Category: Trump Insanity

The OTHER out-take everyone is talking about from the last Jan 6 Committee hearing

This clip begins with Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler telling the January 6 Committee about a phone call between Republican Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and then-President Donald Trump, that she overheard during the attack on the Capitol January 6.

Rep. McCarthy, a staunch Trump supporter, was desperately trying to get Trump to call off the attack. But after the President refused to listen to McCarthy’s plea or take any action to stop the attack, McCarthy then tried contacting Ivanka Trump, and then Ivanka’s husband, Jared Kushner, and others, asking them to get the president to call off the attack.

The footage the Committee shows before the out-takes of Trump in the Rose Garden was what was happening at the Capitol around the same time McCarthy was on the phone, trying to get Trump to help them.

The moment everyone is talking about from the last Jan 6 Select Committee hearing

Above are out-takes of Donald Trump recording a video message to the public on the evening of January 7th, 2021, under pressure from his White House aides, advisors, lawyers, his family members and right wing media figures who were telling him he was at risk of being removed from office using the 25th Amendment or impeachment. Below is sample of that communication to the White House from Fox News talk show host Sean Hannity:

Text from Sean Hannity to White House Communications Director Kayleigh McEnany on the evening of Jan. 7, 2021, saying Trump needed to stop his “stolen election talk.” Hannity explained that threats to removeTrump from office through the 25th Amendment or impeachment “are real.”

The playing of these out-takes was arguably the most-talked about moment from the last hearing of the House Jan 6 Select Committee on July 21, 2022.

Even by January 7, 2021, when Congress was on the brink of certifying the results of the November, 2020 general election, Trump was still unable to say the election was over, despite losing the electoral college to Joe Biden by a count of 306 to 232, exactly the same margin by which he had won  against Hillary Clinton in 2016 — a margin he had previously called “a landslide.”

 

 

In new video, Tina Peters assails Judge Matthew Barrett, who oversees her criminal case, calling him “malicious,” “partisan” and saying his “goal is to incarcerate an innocent woman.”


In her latest unhinged Facebook video made around 9:30 p.m. last night (Thursday, July 21) after turning herself in at the Pitkin County Sheriff’s Department Tina Peters calls Mesa County Court Judge Matthew Barrett, the judge in her criminal case, “partisan” and “malicious,” and says “his goal is to incarcerate an innocent woman.” She accuses him of “legislating from the bench.”

Barrett was the judge who kept her out of jail last week after her unauthorized trip to speak in Las Vegas on July 12. She had traveled to Nevada without Court permission, and the judge had also issued a “no travel” order for her the same day. In spite of this, the judge was lenient with her and gave her the benefit of the doubt that it could have been her attorney’s fault for not informing her of the no-travel order.

The next Jan 6th House Select Committee Hearing is Thursday, July 21 at 6:00 p.m. local time

The next hearing of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol is this Thursday, July 21 in prime time starting at 6:00 p.m. local time. The hearing will be broadcast on all the major TV networks ABC, CBS and NBC, and PBS. It will also be live on CSPAN (cable) and CNN will stream it live at CNN.com without requiring a cable login. It can also be viewed live on the Select Committee’s YouTube Channel. Many media outlets will also stream the hearing on their Facebook pages. The first hearing, also held in prime time, had 20 million viewers.

This hearing will focus on what former President Trump was doing, and not doing, minute by minute during the 187 minutes after Trump-supporting rioters began attacking the Capitol and before he issued he a public response. Two former Trump White House officials, Trump deputy White House Press Secretary Sarah Matthews and former Trump Deputy National Security Advisor Matthew Pottinger, both of whom were in the White House on the day of the attack and both of whom resigned that day, will testify.

January 6 Committee Chair Bennie Thompson has tested positive for Covid and will miss the next hearing. Committee members Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) and Rep. Elaine Luria (D-VA) are expected to take central roles chairing the proceedings.

 

Tina Peters fails to meet deadline to pay for recount

Tina Peters waves around a letter to the Colorado Secretary of State at the July 12 Las Vegas conference she attended, demanding a recount of her race in the primary. She failed to meet the deadline last Friday to pay over $236,000 for a state-wide recount. She lost by over 88,000 votes or a margin of over 14% between her and the winner.

For all the bluster Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters made over demanding a recount in her June 28 primary loss, she failed to get the necessary funds in to the Secretary of State by the deadline last Friday to commence the recount, so it won’t happen.

For the state pay for a recount, the difference between the leading candidate’s total votes and the next highest candidate’s total votes must be less than or equal to one-half of one percent (0.5%). Peters lost to her opponent, Pam Anderson, by 88,000 votes, a margin of more than 14% between her and the front runner.

At a speech she gave at a conference of election-denier sheriffs in Las Vegas on July 12 (video), Peters waved around a notarized letter (pdf) to the Colorado Secretary of State that she told the crowd she was sending to demand a recount, claiming without any evidence that she lost because of “extensive malfeasance” in the June 28 primary. She failed to mention ore recognize how her being indicted on 7 felonies related to election tampering might have affected the vote.

