Trump supporters and conspiracy theory - Part 2

[Rick Plant]

Just something to think about....

[Joe Elliott]

Trump says that his being indicted for:
  + taking classified documents
  + lying to the Justice Department about whether he still had them
  + tampering with witnesses to get them to lie about this matter.
is an example of "election interference at the highest level".

No, that is not "election interference at the highest level". "Election interference at the highest level" is:
  + Calling the Georgia Secretary of State and telling him:
        ++ Just find my 11,780 votes, just enough to win.
        ++ If Brad does not do that, it would be a crime, something that he could go to prison for.
                     If Trump had successfully pressured 3 other Secretary of States to do something similar, Brad may have gone to prison. And may yet go to prison, if Trump wins in 2024 and gets
                     total control of the Justice Department.
  + Calling on a mob to storm the Capitol, preventing Mike Pence from certifying the election. And texting the mob in mid riot, reminding them that Mike Pence was the main target. Don't be distracted
      into going after secondary targets, like Pelosi. Go get Mike Pence.

What does not indicting Donald Trump looks like? It looks like allowing any former President a free license to commit any crime he wants to. Indeed, if this privilege is held by Trump, I don't see why this privilege does not belong to anyone who announces his candidacy for President. Why couldn't Trump have been free of being charged with any crime as soon as he announced his candidacy for President in 2015?

[Rick Plant]

Trump's 'witch hunt' claim destroyed by Republican legal expert: No 'business near power'

A Republican columnist rejected former President Donald Trump’s cries of “witch hunt” and victimization – and urged his prosecution.

Writing for the conservative National Review, Andrew McCarthy - a former prosecutor who authored a book called ‘Ball of Collusion: The Plot To Rig An Election And Destroy A Presidency – said GOP arguments that Trump’s enemies were aiming to bring him down make no sense.

“Now, since we’re hearing a lot, and we’re going to hear a lot more, about selective prosecution, about the sense that the “boxes hoax” is the “biggest witch hunt of all time,” understand this,” he wrote.

"The evidence of this soliloquy — wherein it was Trump-splained that a “great job” by a lawyer entails making incriminating evidence disappear and taking the fall for it so the client escapes jeopardy — does not come from Donald Trump’s enemies.”

Instead, he said, the 37-count indictment leveled at Trump comes from evidence gleaned from the former president’s own lawyers.

He went on: “These are not the people who want to take him out. This is not Joe Biden, Liz Cheney, congressional Democrats, or the “fake news” media. It’s not even RINO Republicans or that (apparently) fiercest of political combatants, “Ada” Hutchinson.

“No, the evidence comes from Trump’s lawyers. The people who were trying to minimize his criminal exposure and push back against his destructive tendencies. The people who were trying to help him.”

Included in the evidence are notes made by lawyer Evan Corcoran, detailing conversations in which Trump discussed denying he has classified documents and even suggested they be destroyed.

“As for Trump, say what you want about Democrats being out to destroy him,” McCarthy wrote. “I know all about that — wrote a book about it, in fact. But if Trump ends up being destroyed in this case, it will be based on the accounts of people who had his best interests at heart.”

He added: “Every official who is entrusted with access to the nation’s secrets, and who then betrays that trust by willful law violations and cover-ups, should be prosecuted. Every . . . single . . . one.

“And none of them has any business near power.”

Read More Here: https://www.nationalreview.com/2023/06/why-trumps-witch-hunt-cries-ring-hollow-in-face-of-doj-indictment/



'Zero courage': Ex-GOP strategist torches members who stand by Trump

An MSNBC panel on Sunday fiercely rebuked the defiantly nonchalant reactions by many Republicans to the historic federal felony charges filed against former President Donald Trump.

"I don't know. After reading those forty-nine pages, it was impossible for the special counsel to not indict Donald Trump," host Jonathan Capehart opined.

Capehart's guest, ex-Republican strategist Matthew Dowd, showed no mercy toward Trump's defenders.

"Well, you know, it, it's as if, if Mike Pence is saying, 'if Donald Trump breaks the law, nobody should ever hold him accountable.' That's actually what he's saying. And as I listen to Christina, who's absolutely right about this, about Mike Pence — but Mike Pence is just one of many — is that I'm reminded of what Maya Angelou said, which is courage is the most important of all the virtues because it's the only one that allows us to practice the other virtues consistently," Dowd said.

"There is a complete abject lack of courage of Mike Pence, Ron DeSantis, every, uh McCarthy, Speaker McCarthy," Dowd continued. "All these others have zero cur courage, zero courage, and the other one — so you put that in one bucket — the other bucket that I think is most, is also upsetting is the sort of 'Sergeant Schultz Brigade' of the Republican Party, which is, I see nothing. I know nothing. I'll say nothing.

