webodec3ARCHIVEPreview
Open in TheBrain

Simone Gold Am Frontline Drs

plandemic?

merri ok

CNP

Jones infowars

see ladapo florida man

ntbcw AA lady stella Immanuel renta? xian? (demon sperm?]

---

gold is tiny white lady who whinged at scary raid on her house (kinda karen? see daily sieg heil] pal of jenny beth

apparently arrested when she wd not obey order b/c she was not done shooting her promo video?

==

she was recruited by (---CNP to front reopen economy, 1 of 3 progs to jan 6:

---

ladapo

---

---

vaxx big pharma 9 25 watters

rfk looks bad in senate hearings 9 25 on msnbc yt anyway

mma

How right-wing media sow distrust and confusion around vaccines and science

As Florida ends school vaccine requirements and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s leadership comes under fire, the right has repackaged anti-science talking points as well-meaning skepticism

Written by Gideon Taaffe, Isabella Sherk, Jack Wheatley & Jack Winstanley

Published 09/18/25

Amid the rise of the so-called “Make America Healthy Again” movement, right-wing media figures have employed a variety of tactics that sow doubt and confusion around vaccine efficacy and science more broadly. These efforts to capitalize on existing distrust of public health institutions and pharmaceutical companies have gained renewed momentum following Florida’s elimination of vaccine requirements for schools and comments made by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. during a contentious Senate hearing.

MAHA acolytes have challenged well-studied topics by “just asking questions,” described vaccination requirements as impediments to freedom and parental choice, and exploited post-pandemic mistrust of public health infrastructure and pharmaceutical companies.

The MAHA movement is fueling mistrust in medicine amid a CDC leadership shake-up and Florida's elimination of vaccine requirements

//

09/09/25 10:09 AM EDT

08/11/25 9:56 AM EDT

07/09/25

---

blurbs

Review

"In two years of interviewing public health officials, Dr. Joe Ladapo was the most impressive I met, and the most decent. I suspect it won't be long before every American knows his name."

—Tucker Carlson

“This gripping biographical narrative lets the world understand the complex reality that has unfolded in the life of Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo, MD, PhD. He stands as an impressive physical and intellectual force yet has been formed and molded into a respectful, careful, and quietly courageous leader in public health. The narrative quickly brings the reader through the life of Ladapo, his family, and Governor Ron DeSantis as characters working to save Floridians and the nation at large from the catastrophic federal response to the pandemic that has unfolded before our very eyes. Ladapo is a wonderful writer and has taken brave steps in disclosure that many public figures could not bring themselves to do in spoken words or print. This book will stand as an important inflection point for Dr. Ladapo and America’s public health community at a time of continued crisis and upheaval in our country. So, sit back and enjoy this wonderful story about one of America's finest heroes in contemporary history."

—Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH, coauthor of Courage to Face COVID-19: Preventing Hospitalization and Death While Battling the Biopharmaceutical Complex

“I searched the nation for ethical and honorable physicians to tell the American people the real public health truth. By reviewing decades of research prior to Covid and observing real-time scientific data, Dr. Ladapo spoke boldly and accurately. He reminded us that masks are unable to stop the spread of a tiny respiratory virus; he reminded us that early treatment is always superior to negligence; and he reminded us of Public Health 101: locking down healthy people is never going to be an effective—or legal—public health measure. Dr. Ladapo was different because he refused to delegate his personal responsibility to think critically—even in the face of overwhelming pressure to follow the herd.”

—Simone Gold, MD, JD, founder of America’s Frontline Doctors and CEO of GoldCare™ Health & Wellness

“Joe Ladapo has been one of very few public voices of reason throughout the Covid pandemic. While other leaders in the field of public health have panicked, forgotten their training, and allowed their thinking to be clouded by fear, he has consistently demanded that we look at the actual evidence, and do a careful weighing of benefits and harms before putting in place massively disruptive public health interventions. With Joe at the center of Florida’s public health decision making, it is not hard to understand why the state has come out of the pandemic looking so good.”

—Sebastian Rushworth, MD, author of Covid: Why Most of What You Know Is Wrong

“Dr. Joe Ladapo is the best Surgeon General in the country. During the COVID crisis, Dr. Ladapo provided the country with a credible outside voice that consistently put forward a vision of health that encompassed psychological, physical, and social well-being. This vision contrasted sharply with the vision of public health focused on the avoidance of a single pathogen that mainstream public health adopted. The results of the lockdown focused public health are plain to see in the form of lost schooling for kids, shuttered businesses, inequality increased on a vast scale, and worse health. The lockdowns did not even prevent more than a million Americans from dying with COVID. We should have listened to Dr. Ladapo.”

—Jay Bhattacharya, MD, PhD, Stanford University professor of health policy

About the Author

---

intercept 8 23

hacked Records Corroborate Claims in Hydroxychloroquine Wrongful Death Suit

Micah Lee

Jeremy Parker died soon after taking the drug, which was prescribed to him by a physician with the anti-vaccine group America’s Frontline Doctors.

READ MORE →

==

ggl alert

july 27, 2023

The Suppression of Discussion Continues to Degrade Science

By Victor Fernandez

One of the primary aims of science, as it is ideally understood in high schools and universities, is to lift us from ignorance.

It generally advances by utilizing the tools of reason and the critical evaluation of evidence to make explicit a more comprehensible understanding of the physical world. Such a process also includes sharing data for peer analysis in an effort to arrive at the truth concerning some matter of fact or make successive approximations to it.

However, our present quest for such lofty goals has run into serious obstacles that thwart science’s revelations and processes.  And, although these obstructions have been ongoing for a number of years, some modern scientific publications have ironically proven themselves to be one of its greatest impediments.

On July 5, 2023, Dr. Peter McCullough among other clinical specialists published a systematic review of autopsy findings involving victims who died post-COVID vaccine onThe Lancetjournal’s preprint server.

They identified…“678 studiesand, after screening for our inclusion criteria, included 44 papers that contained 325 autopsy cases and one necropsy case…Most deaths occurred within a week from last vaccine administration.  A total of 240 deaths (73.9%) were adjudicated as directly due to or significantly contributed by COVID-19 vaccination…”

Dr. McCullough explains that the systematic review went through two sets of checks on the preprint server and that it was getting surges of downloads.  But the very next morning, The Lancet shut it down.  The study got censored.

Why?

The Lancet’s response is that the “study’s conclusions are not supported by the study methodology.” Curiously, they don’t say how.

Dr. McCullough says:

“This act of medical censorship occurred after the paper met all the criteria for listing on the Lancet Preprint Server… This speaks to the importance of our findings as the largest summary of autopsies after COVID-19 vaccination. Elsevier and Lancet are trying to suppress critical scientific observations on COVID-19 vaccine safety. Their actions are reprehensible.”

The Lancet was not alone in its rejection of the study.   The New England Journal of Medicine, and The Journal of the American Medical Association rejected the work within a few days and within an hour of submission, respectively, before finding its way to The Lancet.    

This is but a small example of how the process of science is being suffocated.

We need information, data, discussion and debate on things that have been discovered as well as of things of deep relevance to our lives.  And the massive COVID/vax - related injuries and deaths as revealed by VAERS certainly count among them.  There is no telling where the debate will lead, but at least there remains the possibility that productive courses of action can be taken to stay the hand of illness, motivate motions to address accountability, and redirect medical and scientific practices.

Apart from some scientific journals, lack of important data and discussion continue to take their toll among members of the media and its viewers.  Recently, Fox host Stuart Varney -- believing that 19 straight days above 110 degrees in Phoenix, Arizona is the result of climate change -- is surprised that climate skeptic and journalist Marc Moranodisagrees.  

“This is not outside the normal bounds of hot summer weather. Yes, it’s a record year. It could be one of the hottest, but here’s the thing… Joe Biden's EPA has a chart of the heatwave index going back to the 1930s.  The 1930s are probably 8 to 10 or 12 timeshotter in the United States than anything we’re currently seeing.” 

Not only did Biden’s EPA show that the 1930s heat waves were worse than such waves today, many studies have shown that the Roman Warming Period (250 BC to AD 400) and the Medieval Warm Period (10th to 13th centuries) were as warm or warmer than today.  The United Nations acknowledged this in 1990.  But, evidently the Medieval warming period proved too much an inconvenient fact as the data was altered and, ultimately, erased. 

Geologist Dr.David Deming of the Mewbourne College of Earth and Energy at the University of Oklahoma in a statement to a US Senate Committee of Environment and Public Works in 2006 recounts that in 1995 he received an email from a major researcher in climate change who said, “We have to get rid of the Medieval Warming Period.” Sadly, Michael Mann, and his fraudulent hockey stick graph, erased it by his omission of this well-documented period as well as the Little Ice Age (early 14th to mid 19 century), both of which contradicted the scope of his narrow, deceitful graph.  Such is the state of modern science. 

It gets worse.  Andrew Dessler of Texas A&M University has difficulty with anything contradicting the notion that today’s weather must be warmer than anything in the past.  So, what does he want?  He aims to remove the 1930s EPA heatwave records entirely (here and here).  

The root of this corruption is as long as it is depressing. Suffice it to say for now, that the depraved hand of Marxist cultural constructivists, their wicked march through the institutions, a compliantmedia,the Leftist drive for centralized, absolute power, along with decades of UN plots for a top-down bureaucratic Statehave played a role.  Scientists relying on funding from powerful doners also continue to present a host of conflicting problems. 

Fortunately, there are many who have fought and continue to fight this treachery on a number of fronts.  Besides the work of truly informed and battle-ready warriors like Mark Morano and Tom Heller, who take on the backward forces of climate alarmism, by 2009 there were 31,478 American scientists who had taken a stand against unfounded climate alarmism and signed the Global Warming Petition Project.  NOTE RENAME

“There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate.  Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that the increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.”

So much for the widely buzzed noise that97% of climate scientists agree with views surrounding Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW).  There is no such consensus, and honest scientists made sure to make the point.

And in the world of medicine there are also combatants like Dr. Peter McCullough and Dr. Simone Gold, founder and president of American Frontline Doctors, who on July 27, 2020 gathered a team of doctors and held a White Coat Summit press conference before the US Supreme Court.  AFD delivered accurate scientific data, notes on the law and defended human rights during a time when Covid fearmongering was festering the nation.  AFD has recently arranged for a new White Coat Summit this week on July 27th entitled, The Reckoning .

So, the fight is on.  And the fight is necessary, as an informed citizenry is a requisite for this democratic republic to succeed.

We are living in a time when degenerate and destructive forces have rooted themselves in dangerous positions of power and influence. But, because the march of a dispassionate search for truth cannot and will not be contained, we will notforever remain in ignorance. May those of us who love truth and freedom remain vigilant, as the dissecting blade of reason and courage slowly, butsteadily, slay the dragons of irrationality and deceit.

---

7 23

America’s Frontline Doctors are still standing.

Early in 2020, whisperings of a virus from Wuhan China soon erupted into a worldwide pandemonium of fear and confusion. On July 27, 2020, Dr. Simone Gold gathered a team of physicians who held both the necessary credentials and the relevant experience of treating actual patients with the Coronavirus. These brave doctors stood up against the monolithic machine of COVID propaganda, sharing thepowerful truth that early treatment was widely available and life-saving, and that panic and lockdowns were both unjustified and unacceptable…and America’s Frontline Doctors was born. This trumpet sound of truth, piercing the dark clouds of media fear-mongering and totalitarian government oppression, struck a chord within humanity, and the livestream of this original White Coat Summit skyrocketed past 20 million views in only 8 hours—an explosion never before seen—and then just as quickly was scrubbed from the internet by an ominously orchestrated Big Tech censorship operation…but the mirror of lies had been shattered.

It is time, once again, to make a stand.

America’s Frontline Doctors (AFLDS) has become The Trusted NameforIndependent Information, as they continue to deliver access to life-saving resourcesand empowering education in the defense of healthfreedom and civil liberties, both now fully under assault by government bureaucracythat has openly used the pretext of a “public health emergency” to encroach on and erase our Constitutional rights and due process. The propaganda campaign led by Fauci, the CDC, the FDA, the W.H.O.and others has been exposed by a still-growing torrent of revelations and post-pandemic data, and yet these bureaucrats continue their destructive reign, seemingly without any consequence for their proven failures and the mounting evidence of their corruption. WHITE COAT SUMMIT: The Reckoning is a crucial marker in the public dialogue and policy debate, asAFLDS brings an unmatched consortium of proven medical, scientific, and legal expertiseto present the truthful and complete picture of the great COVID debacle. We will bring the receipts,with extensive documented evidence and scientific study. We will bring the law, examining thesubversion of Constitutional due process, and the history of legal precedent that necessitates punishment for Crimes Against Humanity.And, we will bring the voice of the people, with petitions individually signed and submitted calling for necessary retribution and legitimate justice. On July 27, 2023, America’s Frontline Doctors will bring The Reckoning.

Physicians Group

Take Action to Hold Fauci Accountable for Crimes Against Humanity!

Sign Petition

---

---

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/03/06/matt-gaetz-bombardier-books-conservatism-00013383

in recent years, major publishers and their conservative imprints have grown increasingly skittish over conservative firebrands. Simon & Schuster dropped provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos in 2017 after controversial comments surfaced, and last year dropped Missouri Senator Josh Hawley for his support of the January 6 insurrection, stating that they could not “support Senator Hawley after his role in what became a dangerous threat to our democracy and freedom.”

As larger publishers have stepped away from such authors, newer ventures are stepping up to fill that void — including Post Hill Press, a Tennessee-based independent publisher founded in 2013, and its new conservative imprint, Bombardier Books. Bombardier was founded in 2019 by Adam Bellow, who left stints editing conservative imprints at HarperCollins and St. Martins in order, as he put it at the time, “to play a role in rediscovering what it means to be conservative at a time when ideological priorities are changing and political identities are in flux.”

So what does it mean to be conservative today? If Bombardier’s catalog is any indication, it would seem to be an increasingly extreme and unapologetic attitude. When Laura Loomer — a former candidate who ran in, and lost, former President Donald Trump’s Florida congressional district on a platform of Islamaphobia and was banned from social media — brought out her memoir, it was with Bombardier. When Scott Atlas, the largely discredited doctor who advised Trump’s Covid response from August to November 2020, sought to put out his side of the story, he did it through Bombardier. Controversial Congressman Matt Gaetz’s memoir, Firebrand: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the MAGA Revolution? Bombardier. More and more, Bombardier’s stock-in-trade is in the kinds of writers who are too controversial to be worth the headache for more established presses. As Bellow told the New York Times in April of 2021, “The reaction of people on the right to the cancellation of political books is to double down, so we have lots of books to publish.”

:{:{}:

}:

:{:{}:

As the title of the imprint suggests, these books are meant to be explosive; and Bombardier seems at first blush poised to become a clearinghouse for the right’s most radical ideas. The publisher, which did not respond to a list of questions about its sales figures, fact-checking process and whether it considers any authors too controversial, seemed as good a place as any to divine where the future of the conservative movement might be heading. So over the course of a few months, I read through 10 titles of Bombardier, including Robert Spencer’s Confessions of an Islamophobeand Benjamin Weingarten’s American Ingrate: Ilhan Omar and Progressive-Islamist Takeover of the Democratic Party. I also read a robust number of contrarian takes on the Covid-19 pandemic, from people like Scott Atlas (A Plague Upon Our House: My Fight at the White House to Stop COVID from Destroying America), The Federalist contributor David Marcus(Charade: The Covid Lies that Crushed a Nation), as well as I Do Not Consent: My Fight Against Medical Cancel Cultureby Simone Gold,a doctor who was an early and persistent champion for hydroxychloroquine, which has not been proven to work against Covid.

And I was deeply underwhelmed.

Again and again, what struck me while reading these books was how conservative they are — not in a political sense, but in the word’s more fundamental meaning. For an imprint whose logo is a stealth bomber, there’s very little stealthy about this enterprise, nor are these, in any rhetorical sense, real bombs being thrown. As some parts of the conservative movement and Republican party become more focused on the culture wars and attacking their liberal counterparts, Bombardier suggests this might be the end-point of those trend lines: a lot of posturing and bombast, and very little in the way of new ideas or even new approaches to old ones.

From the start, I was shocked by the quality. Unlike conservative imprints at major publishers like Broadside, or more established independent rightwing presses like Regnery, Bombardier’s titles display an almost open contempt for their readers. Gold’s book lacked any printing on the spine itself. Attorney Alan Dershowitz’s Trumped Up: How Criminalization of Political Differences Endangers Democracy,turns out, despite its title, to be a copy-paste assemblage of all manner of previously published op-eds, including Dershowitz’s musings on President Barack Obama’s Israel policy, the 2016 Democratic primary and other things that have nothing to do whatsoever with Trump or the book’s stated topic. The nicest thing I can say about the production of these books is that they appear to be spell-checked.

As for the ideas contained in these books, Spencer’s Confessions of an Islamophobe seems to be par for much of the course. Beyond its incendiary title, the book’s stated positions don’t veer too far from the standard rightwing talking points regarding Islam: It’s bad and dangerous, intolerant and violent, and poses a threat to Christians, Jews and women everywhere. These arguments are odious, to be sure, and they are often hypocritical. Spencer devotes a whole chapter, for example, attacking Islam as a homophobic religion, while of course remaining silent on American rightwing evangelicals’ attitudes on the LGBTQI community.

But what’s most salient about this attack on Islam is not its hypocrisy but how tired it is. The Dutch politician Pim Fortuyn was the first to articulate it from the right in 2002. From Dutch politician Geert Wilders to French politician Marine le Pen to Trump, the attack has been used so regularly it’s an old classic by now. Spencer’s treatment brings nothing new to it — not even additional vitriol or hate. The same goes for the rest of his arguments; Confessions of an Islamophobereads, at best, like a greatest hits piece.

Spencer’s only move is to embrace the label he’s long been given. “I am an Islamophobe,” he states at the book’s opening. “It’s true. I’ve denied it for years. But now I admit it.” Rather than make a new or convincing argument for his beliefs, the book’s primary goal is to attempt to destigmatize the term itself. This move is standard for how these books operate: take a position the right has focused on for years, albeit one where they’ve relied on euphemism and dog-whistle, and drop the pretense, trying to reclaim the critique.

Gaetz’s book, similarly, is in many ways an attempt to turn the most sordid aspects of political life into virtues. “Speaker of the House Paul Ryan once knocked me for going on TV too much,” he says in Firebrand’sopening pages, adding that it’s “impossible to get canceled if you’re on every channel … And if you aren’t making news, you aren’t governing.” The best these books have to offer, it seems at times, is nothing beyond ham-handed attempts to normalize abhorrent but already widespread attitudes.

In lieu of new ideas, what do such books offer their readers? Primarily, a rehash of current events. Nearly every book I surveyed — from Loomeredto I Do Not Consentto A Plague Upon Our House —was focused primarily on offering a blow-by-blow of the Trump years from the writer’s specific perspective. Gaetz’s Firebrandhas very little to offer by way of an ideology or a legislative agenda, but it fills this absence with name-dropping and gossip from Mar-A-Lago (the absolute horniness of Firebrand,with its depictions of making out in hot tubs in the presence of the Secret Service and condoms setting off metal detectors, would be revolting enough even if Gaetz was not under investigation for under-age sex trafficking). Marcus’ Charadeoffers a slanted re-telling of the past few years, with the overarching goal of convincing his reader that the initial Covid-19 lockdown of spring 2020 “must never happen again.”

This need to almost compulsively revisit and re-narrativize the past few years is not just repetitious or useless, though. What’s being done here is a very specific kind of work. As the country has been plunged into chaos and uncertainty in the past few years, we’ve seen how, on any given day, some new or shocking revelation might be enough to up-end anyone’s prior beliefs or convictions. The Covid-19 pandemic in particular has scrambled a number of rightwing talking points: vaccines are bad, for example, but Trump deserves credit for developing them so quickly. Retelling the events of the past two years is vital, then, in controlling the storyline: The chaos of the past has to be ordered and explained in an ideologically consistent manner.

Thus Atlas’ insistence that we all completely misunderstood the basic science of Covid-19 from the very beginning. “The more I studied the data and the literature,” he writes of his experience at the dawn of the outbreak, “the more obvious it became that basic biology and simple logic were missing from the discussion. Instead, fear had seemingly displaced critical thinking about the data already at hand.” Atlas’ contention that fears of the virus were overblown read as ludicrous in the wake of more than 900,000 deaths in this country alone, but the goal here is not to accurately describe reality. Rather, the goal is to offer a narrative that bridges — as best as is possible — the observable reality around us and the reader’s pre-established beliefs.

It’s in this sense that Bombardier’s books are most explicitly “conservative”: not in their ideology, per se, but in their attempts to conserve a movement. In recent years, the basic meaning of conservatism has been scrambled as Trump, an anti-free-trade, anti-intervention president seized the mantle of the Republican party. Then, the pandemic added a new anti-vax and anti-mask element to conservatism, usually at odds with the prevailing medical consensus.

One feels in these pages an active fight against a splintering of a movement, a reassurance that everything you saw and experienced confirms your prior convictions. These books are not here to throw bombs so much as they are to dispel doubt. Reading through Bombardier’s catalog, it’s hard not to think of Orwell’s line from 1984: “Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.” These are books that hope to control the future by obsessing on the recent past, attempting to make sense of everything that’s just happened in the hope of husbanding the fire of an ideologically confused movement.

The other theme that runs through these books, appearing again and again, is a fixation on “Big Tech.” Loomer’s book is the most obvious; it opens with the night she learned she was permanently banned from Twitter, and continues in that vein unabated for the rest of the book. A psychological portrait of someone addicted to social media, Loomer’s book alternates between blaming social media companies for making their platforms so addictive, and railing against them for banning her, until she resembles a junkie whose dealer has cut her off. “These companies scientifically manipulate their products to be alluring to us,” she writes at one point, “and then for dementedly trivial or blatantly partisan reasons, they take them away forever with no recourse or appeal possible.”

But this same theme appears in nearly every other book I read, in some form or another. Gold, watching her own misinformation scraped off of Youtube and other platforms, proclaims that we are “quite possibly watching free speech in its death throes,” going as far as to say that “Big Media and Big Tech have manipulated the social reality of America and Americans.” Gaetz likewise frets about how the right “tried to be polite conservatives for the past few decades, like quiet, well-behaved children in a church pew. But the big tech companies — Youtube, Facebook, Twitter (which shadowbanned and ‘labeled’ me)— have removed or demonetized our channels.”

Again, these accusations of censorship are nothing new, and seem especially odd when coming from people like Gaetz who are simultaneously demanding “Critical Race Theory” be banned from America’s classrooms. But this obsession with “Big Tech censorship” answers a more pressing question: Why are these figures writing books in the first place? As they’ve been banned from Twitter and Facebook, some of these writers have attempted to migrate to sites like Gettr, Gab, and Parler, but this is not a long-term solution. Their goal is not to linger in the cesspits of racist trolls and anti-vax gurus, but to get their voices heard in mainstream discourse. Publishers like Bombardier, which has a distribution deal with Simon & Schuster, may be the last hope for far-right figures to have a say in the public square — getting them table space at Barnes and Noble even as Twitter grows tired of them. Book publishing, in 2022, has become an alternative to social media for those who’ve worn out their welcome there.

Reading so many books that pretend to be shocking while serving up reheated talking points gives one a grudging respect for the older generation of rightwing media trolls like Ann Coulter. Coulter never had any new or interesting ideas either, but her rhetorical moves accomplished what they set out to do. By working a relentless mockery and derision toward the left, coupled with an air of splendid definitiveness about the rightness of her ideas, Coulter was effectively able to ridicule her political opponents while reassuring her readers that they were morally and culturally superior

Reading Bombardier’s pouters, who default to a sense of wounded grievance, it’s easy to see why Coulter’s schtick worked so well and for so long. But now, it seems, Coulter’s “Can you believe the Left is this stupid?” has transformed into Loomer’s “Can you believe the Left did this to me?” Even as she tries occasionally to make a case for someone other than herself, she can never quite get away from her own solipsism. “I am confident that by the end of this book, I’ll have persuaded you that it’s a big deal that companies like Facebook, Twitter, Google, and Apple have a power of veto over your social and professional life,” she writes, and then immediately adds: “And you might have a better understanding of why it has been so damaging to my life — and why I’m still recovering.”

