Tag: Dangerous Republicans

Anti-semitism, Anti-vaccine, Conspiracy theories, Crazy Republicans, Dangerous Republicans, Embarrassing Republicans, Ethics, Health care, Pandemic, Propaganda, Racism, Stephen D. Daniels, Weird Grand Junction Stuff

Mesa County Commissioners’ new chair of the Public Health Board refuses to say if he believes Covid-19 was “targeted to attack Caucasians and Black people” and spare Jews and Chinese people

by Anne Landman • July 19, 2023 • 16 Comments

On of the many Facebook and Instagram posts by Mesa County Board of Public Health chair Stephen D. Daniels, lauding Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., a vocal anti-vaxxer who has spread lies and conspiracy theories for “the better part of two decades.”

The Mesa County Commissioners’ newly-appointed Chair of the Public Health Board, Stephen D. Daniels, has made it known that he is a strong supporter of anti-vax conspiracy theorist and presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (RFK). In multiple posts on his social media accounts, Daniels urges people to be open to discussion about Kennedy’s views and believe what Kennedy has to say.

But does Daniels support what RFK told a table full of people last week at a press event in Manhattan (video), that the Covid-19 virus is “ethnically targeted” to attack Caucasians and Black people, and to spare Jews and Chinese people?

RFK’s comments were widely reported as being a “Bigoted new Covid conspiracy about Jews and Chinese” (NY Times), as being “deplorable” and “hurtful” (Fox News), as spreading “false claims” about Covid-19 (CBS News) and being “antisemitic and racist” (ABC News).

Specifically, RFK said in part,

“There is an argument that it [Covid-19] is ethnically targeted. COVID-19 attacks certain races disproportionately. COVID-19 is targeted to attack Caucasians and black people. The people who are most immune are Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese.”

Mesa County Commissioners violate County policy to appoint Janet Rowland to Board of Public Health

by Anne Landman • June 16, 2023 • 7 Comments

Last page of the intergovernmental agreement MCA 2012-079, laying out the relationship between Mesa County and the Board of Public Health (BOH). The appointment of Janet Rowland to the BOH was highly controversial at the time Commissioners made it, but the Commissioners skipped holding the required meeting with the BOH about it first.

The relationship between Mesa County and the Health Department is governed by the 2012 “Agreement, MCA 2012-079” (pdf), dated June 25, 2012.

The Agreement discusses financing, budgeting, purchasing and personnel policies, and it lays out the overall relationship between the two agencies.

Item #2 of the Agreement says a county commissioner may be appointed to the Board of Health, but Item #10 says:

“10. Points of controversy hereunder will be addressed by a meeting between the Mesa County Board of Health and the Board of County Commissioners.”

Janet Rowland

Janet Rowland was appointed to the Board of Health on April 25th.

It was a highly controversial appointment at the time.

Janet Rowland convinces newly-installed Public Health Board members to put Director Jeff Kuhr on paid leave

by Anne Landman • June 5, 2023 • 30 Comments

Janet Rowland at the Board of Public Health meeting June 5

Mesa County Commissioner Janet Rowland succeeded in convincing the three new temporary members of the Board of Public Health (BOPH) to vote to put Mesa County Health Department Director Jeff Kuhr on paid leave.

Rowland has been working to push Kuhr out of his job for months.

The stunning part of the BOPH meeting was who was there to support Kuhr.

The audience was packed with prominent longtime local Republican political figures, including former Mesa County Commissioner Kathy Hall, former Chamber of Commerce President Diane Schwenke, former CMU President Tim Foster (now Kuhr’s attorney in this matter) and Doug and Jamie Simons, owners of Enstrom Candies. Former County Commissioner Jim Spehar was there, as well as the owners of the Winery and Crossroads Fitness. All spoke in support of Kuhr and urged the BOPH to keep him in his job. Many said how Kuhr has done an exceptional job as head of the Health Department, how grateful they are to him and that these attacks on him amount to some kind of personal vendetta. Many of those who spoke were previously long time supporters of Janet Rowland.

