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trifecta

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RWW

08/20/2026

by

Kyle Mantyla

Democrats say the flip indicates voters want education to move on from political fights over social issues, while conservatives point to their wins.

On Wednesday, he offered to fund a recount in the Minnesota governor primary.

An influential Southern Baptist pastor stood Wednesday (Aug. 19) in the headquarters of the world’s largest military and, with no sense of irony, preached a message of hope for Pentagon leaders by pointing to multiple biblical passages where God miraculously delivered people by defeating a large imperial military.

It’s unclear why anyone would be concerned about trans kids in sports in a state that banned them four years ago.

At an invitation-only gathering in Italy, far-right leaders mapped out strategies to target rural America while local press coverage vanishes.

Muslim communities have been growing for decades, particularly around Dallas. Now, conservatives want to roll up the welcome mat.

Presler’s recent efforts to influence voters in a high-stakes Pennsylvania Supreme Court retention election last year may have run afoul of state campaign finance laws, according to a complaint filed by the nonprofit consumer advocacy organization Public Citizen.

Tina Peters was convicted of seven counts related to election interference in 2024. Now, she’s fielding an offer from a county that’s become a hotbed of voting-related conspiracy theories.

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MMA

Trump’s shambolic policy-making by Fox segment hits the airports

Written by Matt Gertz

Published 03/23/26

President Donald Trump threw his administration into chaos on Saturday by demanding the stationing of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents at U.S. airports in response to long lines triggered by the expiration of funding for the Transportation Security Administration.

Top administration officials offered disparate explanations for what those ICE agents would be doing — explanations which also seemingly diverted from Trump’s own vision — as they scrambled to turn the president’s social media posts into some sort of coherent policy.

Meanwhile, ICE and Department of Homeland Security sources are grumbling to the press that the deployment will reduce their ability to focus on the president's deportation agenda.

The president-mandated mayhem appears to stem from Trump’s habit of governing based on policy ideas he gets from his television, particularly the MAGA talking heads at Fox News. This Fox-Trump feedback loop has at various times driven everything from administration staffing to legislative and communications strategy to presidential pardons and federal contracts.

Both the problem — long airport lines caused by Trump’s opposition to funding TSA — and his response — stationing ICE agents at the airports — seem to have their origins in Fox segments he had been watching.

A government shutdown is hitting TSA and it’s Trump’s fault (with a Fox assist)

A partial government shutdown which impacts DHS is causing major disruptions at some U.S. airports, including long security lines. And while that shutdown originated with Democratic opposition to the Trump administration’s lawless immigration enforcement, it continues because of the president’s Fox-fueled demand that future appropriations come stapled to his unrelated legislative priorities.

Senate Democrats have refused to support appropriations for ICE or Customs and Border Protection absent reforms to their operations in light of the rampages by those agencies, while Senate Republicans have to date blocked Democratic attempts to separately fund TSA and other DHS agencies. And Trump is reportedly standing in the way of a deal pitched to him by Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) in which “Senate Republicans would support funding all of DHS except ICE,” funding for which would be handled separately on a partisan basis via reconciliation.

What explains Trump’s intransigence, which has become the primary cause of the airport lines? He is using the TSA funding as leverage as he tries to ram through the SAVE America Act, legislation otherwise stymied in the Senate that would rewrite the nation’s election laws. And he is doing so in response to something he saw on Fox.

On March 8, the president declared on Truth Social that he had been so moved by MAGA activist Scott Presler’s comments about the SAVE Act on Fox & Friends that morning that he would sign no other legislation until it was passed.

“It must be done immediately,” he posted. “It supersedes everything else. MUST GO TO THE FRONT OF THE LINE. I, as President, will not sign other Bills until this is passed, AND NOT THE WATERED DOWN VERSION - GO FOR THE GOLD: MUST SHOW VOTER I.D. & PROOF OF CITIZENSHIP: NO MAIL-IN BALLOTS EXCEPT FOR MILITARY - ILLNESS, DISABILITY, TRAVEL: NO MEN IN WOMEN’S SPORTS: NO TRANSGENDER MUTILIZATION FOR CHILDREN!”

The implications of this pledge for TSA funding seem to have largely gone unnoticed. But on Sunday night, Trump explicitly tied the two together.

“I don’t think we should make any deal with the Crazy, Country Destroying, Radical Left Democrats unless, and until, they Vote with Republicans to pass ‘THE SAVE AMERICA ACT,’” Trump posted to Truth Social, claiming, “It is far more important than anything else we are doing in the Senate.”

After denouncing what he portrayed as the Democratic position on DHS funding and rattling off a list of the SAVE Act’s provisions, he urged Senate Republicans to combine the two, writing: “Lump everything together as one, and VOTE!!! Kill the Filibuster, and stay in D.C. for Easter, if necessary.”

Right-wing radio caller -> Fox segment -> presidential post -> policy

ICE agents are currently patrolling some U.S. airports after a right-wing radio caller proposed the idea, the show’s host took it to Fox, and the president adopted the policy in a social media post, as Semafor’s Ben Smith first detailed in a Sunday report.

“Linda from Arizona” called into The Clay and Buck Show on Friday afternoon proposing to “bring in ICE agents” as “a solution to the TSA problem.” Clay Travis, the show’s co-host, liked the idea so much that he brought it up that night during a hit on Fox’s Jesse Watters Primetime.

“I had a caller on the show, The Clay and Buck Show, today, Charlie, had an interesting idea,” Travis told guest host Charlie Hurt. “What if President Trump announced that ICE agents were now going to be supplementing TSA agents inside of all of the airports? The ICE agents are still being paid. How quickly would Democrats panic if he said hey, we're going to put some ICE agents in line with the TSA, help to expedite everybody?”

