Meanwhile in the Epstein files

 

[I]t’s jaw-dropping to learn — some seven long years later — about the phone call that came into a popular Albuquerque disc jockey and was passed onto local authorities from a man who claimed he’d worked on a rural New Mexico ranch belonging to Jeffrey Epstein, the uber-connected financier and convicted sex offender.

The man said he knew where the bodies were buried.

Literally. Two of them, in fact — young girls whose life of abuse in Epstein World allegedly ended in murder and were hidden somewhere in the hills near the ranch not far south of Santa Fe.

[...]

New Mexico authorities were told back in 2019 not to investigate by U.S. Justice Department prosecutors in Manhattan who just as abruptly lost all interest in the matter.

[...]

[A] flurry of smaller but significant details in the latest and supposedly last tranche of Epstein Files has me convinced that 1) there might be some very active landmines in the case that haven’t been touched off yet, and 2) there definitely was, and still is, an active coverup at the highest levels of government.

[...]

The recently released files contain some surprising discoveries from the FBI’s investigation, especially centering on the actions of one of the two guards on duty that night. Both were fired for failing to check on their famous inmate and allegedly falsifying records.

The normally Trump-friendly New York Post reported last weekend that one of the two guards made an unusual $5,000 deposit just 10 days before Epstein’s death and, perhaps even more suspiciously, Googled “latest on Epstein in jail” twice, just 50 and then 40 minutes before her co-worker discovered the body. (The guard has denied in a sworn statement that she had anything to do with Epstein’s death.)

  Philadelphia Inquirer

Perhaps she believes that taking $5,000 for "falling asleep" while it happened isn't having something to do with it. It's a technicality.

The online commentator Alison Gill also notes that Epstein and his associates were discussing the possibility of blackmail material on Trump, presumably with the goal of ending Epstein’s criminal case, in the days right before he died.

Recall that one of the victims claimed Trump threatened her (and her family) with an allusion to a 12-yearold girl being killed.

[N]ow we know from a recently released 302 that Epstein was not just blackmailing the victims, but also his clients and he discussed this with Trump. (A 302 is the number of the FBI form that is used for interviews)

And [Gill] reported that he also discussed some dirt he might have on Trump

And that interview with the FBI took place 3 days before Epstein was found dead in his jail cell

Gill’s pointing out that some of the 302s especially about Trump and how he trafficked girls from his modelling agency are also missing.

[...]

Also reminds us that the DOJ withheld accusations of Trump committing sexual abuse of a minor (discovered by NPR sleuthing)

[...]

Also suspicious was the discovery of these documents in the time of Bondi and Blanche. When these were discovered, Bondi closed the case (or tried to on a 4th of July weekend) and Blanche went to talk to Maxwell. Also that closing memo talked about how no evidence of blackmail found. (Which makes us think that blackmail was found)

  Daily Kos

[T]he Post and Courier of Charleston, S.C., near where the [Trump] accuser [who was 13 years old at the time of her accusations] grew up [...] assigned reporters to look at anything and everything that could either confirm or cast doubt on what she told the FBI — real estate records, court filings, old newspaper clippings, and more — and even sent a journalist out to the West Coast,

The result? The things they could check out pretty much checked out, including her family’s relationship with an Ohio businessman whom she said introduced her to Epstein on Hilton Head Island. None of what the paper found relates to her veracity about the Trump encounter, but both its findings confirming other details, and the fact that the FBI spoke to this woman four times, bolster her credibility.

[...]

We know that during the fraught days between Epstein’s 2019 arrest and his death, the FBI ordered the New York Police Department and local Manhattan prosecutors to back off their own investigations into Epstein. Why? We know that in the New Mexico case, federal prosecutors hijacked the investigation and then absolutely nothing happened. Why? And we know that the three temporarily missing FBI interviews with the Trump accuser are part of a much bigger pattern of disappeared files, constant slow-walking, and other Justice Department irregularities. Why?

  Philadelphia Inquirer

I think we know the answer to those questions is the same answer: protect Trump and the Epstein class.

[L]ocal prosecutors in New York, New Mexico, Florida, the Virgin Islands, and elsewhere need to step up.

