Trump supporters and conspiracy theory - Part 2

[Rick Plant]

Four dozen empty folders marked ‘CLASSIFIED’ found in Trump Mar-a-Lago raid, DOJ reveals
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/09/02/trump-fbi-raid-documents-about-mar-a-lago-search-unsealed.html

[Rick Plant]

'Cornered' Trump is turning 'to violence' as his biggest supporters desert him: Mary Trump



Appearing on MSNBC's "The Katie Phang Show" early Saturday morning, Donald Trump's niece, Mary Trump, said her uncle is digging deeper into inciting violence as his allies flee him as his legal problems pile up and overwhelm him.

Speaking with the host, Mary Trump was asked about the former president lashing out at former attorney general Bill Barr on Friday after Barr told Fox News hosts that the DOJ had every right to search Mar-a-Lago.

On Truth Social, Trump wrote, "Bill Barr had 'no guts,' and got 'no glory.' He was a weak and pathetic RINO, who was so afraid of being Impeached that he became a captive to the Radical Left Democrats - 'Please, please, please don’t impeach me,' he supposedly said. Barr never fought the way he should have for Election Integrity, and so much else. He started off OK as A.G., but faded fast - Didn’t have courage or stamina. People like that will never Make America Great Again!"

According to Phang's guest, her uncle seeing his former allies flee him has pushed him over the edge.

Host Phang noted the former president has been embracing QAnon-style rhetoric and asked her guest, "Is that some type of indication of how he is panicking, he's actually realizing that he's going to get in a lot more trouble and maybe his goose is finally cooked?"

"Yes, I think that's part of it," Trump, a psychologist replied. "The other part of it is too that he has never been a place like this before, as many people have pointed out."

"It isn't just that people like Bill Barr are turning against him, although quite honestly agreeing with Bill Barr is something that makes me want to reevaluate my life choices because whoever knew we would be agreeing with Bill Barr," she continued. "On the one hand, Bill Barr was his staunchest defender at one point; acting like his private attorney. But, on the other hand, because of the egregiousness of Donald's behavior, even people like Bill Barr can't stand with him anymore."

"The window of opportunity for Donald to squirm out of this is closing because of the seriousness of the potential charges that are coming his way," she explained. "And what have we seen in the past? He goes to violence. When he said that President Biden was calling for political violence, he was, as usual, projecting. That was what Donald's going to be calling for as he gets more and more cornered."

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Lindsey Graham won't be able to plead the 5th before the Georgia grand jury -- here's why



According to trial lawyer and legal analyst Page Pate, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) can expect a grilling before a Fulton County grand jury where he will be unable to plead the 5th Amendment against self-incrimination if asked to answer uncomfortable questions.

Reacting to a report two days ago that U.S. District Judge Leigh Martin May rejected Graham’s argument that his calls to Georgia secretary of state Brad Raffensperger about the 2020 presidential election results were protected under the U.S. Constitution’s “speech or debate” clause, means he now has to appear, Pate said the South Carolina Republican, at this point, must comply.

Speaking with CNN host Sara Sidner, Pate was asked what is next for one of Donald Trump's most ardent supporters.

"I think the grand jury wants to know what Senator Graham said to the secretary of state and they want to hear, and they already have heard from our secretary of state that he felt not just Trump's call was an attempt to persuade him to do something potentially illegal but the secretary of state thought the calls from Senator Graham also were encouraging him, or at least attempting to encourage him, to do something illegal."

"That is a pattern of conduct and I think this grand jury investigation into election interference, you want to listen to all of these witnesses," he added. "Were they coordinating their activities and was there intent and, if so, what was that intent."

"One last question," Sidner pressed. "How much trouble could Senator Graham be in if it is determined that he tried to pressure the secretary of state in Georgia to overturn the 2020 election?"

"That is a great question," the attorney replied. "I don't think Senator Graham is facing any potential criminal charge. I believe that the district attorney has already notified him that he is merely a witness in this. I don't think there is enough evidence to show that Senator Graham was aware of what some of the other people were doing as far as accessing voting machines, presenting false testimony to state legislative committees, so that means he'll have to appear and answer questions."

"Now, that the judge is requiring him to do so, he can't claim a Fifth Amendment privilege because he's not under the threat of prosecution in Georgia," he clarified. "As long as he appears and follows the judge's order, he should not face any legal exposure."