“And oh, by the way, if we think you might be an illegal when you're coming through to try to get on an airplane, we're going to go ahead and arrest you at the airport, too,” he added. “I think that might solve things in a hurry. It was a great caller suggestion. But it also goes to let's let people actually do something normal, go through security and get on airplanes — Democrat, Republican and independent, I think it connects with everybody.”

“Yes, it absolutely does,” Hurt replied.

:{Video

Citation

From the March 20, 2026, edition of Fox News' Jesse Watters Primetime

Hurt and Travis weren’t the only ones enamored with “Linda from Arizona’s” idea — the next morning, the president adopted the proposal. In a Saturday morning Truth Social post, Trump stressed — just as Travis had — that the ICE agents would be used both for security and for arresting undocumented immigrants.

“If the Radical Left Democrats don’t immediately sign an agreement to let our Country, in particular, our Airports, be FREE and SAFE again, I will move our brilliant and patriotic ICE Agents to the Airports where they will do Security like no one has ever seen before,” he posted, “including the immediate arrest of all Illegal Immigrants who have come into our Country, with heavy emphasis on those from Somalia, who have totally destroyed, with the approval of a corrupt Governor, Attorney General, and Congresswoman, Ilhan Omar, the once Great State of Minnesota.”

Trump made clear that the plan was moving forward in another post two hours later, writing, “I look forward to moving ICE in on Monday, and have already told them to, ‘GET READY.’ NO MORE WAITING, NO MORE GAMES!”

“The White House hasn’t commented on whether Trump did, in fact, hear the TV segment and act accordingly,” CNN’s Brian Stelter noted Monday. “But Trump has a decade-long track record of watching Fox and posting his reactions on social media.”

In another sign that the policy process driving this policy is the Fox-Trump feedback loop, The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump's “first post Saturday came as a surprise to officials inside ICE and at DHS, who have spent the weekend trying to figure out how it could work, according to three people familiar with the matter.”

Indeed, in Sunday interviews, two top Trump officials one would expect to be involved in executing the policy offered starkly different explanations for what ICE agents would be doing at the airports.

White House “border czar” Tom Homan, who Trump posted Sunday morning is “in charge” of the ICE deployment, stressed that the agents would be assigned to tasks like guarding airport exits, which he said would free up the TSA officers doing that work to do screening to reduce lines.

“I don’t see an ICE agent looking at an X-ray machine because they’re not trained in that, but there are certain parts of security that TSA is doing that we can move them off those jobs and put them in the specialized jobs and help move those lines,” he told CNN’s Dana Bash.

But the same morning, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy suggested that the ICE agents would be screening passengers alongside TSA officers.

“TSA agents are law enforcement,” he said on ABC’s This Week. “They know how to pat people down, they know how to run the X-ray machines because they are, again, under Homeland Security with TSA. So if we can bring in other assets and tools to assist TSA to get rid of these lines, yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense.”

Notably, both Homan and Duffy are in their administration roles at least in part due to their Fox ties. Homan, who has gone through the revolving door from the first Trump administration to a stint as a Fox contributor and then back to the second Trump administration, has taken on a larger role overseeing ICE operations after a Fox & Friends co-host suggested increasing his responsibilities. Duffy, meanwhile, is a former Fox contributor and host (he is also married to a current Fox & Friends Weekend co-host, who worked in that role alongside the nation’s current defense secretary).

Homan and Duffy both seem to be trying to salvage some sort of workable plan from the president’s Fox-stoked half-idea. Notably, neither pitched what Travis initially floated and Trump actually asked for in his initial post — ICE agents specifically tasked with arresting undocumented immigrants en masse. And that’s what the president still says is going to happen.

A reporter asked Trump at a Monday morning gaggle, “Will we see ICE arresting illegal migrants at airports?”

“Yeah,” he responded. “That's why the Democrats are going crazy.”

The president added that ICE agents “love it because they're able to now arrest illegals as they come into the country. That's very fertile territory.”

That’s not what the Journal is hearing. “Officials at ICE and DHS expressed frustration with the plan, saying it will distract from Trump’s core goal of deporting as many people in the country illegally as possible,” the paper reported.

It’s no wonder they are concerned. Either the ICE agents have been moved away from positions supporting the president’s mass deportation effort and are not going to be arresting immigrants at the airports, or they are going to be carrying out their brutal arrest operations in front of airport crowds and end up further damaging the agency’s reputation. The president has put ICE in a no-win situation, all to support a policy of holding TSA funding for ransom to secure unrelated legislation.

That’s what happens when you govern via Fox segment.

//

  1. ### How Fox powered Trump’s first term — and what that means for his second

11/19/24 7:30 AM EST

  1. ### A comprehensive review of the revolving door between Fox and the second Trump administration

11/13/24 11:34 AM EST

  1. ### After 36 hours justifying the killing of Alex Pretti, Fox News suddenly changes its narrative

01/26/26

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MMA

Right-wing media use the SAVE America Act to undermine the upcoming midterm elections

Right-wing pundits have falsely claimed Democrats oppose the SAVE America Act because they are “cheating” and “want the illegals to be able to vote”

Written by Gideon Taaffe & Sage Hodil

Published 03/20/26

For example, in the lead-up to the 2020 presidential election, right-wing media were peddling election conspiracy theories and insisting the 2020 election was rigged. Ahead of the 2024 election cycle, right-wing media deployed that same playbook, spreading false information about undocumented immigrants voting, accusing Democrats of rigging the system, and attempting to undermine the validity of mail-in voting.

As the 2026 midterm elections approach, right-wing media figures are yet again claiming that Democrats are trying to cheat and want undocumented immigrants to vote, even though instances of noncitizen voting are vanishingly rare. Still, right-wing media figures have advocated for Immigration and Customs Enforcement presence at polling locations, President Donald Trump to declare a “national emergency” to enforce his preferred election policies, and Congress to pass the SAVE Act (since modified and rebranded as the SAVE America Act).