This perpetually wounded air of grievance makes for rough reading when it’s repeated for 200 pages. It’s a posture that indicates a decadent and exhausted end of a movement’s fire and ideology, a spent force consuming itself with self-pity and recriminations.

It may be too early to know whether or not this attitude will pay off. Public sales figures of Bombardier books aren’t public, but sales of Gaetz’s Firebrandhave been fairly underwhelming, per his congressional financial disclosure, suggesting that he’s only sold a few thousand copies of the book.

But Bombardier may already be learning that pushing the edges of acceptable discourse while remaining palatable to the mainstream is a tough balance to maintain. Last year, it was announced that Post Hill (the publisher of which Bombardier is an imprint) was going to publish a memoir by Jonathan Mattingly — the police officer involved in the shooting of Breonna Taylor — until their distributor Simon & Schuster faced such a backlash that they refused to distribute it, leading Mattingly to ultimately part ways with Post Hill. But there’s always a new upstart ready to publish the figures too controversial for the mainstream; the book found a home with a new imprint, DW books, published by news site The Daily Wire.

This story has been updated to correct David Marcus’ role at The Federalist.

}:

---

11 22 boing

Simone Gold, the J6-rioting, Trump-loving founder of the Covid pseudoscience group America's Frontline Doctors (AFLDS), isbeing accused by her fellow quacks of using organization funds on private jet trips, a mansion, and her underwear-model boyfriend, according to The Daily Beast.

AFLDS is tearing itself apart in a fight over what Gold's rivals describe as her extravagant spending using the group's funds. The alleged purchases include $100,000 on a single private jet trip and $50,000 a month in Gold's personal expenses. Much of the controversy has centered on AFLDS's purchase of a $3.6 million mansion in Naples, Florida., where Gold lives with her boyfriend: a much younger underwear model and fellow Capitol rioter.

Gold isn't backing down, penning threatening emails to board members and describing herself, alternately, as a "popular folk hero," a "rainmaker," and an avenging "lioness."

---

CNP Action, Inc.

According to CNP's website, "CNP Action, Inc. is the 501(c)(4) sister organization of the Council for National Policy. Founded in 1987, CNP Action, Inc. serves as an advocate for conservative principles such as limited government, free economic enterprise, traditional values and a strong national defense. It promotes issues or specific pieces of legislation through regular Action Sessions and publications."[21] Beginning in April 2020, this organization began involved with strategies to reopen U.S. states despite the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.[22][23]

CNP Action Organized "Pro-Trump" Doctors To Legitimate Reopening Efforts

Associated Press reported on a May 2020 conference call between CNP Action and a senior staffer for Trump's reelection campaign, originally obtained by Center for Media and Democracy. In the leaked meeting, these operatives discussed "recruiting 'extremely pro-Trump' doctors to go on television to prescribe reviving the U.S. economy as quickly as possible" despite the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.[22] When asked about these efforts by AP, Trump campaign communications director Tim Murtaugh asserted he took no issue with contradicting the government's infectious disease experts. Murtaugh explained, "Our job at the campaign is to reflect President Trump’s point of view... We are his campaign. There is no difference between us and him."[22]

CNP Action Helped Coordinate COVID-19 Lockdown Protests

In April 2020, CNP Action "hosted weekly conference calls to coordinate coronavirus response tactics", working together with organizations including FreedomWorks, Open the States, ReOpen PA, The Save Our Country Task Force, and Tea Party Patriots.[23] The stated goal of Tea Party Patriots was to "share the stories of people who have been affected by the lockdowns, to show that we must be concerned with both sides of this crisis."[23]

CNP also shared information through email about attending in-person events, including an Eagle Forum-organized car protest at the Alabama Capitol Building and a lockdown protest at the Pennsylvania state capitol.[23]

---

---

an 7 22

on June 16th, 2022, America's Frontline Doctors founder Simone Gold was sentenced to 60 days in prison and one year of probation for her role in the January 6th, 2021 insurrection at the United States Capitol.

Gold was among the armed horde of former President Donald Trump's supporters that besieged the seat of American democracy while Congress was certifying President Joe Biden's Electoral College victory over Trump in the 2020 election.

Gold, an outspoken peddler of misinformation and conspiracy theories about COVID-19, was also ordered to pay a $9,500 fine "and another $500 to the Capitol architect to compensate for damage the rioters did to the building," according to MedPage Today.

READ MORE: 'Bold and brave' Cassidy Hutchinson showed how Republicans can avoid losing their souls: conservative

District of Columbia District Court Judge Christoper Cooper sternly reprimanded Gold over her lack of contrition.

"Sitting here today, I don't think you have truly accepted responsibility," he told her. "Your organization has used your notoriety to raise money to garner support for you in connection with the sentencing and for its general operations by mischaracterizing what this proceeding is all about ... telling your supporters that this is a political prosecution of a law-abiding physician that's designed to threaten and intimidate any American who dares to exercise their First Amendment rights."

Cooper also smacked down Gold's insistence that she was merely a proverbial fly on the wall.

"It is obvious from the video that we watched today that you were part of an angry and aggressive, I would say mob, crowd of people intent on getting past law enforcement and entering the East Rotunda through those doors," Cooper said. "Regardless of how the door got opened, the police were obviously trying to keep people out."

READ MORE: 'Like interviewing the Joker': Eric Swalwell predicts 'zero' value from Steve Bannon’s potential testimony

Nevertheless, Gold recently released a video in which she complained about having to face the consequences of her actions.

:{:{“As you probably have heard by now, I was sentenced for a misdemeanor trespass with a shocking 60 days in federal prison. It’s unheard of. I don’t know anyone who’s ever gone to prison for a misdemeanor, let alone misdemeanor trespassing for a nonviolent mid-career female. It’s unconscionable," Gold griped.}:

}:

"I'm here to say this tyranny is coming to our nation and that we need to have every person, first of all, be aware of it and to speak up about it. I do feel as though conservative voices have been, have allowed themselves to be completely silenced on the matter of January 6th defendants," Gold continued. "It is not right when one person loses their civil liberties illegally then it threatens all of us."

Watch here via Ron Filipkowski.

READ MORE: New Trump January 6th documentary outlines Ivanka balancing telling the truth against pleasing her father

The premise of Gold's argument – that she was merely exercising their right to free speech and seeking a redressing of her grievances – is familiar among suspected and convicted participants in Trump's coordinated attack on the federal government.

:{:{The first major problem with what Gold said, however, is that her remarks about misdemeanors not landing people in jail are untrue.}:

}:

According to a 2022 report published by the Prison Policy Initiative, "nonviolent" offenders make up a substantial portion of incarcerated Americans – to the tune of hundreds of thousands – regardless of whether they have been convicted or are still awaiting trial.

"It’s true that police, prosecutors, and judges continue to punish people harshly for nothing more than drug possession. Drug offenses still account for the incarceration of almost 400,000 people, and drug convictions remain a defining feature of the federal prison system. Police still make over 1 million drug possession arrests each year, many of which lead to prison sentences. Drug arrests continue to give residents of over-policed communities criminal records, hurting their employment prospects and increasing the likelihood of longer sentences for any future offenses," the analysis explains.

READ MORE: ['He betrayed his oath': Capitol Police sergeant unloads on Donald Trump in powerful editorial

"Nevertheless, 4 out of 5 people in prison or jail are locked up for something other than a drug offense — either a more serious offense or an even less serious one. To end mass incarceration, we will have to change how our society and our criminal legal system responds to crimes more serious than drug possession. We must also stop incarcerating people for behaviors that are even more benign," it states.

Furthermore, PPI adds, "the distinction between 'violent' and 'nonviolent' crime means less than you might think; in fact, these terms are so widely misused that they are generally unhelpful in a policy context. In the public discourse about crime, people typically use 'violent' and 'nonviolent' as substitutes for serious versus nonserious criminal acts. That alone is a fallacy, but worse, these terms are also used as coded (often racialized) language to label individuals as inherently dangerous versus non-dangerous."

The other glaring issue with Gold's defense is that the failed January 6th coup was, in fact, violent.

---

https://newrepublic.com/article/165984/10-people-destroying-democracy

Anne Nelson/April 18, 2022

10 People You’ve Never Heard of Who Are Destroying Democracy

They’re sowing disruption and disinformation, and they have their eyes on 2024.

Democracy in Peril

    [Will the Democrats Fight to Save Democracy?

    10 People You’ve Never Heard of Who Are Destroying Democracy

    The Six States That Could Determine Whether Republicans Steal the 2024 Election

    View All ]

In recent years, America’s democracy has faced countless challenges. Some seemed to materialize out of thin air, but many have been the fruit of secretive networks such as the 40-year-old Council for National Policy. Here are 10 individuals who have sown the seeds of disruption and disinformation—and who are setting their sights on the 2024 presidential election.

Larry Arnn

President, Hillsdale College

For decades, Michigan-based Hillsdale has served as an academic partner for the religious right. The college has had a close relationship to the Council for National Policy, the secretive Christian right umbrella organization that directs so much right-wing activism, through Arnn and his predecessor, George Roche III (who left in a cloud of scandal). Hillsdale’s major donors have constituted a who’s who of the radical right, including the Koch network and leading figures from the CNP. Arnn has expanded Hillsdale’s role as a platform for the CNP’s network of megadonors, fundamentalist activists, and media outlets, providing their policy prescriptions with a thin veneer of academic respectability. The college enrolls around 1,500 students, but its leaves an outsize footprint in political messaging. Its highly politicized publication Imprimis is sent to more than six million recipients. Hillsdale operates the Kirby Center in Washington, D.C., where it has groomed young conservatives at the Capitol Hill Staff Training School, run by the Leadership Institute (see Morton Blackwell, below). Hillsdale is also playing a role in the current disruption of public education, which has been used for political leverage in Virginia and beyond. In 2020, Donald Trump appointed Arnn chair of the 1776 Commission, to promote a “patriotic” rebuttal to the 1619 Project’s racially inclusive approach to U.S. history. Hillsdale has led an ongoing campaign to politicize public schools, promoting anti–critical race theory campaigns and assisting in the launch of “affiliate” charter schools in 11 states.

Joe Seales

CEO, Right Side Broadcasting Network

RSBN serves as the equivalent of a Trump-specific C-SPAN that has carried nearly every Trump speech, rally, and town hall since July 2015, as well as full coverage of the pro-Trump Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). It also broadcasts a show called The Right View, with Trump daughter-in-law Lara Trump. On January 6, it livestreamed Trump’s speech inciting the march on the Capitol, and it gave live coverage to the Florida “Freedom Rally to Show Support for President Trump and January 6th Political Prisoners” a year later. In July 2021, RSBN was temporarily suspended by YouTube, but the network looked to its own app and the new pro-Trump platform Rumble to continue to carry Trump’s rallies. The radical right has been assiduously constructing a parallel media system in recent decades. RSBN, Rumble, and Trump’s new Truth Social platform complement other media initiatives, ranging from traditional fundamentalist broadcasters like American Family Radio to social sites like Gettr and Parler, in the ongoing construction of an alternate political reality for millions of followers. In March 2022, after the height of the Ottawa truckers’ protests, RSBN promoted a truckers’ convoy roundtable hosted by Representatives Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene, and it has offered ongoing amplification of Trump’s false election fraud claims. We can be sure that whatever Trump fabricates for future news cycles, RSBN will be repeating it.

Introductory offer: 50% off fearless reporting.

1 year for $10.

Subscribe

Neil Patel

Co-founder and publisher of The Daily Caller

The Caller website was launched in 2010 by Patel and Tucker Carlson, his college roommate, with a $3 million investment from Patel’s fellow CNP member Foster Friess. (Carlson served as editor in chief until 2016 and left the publication in 2019, when Patel bought him out.) The site claims more than 20 million monthly readers, and the Daily Caller News Foundation licenses its content free of charge to almost 300 outlets. Patel has used the site as a platform for voices of the radical right, including Jason Kessler, the white supremacist who organized the Charlottesville rally, as well as climate denial and disinformation, such as a falsified “nude” photo of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The site favors members of the CNP, including Supreme Court spouse Ginni Thomas (a Caller “special correspondent”) and Turning Point USA’s Charlie Kirk. The Daily Caller has recently launched a Facebook video platform called American Voices, with three million followers, that partners with media platforms of the religious right. It also boosts Carlson’s Fox News broadcasts. The Caller’s YouTube channel features additional Carlson content, comedy and sports programming, as well as regular attacks on Joe Biden, Anthony Fauci, and CNN. It has given ample space to Trump’s false claims of election fraud, and positive coverage of voter suppression legislation.

Jenny Beth Martin

Co-founder and CEO, Tea Party Patriots

Martin launched the Tea Party Patriots in March 2009 in collaboration with Amy Kremer and Mark Meckler, with funding from FreedomWorks, a “grassroots service center” founded with Koch backing. The Tea Party Patriots spent the Obama administration organizing various “spontaneous” anti-government, anti-tax rallies. Martin, Meckler, and Kremer also joined the CNP; by 2020, Martin had risen to the executive committee and Meckler to the status of Gold Circle member. Martin’s Tea Party Patriots became the meeting ground for the secular Koch brothers and the Christian nationalist CNP. She became the go-to woman for organizing campaigns, including political canvassing and public protests. Martin was a key point person for the CNP in Trump’s reelection campaign. In April 2020, she organized “100 Business Executives” in support of Trump, along with fellow CNP members Adam Brandon of FreedomWorks and Lisa Nelson of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). Trump acknowledged Martin by name in his speech before the CNP on the eve of the 2020 GOP convention. On November 4, 2020, Martin announced that her organization was going to hold “Protect the Vote” rallies in swing states. On December 30, she tweeted that she would be speaking at the January 6 Stop the Steal rally: “We must demand Congress to challenge the Electoral College votes and fight for President Trump!” (Martin was present at the rally, but didn’t end up speaking.) Most recently, Martin has spoken out in support of the Canadian truckers’ protest. “We are all truckers now,” she told The Hill in February.

:{:{Simone Gold}:

Founder, America’s Frontline Doctors}:

Gold was an emergency physician in Los Angeles who was tapped by the CNP leadership to serve as a point person for a massive Covid disinformation campaign. The plan was advanced on a conference call in May 2020, while the pandemic was first raging, and after Trump held his increasingly erratic press conferences that included CNP president William Walton and Trump aide Mercedes Schlapp. The goal was to use physicians to persuade the public that the economy could be opened up in time to benefit the Trump campaign. Gold began a series of appearances on media platforms run by CNP members, disparaging the idea that Covid was a “huge medical crisis,” pushing the false hydroxychloroquine “cure,” and attacking Anthony Fauci.

On July 27, 2020, Jenny Beth Martin introduced Gold and a dozen colleagues standing before the U.S. Supreme Court building, repeating a litany of falsehoods about the virus. Their statements, livestreamed by Breitbart News, quickly went viral, and the video was enthusiastically retweeted by Donald Trump. On January 6, Gold joined the mob that breached the Capitol. She was recorded in the Rotunda denouncing the Covid vaccine as “an experimental biological agent deceptively named a vaccine.” She was charged with violent entry and disorderly conduct (she pleaded guilty in March and will be sentenced in June). Over 2021, she appeared in a series of “Health and Freedom Conferences” across the country, sharing the bill with Michael Flynn, Sidney Powell, and Mike Lindell. In 2020, she set up a profitable online prescription service for bogus Covid “cures.” GRIFT

Morton Blackwell

Founder and president, the Leadership Institute

Blackwell, Paul Weyrich, and Richard Viguerie were young Goldwater activists when they joined forces in the 1960s. Together, they helped to create a constellation of conservative groups, including the CNP umbrella organization and its partner CPAC. Blackwell took on the task of training future generations of right-wing political candidates and activists. His Leadership Institute, launched in 1979, claims that it has trained more than 200,000 people over its history, many of them in county- and state-level sessions in battleground districts. The courses include fundraising, speechwriting, social media, and candidate development. Graduates of the institute include Mike Pence, Representative Jim Jordan, and Project Veritas founder James O’Keefe. The institute’s training is ongoing, especially in contested states. In 2021, the GOP, noting that it needed to net only five congressional districts to take the House, targeted 47 districts, five of them in Texas. That year, the Leadership Institute blanketed Texas, scheduling around 40 training workshops between March and November 2021—many months before the midterm elections. The national Democrats, in contrast, have tended to enter the state campaign arenas a few months or even weeks before the elections, offering minimal training on the ground, limited digital campaign tools, and poorly coordinated data. The institute’s menu of courses reflects the right’s current initiatives, including School Board Campaign Training and a School Board Activist Workshop.

:{:{}:

Cleta Mitchell

Attorney}:

Mitchell is a longtime member of the CNP board of governors. More recently, she appeared on panels at 2020 CNP meetings speaking on “Election Integrity: Securing the Ballot Box” and “Election Integrity: Action Steps.” Mitchell also serves on the board of directors of the Bradley Foundation, run by fellow CNP board member Richard Graber. Following Biden’s victory, Mitchell tweeted that the Georgia recount was “A FAKE!!!” She traveled to Georgia as a volunteer legal adviser for Trump’s campaign and helped to file a December 2020 lawsuit challenging the returns. According to The Washington Post’s Robert O’Harrow Jr., “On December 30, Mitchell wrote to [then–White House chief of staff] Mark Meadows and offered to send some 1,800 pages of documents purporting to support claims of election fraud.” On January 2, Mitchell took part in Trump’s infamous call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, of whom Trump famously demanded, “I just want to find 11,780 votes.” The call was leaked, and when Mitchell’s role was disclosed, she was obliged to resign from her position at the Foley & Lardner law firm. But Mitchell continues her work through her strategy sessions at the CNP, her board membership at the Bradley Foundation, her Apple podcast Who’s Counting?, and her November 2021 appointment to the Board of Advisors of the federal Election Assistance Commission, which certifies voting systems—including voting machines—and advises local officials on compliance with federal regulations.

Richard Graber

CEO, Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation

This Milwaukee foundation has assets of some $900 million. Graber is a member of the board of governors of the CNP, while CNP election strategist Cleta Mitchell is one of the foundation’s 11 board members. The Koch network and the DeVos family philanthropies may have received more attention, but the Bradley Foundation’s strategic, longtime focus on state-level politics has allowed it to make a major impact, using its home state of Wisconsin as a laboratory. In 2012 to 2013, the foundation spent more than $8 million on a network of groups promoting a right-to-work law also supported by then-Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker (a fellow CNP board member) and attacking Wisconsin trade unions. The resulting right-to-work law crippled the unions and contributed to Wisconsin’s shift from a Democratic to a swing state. In 2021, the Bradley Foundation earmarked $600,000 for the American Legislative Exchange Council’s voter management campaign software and other activities, bringing its ALEC contributions to $5.4 million over the previous decade. In 2020 and 2021, the foundation gave $200,000 to the Claremont Institute. Claremont has played a critical role in the radical right’s promotion of false claims of fraud and the efforts to rewrite voting laws in advance of the 2024 elections; John Eastman, who drafted the infamous six-point memo used by Trump to challenge the Electoral College on January 6, is a Claremont senior fellow. The foundation also contributed $300,000 to the Public Interest Legal Foundation (chaired by Cleta Mitchell) and $175,000 to the Heritage Foundation’s election law initiative, both of which promoted Trump’s false claims of fraud.

Lisa Nelson

CEO, American Legislative Exchange Council

Nelson came to ALEC in 2014 after previous stints on Newt Gingrich’s staff and at GOPAC, the Republican state and local political training organization. ALEC was co-founded in 1973 by Paul Weyrich, also a co-founder of the CNP. ALEC convenes corporate sponsors and Republican state legislators to “collaborate” on model bills—including legislation to oppose environmental regulation and gun control. In April 2020, The Washington Post reported that Nelson, Jenny Beth Martin, and Adam Brandon were leading an effort to organize a group of businesspeople to help Trump “jump-start” the economy in the depths of the Covid epidemic. Nelson continued her efforts over 2020 and doubled down after the Biden’s victory. From December 2 to 4, 2020, ALEC hosted a secret “process working group” for Republican state legislators, election commissioners, and attorneys to develop strategies on election oversight and redistricting. In July 2021, ALEC hosted and financed an “academy” under the rubric of the “Honest Elections Project” in conjunction with its annual meeting, with panels featuring Cleta Mitchell and other CNP strategists. Nelson offered a preview of their project to rewrite election laws at the CNP’s May 2021 meeting: “We’ve been targeting our efforts on those states that have had issues—Pennsylvania, Michigan, Arizona, Florida to a certain degree.” Currently, Republicans control 30 state legislatures, including Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. If successfully implemented, the independent state legislature initiative could determine the outcome of the 2024 elections, regardless of the popular vote.

Daniel J. Schultz

Attorney and founder, Precinct Strategy

Schultz was an early proponent of the idea that Republican-controlled legislatures could overturn election results—later promoted as the “independent state legislature doctrine.” In some interpretations, Republican-controlled state legislatures could nullify the popular vote and send their own electors to put Trump in office. The key to his strategy? Purging from the Republican Party inconveniently ethical officials like Brad Raffensperger, starting at the precinct level. “We can take over the party if we invade it,” Schultz told Steve Bannon on his podcast in February 2021. Over the following months, there was a surge in candidates for precinct chairman positions across the country. Schultz has pointed to the strategy’s success in Arizona as a model. ProPublica reported that in one Maricopa district, the precinct roster grew by 63 percent in less than six months. Schultz’s website asks: “Can we get 3/10 of 1% of the 74 M Trump America Firsters to Become Republican Precinct Committeemen? To TAKE OVER The Republican Party? To Save the Republic?” He points out that precinct committeemen are the ones who elect the state party leaders and are the only ones who can vote to endorse primary candidates; in some states, they are the only ones who can nominate candidates to fill vacancies in state legislatures. The logic is that full slates of pro-Trump precinct chairs could guarantee pro-Trump candidates on the Republican state-level ballots in 2022, who could be activated to enact the independent state legislature doctrine in 2024—subject to judicial review. Donald Trump approves. On February 27, 2022, he issued a statement endorsing ­Schultz’s project.

Anne Nelson @anelsona

:{:{}:

Anne Nelson is the author of Shadow Network: Media, Money, and the Secret Hub of the Radical Right. She has taught at Columbia University for over 20 years and is currently a research scholar at Columbia’s Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies.}:

Read More: Magazine, May 2022, Politics, The Soapbox, Feature, Democracy, January 6, Republican Party, Donald Trump, Right Wing Extremism

---

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2021/05/doctor-lawyer-insurrectionist-the-radicalization-of-simone-gold/

no lnx pix

Doctor, Lawyer, Insurrectionist: The Radicalization of Simone Gold

“Those who have spent more time educating themselves tend to think they know better than other people.”

STEPHANIE MENCIMER MAY 6, 2021

The coronavirus is a rapidly developing news story, so some of the content in this article might be out of date. Check out our most recent coverage of the coronavirus crisis, and subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily newsletter.

When rioters broke into the US Capitol on January 6, chants of “Fuck the police!” “USA!” or “Treason!” echoed in the marble halls. When Dr. Simone Gold got inside the rotunda, she stepped over a velvet rope and announced to anyone who would listen, “I am a Stanford-educated attorney!”

Thus she distinguished herself among the motley crew of Proud Boys, MAGA types, and the QAnon shaman who paraded through the Capitol to overturn the 2020 presidential election, an event that left five people dead. Not only is Gold a Stanford-educated lawyer, she’s also a board-certified emergency room physician. Neither qualification prevented the FBI from coming to her Beverly Hills house on January 18 and arresting her. Nor did it make a federal grand jury think twice in early February before indicting her on five criminal counts, including entering a restricted building and obstructing an official proceeding.

The arrest marked the end of one chapter in her Icarian trajectory into right-wing fame. Before April 2020, Gold had been just another over-achieving Beverly Hills doctor. But with the arrival of the pandemic, she donned her white lab coat to protest lockdowns and promote President Donald Trump’s favorite unproven COVID treatment, the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine. It seems that’s all it took to find an enthusiastic audience among the MAGA faithful, putting her on a glide path to a certain kind of right-wing stardom. Conservatives who love to bash educated, liberal elites as out of touch quickly embraced Gold and gleefully touted her impressive credentials to support their attacks on public health measures designed to combat the pandemic. She sailed into their well-funded ecosystem, snagging speaking gigs, appearances on cable talk shows, and robust opportunities to fundraise.