Epstein in New Mexico

This week, a New Mexico House Special Investigative Committee launched an investigation into Epstein’s Zorro ranch now owned by Texas businessman Don Huffines after learning of more criminality alleged in the files. Lawmakers also said residents of the Santa Fe community had long alleged crimes were being committed there and no state legislative investigation had been conducted.

[...]

After Epstein was indicted in 2005, campaign contributions he made to New Mexico Democrats were returned, including by former Gov. Bill Richardson and then attorney general candidate Gary King, Bruce King’s son, The Santa Fe New Mexican reported.

[...]

[King] said he would have prosecuted Epstein had he known crimes were committed at the ranch.

  The Cener Square

Sure, Jan.

No investigations were launched by his office when he served between Jan. 1, 2007, and Jan. 1, 2015.

Four years after King left office, New Mexico Land Office Commissioner Stephanie Garcia called for an investigation into “allegations that Epstein sexually abused and trafficked underage girls in New Mexico, with the Zorro Ranch at the heart of possible sex crimes.”

Garcia also canceled state lease agreements with the ranch dating to 1993.

[...]

Former New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas launched an investigation but was asked to halt it in July 2019 by the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Maureen Comey, the daughter of former FBI director James Comey.

According to a Sept. 8, 2019, redacted email, her office said it “spoke with the New Mexico AG's office back in July 2019. In essence, they agreed to cease any investigation into sex trafficking and share whatever they had gathered to date regarding sex trafficking activity with our office. We agreed that they were free. To proceed with whatever other investigations unrelated to sex trafficking they may have concerning Epstein and told them that at the conclusion of our case, we would pass along any information we may have gathered about the state crimes that were committed in their jurisdiction.”

How'd that work out?

Her office said it was interviewing Epstein victims based on the information Balderas provided, according to an Oct. 11, 2019, email. In 2020, Balderas was still providing information. No charges were brought; no search warrants were issued to search Zorro ranch.

After the Epstein files were released, Garcia renewed her call for a state investigation and the New Mexico legislature launched its own investigation.

Good luck getting those federal files now.

Further on the Zorro ranch.

New Mexico presente!

 

New Mexico is woke!

 

Trump 2.0 - Authoritarians have no use for science

 In fact, it is their enemy.

Tomorrow:

UPDATE 01:19 pm:

SCOTUS decision akin to the 14th amendment disqualification

How interesting that they wouldn't let Colorado keep Trump off the ballot for the same reason.

In their decision, the justices ruled that states should not have unilateral power to disqualify candidates for federal office — but that state offices are another matter.

  Politico

Whatever.

The 14th Amendment and Trump 2024

There is precedent for disqualification to hold office - and very recent at that.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Long arm of the law

Good.  That shit needs to be seriously and severely curtailed.

Federal prosecutors have interviewed the secretaries of state for both Pennsylvania and New Mexico in recent months.

[...]

[Pennsylvania Secretary of State Al] Schmidt, a Republican, was asked about issues he encountered while serving as Philadelphia City Commissioner, including how misinformation about widespread voter fraud impacted him and other election officials at the time.

[...]

New Mexico’s top election official, Maggie Toulouse Oliver, also met with federal prosecutors in recent months “to discuss matters related to the 2020 election.”

[...]

Smith’s team has sent subpoenas to local and state officials in all seven of the key states – Georgia, New Mexico, Nevada, Michigan, Arizona, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin – that were targeted by Trump and his allies and where Trump’s campaign convened the false electors as part of the effort to subvert the Electoral College.

Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger also spoke to federal prosecutors as part of the criminal probe.

Benson said in an interview on CNN that prosecutors were focused, in part, on the impact of misinformation on election workers and the “threats that emerged from that from various sources.”

Other officials from those states also have been interviewed by federal investigators as part of the special counsel probe, including Rusty Bowers, a former top GOP official in Arizona.

Smith’s sprawling investigations has focused on multiple alleged election-stealing efforts.

[...]

Smith and his team have zeroed in on a chaotic Oval Office meeting during the final days of Trump’s presidency, during which the former president considered some of the most desperate and far-fetched proposals to keep him in power over objections from his White House counsel.

