Tag: washington dc

Washington Examiner: Capitol Protesters Are ‘Terrorists’ Like Al Qaeda Who Must Be ‘Ruthlessly Hunted Down’

The Washington Examiner ran a hysterical column on Monday from “former” CIA officer Kevin Carroll calling for Americans who took part in the mostly peaceful protests at the Capitol to be “ruthlessly hunted down” and treated like Al Qaeda terrorists.

From The Washington Examiner, “How to fix our domestic terrorist problem”:

Democrats such as Attorney General-designate Merrick Garland and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer should use their executive and legislative power over the next 23 months to do the following five important things.

First, bring the heaviest felony charges possible on as many participants in the insurrection as the Justice Department can identify and believes it can confidently convict. We ruthlessly hunted down foreign terrorists after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks and must do the same to their domestic equivalents. […]

Second, make fire and police departments that receive federal grants have their members sign commitments not to engage in acts to overthrow the government. Prosecute any who subsequently violate their oaths. We could also cut or suspend federal funding to departments that fail to introduce these measures. […]

Third, do not worry about Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Rather than ban extremist chatter through government censorship or private de-platforming, use radical chat rooms as honeypots, as FBI-led Joint Terrorism Task Forces have done with violent, radicalized Islamists since 2001. […]

Fourth, use the supremacy of federal law to ban “militias” beyond the National Guard. […]

Fifth, add domestic terrorism as a predicate to the material support for terrorism statute, including its civil liability provisions. This will provide new means of successful prosecutions and gradually increased deterrence against domestic terrorists. […]

Kevin Carroll served as senior counselor to the secretary of homeland security and chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee and as a CIA and Army officer in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Yemen.

Carroll’s bio says he worked for a branch of The Lincoln Project.

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AOC Wasn’t Even in the Capitol Building During Her ‘Near Death’ Experience

We’ve reported various aspects of the account of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) of what happened to her on Jan. 6 during the breach at the Capitol. But there are some very critical facts that have been missing from her story that I wanted to talk about here.

The story, as it was initially related by AOC, suggested that she was about to be assassinated by rioters in her office in a video that has been viewed over 6 million times.

Newsweek even claimed that’s what AOC said.

Ocasio-Cortez said that rioters actually entered her office, forcing her to take refuge inside her bathroom after her legislative director Geraldo Bonilla-Chavez told her to “hide, hide, run and hide.”

“And so I run back into my office,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “I slam my door. There’s another kind of like back area to my office, and I open it, and there’s a closet and a bathroom. And I jump into my bathroom.”

As it turns out, however, as my colleague Bonchie reported earlier, AOC said in her Instagram drama that the person who came to her office was a Capitol Police officer. But she denigrated the officer who came to help, claiming he “didn’t feel right” and that he was looking at her “in all of this anger and hostility.” Her staffer reportedly wondered if he would have to fight the officer and suggested that he might put them in a “vulnerable situation.”

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AOC’s body politics

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is no stranger to attention. The second-term congresswoman was the second most talked-about politician in 2019, just behind then-President Donald Trump. AOC loves to frequently jump on livestream videos to talk directly to her fans and voters, whether while she’s making macaroni, building furniture, or playing a wildly popular multiplayer game. It was during one of these Instagram livestreams on Monday night that she committed perhaps her gravest sin yet as a politician.

AOC, who has somehow not yet dried the well of public sympathy for the January 6 storming of the Capitol, linked the experience to an alleged sexual assault she suffered in the past:

‘The reason I’m getting emotional in this moment is because these folks who tell us to move on, that it’s not a big deal, that we should forget what’s happened, or even telling us to apologize — these are the same tactics of abusers. And I’m a survivor of sexual assault and I haven’t told many people that in my life, but when we go through trauma, trauma compounds on each other.’