"And they just sit by apathetically understanding Donald Trump and the corruption that exists around Donald Trump and the danger of Donald Trump, but will absolutely act like their fingers are in their ears. They close their eyes and they want nothing to do with saying or doing anything about 'em. And I put Mitch McConnell in that bucket."

AFP



Former GOP head trolls members for defending Trump: 'It feeds their base'



The former chairman of the Republican National Committee hit out at party members for backing former President Donald Trump, suggesting they were turning a blind eye to major crimes so they could benefit politically.

Michael Steele told MSNBC’s Yasmin Vossoughian Sunday that the 37-count indictment was not being taken seriously by many in the party.

And he singled out Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), the head of the House Judiciary Committee that's looking into "weaponization" of federal law enforcement, for particular criticism.

“It's all politics with Republicans,” he said.

“They're not taking it seriously at this point. No one wants to acknowledge we are in this conversation, we're watching this narrative unfold because of what Donald Trump did. Read the indictment – I guarantee you, those Republicans that you've been focusing on from Lindsey Graham down. If they've read that and they were honest, they could not go on the air and say what they said.”

He said, if they had read it, then they were deliberately ignoring what was in it.

“Or they read it and they just want to continue with the political anti-Biden or anti-deep state narrative, because it feeds their base," he said. "They're fundraising off of this. They're rallying support around Trump, around this.

“I'd like to ask Jim Jordan, what did you think of Bill Barr's comment that Donald Trump was toast? Because the evidence in the indictment was so damning. Bill Barr, you remember him? You know what role he played, going into the Mueller trial?

“...if that guy is looking at this and going this is not good. How can you stand up and make the claim that you are making that this is all political?

“This is the bottom line. It's not all political.”

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

'He's toast': Bill Barr 'shocked' by Trump's 'damning' Espionage Act charges



Former Attorney General Bill Barr said former President Donald Trump could be "toast" after being charged under the Espionage Act.

During an interview on Fox News, Barr was asked about Trump's recent federal indictment.

"What about this chief argument that comes up for the president's allies and his legal team that this should have been handled under the Presidential Records Act, not this Espionage Act charge and other federal statutes that were used here?" host Shannon Bream wondered.

"It started out under the Presidential Records Act and the archives trying to retrieve documents that Trump had no right to have," Barr replied. "But it quickly became clear that what the government was really worried about were these classified and very sensitive documents."

Barr said he was "shocked by the degree of sensitivity of these documents and how many there were."

"And so the government's agenda was to get those, protect those documents, and get them out," he continued. "And I think it was perfectly appropriate to do that. It was the right thing to do."

"And I think the counts under the Espionage Act that he willfully retained those documents are solid counts," Barr added. "But I do think that even half of what Andy McCarthy said, which is if even half of it is true, then he's toast. I mean, it's a pretty, it's a very detailed indictment, and it's very, very damning."

Watch:

Trump could sit in a jail cell for '4 to 5 hours' before arraignment: former Southern District of Florida prosecutor



Appearing on MSNBC on Sunday morning, a former prosecutor for the Southern District of Florida explained what Donald Trump will experience when he turns himself into the authorities in Miami next week to face a 37-count indictment.

Speaking with host Katie Phang, former U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Sloman walked host Katie Phnag through the stages of the former president's arraignment and said, if normal procedures are followed, he could be held in a jail cell for hours before entering the courtroom.

Asked if Trump will be handcuffed, Sloman said he wasn't sure before adding, "I know that for regular people, when you voluntarily surrender, at about eight or nine in the morning, an agent who is in charge of the case takes the defendant into custody. The pretrial services department does a full and complete history of the defendant for the three PM arraignment."

"During that period the defendant sits in a jail cell for the four or five hours, awaiting the appearance," he added. "I don't know whether the same is going to be true for Mr.Trump but for regular people that is the way it works."

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

How secret were the documents found at Mar-a-Lago?



(Reuters) - The 37-count indictment against Donald Trump unsealed on Friday accused the former president of risking some of the most closely guarded U.S. government secrets by storing classified documents in unsecured areas of his Florida resort.

The documents, according to the indictment, included details about U.S. nuclear weapons, spy satellites and the U.S. military. They were produced by the Pentagon and arms of the U.S. intelligence community, including the CIA, the National Security Agency, the National Reconnaissance Office and other agencies.

"The unauthorized disclosure of these classified documents could put at risk the national security of the United States, foreign relations, the safety of the United States military, and human sources and the continued viability of sensitive collection methods," the indictment said.