  CNN

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

It's a start

Couy Griffin, one of three commissioners in Otero county in southern New Mexico, was immediately removed from his position and cannot hold elected office again, Francis Mathew, a district judge in Santa Fe, wrote in his ruling.

The 14th amendment to the US constitution bars anyone who has participated in an insurrection from holding elected office. In June, Griffin was sentenced to 14 days in jail and a $3,000 (£2,604) fine for misdemeanor trespassing during the Capitol attack.

[...]

Earlier this year, Griffin sought to block Otero county, which voted overwhelmingly for Donald Trump in 2020, from certifying its official primary election results, citing concerns – which have been debunked – about voting machines.

The state supreme court eventually ordered the three-member commission to certify the election, which it ultimately did with a 2-1 vote. Griffin was the lone holdout.

“My vote to remain a no isn’t based on any evidence, it isn’t based on any facts. It’s only based on my own gut feeling, my own intuition, and that’s all I need,” he said at the time.

[...]

“Mr Griffin aided the insurrection even though he did not personally engage in violence. By joining the mob and trespassing on restricted Capitol grounds, Mr Griffin contributed to delaying Congress’s election certification proceedings.”

  Guardian

Good, now let's see that applied to the people who instigated the insurrection. Or in those words, "contributed to delaying Congress's election certification proceedings."

“This decision makes clear that any current or former public officials who took an oath to defend the US Constitution and then participated in the January 6th insurrection can and will be removed and barred from government service for their actions,” Noah Bookbinder, [CREW's] executive director, said in a statement.

[...]

An effort to remove Marjorie Taylor Greene, the far-right Georgia congresswoman, from the ballot failed earlier this year. A similar effort seeking the removal of Arizona representatives Andy Biggs and Paul Gosar, as well as Mark Finchem, a Republican running to be Arizona’s top election official, also failed.

Try again.

Another day ....

[On] May 15 [Gwendolyn Dean] Schofield and her daughter [Melodie Ivie] pulled over on a residential street in the northwestern New Mexico city of Farmington to help a woman [Shirley Voita] who was shot at random, and they, too, were hit by gunfire and died.

[...]

They were laid to rest this week during two days of memorial services in a community still grieving from the impacts of a rampage by an 18-year-old on the eve of his high school graduation that left six others wounded, including two police officers. Officers shot and killed the gunman.

[...]

Police have said the gunman did not appear to be targeting anyone. Rather, he shot indiscriminately from outside his home before walking around the neighborhood, perforating cars and houses using three different guns.

  The Hill

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Another day, another American mass killing

An 18-year-old man armed with at least three guns roamed through a northwestern New Mexico community firing randomly at cars and houses Monday, killing three people and injuring six others including two police officers before he was killed, authorities said.

Officers responding to reports of shots being fired encountered the attacker within minutes and killed him with at least one shot, Farmington Police Chief Steve Hebbe said in a video released Monday night. He said the gunman fired at least three weapons, including an “AR-style rifle.”

  Dallas News

Thoughts and prayers. Too bad we're helpless to do anything.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Welcome to the resistance

Unsurprising result of pushing the big lie

A failed Republican candidate [in Albuquerque, New Mexico,] who authorities said was angry over his defeat and made baseless claims the election last November was “rigged” against him was arrested in connection with a series of drive-by shootings targeting the homes of Democratic lawmakers in New Mexico’s largest city.

[...]

No one was injured in the shootings, which unfolded amid a rise in threats to members of Congress, school board members, election officials and other government workers around the nation.

[...]

A criminal complaint outlining the exact charges against the former political candidate was expected to be released in the coming days. Additional arrests and charges also were expected, but police declined to elaborate, citing the ongoing investigation.

  The Hill

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Time yet to effect some gun control?

There's a story in the news getting lots of attention about a six-year-old who shot a teacher in school. SIX YEARS OLD. Of course that won't make any change in gun laws.

But maybe when enough politicians are targeted...

Local and state police are working with the FBI in Albuquerque, N.M., to investigate five shootings that have targeted Democratic politicians' homes or offices since in the past month.

  NPR

Oh wait. Maybe not.

Bernalillo County Commissioner Adriann Barboa, whose home was the first to come under fire, told NPR on Friday that the attacks have been difficult to process, "especially knowing that other women of color elected officials have also been targeted."