Simone Gold, with John Strand (left) uses a bullhorn to address protesters in the US Capitol on January 6, 2021. Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty]

Within days of her first media hit, she had teamed up with tea party groups working with the Trump reelection campaign to demand that governors reopen the economy. Fox News put her on national TV to publicly denounce lockdowns and mask mandates as overblown responses to a disease she insisted wasn’t fatal to most people. In July, her new right-wing friends ushered her to meetings with members of Congress and Vice President Mike Pence. The sudden fame seems to have propelled her right up the steps and into the Capitol on January 6.

Her arrest highlights the role of conservative media in fomenting an insurrection, but Gold’s personal experience also illustrates what experts on extremism have long known: Education is no defense against radicalization. “If you think of who is susceptible of extremist ideology, people tend to think it’s people who don’t have much education,” says Don Haider-Markel, a University of Kansas political science professor who has studied extremism and radicalization. “That’s not the case at all. It tends to be more middle class and upper class. Those who have spent more time educating themselves tend to think they know better than other people.”

“If you think of who is susceptible of extremist ideology, people tend to think it’s people who don’t have much education, that’s not the case at all.”

In fact, much like the tea partiers of the Obama era, the Capitol insurrectionists were by and large an aging, middle-class mob. Researchers at the Chicago Project on Security and Threats at the University of Chicago have dug into the demographic profiles of hundreds of people charged with crimes related to the Capitol incursion. They’ve found that about 30 percent of the arrested rioters are white-collar professionals like Gold. Only about 13 percent were affiliated with traditional far-right militias or extremist groups like the Proud Boys, and only 7 percent were unemployed.

Even so, Gold still stands out from that well-heeled crowd, and not just because she’s a woman. (Women make up only about 15 percent of the Capitol defendants.) Of the more than 420 defendants the Chicago researchers studied, she is one of only two lawyers and the only doctor. That’s why it’s hard not to look at Gold’s CV and wonder: How does someone go from medical school to Stanford Law School to an FBI wanted poster?

Gold’s resume doesn’t scream budding far-right revolutionary as much as it reflects unusual precocity and ambition. Raised in a wealthy section of Long Island, New York, Gold, 55, likes to say that she trained as a physician at her father’s knee. Reuben Tizes, her father, was a doctor, a medical school professor, and even served as the Orange County, New York, health commissioner in the early 1970s. Her mother, Carol Tizes, was an elementary school teacher.

After graduating from the City College of New York at 19, she claims she was the youngest person in her graduating class at the Chicago Medical School in 1989. She obtained a California medical license in 1990 but then enrolled in Stanford Law School, graduating in 1993. “That was my idea of rebellion,” she told a religious broadcaster in August, explaining that her father had wanted all his children to be doctors. (They are.) Her legal prowess didn’t stand out much in Palo Alto, however. I reached out to a host of her Stanford Law classmates, but none of those who responded could recall much about Gold aside from her red hair.

Stanford Law School class photo]

The intervening decades between law school and her indictment were unconventional only in the ambition of her professional endeavors. In January 1997, she was admitted to the New York bar and then completed a residency in emergency medicine at the Renaissance School of Medicine at Stony Brook University. That same year, according to her LinkedIn profile, she served as a congressional fellow in DC and wrote speeches for the late Vermont senator James Jeffords, who famously left the Republican Party to become an Independent in 2001. (Susan Boardman Russ, who served as Jeffords’ chief of staff for 25 years before retiring in 2004, does not remember Gold.)

Over the past three decades, Gold has practiced emergency medicine at various hospitals in the LA area, but the lure of Washington seems to have endured. According to her LinkedIn page, in 2009, she worked in DC as an assistant to Michael Oren, then Israel’s ambassador to the US, who credited her in print for stories she helped him research for the Wall Street Journal and New Republic. Oren told Mother Jones that he had no memory of her working for him, nor did anyone on his staff.

In Los Angeles, Gold married businessman Larry Gold and had two children. Active in the Los Angeles Jewish community, she and her husband once provided a glowing testimonial for a local mohel for the bris he performed for their son. A 2003 Jewish Journal article featured Gold and her then two-year-old son in a story about “Shalom Time” at a local bookstore. She and her husband donated thousands of dollars to their children’s private, conservative Jewish day school in Beverly Hills, where Gold volunteered on the PTA, managing the shabbat swap one year.

But by 2010, Gold had filed for divorce. Los Angeles County court records suggest that her relationship with her ex-husband was somewhat contentious. In 2017, a judge ordered them to attend mediation over child custody and visitation issues. (Larry Gold declined to comment for this story other than to say that he was “shocked” to learn about his ex-wife’s participation in the events at the Capitol.)

“As a C-Suite Physician, Dr. Gold works the same way as a highly effective Fortune 100 CEO…all with an eye toward fixing her client’s exact problem.”

In her October 2020 book I Do Not Consent: My Fight Against Medical Cancel Culture Gold writes, “I have always worked with the poor and underserved,” treating ER patients in places like Inglewood, California, which she describes as a “low-income, gang-ridden majority-minority city that provided the setting for the tough 1991 drama Boyz N the Hood.” She does not, however, include any mention of her services as a pricey “concierge physician,” which she advertised on her now-defunct personal website: “As a C-Suite Physician, Dr. Gold works the same way as a highly effective Fortune 100 CEO…all with an eye toward fixing her client’s exact problem.” Gold charged $5,000 for an initial appointment and between $25,000 and $50,000 for ongoing consultations.

The concierge medical practice is just one of several business enterprises she attempted to launch over the years—including MedicaLife, a short-lived lifestyle magazine for doctors that launched in 2006 and folded in 2008. (“Confessions of a Hospital Fundraiser,” teased one cover mockup.) In 2017, Gold started a company called Gold Healthcare Solutions that advertises assistance to hospitals facing government audits. Until recently, the company website listed as CEO the venture capitalist Howard Sherman, who’s married to the actress Sela Ward and who ran in the Mississippi Democratic primary for the US Senate in 2018.

When I asked Sherman about his role at the company, he replied in an email: “I have ZERO relationship with Dr. Simone Gold’s company. I work in the medical device world and at one time she approached me with an idea she had that I vetted with some of my contacts. I was not able to achieve the kind of interest she wanted so we stopped talking about the project.” His name and photo were subsequently removed from the company website.

Lots of people flame out in business, get divorced, and don’t end up storming the Capitol. But Haider-Markel says that those who do become radicalized are searching for broader meaning in their lives or a sense of identity. “Oftentimes there is a precipitating event. They lose a partner. They have a financial crisis,” he says. “They develop some grievance around that and connect that to a broader social movement.” If Gold was looking for a mid-life reboot, the heady mix of the pandemic, President Trump, and right-wing media provided the perfect catalyst.

The moment that “changed my life completely,” she told a California KGET TV reporter in January, took place in April 2020. She had been treating COVID patients in Los Angeles emergency rooms with President Donald Trump’s favorite unproven COVID cure, hydroxychloroquine, just a few weeks after the president had announced that the FDA would be fast-tracking emergency use authorization for the drug for COVID treatment. Trump called it “a game changer,” despite warnings from the FDA that the anti-malaria drug may cause heart rhythm problems in some people.

Gold was enthusiastic about the drug’s treatment possibilities. In her book, she describes how, after extensive research, she had used hydroxychloroquine to cure a woman suffering from mild COVID. “I had expected to get kudos,” she writes. “Instead I was met with hostility.” The hospital medical director challenged her independence and dressed her down for prescribing a drug that wasn’t indicated for outpatients. Gold argued she had science to back her up, and cited the drug’s long safety profile. Unpersuaded, the medical director threatened to fire her if she ever prescribed the drug to an outpatient again.

For most of her life, Gold doesn’t seem to have been politically active. She donated $1,000 to the campaign of Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) in 2019, but before that, the only other federal candidate to whom she gave money was a Democrat—California Rep. Raul Ruiz—in 2011. “I have never considered myself a political person. I’ve supported both parties at various times in my life,” she says in her book. “I’d fall in the middle of any partisan test. I don’t believe in the right-left distinction…That’s the trouble with being in the middle of the road. Sometimes you get run over.”

“That’s the trouble with being in the middle of the road. Sometimes you get run over.”

But after the hospital threatened to fire her over her prescribing practices, Gold picked a lane. On April 14, she called Dennis Prager’s radio show. Prager has been broadcasting in LA since 1982, but he has become an important though underappreciated part of the modern right-wing infrastructure thanks to his online Prager University. Popular with young people and the alt-right, Prager U publishes five-minute tutorials on everything from climate change to economics. The videos are designed to promote “Judeo-Christian values.” (A sampling: “The Dangers of Islam” and “Just Say Merry Christmas.”)

Identifying herself as an ER doctor, Gold described her success at treating patients with hydroxychloroquine and voiced dismay that medicine was becoming so politicized that a perfectly safe drug could not be dispensed by doctors without controversy. “The science has taken a backseat to the hatred of the president,” Prager commiserated.

A week later, Gold made a series of Twitter videos, a platform that she had rarely before used, to share her experience “practicing emergency medicine in this era of the COVID-19 crisis.” Standing in her white lab coat in front of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center—a hospital she didn’t work at—Gold panned the camera over the quiet grounds. “It’s really quite empty. The emergency department volume is down,” she says. “The patient census is down.”

Gold wasn’t entirely wrong about the hospital census but her causality was off. Hospitals all over the country, including in California at that time, were relatively empty because elective surgeries were canceled and fear of the virus kept people out of the ER. Doctors and nurses would soon be laid off. In her book she describes how her own hospital hours were cut by 30 percent. She doesn’t say how much this may have hurt her bottom line, but in June, her medical practice received more than $150,000 in federal bailout loans, suggesting the lockdowns caused a personal budget deficit large enough to turn many a doctor into an activist.

[PODCAST

Listen to Stephanie Mencimer chart Simone Gold's path to radicalization in this episode of the Mother Jones Podcast:]

None of her videos garnered more than 12,000 views but they hit a certain zeitgeist, as conservatives and conspiracy theorists alike pushed the idea that virus cases were overblown and some people in the government were using COVID to take away individual freedom and undermine President Trump. Three weeks earlier, Fox News radio host Todd Starnes had gone to a Brooklyn hospital and made a video claiming that the emergency room was empty. “I’m afraid that the mainstream media has been overblowing the coverage here,” he narrated. “There’s been a lot of fear mongering going on.” With help from a QAnon enthusiast, the video spawned the hashtag #filmyourhospital and prompted a host of right-wing figures like failed California congressional candidate DeAnna Lorraine Tesoriero to rush to their nearest hospitals to make their own “empty hospital” videos weeks before Gold did.

Even in such a climate, Gold’s white coat stood out, and she managed to catch the attention of one particularly influential audience member: Jenny Beth Martin, the co-founder of Tea Party Patriots.One of the largest of the original tea party groups that arose to oppose President Barack Obama, Tea Party Patriots encompasses a trio of nonprofit groups funded by wealthy conservatives and conservative foundations like Donors Trust. A Tea Party Patriots super-PAC also raised $1.2 million to help reelect Trump in 2020.

Martin was dialed into the Trump White House—so much so that she would later join Trump’s Georgia legal team to help overturn the 2020 presidential election, even though she’s not a lawyer. Early in the pandemic, she was working with a newly formed Save Our Country Coalition to help oppose lockdowns and defend Trump’s handling of the pandemic, along with powerful conservative organizations such as the Heritage Foundation and the American Legislative Exchange Council. She is also the executive committee secretary of the Council for National Policy, a secretive but powerful religious-right organization that was working with the Trump reelection campaign to find doctors to help burnish the president’s approval ratings.

Gold was just the sort of surrogate they had been looking for.“I reached out to her and said, ‘Hey, I’m working on this effort and I’d like to talk to doctors,’ and we started emailing and talking, and as things have developed and she watched the virus, things have evolved,” Martin later explained to Yahoo News. The pair met in April, and Gold asked Martin to deliver a letter she’d written to Trump, calling the lockdowns a “mass casualty event,” which she’d been urging other doctors to sign. More than 400 had.

With lightning speed, Martin put Gold on the ready-made conservative media grievance circuit. On May 19, Tea Party Patriots hosted a conference call with conservative media luminaries, including Fox News’ Ed Henry and Breitbart News, featuring Gold and a handful of other doctors who had signed Gold’s letter to Trump. On the call, Gold described the hidden victims of the lockdowns, including a woman she’d treated who’d fallen and broken her hip and shoulder while trying to color her own hair because she couldn’t go to a salon. “I just feel that’s there’s a very big disconnect between what the average American thinks is going on and what’s actually going on,” Gold said.

The call sent Gold on a grand round of media hits with all of the biggest names in the MAGA firmament—former Trump White House adviser Sebastian Gorka, Glenn Beck, Turning Points USA founder Charlie Kirk—and ultimately with some of the major stars of Fox News. In early July, Fox host Laura Ingraham had Gold on her show to promote her favorite drug as an over-the-counter COVID cure. “This is like a medical cancel culture applied to this particular medication,” Ingraham said sympathetically, conflating some cherished conservative points of fury.

“Shouldn’t you as a practicing physician with a medical degree be allowed to express your views on science as you practice it without being censored?”

It’s probably hard to overstate just how much of a role conservative media played in nudging Gold towards insurrection. University of Maryland psychology professor Arie W. Kruglanski is a co-author of the book The Three Pillars of Radicalization. In his research on extremist networks across the globe, he identified three crucial factors in political radicalization: a need to feel significant, a narrative to follow, and a network that supports and validates that narrative. “It’s difficult to become very glamorous or glorious as an emergency room doctor,” Kruglanski told me. Gold’s splash into right-wing media, he says, probably fulfilled all three of the pillars. “This is sort of an overnight stardom. She has the narrative, and she now has the network that supports her.”

Gold really hit the big time in July. After brainstorming with Martin, Gold helped Tea Party Patriots convene an “America’s Frontline Doctors” summit in DC, an event that resembled the “white coat” protests Martin had organized back in the tea party heyday to oppose the Affordable Care Act. The two-day summit garnered almost no media attention until the very end, when Gold and about a dozen white-coated physicians appeared on the steps of the Supreme Court to talk about “medical cancel culture” and spent nearly 45 minutes making misleading claims suggesting that COVID can be prevented and cured with, no surprise here, hydroxychloroquine. Most of them had never treated a COVID patient; ophthalmologists were overrepresented in the group. And one was really out there: Stella Immanuel, a Houston doctor who believes that some gynecological problems are caused by having sex with demons. “You don’t need masks. There is a cure,” she said. “Nobody needs to get sick.”

President Trump and his son Don Jr. retweeted a video of the event and it went viral, receiving more than 16 million views in a matter of hours before Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter took it down for spreading misinformation. Twitter even blocked Don Jr. from using his account for most of the day.

Simone Gold’s summer media splash included big names: Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, Laura Ingraham and Ed Henry, plus Turning Points USA founder Charlie Kirk, Glenn Beck, and conservative talk radio host Dennis Prager.

Gold has claimed that the California hospital she worked for promptly fired her for appearing in the video, and says she hasn’t practiced medicine since. But the episode provided her with instant celebrity as a victim of Big Tech censorship, a credential even more beloved by conservative media than her white coat and fancy law degree. The next day, Gold accompanied Martin to meet with Vice President Mike Pence to press for emergency-use authorization for hydroxychloroquine and talk censorship. The day after that, she appeared on Tucker Carlson’s Fox News show, one of the most watched prime-time cable news shows, with more than 3 million regular viewers.

On the show, Carlson expressed outrage that Gold’s hospital had fired her. “Shouldn’t you as a practicing physician with a medical degree be allowed to express your views on science as you practice it without being censored?” he asked.

Gold agreed and then seized the opportunity to make her case for hydroxychloroquine to Carlson’s millions of viewers. “Look, I majored in Russian History. I don’t know anything about hydroxychloroquine,” he told her in response. “I do know about the way the country is supposed to work, and physicians should be allowed to explain their experiences, their clinical experiences, treating patients and you’re not allowed to because Joe Biden getting elected is more important, and that’s scary.”

In a sign of how far down the far-right rabbit hole she’d already gone by then, Gold told Carlson that because of “some negative things” people had said since the video aired, she had retained attorney and conspiracy theorist L. Lin Woodto put “to rest anything people want to say that’s defamatory.” Wood would later join with Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani to file a host of baseless lawsuits to try to overturn the presidential election.

By early fall, it was clear that Gold’s original analysis of the pandemic was mostly wrong. The virus spiked across the country and researchers declared hydroxychloroquine useless for treating COVID. Even Trump didn’t take it when he got sick. As her prospects in medicine dimmed, Gold seems to have become too toxic even for Fox News, which hasn’t had her on the air since July. She had turned America’s Frontline Doctors into a more traditional nonprofit organization, complete with website, spokesperson, and white papers decrying various alleged flip-flops by Anthony Fauci. But in her quest for publicity, Gold had to dive even deeper into the far-right fever swamp.

For the next few months, Gold gave interviews to or public speeches with QAnon conspiracy theorists, white nationalists, B-list talk show luminaries, and a few politicians, including Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), a “stop the steal” movement promoter affiliated with far-right militia groups that were part of the Capitol riots. She even went on the Patriot Radio show hosted by Matt Shea, a former Washington State legislatorwho has been involved in a number of armed federal standoffs, including the takeover of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in 2016 led by Ammon Bundy. Associated with Christian nationalists, Shea has written a manifesto calling for a fundamentalist holy war, in which non-Christian males would be killed if they didn’t submit to Biblical law.

The Jewish doctor chatted happily with him about vitamins and the value of exercise in preventing COVID. “Before I was called a quack and a fraud, people used to clap for me for working out there on the front lines,” Gold lamented, before encouraging people to give up masks and to freely gather for the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday.

But Gold found her most loyal audience among evangelical Christian prosperity preachers, many of whom had refused to close their church doors during the lockdowns and were vaccine skeptics. After big tech companies pulled down the doctors’ video in July, it was rebroadcast by Daystar, the second-largest Christian TV network in the country. Since then, Gold has made at least six different appearances on the network founded by televangelists Marcus and Joni Lamb—and those visits have paid off.

In mid-August, when she headlined the Lambs’ program “Ministry Now,” along with the anti-vaccine activist Robert Kennedy Jr,Marcus Lamb made a surprise announcement: He was issuing a $10,000 matching challenge from Daystar for donations on Gold’s behalf. “I know that you lost your job and now it may be that God has placed something else in your heart to where you’re gonna make a stand,” Joni Lamb told Gold. “It’s going to take money to do that.” In October, Gold returned to chat with the ladies of “Joni Table Talk,” Daystar’s televangelical version of “The View.” Over coffee with the hosts, Gold thanked “the whole Daystar family for being so generous,” and talked about the small donations from viewers she’d received. “It really adds up,” she said gratefully. “It gave me some breathing room to keep fighting for advocacy.”

“I know that you lost your job and now it may be that God has placed something else in your heart to where you’re gonna make a stand. It’s going to take money to do that.”

Evangelical churches were especially receptive to Gold’s anti-vaccine advocacy, which she pivoted to as hydroxychloroquine faded as a right-wing cause célèbre. Three days before the Capitol riot, Gold appeared at a religious revival event in Tampa, Florida, billed as an “open air mass healing and miracle service,” run by Rodney Howard-Browne. A conspiracy theorist, Howard-Browne has appeared on Alex Jones’ far-right site InfoWars and has called the mass shooting in Christchurch, New Zealand, a “false flag” operation. He was arrested in March for holding religious services in violation of a stay at home order. Gold took the stage before a room full of people without masks and gave an hour-long speech, where she decried the evils of the “experimental biological agent,” better known as the COVID vaccine. She said it’s being tested on minority communities that have been prioritized for vaccines, which she dubbed “pure racism.”

“They are making an overt and covert attempt to push this heavily on Blacks and browns,” she warned. “If you take the vaccine, you’re signing up to be in a pharmacovigilance tracking system.”

For most of 2020, the formerly apolitical Dr. Gold was able to separate her personal crusade for “health freedom” from the presidential election that provided the backdrop to the fight over lockdowns and hydroxychloroquine. She rarely touched on the subject in public other than to suggest that “Orange Man bad” and not science drove opposition to the anti-malaria drug. But whether Gold realized it or not, the battle over the drug was less about health care policy and more of a proxy war over Trump and the future of democracy.

Trump’s loss to Joe Biden in November was a blow to Gold’s cause, as polls showed voters resoundingly rejected his handling of the pandemic, which embraced much of what Gold advocated. It also put her on a collision course with the “stop the steal” movement that metastasized after the presidential election, as her tea party and evangelical benefactors quickly backed Trump’s effort to brand the election as illegitimate and overturn the results. Gold’s Stanford law degree suggests she is smart enough to know a big lie when she sees one, but “stop the steal” was where the action was, not to mention the speaking gigs and fundraising ops she now relied on for her livelihood since her medical career cratered. Once she started down the MAGA path, there was no turning back.

When Trump supporters first converged in DC on November 14 at the “Million MAGA march” to contest the election results, Gold was right there with them, along with other Trump die-hards like Mike Lindell, the MyPillow guy who helped bankroll the march; Sebastian Gorka, and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green, the Georgia congresswoman who’d expressed support for the QAnon conspiracy theory. “You do not give up your inalienable rights just because there’s an epidemic,” Gold shouted from the Supreme Court steps, warning that the government was using an “age-old tactic” to seize power by scaring people with a disease that she said causes mostly mild illness. “Do not live in fear. Be joyful, be happy, go forward!”

The event was advertised on the neo-Nazi website, the Daily Stormer, and drew hordes of militia outfits and white nationalist groups like the Proud Boys and Nick Fuentes’ Groypers. The rally descended into violence; 21 people were arrested on assault and gun charges, and one person was stabbed.

:{:{}:

}:

That didn’t stop Gold from coming back to DC to speak with many of the same people at the January 5 “stop the steal” rally at Freedom Plaza—the warmup to the main event at the Capitol, organized by Ali Alexander, a convicted felon and conspiracy theorist. Speakers represented a parade of far-right figures ranging from anti-abortion activists to former Trump adviser Roger Stone. Standing under an umbrella held by a man in a “Baby Lives Matter” shirt, Gold said to the crowd, “I’m here to ask you a personal question: Why are you here?…I believe the reason you are here is the same reason I am choosing to be here. Because we all have recognized a blatant assault on the rule of law… We are sick and tired of being lied to.”

Kruglanski isn’t surprised that Gold would move from promoting a bogus COVID cure to joining with people who thought the election had been stolen. “In many cases the radical groups first shower you with love without you even accepting their ideology,” he explains. “But once you are accepted by the group, to maintain your good standing in that community you’ve got to accept their narrative.”

The next day Gold was scheduled to speak again at the “Wild Protest” organized by Alexander near the White House, along with Tea Party Patriots’ Jenny Beth Martin and Brandon Straka, founder of the Walkaway Campaign that urges Democrats to quit the party.(Straka was also later arrested for entering the Capitol.) But the speeches were inexplicably canceled, and instead, protesters heeded Trump’s call to march on the Capitol while Congress and the vice president were certifying the results of the 2020 election. Gold joined them.

She was accompanied by John Strand—an international underwear model who serves as the communications director for America’s Frontline Doctors. Strand, 38, had been part of regular Beverly Hills “freedom protests” against the lockdowns over the summer and now lives with Gold. On the steps of the Capitol, he tweeted, “I am incredibly proud to be a patriot today, to stand up tall in defense of liberty & the Constitution, to support Trump & #MAGAforever, & to send the message: WE ARE NEVER CONCEDING A STOLEN ELECTION.”

Lawyers generally know that after engaging in a potentially criminal act, it’s best to stop talking publicly about it. But Gold apparently couldn’t resist the siren call of an interview with the Washington Post. In a January 12 story, Gold admitted to being inside the Capitol on January 6. “I can certainly speak to the place that I was, and it most emphatically was not a riot,” she said, explaining dubiously that she thought it was legal to go inside. “Where I was, was incredibly peaceful.”

