Trump supporters and conspiracy theory - Part 2

[Rick Plant]

Good!

Police Arrest “Freedom Convoy” Protesters Who Remained at U.S.-Canada Bridge
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/02/police-arrest-convoy-protesters-ambassador-bridge.html

[Rick Plant]

'They don’t like Donald Trump. They never liked him': GOP leaders want 'weakened' Trump gone



According to a report from the Washington Post, pollsters and Republican campaign consultants see Donald Trump's political future rapidly fading as mainstream GOP voters -- and donors -- are ready to move on from the "weakened" former president.

Using a battle in Michigan between the GOP leadership and Trump's pick to be the state's attorney general candidate, the report illustrates the growing disconnect between Trump's demands and Republicans' need to move on.

"Similar clashes between Republican leaders and the candidates Trump has embraced have been playing out across the country with growing ferocity in recent months, a chaotic sign that Trump’s once unchallenged hold on the party and rank-and-file supporters is waning, even if by degrees," the Post's Josh Dawsey and Micheal Scherer wrote before adding, "The former president’s power within the party and his continued focus on personal grievances is increasingly questioned behind closed doors at Republican gatherings, according to interviews with more than a dozen prominent Republicans in Washington and across the country, including some Trump advisers."

Adding, "As a result, Trump and his endorsees now find themselves fighting against some elected GOP leaders, donors and party officers intent on navigating the party slowly away from him and his false election claims. Among voters, polls have shown Republican-leaning independents turning from Trump," the report quotes attorney and Trump supporter Matthew DePerno saying the recent turn of events has given Republican leadership in his state an opening to dump Trump.

"There are a lot of people in the state party who — they don’t like Donald Trump. They never liked him," he explained.

According to the report, Republican donors are already turning their backs on the former president, with Art Pope, a prominent North Carolina donor who supported the former president through this four years admitting, "My preference would be he not run again for a variety of reasons and let there be a good primary going forward."

One senior Republican, who did not want to go on the record, said Trump's diminished presence on social media is making it easier to move on without him.

“People aren’t necessarily seeing his messaging as much. They just say he’s not on Twitter, they don’t really know what he’s doing,” they explained. “A lot of people now say to me: 'He did great things, he was a great president, but it’s time for something new.’”

One Trump adviser admitted that even some Trump supporters are feeling Trump-fatigue.

“They needed a break from him. They’re not sure they want him back in their lives, even if they loved the policies,” they explained.

You can read more here:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/02/13/trump-politics-weakness/

[Rick Plant]

‘Zero tolerance’: Multiple arrests made as police clear protesters blockading Canada-U.S. bridge

Canadian police moved in and arrested protesters opposed to Covid-19 vaccine mandates who have been blocking the entrance to the Ambassador Bridge between the United States and Canada.

Windsor police said Sunday morning that several arrests were made, and that all of those arrested face a charge of mischief. Constable Talya Natyshak did not have an exact number but said most of the at least 12 arrests in the demonstration so far occurred Sunday, and at least five vehicles were seized.

“Enforcement actions continue at the demonstration area with arrests being made,” Ontario’s Windsor Police said in a tweet. “There will be zero tolerance for illegal activity. The public should avoid the area,” it added in separate post.

Television images Sunday morning showed officers arresting the few protesters who remained near the Ambassador Bridge linking Detroit and Windsor, Ontario — the busiest border crossing to the U.S., the Associated Press reported.

Only two pickup trucks and less than a dozen protesters blocked the road to the bridge before police moved in, according to the AP. Afterward, police barricades remained and it was not immediately clear when the bridge might be opened.

By Sunday afternoon there were still a small group of demonstrators in Windsor, and officials had not announced when the bridge would reopen.

“Today, our national economic crisis at the Ambassador bridge came to an end,” Windsor Mayor Drew Dilkens said in a statement Sunday. He said when the bridge would reopen was up to police and border officials.

Police officers began to disperse protesters on Saturday after Chief Justice Geoffrey Morawetz of the Ontario Superior Court ordered them to leave.

His ruling, at a hearing on Friday, came after the city of Windsor and lawyers for auto parts makers had successfully argued that the blockade was causing undue economic harm for the city and region by disrupting the flow of traffic and goods as well as forcing the auto industry on both sides to roll back production.

The closure of the bridge, which carries more than one-fourth of the trade between the U.S. and Canada, has affected an estimated $392.56 million a day in cross-border transactions.

The ramps to the bridge remained closed Sunday morning, Michigan State Police tweeted. It said trucks could use another border crossing, the Blue Water Bridge which is around 60 miles to the north, and that cars could use a tunnel.

The Windsor demonstration is one of multiple spinoffs tied to truckers’ “Freedom Convoy,” which started out against vaccination mandates for truckers crossing the U.S.-Canada border and has since evolved into opposition to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government and pandemic restrictions.

The protest is now in its third weekend in Canada's capital of Ottawa, where hundreds of protesters have used their trucks to block city streets, blare their horns and disrupt traffic.