One attendee remarked after the meeting that,

“Every business leader or former community leader that walked out of that room said that Janet has lost her mind.”

County teeing up new Public Health Board members to fire Dr. Jeff Kuhr as longtime Director of Mesa County Public Health Dept., despite being told there is “insufficient evidence” of wrongdoing

by Anne Landman • June 3, 2023 • 8 Comments

Jeff Kuhr won plaudits for helping Mesa County get through the Covid-19 pandemic.

If Mesa County Commissioner Janet Rowland gets her way, the new, temporary members recently intstalled on the Mesa County Board of Public Health (BOPH) will do the Commissioners’ bidding and fire longtime Mesa County Health Department Director Dr. Jeff Kuhr, even though there is insufficient evidence of any financial wrongdoing by Kuhr and even though a large majority of the local public thinks the county commissioners are engaging in a blatant overreach of their authority.

Fox Network hosts privately ridiculed Trump’s election fraud lie while continuing to pump the lie out to viewers

by Anne Landman • February 28, 2023 • 10 Comments

Mesa County’s many, many supporters of Donald Trump (pdf) must be super-bummed this week to find out Fox News owner Rupert Murdoch has acknowledged that Fox News anchors Laura Ingraham, Lou Dobbs, Jeanine Pirro, Sean Hannity, Maria Bartiromo and others knowingly lied to them by repeating Donald Trump’s fraudulent statements that the 2020 general election was “rigged” and he actually won.

Murdoch acknowledged under oath in a deposition in the $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit brought by Dominion Voting Systems against Fox Network, that Fox News hosts knowingly lied to viewers by endorsing false election fraud claims while at the same time they were privately ridiculing such claims. Murdoch further admitted he should have ordered Trump allies like Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, who were lying to the public about the election, off the air, but didn’t.

Tina Peters falsely implies on Joe Oltmann show that the Mesa County D.A. murdered the brothers of two witnesses against her

by Anne Landman • February 4, 2023 • 8 Comments

This article was authored by Erik Maulbetsch and originally appeared 2/2/23 in the Colorado Times Recorder.

Tina Peters’ mugshot from her arrest on 3/9/2022

Former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters took her conspiracy promotion to a new level this week when she implied that law enforcement murdered two family members of her former staff members in order to compel them to testify against her.

Appearing on Joe Oltmann’s far-right podcast, Peters falsely stated that the brothers of her former deputy Belinda Knisley and staffer Sandra Brown were both killed in separate unsolved hit-and-run accidents prior to the Mesa District Attorney offering them plea deals in exchange for their testimony.

All Tina’s court appearances, all in one place – 12/2022 edition

by Anne Landman • December 7, 2022 • 3 Comments

Tina Peters’ Mesa County Court docket as of December 7, 2022

Curious when Tina Peters’ next court hearing is, and what it’s about?

Above is her court docket as of 12/7/2022, with the court dates, type of hearing, and case numbers. Descriptions of each case number are added for clarity. Her docket is subject to change at any time, and it often does. Her docket information can be accessed by going to the Mesa County Court Docket Search page and entering Tina’s first and last names.

Rep. Lauren Boebert, now more televangelist than House Representative, is working to turn politics into a holy war

by Anne Landman • October 22, 2022 • 8 Comments

First 5 minutes of a 55 minute talk Lauren Boebert gave on September 9, where she was introduced as a Member of Congress

At a September 9, 2022 speech at the Truth and Liberty Coalition conference in Woodland Park — the same appearance where she confused the word “wanton” as in “wanton killing” with the word for the Chinese dumpling, the announcer introduced Lauren Boebert in her official capacity as a Member of Congress. But during her talk, Boebert talked less about policy and government and acted and spoke exactly like a televangelist preacher, strutting back and forth across the stage, invoking the apocalypse with lines like “we are in the last of the last days.” She urged her audience to “rise up and take our place in Christ and influence this nation as we were called to do,” adding, “you get to have a role in the second coming of Jesus! How cool is that?”