This is gross manipulation, and AOC should be ashamed. Not for sharing that she was sexually assaulted — I have no way of knowing whether or not her story is true and, ultimately, it’s irrelevant to the issue of the storming of the Capitol. The real story here is that AOC used her alleged trauma as a cudgel against her political opponents. She has weaponized her alleged experience to silence anyone who criticizes her and even went so far as to compare them to the person or people who abused her. This type of behavior cheapens sexual assault

AOC, who has somehow not yet dried the well of public sympathy for the January 6 storming of the Capitol, linked the experience to an alleged sexual assault she suffered in the past:

‘The reason I’m getting emotional in this moment is because these folks who tell us to move on, that it’s not a big deal, that we should forget what’s happened, or even telling us to apologize — these are the same tactics of abusers. And I’m a survivor of sexual assault and I haven’t told many people that in my life, but when we go through trauma, trauma compounds on each other.’

This is gross manipulation, and AOC should be ashamed. Not for sharing that she was sexually assaulted — I have no way of knowing whether or not her story is true and, ultimately, it’s irrelevant to the issue of the storming of the Capitol. The real story here is that AOC used her alleged trauma as a cudgel against her political opponents. She has weaponized her alleged experience to silence anyone who criticizes her and even went so far as to compare them to the person or people who abused her. This type of behavior cheapens sexual assault

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The Trump ‘Incitement’ Narrative About the Capitol Riot is Falling Apart Before Our Very Eyes

The Democratic Party has launched into unfettered hysterics about what took place on that day. But the optics from the Capitol riot are very strange; Capitol police stood down as oddly dressed protesters entered the Senate chambers; criminals entered Speaker Pelosi’s chambers and stole a laptop, which the thief purportedly wanted to sell to Russian intelligence (a red flag about credibility); dozens entered the Capitol building after literally having the door held open for them, and they merely walked in a line and took pictures; and a CNN reporter and a pro-Antifa/BLM agitator were on the scene at one of the oddest moments — the deadly shooting of Trump supporter Ashli Babbitt.

In the ensuing weeks, the Democrats and the mainstream media have made baseless claims about the threat allegedly posed by “Trump supporters.” The National Guard and law enforcement erected a large fence, and there is now word that the intent is for the edifice to remain there permanently.

There are sweeping warnings being issued by DHS, amid no specific intelligence reports, about extremist groups’ intention to commit more acts of violence.

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Capitol Police Chief: U.S. Capitol Needs ‘Permanent’ Wall to Protect Congress

The United States Capitol needs a “permanent” security wall around it to protect members of Congress, Acting U.S. Capitol Police (USCP) Chief Yogananda Pittman says.

In a statement on Thursday, Pittman said the security at the Capitol building must include a “permanent fencing” barrier — a similar barrier to the one halted by President Joe Biden’s administration at the U.S.-Mexico border.

“As I noted earlier this week, even before September 11, 2001, security experts argued that more needed to be done to protect the U.S. Capitol,” Pittman said in a statement. “In fact, a 2006 security assessment specifically recommended the installation of a permanent perimeter fence around the Capitol.”

“In light of recent events, I can unequivocally say that vast improvements to the physical security infrastructure must be made to include permanent fencing, and the availability of ready, back-up forces in close proximity to the Capitol,” Pittman continued.

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Turn snitch and get rich: Texas teen gives his own dad in to the FBI, pays his way through college

A Texas teenager has turned his father in to the FBI for taking part in the Capitol Hill riot, and pocketed tens of thousands of dollars from liberal admirers in the process.

When Jackson Reffitt’s father returned to the family home in Wylie, Texas, after the pro-Trump riot on Capitol Hill earlier this month, Jackson claimed that he warned his son to keep his mouth shut. “If you turn me in, you’re a traitor,” he reportedly said. “And you know what happens to traitors. Traitors get shot.”

However, Jackson had already reported the 48-year-old Guy Reffitt to the FBI, telling agents he thought his father was planning “something big” during the certification of election results at the capitol, per a New York Times article on Sunday. After the riot, Reffitt was identified in video footage from the Capitol, tracked down in Texas, and arrested, according to a sworn affidavit by an FBI agent.

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