On Tuesday, Michael Beckel, the research director for the watchdog group Issue One Reform, flagged Federal Election Commission documents showing that the pro-Trump Great America PAC has agreed to pay a $25,000 fine.
This comes after the PAC's strategist, Jesse Benton, allegedly tried to funnel what he thought was $2 million from a Chinese national into the organization for political campaigning in 2016. Such a scheme is against the law, and in actuality, the Chinese representatives he solicited were journalists from The Telegraph.
"Benton promised to provide a purported Chinese national access to a future president in return for a $2 million contribution," said three FEC commissioners in the report. "Benton's conduct was dishonorable, unpatriotic, and clearly illegal."
3 of the 6 @FEC commissioners called this an "egregious violation" of #campaignfinance law & argued that "Benton’s… https://t.co/sLRj6J4UoW— Michael Beckel (@Michael Beckel) 1634069126.0
This news comes a month after Benton and another GOP strategist, Doug Wead, were criminally indicted for the scheme.
Benton, a former campaign operative for Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), was previously convicted for a scheme to bribe state officials in Iowa to back former Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) for president in the 2012 Iowa Caucus. Former President Donald Trump pardoned Benton for that offense prior to leaving office.
Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL) disputed the Rolling Stone report citing him as one of the key members of Congress who spoke on planning calls for the Jan. 6 insurrection, tweeted CNN Capitol Hill reporter Melanie Zanona.
According to two organizers and one planner involved in the event, Brooks joined a slate of other Republican officials who participated in the planning calls with activists. Their accusations join along with a since-deleted video from far-right activist Alie Alexander, who also named Brooks as someone who helped come up with the idea about the Jan. 6 riot that left five dead and many injured.
"I was the person who came up with the Jan. 6 idea with Congressman Gosar, Congressman Mo Brooks, and Congressman Andy Biggs," Alexander said in the video. "We four schemed up on putting maximum pressure on Congress while they were voting so that — who we couldn't lobby — we could change the hearts and the minds of Republicans who were in that body hearing our loud roar from outside."
But Brooks disputed all four of the claims he was involved, instead, throwing his staff under the bus.
Speaking to reporters on Monday evening, Brooks said he didn't do planning for the event, but "I don't know if my staff did.. but if they did I'd be proud of them for helping to put together a rally lawful under the First Amendment at the ellipse to protest voter fraud and election theft."
Brooks previously confessed that he knew that the Jan. 6 event could get violent, so he donned body armor under his jacket before he spoke to the crowd at the Ellipse.
See the quote from Brooks below:
Rep. Mo Brooks told me he had "no involvement” in planning the Jan 6 rally but said: “I don’t know if my staff did… https://t.co/iSU3vk5AJq— Melanie Zanona (@Melanie Zanona) 1635210178.0
Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate Glenn Youngkin is out with a new ad by a mom talking about how her child was terrified by a book he was forced to read while in school. She goes on to talk about why having a governor like Youngkin means better regulations on schools so far-right parents can decide what everyone's child should read and learn.
What is becoming known now, however, is that the mom's son was actually a senior in high school when he was "scared" by the book he read. He was 17-years-old and legally able to see rated-R movies in a theater. The child is a lawyer in the Republican Party today, and it is being reported in multiple outlets that he was so terrified by a book at 17 that it's being used in political ads years later. Even at 19, he was confessing to having "night terrors" after reading the book.
Night terrors are defined by the Mayo Clinic, "episodes of screaming, intense fear and flailing while still asleep." The analysis goes on to say, "sleep terrors differ from nightmares. The dreamer of a nightmare wakes up from the dream and may remember details, but a person who has a sleep terror episode remains asleep. Children usually don't remember anything about their sleep terrors in the morning. Adults may recall a dream fragment they had during the sleep terrors."
@GlennYoungkin Wait … is this Concerned Mother’s son now a 27-year-old lawyer for the National Republican Congressi… https://t.co/7Wkr4HVWen— Kevin M. Kruse (@Kevin M. Kruse) 1635199111.0
Youngkin is going all-in on his campaign of literary censorship, despite a Fox News campaign attacking Democrats for attempting to censor Dr. Seuss because the author's foundation stopped printing certain books of his.
Issues like "critical race theory" and censorship of African American history and literature could motivate white supremacists and those on the far-right in next week's election. However, it is unclear if it could make or break the Virginia governor's race, where voters say they're most concerned about the economy and COVID.
A Fox News poll tried to claim that a "plurality" of Virginia voters were against teaching "CRT," yet when asked what the top issues people are voting on in the 2021 election only ranked at 7 percent. Only 39 percent (plus or minus 3 percent), oppose CRT. more people say they support teaching it (27 percent) or don't know enough about it (32 percent). The same poll shows Youngkin's polling at just 44 percent and Donald Trump's at 41 percent. A conservative, anti-CRT group is already launching a $1 million expenditure attacking the education policy. Few other groups are polling the issue and non in the past month.
Democratic challenger Terry McAuliffe said that the issue is nothing more than "another right-wing conspiracy" being used to sow hatred and division.
The Republican lawyer, Blake Murphy, who was scared of the Black author Toni Morrison, is now 27-years-old and working for the National Republican Congressional Committee. He was ridiculed online for his fears caused by the book Beloved, which is based on a true story, depicts a family of former slaves after the Civil War who thinks their home is haunted by their daughter who died eight years prior.
You can see some of the mockeries below:
I am trying to imagine being in high school and telling my mother a book scared me.— Bradley P. Moss (@Bradley P. Moss) 1635208922.0
"Murphy does not mention in the ad that her son was a high school senior at the time and that the book, assigned as… https://t.co/jOJT1LxV8N— Bill Kristol (@Bill Kristol) 1635207937.0
@zdroberts @KevinMKruse @GlennYoungkin a nightmare seems like a totally understandable reaction, it’s thinking the… https://t.co/2JrSEsgk4A— whetstone (@whetstone) 1635206346.0
Nazis are going bankrupt because of civil suits against them for their involvement in the Charlottesville, Virginia riots and MSNBC host Rachel Maddow said, sarcastically, that it couldn't happen to a nicer bunch.
Monday, Maddow kicked off her show talking about known neo-Nazi Richard Spencer, who can't even pay his lawyers.
"It's very stressful and very costly," Spencer recently told USA Today, while also saying that it has taken a toll on him.
"Along with the constant stress, the lawsuit," he says, "cost thousands of dollars to defend." By June 2020, Spencer told the court that the case against him has been "financially crippling."
Spencer's legal options are he must defend himself or get a court-appointed attorney. He opted for the former.
"You say he's representing himself?" asked Maddow. "Serving as his own lawyer? You don't say. Whatever else has happened in your life today, I bequeath you this, little warm fuzziness, the Nazis are representing themselves in court, acting as their own lawyers. That always works out great. Good for them. Couldn't have happened to a nicer bunch."
She noted that another Charlottesville person is being forced to find other legal options after his lawyers quit because he started spewing anti-Semitic threats against one of the lawyers for the plaintiffs.
Other neo-Nazis involved in different cases have been able to hold onto their lawyer, Maddow said, because the lawyer "agrees with them because he himself wants to 'oppose Jewish influence in society.'"
See Maddow's opener below:
Legal troubles for spencer and others www.youtube.com
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