GivesendgoBAK

7 25

sparked by, coincidence? promote 2nd on eastmaN legal grift

merri ok

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AN 7 25

Progressive firebrand and former MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan recently debated "20 far-right Republicans" as part of the Jubilee series "Surrounded." One of them went way beyond identifying as conservative and admitted to being an outright "fascist."

When Hasan asked Connor, who goes by "Pinesap" online, if he considered himself a fascist, he replied, "Yeah, I am."

Connor also told Hasan he supports "autocracy" and said, "I, frankly, don't care being called a Nazi at all."

According to the Daily Beast's Ewan Palmer, Connor says he was fired from his job after publicly making those statements and "has launched a fundraising page on GiveSendGo, a Christian crowdfunding site" that has "faced criticism for hosting extremist causes."

IFrame Content

On his GiveSendGo page, Connor writes, "I'm raising money as an emergency fund and for other expenses while I look for a new job. Unfortunately, voicing fully legal traditional right-wing political views results in real consequences. This is cancel culture and political discrimination on full display."

Connor's fundraising campaign is drawing a lot of responses on X, formerly Twitter.

Attorney Ari Cohn wrote, "The pathetic grifty crybabyness of 'I said I am a fascist and lost my job, give me money' is just wild. So f—————— soft. Have fun not getting any insurance/benefits from the government because you're too busy begging for handouts instead of applying for a new job, loser."

X user Chris America mockingly posted, "OPer: I was fired for going on Jubilee and saying that I was a facist! My first amendment rights! Business: Thanks to the same GOP, we can fire you for any reason to protect ourselves. GOPer: The woke people did this to me! I need to raise money now! Grift. Grift. Grift."

X user Keith Edwards tweeted, "The literal fascist who got exposed on Jubilee has been fired from his job. Love that for him."

Edwards also wrote, "he doesn't believe in the First Amendment, so."

Another user Stanislav Birko posted, "This loser coming out as fascist on television thanks to Hasan and then raising more than 20 grand (seemingly in much less than a day) due to getting fired perfectly encapsulates the political moment we are living in."

X user Kennedy Pivnick wrote, "Ok but the actual answer is that unless he worked for the government or a company running a company town, no it isn't First Amendment stuff."

Similarly, Rob Braun posted, "First Amendment protects your right to free speech, he won’t be arrested or jailed. But most states are at will employment and can fire you for any reason they see fit."

*Watch the Mehdi Hasan video below or at this link.

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rww 3 24

john Eastman, a right-wing attorney who is in serious legal trouble for his intensive efforts to help former President Donald Trump stay in power after losing the 2020 election, continues to raise funds for his legal defense fund from Trump’s religious-right supporters. Eastman was the featured speaker at an online event hosted Monday night by the Salt and Light Council, a group that promotes “biblical citizenship.”

Eastman portrayed himself as making a heroic stand for truth and against tyranny, as he did last fall while fighting efforts by the California Bar Association to have him disbarred. Eastman used that trial to make the case that his 2020 claims about election fraud and illegality were legitimate but had never been fully considered by the courts. The judge’s decision in the disbarment trial was expected by March 1.

During his Salt and Light presentation, Eastman promoted his page on the Christian crowdfunding site GiveSendGo, where people have contributed more than $630,000 to his legal defense fund so far. He said he’s “about a million in the hole beyond that right now,” adding that he thinks his total legal costs will run between $3 million and $3.5 million.

Eastman’s appearance made it clear that he remains as unrepentant about his work for Trump as he was last August, when he promoted debunked claims about the 2020 election and asserted that “the very existential threat that the country is under” justified his and Trump’s actions. On Monday’s Zoom call with Salt and Light activists, Eastman made similar claims. Citing the Founding Fathers and Abraham Lincoln, Eastman said, “And now, in this century, this is the fight comparable to those—the defense of freedom.” He went on:

And will this great shining city on a hill that has been a beacon to the rest of the world continue to be that beacon of light? Or will we go into an age of darkness? I can’t imagine anything more important than that fight. And so here we are on the front lines, and let’s just make sure we’re as well armed for it as we can.

