Bevin gov kty

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</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">russia aluminum? RUSS-Al?</font></p><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 153, 0);">2019 proto big lie</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2022/05/hillbilly-spoof-big-lie-kentucky/">https://www.alternet.org/2022/05/hillbilly-spoof-big-lie-kentucky/</a></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">raw story</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">w<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">hen election night returns came in for the Kentucky election on Nov. 5, 2019, <b>Matt Bevin, the Republican incumbent governor trailed Democratic challenger Andy Beshear by about 5,000 votes.</b></span></font></div><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">A brash businessman who antagonized the state’s teachers, Bevin had gone into his reelection campaigns as one of the <a href="https://morningconsult.com/2019/01/10/americas-most-and-least-popular-governors-q4-2018/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">most unpopular</a> governors in the country. But with Republicans prevailing in every single remaining statewide race, his supporters couldn’t believe it was possible for Bevin to lose.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">One the day after the election, Bevin refused to concede, making <a href="https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/politics/elections/kentucky/2019/11/07/kentucky-governor-election-fact-check-matt-bevins-voter-fraud-claims/2516391001/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">baseless allegations</a> to reporters, as the <em>Courier Journal </em>reported, “that absentee ballots were illegally counted</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">, people were turned away from the polls, voting machines malfunctioned and ballots were stored in open boxes” — claims that were systematically refuted by state and local election officials.</span></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">By Saturday, with Bevin still refusing to concede, two far-right influencers jointly appeared on a podcast cross-published on their respective platforms to herald what sounded like an earth-shattering development.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">“We have literally been given the motherlode of leaked documents from a whistleblower that appears to be someone who might be working inside the elections,” declared Millie Weaver, an Ohio-based media provocateur who was a correspondent for the conspiracy theory hub <b>InfoWars</b> at the time</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">.</span></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Weaver introduced Terpsehore “Tore” Maras, a pro-Trump podcaster who lived in North Dakota. Weaver said she and Maras had been on the phone the night before when she checked her email and discovered “that some whistleblower, anonymously, decided to send me hundreds of documents — <em>hundreds </em>— these documents are confirmed legitimate documents — we have official, like, ballots, Kentucky ballots, audit logs, you know, all this crazy information, bank transactions, checks, papers that have literally been taped back together that went through shredders. Somebody must have been doing a lot of work to compile all of this information. But this information looks like there’s significant amount of voter fraud going on in Kentucky.”</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Indeed, someone had broken into Harp Enterprises, a Lexington-based company that supplies voting machines, and had accessed checks received by the company and other internal documents. Roger Baird, the company’s owner, told Raw Story he believes either a disgruntled former employee or someone associated with a losing campaign put a janitor up to stealing the documents.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>But almost nothing about what the two women said about the documents — starting with Weaver’s claim that Harp Enterprises “runs the electronic voting machines for the entire state of Kentucky” — was true</b>. Harp Enterprises, which exclusively purchases voting machines manufactured by Hart InterCivic, services only some of the precincts in Kentucky’s 120 counties.<b> Voters in Jefferson County, which includes Louisville and holds the largest share of Democratic voters, vote on ES&S machines.</b></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Maras claimed that the documents included hand-written notes showing employees coaching each other on “how to manipulate the votes.” And based on a financial transaction from a company with foreign ownership, Maras concluded, “You can’t get any more smoking gun with regards to foreign-entity meddling, let’s say.”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Chagrined to see his private documents tweeted out and displayed on a video stream, Baird showed Weaver’s video presentation to his banker.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">“He was like, ‘This is like a hillbilly spoof,’” Baird recalled. “There was just enough little droplets of real information that you might scratch your head, and say, ‘Huh, maybe there is something there.’ When they started connected me to George Soros….” As he recounted the story, Baird’s voice trailed off in incredulity and he burst into laughter.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>As the joint podcast crept into its second hour, Weaver noted with approval that her boss, Alex Jones, was in the chat watching her video.</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 153, 0);">“This is election fraud,” Maras said. “Kentucky was a dry run. In 2020, they’re coming for everything.”</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 153, 0);">“We need to blow the lid off this now before they steal the 2020 election,” Weaver agreed.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Yeah, but look at the losers they’ve got running on the Democratic ticket,” Maras chimed in. She ticked through the list of Democratic presidential primary contenders, noting each candidate’s unappealing attributes and weaknesses, while assigning insulting nicknames to them, before concluding with Trumpian logic that none of them could win fair and square.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>“So, what they’re gonna do is they’re gonna steal it,” Maras concluded.</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Weaver also attended a press conference at the state Capitol in Frankfurt, and spread many of the same baseless allegations to her followers in a <a href="https://www.pscp.tv/w/1OwxWdAXVZqKQ" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">livestream</a> on Periscope. Weaver could not be reached for comment for this story.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Kentucky election in 2019 was a harbinger, but in a different sense than Maras likely intended.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 153, 0);">Many of the same players who would later turn up in Washington, DC after the 2020 election and promote a battery of conspiracy theories falsely claiming the election was stolen were also involved in investigating election fraud claims in Kentucky, </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">according to at least two people involved.</span></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/american-chronicles/the-secret-source-who-helped-fuel-trumps-big-lie" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">Joshua Merritt</a>, a Dallas area information technology consultant, <a href="https://twitter.com/AmericanREI5/status/1520490454701285377" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">indicated</a> in a Twitter thread last month that <b>Patrick Byrne, the former Overstock.com CEO “contracted” the Texas-based company Allied Security Operating Group to work on the Kentucky election.