Here are some of the documents mentioned in the indictment:

\- A document marked TOP SECRET//[redacted]/[redacted]//ORCON/NOFORN that the indictment says concerned "nuclear capabilities of a foreign country."

ORCON means that the material in the document cannot be disseminated outside the U.S. government department that originated it without prior approval.

\- A document marked SECRET//FORMERLY RESTRICTED DATA that the indictment says concerned "nuclear weaponry of the United States."

According to a Department of Energy training guide, the Formerly Restricted Data, or FRD, classification is used for materials downgraded from a higher classification that relate "primarily to the military utilization of atomic weapons."

"Formerly does not mean unclassified," says the guide.

Examples of FRD provided by the guide includes quantities of nuclear weapons in the U.S. stockpile, warhead yields and their locations.

\- A document marked TOP SECRET//SI//NOFORN//FISA that the indictment says concerned "military capabilities of a foreign country and the United States, with handwritten annotation in black marker."

NOFORN means the document cannot be shared with a foreign government. FISA refers to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and means the material is from intercepted communications.

\- Six top-secret documents marked TK, standing for Talent Keyhole, a classification for materials related to U.S. spy satellites.

The indictment says these documents concerned the military capabilities of foreign countries.

(Reporting by Jonathan Landay; Editing by Daniel Wallis)

© Reuters



Trump is walking into his 37-count federal indictment 'blinded to the danger he is in': analyst



According to one political analyst, Donald Trump's rich history of involvement in civil lawsuits has given him a false sense of security as he faces real jail time should he gets a guilty verdict in any one of the 37 federal charges in his indictment.

In a column for Politico, Jack Shafer wrote that the former president has long boasted he knows the ins and outs of the court system after decades of civil lawsuits filed against himself and his Trump Organization.

Because of that, Shafer suggested the former president is in for a rude awakening when he is arraigned in Florida next Tuesday.

Writing that "Trump has been a party to so many legal actions — both suing and being sued," that he feels he has a handle on how to direct his attorneys to proceed, Shafer added that the former president's previous experience has "blinded him to the danger he is in."

Shafer added that civil suits are "the padded playroom in which Trump has cavorted his entire professional life," and he explained that jail time was never on the table with them. But now it is.

"Criminal cases don’t pit one person or organization against another. They are reserved for crimes against the state or society, and the plaintiff isn’t Joe or Doris or some regulatory body, it’s the big, angry fist of government. When you lose in this venue, you don’t write a check. You’re often sentenced to prison," he explained before adding, "Prosecutors seek justice, not compromise, and they’re relatively immune to the field disturbances that rattle civil litigators. Did Trump’s attorneys not tell him that?"

The analyst added that the newest indictment related to top secret government documents he refused to return could have been the easiest case to avoid by just complying.

"Inside his own bleached skull, Trump must now be imagining that he can run out the criminal clock too, just as he did in so many civil cases," he wrote.

He concluded, "A normal person would not assume they could win all four or five (or however many) criminal cases. A normal person would never put all his eggs in the single basket that says, 'Win the White House, Get Out of Jail Free.' A normal person would never count on DeSantis to deliver. And a normal person would never find himself in this pickle. But Donald Trump is not a normal person."

Read More Here: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2023/06/09/trump-criminal-indictment-00101351



Bill Barr rebuts Trump's claim about indictment: He is not a victim

Former Trump administration Attorney General Bill Barr says that the Department of Justice charges filed against former President Donald Trump resulting from the classified documents probe are not part of a "witch hunt" as Trump and his allies claim.

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

Prosecutors charged Trump with 37 felonies, including 31 counts under the Espionage Act of “willful retention” of classified records.

A federal indictment unsealed Friday charges former President Donald Trump with 37 felony counts stemming from an investigation into the presence of a trove of classified information at his Florida estate and other locations after he left office.

Prosecutors led by special counsel Jack Smith allege that Trump arranged to remove a massive collection of highly sensitive classified material — much of which consists of intelligence about the “defense and weapons capabilities” of the United States and foreign countries — to his private residence as he left the White House in January 2021.

He had aides stash those records in boxes that also included personal items and ordered them shipped to his estate in Mar-a-Lago at the end of his tenure, according to the indictment. The 49-page charging document also says that on at least two occasions, Trump showed classified records to visitors without security clearances at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey — including the map of a military operation to a representative of his political committee.

Trump is facing 31 counts of violating the Espionage Act through “willful retention” of classified records, plus six counts — including obstruction of justice and false statements — stemming from his alleged efforts to impede the investigation. Nauta was also charged with six felonies related to the alleged cover-up.

