#SeditionHunters - as we ring out the year & 358 days of sedition hunting it seemed time to summarize what we’ve achieved so far. The community's found so many #SeditionVIPs it’s hard to keep track, so here’s a guide: 74 Capitol attack figures as the 12 days of Christmas. 1/
We’ll count them off as:
12 Stop-the-Stealers
11 Sore Losers
10 Candidates running
9 Leaders leading
8 State legislators
7 Bikers biking
6 Arrested streamers
5 Anti-vaxxers
4 Federal pardons
3 Angry preachers
2 CNP’ers
and 1 monstrous ego who can't let go 2/
12 Stop-the-Stealers - note these are only a small part of Ali Alexander's crew of dozens on Jan 6. 3/
11 Sore Losers - sad figures who lost an election for U.S. Senate or Congress and are still fuming about it, now trying to overthrow elections instead. 4/
10 Candidates running - J6 insurrectionists now running for federal or high state offices. These are the folks who would help overturn the next election. 5/
9 Leaders leading - Nine who provided active leadership in the events of January 6 and in the attack itself. All are seen on Capitol grounds. 6/
8 State legislators - On Jan 6 eight state representatives were seen on Capitol grounds. Some like Vernon Jones were rally speakers. Some walked in with the Proud Boys (Biedermann) or came in armor (Evans). All seemed to expect that attack that occurred. 7/
7 Bikers biking - members of Bikers for Trump, Bikers for 45, and other similar groups were heavily represented on Jan 6, some providing rally security. All here are leaders or high-level figures in these organizations. 8/
6 Arrested streamers. We expect more arrests as DOJ works out their definition of "who is a journalist", but here are the most famous so far. Two from InfoWars, the rest independent. 9/
5 Anti-vaxxers. While many J6 perps are covid deniers, this group helped lead protests and rallies and have been drivers of the anti-vaxx movement. Two (Gold and Strand) have been arrested for Jan 6 already. 10/
4 Federal pardons. All these suspected J6 figures were pardoned by Trump between Nov 2020-Jan 2021. Three have been subpoenae'd by the January 6 Committtee; Manafort's company ran the Jan 6 rallies. (See justice.gov/pardon/pardons… for full list). 11/
3 Angry preachers. While many religious leaders seemed to find insurrection compatible with pastoral duties, these 3 are the angriest, loudest, and most nationally known of those who entered Capitol grounds. 12/
2 CNP'ers. The shadowy Council for National Policy, which mixes mainstream conservatives with far-right extremists, was heavily represented at the morning Ellipse rally on January 6, & at least 2 longstanding members played roles at the Capitol. (See splcenter.org/hatewatch/2016…) 13/
1 Monstrous ego who can't let go. While many figures helped produce the organized attack on January 6, and likely some more directly issued orders, it could not have happened without Trump. 14/
The 67 on the grounds here are only a subset of the backlogged #SeditionVIP list - 16 are totally new. Considered-but-rejected categories include "Grifters grifting" (too many); "Dirty tricksters", "Russian girlfriends" (too sensitive).. See jan6attack.com/individuals.htm for more. 15/
The slides are available for download in the public "Jan 6 Resources and Analysis" folder at bit.ly/Jan6Analysis. Please feel free to use, and please retweet! Happy New Year's to all, and may 2022 be better than 2021. With your help it can be. 16/
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Reminder: Ed Martin, Trump's US Pardon attorney (R) and George Santos, whose sentence he just helped commute (L) were both speakers at the Stop the Steal rally the day before the Jan 6 Capitol attack. The next day, they both sat in the VIP section at Trump's Ellipse rally. 1/
On Jan 6, Ed Martin, as a founding member of Ali Alexander's Stop the Steal team, had a better seat than George Santos, a lesser figure. Brandon Straka, the man who first got Santos into politics, sat in the front row center; Ed two rows back; Santos deeper in the crowd. 2/
Santos, who rocketed from a minor part of Brandon Straka's WalkAway operation to a member of Congress, was sentenced to over 7 years in prison for wire fraud and identity theft. Today Trump let him out. Ed Martin says he was "honored" to help "make clemency great again". 3/
