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'WalkAway' founder Brandon Straka arrested for Capitol riots after his his own family called the FBI on him
January 25, 2021
Yet another far right extremist has been arrested for his role in the January 6th insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
Brandon Straka was charged with three counts by federal prosecutors: impeding law enforcement during a civil disorder, entering restricted grounds, and disorderly conduct with intent to disturb a hearing before Congress. He has been arrested.
<p>Straka founded the "WalkAway Campaign" that sought to encourage Democrats to leave the Democratic Party and spoke at a "Stop the Steal" rally in D.C. the day before the riots.</p><p>The day after the riots, <a href="https://www.rawstory.com/pro-trump-capitol-riot-2649780687/" target="_blank">Straka criticized those on the right were were attempting to blame the riots on antifa</a>.</p><p>The FBI said that "Witness-1" was a relative of Straka to pointed investigators to a video Straka had posted to Twitter. After the video was deleted from Twitter, the relative let the agent know there was a copy of the video posted to YouTube.</p><p>In the video, Straka was seen wearing the same clothes that he had worn the previous day while speaking at the rally.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="c11e8daf8825a59b15a90364cb61e8c4" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" id="5e5c3" type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNTUzMzM3Ni9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY3MzEyNzI2MX0.H1Y91IlCHmxuco4Rr30uMd6IqdQiySRJJf6MVo61y6M/img.png?width=980"/>
<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">Photos included in criminal complaint against Brandon Straka.</small><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="Add Photo Credit...">Screengrab.</small></p>
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Trump biographer predicts Republicans will try to turn ex-president into a martyr — but it’ll fail
January 25, 2021
One of President Donald Trump's biographers, Michael D'Antonio, predicted that his supporters will attempt to turn the president into a martyr during his impeachment, but that it will fail.
As Trump heads into his second impeachment trial, his supporters are already issuing threats of violence to lawmakers. The MAGA insurrectionists are well acquainted with the idea of martyrs in their faith, wrote D'Antonio at CNN.com.
<p>"Among the rioters who <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2021/01/12/evangelicals-donald-trump-capitol-riot-voter-fraud/6644005002/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">broke</a> into the Capitol were many who prayed and others who carried religious symbols -- after they drove legislators from their chamber and occupied it," he explained. "We should expect some of these supporters, not only to recommit to Trump, but also to visit retribution upon Republicans who fail to defend him in his upcoming trial."</p><p>In December, the Arizona Republican Party asked its members if they were <a href="https://www.chicagotribune.com/nation-world/ct-nw-arizona-republican-party-rift-twitter-20201211-fxq7ys4shnapbgmbv27ucvtjqy-story.html" target="_blank">prepared to "die" for Donald Trump.</a> "Live a life of service to a cause greater than yourself," the AZ GOP urged followers. They've since moved to censure so-called "never Trump" Republicans like former Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) and Cindy McCain, wife to late Sen. John McCain (R-AZ).</p><p>D'Antonio noted that even Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) alluded to the dangers of going after Trump, saying that the impeachment would be "like pouring gasoline on fire. And, by the way, I think a lot of the people who are out there for the first time, after seeing what happened last week, sort of reckoning with the last four years, now all of a sudden they're circling the wagons and it threatens to make him a martyr."</p><p>Rubio is possibly facing a primary challenge from Ivanka Trump in 2022. D'Antonio noted that when people like Rubio try to use the martyr argument, they're ignoring two main points. First, that Trump isn't already a martyr to his supporters, and second that as a martyr he's a "threat, not to the nation, but to the Republican Party and those GOP senators who vote to convict him."</p><p>Trump is already teasing about starting a third party where Trump supporters can be free from traditional policy principles of the GOP. A <a href="https://poll.qu.edu/national/release-detail?ReleaseID=3686" target="_blank">recent poll</a> shows that 73 percent of Republicans believe that there was massive voter fraud, something critics are openly referring to as "the big lie." Any Republican will be forced to face off against a Trump-loving primary opponent who intends to hold them accountable for refusing to support the president. </p><p>D'Antonio argued that "Republicans are well beyond the point where they should be worried about a schism on the political right. Trump and his followers are already talking about <a href="https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/trump-impeachment-biden-inauguration/card/90pPMzFPqr5fMzg1Bkbs" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">creating</a> their own MAGA party should the GOP fail them. This schism is <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/20/politics/donald-trump-destroy-gop-patriot-party/index.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">happening</a> and the Republican Party as they knew it is already lost."</p><p><a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/25/opinions/trump-impeachment-martyr-dantonio/index.html" target="_blank">Read his analysis at CNN.com.</a></p>
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Fox News reporter mocked after WH press secretary ‘crumpled him up’ with ‘intelligent answer’ and ‘without any lies’
January 25, 2021
Fox News White House Correspondent Peter Doocy appears to have had a rough day in the White House press briefing room, after asking Press Secretary Jen Psaki hyper-partisan questions seemingly designed to help the right wing network's falling ratings while not providing the American public with anything of merit.