Though the SAVE America Act appears to be doomed in the Senate, the controversial bill, which aims to rewrite election laws nationwide, would, if passed, create new barriers for people attempting to register to vote by requiring them to provide documents such as a passport or birth certificate as proof of citizenship. But as the Brennan Center for Justice points out, millions of citizens lack access to these documents, and “roughly half of Americans don’t even have a passport.” As an example of the potential effects, the Bipartisan Policy Center examined a similar law requiring proof of citizenship passed in Kansas and found the law prevented roughly 12% of applicants from registering to vote. The SAVE America Act could also place additional burdens on married women who have changed their last name from the one that appears on their birth certificate.

Nonetheless, right-wing media have been using the bill to sell a false narrative that Democrats have “nefarious intentions” and are “petrified about having safe and secure elections” because “they want the illegals to be able to vote.”

//

  1. ### Newsmax host discusses a Senate filibuster against the SAVE Act: “This is why people need guns in this country, because a government is willing to go 80% against the country”

03/18/26 10:15 AM EDT

  1. ### Nick Shirley rebooted James O’Keefe’s debunked voter fraud myths for a new audience

02/18/26 4:25 PM EST

  1. ### Daily Wire host admits if the SAVE Act becomes law, “fewer actual American citizens will end up voting”

02/12/26

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AN 12 25

GOP organizer Scott Presler is an unlikely figure in the Republican Party. The 37-year-old Presler is openly gay, yet his history is that of a far-right MAGA culture warrior — from anti-Islam events to defending Christian nationalists.

In an article published by Slate on December 8, journalist Aymann Ismail stresses that Presler is trying to put his past behind him but may have difficulty doing so.

"Scott Presler deeply, desperately wants to be known as a winner," Ismail explains. "And for a moment, he was. Presler is a Republican campaign operative who travels the country as a kind of itinerant preacher of civics, rallying conservatives to register and vote en masse. His chosen cause is destigmatizing early and mail-in voting for Republicans. It's a noble-enough goal, only complicated by Donald Trump's incessant claims that mail-in ballots are tools of liberal fraud. In the 2024 election, Presler brought his get-out-the-GOP-vote magic to Pennsylvania — where Trump eventually won handily, a turning point that made Presler an instant Republican hero."

Ismail continues, "Presler, 37, is also a hell of character. He's a 6-foot-5 gay man who would stand out even if he didn't wear those flashy cowboy boots or his hair straight from an early-2000s Herbal Essences commercial. He's also a very effective speaker. I've seen him work a room full of pissed-off biker types and older housewives alike. It's genuinely striking watching Trump diehards dote on a flamboyant sweetheart like Presler."

The Slate journalist, a Muslim, notes that Presler "hates talking about his past," including "a long stint trafficking in anti-Muslim propaganda" as well as "'Stop the Steal' activism."

"Can someone build a shiny new political identity on top of years of dehumanizing rhetoric aimed at people like me, and simply bury that past altogether?," Ismail writes. "Presler clearly hopes the answer is yes, that he can become the unusual MAGA voice built on positivity and can-do bluster. But here, observing someone up close as they make that pivot, I found it's not so simple."

*Read Aymann Ismail's full article for Slate at this link.

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AN 2 325 FAIL

A conservative activist is claiming that Pennsylvania has “tens of thousands” of voters improperly registered, but state officials say he’s misrepresenting a normal, legal part of the voter registration system.

*This article was originally published by Votebeat, a nonprofit news organization covering local election administration and voting access.

The commonwealth regularly cleans its voter rolls to eliminate names of people who have moved out of the state or otherwise become ineligible. This process isn’t immediate. It can take several years, as counties are required to send voters notices to make sure they’re not improperly disenfranchised.

All of this is regulated by federal and state law.

But that hasn’t stopped Scott Presler from using these routine lags to suggest that something is wrong with voter registrations, Democratic ones in particular.

Presler, who has been among Donald Trump most vocal supporters in Pennsylvania, says he has used an unnamed artificial intelligence tool to identify voters registered in multiple states simultaneously. Presler suggested those registrations were fraudulent and said he would refer them to law enforcement, though he said he hasn’t done so yet.

But multiple registrations themselves aren’t a sign of fraud or illegal voting. In fact, they can be a sign of the law working as intended to protect voters’ rights.

How federal and state law affects timing of removals

In states around the country, people can remain on the voter rolls for years after moving to another state. A federal law, theNational Voter Registration Act of 1993, governs how voters can be removed from the rolls.

In cases where election officials learn someone may have moved out of their jurisdiction, such as from change-of-address data provided by the U.S. Postal Service, the law requires that election officials provide notice to the voter of their intent to remove them. If the voter doesn’t confirm the move, they may have to confirm their address before they can vote in their original jurisdiction. But they can’t be removed until they’ve missed voting in two consecutive general elections after being notified. That could be as long as four years.

Under Pennsylvania law, those notices are also sent to any voters who have not participated in an election for five years or updated their registration. That means it can take as long as eight or nine years to remove a voter who has moved, if the NVRA removal process begins after that. According to a 2024 report from the Department of State, in 2023 counties sent out 4,320 notices of duplicate voter registrations and more than 44,000 notices to voters believed to have moved out of state.

Actually voting in two separate jurisdictions in the same election is illegal. Election officials refer such double-voting cases for prosecution, and studies have found it to be very rare.

As for duplicate registrations, states have long shared data to try and identify and resolve them promptly.

Much of this work is done through the Electronic Registration Information Center, or ERIC, a bipartisan multi-state data-sharing compact aimed at addressing this exact issue.

ERIC compares data from member states, along with other sources such as the U.S. Postal Service’s National Change of Address database, to identify cross-state movers, so that states can start removing those names. ERIC says it has identifiedmore than 13 million cross-state moves since its inception in 2013.

But several Republican-led states abandoned ERIC in recent years after it became the target of misinformation, undercutting efforts at cross-state collaboration.

