#SeditionHunters - a must-read, deeply researched WaPo piece on the lead-up to the Jan 6 Capitol attack. Confirms its origins well before the election. Confirms that EVERYONE KNEW the danger: DHS even alerted hospitals to prep for mass casualties Jan 6. 1/ washingtonpost.com/politics/inter…
"While the public may have been surprised by what happened on Jan. 6, the makings of the insurrection had been spotted at every level, from one side of the country to the other. The red flags were everywhere." 2/
The article is hyper-cautious on one point: does not raise even a hint that lack of preparation could mean complicity. But this is the journalism we have been waiting for, for months. Wide-ranging, meticulous, and with the horsepower to grasp the scale of events: 16 reporters! 3/
Bombshell reporting that Congressional Democrats were alert to possible attempts to overturn the election ... already in AUGUST. 4/
The article confirms what we see in video: that militia groups, extremists, white supremacists, radical political activists began coming together in Fall 2020, that the Nov 14th rally in DC was a meet-up across this radical spectrum, a part of wider coordination. 5/
Much of what's here is known by #SeditionHunters, but finally it's being said out loud, in a big national newspaper. And there are new shocks, like this one: Gen Milley worrried that deploying the National Guard would give Trump the opportunity to misuse the armed forces. 6/
The article does throw the FBI under the bus somewhat, letting Pentagon have the last word - will be interesting to see how that plays out as the J6 Committee gets rolling. But this piece is hopefully just the start of the reporting we need so much. 7/
At least one member of the reporting team was at the Capitol Jan 6: @HannahAllam took the definitive footage of the Proud Boys arriving at the Capitol, and followed the crowd as people moved from W to E sides to start synchronized breaches - see thread. 8/
In tonight's military purge, Tump named as Chair of the Joint Chiefs Dan Caine, a retired Lt. Gen so underqualified he'd need a waiver. Oddly, Caine was installed last month at 3 VC firms doing crypto, AI, and defense tech, including Thrive, founded by Jared Kushner's brother. 1/
It does look bad if the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs is taking a paycheck from relatives of the president. But since Trump also fired the Judge Advocates General from all four military branches tonight, we might have to wait for an ethics ruling. 2/ military.com/daily-news/202…
The New York Times article tonight calls Lt Gen Caine a "serial entrepreneur and investor", but doesn't mention his role in Joshua Kushner's company. It's not a secret - it's on his LinkedIn. And it's very relevant - the public deserves to understand. 3/ archive.is/8Je1R
For journalists who need a handy reference guide to our new FBI Director, Kash Patel, the Jan 6 "Big Timeline" has 35 entries on him, from his early days attacking the FBI for investigating Trump's Russia ties to his 2024 book calling the FBI "gangsters" and promising a purge. 1/
The "1950-2019" historical tab has 5 entries, starting with Kash's attempts to subpoena the FBI and DOJ for investigating Trump's Russia ties. This is pushback even before Robert Mueller was appointed as Special Counsel. Just ctrl-F search on "Patel". 2/ docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d…
The "2020-Jan 6" tab has 6 entries. (More on that later). Kash was installed as part of Trump's maneuvers AFTER he lost the election. Chris Miller was made Acting SecDef and Kash his Chief of Staff. Kash delivered the order to withdraw from Afghanistan. 3/ docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d…
As Trump's folks repeat Elon Musk's bs that tens of millions of dead people are getting Social Security, here's the 2023 inspector general report on the SSA's death records - with facts. Yes, there are over 6M dead people in the database, but they are NOT PAID. Link follows. 1/
The false claim matters for two reasons. First, Elon & Trump may use these lies to justify cutting Social Security. Second, they may take credit for work already under way - 'we found dead people.' It's not a discovery! It's routine government stuff. 2/ oig.ssa.gov/assets/uploads…
The report is only 19 pages and Elon seems to have read none of them. This kind of reporting is why the US has an inspector general for all agencies - to look at data, to find mistakes or even fraud. Trump just fired 15 of those inspectors general. 3/
As US envoy Keith Kellogg tries to sideline Europe from talks over Ukraine, please remember: Kellogg has served Trump for years. Kellogg was on the 2019 phone call to extort Zelensky, then testified at Trump's impeachment: "I heard nothing wrong or improper on the call..." 1/
On Jan 6, Kellogg, who was Mike Pence's security advisor, spent the day with Trump instead. Here he is in the Oval Office with Trump. That's when Trump threatened Pence, then rewrote his speech to "re-insert the Pence lines". Kellogg stuck with Trump. 2/
Kellogg first came to public notice in 2016 when then-candidate Trump appointed a council of 5 national security advisors, names so obscure that the NYT called them "confound[ing]". 2 then got more famous in the Mueller report for their ties to Russia. 3/ web.archive.org/web/2016032302…
Today's news is grim: the two factions taking over our government are united on the one issue we had hoped they might split over. Turns out the techbro neo-fascists and the religious-right Project 2025 guys agree: US education should be gutted, privatized, and made religious. 1/
Here's the article laying it out: Elon Musk and Ted Cruz both urge the TX legislature to pass school vouchers that would push public funds to private religious schools. Musk of course is Peter Thiel's former partner, Cruz his first political protege. 2/ fox7austin.com/news/elon-musk…
Musk's announcement is the more surprising. In my taxonomy of the forces behind Jan 6, Ted Cruz is actually a crossover between the two wings: he's a protege of tech overlord Thiel but also deep in the far religious right, who backed him over Trump for president in 2016. 3/
As Elon Musk gives the Nazi salute in DC, let me just say that it was very clear, 4 years ago, at least to me, that Jan 6 was a precursor, and that this would be the result if we did not investigate it thoroughly - not the footsoldiers but the ones who gave orders that day. 1/
Some people say Jan 6 was more like the 1923 Beer Hall Putsch than the 1933 Reichstag fire, but either way, the analogy holds. The attack was planned; the Proud Boys were sub-contractors; there were people on the ground directing. And we missed it. 2/
Jan 6 is still relevant. Because there was so much effort to erase it, one key task is preserving its memory and its evidence. More broadly, resisting in a way that Germany did not in the 1930s. We need to read our history and listen to historians. 3/ lucid.substack.com/p/its-day-one-…