There was no fraud or malfeasance in the June 28 primary, and Peters’ loss has been accepted as legitimate.

Should we doubt attorney Harvey Steinberg’s motion to quash Tina’s arrest warrant?

Harvey Steinberg (Photo: BestLawyers.com)

Tina Peters’ attorney, Harvey Steinberg, submitted a Motion-to-Quash her arrest warrant on 7/14 for her travel out of state to Las Vegas without court permission on 7/12, violating the terms of her bond. In the motion, Steinberg blames himself for Tina making the trip to Las Vegas, saying she emailed him her plans for the trip and relied on him to get permission from the Court before leaving the state, but he didn’t see the email that contained her plans. In the body of the motion, Steinberg writes that it was “part of an email thread that he didn’t notice.” But Steinberg did not include for the Court a print out of the entire email thread for the Court to see, for context, or to see what other talk surrounded it.

Plus, we have reason to doubt the veracity of what Steinberg has written in his motion.

After all, he has a lot less to lose than Tina in this matter. Tina is the Goose that Laid the Golden egg for attorneys. Based on what Mike Lindell alone says he donated to Tina’s legal defense fund, she likely has at least $1 million to spend on attorneys, making her an extremely attractive deep pocket.

Tina Peters’ unhinged talk in Las Vegas

By now everyone has probably heard that Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters had her bond revoked today for leaving the state without first getting permission from the court, which violated the terms of her release in her criminal case. Peters traveled to Las Vegas for a July 12 conference of the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association, a group of anti-government sheriffs who are also election deniers.

While there, Peters gave an unhinged 9 minute talk that appeared to even confuse her audience.  In her talk, she made a slew of bizarre statements, like:

  • “Our crooked DA arrested [my election manager] knowing today is her birthday.”
  • “They arrested three grandmothers for defending your elections.”
  • “They’re stealing our elections.”
  •  DA Dan Rubinstein “is the guy who let 26 pounds of fentanyl go.”
  • “Our candidates were offered to step aside and they would be propelled over the finish line if they did not talk about election security.”
  • “They took away my husband, too. 36 years we would’ve been married. The DA went in there and had him sign divorce papers in a nursing home. He has advanced dementia. These people are criminals.”
  • “They’re coming after you.”

Wendi and Gerald Wood: “Tina Peters and Sherronna Bishop have sullied election integrity efforts in Mesa County,” and Tina’s “Gerald Wood” impersonator was election denier Conan Hayes


Gerald and Wendi Wood are speaking out after Tina Peters slandered Gerald Wood on a Denver radio talk show on June 18. Tina told Jimmy Sengenberger of KNUS in Denver that Gerald Wood, whose identity Tina is accused of stealing, “perjured himself” before a Mesa County grand jury. Tina called Wood’s grand jury testimony “political theater.”

Woods called Tina’s statement that he perjured himself “a blatant lie.”

On June 28, the Woods gave an interview to KREX TV in which they break their silence on the matter. The full, edited interview is about 20 minutes long.

Among other things, the Woods say Tina used them, that her lack of integrity should disqualify her from office, that Tina “seems like she’s being pushed over the edge,” and that the way Tina used Gerald Wood “could happen to anybody if you elect a disreputable business person” to office.

Trump’s AG Barr on Trump’s claim the election was “stolen”: “The idea was bullshit” and “I didn’t want to be a part of it.”

In this testimony before the January 6 Committee released on June 14, former U.S. Attorney General under Trump, William Barr, says he disagreed with Trump telling the public the election was stolen and he told the president the idea was “bullshit”:

“I did not agree with the idea of saying the election was stolen and putting out this stuff which I told the President was bullshit, and you know, I didn’t want to be a part of it. 

And that’s one of the reasons that went into me deciding to leave. When I did, I observed, I think it was on December 1st, you know, how can … we can’t live in a world where where the incumbent administration stays in power based on its view, unsupported by specific evidence, that … there was fraud in the election.”

Trump aides, appointees & family all testify that Trump kept pushing the lie of widespread election fraud to the public even after they told him no proof of fraud exists

In this video clip from a House Jan 6 Select Committee public hearing posted to the public on June 14, William Barr, Trump’s Attorney General, Trump’s daughter and White House Advisor Ivanka Trump, multiple Trump campaign aides and attorneys all testify that they informed Trump in no uncertain terms that no evidence of widespread election fraud existed and his claims about it were false, and in spite of this, Trump continued to push the lie out to the public that widespread election fraud had cost him the election.

Trump admitted to aide he had lost the election

Here is just one piece of proof former President Trump is lying by continuing to insist he won the 2020 election. In this video,  Trump’s former White House Director of Strategic Communications, Alyssa Farah Griffin, tells the interviewer that Trump admitted to her right after the election that he had lost the election.

Trump is continuing to promote the Big Lie even long after it has been thoroughly debunked to get his followers to send him money. Trump has already scammed his followers out of $250 million by promoting a non-existent “official election integrity” fund.