</b></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In response to an account with the username @AmericanRE15 who asked him to confirm that he was saying “Byrne contracted you guys to work on the Bevins [sic] fraud in f*ing 2019,” Merritt replied, “Bingo….”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">He added in a separate tweet: “And then there are all the people we briefed after 2018… We investigated Bevins case, Florida, Dallas, Maryland… And others.”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><small>Josh Merritt responds to a question on a Twitter thread by @AmericanRE15 on April 30</small><small>Screengrab]</small></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Merritt could not be reached for this story, and he blocked this reporter on Twitter during the reporting of this story.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/interactive/2021/trump-election-fraud-texas-businessman-ramsland-asog/" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">Russell Ramsland</a>, the founder of Allied Security Operating Group</b>, began pushing election fraud claims after Democrats made gains in Texas during the 2018 mid-term elections, and would go on to push specious claims about the 2020 election on Lou Dobbs’ show on Fox Business Network, and then file a declaration alongside Maras to support federal lawsuits seeking to overturn the election.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Weaver also confirmed Allied Security Operations Group’s involvement in the Kentucky election, which has not been previously reported.</b></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“I went down to Kentucky to go hand-deliver an SD drive or a USB stick to Governor Bevin himself at his office,” Weaver recounted in a December 2020 <a href="https://www.pscp.tv/w/1RDGlPDXMOgGL?t=10m17s" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">livestream</a>. “And I also met with a group called ASOG. So, there’s this group called Allied Security Operations Group, and they’re heading a lot of the election fraud efforts that have been happening.”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Weaver said in the same livestream that she had provided the documents to Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), and described working with Allied Security Operations Group.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Yeah, we met with them,” she said. “We essentially went over the information. They already had seemed to have gotten it, which means they probably got it from Grassley or something.”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Messages to Grassley’s office seeking clarification on whether the senator received the documents or anyone from his office passed them on to Ramsland were not returned before press time.</b></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In November 2020, Weaver, Maras and Weaver’s partner Gavin Wince came to Washington, DC as the nucleus of a conspiracy-happy group that would come to be known as <b>“Team America.” Patrick Bergy, who was also part of the group, <a href="https://www.rawstory.com/tore-maras/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">previously told</a> Raw Story that Byrne paid </b>for their hotel rooms at the Westin Arlington Gateway hotel in northern Virginia.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Merritt also indicated in the April 30 Twitter thread that Byrne and Maras together connected with Allied Security Operations Group during the efforts to uncover fraud in Kentucky. In response to a question from the @AmericanRE15 account on whether he had disclosed that he worked with Maras on the Kentucky fraud claim, Merritt replied, “She was brought in with Byrne when we were working with them through ASOG.”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Raw Story could not independently confirm Byrne’s involvement in the Kentucky 2019 election. Byrne and Maras have previously said in a <a href="https://www.audacy.com/podcasts/tore-says-show-32690/sun-27-mar-tore-with-patrick-byrne-on-the-daily302-vodcast-1330267662" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">podcast</a> published two months ago that they did not formally meet until November 2020.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“The first time that I think of myself as meeting Tore, we were in a restaurant in Alexandria; it was a week or two after the election,” Byrne said in the podcast. “She was with some people. I was with some people. Somebody took me over to meet her people. Boom boom boom. When I shook hands with her, after looking at her or listening to her for a few seconds, I said, ‘Gee, I’ve met you somewhere, haven’t I?’ And she actually turned away, didn’t answer. I thought it was funny.”</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Byrne went on to share a cryptic story about how a couple of nights later Maras made an admission to him that suggested she had spied on him eight years earlier. According to Maras, she had been Byrne’s “waitress” at a restaurant in London in 2012 and he was her “target.</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">”</span></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Neither Byrne nor Maras could be reached for comment about Merritt’s assertion that they worked together on the 2019 election in Kentucky.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">As <a href="https://www.rawstory.com/tore-maras/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">previously reported</a> by Raw Story and ProPublica, Byrne has described tasking a group of intelligence professionals with interviewing Maras after she submitted a declaration to support lawsuits filed by Sidney Powel that sought to overturn the 2020 election. Byrne said the team that interviewed Maras concluded that “we cannot rely on her for anything factual because we caught her in too many lies and exaggerations.”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Despite Byrne’s determination in December 2020 that Maras was not credible, the two continue to appear together on podcasts, where they promote election fraud conspiracy theories and praise one another.</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Maras and Weaver have both said they worked with</span><b style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> Phill Kline, a former Kansas attorney general on examining alleged election fraud in Kentucky. In December 2020, Kline <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/21/us/politics/jan-6-fake-trump-electors.html?smid=em-share" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">reportedly</a> promoted a scheme to submit pro-Trump electors in the six swing states carried by Joe Biden,</b><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> talking up the plan on far-right media outlets like </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">One America News and former White House strategist Steve Bannon’s podcast.</span></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Weaver mentioned Kline’s involvement in the Kentucky election in her December 2020 <a href="https://www.pscp.tv/w/1RDGlPDXMOgGL?t=10m17s" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">livestream</a>, and Maras said she worked with Kline “in 2019 on the election fraud in Kentucky” in a <a href="https://www.audacy.com/podcasts/tore-says-show-32690/wed-09-feb-re-betrayal-many-forms-maskholes-push-n-push-off-ride-peak-stimulus-hard-lines-1241253357" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">podcast</a> earlier this year. Kline could not be reached for comment for this story.