“We have one set of laws in this country,” said Smith, briefly addressing the media after the unsealing of the indictment. “They apply to everyone.”


Donald Trump is facing 31 counts of “willful retention” of classified records, as well as several counts related to his alleged effort to obstruct the investigation. | Justice Department via AP



This image, contained in the indictment against former President Donald Trump, shows boxes of records being stored on the stage in the White and Gold Ballroom at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Fla. | Justice Department via AP




https://www.politico.com/news/2023/06/09/trump-indictment-read-00101292



Where Documents Were Found at Mar-a-Lago - The New York Times





Photos show classified documents in ballrooms, bathrooms at Mar-a-Lago

The Department of Justice released new photos of the documents found at former President Trump's Mar-a-Lago home. The photos show the alleged stored boxes in Trump's ballroom, bedroom, bathroom and shower. NBC's Julia Ainsley reports.

Watch:

[Rick Plant]

Calling for violence and committing violence, like on January 6th, is what MAGA Republicans are all about.

Andy Biggs and Clay Higgins both MAGA Republican Congressmen were trying to incite civil war on Twitter by calling for war and violence.







‘We Need to Start Killing’: Trump’s Far-Right Supporters Are Threatening Civil War

Within minutes of Trump’s indictment, supporters lit up social media platforms with violent threats and calls for civil war.



In what is becoming a now all-too-familiar trend, former President Donald Trump’s far-right supporters have threatened civil war after news broke Thursday that the former president was indicted for allegedly taking classified documents from the White House without permission.

“We need to start killing these traitorous f********,” wrote one Trump supporter on The Donald, a rabidly pro-Trump message board that played a key role in planning the January 6 attack on the Capitol. Another user added: “It's not gonna stop until bodies start stacking up. We are not civilly represented anymore and they'll come for us next. Some of us, they already have.”

Trump has been indicted on seven counts following an investigation by special counsel Jack Smith into classified documents taken by Trump from the White House in 2021. The indictments have not been released, but Trump’s attorney Jim Trusty told CNN that his client  is facing a charge under the Espionage Act, as well as “charges of obstruction of justice, destruction or falsification of records, conspiracy and false statements.”

Trump announced the news himself on Truth Social, writing that he had been indicted in the “Boxes Hoax” case, as he put it, and said he would be arraigned on Tuesday at Florida Southern District Courthouse in Miami. Within minutes, his supporters lit up social media platforms with violent threats and calls for civil war, according to research from VICE News and Advance Democracy, a nonpartisan think tank that tracks online extremism.

Trump supporters are making specific threats too. In one post on The Donald titled, “A little bit about Merrick Garland, his wife, his daughters,” a user shared a link to an article about the attorney general’s children.

Under the post, another user replied: “His children are fair game as far as I’m concerned.”

In a post about the special counsel conducting the probe, one user on The Donald wrote: “Jack Smith should be arrested the minute he steps foot in the red state of Florida.”

In addition to threats of violence against lawmakers and politicians, many were also calling for a civil war.

“Perhaps it’s time for that Civil War that the **** DemoKKKrats have been trying to start for years now,” a member of The Donald wrote. Another, referencing former President Barack Obama and former secretary of State Hillary Clinton, said: “FACT: OUR FOREFATHERS WOULD HAVE HUNG THESE TWO FOR TREASON…”

Others on similar social media platforms made general calls for an armed uprising. “The entire Republican Party should flood the courthouse and demand real justice here,” one supporter wrote on Truth Social. It wasn’t just anonymous users saying this, however: Right-wing talk show host Charlie Kirk called on all Trump supporters to descend on Miami on Tuesday to protest the indictment.

“This is the JFK assassinaton all over again,” right-wing personality and Pizzagate promoter Michael Cernovich wrote, claiming that the “deep state” had killed JFK and were now using the Justice Department to take down Trump.

Other right-wing lawmakers and commentators also pushed the idea that this was a politically-motivated prosecution ordered by Joe Biden. Republican Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy echoed Trump’s own words, calling Thursday “a dark day for the United States of America.” In a statement, he also claimed that Biden was directly behind the indictment of Trump in a bid to remove the leading GOP candidate for the 2024 election.

On right-wing media, hosts echoed the messages posted on social media, boosting the same baseless claims while using war-related language and providing no evidence to back up their allegations.

Fox News host Sean Hannity, for example, told his viewers that the U.S. justice system has “been weaponized beyond belief” and that the country is “in serious trouble,” while former Trump aide Stephen Miller appeared on Fox News and said he hoped the “whole of the Republican party, the whole of the conservative movement, the whole of the country that cares about the rule of law coalesces around President Trump.”