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

Chaotic condition of stolen files at Mar-a-Lago will come back to haunt Trump at trial: former prosecutor

According to one former federal prosecutor, Donald Trump's habit of intermixing stolen top secret files with magazine covers and personal items at his Mar-a-Lago resort will be presented as damning evidence at his trial should the DOJ indict him.

Speaking with CNN's Boris Sanchez, ex-federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti stated that the condition in which the files were found will help prosecutors make their case against the former president.

"So you mentioned the folders with the classified markings being among the things that were recovered," host Sanchez prompted. "What did you make of the fact that there were all sorts of random stuff in there, too, The magazines? The gifts? That was unexpected."

"I think that's right," the attorney replied. "I think it goes to show, as I was mentioning a moment ago, Boris, it goes to show the way in which these documents were kept. It goes to show who was the possessor and owner of these documents."

"The fact that they're mixed in, let's say with passports and mixed in with Time magazine covers, all will be shown in evidence at trial to show that the former president is the one who actually possessed these documents," he asserted. "It wasn't an aide off acting on their own without his authorization. It wasn't something where he had no idea what was in his office."

"He was personally handling these documents himself and he was the one who decided to keep them," he concluded.

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

Former White House aides speculate 'leverage' was part of the motivation for Trump's stolen documents

The stolen government documents discovered at Donald Trump's golf course Mar-a-Lago continue to prompt questions about the former president's motivations for stealing the information.

Speaking to CNN on Sunday, former communications director and chief of staff to the first lady, Stephanie Grisham said that she's not surprised that all of the folders were mixed in with mementos and gifts.

"That is exactly what his filing system was," she explained. "It was just boxes of things randomly placed together. When I saw the picture, though, and I saw the sheer volume of classified materials and now we're hearing some could be missing, I just don't know how that amount could be put in those boxes and not be seen and not be noticed."

It was one of the pieces of information that former White House counsel Pat Cipollone and Patrick Philbin spoke to the FBI about the stolen documents, the New York Times reported last month. They were both nominated by Trump to serve as the representatives to deal with the National Archives for the transition ahead of Jan. 20, 2021. Mark Meadows was another.

The National Archives knew that there were documents "lingering" in the White House residence as Trump was packed to move out. Given those men were tasked with returning the documents, it's likely one of the main reasons that Cipollone and Philbin have been so forthcoming with the Justice Department about their handling in the final weeks. Trump ally Kash Patel also told right-wing streaming channels that the act of taking the documents to the residence from the Oval Office "declassified" them. Trump also claimed that he had a "standing order" to declassify anything he wanted. Both claims are false.

Patel also said at one point that he aimed to post the documents on his personal website.

"My thought is, as Alyssa [Farrah Griffin] said earlier, is I think it's some kind of leverage," Grisham told CNN on Sunday. "I do believe that some of it he thinks was cool. And I do think he thinks he owns it, which he did not. And the fact he did not give things back when asked over and over over the course of a year, I think there's something behind it. But as Alyssa also said, it's the million-dollar question to know exactly what it was."

Farrah Griffin said that the Justice Department has an obligation to the American people to explain some of the details about what was in the documents, whether they were nuclear related or military equipment as well as letters from leaders or intelligence on world leaders. It was revealed last week that Trump had intelligence on the love life of French President Emmanuel Macron.

Former Homeland Security aide to Mike Pence, Olivia Troye explained that had she done what Trump did she would be in jail.

"I would be answering questions afterwards, to be honest," she said about the seriousness the national security takes classified information. "Honestly, even when finding classified information outside of where it should be stored, there was a responsibility to actually report that, to turn it in and self-report. That is how seriously we take this. So, if anything like this were to be the case, anyone would be walked out. I saw people get walked out of the Pentagon for much less, you know, greater efforts like this. I mean, it is — it is mind-blowing to think about the fact that these documents were down there."

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

MAGA Republican fascists are indeed a danger to democracy.

MAGA Republican groups go from attacking teachers and librarians to target children's hospitals: expert warns



MAGA Republicans have spent the last two years going after teachers and librarians for teaching about slavery or highlighting Black leaders like Marin Luther King, Jr. and Harriet Tubman.

Speaking to MSNBC's Mehdi Hasan, reporter Brandy Zadrozny explained that the recent bomb threats called into Boston Children's Hospital are just more of the same from the right-wing that has been going after anyone helping to treat transgender children. The Washington Post reported that a right-wing digital group is behind attacks on a Washington, D.C. children's hospital. To make matters worse, social media sites are allowing it to continue.