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><strong><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Warning signs in Kentucky</font></strong></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“I had <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/11/08/opinions/kentucky-election-fraud-bevin-opinion-douglas/index.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">said</a> back then and have said all along that 2019 was a mini version of what potentially could happen in 2020, and did happen,” Joshua A. Douglas, a law professor at the University of Kentucky, told Raw Story. “I said then that we need to pay attention to what happened in Kentucky for fear of that happening on a larger scale with the presidential election.”</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Douglas said he sees one critical difference in how Bevin’s baseless fraud claims played out in 2019, compared to the firehose of the spigot of falsehoods issued by President Trump that culminated in the attack on the US Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>After the 2019 election, Douglas said, Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell issued an ultimatum to Bevin to present evidence of voting problems or concede. In contrast, McConnell waited for more than a month after the 2020 election </b>as Senate majority leader before <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/12/15/mcconnell-gop-let-trump-down-gently-election-445690" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">congratulating</a> Joe Biden on his win.</span></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">For conspiracy theorists, Kentucky in 2019 was a ripe target.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Twenty-nineteen is an off-election year, so you could really focus on Kentucky,” said Roger Baird, the Harp Enterprises owner. “You get a lot of attention all of a sudden when you’re the only one having an election. We get more attention in an off-election year than we do in a big year like 2020.”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Similar to the feverish claims about election fraud in the 2020 election, Maras’ theory about the Harp Enterprises documents quickly expanded to include claims about official betrayal to explain why no one was being prosecuted.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“If you had asked me, I would tell you: Everyone in Kentucky government is guilty,” Maras said during the Nov. 9, 2019 podcast. “And maybe this is why the secretary of state is like, ‘Oh, just leave it alone.’ Yeah, leave it alone because everyone’s gonna be going to jail.”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Maras said she called the Kentucky State Police hoping that she could bring the documents to the attention of Governor Bevin. She said a detective called her back and tried to get her to explain how she obtained the documents. A spokesperson told Raw Story he couldn’t confirm that the agency received a complaint about the matter.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Kentucky Attorney General’s office, which would typically investigate allegations of election fraud or other criminal misconduct, did not respond to inquiries.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Baird told Raw Story he asked Homeland Security to try to determine how his company’s internal documents were stolen, but they never reached any conclusions.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In the weeks following Bevin’s loss in Kentucky, Maras continued to refine a fanciful theory of electronic vote-swapping.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In 2019 and 2020, according to the <b><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/interactive/2021/trump-election-fraud-texas-businessman-ramsland-asog/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="blank" class="rm-stats-tracked" style="text-decoration-line: none; opacity: 1; transition: color 0.25s ease 0s, background 0.25s ease 0s, opacity 0.25s ease 0s;">Washington Post</a>,</b> Ramsland and Merritt from Allied Security Operations Group appeared on a<b> podcast called “Economic War Room</b>” and claimed that hackers or rogue operators could direct vote data to a remote location and manipulate it. During his media appearances, Ramsland also circulated baseless claims about<b> Scytl, a Spain-based company that provides election-night reporting services,</b> asserting that “they’re housing all of our vote, and they’re doing it in an insecure fashion,” the <em>Post </em>reported.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Maras appears to have been exposed to the same baseless claims about Scytl in November 2020, roughly the same period when Merritt and Weaver indicated Allied Security Operations Group was looking at the Kentucky election.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In a podcast two weeks after the 2019 election, Maras spent an hour offering a breezy discourse on how various election technology companies supposedly carry out electronic vote manipulation, asserting that “the Hart-Intercivic software” was “working together” with Scytl.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“So, this phase is shuffling ballots, mixing them,” Maras said, adopting the professorial air of an adept instructor breaking down a complex formula for undergrad students. “Picture a bag of Scrabble tiles, and you’re mixing them. That’s basically what they do to all your votes. And during this mixing phase is where you can swap a vote for some other vote.”</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In a previous podcast, on Nov. 10, Maras had acknowledged that “elections aren’t my thing,” and admitted she knew little about how voting machines work. Now, on Nov. 19, Maras was saying that it had taken her a week to figure out what a highly compensated cybersecurity contractor in northern Virginia who was paid to safeguard US elections would have known for at least 10 years.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>What Maras missed — and what election deniers in 2020 missed and continue to miss as they go around the country sewing doubt about the election system — is that vote data that is reported on election night is separate from the votes that are tallied up and certified by local and state elections officials.</b></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In Kentucky, two poll workers — one Republican and one Democrat — hand-deliver a tape displaying a printout of the aggregate vote and a media card in a sealed bag to the county election office. A duplicate of the tape is displayed at the polling place as a record of the precinct tally. At the county office, the media card is inserted into a machine that tallies the votes from across the county. Like the voting machines, the machine that tallies the votes is not connected to the internet. To ensure that the votes remain secure, an election worker uses a clean thumb drive to pull the data off the tally machine and then walks it over to a networked computer to upload it to the election-night reporting site.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Our job is to make sure nothing touches the computer that does the tally,” Baird said.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Common sense tells you that if you hook up your voting machines to the internet, you’re plumb dumb,” he added.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">References to Scytl and foreign servers purportedly housing votes would prove to be a ubiquitous feature in declarations sworn by Maras and Merritt for the lawsuits filed in November and December 2020, along with video documentaries and livestreams by Weaver during the same period. Maras’ 37-page declaration, executed on Nov. 29, 2020, alone contains 23 references to Scytl.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Ensconced in Washington, Weaver addressed her followers on Periscope around the same time, outlining her qualifications to be part of an elite team churning up dubious evidence to aid in the effort to overturn the election.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“I want to give you guys a little bit of background as to why I know what I know and I’m in the situation where right here where I’m even being invited to some of the groups that are heading these efforts, where you see people like Phill Kline, and you see people like Sidney Powell and these other people out here heading these movements,” Weaver said. “Why would they care what little Millie has to say?... So, I’ve been making these videos for over a year now, talking about the plan that the Democrats and really the establishment has had to throw Trump out of office, to get rid of him.”</font></p><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">an intact hymen BS</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/12/tea-party-governors-last-act-pardons-for-hundreds-including-killer-whose-family-raised-21500-for-re-election/">https://www.alternet.org/2019/12/tea-party-governors-last-act-pardons-for-hundreds-including-killer-whose-family-raised-21500-for-re-election/</a></div><div>