Simone Gold (top left), on the FBI poster that became fodder for internet sleuths, who quickly ID her and posted videos like these online.]

“Peaceful” is not a word the FBI used in court filings to describe where Gold was that day. According to an FBI agent, Gold and Strand were photographed “in a large crowd attempting to push past multiple officers blocking the entrance to the Capitol, which had visibly broken windows at the time. One of the officers, who had been pinned near the doors to the Capitol, appears to be pulled down by someone in the crowd and lands near where Strand and Gold were standing.” Videos and still photos also show the pair pressed up against the door to the House chamber where law enforcement was trying to block them. Gold told the Post that she worried that those photos and videos would impact her ability to advocate the America’s Frontline Doctors. “I do regret being there,” Gold admitted.

Her regret is understandable. For days, an image of her standing in the Capitol Rotunda with a bullhorn appeared on an FBI wanted poster seeking help identifying people who participated in the insurrection. Five days after her interview with KGET, FBI agents went to her Beverly Hills house and arrested her and Strand. A DC federal grand jury indicted her on February 5. By then, L. Lin Wood was facing disbarment efforts in Georgia, where authorities have demanded a mental health evaluation after he called for Vice President Mike Pence to be executed. He was thus unavailable to defend Gold.

So why did she do it? It’s impossible to know what combination of impulse, exhilaration, and conviction led Gold to follow a mob into the US Capitol. She did not respond to multiple requests for an interview, but there are a few likely dynamics at work. Let’s start with her own reflections on what happened, which were surprisingly uncomplicated: “When you’re crossing the street and the light turns green, you go,” she said in an interview with KGET. Shaking her head somewhat ruefully, she added that she came up with the “genius” idea to give the speech she had planned to deliver at the canceled rally. “I…I just wanted to,” she stammered. “Someone had a bullhorn. I asked to use it. Those of us who were there believe the election is completely fraudulent. We just kind of wanted to be heard.”

“Someone had a bullhorn. I asked to use it.”

Several months before her arrest, she foreshadowed her new militancy. “Not everyone can, or should, turn to political activism. I fully understand those who point out the negative consequences this approach can have for one’s career and personal life,” she wrote in her book. “Going along with the crowd in times of fear and uncertainty present their own pitfalls, as we have seen. In Judaism we often ask ourselves, ‘What does God expect of me in this situation?’ It’s this emphasis on action that is essential to the Jewish faith. Trust in God, believe in yourself, and courageous conduct will follow.”

It is always perilous to engage in psychoanalyzing a relatively public figure, even one who seems to be having a midlife crisis in plain sight. And yet, Haider-Markel says that while most people don’t react to personal existential crisis by storming the Capitol, it might not be that surprising that Gold did. Many people who’ve spent a long time investing in their own education and status tend to socialize with others—like, say, in the PTA of an exclusive Beverly Hills private school—who have the same or similar credentials. In these circles, they discover that the very qualities that once made them special, all those degrees and awards they worked so hard to attain, are just the ticket to admission. Where will their prestigious resume still stand out?

Simone Gold poses as a hostage for a video she made framing her as victim of government persecution. With co-defendant John Strand (left) and former professional boxer and current Nevada cannabis lawyer Joey Gilbert, a member of the “legal eagle dream team” at Gold’s America’s Frontline Doctors.

Few paths to fame are as reliable as switching sides. Conservatives claiming to represent “we the people” love to dump on professional expertise and fancy pedigrees in latte liberals—just listen to Fox’s Tucker Carlson repeatedly mock MSNBC host Joy Reid for having gone to Harvard. But when someone with fancy degrees and professional credentials abandons their over-educated tribe and converts, the right-wing superstructure will shower them with love—and money.

Others in right-wing politics share similar credentials as Gold’s—think Texas Sen. Ted Cruz (Princeton, Harvard Law), or Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley (Stanford, Yale Law),both of whom worked to overturn the election of President Joe Biden. But as senators, Cruz and Hawley are still very much part of the establishment. Their extremism is checked by their need to fundraise and get reelected.

Experts say that far-right radicalism of the sort on display on January 6 and elsewhere over the past year has strong parallels not in Cruz’s “defund the IRS” agenda but in Islamic radicalism, which studies have shown is full of doctors, engineers, and other professionals, even in the United States. In 2017, the Chicago Project on Security and Threats studied more than 100 people in the US, mostly American citizens, who’d been prosecuted for perpetrating a domestic attack on behalf of ISIS or going to fight for the Islamic State in Syria. They discovered that, like the Capitol rioters, two-thirds of the defendants had a college education.

Kruglanski notes, too, that many of the leaders of the neo-Nazi “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville in 2017, which left one woman dead and scores injured, were college educated, including Richard Spencer, who has a BA from the University of Virginia, a masters from the University of Chicago, and spent two years working on a PhD in modern European intellectual history at Duke University before leaving to “pursue a life of thought-crime.”

“You do not have to be poor and left behind to embrace these theories,” Kruglanski told me.

When it comes to real extremism, as opposed to political grandstanding, Gold much more resembles Stewart Rhodes than Ted Cruz. Rhodes is the founder of the Oath Keepers, the far-right militia group of which about a dozen members have been charged with crimes related to the Capitol riot. Rhodes was there that day, too, but unlike Gold, he was smart enough to stay out of the building. If he had gone in, he could have joined her in the rotunda and announced, “I am a Yale-educated attorney.”

Gold’s initial regret about her actions at the Capitol has given way to defiance as she returned to the lecture circuit, where she has reframed herself as a victim, and her prosecution as an assault on free speech. On their podcast recently, she told sympathetic Newsmax hosts Diamond and Silk that she looks forward to making her case to a jury. The vaccine rollout has also provided fresh opportunities for spreading misinformation in her ongoing crusade against “medical discrimination” through America’s Frontline Doctors.

Evangelical groups have continued to shower her with Biblical hospitality. At the end of March, Gold took her anti-vaccine schtick to Coeur D’Alene, Idaho, a hotbed of far-right extremism, where she spoke at the “Steeling the Mind” conference put on by Compass International, a Christian ministry founded by Bill Perkins. Perkins is part of the “young earth” creationist movement, ties reflected in the conference lineup, where Gold’s fellow speakers explored such topics as whether “When God created the earth in six, 24-hour days, was that 7-day creation week God’s template for 7,000 years of humans on earth?”

The evangelical anti-vaccine circuit has put Gold back in close quarters with people who helped set the stage for the siege at the Capitol. In mid-April, Gold appeared at a two-day “health and freedom” conference in Oklahoma at the Rhema Bible College that ended with a mask-burning ceremony. There, she took the stage along with many others who’d been involved in the “stop the steal” efforts after the election, including Michael Flynn, Sidney Powell, and L. Lin Wood.

In her speech, Gold announced that her America’s Frontline Doctors was setting up a legal task force to help people fight pandemic-related restrictions and vaccine passports.The audience cheered when she introduced her “legal eagle dream team” member Leigh Dundas. A Scientologist, an anti-vaccine activist, and far-right agitator from Orange County, California, Dundas also happened to be at the Capitol on January 6. She can be seen in videos not far from the QAnon shaman, yelling “Traitor! Traitor! Traitor!” at the police. After getting tear gassed outside, she went back to a nearby stage where she implored people to “stand the hell up! Because you are far better off fighting on your feet and being prepared to die on your feet than living a life on your damned knees. Fight on.”

Like any good victim of cancel culture, Gold is also fundraising. For weeks after her arrest, the America’s Frontline Doctors website featured a popup box that said, “Dr. Gold and her Communications Director were arrested by the FBI in an extremely aggressive manner. They need your support. This fight is not just for them, but for you. Clearly this political persecution of a law-abiding emergency physician is designed to threaten and intimidate any American who dares to exercise their 1st Amendment rights. The legal pressures mounting against Dr. Gold require your urgent and generous donations to withstand such aggressive assaults from the ruthless enemies of free speech.”

As of May 5, she’d raked in $392,000.

---

in chris b jan 6 daily signal victim b/c the cops yelled at her and knocked on her dr loudly (kicked after she "froze"?

---

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-06-17/beverly-hills-antivax-doctor-sentenced-to-prison-for-role-in-capitol-riot

California doctor who is a leading figure in the antivaccine movement was sentenced on Thursday to two months in prison for storming the U.S. Capitol, where she delivered speeches to rioters during the mob’s attack.

U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper in Washington, D.C., also sentenced Dr. Simone Gold to 12 months of supervised release after her 60-day prison term and ordered her to pay a $9,500 fine. She can report to prison at a date to be determined.

Gold, a former emergency room physician, said she regrets entering the Capitol during the riot on Jan. 6, 2021, and didn’t intend to get involved in an event that was “so destructive to our nation.”

“It’s the opposite of who I am,” she told Cooper.

POLITICS

Beverly Hills anti-vaccine doctor pleads guilty in Jan. 6 Capitol riot case

March 3, 2022

Gold founded America’s Frontline Doctors. a group known for purveying COVID-19 misinformation. The Beverly Hills-based doctor, a Stanford Law School graduate, has over 480,000 followers on Twitter. She has condemned COVID-19 lockdowns and promoted the use of unproven and potentially dangerous drugs as coronavirus treatments.

5 members of the Proud Boys charged with seditious conspiracy in Capitol riot

June 6, 2022

The judge told Gold that her antivaccine activism wasn’t a factor in her sentencing. Cooper said Gold wasn’t a “casual bystander” on Jan. 6.

The judge also said Gold’s organization has misled supporters into believing her prosecution was politically motivated and trampled on her free speech rights. Cooper called it “unseemly” that America’s Frontline Doctors has invoked the Capitol riot in raising money, including for her salary.

"I think that is a real disservice to the true victims of that day,” he said.

Gold pleaded guilty in March to entering and remaining in a restricted building, a misdemeanor that carries a maximum sentence of one year in prison.

POLITICS

Inside the MAGA world scramble to produce findings suggesting the 2020 election was stolen

June 17, 2022

More than 800 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the riot at the Capitol. Over 300 of them have pleaded guilty, mostly to misdemeanors, and nearly 200 have been sentenced.

After the riot, Gold told the Washington Post that she followed a crowd into the Capitol, didn’t witness any violence and didn’t think she was breaking any laws.

“I can certainly speak to the place that I was, and it most emphatically was not a riot,” she said. “Where I was, was incredibly peaceful.”

But prosecutors say she entered the Capitol immediately after a law enforcement officer was assaulted and dragged to the ground in front of her. Gold also joined a mob that was trying to break into the House chamber and later ignored police commands to leave Statuary Hall so she could finish giving a speech, according to prosecutors.

POLITICS

Jan. 6 attack on Capitol was the ‘culmination of an attempted coup,’ panel chairman says

June 9, 2022

Prosecutors had recommended 90 days of imprisonment, one year of supervised release and 60 hours of community service for Gold.

Gold spent two days in jail after her January 2021 arrest. Her lawyers had requested a sentence of time served and 60 hours of community service. Gold agreed to pay $500 in restitution.

Prosecutors said Gold hasn’t shown remorse or accepted responsibility for her actions. They accused her of trying to profit from her crime, saying America’s Frontline Doctors has raised more than $430,000 through its website for her legal expenses.

“It beggars belief that Gold could have incurred anywhere near $430,000 in costs for her criminal defense: after all, she pleaded guilty — in the face of indisputable, readily identifiable evidence — without filing a single motion,” prosecutors wrote in a court filing.

Defense attorney Dickson Young said Gold has paid her lawyers “out of her own pocket.” Young said America’s Frontline Doctors has kept the donated money for itself.

Gold told the Post that she had traveled to Washington to speak at a “Rally for Health Freedom” on the East side of the Capitol on the afternoon of Jan. 6.

Gold was charged withJohn Strand, the communications director for America’s Frontline Doctors. Prosecutors also described him as Gold’s boyfriend.

POLITICS

Who’s who: Key figures in the Jan. 6 hearings on the Capitol insurrection

June 12, 2022

Strand has pleaded not guilty to the charges against him and has a trial scheduled to start on July 18. Prosecutors say Strand rejected their offer for a plea agreement.

Strand was filming as Gold gave a speech in Statuary Hall about her opposition to coronavirus vaccine mandates and government-imposed lockdowns. After police escorted her out of Statuary Hall, Gold delivered another speech in the Rotunda using a bullhorn while standing on a statue of former President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Gold and Strand spent nearly an hour inside the Capitol before leaving.

The Medical Board of California’s database shows Gold remains licensed to practice medicine in the state. However, Gold’s lawyers say the board sent her a letter threatening to revoke her medical license for “an instance of misinformation.”

“My reputation has been utterly shredded,” Gold said Thursday.

Gold moved from California to Naples, Fla., after her arrest. Defense attorney Kira West said Gold has received threats and travels with a bodyguard.

---

Anti-Vaccine Doc Sentenced to Prison for Role in Capitol Riothttps://www.medscape.com › viewarticle

Jun 16, 2022 — In addition to a 60-day prison sentence, Simone Gold, MD, will serve 12 months supervised release and pay a $9500 fine for her acts on ...

GOLD, Simone Melissa | USAO-DC - Department of Justicehttps://www.justice.gov › ... › Capitol Breach Cases

Arrested 1/18/21. Indicted 2/5/21. Arraigned 2/25/21 and pleaded not guilty to all counts. Pleaded guilty 3/3/22. Sentenced 6/16/22, 60 days in jail, ...

Beverly Hills antivax doctor sentenced to prison for Capitol riothttps://www.latimes.com › california › story › beverly-...

7 days ago — A California doctor, who is a leading figure in the antivaccine movement, has been sentenced to 60 days in prison for storming the U.S. ...

Dr. Simone Gold, leading anti-vax figure, sentenced for ...https://abcnews.go.com › story

Jun 16, 2022 — Dr. Simone Gold, a leading figure in the anti-vaccine moment, was sentenced to prison Thursday for storming the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 ...

Anti-vax Dr. Simone Gold sentenced to 60 days in jailhttps://www.wusa9.com › news › national › capitol-riots

Jun 16, 2022 — Gold, who gained notoriety for promoting debunked claims about the COVID-19 pandemic, was also ordered to pay a $9500 fine for her role in ...

Anti-vaccine doctor sentenced to prison for storming the ...https://www.nbcnews.com › politics › justice-department

Jun 16, 2022 — A California doctor who is a leading figure in the anti-vaccine movement was sentenced on Thursday to two months in prison for storming the ...

Simone Melissa Gold Gets 60 Days in Jail for Jan. 6 Breachhttps://lawandcrime.com › u-s-capitol-breach › judge-se...

Jun 16, 2022 — Simone Melissa Gold, founder of the controversial "America's Frontline Doctors," has been sentenced to 60 days behind bars for storming the ...

Anti-vaccine doctor sentenced to prison for Jan. 6 trespassinghttps://www.washingtonpost.com › 2022/06/16 › simon...

Jun 16, 2022 — A federal judge blasted Simone Gold for using her legal woes to raise $430000 for herself and her organization.

Simone Gold Arrested for Role in Capitol Insurrectionhttps://www.medpagetoday.com › washington-watch

Jan 21, 2021 — Simone Gold, MD, JD, founder of the notorious pro-hydroxychloroquine, anti-vaccine group America's Frontline Doctors, was arrested Sunday ...

Doctor known for spreading Covid misinformation is ... - CNNhttps://www.cnn.com › 2022/06/16 › politics › simone-go...

Jun 16, 2022 — Dr. Simone Gold, a Beverly Hills woman known for spreading debunked claims about Covid-19 was sentenced on Thursday to 60 days in prison for ...

---

Florida senators walk out after DeSantis' surgeon general refuses to answer if vaccines are good

David Badash The New Civil Rights Movement

January 26, 2022

Democrats on a Florida state Senate committee walked out of the confirmation hearing of Governor Ron DeSantis’ Surgeon General nominee, Dr. Joseph Ladapo, a far right-wing anti-science extremist after...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Ladapo

---

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Ladapo

am frontline dr

---

https://medika.life/exposing-americas-frontline-doctors-and-their-financial-empire-built-on-hydroxychloroquine/

no lnx pix screenshots

Exposing America’s Frontline Doctors and Their Financial Empire Built on Hydroxychloroquine

These doctors want to harm you. Don't let them.

By

Robert Turner, Founding Editor

January 13, 2021

Dr Simone Gold Quack

There is a group of American doctors that would prefer it if you didn’t wear masks. They would dose you with hydroxychloroquine, telling you it would stop Covid-19 and they want to have Covid-19 vaccines banned. They would rather expose your elderly, the infirm, and those with underlying conditions that place them at risk, to Covid-19 and have you take your chances. In short, they are trying to kill you, and they operate in broad daylight, going as far as to join in on the recent assault on the nation’s Capitol.

They are doing all this for money and they need to be stopped.

We are not referring to the healthcare heroes on the frontlines of the Covid-19 pandemic, but a group of medical misfits that have appropriated the name America’s Frontline Doctors (AFLD), as a moniker for their motley band of quacks and con artists. They are extremely dangerous, with ties to radical conservative extremists, witchcraft, paranoia, conspiracies, and do not possess a shred of actual experience dealing with Covid patients on the frontlines of the pandemic. They are, in short, frauds, exploiting a pandemic for their own financial gain.

They are, and we are ashamed to admit it, doctors. Doctors, however, in name only and that is the intent of this article. If, like so many of us, you would like to see the end of their orchestrated campaign of covid misinformation and attacks on the covid vaccine, join us in deplatforming their social media, reporting them to their individual medical boards, and filing reports with the Department of Justice. They are an affront to the medical profession and a danger to public health.

Their website blatantly tries to combat official Covid-19 advice and destroy public confidence in the covid vaccines for reasons we will explain below. Here is a screenshot from their website where they refer to the vaccines as experimental. This is a false and misleading statement.

Screenshot by author / American Frontline Doctors

They continue to spread advice about hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for Covid despite this having been publically disproven by open studies conducted under the auspices of the World Health Organization and other medical boards. They continue to question the efficacy of masks, thereby encouraging the spread of the virus. Their actions will lead to trusting members of the public accepting their advice and people will die as a result of severe Covid-19. It could be someone close to you.

If you want to protect vulnerable members of your community, register your outrage by contacting the links in the footer of this article or reporting the individual doctors to their relevant medical boards (shown below each doctor listed below).

If you don’t think they pose a risk, then have a look at their petition to stop the covid vaccines. If they were to have their way, your grandparents, parents, and at-risk sectors of our community would be facing Covid-19 without the benefit of a vaccine. Still, think they aren’t dangerous?

Incidentally, no one is enforcing the covid vaccine. That is patently untrue and under the American constitution, you cannot be forced into taking a vaccine. It remains a personal choice.

Screenshot by author

Their website displays a whole range of supposed “hydroxychloroquine home treatments” for Covid-19, the suggestion a clear one. You can treat Covid-19 at home. This is untrue, not based on any verifiable clinical data and in flagrant breach of the FDA’s policy of advertising cures or treatments for Covid-19. The following screenshot is again taken from their website, in the event they should remove it.

Screenshot by Author

To be clear, there are no home treatments for Covid-19. If you suspect you have contracted the coronavirus, please quarantine and if you are in an at-risk category, dial 9-1-1 and seek immediate medical help.

Why all the effort?

Great question and as will all these cons, profit is at the heart of the sales pitch. In this instance, it wasn’t even very well hidden. Initially, politics and Trump’s agenda to reopen America provided funding and impetus for this group. With those agenda’s now behind them, the business has been repurposed for profit.

Convince the American public you have the cure for Covid-19 in the form of hydroxychloroquine and then proceed to supply it to them through your network of unethical doctors, who are only too happy to write out prescriptions that a complicit pharmacy then fills.

The players in this not so elaborate con are as follows. America’s Frontline Doctors, Ravkoo Pharmacy and Speakwithanmd.com

Here’s how the chain works, not that it’s important, but it will provide a roadmap for the FDA and DOJ to follow. I encourage any journalists who want to explore and expose existing relationships between these entities to investigate further.

Step 1: American Frontline Doctors – The marketing arm

They discredit conventional Covid-19 treatments and scare people off the vaccine in favor of hydroxychloroquine, which as we all know, isn’t that simple to get hold of anymore. They achieve this with a concerted campaign of misinformation and pseudoscientific materials published on their website and spread through social media. They become visible, they become political and they become radical. At the top of their site is a link to purchase hydroxychloroquine, which takes you to this page.

Screenshot by Author /America’s Frontline Doctors

Step 2: Speakwithanmd.com – Distribution

You cant shift your product, which, annoyingly, requires a prescription, without the necessary paperwork. How do you address this across numerous states? Easy, you hook up with an online service that allows your network of doctors to prescribe to their heart’s delight, state by state. Possibly the cleverest bit of the con. You can see the network on this page and I suspect having a look at the prescriptions issued by these doctors would make for fascinating reading.

Here’s what their page says about America’s Frontline Doctors on Speakwithanmd;

• America’s Frontline Doctors (AFLDS) are available in every state. Physician Consult Fee is $90. We see patients between 7 am and 9 pm and we will try hard to see you on the day you contact us but it could be the next day.

• Through telemedicine we can offer convenient and affordable healthcare services to patients. Telemedicine is an excellent option for nonemergency situations, including prophylactic (preventive) and early (home) treatment of COVID-19.

• Our physicians are hydroxychloroquine knowledgeable and fully aware of the science and data regarding its safety and efficacy.

Step 3: Ravkoo Pharmacy – Fulfillment

Linked on their page on Speakwithanmd.com is Ravkoo Pharmacy. Officially, according to America’s Frontline Doctors, partnered with them to ensure all the scripts are quickly filled and dispatched. We have reached out to the Ravkoo CEO, Alpesh Patel for comment regarding their association with AFLD, but have not, at the time of publication, received a response.

Cutting the head off the snake

Let’s start with the originator or founder of AFLD, Dr. Simone Gold. Her most recent claim to fame is a photograph of her in the Capitol building, surrounded by her fellow protestors, after having forcibly gained entry. Her statement that she did not know it was illegal to enter the building should be seen for what it is. Complete bullshit.

She is a trained Stanford lawyer. Ignorance, claimed or otherwise, is not acceptable as a legal defense. You lie, Ms. Gold, and you should be locked up, along with your other seditious conspirators.

Simone Gold among protesters in the Capitol riots

Simone Gold, MD, JD, is a board-certified emergency physician in Los Angeles, California. You can view her current status here. She graduated from Chicago Medical School before attending Stanford University Law School to earn her Juris Doctorate degree. Impressed? Well, don’t be. We all know education is not a prerequisite for either common sense, morals, or ethics, none of which Ms. Gold appears to possess.

Her California medical license includes her unverified claim that she is involved in patient care 30-39 hours per week and indicates a practice location in Hesperia, a bedroom community of about 100,000 at the edge of the Mojave Desert. Efforts to determine where specifically she may practice were unsuccessful.

Any platform offering medical advice alongside the sale of the founder’s book and featuring prominent “donate” buttons all over the site is by definition, highly suspect. The strapline Gold uses to advertise their site “Empowering patients and physicians with independent, evidence-based medicine.” is laughable. There is no hard evidence-based medicine taking place in their deluded world.

The quotes Gold references from reputable sources are taken out of context or reflect earlier views, now scientifically repudiated. No sane doctor or medical student would waste five minutes on the journals or papers she uses to justify her flawed agenda. Simply put, Dr. Simone Gold and her band of merry co-conspirators are trying to pull the wool over your eyes for personal financial gain. She is trying to mislead you and is, in effect, threatening your life and the lives of others.

To clarify just how radical her medical views are, let’s take an excerpt from one of her websites, where she responds to a comment on an article she wrote on maks.

then, given these big neocons’ vaccination programs intentionally spreading sterility (as well as thimerosol-caused autism, & even the very diseases being vaccinated against, esp. measles & polio);

Perhaps, Ms. Gold, you would care to explain why that anti-vaccine stance doesn’t quite gel with your comments on your petition website. Here they are, in case you’ve forgotten making them.

SMD & AFLDS is NOT “anti-vaxx” or in any other form to be considered or mislabeled as disapproving of established, reputable vaccines when taken voluntarily without coercion.