Eastman portrayed himself as a defiant warrior for freedom and the future of the country:

Our country is on a precipice of losing our freedoms. And for whatever reason, I’ve been cast in the forefront of this battle. I’m on the battle lines, I’m on the ramparts. And I consider it one of the greatest honors of my life to be in the front of this fight for freedom, and fighting against tyranny. And I will do, I will engage in that fight with every fiber of my being as long as I’m able.

And he seems to have no doubt that he is up to the task:

I’ve been fighting for principled positions for my whole career. I’ve got one of the best law degrees and academic careers you can have. I clerked at the Supreme Court of the United States. I was a dean. I’ve got the skill set, God has given me the skill set to be in a position to fight this probably, at least as well as anybody else in the country. And so that’s what I do. And I’ll do it, you know, I’ll do it with a law degree as long as I have it. And I’ll do it without the law degree if they try and take that away from me, because this is an important fight to have.

Eastman had harsh words for his opponents, whether he was talking about the people trying to impose “a one world order,” public school teachers who undermine parents’ authority, members of the congressional Jan. 6 committee, or officials seeking to silence people who question the official line on vaccines, critical race theory, or transgender youth:

The folks we’re dealing with are evil. They don’t consider destroying our country as collateral damage for their overall mission, they consider that icing on the cake for their overall mission. I mean, we have to understand that we are dealing with pure evil, and the way you gotta, just you got to arm yourselves in truth and light, salt and light.

He urged the Salt and Light activists to get their churches politically engaged:

Your congregations, that’s a massive force, get them engaged, sign them up to vote, get the voter guides out in their hands and let them know who the decent people are, and who the folks that are mouthing platitudes are, whether in the primary elections or the general election. Get them engaged. Get them educated. This is an army that cannot be stopped if we would just launch it.

Salt and Light Council founder and President Dran Reese portrayed the ongoing legal prosecutions over the 2020 election in spiritual terms, praying that God would “overcome the devil in this case around John Eastman and President Trump.”

Video excerpts (full video linked above):

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/06/john-eastman/

on fox beg $

GiveSendGo, the Christian right’s version of GoFundMe, is a top platform for Jan. 6 defendants seeking help with legal bills related to the insurrection at the Capitol. “QAnon Shaman” Jake Chansley raised $13,000; Oath Keeper founder Stewart Rhodes has collected (a surprisingly modest) $12,000; Proud Boy leader Enrique Tarrio has raked in $113,000.

... ROLLING STONE

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/john-eastman-maga-fundraising-jan-6-committee-1349384/

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Gizmodo

Project Veritas 'Whistleblower' Complains Fox Station Suppressed Bitcoin Reports

Project Veritas founder James O'Keefe at Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) 2020. Photo: Samuel Corum (Getty Images).]

2 days ago

no lnx many

Project Veritas's latest video is underwhelming even by its own miserable standards.

Tom McKay

Depending on your political outlook and/or how much paint you’ve huffed lately, the far-right activist group Project Veritas is either a groundbreaking conservative investigative outlet or a group of dweebs doing an unending series of pratfalls and faceplants for your amusement. Just kidding, it’s the latter, always. Point in case: Their latest “scoop.”

For years, Project Veritas has employed conservative activists and enlisted backstabbing insiders for a pantomime of investigative journalism, using secretly recorded and deceptively edited videos to smear liberal groups, tech companies, and perceived opponents of the conservative movement and, in particular, Donald Trump. They’ve also propped up a series of bogus whistleblowers claiming to uncover liberal corruption and who all conveniently seem to have crowdfunding accounts, like a United States Post Office employee who fabricated a story about vote-by-mail fraud in Pennsylvania.In their latest effort, Project Veritas convinced Fox 26 Houston general assignment reporter Ivory Hecker to secretly record her colleagues in some sort of effort to discredit Fox News.

Now let’s get one thing straight: Fox News sucks. It’s a lousy propaganda machine for racists and other right-wing zealots, and the same could be said of many of its affiliates and local stations. But that’s not what Hecker sought to expose. Instead, she sought to portray the Fox owned-and-operated Fox 26 Houston as part of some kind of... liberal media conspiracy?