</div><div><div>no lnx</div><div>
</div><div>Tea Party governor’s last act: Pardons for hundreds — including killer whose family raised $21,500 for re-election</div><div>Matt Bevin image via.”>Wikipedia.</div><div>Written by David Badash / The New Civil Rights Movement December 12, 2019</div><div>Outgoing Tea Party Republican Governor Matt Bevin of Kentucky has now pardoned hundreds of convicts since he lost a close re-election race one month ago. Among those benefitting from his exit are five convicted killers and other violent felons. One of the men receiving a pardon just happens to have family members who hosted a high-dollar fundraiser for the governor’s re-election campaign this past summer.</div><div>
</div><div>Gov. Bevin issued 428 pardons in the month before leaving office this week under objection. Bevin wanted to challenge the election results but Kentucky does not have a law mandating it and he was unsuccessful.</div><div>
</div><div>41-year old Patrick Brian Baker received an unconditional pardon from his 19-year prison sentence this week after being convicted in 2017 “of reckless homicide, first-degree robbery, impersonating a peace officer and tampering with physical evidence,” The Times-Tribune reports. The victim’s wife and three children were in the home when the acts  occurred.</div><div>
</div><div>Saying, “I’ve never seen a more compelling or complete case … the evidence was just overwhelming,” Judge David L. Williams had lamented at sentencing the convicted felon could be imprisoned for only 19 years.</div><div>
</div><div>“I believe it would be a miscarriage of justice to do any less,” Williams added. “It’s 19 years because that’s all I can give you…if I could give you more, I would.”</div><div>
</div><div>But as Newsweek reports, “Baker’s brother and sister in law, Eric and Kathryn Baker, hosted a fundraiser for Bevin at their home in Corbin, Kentucky, in July last year,” according to The Courier Journal. They raised a whopping $21,500. The pair added $4000 to the pot as well.</div><div>
</div><div>Baker’s co-defendants are not receiving pardons, despite the fact it was Baker who pulled the trigger.</div><div>
</div><div>Others receiving pardons “include one offender convicted of raping a child, another who hired a hit man to kill his business partner and a third who killed his parents.”</div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/11/kentucky-senate-president-thinks-gop-controlled-state-legislature-could-review-gubernatorial-election-and-challenge-democratic-beshears-victory/"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.alternet.org/2019/11/kentucky-senate-president-thinks-gop-controlled-state-legislature-could-review-gubernatorial-election-and-challenge-democratic-beshears-victory/</font></a></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">no lnx</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Kentucky Senate president thinks GOP-controlled state legislature could review gubernatorial election and challenge Democrat’s victory</b></font></div><div>
</div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Written by Alex Henderson November 6, 2019</font></div><div>
</div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">On Election Night 2019, Democrat Andy Beshear pulled off a shocking political upset when he defeated incumbent Republican Gov. Matt Bevin in Kentucky’s gubernatorial race. But it was a very close race. Bevin has yet to concede, and<b> Republican Robert Stivers (president of the Kentucky State Senate) has suggested that Kentucky’s GOP-controlled state legislature could end up choosing Kentucky’s next governor.</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Kentucky, unlike Florida, does not have automatic vote recounts in gubernatorial elections. But Bevin has the option of requesting a recount. And under Kentucky state law, a candidate has 30 days to formally contest an election’s results after they have been certified by the Kentucky Board of Elections. As of Wednesday morning, Beshear’s victory has not been certified.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The 57-year-old Stivers, the Courier Journal reported, said that according to the research of his staff, the election could ultimately come before the Kentucky State Legislature for review. And The Week notes that Section 90 of the Kentucky State Constitution says that “contested elections for governor and lieutenant governor shall be determined by both houses of the General Assembly, according to such regulations as may be established by law.”</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">According to the vote count on Tuesday night, Beshear won by about 5100 votes. Stivers asserted, “There’s less than one-half of 1%, as I understand, separating the governor and the attorney general. We will follow the letter of the law and what various processes determine.”</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Sam Marcosson, a professor of constitutional law at the University of Louisville, told the Courier Journal that it’s a risky “proposition to suggest that the General Assembly would take vague allegations of unspecified irregularities and call into question a gubernatorial election.” And Joshua Douglas, a law professor at the University of Kentucky, told the Courier Journal that in order for the Kentucky State Legislature to review the election results, Bevin would need to call a special session of the Kentucky General Assembly; after that, a panel consisting of eight members of the Kentucky House of Representatives and three members of the Kentucky Senate “would hear evidence and make a final determination — and that determination would be final.”</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Beshear’s victory is stunning in light of how Republican Kentucky is. In 2016’s presidential election, Donald Trump defeated Democrat Hillary Clinton by 3 percent in Kentucky — and Trump visited Kentucky in a last-ditch effort to save Bevin’s reelection campaign. But Bevin was deeply unpopular in his state; even so, a Democratic gubernatorial victory was a major political upset.</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/09/gop-incumbent-resorts-to-racism-in-close-governors-race/"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.alternet.org/2019/09/gop-incumbent-resorts-to-racism-in-close-governors-race/</font></a></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">E<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">xactly one year before Kentuckians will decide whether to reelect Mitch McConnell, they face a governor’s election in which the incumbent, Republican Matt Bevin, faces a challenge from Democratic state Attorney General Andy Beshear.