Those spreading hate now worked previous ops too. Chad Prather & CJ LeRose, backing DeSanti's anti-immigrant stunt with a viral song, were inner-circle Stop the Stealers in 2021: here with police-assaulter Nathan Hughes, rally MC Matt Couch, Russian influencer Anna Khait. 1/
It's actually comforting that the same folks are involved, because it means it's not a mass movement. Instead it's highly manufactured, recycling the same faces. Also politically unsuccessful: Prather tried to unseat TX Governor Greg Abbott in 2022... 2/
... but Prather failed miserably, getting just 3.8% of the vote. The ultra-MAGA fascist movement is amplified by stunts and social media, powered by complicit judges and politicians - but actual popular support is not deep. It can be defeated. 3/ ballotpedia.org/Chad_Prather
When influencers switch from die-for-Trump to go-go-DeSantis, pay attention. The organization folks are backing DeSantis. Trump is playing to a shrinking base, forcing him to make increasingly radical references to please the QAnoners left behind. 4/ dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1…
The keynote speakers at the recent "National Conservatism" conference are instructive. DeSantis and Hawley first. Rubio & Scott, maybe just because it's in FL. Mohler heads the main school in the Southern Baptist Convention. And billionaire Peter Thiel. 5/ nationalconservatism.org/natcon-3-2022/…
DeSantis' press sec. Christina Pushaw is also a speaker. American but ties to Russia since 2011. Parachuted into Florida in 2021 from former Soviet republic Georgia, rose to lead DeSantis' comms, now on his campaign. We have to avoid the mistakes of 2016 - with real reporting 6/
Christina Pushaw, whose only major prior employment was in Tbilisi, Georgia, used the role as DeSantis' press secretary to "pick public fights...on social media, amplify right-wing media outlets..and attack individuals." (Politico). Awkward for a taxpayer-funded position. 7/
DeSantis' stunt of flying asylum seekers to MA was not simple - it cost over $600,000, involved transit through 4 airports in 4 states. One month before, Pushaw had abruptly stepped down from her taxpayer-funded position and moved to DeSantis' campaign. 8/ politico.com/news/2022/08/1…
Be alert: MAGA influencers ignored Trump's rally, focused on DeSantis & Martha's Vineyard. Sen. Ted Cruz Tweeted about it 35 times in 2 days, Christina Pushaw even more - & celebrated getting #MarthasVineyardRacists to trend. QAnon & Trump are declining. DeSantis is rising. 9/
We nearly lost the country in 2021. In 2022 we need to be more savvy. And that doesn't mean finally calling Trump dangerous - it means understanding what brought him to power, and who is in line next. We win by fighting tomorrow's war, not yesterday's. 10/
Update: George Papadopoulos is now boosting the script. He's a Trump adviser convicted for Russia contacts (via foreign gf, married in whirlwind courtship). Pardoned 2020; partied in the VIP tent Jan 5 (video). The influence machine is with DeSantis. 11/
Adding another voice on the alarming DeSantis / Martha's Vineyard disinformation operation. Hunter Walker of Rolling Stone calls it "coordinated and organized activity" higher than anything seen in "ages". 12/
If Trump is once again declaring Antifa a terrorist organization, that's not a good sign. The last time he did that was on Jan 5, 2021. The next day the Proud Boys "dressed as Antifa" when they set off the attack on the US Capitol. 1/
Trump started talking about "Antifa terrorists" in May 2020, during the George Floyd protests (when he also mused about shooting protestors). After he lost the election, he swapped his Secretary of Defense, then on Jan 5 issued a declaration on Antifa. 2/ aila.org/library/presid…
Hard to tell whether Trump is rehashing old memories or planning something new, but it's not a good sign. Before Jan 6 they worked hard to build up 'Antifa' as a shadowy threat. And Charlie Kirk helped with Jan 6: with money, buses, and Antifa stories. 3/ docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d…
As weird as it is to see Trump, his VP, SecDef, and SecState out in DC with hardly any security, it is weirder that it was Codepink that was protesting. Codepink is an astroturfed "women for peace" group whose "peace" means giving Putin whatever he wants. Slavishly pro-Russia. 1/
Codepink has left such a long trail of dubious actions and shadowy funding that @P_Kallioniemi, who posts about Russian influencers, needed 23 Tweets to outline it all. If they are involved, tonight's events were not a normal protest. 2/
Medea Benjamin, Codepink co-founder, is so committed to Putin's talking points that she wrote an entire book about the Russia-Ukraine war rehashing them: Ukraine provoked the invasion! 2014 in Ukraine was not the people's liberation but a US coup! Nothing about this is normal. 3/
Welcome comrades to the new free-speech university UATX, created by the co-founder of Palantir! Today after early-morning calisthenics we will discuss the writings of the Palantir CEO and also co-founder. Be ready to discuss his belief that companies must take over the state. 1/
Tomorrow's topic: how Joe Lonsdale and Alex Karp exemplify Merit and not Woke DEI! Both
* were student friends of Peter Thiel. Lonsdale edited Thiel's Stanford Review.