On Saturday, demonstrators also shut down smaller border crossings in Surrey, British Columbia; Emerson, Manitoba; and Coutts, Alberta, according to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford declared a state of emergency on Friday, saying he would use all government resources to end a two-week protest by Canadian truckers. He said the protests amounted to a “siege” of downtown Ottawa and the Ambassador Bridge.

The protests have reverberated outside the country, inspiring similar convoys in Europe and New Zealand.

Inside Canada, the protests have sparked a backlash in both Ottawa and across the country over alleged harassment as well as the presence of Confederate flags and flags bearing swastikas.

A majority of Canadians oppose the truckers’ actions, according to an Ipsos poll.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/ambassador-bridge-police-canada-us-border-covid-protesters-arrests-rcna16036

[Rick Plant]

Vindman lawsuit could open the floodgates to more civil suits against Trump: legal expert

Writing for MSNBC, legal analyst and former U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance claimed that the civil suit filed against Donald Trump and two members of his inner circle by former military official Alexander Vindman is both a courageous act and also could be a precursor to a flood of more civil lawsuits against the former president if it proves to be successful.

As NPR reported on Feb 2, the National Security Council advisor's suit filed in federal court in Washington, D.C. "...accuses the defendants [Trump, Rudy Giuliani, Dan Scavino] of engaging in an 'intentional, concerted campaign of unlawful intimidation and retaliation' against him for testifying before Congress in 2019."

Recalling Vindman's congressional testimony, Vance wrote, "A high-ranking member of the military who swore an oath to uphold the Constitution, Vindman did the right thing. Concerned about the call’s legality and possible national security implications, he reported it up his chain of command. When subpoenaed to testify before the House of Representatives, he willingly told the truth. In other words, he did precisely what we would hope our public servants would do."

With the lawsuit alleging, "Witnesses subpoenaed by Congress in connection with its investigation into the events of January 6, 2021, continue to heed former President Trump’s instructions to defy those subpoenas, undermining Congress’s constitutional oversight role and the fundamental principle of checks and balances between three co-equal branches of government,” Vance called it a "stunning statement" before adding that it was also "unsurprising, at least for anyone who paid attention during Trump’s time in office."

"Whether the lawsuit is ultimately successful, Vindman’s concern is an important one. Elected officials — and certainly presidents — shouldn’t be able to use the power of their office to threaten or retaliate against witnesses who testify truthfully in official proceedings," she suggested. "It has been carefully crafted to include details of Trump’s involvement but does not actually name him as a defendant, at least at this early stage in the proceedings. This could avoid the delays he has caused with other cases by using his former presidential status."

More importantly, she added, Vindman's suit could inspire more victims of the Trump administration to follow his path.

"Sometimes it can be enough, or at least a start, to take the first step forward, on principle. This, we can hope, is one of those moments. No president should be able to besmirch a public servant with lies about his patriotism in an effort to deflect attention from his own misconduct. And the courage of one person to call out wrongdoing may inspire others, including both career employees and political appointees who found themselves in Trump’s orbit during the orchestration of the big lie," she wrote. "Truth is essential to democracy. Perhaps Vindman, by standing for the truth, can inspire others to do the same."

You can read the whole piece here:

https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/alexander-vindman-s-trump-white-house-lawsuit-matters-n1289008

[Richard Smith]

Good!

Police Arrest “Freedom Convoy” Protesters Who Remained at U.S.-Canada Bridge
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/02/police-arrest-convoy-protesters-ambassador-bridge.html

So gleeful to arrest ordinary people and lock them up.  Even Canadian truckers are "neo-nazis."  LOL.  A great Stasi-like tactic for losing elections.  Keep it up until November!  The red tsunami is coming.

[Richard Smith]

Rick omitted this from his tireless campaign to lock everyone up - what is known as spying on the U.S. President (an actual treasonable offence):

Wash. Times:

"Special counsel John Durham alleged in a court filing Saturday that the Clinton campaign paid for a tech company to hack servers in former President Donald Trump’s residences and the White House to gather derogatory information on him during the 2016 campaign and while he was president.

In the filing, Mr. Durham says the government has evidence that an unnamed tech executive “exploited” an arrangement with the government to monitor Mr. Trump’s internet traffic at Trump Tower, Mr. Trump’s Central Park West apartment, the executive office of the president and an unnamed healthcare provider."

[Rick Plant]

Just like I said, this phony "convoy" was a funded right wing operation to cause chaos and to disrupt the Canadian and American government. This is the ongoing violent right wing coup to overthrow our governments. 

Hackers Just Leaked the Names of 92,000 ‘Freedom Convoy’ Donors
GiveSendGo, the Christian crowdfunding site that helped raise $8.7 million for the anti-vax “freedom convoy” in Canada, was hacked on Sunday night.

The Christian crowdfunding site that helped raise $8.7 million for the anti-vax “freedom convoy” in Canada was hacked on Sunday night, and the names and personal details of over 92,000 donors were leaked online.