</span></font></div><div class="p1_21" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">According to Morning Consult<b>, Bevin is the most <a title="unpopular" href="https://morningconsult.com/governor-rankings-q2-19/" target="blank" rel="external nofollow noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">unpopular</a> governor in the nation. Campbell Robertson <a title="explained" href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/01/us/matt-bevin-kentucky.html" target="blank" rel="external nofollow noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">explained</a> why.</b></font></p><div class="p2_21" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="alt_ad_block story-page-in-content-graph-2" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="teadsNative" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><div id="story_page_incontent_p2_target" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><div style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; height: 15px;"><blockquote style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 20px; padding: 10px 20px 10px 24px; position: relative; line-height: 1.7; overflow: hidden; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; border: none !important;"><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.7;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">He has tangled with journalists, union representatives and Democrats, but he has been startlingly harsh on less typical targets — like public school teachers. After thousands of educators walked out last year in protest of budget cuts and proposed changes to teacher pensions, Mr. Bevin accused some who picketed a state senator’s business of having a “thug mentality” and called others “selfish” and “ignorant.” He blamed those involved in the walkouts for hypothetical poisonings and sexual assaults as well as <a title="a very real shooting" href="https://www.kentucky.com/news/local/education/article229676804.html" target="blank" rel="external nofollow noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">a very real shooting</a>.</font></p></blockquote><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Quite the charmer, isn’t he?</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>The state of Kentucky shares some things in common with its neighbor, West Virginia. The population is more than 80 percent white, and the Republicanization of southern states that followed the passage of civil rights legislation is not quite complete.</b></font></p><div class="p3_21" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><blockquote style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 20px; padding: 10px 20px 10px 24px; position: relative; line-height: 1.7; overflow: hidden; background: rgb(245, 245, 245); border: none !important;"><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.7;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="">The current era of all-or-nothing partisanship is an awkward fit for Kentucky. It would be easy to take the state these days for an unquestioned stronghold for Republicans, given their supermajorities in both houses of the Legislature and the fact that Republicans hold all but one of the state’s seats in Congress.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.7;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> </font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.7;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="">But the thoroughness of the Republican takeover was recent; registered Democrats still outnumber Republicans in the state and in even some of the strongest pro-Trump counties, the rural county courthouses remain all-Democrat shops. As in many Southern, or at least Southern-adjacent, states, the Democratic label is fine for the county clerk but quickly loses its luster the higher the elected office.</font></p></blockquote><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Those are the dynamics that lead to Democratic statewide officeholders like Senator Joe Manchin. Bob Moser <a title="described" href="https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/what-happens-in-georgia-could-have-national-implications-for-years-to-come-627896/" target="blank" rel="external nofollow noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">described</a> their politics as “business-friendly centrism, with heavy doses of gunfire and Jesus</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">.” From that perspective, Beshear (son of Steve Beshear, Bevin’s predecessor) is a </span><a title="flaming liberal" href="https://andybeshear.com/on-the-issues/" target="blank" rel="external nofollow noopener" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">flaming liberal</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> who acknowledges the reality of climate change, and supports Obamacare, marriage equality, a woman’s right to chose, red flag laws, and medical marijuana legalization. It will come as no surprise, however, that his main issue is </span><a title="support" href="https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/politics/2018/07/09/andy-beshear-run-kentucky-governor-2019/767093002/" target="blank" rel="external nofollow noopener" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">support</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> for teachers and public education.</span></font></p><blockquote style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 20px; padding: 10px 20px 10px 24px; position: relative; line-height: 1.7; overflow: hidden; background: rgb(245, 245, 245); border: none !important;"><p class="speakable-p-1 p-text" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.7;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><b>In announcing his candidacy for Kentucky governor Monday, Attorney General Andy Beshear said he wants to honor teacher pensions and break away from the current culture of “bullying” in Gov. Matt Bevin’s administration.</b></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.7;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> </font></p><p class="speakable-p-2 p-text" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.7;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">With educator Jacqueline Coleman as his running mate, Beshear, a Democrat, is the first candidate of either party to announce a bid for governor in 2019…</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.7;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> </font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.7;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="">“Governors have a moral responsibility to act with decency, to do their best to provide good-paying jobs and to provide justice to all Kentuckians,” Beshear said Monday in Louisville. “… We will move forward, and these days of bullying, name calling, and my-way-or-the-highway will be left in the past.”</font></p></blockquote><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">At this point, there hasn’t been much polling in this race, but it appears to be close. Bevin might have signaled that he’s worried with the release of this television ad....</font></p><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div><a href="https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/kentucky-hampton-sue-governor-bevin-fire-top-aides"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/kentucky-hampton-sue-governor-bevin-fire-top-aides</font></a></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/05/this-trump-loving-gop-governor-is-in-danger-of-losing-re-election-and-the-white-house-is-worried-report/">https://www.alternet.org/2019/05/this-trump-loving-gop-governor-is-in-danger-of-losing-re-election-and-the-white-house-is-worried-report/</a></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Three gubernatorial races are scheduled to take place in 2019, but