In a recent broadcast, Hecker told the station’s viewers that “Fox Corp has been muzzling me to keep certain information from you, the viewers” and that “I am going to be releasing some recordings about what goes on behind the scenes at Fox, because it applies to you, the viewers.” She was promptly and justly fired. Project Veritas then released the supposedly shocking recordings, which are not shocking in the least. The Daily Beast reported that one of her primary complaints is that station staff didn’t want a deluge of primetime Bitcoin coverage:

Elon Musk Juices Bitcoin Price Yet Again With His Stupid Tweets

How the FBI Is Trying to Break Encryption Without Actually Breaking Encryption

Google Messages Is Finally Getting Support for End-to-End Encryption]

In one piece of surreptitiously recorded footage, Fox 26 assistant news director Lee Meier was seen explaining why the station does not do more stories on Bitcoin. In the clip, Meier said it’s “an editorial choice” to not cover the cryptocurrency because it likely would not appeal to the station’s early-evening broadcast viewership.

“I have passed on Bitcoin stories by almost every single reporter for our five o’clock audience, because that’s not our five o’clock audience,” Meier stated. “So, there are lots of reasons. If I know our numbers are tanking from five to six and in one particular segment… I may say, yeah, and Bitcoin for poor African-American audience at five, it’s probably not going to play. That’s a choice I’m making.”

In the Project Veritas video, the clip plays before Hecker tells founder James O’Keefe, “I want out of this narrative news telling! I want out of this corruption.”

That a local TV station is apparently “meh” about wall-to-wall primetime Bitcoin coverage is about the least juicy topic in the world. Local news, as the name implies, generally covers local issues that national outlets barely touch—a category that doesn’t usually include cryptocurrency. (Due to Project Veritas’s history of malicious editing, we can’t even be sure low-income Black viewers are the only demographic Hecker’s producer mentioned as potentially disinterested in wall-to-wall Bitcoin coverage.) What’s more, local states typically outsource much national news to wire services like the Associated Press or, in Fox 26 Houston’s case, Fox News. But this is apparently a moral outrage because cryptocurrency is popular with the type of libertarian convinced that people who don’t agree with them on everything fall into the two categories of either nefarious puppet master or gullible sheeple.

Hecker also apparently took issue with the station’s unwillingness to play uncritical coverage of hydroxychloroquine, an anti-parasitic drug that Trump promoted as a sort of miracle cure for the novel coronavirus. There was never more than weak evidence that hydroxychloroquine worked in the first place, and scientific studies eventually demonstrated it is essentially useless as a pandemic treatment. Hecker videotaped a call in which she was apparently dressed down by station management for sharing a video interview on Facebook with Dr. Joseph Varon, who said he had used the drug to “good success.”

Meier, the assistant news director, and Fox 26 vice president/news director Susan Schiller told Hecker during the call she had “failed as a reporter” and did not look at the “latest research” before sharing the post. Shiller told Hecker, “You need to cease and desist posting about hydroxychloroquine.”

At the time the video was posted on August 10, 2020, the original study promoting hydroxychloroquine had been debunked, the World Health Organization had ceased trials citing safety concerns, and the Food and Drug Administration had yanked its emergency use authorization in coronavirus treatment. Hecker’s rebuttal was that the scientific research showing the drug was not effective made Varon’s comments even more explosive, and she also cited Dr. Stella Immanuel, a religious minister who believes literal demons steal sperm from people while they sleep in order to breed via gay sex. Note that Fox 26 Houston was just fine with running Hecker’s coverage claiming Immanuel was a victim of censorship.

Varon, by all accounts a hardworking doctor, is part of a group known for promoting unsubstantiated and experimental treatments, and on August 2, the Texas medical board warned doctors not to promote hydroxychloroquine as a cure. Even more research showing hydroxychloroquine is not effective against the SARS-COV-2 virus came out in September 2020.