"President Trump was imposing travel restrictions in March specifically on China," Doocy said, beginning his question. "Then-candidate Biden called it 'xenophobic' and 'fear-mongering.' So, now-President Biden is putting travel restrictions on people coming in from other countries. What words would you use to describe this?" he asked.
<p>"Well, I don't think that's quite a fair articulation," Psaki replied. "The President has been clear that he felt the Muslim ban was xenophobic; he overturned the Muslim ban. He also though has supported, and he himself – even before we did, I should say even before he was inaugurated – steps, travel restrictions in order to keep the American people safe, to ensure that we are getting the pandemic under control, that's been part of his policy, but he was critical of the former president for having a policy that was not more comprehensive than travel restrictions, and he conveyed at the time and, more recently, the importance of having a multifaceted approach, mask wearing, vaccine distribution, funding in order to get 100 million shots in the arms of Americans in the first 100 days, not just travel restrictions."</p><div class="twitter-tweet twitter-tweet-rendered" style="display: flex; max-width: 550px; width: 100%; margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><iframe allowfullscreen="true" allowtransparency="true" class="" data-tweet-id="1353778727662968837" frameborder="0" id="twitter-widget-0" scrolling="no" src="https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-0&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1353778727662968837&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.rawstory.com%2Fr%2Fentryeditor%2F2650132482%23&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px" style="position: static; visibility: visible; width: 550px; height: 468px; display: block; flex-grow: 1;" title="Twitter Tweet"></iframe></div><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script><p>For the record, candidate Biden <a href="https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2020/oct/23/donald-trump/trump-repeats-flawed-claim-biden-opposed-trumps-co/" rel="noopener" target="_blank">did accuse President Trump of "xenophobia," but not in response to Trump's ban on China</a> (which was not an actual ban since at least 40,000 people were still able to enter the U.S. from China.)</p><p>Historian Michael Beschloss made this general observation:</p><div class="twitter-tweet twitter-tweet-rendered" style="display: flex; max-width: 550px; width: 100%; margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><iframe allowfullscreen="true" allowtransparency="true" class="" data-tweet-id="1353771189093732354" frameborder="0" id="twitter-widget-1" scrolling="no" src="https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-1&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1353771189093732354&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.rawstory.com%2Fr%2Fentryeditor%2F2650132482%23&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px" style="position: static; visibility: visible; width: 550px; height: 188px; display: block; flex-grow: 1;" title="Twitter Tweet"></iframe></div><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script><p>Meanwhile, Doocy was quickly mocked on social media.</p><div class="twitter-tweet twitter-tweet-rendered" style="display: flex; max-width: 550px; width: 100%; margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px;"><iframe allowfullscreen="true" allowtransparency="true" class="" data-tweet-id="1353780900283072513" frameborder="0" id="twitter-widget-2" scrolling="no" src="https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-2&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=true&id=1353780900283072513&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.rawstory.com%2Fr%2Fentryeditor%2F2650132482%23&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px" style="position: static; visibility: visible; width: 550px; height: 257px; display: block; flex-grow: 1;" title="Twitter Tweet"></iframe></div><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script><div class="twitter-tweet twitter-tweet-rendered" style="display: flex; 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