the one that might have President Donald Trump most worried is Kentucky.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2019/05/03/trump-matt-bevin-kentucky-1300039">According</a>

to Politico, White House officials are deeply worried about the

re-election prospects of Trump-loving GOP Gov. Matt Bevin, who polls as

the least popular governor in America. His approval ratings in recent

months have been stuck in the low 30s.</font></p><div class="alt_ad_block story-page-in-content-graph-2">

</div>

<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Trump has gradually been ramping up efforts to help Bevin’s campaign.

But the president’s allies are worried that if Trump stakes his

political capital on rescuing Bevin, only for him to lose, it will

damage the president’s credibility with Republican candidates and loosen

his grip on the party.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Despite Kentucky’s conservative lean, partisan control of the state

has historically been heterogeneous. Indeed, Bevin is the first GOP

governor to ever preside over unified Republican control of the state

legislature — and it has been working out horribly for him.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Bevin’s term has been plagued by faction fighting, and his repeated

efforts to gut the state educational system has earned him wrath from

educators and triggered a string of teacher strikes and sickouts. Bevin

has responded with a war of words, blaming striking teachers for <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/education/wp/2018/04/14/kentucky-governor-claims-that-children-were-raped-used-drugs-while-teachers-protested/">child sexual assault</a> and <a href="https://www.rawstory.com/2019/04/kentucky-governor-matt-bevin-blames-shooting-7-year-old-teachers-sickout/">accidental shootings</a>.</span></font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Democrats lining up to take on Bevin include state attorney general

Andy Beshear, who is currently suing to block Bevin’s war on teachers;

Rocky Adkins, the state House Minority Leader; and former state auditor

Adam Edelen. Bevin also faces a primary challenge from GOP state Rep.

