'Lin Wood is disgusting': Trump-loving attorney spreads anti-hospital conspiracies as GOP activist battles COVID-19

A prominent South Carolina conservative activist is fighting for his life after becoming infected with COVID-19, and right-wing attorney L. Lin Wood is upsetting friends and family by spreading conspiracy theories about his illness.

Pressley Stutts, a Greenville County Republican Party leader, announced Friday that he was going on a ventilator after his oxygen levels dropped precipitously, and he asked for prayers as he battled for his life against the potentially deadly virus, reported FITSNews.

"Listen to me please: I am making a decision to go on a ventilator," Stutts posted on his Facebook account. "This is my OWN decision. I trust God to keep me. I ask you to trust Him, too. He IS ABLE, right?"

Neither Stutts nor his wife, who also became infected and was briefly hospitalized, were vaccinated against the coronavirus -- and the recently elected South Carolina Republican Party executive committeeman quoted Thomas Jefferson in mid-May to justify his decision.

"I prefer dangerous freedom over peaceful slavery," Stutts posted on his Facebook page.

Before becoming ill last month, Stutts backed an unsuccessful challenge by Wood -- who filed several doomed challenges to Donald Trump's election loss -- to replace the state GOP chair Drew McKissick and purge the party of "Republicans in name only."

"There are a lot of good people that did lose their positions, some are my friends," Stutts said in April. "Some people say, Pressley, what have you done? [Trump] said, go purge, get rid of the RINOs in the Republican Party, so we took him seriously."

On Sunday, as Stutts was hospitalized on a ventilator, Wood accused his doctors and medical staff of ignoring the wishes of his family and legal counsel in a post on the right-wing Telegram platform.

"The hospital and attending physicians have refused so far to change the treatment protocol from the CDC/ NIH protocol despite demands from Pressley's family and lawyers," Wood posted. "Pressley has developed deep vein thrombosis and is in renal failure while still on the ventilator."

That contradicts Stutts' own post on Friday announcing his worsening medical condition, and several sources close to the Greenville County Tea Party activist's family told FITSNews his "situation is dire."

"He knew the risk," one friend told the website. "He put on Facebook he agreed he needed to go (on) the ventilator. He told me if he didn't he would have a heart attack. This is truly heartbreaking."

"Lin Wood is disgusting," the friend added.