Gold first rose to notoriety when she appeared in a viral video touting hydroxychloroquine back in July of 2020. She was accompanied by Stella Immanuel, MD (we exposed Immanuel’s quackery/witchcraft here), James Todaro, MD, Bob Hamilton, MD,Dan Erickson, DO, Richard Urso, MD and Joseph Ladapo, MD, PhD.

In a later article from the Washington Spectator exposing more lies about the media face of Simone Gold and the Republican-backed politics and people enabling her, Emergency physician Nick Sawyer, disturbed by the implications for medical practitioners that Gold and the AFLD poses, had this to say.

The America’s Frontline Doctors campaign, he says, “violates two of the primary principles of medical ethics. Medical ethics has four major principles: beneficence, non-maleficence, autonomy, and justice. As hydroxychloroquine offers no clinical benefit and may be harmful, it violates the first two tenets. Further, their statements place actual frontline physicians treating patients with Covid-19 in conflict with patients’ right to autonomy.

To have Simone Gold’s medical license investigated, you will need to place a formal complaint with California’s medical licensing authority. This link will take you directly to the Califonia Medical Board’s page for filing a complaint online. Gold is not acting in the interest of public health and her outspoken views and advice on the coronavirus, masks, social distancing, lockdowns, and the covid vaccine are not in keeping with her profession’s very clear overriding mandate – First do no harm.

Report Gold and America’s Frontline Doctors directly to the Department of Justice by following this link. The page contains information and telephone numbers or you can call directly on COVID-19 Fraud Hotline: 1-888-C19-WDPA.

Here is information on the other medical voices that have lent support to Gold and enabled her reach online and on Social Media. They are, in Medika’s opinion, incidental and Gold is the driving force behind AFLD.

James Todaro, MD

Todaro, an ophthalmologist based in Michigan who is no longer practicing, graduated from Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons in 2014. His medical license, which was classified as “educational limited” in Michigan, expired in 2019. According to his LinkedIn profile, Todaro has not practiced medicine since 2018. He co-founded an investment fund called Blocktown Capital.

Bob Hamilton, MD

Hamilton, a pediatrician and school liaison with America’s Frontline Doctors, has been practicing in Santa Monica, California — home to his private practice, Pacific Ocean Pediatrics — for more than 30 years. He has hospital privileges at Providence-St. John’s Health Center and the UCLA-Santa Monica Medical Center. He has been vocal in suggesting schools re-open, citing no risk to children from Covid-19

Dan Erickson, DO

Erickson is the co-owner of Accelerated Urgent Care in Bakersfield, California. He is a former emergency physician, according to reports, who was featured on national television in late April after he claimed data his center had collected showed that COVID was more widespread and less harmful than reported in medical journals.

The American College of Emergency Physicians and American Academy of Emergency Medicine issued a joint statement condemning Erickson’s claims, calling them “reckless and untested musings” that are “inconsistent with current science and epidemiology regarding COVID-19.”

Richard Urso, MD

Urso is an ophthalmologist at Houston Eye Associates in Bellaire, Texas, who has been touting HCQ for COVID-19. He told Fox News host Laura Ingraham earlier this month that he has been working with the drug for 30 years and has never had a patient with a heart issue.

He also said during that interview that HCQ was “safer than Tylenol, aspirin, Motrin.” In 2003, Urso paid a $1,500 fine to resolve allegations that he didn’t provide a narrative of medical records to an attorney for a patient’s personal injury lawsuit.

Joseph Ladapo, MD, PhD

Ladapo is a physician and health policy researcher at UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine, according to his UCLA profile. His primary research interests include diagnostic technology cost-effectiveness and decreasing cardiovascular disease population burden. He is also an adjunct professor of population health at New York University-Langone, a spokesperson confirmed and sees patients at Langone Medical Center.

He has cared for COVID patients at UCLA, he wrote in a Wall Street Journal editorial in early April, though that could not be confirmed (a UCLA Medicine spokesperson declined to answer questions and said Ladapo declined to comment). On the Supreme Court steps, he said nothing about treating COVID-19 patients himself.

Simone Gold, MD, images are all used in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, commonly known as “fair use law”. This material is distributed without profit with the intent to provide commentary, review, education, and increase public health knowledge.

Still don’t get it?

If you still don’t believe that Ivermectin and Hydroxychloroquine are sold to you as part of an elaborate medical scam. please read this article on why we just can’t say at this point which treatments are actually useful in reducing deaths.

REPORTING A HEALTHCARE PROFESSIONAL

In the U.S: The American Medical Association lists a very clear and distinct set of guidelines or Code of Conduct for doctors and healthcare professionals. If you feel this code has been breached, or if you have concerns relating to your healthcare provider, you need to get in touch with your state’s licensing board. You can find contact details for all the state boards on this page, The Federation of State Medical Boards

Medwatch is a brand of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and they have teeth with which to bite. You can access their online form for registering a complaint by following this link. At the moment, they’re really hot on fake covid-19 products and treatments and the individuals and websites selling the products or spreading misinformation.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) is an excellent place to register your covid related complaints as they have a task team set up specifically to protect consumers against charlatans and quacks. Fill in their online form or call their dedicated National Helpline number. They are also the place to report price gouging and hoarding.

In the U.K: Direct your complaints to the GMC (General Medical Council) via their website, which also makes allowance for Welsh speakers.

---

12 21 4 from am fl dr chases ca vaccine into car garage?!

---

---

11 2 mma

The House of Representatives is opening an investigation into a network of right-wing organizations that have pushed anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine and anti-parasitic drug ivermectin, which have become a right-wing cause célèbre as discredited alternatives to vaccines or conventional treatments for COVID-19.

The Intercept reported Monday that theHouse Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisishas requested documents from the right-wing group America’s Frontline Doctors (AFLDS) and the telemedicine provider SpeakWithAnMD about their business practices. The committee also “wrote to the Federal Trade Commission requesting that the agency investigate whether these companies are in violation of federal laws.”

“Attempts to monetize coronavirus misinformation have eroded public confidence in proven treatments and prevention measures and hindered efforts to control the pandemic,” committee chair Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC)wrote in his letter to AFLDS. “Some Americans who have been influenced by misinformation have chosen not to get vaccinated, delayed receiving evidence-based treatment, and ingested unapproved substances in harmful quantities.”

The Intercept previously reported two months of leaked patient records that showed the partnership between AFLD and SpeakWithAnMD had pulled in millions of dollars from over 70,000 customers. Such proceeds could not have been possible without the long history of right-wing media outlets like Fox News first pushing discredited alternative treatments for COVID-19 such as hydroxychloroquine throughout 2020 and ivermectin in 2021.

Two major fixtures of right-wing media have set up this medial grift: Capitol riot participant Dr. Simone Gold — whose organization AFLDS has multiple links to the QAnon movement — as well as far-right conspiracy theorist Jerome Corsi who set up SpeakWithAnMD.

Gold’s long political involvement in the COVID-19 pandemic began with an organization, “A Doctor a Day,” started in May 2020 in coordination between the Trump campaign and the right-wing Council for National Policy to create an astroturf organization of doctors to support the Trump administration’s plans for a premature economic reopening. The was immediately promoted on Fox News, which also gave positive coverage to AFLDS’ continued activities in promoting hydroxychloroquine, which Gold claimed was a “cure” for the virus.

Right-wing media personalities also fervently defended another AFLDS figure, Dr. Stella Immanuel, after videos and online posts surfaced in which she had made various statements “regarding the medical use of alien DNA and the gynecological effects of having sex with demons and witches while sleeping.” More recently, she's pushed QAnon related conspiracy theories while attending a QAnon conference.

Gold also appeared on Newsmax in December 2020, ahead of the wider public vaccine rollout, and discouraged viewers from getting the vaccine: “Do you want to be part of an experimental medical trial? Do you want to be tracked and traced?” (The vaccines, of course, had already undergone rigorous testing.}December 17, 2020, edition of Newsmax's National Report

Gold later participated in the storming of the U.S. Capitol on January 6 and was seen on video reading a speech from inside the Rotunda in which she denounced the “experimental, biological agent deceptively named a vaccine” and the “massive medical establishment.”She was later arrested and indicted and is currently charged with multiple counts including obstruction of an official proceeding and disorderly conduct. (She told The Washington Post she regrets being there.)

Time reported in August that SpeakWithAnMD had been set up by Corsi, a longtime peddler of far-right conspiracy theories, including the QAnon movement and racist “birther” theories against former President Barack Obama. In 2020, Corsi started making false claims against the development of the COVID-19 vaccines and in favor of discredited alternative drugs.

Time further reported that hundreds of customers had reported paying the $90 fee through America’s Frontline Doctors, only to never actually receive the promised drugs or consultation services. Time also found that while booking a consultation directly through SpeakWithAnMD cost $59.99, the referrals linked through AFLDS cost $90, implying a possibility that Gold’s group could’ve been pocketing $30 per patient. (AFLDS declined to comment to Time on this question.)

And while SpeakWithAnMD claims that it has “Over 20 Years in Business,” NBC News also reported that the site was“​​created in March 2020.**” The website also appears to have only one purpose in mind — to peddle debunked drugs for COVID-19 instead of the vaccines or other legitimate treatments: “On a SpeakWithAnMD.com intake form viewed by NBC News, prospective patients are asked, ‘What medication do you prefer?’ The user is then presented with three options: ‘Ivermectin,’ ‘Hydroxychloroquine’ or ‘Not sure.’”

---

---

1021 an

Two years ago, ivermectin was an obscure drug consigned only to those who had the rare displeasure of contracting parasites like scabies or river blindness. American doctors wrote a mere 150,000 prescriptions for the drug in 2019 – roughly 0.1% of the prescriptions written for Lipitor, a widely used atorvastatin designed to lower cholesterol.

Last year, however, as the pandemic raged on and conservatives stood their ground against common sense public health measures like masks and vaccines, ivermectin became a household name. Despite lacking proper consensus from the scientific community, the drug has been widely touted by right-wing pundits, politicians, and entrepreneurs as the unofficial magic bullet for COVID-19.

In many ways, the right-wing frenzy around ivermectin can be traced back to that of hydroxychloroquine, which was last year baselessly extolled by Donald Trump and many of his supporters in media and congress. However, ivermectin appears to have taken a much stronger hold over Trump's following (and beyond), benefiting from a robust network of profit-seeking providers continuously selling it to thousands of Americans.

Over the last several months, much of the battle to normalize ivermectin as a legitimate COVID treatment has played out in courts, which have seen a sudden surge in lawsuits filed against hospitals unwilling to administer the drug. Such offensives have arisen in states like Louisiana, Illinois, California, Kentucky, Delaware, Texas, and more.

"I've never encountered this and I've been in practice over 40 years," Dr. Rodney Hood, who serves on the National Medical Association's COVID-19 Task Force on Vaccines and Therapeutics, told FiveThirtyEight. "You don't get treated based upon what you feel or think," Hood said. "There are certain approved treatment regimens for certain diseases. If [what a patient is demanding] doesn't fit within that regimen, then you cannot treat them."

In one of the most widely publicized cases from August, Julie Smith, the wife of a 51-year-old coronavirus COVID patient in Ohio, sued a Cincinnati-based hospital network for not administering the ivermectin to her husband, demanding that the hospital deliver a three-week course of the drug. That month, Smith saw a favorable ruling from Butler County Judge Gregory Howard, who formally ordered the hospital to administer the drug to her husband despite warnings from the Centers for Diseases Control that its use could be unsafe. In September, the decision was reversed by a different Ohio judge, who noted that "medical and scientific communities do not support the use of ivermectin as a treatment for COVID-19."

In May, Desareta Fype, the daughter of a 61-year-old woman with COVID-19, similarly sued an Illinois hospital after all of its affiliated doctors refused to administer ivermectin to her mother. A judge later told the hospital to "get out of the way" and allow any board-certified doctor to give Fype's mother the drug, according to The Daily Herald.The hospital's attorney, Daniel Monahan, said that 20 physicians and 19 other health care workers at the hospital all refused to deliver the medicine despite the ruling, ultimately prompting Fype to hire an outside doctor to administer the drug.

While many of the ivermectin suits have been filed by seemingly unconnected individuals throughout the country, there do appear to be several common threads.

One of these threads is Ralph Lorigo, who this year became the most "in-demand" attorney for plaintiffs looking to compel the use of ivermectin in hospital systems for their loved ones, according to The Daily Beast. Lorigo helms a general practice law firm in West Seneca, New York, and has reportedly worked on at least 60 ivermectin cases, per a Journal News report. The attorney, who represented both Julie Smith and Desareta Fype, claims to be "largely successful" in delivering wins, allowing patients to force ivermectin's use.

Citing an array of dubious studies, Lorigo told the Beast that his legal actions are aimed at delivering "last-ditch" treatment for patients that have exhausted every option. But many medical professionals argue that the suits put unnecessary strain on hospitals that are already buckling under the weight of a pandemic.

"Hospitals are dealing with the unvaccinated COVID-19 patients at a very high pace," Dr. Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, told the Beast. "And then you're going to burden them by filing a lawsuit or creating legal problems over them trying to provide the best care for these people who chose not to be vaccinated and who are now crushing their hospitals?"

Timothy Brewer, an epidemiology professor at UCLA, added that Lorigo's "why not?" approach is far from justified, largely because the studies proffered by Lorigo are hardly conclusive, potentially adding complications to drugs patients are already being given. For instance, many of the studies use statistically insignificant sample sizes, deliver unsafe doses of the drug, or were written by doctors with clear conflicts of interest.

In recent months, Lorigo, the chairman of New York's Erie County Conservative Party, has said that his business has become effectively consumed by ivermectin suits, telling SpectrumNews1 that he receives "somewhere between 80 and 150 emails and requests for information and help" on a daily basis.

"We freely give the information. I've been here seven days a week for the last seven weeks without a day off, trying to get people the information that they so desperately need," he added.

It remains unclear how much the attorney profits from each suit – or how the suits are structured. Asked who fronts the money, Lorigo refused to answer. According to Bloomberg Law, he alleges that he offers his services at a "reduced rate."

Aside from Lorigo, another common thread in the ecosystem of ivermectin litigation is America's Frontline Doctors (AFLD), a conservative political group founded by Dr. Simone Gold in 2019.

AFLD is arguably the most dominant force currently working to legitimize ivermectin as a valid COVID treatment, connecting hundreds of patients with drug providers happy to fuel what's become a multimillion-dollar industry in ivermectin sales, Time reported. The Intercept estimated that, between mid-July to mid-September of this year, AFLD and its partners raked in roughly $6.7 million in revenue by coordinating telehealth consultations for the drug. But in the process, the group reportedly bilked hundreds of unsuspecting customers out of thousands in consultation fees by, in many cases, failing to deliver the drug at all.

Irwin Redlener, who directs the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University said that the group AFLD is "the 21st century, digital version of snake-oil salesmen."

"And in the case of ivermectin, it's extremely dangerous," he added.

Throughout the pandemic, AFLD waged a whole host of right-wing disinformation campaigns. It advocated for the use of hydroxychloroquine, called lockdowns "mass casualty events," disputed the efficacy of mask-wearing, and alleged that death certificates were being forged to artificially inflate the pandemic death toll.

While Gold has reportedly labeled the group "grassroots," AFLD is led by a cavalcade of high-brass conservatives with roots in think tanks and advocacy groups like the Heritage Foundation, the American Legislative Exchange Council, and FreedomWorks. Its founding director, Jenny Beth Martin, is the co-founder of the Tea Party Patriots, a right-wing group started in opposition to President Obama's domestic agenda before becoming a pro-Trump outfit.

On top of AFLD's connection to the Tea Party Patriots, the group is also affiliated with the Council for National Policy (CNP), a "shadowy coalition" founded in 1981 "that coordinates initiatives among conservative megadonors, political operatives, and media owners, many of them Christian fundamentalists," the Washington Examiner reported. Conservative businessman Richard Uihlein gave the group $4.3 million over a five-year period through 2020.

---

ref no lnx

Anatomy of Deceit: Team Trump Deploys Doctors with Dubious Qualifications to Push Fake Cure for Covid-19

by Anne Nelson

Sep 20, 2020 | Coronavirus, Politics

On July 27, a dozen physicians posed in front of the Supreme Court in Washington, D.C., dressed in white lab coats with “America’s Frontline Doctors” stitched over the pocket. The group’s chief spokesperson was Dr. Simone Gold, an emergency physician from Los Angeles. They were introduced by Jenny Beth Martin, the founding CEO of Tea Party Patriots, as participants in the “White Coat Summit.” The doctors made spirited arguments for the use ofhydroxychloroquine as a “cure” for Covid-19 and against wearing masks and imposing lockdowns—all running counter to the recommendations of Dr. Anthony Fauci and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.[1]

Although the event was billed as a “press conference,” few journalists attended. A video posted by a bystander showed only a handful of attendees, most of them dressed in tourists’ shorts and T-shirts. But the event was livestreamed by Breitbart News and quickly went (so to speak) viral.

There was a rapid backlash. Much of the media attention focused on Dr. Stella Immanuel, one of Gold’s cohort. Following the press conference, the Daily Beast posted a video of Immanuel, who is also a Pentecostal preacher, delivering a sermon claiming that various female ailments were caused by sexual visitations from “demons.”

Immanuel has since disappeared from the America’s Frontline Doctors online roster, but the group has continued to get traction. On August 10, Pat Robertson’s show on the Christian Broadcasting Network carried an interview with Simone Gold and an endorsement of her hydroxychloroquine cure. On August 21, Alex Jones’s NewsWars carried an interview with another member of America’s Frontline Doctors, Mark McDonald. McDonald—a child psychiatrist—maintained, “If all Americans had access to hydroxychloroquine, the pandemic would essentially end in about 30 days.”

Science has shown otherwise. Despite early hopes last spring, there is mounting evidence that hydroxychloroquine is a problematic—and even dangerous—treatment for Covid-19. One expert with firsthand knowledge is Nick Sawyer, an academic emergency physician in Sacramento, Calif. In July he wrote an article for Lifeline, the publication of the California chapter of the American College of Emergency Physicians, describing his harrowing two weeks of service in the Covid wards of Elmhurst Hospital in Queens. Sawyer was part of a team of California doctors dispatched by Governor Gavin Newsome to offer emergency assistance at the epicenter of the epidemic, at the height of the New York City outbreak.

Sawyer is now dealing with the spike in cases in California, this time with the benefit of four months of additional Covid research. “The science on the effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine in treating Covid-19 is settled—multiple high-quality studies have shown that it shows no benefit,” he notes. Far more concerning, Sawyer says, is its potential harm: “Hydroxychloroquine can cause unstable cardiac arrhythmias, cardiac arrest and sudden cardiac death.” Over recent months, the Food and Drug Administration, the American Medical Association, and other organizations have issued warnings that the drug should be withdrawn as a Covid-19 treatment. “It’s irresponsible for America’s Frontline Doctors to continue to push this medication on the unwitting American population,” Sawyer states.

Why, then, would Gold’s band of physicians continue its campaign to pitch the treatment to the public? Simone Gold has repeatedly described her group as a “grassroots organization” acting in the service of its patients.[2] In fact, it has been a highly orchestrated effort, months in the making, assembled by conservative Washington insiders in direct consultation with the White House, with the goal of reopening the economy in time to benefit Trump’s reelection prospects—regardless of the toll in human lives.

The first public mention of the initiative may have been a Washington Post story on April 13, as the virus raged across New York City and Covid-19 deaths passed the 20,000 mark.[3] The Post reported the creation of a new conservative coalition “pushing for the White House and GOP lawmakers to push back against health professionals who have urged more caution.” The leadership was listed as Stephen Moore of the Heritage Foundation, Adam Brandon of FreedomWorks, and Lisa Nelson of the American Legislative Exchange Council. A fourth individual, Jenny Beth Martin, is the founding director of the Tea Party Patriots. She would play a key role in organizing the events to come, including the doctors’ Washington “summit” in July.

Brandon, Nelson, and Martin are all prominent members of a secretive organization called the Council for National Policy, a shadowy coalition that coordinates initiatives among conservative megadonors, political operatives, and media owners, many of them Christian fundamentalists (see “Holding Democracy Hostage”).

The Post story quoted an interview with Richard Viguerie, a co-founder of the CNP, on the mission of the initiative: “The sooner we get the economy going and back up, the better it’s going to be for conservatives and Republicans in this election year. . . . Conservatives feel the government has overreacted, and it’s got to end.”[4]

The new coalition, called Save Our Country, officially debuted on April 27, as U.S. Covid deaths approached 55,000.[5] Headed by economist Art Laffer, its maiden press release featured quotes from Brandon, Nelson, and Martin. “The long-term consequences of a prolonged societal shutdown outweigh the damage done by the virus itself,” Martin stated. “We must immediately reopen the economy.”[6] Earlier that week, The New York Times reported that the Save Our Country coalition’s members were mobilizing their networks for state-level rallies, filing lawsuits, and commissioning polls, all to counter the lockdowns: “Nonprofit groups including FreedomWorks and Tea Party Patriots have used their social media accounts and text and email lists to spread the word about protests across the country.”[7]

But the state-level protests turned out to be of limited utility, and the group began to look for new avenues. In April, CNP Action, the lobbying arm of the CNP, began a series of weekly conference calls to discuss Covid strategy. On May 11—as U.S. Covid deaths reached 74,270[8]—one of the calls was intercepted and published by the Center for Media and Democracy and the Associated Press.

Among the participants were CNP President William Walton,CNP member Nancy Schulze,[9] and Mercedes Schlapp, a senior adviser to the Trump campaign. Schulze, the wife of former nine-term Pennsylvania Republican Congressman Dick Schulze, opened the call with a warning that two-thirds of the American people were wary of reopening the economy. But, she added, “Doctors are seen by the American people—they have a 92 percent trust rate with the American people according to polling. . . . There is a coalition of doctors, doctors’ coalition, who are extremely pro-Trump, that have been preparing and coming together for the war ahead in the campaign on health care, and these doctors could be activated for this conversation now for reopening.

“The one thing the left does give credence to, in that they tend to be motivated by a secular worldview, the one thing that they do appreciate and listen to is science, and we have doctors that have the facts, that lived this themselves, that are in the trenches, that are saying it’s time to reopen,” Schulze continued. “I’ve been working with them for three years. There’s a coalition of doctors . . . including the most respected doctors in this country, that are ready to speak if somebody will just call on them.”

Walton told her, “We need to not just make the economic argument, we need to make the health argument, and we need doctors to make that argument, not us. And so that would be great if you, if we could tee that up.”

Schulze said she’d be happy to put him in touch “with any and all of these doctors, and I have submitted 27 of these doctors’ names to the campaign for the doctors’ coalition that they’re in the process of building.”

Mercedes Schlapp asked Schulze if she had spoken with Hannah Castillo, director of coalitions for the Trump campaign. “I know they’ve been working on building that coalition. I know they’re going through the vetting process right now. As long as you have the names, that would be helpful. . . . Those are the type of guys we want to get out on TV and radio to help push out the message.”

Schulze replied, “I’ve been working with Hannah for over six weeks now, so they already have been vetted. But they need to be put on the screen.”[10]

Dr. Simone Gold, a 54-year-old emergency physician from Los Angeles, was ready for her close-up. On April 22, Gold had tweeted a stand-up of herself wearing a white “Emergency Dept.” coat, in front of Los Angeles’ Cedars-Sinai hospital emergency room, suggesting that concerns over the virus were inflated. She pointed out that the hospital “parking lots are empty, the emergency department volume is down, the patient census is down, and that’s really in most of the areas I’ve been to.”[11]

On May 7, she brought a more explicit anti-lockdown message to a program on the Whiskey Politics show on Salem Radio, part of the massive Salem Media conglomerate owned by two leading members of the Council for National Policy.[12] It was headlined “DR. SIMONE GOLD GOES PUBLIC! What the Government WON’T Tell Us About COVID-19.”