Later, one of Trump’s own lawyers Alina Habba appeared on Fox News and said she was “embarrassed to be a lawyer at this moment. Honestly, I'm ashamed to be a lawyer.”

And just like Trump’s last indictment in April, many of his supporters said they believed that these indictments would actually be a benefit to Trump’s campaign.

“It's the biggest campaign contribution ever, thanks Dims,” one user wrote on The Donald. “This will actually help Trump get re-elected by a wide margin. Then he will go on a rampage. These communists don't know when to quit,” another wrote.

Alternatively, some even believed that the latest indictments were the result of Trump’s failure to get January 6 prisoners released from jail while they awaited their trial, something the former president has no power over.

"Karma is a ***** isn't it, you rich **** *******,” a 4chan user wrote. “Leaving innocent people to be abused in the DC jail then catch hard time for supporting you on Jan 6th 2021, has consequences.”

https://www.vice.com/en/article/wxjjgb/trump-supporters-are-threatening-civil-war



'Scary as hell': Militia expert says Trump tweet from GOP's Clay Higgins is call for 'civil war'



Rep. Clay Higgins (R-LA) mystified many social media users with his response to Donald Trump's indictment, but one militia expert interpreted his tweet as a call to arms.

The Louisiana Republican tweeted out a seemingly inscrutable message Thursday after the former president confirmed he had been indicted in the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case, but award-winning journalist and author Jeff Sharlet saw the message as a violent threat.

"President Trump said he has 'been summoned to appear at the Federal Courthouse in Miami on Tuesday, at 3 PM,'" Higgins tweeted. "This is a perimeter probe from the oppressors. Hold. rPOTUS has this. Buckle up. 1/50K know your bridges. Rock steady calm. That is all."

Sharlet, whose latest book, The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War, features in-depth reporting on right-wing extremists, warned that the GOP lawmaker appeared to be calling for an insurgency.

"Deep scary: 1/50 k refers to military scale maps & publicly available US Geological Survey maps of areas mostly surrounding military installations," Sharlet said. "This isn’t a metaphor. This isn’t slow civil war. This is a congressman calling for the real thing."

"I think this is scary as hell," he added.

Higgins, a former police officer who claims to hold an "active commission" in law enforcement, was caught on video last month manhandling an activist who asked him about his ties to right-wing extremists, and he resigned from one police department in 2007 before he could face discipline for using unnecessary force by slapping a Black man while on duty.

He later gained notoriety by posting viral videos online showing himself wearing a police uniform and threatening purported criminals with violence and calling them "animals" and "heathens."

Higgins has previously spoken at events held by mostly white militias, including the Oath Keepers, and sold T-shirts at political events featuring the logo of the anti-government III Percent militia, while threatening to shoot members of a Black militia that took part in Black Lives Matter marches in 2020.

"If you’re laughing at Rep Clay Higgins using militia speak, referencing military grade maps, & telling Trumpers to 'know your bridges,' recall that Canadian far rightists held border bridges recently in a tense stand off," Sharlet warned. "This is on the table."

Sharlet went through and defined the phrases the congressman deployed and determined he was calling for a "county-level insurrection" in response to Trump's federal indictment, which Higgins characterized as an act of war.

"Take this seriously," Sharlet said. “'Perimeter probe': Higgins thinks indictment precedes bigger attack. 'rPOTUS': real POTUS,' Trump. 'Hold': 'stand back & stand by.' 'Buckle up': prepare for war. '1/50 k': military scale maps. 'Know your bridges': militia speak for prepare to seize bridges."

https://www.rawstory.com/rep-clay-higgins/

[Rick Plant]

Former Watergate journalist Bob Woodward says he’s not surprised by Trump indictment

CNN's Jake Tapper is joined by legendary Watergate journalist Bob Woodward and former Watergate Special Prosecutor Richard Ben-Veniste to talk about former President Donald Trump's federal indictment.

Watch:

Criminal Donald has been lying about the top secret documents he stashed at his residence being "declassified" and his cheerleaders are parroting that same lie. Back in October of 2022, this report from CBS News shows Criminal Donald admitting the top secret documents that were seized at his residence were still classified documents. 


Trump contradicts claim on Mar-a-Lago documents

Oct 19, 2022

Donald Trump has acknowledged that some of the top secret documents seized from his Mar-a-Lago estate were classified. In recordings from Bob Woodward's new audio book, "The Trump Tapes," Trump says letters he exchanged with North Korean Leader Kim Jong Un are "top secret." CBS News congressional correspondent Scott MacFarlane discusses the latest.