Griffin’s conservative credentials are solid. She previously wrote articles for the far-right conspiracy website World Net Daily, she was an associate producer for the Laura Ingraham Show and previously served as Communications Director for Trump’s White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, among other positions.

Oklahoma is just the beginning of what life will be like under Republican rule

In late May 2022, Oklahoma once again passed the nation’s worst abortion ban, making it the first state to effectively end women’s right to have an abortion, and making this article, that I first published on May 20, 2019, even more relevant.

Oklahoma Republicans just passed a mind-blowingly strict law that makes abortion illegal in virtually every circumstance, effectively terminating the right of women in the state to control their own bodies and reproductive fate.

Oklahoma wasn’t alone in this, either. Other Republican-dominated states are also enacting extremely strict laws that effectively make abortion illegal, with some banning the procedure as soon as a fetal heartbeat is detected.

Republicans base these laws on their belief that a fetus is a fully legal person entitled to all the rights and privileges that all legal American citizens enjoy.

But if actually put into effect, what do these beliefs really portend for life in America?

Local rally planned to urge use of the 14th Amendment to disqualify Boebert from the ballot

The national progressive group OurRevolution, named after a book by Sen. Bernie Sanders, is planning a local rally at Rep. Lauren Boebert’s Grand Junction office on Horizon Drive to urge Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold to disqualify Boebert from being on the Colorado ballot by applying Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which says:

No Person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

Like Tina, Mesa County Sheriff Candidate Bob Dalley believes The Big Lie

Dalley is overtly politically partisan, and promotes himself repeatedly as a Christian who loves guns. But more than this, he believes in Trump’s Big Lie, just like Tina Peters does.

The front page of this Saturday’s Daily Sentinel featured an article about the debate held recently between the two candidates running for Mesa County Sheriff in the Republican primary election coming up June 28: Bob Dalley and incumbent Sheriff Todd Rowell.

At the debate, Dalley cited statistics about alarming increases in crime within the county, without giving any sources for his statistics, while Sheriff Rowell cited Colorado Bureau of Investigations data that show Mesa County actually has lower crime rates than the rest of the state as a whole.

That Dalley would quote statistics, as he does on his campaign website as well, without citing even a single source for any of the information, is always a red flag, since he could be making up this information, but the biggest bombshell in the Sentinel article was really near the end, and was presented with little fanfare or attention:

It was this:

“Dalley said he doesn’t believe Joe Biden fairly won his election to president of the United States in 2020.”

D-51 School Board President’s transphobic social media posts draw condemnation

District 51 School Board President posted this photo to social media recently on her personal account

Recent social media posts by District 51 School Board President Andrea Haitz, and one in particular that she posted on Mother’s Day, are drawing condemnation, disgust and shock from many Mesa County residents who saw them.

Convicted felon Rod Blagojevich to headline campaign fundraiser for indicted Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters

Kyle Clark of 9News in Denver reported yesterday (video) that convicted felon Rod Blagojevich will headline a Saturday, May 14, 2022 fundraiser for indicted Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters‘ campaign for secretary of state. The fundraiser will be held at Dunafon Castle, a wedding venue in Lakewood, Colorado owned by Debbie and Mike Dunafon, who also own Shotgun Willie’s strip club in Glendale, Colorado. The Dunafons are hosting the fundraiser. The cost to rent the venue on a Saturday for a group of up to 150 people is $9,400.00.

Just how much are taxpayers paying Tina Peters and Belinda Knisely not to do their jobs?

Tina Peters

Everyone wants to know just how much Mesa County taxpayers are shelling out in salary and benefits to indicted Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters and Deputy Clerk Belinda Knisely for not doing their jobs while they obey conditions of their bond to stay away from their workplace and co-workers. During all this time of not going to work, they have continued to collect paychecks.

Thanks to the County, we’ve got the figures.

Between August 10, 2021 and April 22, 2022, Knisely collected a total of $71,524.14 in salary and benefits including health and disability insurance, and Tina collected a total of $83,958.88 for a grand total paid to the pair since August 10, 2021 of $155,483.02.

Belinda Knisely

The two are indicted on multiple felony charges related to election tampering.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Accused felon & election denier Tina Peters leads Republican primary for Secretary of State


In an event that shows just how far out of touch with reality Colorado’s Republic Party has become, election denier Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, who was indicted a month ago on multiple felony charges related to tampering with election equipment, was the runaway winner for the Secretary of State nomination at the Colorado Republican Party state assembly April 9, 2022 in Colorado Springs. Peters won a whopping 62% of the vote, making her the Republicans’ front runner for Secretary of State in the primary election on June 28. Peters will oppose former two-term Jefferson County Clerk and Recorder and former president of the Colorado County Clerks Association Pam Anderson, on the primary ballot. Anderson petitioned her way onto the ballot. (Anderson’s mother-in-law is former longtime Colorado Senate Majority Leader Norma Anderson.) While Pam Anderson is a Republican, she not an election denier. Peters also faces Mike O’Donnell, a candidate from Yuma County.