“It’s not at all clear that overall, that social distancing is going to make a huge impact,” Gold said.[13] “We’re all acting like as though there’s a huge medical crisis. There’s a medical issue, we should handle it responsibly, but what’s going on in our country now is a terrible legal crisis. Our constitutional rights are being trampled on right and left.”[14] Gold later added, “There’s always viruses . . . but I’m not sure that it’s front-page news.”[15]

The Guardian reported that over the same period, the Save Our Country coalition spent $50,000 on videos on social media platforms “targeting independents and Republicans with the message that Covid-19 mostly hits the elderly to minimize risks for others.”[16]

On May 19—as U.S. Covid deaths reached 84,640[17]—the CNP’s doctors coalition (billed as “A Doctor A Day”) made its debut with an open letter to Donald Trump signed by “500+ doctors” (a number that was later revised to over 800). “In medical terms, the shutdown was a mass casualty incident,” it stated. “It is impossible to overstate the short, medium, and long-term harm to people’s health with a continued shutdown.” The lead signatory was Dr. Simone Gold.

On June 16—with U.S. Covid deaths approaching 110,000[18] and the U.S. economy in freefall—the Save Our Country coalition published an open letter to President Trump and Leader McConnell, urging “that the multi-trillions of dollars of federal government debt spending in the wake of the Coronavirus come to a stop.”[19] Twelve of the 20 signatories (among them Brandon, Nelson, and Martin) were members of the CNP, including CNP President William Walton and Executive Director Bob McEwen.

The push to reopen the schools became a full-court press. On July 7, Trump assembled a White House meeting on the subject. Jenny Beth Martin spoke as both the CEO of Tea Party Patriots and “as a mom.”

“Mr. President, you were right, and I hope you will trust your instincts,” she told Trump. “America is not meant to be shut down. And we have to reopen schools this fall. I’ve been in touch with almost a thousand doctors from around the country. I helped Dr. Simone Gold spearhead a letter to you signed by 800 physicians and surgeons who talked about the side effects of the lockdowns. I’ve done a second letter with over 150 doctors, 240 nurses, 330 educators, 70 national groups, and thousands of parents and concerned Americans who want to see schools reopened.”

A video of Martin’s statement appeared, billed as “Mom Gives Unexpected Speech Directly to Trump” without naming her or her affiliation. It was posted on various social media platforms, including Glenn Beck’s YouTube channel, The Blaze (where it clocked over 400,000 views as of August 4).[20]

Dr. Simone Gold was now preparing to join Jenny Beth Martin on center stage.On July 22, Gold warmed up for her appearance on The Charlie Kirk Show, with over 157,000 YouTube subscribers. Kirk, a member of the Council for National Policy, heads a group called Turning Point USA, which recruits right-wing campus activists. (Donald Trump addressed its Youth Action Summit last December, and Donald Trump Jr. is quoted on its website stating, “I’m convinced that the work by Turning Point USA and Charlie Kirk will win back the future of America.”)[21]

The introduction for Kirk’s show summed up the case Gold and her colleagues would make over the coming weeks: “Charlie is joined in studio by board-certified emergency physician Dr. Simon [sic] Gold, who says nearly everything we’ve been told about the Chinese Coronavirus is a lie. She and Charlie take a deep dive into the efficacy of hydroxychloroquine and why the U.S. government is barring physicians from prescribing the drug—endangering potentially 100,000 lives, at least. Charlie also takes on Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx, asking if Dr. Gold challenges the effectiveness of wearing masks. Dr. Gold makes a stunning and factual assertion about the death rates and who exactly is to blame for what she believes is one of the biggest lies ever perpetrated against the American people.” [22]

Gold’s “stunning assertion” was the often-repeated claim that doctors were falsifying death certificates, speculating without foundation that they were inflating Covid-19 cases by “20 to 30 percent.”[23] Gold also asserted, “Masks are really foolish, they don’t do anything. . . . There’s zero scientific justification for the mask.”[24]

Jenny Beth Martin emphasized a social media campaign from the start. Her Tea Party Patriots website posted the program of the White Coat Summit, offering the participating doctors a two-hour session devoted to expanding their social media reach: “YouTube and other social media vastly exceed television news as the information source for most Americans. Interviews and Q/A with social media personalities with large followers is the best way to talk to Americans. Doctors who want to answer questions from these modern journalists will have the opportunity.”

By the time Jenny Beth Martin hosted Gold’s White Coat Summit on July 27, U.S. Covid-19 deaths had skyrocketed to over 136,000.[25] The physicians’ presentation carried a lethal stew of misinformation. Dr. Bob Hamilton, a pediatrician from Santa Monica, assured viewers, “Children are not passing [the virus] on to their parents or their teachers.” (A few days later, the CDC released a report on a massive transmission event in June at a Georgia summer camp, with a median age of 12.[26])

Dr. Richard Urso—an ophthalmologist—praised hydroxychloroquine as a “cure” for the virus, but it was not clear that Urso had ever had any significant experience treating Covid-19 patients. Another speaker was Dr. Daniel Erickson, a Bakersfield physician who co-owns an urgent care facility. In April he had been censured by the American College of Emergency Physicians and the American Academy of Emergency Medicine for his “reckless and untested musings” opposing stay-at-home orders and promoting the conspiracy theory about doctors misattributing deaths to Covid-19.[27]

The social media strategy paid off. Gold and her colleagues’ video, livestreamed on Breitbart News, reportedly reached 185,000 concurrent users.[28] The New York Times’ Kevin Roose reported that over its six hours on Facebook, it was the second-most-engaged post on the platform, with 14 million views.[29] (The audiences for network news broadcasts, by comparison, range from 9 to 12 million.) A few hours after the presentation, President Trump tweeted the video to his 84.5 million followers. Donald Trump Jr. told his 5.3 million Twitter followers, “This video is a much [sic] watch!!! So different from the narrative everyone is running with.”[30] Trump redoubled his support at his press conference the following day, stating “I think they’re very respected doctors.”[31]

But major social media platforms reacted with relative speed. Facebook took the group’s video down a few hours after it was posted, and Twitter and YouTube followed suit, all three on the grounds that the video violated their Covid-19 misinformation policies.[32] Twitter took the unusual step of suspending Trump Jr.’s account for 12 hours.

Gold had built the original America’s Frontline Doctors website on a SquareSpace platform, but SquareSpace took it down. Gold rebuilt the website (omitting Stella Immanuel of “demon sperm” renown) and started raising money through PayPal and fundly.com. The doctors’ program also remained on the Tea Party Patriots site.

There was an additional reaction to the doctors’ “frontline” Covid credentials. MedPageToday, a peer-reviewed medical news site, was unable to find evidence that any of America’s Frontline Doctors in Washington had served in “frontline” emergency rooms during the Covid epidemic.[33] Simone Gold came under additional scrutiny. Her initial Whiskey Politics introduction described her as a “frontline doctor” in an “inner-city emergency room” that treated “150 patients a day,” but neither her LinkedIn profile nor other available sources listed the emergency room in question. Her personal website (taken down amid the controversy but archived) described her as a “Concierge Immediate Needs Physician” working in “C-Suite Medicine.”[34]

On July 29, Cedars-Sinai, the backdrop for Gold’s Twitter video, issued a disavowal stating, “Simone Gold, MD, has not worked with Cedars-Sinai Medical Center or any of its offices or affiliates since 2015.For three weeks in late 2015, Dr. Gold was employed on a per diem basis by Cedars-Sinai Medical Network, a component of Cedars-Sinai. She worked during this brief time in a network urgent care clinic. Dr. Gold is not authorized to represent or speak about any information on behalf of Cedars-Sinai.”

The sharecare.com “Find a Doctor” site stated that “Dr. Simone Gold, MD, is a[n] emergency medicine specialist in Los Angeles, CA. and is affiliated with Centinela Hospital Medical Center.” But on July 31, Centinela Hospital posted a statement reading: “Simone Gold, MD, is not credentialed as part of the Centinela Medical Staff, as she resigned her position here a number of years ago. Dr. Gold was never employed here as we don’t employ our physicians.”[35]

Also troubling was American Frontline Doctors’ repeated suggestion that patients should demand hydroxychloroquine from their doctors for Covid-19. The medication has been an important treatment for lupus and other autoimmune diseases, but the publicity around its application to Covid has created an ongoing shortage with devastating consequences.

Much of the mainstream coverage of America’s Frontline Doctors was devoted to Stella Immanuel’s “demon sperm” sermon, but alternative platforms were another story.

Simone Gold was reaching a vast new public and was now celebrated as a victim. On July 30, Fox News’s Tucker Carlson interviewed her on his nightly program. The crawl stated, “Doctor Censored by Big Tech Has Now Lost Her Job” (though that job was never specified)—echoing Trump’s executive order on Big Tech censorship released the previous day.[36] (Carlson’s show is currently the highest-rated program on cable television, with an audience of over 4.3 million.[37])

Glenn Beck’s multi-platform media operation, The Blaze, covered the story on his radio program and posted the Tucker Carlson video on its website on July 31, with a companion piece repeating her case for hydroxychloroquine.[38] A similar report was posted the same day on CNS News, founded by Council for National Policy Executive Committee member L. Brent Bozell III.[39] (MediaPost recently named CNS News as the country’s fastest-growing conservative website, with more than 8.3 million unique visitors in June and over 1,000 percent gain in year-over-year unique visitors.[40]) Pat Robertson’s CBN.com averages over four million unique visitors each month. Add these to Alex Jones’s August 21 coverage—as well as legions of subsidiary platforms—and you have a deadly misinformation campaign that’s reaching tens of millions of voters, most of them off the radar of the national news media.

Emergency physician Nick Sawyer is disturbed by the implications for medical practitioners. The America’s Frontline Doctors campaign, he says, “violates two of the primary principles of medical ethics. Medical ethics has four major principles: beneficence, non-maleficence, autonomy, and justice. As hydroxychloroquine offers no clinical benefit and may be harmful, it violates the first two tenets. Further, their statements place actual frontline physicians treating patients with Covid-19 in conflict with patients’ right to autonomy.

“Patients have the right to make decisions regarding their medical care, but as more and more patients are asking—if not outright demanding—that physicians prescribe hydroxychloroquine to them, it places these physicians in a position where they are faced with an ethical dilemma. We respect patients’ right to autonomy, but we are not willing to allow them to demand a treatment that is not helpful and may be harmful. In sum, America’s Frontline Doctors are introducing additional havoc into the already complex Covid-19 pandemic.”

As of the publication deadline for this article, neither Jenny Beth Martin or Simone Gold had responded to requests for comment.

The day after Gold’s Washington presentation, U.S. Covid-19 deaths stood at 140,309; they swelled to 147,653 only a week later.[41] Less than a month later, on August 21, Donald Trump addressed the Council for National Policy at the Ritz-Carlton in Pentagon City, his last major address before the Republican convention. In his opening remarks, he thanked several figures from the CNP, including Jenny Beth Martin, “for your tremendous leadership of the CNP. You’ve done a fantastic job.”

As of that Friday, over 174,000 Americans had died of Covid-19. That number continues to climb.[42]

Anne Nelson is the author of Shadow Network: Money, Media, and the Secret Hub of the Radical Right. She is the recipient of the Livingston Award for journalism and a Guggenheim Fellowship for historical research.

[1] https://www.politifact.com/article/2020/jul/28/fact-checking-video-doctors-talking-about-coronavi/

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKmPKmZw-Wk&feature=youtu.be

[3] https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/how-value-based-care-can-save-your

[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKmPKmZw-Wk&feature=youtu.be

[5] https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/coronavirus-case-numbers-united-states-april-30-update

[6] https://www.freedomworks.org/content/conservative-groups-launch-save-our-country-coalition

[7] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/21/us/politics/coronavirus-protests-trump.html

[8] https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/coronavirus-case-numbers-united-states-may-11-update

[9] https://www.greatamericanspeakers.com/speakers/nancy-schulze

[10] https://soundcloud.com/alexkotch/center-for-national-policy-call-doctors-clip-51120

https://www.exposedbycmd.org/2020/05/19/coalition-pro-trump-doctors-will-defend-presidents-Covid-19-blunders/

[11] https://twitter.com/drsimonegold/status/1253147796481302531

[12] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxDHS9ck4k8

[13] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxDHS9ck4k8 5:55

[14] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxDHS9ck4k8 12:50

[15] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3f0VRtY9oTs 23:30

[16] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/01/save-our-country-coalition-states-reopen

[17] https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/coronavirus-case-numbers-united-states-may-19-update

[18] https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/coronavirus-case-numbers-united-states-june-16-update

[19] https://committeetounleashprosperity.com/free-market-coalition-says-stop-the-spending/

[20] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuWxEfR5Za8

[21] https://www.tpusa.com/donaldtrumpjr

[22] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwbICfJ6ePs&t=654s

[23] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwbICfJ6ePs&t=654s 12:00

[24] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwbICfJ6ePs&t=654s 17:00

[25] https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/coronavirus-case-numbers-in-the-united-states-july-27-update

[26] https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6931e1.htm?s_cid=mm6931e1_x#T1_down

[27] https://www.acep.org/corona/Covid-19-alert/Covid-19-articles/acep-aaem-joint-statement-on-physician-misinformation/

https://www.mercurynews.com/2020/04/29/dubious-coronavirus-claims-by-california-doctors-condemned-by-health-experts/

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/twitter-removes-tweet-highlighted-trump-falsely-claiming-Covid-cure-n1235075

[28] https://americasfrontlinedoctorsummit.com/

[29] https://twitter.com/kevinroose/status/1287906751069581318

[30] https://techcrunch.com/2020/07/28/twitter-donald-trump-jr-frontline-doctors-viral-video-misinformation/

[31] https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-press-briefing-july-28-2020/

[32] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/28/technology/virus-video-trump.html, https://nypost.com/2020/07/28/fauci-i-have-not-been-misleading-the-american-public/

[33] https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/Covid19/87797

[34] https://web.archive.org/web/20191225102747/https://www.drsimonegold.com/home.html

[35] https://www.centinelamed.com/News/2020/July/STATEMENT-RE-SIMONE-GOLD-MD.aspx

[36] https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-press-secretary-regarding-implementation-president-trumps-executive-order-preventing-online-censorship/

[37] https://www.forbes.com/sites/markjoyella/2020/06/30/tucker-carlson-has-highest-rated-program-in-cable-news-history/#4839a1d86195

[38] https://www.theblaze.com/news/hydroxychloroquine-touting-doctor-fired?utm_source=theblaze-breaking&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20200731Trending-HCQDocFired&utm_term=ACTIVE%20LIST%20-%20TheBlaze%20Breaking%20News

[39] https://www.cnsnews.com/blog/craig-bannister/doctor-banned-social-media-touting-hydroxychloroquine-hires-sandmanns-lawyer

[40] https://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/354137/cns-news-is-now-fastest-growing-conservative-news.html

[41]https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/coronavirus-case-numbers-in-the-united-states-july-28-update

https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/proposed-physician-fee-schedule-calls-for-more-than-10-decrease

[42] https://www.statista.com/statistics/1103688/coronavirus-Covid19-deaths-us-by-state/

Read On:

After Covid-19: A Policy Blueprint

Donald Trump and Anthony Fauci

Covid-19 Presents a Unique Set of Economic Challenges to Policymakers

Trump drinks clorox

Dr. Trump Meets the Press

Coronavirus Task Force

The Trump Virus

3 Comments

Karen L Husted on September 23, 2020 at 8:18 PM

A criminal conspiracy.

R Jenkins on February 16, 2021 at 11:05 AM

This Article needs updating. Latest studies from multiple US hospitals are showing positive results in the use of hydroxychloroquine for the treatment of coronavirus. A thorough review of past studies should be conducted to understand why results now are differing from prior outcomes.

Trackbacks/Pingbacks

Doctor Who Joined Capitol Attacks Leads a Far-Right Campaign Against Covid-19 Vaccine – Central Valley Buzz - […] clear that Gold still has deep ties to far-right groups that support Trump. She was one of 27 “extremely…

---

921 an

when a coronavirus pandemic has killed more than 4.7 million people worldwide and over 695,000 of them are in the United States — according to Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore — a vaccine mandate for the U.S. Armed Forces makes perfect sense. But a lawsuit filed by a "MAGA medical group," consisting of far-right anti-vaxxers and conspiracy theorists, is aiming to stop the Pentagon's vaccine mandate, according to Daily Beast senior researcher Adam Rawnsley.

Gen. Lloyd J. Austin, Secretary of Defense in the Biden administration, ordered all active-duty members of the U.S. Armed Forces to get vaccinated for COVID-19 — and the far-right MAGA anti-vaxxers, in response, have filed a lawsuit against the Pentagon.

Rawnsley, in an article published on September 30, explains, "Lt. Col. Theresa M. Long, who serves as the brigade surgeon for the Army's 1st Aviation Brigade, filed an affidavit late last week in support of the suit's motion to block the vaccine mandate — arguing against the requirement based in part on her false belief that 'all persons who have received a COVID-19 vaccine are damaged in their cardiovascular system in an irreparable and irrevocable manner'…. The affidavit was filed as part of a suit brought by lawyers working with America's Frontline Doctors (AFLDS), according to the group, and requests a declaratory judgment blocking the vaccine requirement, on behalf of Staff Sergeants Dan Robert (USA), Hollie Mulvihill (USMC), and anti-vaxxers within the military."

Long, according to Rawnsley, "has joined a small but increasingly vocal group of field-grade officers encouraged by conservative activists and media as part of the right wing's crusade against COVID-19 vaccine mandates."

"The few officers and enlisted service members who have gone public with their opposition to the vaccine mandate are now finding increasing support among Republican members of Congress," Rawnsley notes. "Sens. Ted Cruz (R-TX), James Lankford (R-OK), Roger Marshall (R-KS), Tommy Tuberville (R-AL), for example, have recently drafted (a) proposed amendment to the annual National Defense Authorization Act that would gut the proposed vaccine mandate."

According to Rawnsley, roughly 70% of the U.S. military has been vaccinated for COVID-19. Austin and President Joe Biden would like to get that number even higher.

The good news about the AFLDS lawsuit, according to Rawnsley, is that it "faces long odds."

"Within the military," Rawnsley observes, "Long's own court filing suggests that ardent anti-vaccine attitudes may not be that widely shared. Long wrote that she's encountered 'mixed results in terms of acceptance, rejection and threats of punishment' over her opinions."

---

https://theintercept.com/2021/09/28/covid-telehealth-hydroxychloroquine-ivermectin-hacked/

a  NETWORK OF health care providers pocketed millions of dollars selling hydroxychloroquine, ivermectin, and online consultations, according to hacked data provided to The Intercept. The data show that vast sums of money are being extracted from people concerned about or suffering from Covid-19 but resistant to vaccinations or other recommendations of public health authorities.

America’s Frontline Doctors, a right-wing group founded last year to promote pro-Trump doctors during the coronavirus pandemic, is working in tandem with a small network of health care companies to sow distrust in the Covid-19 vaccine, dupe tens of thousands of people into seeking ineffective treatments for the disease, and then sell consultations and millions of dollars’ worth of those medications. The data indicate patients spent at least $15 million — and potentially much more — on consultations and medications combined.

 Intercept has obtained hundreds of thousands of records from two companies, CadenceHealth.us and Ravkoo, revealing just how the lucrative operation works. America’s Frontline Doctors, or AFLDS, has been spreading highly politicized misinformation about Covid-19 since the summer of 2020 and refers its many followers to its telemedicine partner SpeakWithAnMD.com, which uses Cadence Health as a platform. People who sign up then pay $90 for a phone consultation with “AFLDS-trained physicians” who prescribe treatments such as hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin to prevent and treat Covid-19. The drugs are delivered by Ravkoo, a service that works with local pharmacies to ship drugs to patients’ doors. Of course, that’s if patients ever get the consultation; many customers told Time they never received the call after paying.

The data from the Cadence Health and Ravkoo sites was provided to The Intercept by an anonymous hacker who said the sites were “hilariously easy” to hack, despite promises of patient privacy. It was corroborated by comparing it to publicly available information. The Intercept is not publishing any individual patient data and has taken steps to secure the data. After The Intercept reached out, Cadence Health’s Roque Espinal-Valdez said he shut the platform down, not wanting any part in profiting off of Covid-19 “quackery.”...

---

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/ivermectin-demand-drives-trump-telemedicine-website-rcna1791

no lnx

Clamoring for ivermectin, some turn to a pro-Trump telemedicine website

Much as the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine became an unproven remedy for Covid deniers, ivermectin has emerged in recent weeks as a new false cure.

Some Facebook and Reddit groups offer people ways to buy ivermectin, which health professionals warn can be toxic and do little to stop Covid-19.Chelsea Stahl / NBC News; Getty Images

Aug. 26, 2021, 3:09 PM PDT / Updated Aug. 27, 2021,

By Ben Collins and Brandy Zadrozny

When users visit the telemedicine website SpeakWithAnMD.com, they are immediately hit with a warning: “Due to overwhelming demand, we are experiencing longer than usual wait times.”

The demand is for ivermectin, a drug primarily used to deworm animals that has become the latest false cure for Covid-19. And the website, in partnership with the organization America’s Frontline Doctors, whose founder stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, has become well-known in the Facebook groups and Reddit communities where anti-vaccination sentiment thrives.

In those groups, people trade dosing directions and purchasing advice for ivermectin.

FDA issues warnings about ivermectin amid spread of disinformation

AUG. 27, 202103:29

“Please consider that even if you can get an Rx for IVM, the pharmacy may not fill it for 1-3 days claiming they don’t have it in stock, which is pure bulls---,” a Reddit user wrote in the ivermectin community this month. “HAVE SOME HORSE PASTE ON HAND,” the user added, referring to the tube form that ivermectin meant for horses comes in.

Originally introduced as a veterinary drug for livestock animals in the late-1970s, ivermectin quickly proved useful in combating certain human diseases caused by parasites, a discovery that won the Nobel Prize for medicine in 2015. It comes in pills and pastes, in versions meant for humans and for animals.

Ivermectin has been called a “wonder drug” because of its use in treating parasitic diseases, but it has not shown the same results in studies against viruses.

The drug was the subject of research into possible use as a Covid-19 treatment — including a promising non-peer-reviewed study that was later determined to be “flawed” and taken down by the website Research Square, which hosts preprints of research papers that have not yet been published in academic journals.

The groups highlight the challenge public health officials and tech companies face in cracking down on Covid-19 misinformation — and the lengths some people will go to embrace fringe and misleading Covid advice. NBC News obtained access to several groups that are dedicated to ivermectin or have recently embraced the drug. Some groups have tens of thousands of members and can easily be found through Facebook’s search feature.

More than a year and a half into the coronavirus pandemic, various drugs have had their moments in anti-vaccination communities and among some conservatives in the U.S. — and ivermectin is not particularly different. But it comes at a time when parts of the country are in another Covid wave, this one fueled by the delta variant of the virus and with a safe and effective option available: the vaccines.

Oklahoma stores selling out of horse medicine despite FDA plea not to take the drug

AUG. 24, 202101:41

“It’s hard to understand why people would turn down an[FREE]  FDA-approved Covid preventative in favor of a treatment that’s not only unapproved but has a large body of evidence showing it doesn’t work,” said Dr. Nathan Boonstra, a pediatrician at Blank Children’s Hospital in Des Moines, Iowa, and co-host of the podcast “Voices for Vaccines.” “But antivax groups will eat up any opportunity to make it seem like a vaccine isn’t needed. This has been true about anti-vaccine groups long before the pandemic.

“There is a lot of shared space between pro-ivermectin and anti-vaccine groups,” he added.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a health advisory Thursday warning of a rapid increase in ivermectin prescriptions and reports of severe illness by people using ivermectin products. Data from the National Prescription Audit showed a dramatic spike in ivermectin prescriptions in recent weeks — more than nine times pre-pandemic levels.

Facebook spokesperson Aaron Simpson said in an emailed statement that the company removes any content that "attempts to buy, sell, donate or ask for Ivermectin."

"We also enforce against any account or group that violates our COVID-19 and vaccine policies, including claims that Ivermectin is a guaranteed cure or guaranteed prevention, and we don’t allow ads promoting Ivermectin as a treatment for COVID-19," he wrote. "Since the beginning of the pandemic, we have removed 20 million pieces of COVID misinformation, labeled more than 190 million pieces of COVID content rated by our fact-checking partners, and connected over 2 billion people with authoritative information through tools like our COVID information center.”