Pennsylvania changes are part of routine voter roll maintenance

Presler’s misleading claims go beyond the notion that the duplicate registrations indicate fraud. In his public comments and in an interview with Votebeat and Spotlight PA, he has suggested that his claims led the Pennsylvania Department of State to shift more than 10,000 Democratic voters from active to inactive — although it is counties, not the state, that manage voter registrations.

In the week between Feb. 3 and Feb. 10 Pennsylvania’s weekly voter roll statistics showed that about 14,500 registered Democrats moved from active to inactive status. But the Department of State said those shifts had nothing to do with Presler.

“All voter cancellations this week — like any other week — are the result of counties performing routine voter roll maintenance in accordance with the law, as they do consistently year-round,” State Department spokesperson Amy Gulli said in an email. “To our knowledge, zero cancellations have resulted from Presler’s ‘research.’”

About 2,000 Republicans and 3,300 unaffiliated or third party voters also shifted from active to inactive that same week.

A review of weekly data since the beginning of 2024 also shows that while 14,500 voters shifting status is relatively high for one week, similar shifts happened in at least seven other instances during that year.

Most of the registration changes happened in Philadelphia, which Presler has specifically called out on social media. Philadelphia’s history of election fraud has helped feed conspiracy theories and unfounded allegations targeting the city.

But Seth Bluestein, a Republican city commissioner in Philadelphia, said the number of status changes in the city is both normal and unrelated to Presler. Philadelphia is by far the state’s largest city, and predominantly Democratic.

Bluestein said that last Tuesday, before Presler began posting about duplicate voters in the city, city workers had processed a large backlog of national change-of-address and returned-mail data, which accounts for the increase in status changes. All three city commissioners’ offices confirmed Presler had not contacted them.

Federal law restricts systematic cleaning of voter rolls in the 90-day period leading up federal elections, so it is normal for more of that work to take place in the months after the election. In January 2024, for instance, Philadelphia moved roughly 17,000 Democrats from active to inactive status in one week.

Presler’s efforts aren’t strictly aimed at voter roll integrity. He has linked his campaign for removing duplicate registrations to his goal of flipping the state from a plurality of registered Democrats to a plurality of Republicans.

The commonwealth currently has 185,000 more registered Democrats than Republicans.

Carter Walker is a reporter for Votebeat in partnership with Spotlight PA. Contact Carter at[cwalker@votebeat.org

Votebeat is a nonprofit news organization covering local election integrity and voting access. Sign up for their newsletters here.

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Right-wing media and conspiracy theorists spread debunked viral video falsely claiming a Pennsylvania postmaster was illegally harvesting ballots

A county official confirmed that the “25-year veteran of the U.S. Postal Service,” who is now facing harassment, was “lawfully bringing ballots into the election office”

Written by Ilana Berger

Research contributions from Alex Kaplan

Published 10/30/24 MMA

IFrame Content

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scott pressler

Strong Communities Foundation of Arizona

Strong Communities Foundation of Arizona

Civic Education Made Easy

Donate

Active campaigns

[# San Tan Flat - Voter Registration with Scott Presler

Join Scot Presler and American Majority for Voter Registration at San Tan Flat

Created 5 months ago

ttps://givebutter.com/preslerst)

[# Pinal County Stop - Scott Presler Save AZ Tour

Scott helps us kick off saving Arizona in 2024 with a 3-day tour of training, equipping volunteers, and registering voters!

Created 6 months ago

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[# Gila County Stop - Scott Presler Save AZ Tour

Scott helps us kick off saving Arizona in 2024 with a 3-day tour of training, equipping volunteers, and registering voters!

Created 6 months ago

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[# Lake Havasu City Stop - Scott Presler Save AZ Tour

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Created 6 months ago

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[# Yavapai County Stop - Scott Presler Save AZ Tour

Scott helps us kick off saving Arizona in 2024 with a 3-day tour of training, equipping volunteers, and registering voters!

Created 6 months ago

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[# Tucson Stop - Scott Presler Save AZ Tour

Scott helps us kick off saving Arizona in 2024 with a 3-day tour of training, equipping volunteers, and registering voters!

Created 6 months ago

ttps://givebutter.com/preslertucson)

[# East Valley Stop - Scott Presler Save AZ Tour

Scott helps us kick off saving Arizona in 2024 with a 3-day tour of training, equipping volunteers, and registering voters!

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[# West Valley Stop - Scott Presler Save AZ Tour

Scott helps us kick off saving Arizona in 2024 with a 3-day tour of training, equipping volunteers, and registering voters!

Created 6 months ago

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[# Giving Tuesday: Save the Republic Gift Bag with a $100 Donation or More

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[# Prop 412 Facts Voter Education Campaign

Informed Voters Vote Better

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ivebutter.com/412facts)

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STRONG COMMUNITIES FOUNDATION OF ARIZONA INCORPORATED

pro publ

ProPublica

ethel L Blankenship

Treasurer|40.00|0|0|0|

Jeffery Blankenship

Statutory Agent

0.00000

Merissa hamilton

Chairperson of Board of Directors

0.00000

Merissa L Hamilton

President CEO

Merissa L Hamilton

President CEO

Merissa L Hamilton

President CEO

Merissa L Hamilton

President CEO

Merissa L Hamilton

President CEO

==

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rww June 17, 2024

Judging from the first two days of the event, it would be hard to call this a youth movement. Saturday morning, I attended a breakout session headlined by voter registration activist Scott Presler. There were about 50 or 60 people in the room, virtually all well over 40. When Presler opened the floor for a Q&A, the first questioner said he was 77 years old.