Trump's move this week revoking 6 visas for posting about Charlie Kirk is a wake-up call. These weren't random. They were all prominent people in the arts, with business visas. One is German filmmaker Mario Sixtus, whose new documentary criticizes AI and US tech firms. 1/
Sixtus' documentary examines how AI slop is infecting the internet, making it a "dumping ground for machine-generated nonsense". He's based in Berlin, but interviews famed US AI researcher Melanie Mitchell. Now he can't come to the US to promote it. 2/ arte.tv/de/videos/1221…
These six are not random. Another revokee, music exec Nota Baloyi from South Africa, has said he was targeted and wonders if South African right-wingers sent in a tip. US journalists need to ask how these six were chosen. Whose speech is being barred? 3/ news24.com/southafrica/ne…
A big caution here: we have to take seriously that GOP has coordinated talking points that No Kings will involve an act of terrorism. We have to ask seriously whether someone has planned such an act. It wouldn't be provoking people in frog costumes. It would be worse 1/
The last time we heard so much talk about "Antifa" as a terrorist threat was Jan 2021, just before the Capitol attack. The 200+ Proud Boys who kicked it off didn't wear "colors"; they came "dressed as Antifa". They talked about it repeatedly. That instruction came from above. 2/
Remember: in 1999, a month after he was made Prime Minister, Putin solidified his power using explosions that killed hundreds. He blamed Chechen terrorists as a pretext for a crackdown. Regardless of who planted the bombs, Putin found a use for them. 3/ henryjacksonsociety.org/wp-content/upl…
Jan 6 is in the news again as GOP Senators reveal that FBI searched their phone records in 2023. A totally reasonable action, but what's surprising is the list. The FBI left off Ted Cruz, by far the Senator with the most known ties to Jan 6! And they added some surprises 1/
The article by @etuckerAP & @stephengroves gives the basics, but not why this information was released now or why these Senators were chosen. Before Jan 6, Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz were talked of as a team plotting something - so why isn't Cruz here? 2/ apnews.com/article/fbi-ja…
The FBI has private sources of information, but the list is still baffling. (Why Dan Sullivan of AK?) The Congressional Insurrection Scores rank lawmakers by publicly known actions around Jan 6. In this metric, Sens Cruz, Hawley, & Tuberville stand out. 3/ docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d…
Just unbelievable stuff coming from independent journalists. Jack Posobiec, a Roger Stone protege, was one of the biggest spreaders of Russian disinfo in 2016. Of Pizzagate. Of election-fraud claims in 2020. And it took til now to show he was voting fraudulently himself? 1/
Slate picked up this article (kudos!) but both journos are independent.
Poso was one of the first people tapped for Ali Alexander's Stop the Steal. He pushed election-fraud claims to 1M followers, watched the J6 attack from Alex Jones' rented rooftop. 2/ slate.com/news-and-polit…
How is it that with all the resources of mainstream media his own voter fraud gets uncovered only now? How did CBS cover Poso, a major propagandist and a vector for foreign influence? They interviewed him about "the death of his friend Charlie Kirk". 3/
Dear god, our politicians have learned nothing. DO NOT LET YOUR OPPONENT SET THE NARRATIVE. Offense, not defense. The answer to "you are shutting the government down to give illegal immigrants healthcare" is "The GOP shut down the government to give handouts to billionaires." 1/
Never, never, use their framing. It does not work to try to avoid a fight by saying "we all agree", if your opponent is determined to fight. It just concedes territory. It makes their framing the topic Don't defend against a bad-faith argument. Attack and move forward. 2/
If someone insists on fighting you, you have to fight back. DO NOT ANSWER A BAD-FAITH QUESTION. Do not cede that authority. Just say the question is bs - attack their motivation - and move on to say what you think is true. Be the boss, set the terms of the debate. 3/