"Children’s hospitals across the U.S. are facing growing threats of violence, driven by an online anti-LGBTQ campaign attacking the facilities for providing care to transgender kids and teens," the Post reported.

Zadrozny said that this is the next step for MAGA Republicans, who she believes are setting their sights on attacking doctors and hospitals.

"Like you said, this is an ongoing way of anti-LGBTQ sentiment, the far-right and from the loudest conservatives on Twitter," she explained. "And that sentiment has hit libraries. We've seen librarians targeted. Schools, we've seen kindergarten teachers, and elementary school teachers targeted. And now, we're heading to children's hospitals. Literally, these folks have doctors, librarians, school teachers in their target."

She explained that Twitter suspended "Libs of TikTok" for their policy against threats of violence and harassment, but after a week the group is back targeting specific teachers with harassment. Meanwhile, TikTok is allowing threats of violence to grow on it's platform despite claiming they don't allow "hateful behavior" on the platform.

Zadrozny explained that the right-wing account thinks that teachers are somehow indoctrinating children to be gay, after Gov. Ron DeSantis's (R-FL) so-called "don't say gay" legislation.

"You know, here's the problem, it's that none of these tech companies have a north star when it comes to moderation, right? This is violence. This is harassment. It's clear what these accounts are doing," she explained. "But with their policies, they literally have to wait until somebody gets hurt or killed to say, 'oh, this is the promotion of violence.' Just like we saw with Jan. 6th. Nothing got Donald Trump kicked off the platform until something dangerous, until violence actually happened. And by then, it's too late. At this point, the way that we've built social media, it's already been weaponized. And so, even kicking 'Libs of TikTok' off now would hardly really do anything. They could still target on another social media platform or another person who just would come up and take 'Libs of TikTok's place.' It happens all the time. I don't actually see a way out of it."

On Thursday, President Joe Biden sounded the alarm about the right being filled with violence and urged Americans to stand up against movements like these that incite violence.

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

Democracy under threat from MAGA Republicans.

According to new CBS polling 72% of Americans say our Democracy is threatened.

[Rick Plant]

Why did Trump choose to showcase a Nazi sympathizer as Jan. 6 prisoner at Pennsylvania rally: CNN reporter asks



Among the people who spoke at Donald Trump's rally on Saturday was a woman named Cynthia, who spoke out on the plight of her nephew who attended the Jan. 6 attack on Congress. It turns out, however, her nephew is a Nazi sympathizer. The larger question, however, is how he became Trump's poster-boy at the rally.

Speaking about Cynthia Hughes, CNN's Zachary Cohen told Jim Acosta that she was leaving out a lot of details in her speech to Pennsylvania. At the same time, there were plenty of Jan. 6 attackers who could have been highlighted at the event that were everyday people who were caught up in the crowd and who got light sentences. That isn't who this was.

"He went to the nation's capitol to hear his president speak," Hughs told the crowd. "He dressed in a suit and tie and his favorite hat. Tim wanted to take part in what he thought was going to be a historical event. Instead, he witnessed a horror show."

Tim Cusanelli is the nephew she was talking about. He once explained that "Hitler should've finished the job." CNN reported over the weekend that Cusanelli faced an internal Navy probe, which found 34 of his colleagues believed he held "extremist or radical views pertaining to the Jewish people, minorities and women." His phone had racist memes using the N-word on his phone. He also told an FBI informant that he was hoping for a "civil war."

"Cynthia Hughes used her time at this high profile Trump rally to talk about her nephew who, as she says, has been in jail for nearly two years now but holds him up as sort of a poster child for Jan. 6th related injustice. But in reality, the Justice Department has argued that he is a Nazi sympathizer and somebody who the judge, in this case, a Trump appointee was so concerned that his violent neo-Nazi rhetoric would turn from words into violence, that's why the judge decided to keep him in jail while his court process played out," explained Cohen.

He went on to explain that Cusanelli's defense "was that he didn't know Congress met at the Capitol. Clearly, the jury did not buy that. But I think the bigger picture here you got to look at the fact that there is a ton of Jan. 6th defendants that the former president could have chosen from in terms of featuring them to defend or at least try to draw sympathy for people who were at the Capitol on Jan. 6th and this was the case that ultimately took center stage during this rally."

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