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charlie Kirk’s Turning Point connects far-right extremists with the Republican National Committee and the Trump campaign

The Turning Point event this past weekend featured a number of extremists, with at least two speakers using the phrase “Christ is king” — an antisemitic dog whistle long favored by the white nationalist “groyper” movement

WRITTEN BY JOHN KNEFEL

RESEARCH CONTRIBUTIONS FROM MADELINE PELTZ, SOPHIE LAWTON & ALEX KAPLAN

PUBLISHED 06/18/24

Several right-wing extremist figures spoke at a weekend event organized by conservative radio host Charlie Kirk’s Turning Point Action, which is partnering with the Republican National Committee and former President Donald Trump's campaign. At least two speeches included the phrase “Christ is king,” an antisemitic dog whistle long favored by white nationalists.

Speakers at The People’s Convention included right-wing pundit Candace Owens, who has a history of making antisemitic remarks and appears to be associating herself with Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes; neo-Nazi collaborator and Pizzagate conspiracy theory peddler Jack Posobiec; and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones. The presence of these figures is not surprising, given the significant ties Kirk and Turning Point have to right-wing extremists and white nationalists.

The three-day summit illustrated how Turning Point Action and its affiliate Turning Point USA have come to serve as a bridge between official Republican Party institutions and the more openly bigoted and extremist elements of Trump’s movement. Over the weekend, CNN reported that the Trump campaign is working with Turning Point Action. Politico wrote that Turning Point “has become a central player in the party apparatus,” as “part of recent collaborations between the [Trump] campaign, RNC and outside groups.” In May, The Washington Post reported that the RNC was adopting a “leaner” approach and was considering outsourcing much of its voter outreach to TPUSA and other right-wing organizations.

Speaking directly after Kirk on the event’s opening day, Owens opened and closed her speech with the phrase “Christ is king” — a slogan long used by Fuentes’ “groyper” movement that has gained antisemitic connotations through its use in far-right-wing contexts. Last November, Owens used the phrase to troll Ben Shapiro, her then-colleague at The Daily Wire — one flare-up in a monthslong feud between the two. The Daily Wire and Owens “ended their relationship” in March, according to CEO Jeremy Boreing.

“When you do come together and you do start a family, for the love of God, put Christ first,” Owens said, prompting an audience chant of: “Christ is king.”

“Correct, and we’re going to lead out on that chant,” Owens responded.

Owens then claimed that Democrats and liberals are bringing “the full weight of the government” against Trump, but that “Trump is just one step — they’ve always been after Jesus Christ.”

“Christ is king,” Owens said in closing.

Video

CitationFrom the June 14, 2024, Rumble livestream of Turning Point USA's The People's Convention

On the third day of the event, Posobiec echoed Owens.

“We understand this is a war against the demonic, this is a spiritual war!” Posobiec shouted, raising a rosary in his clenched fist. “We can only defeat a spiritual war with Christ as king because Christ is king.”

“Christ is king,” he repeated.

That phrase wasn’t the only example of the groypers’ influence on Turning Point. In 2021, Chet Hanks attempted to manufacture a viral moment for himself by calling for a “white boy summer,” but the phrase was quickly adopted by neo-Nazis and other extremists, including followers of Fuentes. On Sunday, Posobiec took the stage next to a banner reading “WHITE BOY SUMMER” and tossed hats branded with the slogan to the crowd.

Video

CitationFrom a June 16, 2024, Rumble livestream of Turning Point USA's The People's Conference

Posobiec then introduced Jones, appearing fresh off a court order to liquidate his assets in order to pay surviving members of the Sandy Hook massacre whom he’d repeatedly defamed by claiming the shooting was a false flag.

“The answer to 1984 is 1776,” Jones said before attempting to lead the crowd in a “1776” chant — a dog whistle that signifies opposition to the anti-racist 1619 Project.

“Just three or four days ago, the great folks at Turning Point Action invited me on here. I’m very blessed and honored to be here,” Jones said before pushing an election denialist conspiracy theory. “We are in the very center, the TCF Center, where almost four years ago, in the dead of night, they stole the election not just from our amazing president, but from us.”

Later in his speech, Jones repeated another conspiracy theory he’d helped spread in May when he falsely claimed President Joe Biden had hatched a scheme to kill Trump. “They are going to try to assassinate President Trump, make no mistake about that,” Jones said.

Video

CitationFrom a June 16, 2024, Rumble livestream of Turning Point USA's The People's Conference

Posobiec, standing next to Jones, praised his career. “Alex Jones has spent 30 years being the loudest voice for freedom, for liberty, and for anti-war that this world has seen,” Posobiec said.

Other notable speakers included anti-LGBTQ extremist James Lindsay and QAnon conspiracy theory peddler Scott Presler, who was present during the January 6 attempted insurrection and previously worked at anti-Muslim hate group Act for America. In March, RNC co-chair Lara Trump said she was interested in hiring Presler to be “part of the team” to help with “the largest legal ballot harvesting operation in the entire country,” which will be “started by the RNC.”

===

lara-trumps-dream-rnc-hire-was-previously-linked-lewd-photos-craigslist

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alternet-3 24 no lnx

Why the RNC’s latest 'B-level' hire is 'good news for Democrats': analysis

Scott Presler at the 2023 Turning Point Action Conference in Palm Beach, Florida (Gage Skidmore)

Alex Henderson

March 19, 2024

On Thursday, March 14, Lara Trump — the Republican National Committee's new co-chair and Donald Trump's daughter-in-law — announced that the RNC was hiring MAGA Republican Scott Presler to lead its voter turnout efforts.

Presler, a far-right conspiracy theorist known for promoting QAnon posts on social media, has aggressively promoted Donald Trump's false claim that the 2020 election was stolen from him. And Presler has praised the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol Building as the "largest civil rights protest in American history."

In a ReidOut Blog opinion column published on March 18, MSNBC's Ja'han Jones argues that Lara Trump's decision to hire Presler is "good news for Democrats" because "it's a sign that the RNC is increasingly staffing up with a team of B-level or worse staffers who are more focused on spouting conspiracy theories and getting internet clout than actually doing the grueling, substantive work of winning an election."