As the Daily Beast reported, Hecker also offered an apparently secretly recorded conversation between Hecker and a station staffer on the business side. That staffer mentioned that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was one of their biggest advertisers. This is the type of thing that absolutely no one but anti-vax losers would find alarming, and this is a group that apparently includes Hecker, who suspected the station could theoretically be advocating vaccines to get that sweet, sweet Big Epidemiology money. The Daily Beast wrote:

“So could the Ad Council call you and be like, ‘Hey, I want to run all these spots but I want to make sure your journalists aren’t running any anti-vax stories’?” the Project Veritas plant asked.

“If that happens, it’s above our [pay grade],” the promo producer replied.

“Does that stuff like that ever happen?” the Project Veritas operator pressed some more.

“It can, a lot of stuff can happen,” the sales coordinator responded.

It would of course be improper for advertisers to influence coverage. But the sales coordinator only suggests it’s theoretically possible advertisers could be pressuring Fox 26 Houston behind the scenes. This is something that any journalist can tell you happens all the time—the entire point is whether or not the bigwigs cave and order reporters to change their coverage, something the staffer explicitly said they weren’t aware of happening at the station. Besides, one would be hard-pressed to find a person working for a journalistic outfit that doesn’t have some vague suspicion that senior management could be up to no good. It’s fucking media!

This is all beside the point, as no news station should be running anti-vax conspiracy theories as news in the first place.

Finally, Hecker claimed that she met with Fox News to discuss a job offer, but was told she would have to “get in line with the narrative” to receive it. A company spokesperson told the Daily Beast she was never offered a job and the meeting was, apparently outside Hecker’s understanding, a “courtesy.”

This might have been a pathetic showing even for Project Veritas, whose past best hits included failing to trick the Washington Post into running additional hoax accusations against actually accused pedophile and former Senator Roy Moore and unsuccessfully plotting to get former National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster drunk to record him talking shit about Trump. But that didn’t stop Hecker and O’Keefe from taking their best shot at cashing in.

At the tail end of the video, Hecker announces she wants a job where she can “tell true stories without fear of if it fits the corporate narrative.” O’Keefe added that she was “ready to pursue a career in independent journalism where she can report the news without fear or favor.”

While there’s no news yet as to whether a job at Newsmax or One America News might be in Hecker’s future, taking up with Project Veritas seems to have been extremely lucrative for her in the short term. A fundraiser on the Christian fundraising site GiveSendGo stood at over $90,000 as of early Wednesday afternoon. (Two others on GoFundMe had only raised a total of $240.)

“FOX 26 adheres to the highest editorial standards of accuracy and impartiality,” the station told the Houston Chronicle in a statement. “This incident involves nothing more than a disgruntled former employee seeking publicity by promoting a false narrative produced through selective editing and misrepresentation.”

Tom McKay

Tom covers tech, politics, online extremism, and oddities for Gizmodo. His work has appeared on Mic, Yahoo News, AOL, HuffPo, Business Insider, Snoop Dogg's Merry Jane, Wonkette and The Daily Banter.

Newsweek

Local Fox Reporter Tells Viewers Live on Air Network 'Muzzling' Her, Going to Project Veritas

... would be releasing recordings from Hecker on Tuesday night, along with a one-on-one interview with Project Veritas founder James O'Keefe.

3 days ago

Houston Press

Far-Right Group Unveils Fox Reporter's Secret Tapes

Project Veritas, the far right-wing organization founded and operated by conservative trickster James O'Keefe, is devoted to discrediting American mainstream ...

2 days ago

The Hollywood Reporter

Project Veritas Wants Supreme Court to Vindicate Secret Recordings

James O'Keefe's outfit asks the justices to step into his fight with Massachusetts over a law that bans the secret taping of public officials. By Eriq ...

1 month ago

Fox News

O'Keefe: 'More to come' after Project Veritas release docs revealing Facebook censoring 'vaccine hesitancy'

Investigative journalist James O'Keefe reacted on "Hannity" on Monday to exclusive documents and interviews that were provided to his Project ...

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The AV Club

Meet Ivory Hecker, the reporter sabotaging her local news gig for conservative clout

demanded Hecker to Project Veritas founder, James O'Keefe, during their ten-minute video segment... a wish which was promptly granted to ...