The database of 92,845 donors is no longer available on the site, but VICE News was able to review a copy of the data.

While some of the donors did not provide their names—such as the person behind the current top donation of $215,000—the vast majority did provide them, including American software billionaire Thomas Siebel, who donated $90,000 to the “freedom convoy.”

While GiveSendGo does allow donors to make their donations public, many chose to use their company’s name or omit their names entirely, so the leaked database contains a lot of information that was never meant to be shared, data like donors’ full names, email addresses, and location.

Analysis of the leaked data by extremism researcher Amarnath Amarasingam shows that while the majority of donors come from the U.S. (56%) and Canada (29%), there are also thousands of donations from overseas, including the U.K., Australia, and Ireland.

Despite over 15,000 more donations flooding in from the U.S., Canadian donors out-raised Americans by almost $1 million, bringing in $4.3 million compared to $3.6 million, Amarasingam reported.

Also included in the leaked data were the messages that some donors posted alongside their donations. The messages contained over 13,000 references to “God” or “Jesus” as well as thousands of references to “tyranny.”

While most of the users’ messages were relatively benign, there are a number of more troubling posts, like this from one user: “I look forward to the day you tyrants are swinging from a noose.”

Other messages flagged by Monmouth University extremism researcher Sara Aniano—and verified by VICE News—included: “We have 2A here in America send your mounties and see what happens,” “CABAL PIGLETS ARE CORRUPT CRIMINALS WHO NEED SEVERE PUNISHMENT UNDER LAW,” and “Death to all liberal traitors.”

One donor who submitted from a Department of Justice email address appears to have donated $25 on two separate occasions. VICE News was unable to verify that the named person sent the donations, but the name provided matches a current employee of the DOJ, based on their LinkedIn profile.

After submitting a second donation, the person claiming to be a DOJ employee wrote:

“Thank you, Truckers! It is working. Others have taken your lead like Australia, New Zealand, UK. I think the reason all these blue states in the USA have stopped the mask mandates is there were rumors that truckers here in the USA were going to start a protest starting in CA to DC, and the local and federal governments did not want that. And it is an election year.”

There are also email addresses from people claiming to work for NASA, the U.S. military, the Federal Bureau of Prisons, and the Transportation Security Administration. There’s also a donation from someone whose name and email address match those of a senior employee at the Delaware Transit Corporation (DTC).

"God Bless you all, need your spirit here in the US!” the person using that email address wrote.

No one has claimed credit for the hack of the GiveSendGo website, but users who visited the site on Sunday evening were redirected instead to GiveSendGone.wtf, where they were greeted by a video from the Disney film Frozen and a message that read:

“Attention GiveSendGo grifters and hatriots. You helped fund the January 6th insurrection in the U.S. You helped fund an insurrection in Ottawa. In fact you are committed to fund anything that keeps the raging fire of misinformation going until it burns the world’s collective democracies down. On behalf of sane people worldwide who wish to continue living in a democracy, I am now telling you that GiveSendGo itself is now frozen.”

A portion of the video was uploaded by Mikael Thalen to Twitter before it was taken down.



In their message, the hacker or hackers also pointed out that the Canadian trucker protest has inspired copycat protests around the world. “Has anyone thought about how dangerous this is, especially during these times?” they wrote.

"The Canadian government has informed you that the money you assholes raised to fund an insurrection is frozen,” the hackers added.

This was a reference to the fact that on Friday, the Superior Court of Justice in Ontario granted a restraining order requested by the Government of Ontario against the crowdfunding platform, demanding that protesters’ funds be frozen.

In response, GiveSendGo dismissed the court order, tweeting: “Canada has absolutely ZERO jurisdiction over how we manage our funds here at GiveSendGo. All funds for EVERY campaign on GiveSendGo flow directly to the recipients of those campaigns.”

Countering media reports over the weekend, GiveSendGo said on Saturday that the funds were not frozen and that it was “working with many different campaign organizers to find the most effective legal ways to continue funds flowing.”

GiveSendGo took over as the main crowdfunding platform for the truckers after GoFundMe announced earlier this month that it would no longer support the protest, citing police reports of violence by the protesters.

GiveSendGo has become the go-to platform for extremists of all stripes in recent years, hosting fundraisers for groups including the Proud Boys, QAnon influencers, anti-vaxxers, and the families of Jan. 6 prisoners.

GiveSendGo’s website was offline early Monday morning with a message reading: “Application is under maintenance, we will be back very soon.”

Early last week TechCrunch revealed that security researchers had discovered 50GB of unsecured GiveSendGo data including scans of passports and driver’s licenses. The crowdfunding platform said it fixed the issue, but the Daily Dot reported Thursday that the data was still accessible.

GiveSendGo has not publicly commented on Sunday night’s breach or responded to VICE News’ request for comment.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/k7wpax/freedom-convoy-givesendgo-donors-leaked