* spent their entire careers in companies created or funded by Thiel
Next week: "Freedom is Slavery"
-- UATX
2/
Comrades - building an empire of proteges is not Woke DEI but Righteous Merit! Because your friends obviously have more Merit than those, well, other people. Competitive job applications bad, hiring your friends good! - UATX. Where Speech is Free! stanfordpolitics.org/2017/11/27/pet…
Eric Schmitt's blood-and-soil nationalism at Peter Thiel's NatCon this week is making news - but this isn't new. Schmitt's staffer Nate Hochman, posting here, was fired in 2013 from Ron DeSantis' campaign for pushing a video where the Florida flag turns into a Nazi Sonnenrad. 1/
MO Senator Eric Schmitt hired Hochman AFTER he got internationaly famous for using a Nazi symbol. That tells you a lot. Schmitt didn't mind the Sonnnerad, or Hochman's later work pushing conspiracy theories about immigrants. 2/ theguardian.com/us-news/2025/j…
When you listen to Eric Schmitt deny that America was founded on an idea about liberty - he says it was just meant as a homeland for white people - remember this guy is fine with Nazi Sonnenrads. And he's now in the US Senate. It can happen here. 3/
The guy who is going viral complaining that "we" have judges who aren't what "the founders intended" is... based in Italy, named his substack after a cultish Russian philosophy, and uses a profile picture of a man who grew up in Nazi Germany and became a mercenary in Africa. 1/
Note that this account isn't "captivedreamer7", the now-famous racist who is actually Canadian. This guy seems truly European from his posts and his pretentious Substack, which is very focussed on the German officer Ernst Junger (anti-Nazi at the end). 2/ web.archive.org/web/2025080301…
His profile picture is another German soldier: Rolf Steiner was too young to join the Nazis (though his father did). Like Junger he went to the French Foreign Legion, then tried to overthrown the government of France and fought in a French mercenary unit in the Biafran war. 3/
The techbro takeover of the US continues: while CDC employees "clap out" their principled leaders who resigned, Trump swears in a 2-decade Peter Thiel advisor to lead CDC. Thiel's Palantir already has all your data. He controls your VP. Now he controls your public health too. 1/
No one's even trying to hide the Thiel takeover anymore. Jim O'Neill's been a key Thiel lieutenant for nearly 20 years. He ran the Thiel foundation, Thiel's Clarium Capital and Mithril Capital (the one that employed JD Vance). 2/ citizen.org/article/jim-on…
Jim O'Neill's not just a Thiel lieutenant, he's a true acolyte, pushing all Peter's fruitcake ideas: building government-free floating cities. Achieving eternal life. Getting kids to drop out of college. And he says drug safety testing is for wimps. 3/ technologyreview.com/2025/06/30/111…