Reddit is reviewing the ivermectin communities,spokesperson Cameron Njaa said in an emailed statement that underscored its commitment to providing accurate information, resources and support to its users.

The groups suggest ways to buy ivermectin and plenty of encouragement to do so. Some commenters push users to online cattle supply companies or pet stores. Others recommend SpeakWithAnMD.com.

The website advertises consultations for $90 and fills prescriptions through Ravkoo Pharmacy, an online pharmacy that America’s Frontline Doctors advertises as “partners,” who provide “the option to have that prescription delivered right to your door, the same day.” On a SpeakWithAnMD.com intake form viewed by NBC News, prospective patients are asked, “What medication do you prefer?” The user is then presented with three options: “Ivermectin,” “Hydroxychloroquine” or “Not sure.”

A user visiting for other reasons may not have much luck. The website makes it clear: “Controlled substances (such as narcotics) will never be prescribed.”

Reached by phone, Ravkoo Pharmacy CEO Alpesh Patel declined to comment about the relationship with America’s Frontline Doctors and hung up. America’s Frontline Doctors and SpeakWithAnMD did not respond to requests for comment.

From hydroxychloroquine to ivermectin

Much as the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine became an unproven remedy for Covid deniers after former President Donald Trump embraced it, ivermectin has emerged in recent weeks as a favorite treatment of some conservatives and anti-vaccination activists.

Ivermectin first drew some attention late last year as a possible Covid treatment, with interest remaining reasonably low until July, according to Google search data.

In recent weeks, a variety of conservative figures and anti-vaccination activists have embraced the drug. Fox News hosts Laura Ingraham, Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson have mentioned it.

:{:{}:

}:

Phil Valentine, the conservative radio host who died from Covid-19 this week, also turned to ivermectin after his diagnosis and urged his listeners to do the same. (He later encouraged listeners to get vaccinated.)

“Have a doctor on speed dial who will write you a prescription for ivermectin,” he wrote on Facebook.

While ivermectin is generally safe in low doses, high doses can be toxic in humans. The Food and Drug Administration warned that ivermectin in large doses can cause side effects including “skin rash, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, stomach pain, facial or limb swelling, neurologic adverse events, sudden drop in blood pressure, severe skin rash potentially requiring hospitalization and liver injury.”

The State Health Department in Mississippi, where at least two people had been hospitalized for ivermectin toxicity, warned residents against taking the medicine this week.

And in perhaps a prime example of the exhaustion with which some public health professionals have confronted ivermectin, the FDA recently tweeted: “You are not a horse. You are not a cow. Seriously, y’all. Stop it.”

‘Moo juice’

The warnings have done little to stunt enthusiasm for ivermectin in some Facebook groups and Reddit communities. After self-medicating, some community members report back to the group with side effects, like gastrointestinal upset or dizziness, or wonder whether they have overdosed.

The link to the SpeakWithAnMD website has been shared in dozens of public Facebook groups, including Unmask Our Kids, Nevada! It has also been shared by prominent anti-vaccination influencers, including Dr. Christiane Northrup, who posted the link to her 550,000 followers on Facebook with the caption: “To get the right treatment or prevention. No need for fear. Many of us have known this all along.”

America’s Frontline Doctors is not SpeakWithAnMD’s only link to the far right. Conspiracy theorist Jerome Corsi also provides his audience with a vanity link to the website, which was created in March 2020 and offers no information about its ownership. 

:{:{}:

}:

SpeakWithAnMD is closely tied with America’s Frontline Doctors, a group that went viral last year when its makeshift news conference in Washington got millions of views after one of the physicians, Dr. Stella Immanuel, falsely called hydroxychloroquine a “cure” for Covid-19. Trump retweeted a video of the news conference pushed on social media by the conservative media site Breitbart.

The website for America’s Frontline Doctors directs people to SpeakWithAnMd through a button that reads “Contact A Physician,” and the America’s Frontline Doctors logo is prominent on the SpeakWithAnMD homepage.

Simone Gold, founder of America’s Frontline Doctors, was arrested and charged with violent entry and disorderly conduct after she entered the Capitol during the riot on Jan. 6. She pleaded not guilty to all charges. Gold, who is awaiting trial, spoke at an anti-vaccination protest in Santa Monica, California, last weekend.

Gold has spent the last year barnstorming churches, schools and event spaces throughout the U.S. on “The Uncensored Truth Tour,” in which she gives a presentation sowing doubt about Covid vaccines.

Gold did not respond to requests for comment.

The popularity of the site has sent some Facebook users back to the feed store. Losing patience with SpeakWithAnMD’s wait times, users on Facebook’s ivermectin groups sometimes share anecdotes about other telemedicine apps on which doctors have prescribed the drug prophylactically, or they try to persuade one another to buy it over the counter at pet stores.

The Facebook groups, which have names like Ivermectin MD Team, lead some users to believe they are talking to medical experts and doctors, but any one of the 25,000 members can post advice or suggestions about taking the deworming drug.

The communities are filled with advice for off-label drug cocktails featuring the dewormer. The pages frequently feature ways to make the paste more palatable, such as mixing it with jellies or eating it as a sandwich. The flavor frequently has users wondering how to hide its pungent taste.

“I take it by hiding it in a banana or bread,” a Reddit user wrote. “The flavor sort of bothers me.”

Some users sell what they claim to be ivermectin in the comments sections. Desperate for what they believe is a miracle drug, commenters frequently oblige, often leaving their WhatsApp addresses or phone numbers in replies to complete transactions.

Worried about crackdowns due to increasingly bad publicity, moderators of the Facebook groups are also creating backup channels on smaller social media channels, like MeWe and Telegram, in case they are banned from Facebook. Users have also cut back on the use of the words “vaccine” and “ivermectin,” calling them “v” and “ivm,” respectively.

Some users have begun to call ivermectin more colloquial names, like Moo Juice, because many have been ingesting the gel version. Others ask users how much their “horse” weighs when they dole out advice for dosages.

“I identify as a horse and can report no ill effects from the directed dosage as recommended by professionals, taken on a weekly basis,” a Reddit user wrote. “I like mine with a side of strawberry jam.”

CLARIFICATION (Aug. 26, 2021 9:35 p.m. E.T.): A previous version of this article inadvertently included a quote from a Facebook group about possible side effects from ivermectin that was later determined to be in jest. It has been removed. [understandable ]

---

an 921

deSantis hires a new surgeon general: A hydroxychloroquine pusher who appeared in ‘demon sperm’ doc’s video

---

---

In July 2020, [LIN? ]Wood was retained to represent Dr. Simone Gold, founder of America's Frontline Doctors, who was fired for appearing in a video making false claims about COVID-19.[34][][35]

---

nancy schulz CNP cf RWI eco-system niche: jamie loftus activate like deep frozen marvel hero'

---

https://theintercept.com/2021/01/14/capitol-riot-covid-vaccine-doctor/

the  DAY BEFORE she entered the Capitol with the throngs of insurrectionists, Dr. Simone Gold gave a speech in which she urged people not to get the coronavirus vaccine. “You must not comply if you do not want to take an experimental biological agent deceptively named a vaccine; you must not allow yourself to be coerced,” Gold shouted at a rally held outside the White House.

:{:{}:

}:

Gold was spreading her brand of politicized medical misinformation during the siege too. In the FBI’s flyer of those most wanted for “violence at the United States Capitol,” Gold, No. 21, is pictured holding a megaphone, which she apparently used to a give a speech inside the federal building, as the Washington Post was first to report.

An emergency physician who has spent much of the past six months promoting the drug hydroxychloroquine as a Covid-19 treatment despite the overwhelming evidence that it is not effective and causes serious side effects, Gold is at the forefront of a right-wing medical misinformation effort that is now shifting its emphasis to the coronavirus vaccine.

gold cautions that one should never call it just “the vaccine,” though. “Always use the word ‘experiment’ when you talk about this. Always,” she told an enthusiastic audience in:{ }Rodney Howard-Browne’s church:{ }::{in Tampa Bay, Florida, on January 3. “The socialists win the language wars.”}:

Howard-Browne’s church is an apt setting for this latest battle in the war over the language and science of the coronavirus pandemic. An evangelist who has laid hands on President Donald Trump, Howard-Browne has been sharing Covid-19-related conspiracy theories with his followers since at least March, when he told them that vaccines for the coronavirus would “kill off many people” and that Covid-19 is a “phantom plague” designed to shut down churches. Howard-Browne was arrested and jailed in March for violating safety codes by encouraging his followers to shake hands — public health restrictions that he said were for “pansies.” Prosecutors later dropped the charges because he was allegedly taking steps to enforce social distancing. But in the January 3 video, audience members sat close together without masks.

America’s Frontline Doctors, a group Gold founded last summer, tries to put a professional medical spin on this kind of defiance of public health measures. Members appear in white coats and tout their institutional affiliations while disavowing masks and social distancing and pushing unproven Covid-19 treatments. Although most of these “front-line” doctors have no experience treating Covid-19, Gold apparently does, having worked at Adventist Health Bakersfield hospital in California. A spokesperson for the hospital told The Intercept in a text that Gold did her last shift in the “summer of 2020” but did not say when she began treating patients there or why she left. Two other hospitals Gold has mentioned have already distanced themselves from her.

[pix  vax = death  A Trump supporter holds an anti-vaccine sign while protesting at Freedom Plaza in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 5, 2021.

The Medical Board of California, which licenses physicians, is aware of Gold’s presence at the siege on the Capitol and is “looking into it,” according to Carlos Villatoro, public information manager for the board. Gold and America’s Frontline Doctors declined to comment for this story, but a statement on the group’s website about the events at the Capitol says that “no AFLDS members participated in or were a party to any violence or vandalism and any suggestion to the contrary is false and misleading.”

Gold does not appear to be currently employed by a medical institution, but in June she received more than $150,000 in three separate bailout grants.

The apparent success of her efforts to undermine the vaccine seems to hinge in part on Gold’s ability to turn her marginalization from the medical establishment into credibility in other contexts, particularly on the “alt-right.” Gold told her audience at the Tampa Bay church that she was fired for trying to give her patients hydroxychloroquine and that her dismissal has been “a blessing.”

Gold’s entrée into the world of medical misinformation influencers — she has more than 200,000 followers on Twitter — was largely achieved when Breitbart livestreamed a “white coat summit” she led in July in which she said that hydroxychloroquine was a cure for Covid-19 and that “you don’t need masks.” Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter ultimately removed the video, but not before Trump tweeted several versions of it. Since then, Gold has given herself the unfortunate moniker “the doctor who went viral” and published a book subtitled “My Fight Against Medical Cancel Culture.”

Unfortunately, the efforts of Gold and others to undermine vaccine acceptance seem to be gaining traction. A surprisingly large number of health care workers, the group first offered the vaccine in the U.S., have refused to take the vaccine, with acceptance rates as low as 50 percent in some places. And research has already shown that significant numbers of health care workers cite religious reasons, concerns about personal freedom, and distrust of government claims about the severity of Covid-19 among their reasons for refusing the vaccine.

Gold, who insists she’s not against vaccines in general, says that she opposes the use of the Covid-19 vaccine in most cases because she believes that people under the age of 75 face greater risks from the vaccine than from the virus. This is false. The virus has already killed more than 382,000 people in the U.S., including at least 127,000 people under 75. While the death of a Florida doctor who had recently received the vaccine is now being investigated, there are no confirmed fatalities from either the Pfizer or the Moderna vaccines, which have already been given to some 9 million Americans. Gold also cited a debunked theory that the vaccine might damage the placenta and cause infertility. And she has launched a petition to stop people from being forced to get vaccinated. Despite the fact that no one is being forced to get vaccinated, more than 94,000 people have already signed it.

For physicians who are hoping to put an end to the pandemic, Gold’s influence on the public conversation has been vexing. “She’s a chaos agent,” said Dr. Nick Sawyer, an emergency physician in the Sacramento. “She has created a competitive narrative of what’s true about Covid and vaccines. So many people come into my office and say to me, ‘I don’t know what to believe.’”

Sawyer sees America’s Frontline Doctors’ efforts to minimize the severity of the pandemic as fueled by politics. “They got pulled into this disinformation campaign put forward by Trump to downplay the virus,” he said. But while promoting hydroxychloroquine might be seen as currying favor with the president, who has inexplicably embraced the drug, the efforts to undermine the vaccine are harder to parse politically.

It’s clear that Gold still has deep ties to far-right groups that support Trump. She was one of 27 “extremely pro-Trump” doctors that Republican activist Nancy Schulze proposed to promote the message that it was appropriate to reopen the economy during the surging pandemic. Schulze is a member of the Council for National Policy, an organization of powerful GOP activists on the Christian right. Gold is also involved with the far-right group Turning Point USA and has spread her message on the “Charlie Kirk Show.” Kirk is also a member of the Council for National Policy and boasted on Twitter of sending “80+ buses full of patriots to DC to fight for this president.” His original tweet has since been deleted.

America’s Frontline Doctors’ Twitter account has also been “purged,” according to a January 9 tweet from Gold, who seems to be preparing for the eventual deletion of her own account. After characterizing the removal of social media accounts as censorship and “a danger to your health,” she advised her followers to “protect yourself and your loved ones” by signing up to become a member of America’s Frontline Doctors.

---

==

ginni ali hubs?

https://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/how-ginni-thomas-and-the-shadowy-council-of-national-policy-advanced-a-disinformation-campaign/

before Trump loyalists stormed the Capitol building on Jan. 6, Virginia “Ginni” Thomas took to Facebook in the early morning hours that Wednesday; there she urged people to tune into the so-called Stop the Steal rally held on the grounds of the White House. “LOVE MAGA people!!!!” sheposted, adding minutes later, “GOD BLESS EACH OF YOU STANDING UP or PRAYING.”

Though her affinity for caps-lock commentary may suggest otherwise, Ginni Thomas is an influential right-wing activist respected in conservative politics. The wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, she has made her own mark on the Republican Party with lofty positions at Turning Point USA, the Heritage Foundation, The Daily Caller, and the Council for National Policy,a highly secretive organization whose members include some of the most powerful conservatives and right-wing players in the country.

Respected though she may be in conservative circles, Ginni Thomas’ connection to extremists is nothing new. In 2010, she led Liberty Central, a think tank she founded to appeal to Tea Party supporters andto serve as the connective tissue between “Tea Party groups and the new citizen activists,” as she claimed in a2010 interview. That group’s sponsors included the Gun Owners of America—a radical alternative to the NRA—and its gun-rights extremist leaderLarry Pratt, who addressed white supremacists at a 1992 gathering in Colorado and appeared to call for war against the U.S. government in 2010. The far-right Catholic groupTradition, Family and Property, known for being virulently anti-LGBTQ, anti-woman, and anti-democratic, was also linked to Ginni Thomas’ think tank from its inception. 

Ginni Thomas’ zeal for the Stop the Steal campaign and its followers, a mob of whom would later storm the Capitol in an act of domestic terrorism, is notable in and of itself—her husband sits on the highest court, after all—but it’s also disconcerting for another reason: She is the latest in a string of Council for National Policy members—and an authoritative voice at that—who has supported the Stop the Steal movement.'[twt]

since the inception of this latest incarnation of the Stop the Steal campaign on Nov. 4 by lead organizer Ali Alexander, who himself was a member as recently as 2017, according to membership rollsobtained by the watchdog group Documented, it has received support from CNP members. In fact, the tacit support of key CNP members for challenging the 2020 presidential election results may have been theimpetus for Alexander’s decision to begin the campaign to overturn the results of the presidential election by peddling disinformation. 

Formed during the Reagan administration, CNP holds closed-door meetings and instructs members to not discuss the council’s work or its membership, though, over the years, membership rolls have been leaked to the press. Those rolls have shown the organization to be home to a couple hundredmarquee names in the conservative movement, Christian right, and right-wing fringe: Current members include Tom Fitton of Judicial Watch and Tony Perkins of the religious-right Family Research Council; former members include Trump’s former White House counselor Kellyanne Conway and former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon. 

The CNP has a close relationship with the Trump White House—so much so, that at the superspreader Rose Garden event to celebrate the confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett, “there were more Council for National Policy members present there than there were members of the White House staff and members of Congress combined,” said Anne Nelson, author of the “Shadow Network: Media, Money, and the Secret Hub of the Radical Right,” a book about the CNP. And on the eve of the Republican National Convention, Trump gave a big speech to the Council for National Policy, calling it as his “flagship address,” a rare public event for the council, Nelson said.

Nelson describes the CNP’s main role as providing “coordination, rather than direction” to its members, which include executives of such right-wing outlets the Salem Media Group and The Daily Caller.Ginni Thomas, Nelson points out, is on the board of governors of CNP Action, the lobbying arm of the secretive organization. In May 2019, Thomas and Trump lawyer Cleta Mitchell provided an update on the Conservative Action Project,CNP’s 501(c)(4) arm that holds weekly meetings, and laid out their strategy for the coming year with aslide presentation to CNP members, which included messaging about building a robust infrastructure on the right and protecting Trump. 

In the days leading up to the Jan. 6 mayhem, and on the day itself, the connection between CNP and Stop the Steal—and the campaign’s influence on the White House—became more apparent. 

On Dec. 30, Right Wing Watch posted areportabout alettersent by the Conservative Action Project to Senate Republicans urging them to “contest the electoral votes” from “Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Arizona”—the battleground states Biden won. That letter may have not mentioned Stop the Steal by name, but it asked senators to do exactly what Stop the Steal was demanding of Republican members of Congress: to reject electoral votes in favor of Biden. 

Those signees included Cleta Mitchell, Trump’s lawyer (who was on theinfamous phone call when Trump asked that Georgia Secretary of State Raffensperger “find 11,780 votes”); Tom Fitton, an CNP executive committee member whose Judicial Watch group constantly spouts voter fraud conspiracy theories; Jenny Beth Martin, co-founder of the Tea Party Patriots and columnist for The Washington Times; Tony Perkins, former CNP president and leader of the Family Research Council; Kenneth Blackwell,former Ohio secretary of state and member of CNP Action’s board of directors; and William L. Walton, current CNP president. All were revealed as CNP members in a leak of CNP’s September2020 membership directory. 

ADec. 10 letter posted on the Conservative Action Project website,reported by Alex Kotch at Exposed by CMD, asked state legislatures in battleground states to “exercise their plenary power under the Constitution and appoint clean slates of electors to the Electoral College to support President Trump,” and that the House and Senate only recognize the electors of those states that do so. Again, this was the same demand state legislators and Congress members were hearing from Stop the Steal activists. Kotch reports that the letter links to a document that, according to metadata embedded in the file, was created by none other than Cleta Mitchell, calling for a “constitutional remedy” to reject votes for Biden. The signatories included some of the same names that appeared on the Dec. 30 letter, in addition to Ed Martin, a leading Stop the Steal organizer and CNP member whom Alexander has thanked for his“mentorship” in organizing the Stop the Steal campaign. 

Two days before the Jan. 6 rally, CNP member Charlie Kirk, who leads the youth-oriented group Turning Point USA, shared a video from Women for America First’s Kylie Jane Kremeradvertising the rally and told his followers that his organizations, TPUSA and Students for Trump, had funded more than 80 buses to attend the rally. “The historic event will likely be one of the largest and most consequential in American history,” Kirk wrote. “The team at @TrumpStudents & Turning Point Action are honored to help make this happen, sending 80+ buses full of patriots to DC to fight for this president,” he said in the since deleted tweet,uncovered by Daily Dot. Kirk’s Students for Trump co-chair is Ryan Fournier, a Stop the Steal organizer who spoke at the Jan. 5 rally on the same stage where speakers advocatedrebellion.  

While a viral claim that Ginni Thomas funded the buses herself appearsto be false, Ginni Thomas has been linked to the group in the recent past, serving on Turning Point USA’s advisory council in 2019, along with fellowCNP members Foster Friess, Adam Brandon, and former Ohio congressman Bob McEwen.

On Jan. 5, speakers took to Freedom Plaza for a Stop the Steal rally designed to prime attendees for the big day. Among the speakers wasPeter Navarro, a fringe right-wing economist whospoke at the May 2019 CNP meeting. and who serves as an assistant to the president and director of the White House Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy. On the stage at Freedom Plaza, Navarro peddled voter fraud conspiracy theories and urged activists to stay angry,declaring to the assembled crowd, “We will take this back.”  

On Jan. 6, Ginni Thomas told her Facebook followers to watch the event convened by groups working in concert with the Stop the Steal campaign, dubbed the “Save America Rally,” on the right-wing Right Side Broadcasting, one of the few networks to cover the gathering. The massive rally, at which Trump would incite his supporters to bring their wrath to the Capitol, was led by the groups March for Trump and the Kremers’ Women for America First. 

Amy Kremer, who was listed as a member in a2014 CNP membership directoryobtained by the Southern Poverty Law Center, was among the first speakers. Jenny Beth Martin, the CNP executive committee secretary whom Trump thanked in his speech to CNP this summer, was another. She brought with herSimone Gold, who is nowsought by the FBI after she appeared to be part of the crowd thatstormed the Capitol following her speech on the main stage, as seen on social media.

After the Capitol insurrection, Ginni Thomas either deactivated or deleted her Facebook account, likely unhappy thatreporters noted her enthusiasmfor a movement what would launch a riot. Josh Hawley, one of the senators who led the charge to contest electors’ votes in the Senate,charged ahead even as other lawmakers backed off in light of the violent consequences wrought by the disinformation campaign designed to delegitimize the outcome of the presidential election. “Shadow Network” author Nelsonnoted that, throughout his career, Hawley was groomed by CNP affiliates.

[pix 

Ali Alexander and other “Stop the Steal” activists at Dec. 15, 2020 press conference (Image from NTD livestream posted on Epoch Times YouTube channel.)

The Stop the Steal disinformation campaign wouldn’t have gotten off the ground without CNP support. When on Nov. 4, Ali Alexander floated the idea of rebooting the Stop the Steal campaign, which in its prior iteration was focused on the outcome of the 2018 mid-term elections, baselessly claiming that the election had been stolen from Trump, he called on key CNP members including Tom Fitton, Amy Kremer, Ed Martin, and Charlie Kirk.

“Because Ali Alexander is a fairly veteran operative, he managed to get a lot of people on board very quickly,” ​said Stephanie Lamy, a French information warfare researcher with the advocacy groupDanaides. “Although he was a fairly marginal actor, he managed to have a big reach because he knew which people to rely on. And that was a lot of the CNP.”

Once he began to be successful, Lamy said, the White House seemed to have taken note.

Right Wing Watch reported about CNP members’ connection to Stop the Steal on Nov. 13—the same day Vice President Mike Pence was set to address CNP attendees in Virginia. CNP convened that meeting, Nov. 12-14, “to strategize on how to challenge the election results,”according to Exposed by CMD reporter David Armiak. At the meeting, a panel dedicated to the election results and the ensuing legal battles featured Cleta Mitchell, J. Christian Adams, a knownvoter suppressor who leads the Public Interest Legal Foundation, and the Heritage Foundation’s Hans von Spakovsky, a leading proponent ofthe voter fraud myth. 

The following day, Stop the Steal organizers held the first of three major rallies in Washington, D.C., with speakers peddling disinformation and violent rhetoric on the main stage—a day that ended in violent skirmishes between Proud Boys and counterprotesters, foreshadowing the violence to come.

“Most people don’t realize that disinformation has an aim, and that aim is to have real life impact. So what we saw with Stop the Steal, it had a real-life impact as of the 6th of November [the date of one of the first Stop the Steal rallies], and it kind of culminated with these terrorist threats and a breach of the Capitol,” said Lamy, the French disinformation researcher. “And it’s still ongoing,” she continued. “The CNP hasn’t finished manipulating anger and personal grievances.”