Robert Goforth.</font></p></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">deripaska kty alum plant (no direct link?)
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</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/04/somethings-rotten-in-the-state-of-kentucky/">https://www.alternet.org/2019/04/somethings-rotten-in-the-state-of-kentucky/</a></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">mcconnell
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/kentucky-gov-matt-bevin-may-destroy-states-public-education-system-charter-schools-scheme">https://www.alternet.org/kentucky-gov-matt-bevin-may-destroy-states-public-education-system-charter-schools-scheme</a></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">https://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/even-republicans-are-horrified-kentucky-governors-attack-protesting-teachers</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> =</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">https://www.eenews.net/climatewire/2017/06/21/stories/1060056345</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">GOP threatens to sue Calif. over climate rule for insurers</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Benjamin Hulac, E&E News reporter</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Published: Wednesday, June 21, 2017</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Twelve Republican attorneys general and Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin (R) demanded Monday that the California insurance commissioner halt a program requiring companies to disclose their investments in fossil fuels.</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">They called the program misguided and inflammatory, and they threatened to file a lawsuit if it continues to be used. The Republican officials made their demands related to the Climate Risk Carbon Initiative in a letter yesterday to California Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Jones announced the climate disclosure effort in January 2016. He said falling coal prices present financial hazards, and he asked insurance companies to "voluntarily" sell their stakes in thermal coal. He also required insurers to turn over data about their fossil fuel investments.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">That has chafed Republicans, who claim that California's requirements are heavy-handed and ideological. They say the program is not about the financial stability of insurers — the traditional jurisdiction of insurance regulators.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">"Rather, your call for divestment and attempt to publicly shame those who invest in American energy appears to be driven by politics unrelated to insurance regulation, animus towards the fossil fuel industry and those who depend on it, and a desire to discriminate against those who transact in commerce that mostly takes place outside your state (e.g. coal mining and coal power generation)," the letter reads.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>If Jones does not end the program, Bevin and the attorneys general said, "we will be forced to consider the legal avenues of relief available to protect our insurance carriers, energy producers, and consumers."</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Jones said threats of lawsuits would not get him to shut down the program.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"For those climate-denying politicians of red states who threaten to sue me, I will happily defend my obligation as California's insurance commissioner to make sure insurers are addressing climate change related risks and to protect California consumers," he said in a statement.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The interstate spat highlights the massive financial clout California wields in American insurance markets. To do business nationwide, insurers often need to comply with regulations set down by the California Department of Insurance.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>The attorneys general of Alabama, Arkansas, Indiana, Louisiana, Montana, Missouri, North Dakota, Utah, Texas, Oklahoma, West Virginia and Wyoming signed the letter.</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">Representatives for Bevin and Jones did not respond to requests for comment.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>About 650 insurance firms have responded to the disclosure program. More than 300 said they have analyzed their "carbon risk," while 272 declined to do so, according to figures from the California insurance commission.</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);" size="4" face="Times New Roman">The data show that insurers surveyed have invested about $240 billion in the oil and gas industry and roughly $10.5 billion in thermal coal.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>"This misguided policy is negligent, politically driven, unrelated to insurance regulation and is risking a certain lawsuit," Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter (R), the letter's author, said in a statement.</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Alex Gerszewski, a spokesman for Hunter, said the attorney general has not spoken to Jones about the issue but was motivated by his experience in the energy industry and by his conversations with the Oklahoma insurance commissioner.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Hunter succeeded Scott Pruitt, who now serves as U.S. EPA administrator, as Oklahoma's attorney general earlier this year.</font></p><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="http://www.alternet.org/labor/kentuckys-attack-unions-provides-glimpse-gops-impending-war-workers">http://www.alternet.org/labor/kentuckys-attack-unions-provides-glimpse-gops-impending-war-workers</a></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...</font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>For 95 years—all the way back to 1921, when Warren G. Harding was president—Kentucky Democrats had maintained control of the state House of Representatives.</b></font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>When Tea Party darling Matt Bevin, who ran as the “right-to-work” candidate</b>, rode the national GOP wave and succeeded Democratic Governor Steve Beshear in 2014, the Kentucky House became the sole bulwark blocking the implementation of his anti-union agenda. Naturally, heading into the 2016 elections, the right wing turned all its firepower against the Democrats’ six-seat house majority. It worked—<a href="http://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article113464563.html" style="text-decoration: none;">and it wasn’t even close</a>. Republicans won an astounding 13 seats to gain a commanding 64-36 majority, making Kentucky one of 25 states with GOP trifecta-control.</font></font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">It didn’t take long for Republican legislators to introduce their stable of anti-union measures: a right-to-work bill that bans unions from requiring mandatory dues for all workers covered by their contracts; a repeal of the state’s prevailing wage law, meaning that public construction projects would no longer be required to pay their workers based on a community survey (usually meaning a union pay-scale); and banning public-employee unions from striking and from using member dues for political contributions.</font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">It’s also the first of many attacks on unions that will materialize during the Trump presidency.With Democrats completely out of power, unions had little recourse—beyond workers protesting in the chambers—to combat the legislative onslaught. Over the weekend, <a href="http://www.whas11.com/news/bevin-new-laws-will-be-in-effect-by-monday/383510069" style="text-decoration: none;">Republicans passed all three bills</a> (in addition to a 20-week abortion ban) with emergency clauses ensuring they would be implemented immediately after Bevin signs them into law. Kentucky is now the 27th right-to-work state, and the last state in the South to pass such a law. “It’s an attack on the working people,” Chris Kendall, a member of a Kentucky Plumbers and Steamfitters Union local <a href="http://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article125140549.html" style="text-decoration: none;">told the Lexington Herald-Leader</a> as he protested right-to-work at the state capitol in Frankfort on Saturday. “It’s almost like we’re the enemy somehow, that it’s the politicians against us. And all we’re trying to do is earn an honest day’s wage.”</font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In public, conservatives argue that right-to-work is about ensuring freedom in the workplace by using fear-mongering rhetoric about mandatory union membership. But they fail to mention that, by law, union membership can’t be mandatory; it’s the payment of union dues for collective bargaining services—which benefit all workers in unionized shops—that is required with union security clauses. The reality, as <a href="http://www.epi.org/publication/right-to-work-states-have-lower-wages/" style="text-decoration: none;">research consistently shows</a>, is that, on average, workers make less—about 3.1 percent—in states with right-to-work laws compared with states without those laws. Right-to-work’s other effect is to create a “free rider” problem for unions, which are forced to provide services for all workers in union shops without any compensation from the non-members they bargain for and represent in disputes with management.</font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Conservatives also argue that prevailing wage laws are a leading cause of bloated government spending. What surveys have shown, however, is that <a href="http://www.epi.org/publication/bp215/" style="text-decoration: none;">there are no adverse affects</a> associated with government projects that pay a prevailing wage.</font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Attacking unions is a top GOP priority not because of actual concern for workers or public services. Rather, it’s about undermining the left’s most effective tool for convincing working people to vote for more pro-worker candidates, who are almost invariably Democratic, and curtailing unions’ ability to finance Democratic candidates. Right-to-work laws and bans on political contributions from dues are primarily about draining unions’ coffers and breaking up concentrated worker power. </font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>Kentucky was once a union stronghold, thanks to strong membership density in the state’s heavy-industry sectors like coal mining and manufacturing.</b> But, as those types of jobs have disappeared and the GOP’s war on unions ramped up, Kentucky’s union membership dramatically eroded—a trend that has played out across the country. The state’s union membership <a href="https://www.bls.gov/regions/southeast/news-release/2016/pdf/unionmembership_kentucky_20160226.pdf" style="text-decoration: none;">reached its peak</a> in 1989, but has fallen since then. In 2015, 11 percent of Kentucky’s workforce— about 187,000 workers—was unionized, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Right-to-work will only further accelerate that decline.</font></font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">With Trump’s win and the GOP’s continuing majorities in the House and Senate, the party now has unified federal control for the first time since 2006—and in those 10 years, the party’s anti-union strain has become even more mainstream and vitriolic</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">. Republicans in the House and Senate will soon begin pushing for a national right-to-work law and a repeal of the Davis Bacon Act (the federal prevailing wage), bringing to the national stage what has for the past decade been limited to state-level fights. Trump has already <a href="http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/trump-i-like-right-to-work-better/article/2583977" style="text-decoration: none;">indicated his support</a> for a national right-to-work law and his top allies, from Vice President-elect Mike Pence on down, have close ties to the Kochs’ anti-union political crusade in the states.The Bevin-led attack on Kentucky workers comes straight out of the right-wing playbook for states</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">. Since the 2010 elections, Republicans, with ample funding from the Koch brothers, have pushed through right-to-work and prevailing wage repeals in such former union strongholds as Indiana, Michigan, West Virginia, and Wisconsin. With statehouse gains in 2016, Republicans are also expected to pass right-to-work measures in Missouri and New Hampshire. But that’s not all.</span></font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The challenge for unions in a right-to-work landscape becomes a battle for relevance—and convincing members that the services unions provide are still important. Whether they can do that in Kentucky, and soon, nationwide, is a question that looms large for the future of the labor movement. </font></p><div wibbitz="embed-main-player" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="bio-new body_story" style="width: 630px; line-height: 22px; height: auto; border-top: 3px solid rgb(223, 223, 218); clear: both; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="author-bio"><p style="margin: 0px 0px 22px; line-height: 32px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><strong> Justin Miller</strong> is a writing fellow for The American Prospect.</font></p></div></div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">==</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/ky-gov-matt-bevin-election-hillary-clinton-may-call-shedding-blood-tyrants-and-patriots">http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/ky-gov-matt-bevin-election-hillary-clinton-may-call-shedding-blood-tyrants-and-patriots</a></font></p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">