23 hours ago

Fox News

Facebook whistleblower fired after leaking 'vaccine hesitancy' censorship documents to Project Veritas

In a video shared on Friday, Project Veritas founder James O'Keefe is seen crashing a virtual meeting Kahmann was having with his employer, ...

3 weeks ago

Orlando Sentinel

DeSantis signs Big Tech censorship bill, despite constitutional concerns

DeSantis was joined by GOP legislators but also gave a shoutout to James O'Keefe, a conservative whose Project Veritas has released ...

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The Daily Progress

Clowdus' outdoor production of 'Oklahoma!' coming to ...

Casting for the production was announced Friday, and James O'Keefe, founder of Project Veritas, will lead the cast in the role of Curly.

1 month ago

Fox News

Facebook whistleblower raises over $500,000 after being fired for leaking to Project Veritas

Facebook whistleblower raises over $500,000 after being fired for leaking to Project Veritas. Morgan Kahmann leaked documents exposing ...

no lnx

Facebook whistleblower raises over $500,000 after being fired for leaking to Project Veritas

Morgan Kahmann leaked documents exposing Facebook's 'vaccine hesitancy' censorship efforts

By Joseph A. Wulfsohn | Fox News

Media top headlines June 8

[Media top headlines June 8

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez refusing GoFundMe money for abuela, a judge ordering Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot to clarify policy that only granted interviews to journalists of color, and MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace agreeing that not passing Democratic voting bill would be like the ‘fall of the Roman empire’ round out today’s top media headlines]

Morgan Kahmann, the former Facebook employee who was fired after leaking the tech giant's "vaccine hesitancy" censorship efforts to Project Veritas, fundraised over half a million dollars to support his family.

Kahmann, a data center technician who initially came forward anonymously to the right-wing guerilla news outlet, revealed his identity after he was suspended by Facebook for sharing documents explaining "Vaccine Hesitancy Comment Demotion" which shows the "goal" is to "drastically reduce user exposure to vaccine hesitancy."

Following his ouster, Kahmann launched a viral fundraiser on the crowdsourcing site GiveSendGo, which exceeded $500,000in contributions on Monday from over 12,000 donors.

FACEBOOK WHISTLEBLOWER FIRED AFTER LEAKING ‘VACCINE HESITANCY’ CENSORSHIP DOCUMENTS TO PROJECT VERITAS

"The flood of donations, prayers and distribution of my story in the past weeks has been nothing short of a miracle," Kahmann wrote in the update on his GiveSendGo page. "There is a silent majority in this country who believe in truth and morality, and they have made themselves heard.My wife and I were uncertain when all this began, we were afraid of where this may take us, and how we could maintain stability for our family. Those worries have been taken care of by like-minded people donating to my fundraiser from around the globe."

"My family and I now have the resources to secure stability for ourselves, and we look forward to spreading this message of hope and providence. It only takes one person to stand up for what's right, to set an example for all to see, to inspire others. My message is this; whatever you do in your life, build it upon the solid foundation of God's truth, and you will not face any trial you can't overcome," Kahmann continued. "I am not some special person, I'm nothing but a regular guy from a small town in the USA, and that did not stop me, don't let it stop you. As for companies like Facebook, their days are limited. Do not relinquish your God-given freedoms to these tech tyrants. Stand up for the truth, no matter the cost, no matter the risk. Be brave. Do something. Our world depends on it."

Whistleblower who exposed Facebook's plan to censor content speaks outVideo

During an interview with Project Veritas founder James O'Keefe, Kahmann said the consequences of Facebook's actions and the ramifications if such practices are made across tech giants are "way worse than anything that can happen from me getting fired from my job."

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

In response to the leaked documents, Facebook told Project Veritas, "We proactively announced this policy on our company blog and also updated our help center with this information."

Last week, Project Veritas shared leaked footage from an internal Q&A session at Facebook showing Mark Zuckerberg and other top executives discussing the Kahmann's leak and vowed that other leakers will be found and terminated.

Joseph A. Wulfsohn is a media reporter for Fox News. Follow him on Twitter @JosephWulfsohn.

Fox Nation

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