READ MORE:'Not playing games': Lara Trump warns Republicans to support father-in-law’s campaign — or else

"Presler is known more for political stunts than substantive election victories," Jones observes. "He's made a habit of visiting various states to assist with highly public campaigns that, in many cases, don't end up going in Republicans' favor. Ahead of a crucial election in February that could have flipped Pennsylvania's state house to Republicans, he visited and attempted to mobilize voters for a candidate who ultimately went on to lose."

Jones adds, "Philly GOPers were pretty demoralized after that loss. And in a similarly high-stakes campaign last year, Presler threw his support behind failed Wisconsin Supreme Court candidate Daniel Kelly. He's also a staunch backer of Arizona gubernatorial election-loser Kari Lake."

Since taking over the RNC, Chairman Michael Whatley and Co-Chair Lara Trump have made a concerted effort to give the RNC a top-to-bottom MAGA makeover. Countless RNC staffers are being fired, and Lara Trump has stressed that the RNC's #1 priority in 2024 is helping her uncle defeat President Joe Biden in November.

But some traditional conservatives have been highly critical of the RNC's new direction, including former RNC Chairman and ex-Maryland Lt. Gov. Michael Steele. A Never Trumper and MSNBC host who is rooting for Biden, Steele has warned fellow conservatives that the RNC's heavy emphasis on Trump's presidential campaign will cause GOP candidates in down-ballot races to suffer in November.

READ MORE: 'No point donating now': Lifelong Republicans revolt after Lara Trump elected RNC co-chair

Jones stresses that if the RNC's new leadership continues to hire conspiracy theorists like Presler, Democrats will be the ones who ultimately benefit.

"Presler being given a high-profile position in the RNC would be the latest sign that Turning Point USA and its affiliates are in total control of the Trump-branded Republican Party," Jones writes. "And while that may serve each of them quite well personally, evidence suggests it's bound to hurt the GOP's electoral chances come November."

READ MORE: Lara Trump: GOP voters will 'absolutely' pony up to pay ex-president’s legal bills

Ja'han Jones' full MSNBC column is available at this link.

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https://www.exposedbycmd.org/**2020/11**/06/operatives-tied-to-council-for-national-policy-organizing-protests-alleging-voter-fraud/

no lnx twt

as ballot counting to determine the outcome of the 2020 U.S. Presidential election continues in swing states, right-wing operatives with ties to the influential Christian Right group Council for National Policy (CNP) are organizing daily #StoptheSteal protests. #StoptheSteal, a “coalition/team effort” that The Washington Post reported yesterday was shut down on Facebook, and FreedomWorks are promoting and hosting rallies across the country based on the false claim that Joe Biden’s growing lead is based on election fraud.

Facebook spokesman Andy Stone announced in a statement that its banning of the #StoptheSteal group page with 360,000 members was due to it being “organized around the delegitimization of the election process, and we saw worrying calls for violence from some members of the group.”

The new #StoptheSteal site was registered on November 4 by viceandvictory.com in Fort Worth, Texas. Vice and Victory is nothing but a landing page for Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook accounts. An examination of the three, leads to one individual: Ali Akbar AKA Ali Alexander.

Akbar, who has a book written on him titled “Vice and Victory,” has taken on the name Ali Alexander to distance himself from his past legal troubles. In 2007, he pled guilty to felony property theft in Fort Worth, and in 2008 he pled guilty to a felony charge of credit card abuse, reported the daily dot.

Alexander’s homepage, which links to his blog for subscribers and offers a “Persuasion Masterclass” for $199, links to StoptheSteal.us, as does his Twitter profile.

Alexander calls himself an “interpreter of energy for this period,” and is Pro-Trump influencer on Twitter with over 140,000 followers. It is unclear who funds Alexander’s activities, but Politico noted in 2018 that Robert Mercer, one of the “blow-it-all-up billionaires” behind the rise of Trump, gave a PAC Alexander advises $60,000.

Alexander, a former member of CNP, announced the StoptheSteal.us site with a video and a tweet, “Proud to be working with these patriots to Save the Election,” and listed 15 Twitter handles.

Proud to be working with these patriots to Save the Election@ScottPresler@alexbruesewitz @Cernovich @EagleEdMartin @KylieJaneKremer @AmyKremer @thecjpearson @JackPosobiec @debostic @MichaelCoudrey @hollandcourtney @stclairashley @BrandonStraka @DrPaulGosar @ReaganBabe pic.twitter.com/9otKQA7tWv

— Ali stopthesteal.us (@ali) November 5, 2020

Many of the individuals listed are organizers of individual states protests. Jack Posobiec, a correspondent for the far-Right One America News Network, and pro-Trump activist Scott Presler are leading a protest at the capitol in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

Georgia protests held yesterday at in Atlanta and Savannah were led by Kylie Kremer, executive director of the Women for Trump PAC; right-wing activist CJ Pearson; former congressional staffer Daniel Bostic; and Amy Kremer, chair of Women for America First and co-founder of Women for Trump. Women for Trump’s co-founder Caroline Wetherington is a member of the CNP.

Trumpist Courtney Holland and right-wing social media operative Mike Coudrey are listed as organizers of a protest scheduled for 6 p.m. tonight at the Nevada Clark County Elections Department in Las Vegas.

Right-wing social media influencer Brandon Straka and Amy Kremer led a Detroit, Michigan protest this morning at the TCF Center, where ballots were being counted. Protesters blocked a bridge, and at least one arrest was reported.

Protests at the capitol in Madison, Wisconsin yesterday, today, and tomorrow are being led by Alex Bruesewitz, co-founder and CEO of the PR firm X Strategies.

Although not listed in Alexander’s tweet, Turning Point USA‘s founder and president Charlie Kirk is listed as leading an Arizona protest at the Maricopa Tabulation Center in Phoenix at 6 p.m. this evening. Kirk is also a CNP member.