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<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Numerous speakers at last weekend’s Values Voter Summit suggested that the American republic might not survive a Hillary Clinton presidency. During the Obama administration it has become almost routine to hear far-right leaders talk about the possibility of armed revolution against the federal government. But it was still jarring to hear a sitting governor suggest that America might only survive the election of Hillary Clinton through bloodshed.</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Matt Bevin, who was<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/liberty-counsel-brags-kim-davis-attending-matt-bevins-inauguration" style="text-decoration: none; line-height: 20.4px;">elected governor of Kentucky last year</a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>after<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="http://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/politics/2015/09/01/matt-bevin-defends-rowan-clerk-kim-davis/71514564/" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; line-height: 20.4px;">expressing “absolute” support</a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>for marriage-refusing county clerk Kim Davis, received the<a href="http://kentuckytoday.com/stories/bevin-chosen-for-distinguished-christian-statesman-award,5223" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; line-height: 20.4px;">Distinguished Christian Statesman</a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>award from the D. James Kennedy Center for Christian Statesmanship on Friday night. Speaking on Saturday, he told VVS attendees that the country is facing a fork in the road: “We don’t have multiple options; we’re going one way or we’re going the other way, politically, spiritually, morally, economically, from a liberty standpoint. We’re going one way or we’re going the other way.”</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Bevin recounted a story from his college days about how he confronted a professor who he said mocked Christianity, the way liberals always do: “They try to silence us. They try to get us to shut our mouths. They try to embarrass us. Don’t be embarrassed. We were not redeemed to have a spirit of timidity.” He urged young people, “Be bold. There’s enough Neville Chamberlains in the world. Be a Winston Churchill…There are quite enough sheep already. Be a shepherd.”</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">American freedom, Bevin said, was “purchased at an extraordinary price,” saying that one and a half million Americans have given their lives in uniform. “America is worth fighting for. America is worth fighting for, ideologically.”</font>

<font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“I want us to be able to fight ideologically, mentally, spiritually, economically, so that we don’t have to do it physically,” said Bevin. “But that may in fact be the case.” He explained that it might take the shedding of the blood of tyrants and patriots for America to survive a Hillary Clinton presidency:</font>

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