It'll have to be white male politicians.

Authorities had planned to highlight the shootings on Thursday, after a state senator's home was fired at on Tuesday — and then came word of yet more gunfire with a political target, as bullets struck a second state senator's office Thursday morning.

[...]

In the attacks, multiple rounds have been fired into the doors and walls of buildings — in some cases while elected officials were inside with their families — but no one has been hurt.

Don't pay any attention to me.  I've become quite jaded.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:  I guess I have the answer to my question...

Let's do this!

The fascists are moving fast while the Supreme Court is on their side

Testing the waters

And so it begins. The plans for the next coup are underway.

New Mexico’s secretary of state on Tuesday asked the state Supreme Court to order the Republican-led commission of rural Otero County to certify primary election results after it refused to do so over distrust of Dominion vote-tallying machines.

Democratic Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Olive’s request came a day after the three-member Otero County commission, in its role as a county canvassing board, voted unanimously against certifying the results of the June 7 primary without raising specific concerns about discrepancies. The commission’s members include Cowboys for Trump co-founder Couy Griffin, who ascribes to unsubstantiated claims that former President Donald Trump won the 2020 election. Griffin was convicted of illegally entering restricted U.S. Capitol grounds — though not the building — amid the riots on Jan. 6, 2021, and is scheduled for sentencing later this month. He acknowledged that the standoff over this primary could delay the outcome of local election races.

[...]

New Mexico uses paper ballots that can be double-checked later in all elections, and also relies on tabulation machines to rapidly tally votes while minimizing human error. Election results also are audited by random samplings to verify levels of accuracy in the vote count.

The Otero County commission voted last week to recount ballots from the statewide primary election by hand, remove state-mandated ballot drop boxes that facilitate absentee voting and discontinue the use of Dominion vote tabulation machines in the general election.

On Monday, Holmes said those instructions from the county commissions conflict with state and federal election law, and that she would only recount the election by hand under a court order.

“The election law does not allow me to hand tally these ballots or to even form a board to do it. I just can’t,” said [County Clerk Robyn] Holmes, a Republican. “And I’m going to follow the law.”

Holmes noted that the state-owned vote tabulation machines from Dominion are tested by Otero County officials in public view and that the machines also are independently certified in advance. Griffin said he and fellow commissioners don’t see the process as trustworthy.

“That’s a source that we don’t have any control or influence over,” he said.

  The Hill

Cowboys for Trump want control and influence over the voting mechanisms.

Democrats have to make sure they're defeated in the general.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

The way to a better future may be starting

New Mexico could become the second state to implement a statewide universal basic income program.

The city of Santa Fe is testing out universal basic income, or guaranteed monthly payments, for 100 parents under the age of 30 who attend Santa Fe Community College. They'll get $400 monthly payments, also known as a "stability stipend," for a year, and if that local pilot program goes well, lawmakers are considering moving forward with a similar statewide proposal.

[...]

Santa Fe Mayor Alan Webber, who testified at the hearing, expressed support for guaranteed monthly payments, saying that they are "exactly what we need to break the cycle of poverty."

[...]

A growing number of cities are testing out universal basic income for targeted groups of residents. For example, upstate New York is testing out a one year program giving 100 residents $500 monthly payments for a year, with Chicago, Boston, St. Paul and others having implemented similar programs.

Last month, California approved the nation's first statewide guaranteed income program, giving up to $1,000 monthly checks prioritized to pregnant people and those aging out of the foster care system.

  Business Insider

The percentage of American families with kids who report not having enough to eat fell dramatically after the first child tax credit payments were distributed last month, according to new data from the U.S. Census Bureau.

The government’s finding shows that the monthly payments are having a major and immediate impact on millions of households, potentially bolstering President Joe Biden’s push to extend the tax credit past the end of this year, when it is set to expire.

[...]

Before the first tranche of tax credit payments hit bank accounts in mid-July, about 11 percent of households with children reported that they sometimes or often did not have enough to eat in the past week. After the money went out, the rate dropped to just over 8 percent — a decrease of nearly 24 percent — and the lowest rate recorded since the beginning of the pandemic.

  Politico

Celebrate

A madman and his mindless supporters

Trump in New Mexico...



WTF?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.