Ed Martin, president of the Phyllis Schlafly Eagles, listed by Alexander as a partner in the tweet above, is also a member of the CNP.

Early today, Alexander announced protests for every state capital tomorrow at noon.

We want everyone at their state capitols on Saturday at noon. #StopTheSteal @BrandonStraka @ScottPresler @AmyKremer @tracybeanz @alexbruesewitz @stclairashley @EagleEdMartin @JackPosobiec @Cernovich @hollandcourtney @RyanAFournier @thecjpearson

Peaceful Protest

— Ali stopthesteal.us (@ali) November 6, 2020

FreedomWorks, led by president Adam Brandon, who also serves on the advisory council for Turning Point USA and the CNP Action Board of Directors, is also organizing “Protect the Vote” protests in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona, and Oklahoma today. The times of the events do not match the #StoptheSteal events.

FreedomWorks, a group that grew out of a Charles Koch-founded organization and that helped launch the Tea Party in 2009, was also behind many of the protests to reopen the economy amidst the pandemic this year, as the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) reported.

A number of CNP members are major donors to FreedomWorks.Lawson Bader, president of DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund is a CNP member. DonorsTrust has given $3.4 million (2006-2018) and Donors Capital Fund another $667,000 (2008-2016) to FreedomWorks.

Bradley Foundation president and CEO Richard Graber is a CNP member.Bradley has given FreedomWorks $1.2 million (2007-2017) and disclosed another $100,000 this year to fund FreedomWorks “Save Our Country initiative,” as CMD first reported.

Heather Higgins is a CNP Gold Circle member, and her Randolph Foundation gave FreedomWorks $10,000 in 2017.

The Richard and Helen DeVos Foundation gave FreedomWorks $600,000 (2009-2011). Richard DeVos is a former CNP member.

Tea Party Patriots Action (TPPA) announced this morning that it is “working with FreedomWorks, Turning Points, Heritage, and countless social media influencers” to promote and hold “Protect the Vote” rallies in Georgia, Arizona, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. TPPA’s honorary chairman Jenny Beth Martin serves on the CNP Executive Committee and a number of those working at the Heritage Foundation are also members.

CNP is deeply tied to the Trump administration. In August, Trump himself spoke to CNP on the last day of the meeting, where he repeatedly thanked the Christian Right group for its leadership.

Trump’s vice president Mike Pence went further in thanking CNP in November 2019, for “standing by him” and for giving him counsel “every single day.” Pence later followed up in March of this year in a letter made public by investigative researcher Brent Allpress, in which he “thanked the Council for National Policy for your support and for consistently amplifying the agenda of President Trump and our Administration.”

Brent Allpress contributed research on #StoptheSteal and Vice and Victory for this report.

About David Armiak

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https://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/right-wing-operative-ali-alexander-leads-stop-the-steal-campaign/

right-wing political operative Ali Alexander has brought back “Stop the Steal,” a campaign to get right-wing activists to discredit mail-in voting, disrupt vote-counting, and ​falsely accuse Democrats of stealing the presidential election—presumably because legally cast ballots are being counted in states that have yet to declare the winner of the 2020 presidential contest. (Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden appears to be prevailing among votes cast by mail-in ballots.)

The move comes after President Donald Trump declared a premature victory in the early morning hours Wednesday and accused Democrats of mass voter fraud, a false narrative he’s been pushing for months about mail-in voting. At a Wednesday afternoon press conference in Philadelphia, Trump’s legal team, including conspiracy theorist and Trump sycophant Rudy Giuliani, doubled down on those claims, as have right-wing activists. The race is still too close to call, but as more mail-in ballots have begun to be counted, Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden has taken the lead. 

In a panicked Periscope broadcast Wednesday evening, Alexander said he was “busy organizing thousands and thousands and thousands of people” to join “voter integrity” rallies in Phoenix, Arizona, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Detroit, Michigan, Madison, Wisconsin, and Atlanta, Georgia, (and perhaps Nevada) to protest. Alexander said the first rally would feature “Pizzagate” booster Mike Cernovichat the capitol in Arizona at 7 p.m. Wednesday evening, claiming that they’d have hundreds there and 10,000 attendees there by Friday. Asecond rally took place Wednesday night in Las Vegas. Alexander encouraged viewers to go to a website where they could register with the campaign and explained how he hoped to draw attention to these rallies. 

“We’re matching influencers with operatives, so every influencer will have an operative there also working with local media, capturing all the vehicles going in and out ‘dropping of ballots,’” Alexander said. “We’re gonna capture everything.”

“If you need a plane ticket, I’ll PayPal you money, because people have sent me money,” Alexander said, before clarifying, “We’re flying giant influencers. We’re flying those people who are offering to share their audiences.”

Earlier in the day, Ali had put out a call for right-wing political operatives to lead the campaign in a number of states where Trump and Biden are in tight races or where Biden has won by a slim margin.

He called on Scott Presler and far-right activist Jack Posobiec to join the effort in Pennsylvania;Turning Point USA Founder Charlie Kirk and Cernovich in Arizona;Alex Bruesewitz in Wisconsin; and CJ Pearson and Daniel Bostic, a producer of “The Plot Against the President” in Georgia. He also called on Tom Fitton of Judicial Watch, a right-wing legal outfit that doubles as a communications shop, to work the legal network and Amy Kremer of Women for Trump and Ed Martin of Phyllis Schlafly Eagles to work the campaign nationally. He also said that Ed Martin, Amy Kremer and Kyle Jane Kremer would be “running point” for aWashington, D.C.event 1 p.m. Thursday. 

At Wednesday’s rally in Phoenix, Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona, who has his own ties to far-right nationalists, introduced Cernovich to the assembled crowd waving Trump flags. Taking the megaphone, Cernovich claimed that 200 anti-fascist activists had planned to disrupt his rally, but he said they’d never show up because, “I’ll get sent to prison after kissing their asses—legally and lawfully under self-defense laws.”