Tags: Ali Akbar Ali AlexanderAmy Kremer Charlie Kirk Clarence Thomas Cleta Mitchell Ed Martin Ginni Thomas Hans von Spakovsky J Christian Adams Jenny Beth Martin Kellyanne Conway Ken Blackwell Kylie Jane Kremer Peter Navarro Ryan Fournier Steve Bannon Tom Fitton Tony Perkins William Walton Capitol Insurrection Disinformation Stop the Steal Council for National Policy Gun Owners of America tea party Women for America First

---

---

9/20

https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/

On July 27, a dozen physicians posed in front of the Supreme Court in Washington, D.C., dressed in white lab coats with “America’s Frontline Doctors” stitched over the pocket. The group’s chief spokesperson was Dr. Simone Gold, an emergency physician from Los Angeles. They were introduced by Jenny Beth Martin, the founding CEO of Tea Party Patriots, as participants in the “White Coat Summit.” The doctors made spirited arguments for the use of hydroxychloroquine as a “cure” for Covid-19 and against wearing masks and imposing lockdowns—all running counter to the recommendations of Dr. Anthony Fauci and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.[[1]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn1)

Although the event was billed as a “press conference,” few journalists attended. A video posted by a bystander showed only a handful of attendees, most of them dressed in tourists’ shorts and T-shirts. But the event was livestreamed by Breitbart News and quickly went (so to speak) viral.

There was a rapid backlash. Much of the media attention focused onDr. Stella Immanuel, one of Gold’s cohort. Following the press conference, the Daily Beast posted a video of Immanuel, who is also a Pentecostal preacher, delivering a sermon claiming that various female ailments were caused by sexual visitations from “demons.”

Immanuel has since disappeared from the America’s Frontline Doctors online roster, but the group has continued to get traction. On August 10, Pat Robertson’s show on the Christian Broadcasting Network carried an interview with Simone Gold and an endorsement of her hydroxychloroquine cure.On August 21, Alex Jones’s NewsWars carried an interview with another member of America’s Frontline Doctors, Mark McDonald. McDonald—a child psychiatrist—maintained, “If all Americans had access to hydroxychloroquine, the pandemic would essentially end in about 30 days.”

Science has shown otherwise. Despite early hopes last spring, there is mounting evidence that hydroxychloroquine is a problematic—and even dangerous—treatment for Covid-19. One expert with firsthand knowledge is Nick Sawyer, an academic emergency physician in Sacramento, Calif. In July he wrote an article for Lifeline, the publication of the California chapter of the American College of Emergency Physicians, describing his harrowing two weeks of service in the Covid wards of Elmhurst Hospital in Queens. Sawyer was part of a team of California doctors dispatched by Governor Gavin Newsome to offer emergency assistance at the epicenter of the epidemic, at the height of the New York City outbreak.

Sawyer is now dealing with the spike in cases in California, this time with the benefit of four months of additional Covid research. “The science on the effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine in treating Covid-19 is settled—multiple high-quality studies have shown that it shows no benefit,” he notes. Far more concerning, Sawyer says, is its potential harm: “Hydroxychloroquine can cause unstable cardiac arrhythmias, cardiac arrest and sudden cardiac death.” Over recent months, the Food and Drug Administration, the American Medical Association, and other organizations have issued warnings that the drug should be withdrawn as a Covid-19 treatment. “It’s irresponsible for America’s Frontline Doctors to continue to push this medication on the unwitting American population,” Sawyer states.

Why, then, would Gold’s band of physicians continue its campaign to pitch the treatment to the public? Simone Gold has repeatedly described her group as a “grassroots organization” acting in the service of its patients.[[2]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn2) In fact, it has been a highly orchestrated effort, months in the making, assembled by conservative Washington insiders in direct consultation with the White House, with the goal of reopening the economy in time to benefit Trump’s reelection prospects—regardless of the toll in human lives.

The first public mention of the initiative may have been a Washington Post story on April 13, as the virus raged across New York City and Covid-19 deaths passed the 20,000 mark.[[3]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn3) The Post reported the creation of a new conservative coalition “pushing for the White House and GOP lawmakers to push back against health professionals who have urged more caution.” The leadership was listed as Stephen Moore of the Heritage Foundation, Adam Brandon of FreedomWorks, and Lisa Nelson of the American Legislative Exchange Council. A fourth individual, Jenny Beth Martin, is the founding director of the Tea Party Patriots. She would play a key role in organizing the events to come, including the doctors’ Washington “summit” in July.

Brandon, Nelson, and Martin are all prominent members of a secretive organization called the Council for National Policy,a shadowy coalition that coordinates initiatives among conservative megadonors, political operatives, and media owners, many of them Christian fundamentalists (see “Holding Democracy Hostage”).

The Post story quoted an interview with Richard Viguerie, a co-founder of the CNP, on the mission of the initiative: “The sooner we get the economy going and back up, the better it’s going to be for conservatives and Republicans in this election year. . . . Conservatives feel the government has overreacted, and it’s got to end.”[[4]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn4)

The new coalition, called Save Our Country, officially debuted on April 27, as U.S. Covid deaths approached 55,000.[[5]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn5) Headed by economist Art Laffer, its maiden press release featured quotes from Brandon, Nelson, and Martin. “The long-term consequences of a prolonged societal shutdown outweigh the damage done by the virus itself,” Martin stated. “We must immediately reopen the economy.”[[6]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn6) Earlier that week, The New York Times reported that the Save Our Country coalition’s members were mobilizing their networks for state-level rallies, filing lawsuits, and commissioning polls, all to counter the lockdowns: “Nonprofit groups including FreedomWorks and Tea Party Patriots have used their social media accounts and text and email lists to spread the word about protests across the country.”[[7]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn7)

But the state-level protests turned out to be of limited utility, and the group began to look for new avenues. In April, CNP Action, the lobbying arm of the CNP, began a series of weekly conference calls to discuss Covid strategy. On May 11—as U.S. Covid deaths reached 74,270[[8]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn8)—one of the calls was intercepted and published by the Center for Media and Democracy and the Associated Press.

Among the participants were CNP President William Walton, CNP member Nancy Schulze,[[9]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn9) and Mercedes Schlapp, a senior adviser to the Trump campaign. Schulze, the wife of former nine-term Pennsylvania Republican Congressman Dick Schulze, opened the call with a warning that two-thirds of the American people were wary of reopening the economy. But, she added, “Doctors are seen by the American people—they have a 92 percent trust rate with the American people according to polling. . . . There is a coalition of doctors, doctors’ coalition, who are extremely pro-Trump, that have been preparing and coming together for the war ahead in the campaign on health care, andthese doctors could be activated for this conversation now for reopening. NOTE RWI NICHE SLEEPER CELLS]

“The one thing the left does give credence to, in that they tend to be motivated by a secular worldview, the one thing that they do appreciate and listen to is science, and we have doctors that have the facts, that lived this themselves, that are in the trenches, that are saying it’s time to reopen,” Schulze continued. “I’ve been working with them for three years. There’s a coalition of doctors . . . including the most respected doctors in this country, that are ready to speak if somebody will just call on them.”

Walton told her, “We need to not just make the economic argument,we need to make the health argument, and we need doctors to make that argument, not us. THIRD PARTY TOBACCO PR BS And so that would be great if you, if we could tee that up.”

Schulze said she’d be happy to put him in touch “with any and all of these doctors, and I have submitted 27 of these doctors’ names to the campaign for the doctors’ coalition that they’re in the process of building.”

Mercedes Schlapp asked Schulze if she had spoken with Hannah Castillo, director of coalitions for the Trump campaign.“I know they’ve been working on building that coalition. I know they’re going through the vetting process right now. As long as you have the names, that would be helpful. . . . Those are the type of guys we want to get out on TV and radio to help push out the message.”

Schulze replied, “I’ve been working with Hannah for over six weeks now, so they already have been vetted. But they need to be put on the screen.”[[10]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn10)

Dr. Simone Gold, a 54-year-old emergency physician from Los Angeles, was ready for her close-up. On April 22, Gold had tweeted a stand-up of herself wearing a white “Emergency Dept.” coat, in front of Los Angeles’ Cedars-Sinai hospital emergency room, suggesting that concerns over the virus were inflated. She pointed out that the hospital “parking lots are empty, the emergency department volume is down, the patient census is down, and that’s really in most of the areas I’ve been to.”[[11]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn11)

On May 7, she brought a more explicit anti-lockdown message to a program on the Whiskey Politics show on Salem Radio, part of the massive Salem Media conglomerate owned by two leading members of the Council for National Policy.[[12]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn12) It was headlined “DR. SIMONE GOLD GOES PUBLIC! What the Government WON’T Tell Us About COVID-19.”

“It’s not at all clear that overall, that social distancing is going to make a huge impact,” Gold said.[[13]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn13) “We’re all acting like as though there’s a huge medical crisis. There’s a medical issue, we should handle it responsibly, but what’s going on in our country now is a terrible legal crisis. Our constitutional rights are being trampled on right and left.”[[14]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn14) Gold later added, “There’s always viruses . . . but I’m not sure that it’s front-page news.”[[15]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn15)

The Guardian reported that over the same period, the Save Our Country coalition spent $50,000 on videos on social media platforms “targeting independents and Republicans with the message that Covid-19 mostly hits the elderly to minimize risks for others.”[16] GUK

On May 19—as U.S. Covid deaths reached 84,640[[17]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn17)—the CNP’s doctors coalition (billed as “A Doctor A Day”) made its debut with an open letter to Donald Trump signed by “500+ doctors” (a number that was later revised to over 800). “In medical terms, the shutdown was a mass casualty incident,” it stated. “It is impossible to overstate the short, medium, and long-term harm to people’s health with a continued shutdown.” The lead signatory was Dr. Simone Gold.

On June 16—with U.S. Covid deaths approaching 110,000[[18]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn18) and the U.S. economy in freefall—the Save Our Country coalition published an open letter to President Trump and Leader McConnell, urging “that the multi-trillions of dollars of federal government debt spending in the wake of the Coronavirus come to a stop.”[[19]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn19) Twelve of the 20 signatories (among them Brandon, Nelson, and Martin) were members of the CNP, including CNP President William Walton and Executive Director Bob McEwen.

The push to reopen the schools became a full-court press. On July 7, Trump assembled a White House meeting on the subject. Jenny Beth Martin spoke as both the CEO of Tea Party Patriots and “as a mom.”

“Mr. President, you were right, and I hope you will trust your instincts,” she told Trump. “America is not meant to be shut down. And we have to reopen schools this fall. I’ve been in touch with almost a thousand doctors from around the country. I helped Dr. Simone Gold spearhead a letter to you signed by 800 physicians and surgeons who talked about the side effects of the lockdowns. I’ve done a second letter with over 150 doctors, 240 nurses, 330 educators, 70 national groups, and thousands of parents and concerned Americans who want to see schools reopened.”

A video of Martin’s statement appeared, billed as “Mom Gives Unexpected Speech Directly to Trump” without naming her or her affiliation. It was posted on various social media platforms, including Glenn Beck’s YouTube channel, The Blaze (where it clocked over 400,000 views as of August 4).[[20]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn20)

Dr. Simone Gold was now preparing to join Jenny Beth Martin on center stage. On July 22, Gold warmed up for her appearance on The Charlie Kirk Show, with over 157,000 YouTube subscribers. Kirk, a member of the Council for National Policy, heads a group called Turning Point USA, which recruits right-wing campus activists. (Donald Trump addressed its Youth Action Summit last December, and Donald Trump Jr. is quoted on its website stating, “I’m convinced that the work by Turning Point USA and Charlie Kirk will win back the future of America.”)[[21]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn21)

The introduction for Kirk’s show summed up the case Gold and her colleagues would make over the coming weeks: “Charlie is joined in studio by board-certified emergency physician Dr. Simon [sic] Gold, who says nearly everything we’ve been told about the Chinese Coronavirus is a lie.She and Charlie take a deep dive into the efficacy of hydroxychloroquine and why the U.S. government is barring physicians from prescribing the drug—endangering potentially 100,000 lives, at least. Charlie also takes on Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx, asking if Dr. Gold challenges the effectiveness of wearing masks. Dr. Gold makes a stunning and factual assertion about the death rates and who exactly is to blame for what she believes is one of the biggest lies ever perpetrated against the American people.” [[22]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn22)

Gold’s “stunning assertion” was the often-repeated claim that doctors were falsifying death certificates, speculating without foundation that they were inflating Covid-19 cases by “20 to 30 percent.”[[23]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn23) Gold also asserted, “Masks are really foolish, they don’t do anything. . . . There’s zero scientific justification for the mask.”[[24]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn24)

Jenny Beth Martin emphasized a social media campaign from the start. Her Tea Party Patriots website posted the program of the White Coat Summit, offering the participating doctors a two-hour session devoted to expanding their social media reach: “YouTube and other social media vastly exceed television news as the information source for most Americans. Interviews and Q/A with social media personalities with large followers is the best way to talk to Americans. Doctors who want to answer questions from these modern journalists will have the opportunity.”

By the time Jenny Beth Martin hosted Gold’s White Coat Summit on July 27, U.S. Covid-19 deaths had skyrocketed to over 136,000.[[25]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn25) The physicians’ presentation carried a lethal stew of misinformation. Dr. Bob Hamilton, a pediatrician from Santa Monica, assured viewers, “Children are not passing [the virus] on to their parents or their teachers.” (A few days later, the CDC released a report on a massive transmission event in June at a Georgia summer camp, with a median age of 12.[[26]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn26))

Dr. Richard Urso—an ophthalmologist—praised hydroxychloroquine as a “cure” for the virus,but it was not clear that Urso had ever had any significant experience treating Covid-19 patients. Another speaker was Dr. Daniel Erickson, a Bakersfield physician who co-owns an urgent care facility. In April he had been censured by the American College of Emergency Physicians and the American Academy of Emergency Medicine for his “reckless and untested musings” opposing stay-at-home orders and promoting the conspiracy theory about doctors misattributing deaths to Covid-19.[[27]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn27)

The social media strategy paid off. Gold and her colleagues’ video, livestreamed on Breitbart News, reportedly reached 185,000 concurrent users.[[28]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn28) The New York Times’ Kevin Roose reported that over its six hours on Facebook, it was the second-most-engaged post on the platform, with 14 million views.[[29]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn29) (The audiences for network news broadcasts, by comparison, range from 9 to 12 million.) A few hours after the presentation, President Trump tweeted the video to his 84.5 million followers. Donald Trump Jr. told his 5.3 million Twitter followers, “This video is a much [sic] watch!!! So different from the narrative everyone is running with.”[[30]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn30) Trump redoubled his support at his press conference the following day, stating “I think they’re very respected doctors.”[[31]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn31)

But major social media platforms reacted with relative speed. Facebook took the group’s video down a few hours after it was posted, and Twitter and YouTube followed suit, all three on the grounds that the video violated their Covid-19 misinformation policies.[[32]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn32) Twitter took the unusual step of suspending Trump Jr.’s account for 12 hours.

Gold had built the original America’s Frontline Doctors website on a SquareSpace platform, but SquareSpace took it down. Gold rebuilt the website (omitting Stella Immanuel of “demon sperm” renown) and started raising money through PayPal and fundly.com. The doctors’ program also remained on the Tea Party Patriots site.

There was an additional reaction to the doctors’ “frontline” Covid credentials. MedPageToday, a peer-reviewed medical news site, was unable to find evidence that any of America’s Frontline Doctors in Washington had served in “frontline” emergency rooms during the Covid epidemic.[[33]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn33) Simone Gold came under additional scrutiny. Her initial Whiskey Politics introduction described her as a “frontline doctor” in an “inner-city emergency room” that treated “150 patients a day,” but neither her LinkedIn profile nor other available sources listed the emergency room in question. Her personal website (taken down amid the controversy but archived) described her as a “Concierge Immediate Needs Physician” working in “C-Suite Medicine.”[[34]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn34)

On July 29, Cedars-Sinai, the backdrop for Gold’s Twitter video, issued a disavowal stating, “Simone Gold, MD, has not worked with Cedars-Sinai Medical Center or any of its offices or affiliates since 2015. For three weeks in late 2015, Dr. Gold was employed on a per diem basis by Cedars-Sinai Medical Network, a component of Cedars-Sinai. She worked during this brief time in a network urgent care clinic. Dr. Gold is not authorized to represent or speak about any information on behalf of Cedars-Sinai.”

The sharecare.com “Find a Doctor” site stated that “Dr. Simone Gold, MD, is a[n] emergency medicine specialist in Los Angeles, CA. and is affiliated with Centinela Hospital Medical Center.” But on July 31, Centinela Hospital posted a statement reading: “Simone Gold, MD, is not credentialed as part of the Centinela Medical Staff, as she resigned her position here a number of years ago. Dr. Gold was never employed here as we don’t employ our physicians.”[[35]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn35)

Also troubling was American Frontline Doctors’ repeated suggestion that patients should demand hydroxychloroquine from their doctors for Covid-19. The medication has been an important treatment for lupus and other autoimmune diseases, but the publicity around its application to Covid has created an ongoing shortage with devastating consequences.

Much of the mainstream coverage of America’s Frontline Doctors was devoted to Stella Immanuel’s “demon sperm” sermon, but alternative platforms were another story.

Simone Gold was reaching a vast new public and was now celebrated as a victim. On July 30, Fox News’s Tucker Carlson interviewed her on his nightly program. The crawl stated, “Doctor Censored by Big Tech Has Now Lost Her Job” (though that job was never specified)—echoing Trump’s executive order on Big Tech censorship released the previous day.[[36]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn36) (Carlson’s show is currently the highest-rated program on cable television, with an audience of over 4.3 million.[[37]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn37))

Glenn Beck’s multi-platform media operation, The Blaze, covered the story on his radio program and posted the Tucker Carlson video on its website on July 31, with a companion piece repeating her case for hydroxychloroquine.[[38]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn38) A similar report was posted the same day on CNS News, founded by Council for National Policy Executive Committee member L. Brent Bozell III.[[39]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn39) (MediaPost recently named CNS News as the country’s fastest-growing conservative website, with more than 8.3 million unique visitors in June and over 1,000 percent gain in year-over-year unique visitors.[[40]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn40))

Pat Robertson’s CBN.com averages over four million unique visitors each month. Add these to Alex Jones’s August 21 coverage—as well as legions of subsidiary platforms—and you have a deadly misinformation campaign that’s reaching tens of millions of voters, most of them off the radar of the national news media.

Emergency physician Nick Sawyer is disturbed by the implications for medical practitioners. The America’s Frontline Doctors campaign, he says, “violates two of the primary principles of medical ethics. Medical ethics has four major principles: beneficence, non-maleficence, autonomy, and justice. As hydroxychloroquine offers no clinical benefit and may be harmful, it violates the first two tenets. Further, their statements place actual frontline physicians treating patients with Covid-19 in conflict with patients’ right to autonomy.

“Patients have the right to make decisions regarding their medical care, but as more and more patients are asking—if not outright demanding—that physicians prescribe hydroxychloroquine to them, it places these physicians in a position where they are faced with an ethical dilemma. We respect patients’ right to autonomy, but we are not willing to allow them to demand a treatment that is not helpful and may be harmful. In sum, America’s Frontline Doctors are introducing additional havoc into the already complex Covid-19 pandemic.”

As of the publication deadline for this article, neither Jenny Beth Martin or Simone Gold had responded to requests for comment.

The day after Gold’s Washington presentation, U.S. Covid-19 deaths stood at 140,309; they swelled to 147,653 only a week later.[[41]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn41) Less than a month later, on August 21, Donald Trump addressed the Council for National Policy at the Ritz-Carlton in Pentagon City, his last major address before the Republican convention. In his opening remarks, he thanked several figures from the CNP, including Jenny Beth Martin, “for your tremendous leadership of the CNP. You’ve done a fantastic job.”

As of that Friday, over 174,000 Americans had died of Covid-19. That number continues to climb.[[42]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftn42)

Anne Nelson is the author of Shadow Network: Money, Media, and the Secret Hub of the Radical Right. She is the recipient of the Livingston Award for journalism and a Guggenheim Fellowship for historical research. 

[[1]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref1) https://www.politifact.com/article/2020/jul/28/fact-checking-video-doctors-talking-about-coronavi/

[[2]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref2) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKmPKmZw-Wk&feature=youtu.be

[[3]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref3) https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/how-value-based-care-can-save-your

[[4]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref4) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKmPKmZw-Wk&feature=youtu.be

[[5]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref5) https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/coronavirus-case-numbers-united-states-april-30-update

[[6]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref6) https://www.freedomworks.org/content/conservative-groups-launch-save-our-country-coalition

[[7]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref7) https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/21/us/politics/coronavirus-protests-trump.html

[[8]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref8) https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/coronavirus-case-numbers-united-states-may-11-update

[[9]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref9) https://www.greatamericanspeakers.com/speakers/nancy-schulze

[[10]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref10) https://soundcloud.com/alexkotch/center-for-national-policy-call-doctors-clip-51120

https://www.exposedbycmd.org/2020/05/19/coalition-pro-trump-doctors-will-defend-presidents-Covid-19-blunders/

[[11]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref11) https://twitter.com/drsimonegold/status/1253147796481302531

[[12]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref12) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxDHS9ck4k8

[[13]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref13) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxDHS9ck4k8 5:55

[[14]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref14) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxDHS9ck4k8 12:50

[[15]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref15) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3f0VRtY9oTs 23:30

[[16]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref16) https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/01/save-our-country-coalition-states-reopen

[[17]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref17) https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/coronavirus-case-numbers-united-states-may-19-update

[[18]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref18) https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/coronavirus-case-numbers-united-states-june-16-update

[[19]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref19) https://committeetounleashprosperity.com/free-market-coalition-says-stop-the-spending/

[[20]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref20) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuWxEfR5Za8

[[21]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref21) https://www.tpusa.com/donaldtrumpjr

[[22]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref22) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwbICfJ6ePs&t=654s

[[23]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref23) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwbICfJ6ePs&t=654s 12:00

[[24]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref24) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwbICfJ6ePs&t=654s 17:00

[[25]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref25) https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/coronavirus-case-numbers-in-the-united-states-july-27-update

[[26]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref26) https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6931e1.htm?s_cid=mm6931e1_x#T1_down

[[27]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref27) https://www.acep.org/corona/Covid-19-alert/Covid-19-articles/acep-aaem-joint-statement-on-physician-misinformation/

https://www.mercurynews.com/2020/04/29/dubious-coronavirus-claims-by-california-doctors-condemned-by-health-experts/

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/twitter-removes-tweet-highlighted-trump-falsely-claiming-Covid-cure-n1235075

[[28]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref28) https://americasfrontlinedoctorsummit.com/

[[29]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref29) https://twitter.com/kevinroose/status/1287906751069581318

[[30]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref30) https://techcrunch.com/2020/07/28/twitter-donald-trump-jr-frontline-doctors-viral-video-misinformation/

[[31]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref31) https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-press-briefing-july-28-2020/

[[32]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref32) https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/28/technology/virus-video-trump.html, https://nypost.com/2020/07/28/fauci-i-have-not-been-misleading-the-american-public/

[[33]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref33) https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/Covid19/87797

[[34]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref34) https://web.archive.org/web/20191225102747/https://www.drsimonegold.com/home.html

[[35]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref35) https://www.centinelamed.com/News/2020/July/STATEMENT-RE-SIMONE-GOLD-MD.aspx

[[36]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref36) https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-press-secretary-regarding-implementation-president-trumps-executive-order-preventing-online-censorship/

[[37]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref37) https://www.forbes.com/sites/markjoyella/2020/06/30/tucker-carlson-has-highest-rated-program-in-cable-news-history/#4839a1d86195

[[38]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref38) https://www.theblaze.com/news/hydroxychloroquine-touting-doctor-fired?utm_source=theblaze-breaking&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20200731Trending-HCQDocFired&utm_term=ACTIVE%20LIST%20-%20TheBlaze%20Breaking%20News

[[39]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref39) https://www.cnsnews.com/blog/craig-bannister/doctor-banned-social-media-touting-hydroxychloroquine-hires-sandmanns-lawyer

[[40]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref40) https://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/354137/cns-news-is-now-fastest-growing-conservative-news.html

[[41]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref41)https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/coronavirus-case-numbers-in-the-united-states-july-28-update

https://www.medicaleconomics.com/view/proposed-physician-fee-schedule-calls-for-more-than-10-decrease

[[42]](https://washingtonspectator.org/anatomy-of-deceit/#_ftnref42) https://www.statista.com/statistics/1103688/coronavirus-Covid19-deaths-us-by-state/

---