide new details about the members’ specific roles in these efforts. The sources plan to share that information with congressional investigators right away. While both sources say their communications with the House’s Jan. 6 committee thus far have been informal, they are expecting to testify publicly.
Republicans and autocrats don't like it when people are able to vote.Both of the sources made clear that they still believe in Trump’s agenda. They also have questions about how his election loss occurred. The two sources say they do not necessarily believe there were issues with the actual vote count. However, they are concerned that Democrats gained an unfair advantage in the race due to perceived social media censorship of Trump allies and the voting rules that were implemented as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.
I'm guessing the latter reason is a real one, while the former is B.S.Despite their remaining affinity for Trump and their questions about the vote, both sources say they were motivated to come forward because of their concerns about how the pro-Trump protests against the election ultimately resulted in the violent attack on the Capitol. Of course, with their other legal issues and the House investigation, both of these sources have clear motivation to cooperate with investigators and turn on their former allies.
Naturally.And both of their accounts paint them in a decidedly favorable light compared with their former allies.
No argument there.“The reason I’m talking to the committee and the reason it’s so important is that — despite Republicans refusing to participate … this commission’s all we got as far as being able to uncover the truth about what happened at the Capitol that day,” the organizer says. “It’s clear that a lot of bad actors set out to cause chaos. … They made us all look like shit.”
I'd like to know what the fuck they expected. It's Trump.“The breaking point for me [on Jan. 6 was when] Trump starts talking about walking to the Capitol,” the organizer says. “I was like. ‘Let’s get the fuck out of here.’ ”
“I do kind of feel abandoned by Trump,” says the planner. “I’m actually pretty pissed about it and I’m pissed at him.”
The organizer offers an even more succinct assessment when asked what they would say to Trump.
“What the fuck?” the organizer says.
If true, that puts Trump squarely in play for urging the Ellipse crowd to march on the Capitol.Heading into Jan. 6, both sources say, the plan they had discussed with other organizers, Trump allies, and members of Congress was a rally that would solely take place at the Ellipse.
Thank Trump.A senior staffer for a Republican member of Congress, who was also granted anonymity to discuss the ongoing investigation, similarly says they believed the events would only involve supporting objections on the House floor. The staffer says their member was engaged in planning that was “specifically and fully above board.”
“A whole host of people let this go a totally different way,” the senior Republican staffer says. “They fucked it up for a lot of people who were planning to present evidence on the House floor. We were pissed off at everything that happened.”
They'll be wearing MAGA shit, and carrying signs in support of Trump. Bet.Trump has in the past spoken in support of his fans who attacked the US Capitol on January 6 in a bid to stop Joe Biden's certification as president.
But sources told The Times that he wouldn't be going anywhere near Washington on Saturday and would instead spend the day at his golf resort in Bedminster, New Jersey.
"Mr. Trump views the planned protest as a setup that the news media will use against him regardless of the outcome," The Times said, citing people familiar with his thinking.
[...]
The Saturday rally was organized by Matt Braynard, a former data official for the Trump campaign, and is being held in support of those who have been jailed or have faced other punishments in relation to the Capitol riot.
Earlier this week, Braynard said attendees would not be allowed to wear clothing in support of Trump or Biden, adding that the event was not about the election or the candidates.
Yahoo
The most paranoid people on the planet.The Department for Homeland Security said about 700 people were expected to attend the event.
[...]
The event had raised fears of a repeat of the violence on January 6, with intelligence officials saying that several far-right groups, such as the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers, were expected to attend.
[...]
Trump appears not to be the only one concerned that the event was a setup, with NBC News reporting on Wednesday that hard-line Trump supporters and right-wing extremists on social media were riddled with paranoia that the event could be a decoy used to entrap them.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and Madison Cawthorn (R-N.C.) expect to skip the “Justice for J6” rally on Sept. 18, according to the GOP duo's spokespeople. [...] Cawthorn and Greene — two of the most vocal elected Republicans who have said some who breached the Capitol were unfairly prosecuted — would have been VIP attendees.
[...]
Braynard dismissed the possibility of violence at his rally, saying his group held “two similar rallies in D.C. at the Department of Justice and at the prison where these political prisoners are being held. These events occurred without incident.”
He added that in addition to working with the Capitol Police, the Metropolitan Police, and the Park Police “on a daily basis for over a month,” rally organizers will have “a private, diplomatic security team working with the Capitol Police and many volunteers who will ensure this is a safe and productive event.”
[...]
Reps. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) and Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) had joined Greene and Gaetz for a protest outside the Department of Justice at the end of July, though protesters disrupted their event.
[...]
Prosecutors have arrested more than 600 alleged members of the mob that breached the Capitol on Jan. 6, and more than 60 have pleaded guilty for their actions. More than 150 defendants have been charged with assaulting or impeding police during the breach, and prosecutors say more than 1,000 assaults were committed that day. A small subset of those arrested have been held in prison while they await trial, deemed too dangerous by judges — appointed by presidents of both parties — to remain in the community while they fight the charges against them. Lawmakers who have decried the treatment of these defendants have not identified specific cases they believe to be unfair or inappropriate.
Politico
They'll kick Cheney out of the GOP next.One of the nation’s two major parties was in effect declaring an extraordinary admission requirement to its highest ranks: fealty to, or at least silence about, Trump’s lie that he lost his November reelection bid due to widespread fraud. In states around the country, officials and judges of both parties found no evidence to support Trump’s claims that extensive illegalities caused his defeat.
[...]
Meeting behind closed doors for less than 20 minutes, GOP lawmakers used a voice vote to remove Cheney, R-Wyo., from the party’s No. 3 House position, a jarring turnabout to what’s been her fast-rising career within the party.
She was Congress’ highest-ranking Republican woman and is a daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, and her demotion was the latest evidence that challenging Trump can be career-threatening.
Cheney has refused to stop repudiating Trump and defiantly signaled after the meeting that she intended to use her overthrow to try pointing the party away from the former president.
[...]
In an audacious signal that she was not backing down, Cheney took to a nearly empty House chamber Tuesday evening to deliver an unapologetic four-minute assault on her GOP adversaries and defense of her own position.
“Remaining silent and ignoring the lie emboldens the liar,” she said, adding, “I will not sit back and watch in silence while others lead our party down a path that abandons the rule of law and joins the former president’s crusade to undermine our democracy.”
[...]
“I will do everything I can to ensure that the former president never again gets anywhere near the Oval Office,” she told reporters.
Cheney’s replacement was widely expected to be Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., who entered the House in 2015 at age 30, then the youngest woman ever elected to Congress. Stefanik owns a more moderate voting record than Cheney but has evolved into a vigorous Trump defender who’s echoed some of his unfounded claims about widespread election cheating.
AP
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.Voters in North Carolina went to the polls on Tuesday for a special election to fill the vacancy created when Rep. Mark Meadows (R-NC) resigned from Congress to serve as Trump’s chief of staff.
Trump had repeatedly urged his supporters to back Lynda Bennett in the race for North Carolina’s 11th congressional district.
But voters decided not to go along with Trump’s wishes.
[...]
“A 24-year-old motivational speaker has defeated the Republican candidate endorsed by President Donald Trump and White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows in a GOP runoff for Meadows’ old congressional seat, according to unofficial results,” the Charlotte Observer reported Tuesday evening. “Madison Cawthorn defeated Lynda Bennett in North Carolina’s 11th Congressional District in far-western North Carolina. He was leading with 65% of the vote with nearly all of precincts reporting. The Associated Press called the race in Cawthorn’s favor at 8:47 p.m.”
Raw Story