Cernovich went on to attack Fox News. “Do you think Fox News is suppressing pro-Trump vote?” He asked the crowd. “Yes!” The crowd shouted back.

Alexander also lashed out at Fox News in his Periscope, saying the conservative, pro-Trump network’s coverage of the presidential election was why he launched the campaign. He asked his viewers to spend 15 to 20 minutes after his Periscope harassing Fox News reporters and producers.

“Fox News is about to call the election for Joe Biden. How does this happen? They called Arizona too early. … I think it’s going for Trump,” he said. “If they call Nevada for Biden, then they will accidentally be forced. You need to tweet the hell out of everyone at Fox News.” 

In September, Alexander took to Periscope to float the idea of revamping “Stop the Steal” for the 2020 presidential election, Jared Holtreported for Right Wing Watch then. At that time, Alexander had said that the 2020 “Stop the Steal” campaign would bypass social media by collecting phone numbers from supporters. 

Theoriginal “Stop the Steal” campaign was led by Alexander in 2018, along with convicted felon and self-described “dirty trickster” Roger Stone, who Alexander said came up with the phrase, and his associates, including Posobiec. The campaign featured protests and misinformation against a ballot recount in Florida’s 2018 Senate race between Republican Rick Scott and Democrat Bill Nelson. In that campaign, pro-Trump activists from around the country descended on Florida to protest and spread misinformation, a seeming reboot of the so-called “Brooks Brothers riot,” which broke out following Florida’s contested presidential election results in 2000. Stone was behind that riot, which shut down recount efforts in Miami-Dade.

For the 2018 “Stop the Steal” campaign, Alexander said that he had recruited QAnon followers as well as people experiencing homelessness to fill spots at the protest. Politico reported in 2016 that Alexander’s PAC had received a large donation from billionaire**Robert Mercer**; Ali claims to not be taking money from him for this campaign.

It appears the 2018 “Stop the Steal” campaign was an attempted dry run for the 2020 presidential election. On Twitter, Alexanderclaimed to have approached Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel about running the campaign and that she had mocked it. On Wednesday, Alexander lashed out at those around Trump andMcDaniel, who he called “the dumbest woman in history.” He said that the RNC, McDaniel, and the Trump campaign were not doing the campaign. [twt  forced errors in messaging and non-legal and non-protest actions coming out of the GOP right now is simply stunning. Trump may ruin his own efforts before they start. Why is no one around him doing this right?]

alexander claimed that his campaign of right-wing and far-right activists just want “a fair, predictive, determinative result” and that “This election is going to be conducted fairly where it produces a legitimate result that both sides can come together on.”

“I’m going to be here in Texas, just providing my friends with support,” Alexander said. “What I want to do is bring this country as much together as we can and have a certain outcome and ride off into the sunset.”

tranferred from other node no pix /vid here

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https://www.mediamatters.org/gab/daniel-kelly-surrogate-scott-presler-using-antisemitic-platform-gab-recruit-support-wisconsin

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https://www.mediamatters.org/local-news/wisconsin-media-should-ask-daniel-kelly-why-hes-campaigning-qanon-conspiracy-theorist

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mma 1 23

Republican groups in Pennsylvania are set to hold training workshops with right-wing social media influencer Scott Presler in the coming weeks. Presler is a January 6 insurrectionist who helped organize “Stop the Steal” events around the 2020 election, frequently promoted the QAnon conspiracy theory, and worked with a leading anti-Muslim group.

Presler helped organize election-denying rallies following then-President Donald Trump’s loss. During one protest outside the Pennsylvania capitol, for instance, he led people in yelling for politicians to “stop the steal” and “audit the vote.” 

He also went on right-wing media to encourage viewers to protest the vote. While speaking onOAN, for instance, he told viewers that they needed to rally against the “stolen election,” stating: “This is your legacy. This is your defining moment in history. … And so tomorrow's Saturday. Show up at your state capitol, no matter what state that you are living in, and make your voices heard. Don't regret it.” 

On January 6, 2021, he went to Washington, D.C., and was outside the Capitol for what he (absurdly) claimed was “the largest civil rights protest in American history." [vid twt]

media Matters previously documented that Presler promoted QAnon in dozens of instances on his Instagram account. Presler has also worked for the anti-Muslim group Act for America, which, The Associated Press wrote, “is identified by the Anti-Defamation League as the largest anti-Muslim group in America. The group spreads conspiracy theories about Muslims and ‘stokes irrational fears’ of them, ADL says.The Southern Poverty Law Center also labels Act for America as an ‘extremist hate group.’”

Right-wing media figures have frequently and falsely alleged that the 2020 election was stolen, including in Pennsylvania. During the 2022 election, Pennsylvania Republicans nominated January 6 insurrectionist Doug Mastriano as their gubernatorial nominee. Mastriano ran a far-right campaign that, among other things, focused on election denialism. He lost by roughly 15 percentage points in the battleground state. 

Yet Republicans in Pennsylvania are scheduled to work with Presler in the next several weeks: 

Additionally, a regional captain for the Franklin County, PA, GOP, Deb Howard, posted on Facebook that Presler is “joining us in Franklin County” on February 9. Presler responded with an event link describing the training as including “voter registration, how to get out the vote, as well as ballot harvesting techniques.”

Media Matters has documented other instances of Republican groups across the country teaming up with Presler. Additionally, just this month, Presler returned to Louisiana and said that he “conducted 2 volunteer trainings” and “registered voters.” He also met with Louisiana GOP Chair Louis Gurvich, Louisiana RNC Committeewoman Lenar Whitney, and Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry (who is running for governor this year). The Republican Party of Louisiana thanked him for coming, with Presler replying: “Thank you so much for having m

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