Anti-transgender, racist hate mail sent to 92 year old School District 51 retiree; Local Republican political leaders may be contributing to undercurrent of hatred in Mesa County

by Anne Landman • October 14, 2022 • 8 Comments

“Citizens District 51 Defund Vote” sent hate mail postmarked Oct. 11, 2022 to a 92 year old School District 51 retiree in Grand Junction

My 92 year old neighbor, who worked for School District 51 over forty years ago, received this hate mail yesterday, with the following computer-printed in screaming all-caps, racist, anti-transgender hate letter glued to the back of the picture with the child at the chalkboard:

My neighbor is pretty tough, but the line that said “OL’ BITCH” really saddened her.

In addition to showing that racism and homophobia in Grand Junction are alive and thriving, this rude correspondence raises several questions:

— How did the sender get the address of this person?

Mesa County Commissioners give Republican commissioner candidate Bobbie Daniel a huge advantage using taxpayer-funded resources

by Anne Landman • October 12, 2022 • 11 Comments

Election denier Bobbie Daniel (R), Republican running for County Commissioner, with her friend Tina Peters in 2018, before Tina was elected Clerk and was indicted on multiple felonies related to election tampering.

On Wednesday, October 12, 2022, in its opinion section the Daily Sentinel endorsed Republican election denier Bobbie Daniel for County Commissioner, saying she was “prepared to step in ready to work on day one.” But the Sentinel failed to ask the big question of how it happened that Daniel had become so prepped for the position.

It happened because Daniel has been groomed for months, maybe years, for the job by sitting Republican Mesa County commissioners, who have been using taxpayer-funded resources and taxpayer-funded County time to make sure Daniel gets a huge leg-up over her opponent in the race.

Tina Peters on Lindell TV: “They tried to frame me with ballot stuffing [in 2019],” “Why aren’t they arresting the REAL felons: Jena Griswold, the A.G., Rubinstein, Judge Barrett, the Commissioners?”

by Anne Landman • September 6, 2022 • 0 Comments

Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters gave an unhinged interview September 1 on LindellTV.com in which she claimed she is still a candidate even though she lost her primary election for Secretary of State by a wide margin over two months ago, and lost a second time by the same margin in a recount that cost over a quarter of a million dollars raised through donations from people who continue to believe her wild and completely unproven claims of election fraud.

Peters claims she hasn’t broken any laws and says that letting someone into the secure area of the Elections Department to make copies of voting machine hard drives was not a security breach because “I can have anybody I want in there.”

Tina Peters: Judge and D.A. are “very, very evil,” and “don’t follow the same God that we do”

by Anne Landman • September 1, 2022 • 13 Comments

In a talk in El Paso County on August 29 to an audience of election-deniers, indicted Republican Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters quoted the Bible, called her legal troubles “a spiritual battle” and praised her multi-millionaire benefactor, My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell, saying,

“Lindell has paid for many of our legal challenges, you know, and their end goal for me, and I’m just going to be really frank and really serious for a minute, is to put me in prison.”

Peters added,

“That is what they want. … I’ve got such an — I can’t even think of a word beyond ‘egregious”– judge, [and] when my chief deputy just made a deal, he was just sorry that she didn’t have to serve prison time.

They’re coming after me, and you know, Mike Lindell and the Legal Offense Fund, you know, these attorneys are not cheap, you know, they have they put a lot of hours [in] ….

D-51 School Board members attend seminar in how to fight equity and inclusion policies

by Anne Landman • August 31, 2022 • 9 Comments

“Stand for the Constitution,” the right wing extremist Mesa County group that endorsed and defended Tina Peters, also endorsed and promoted Angela Lema, Andrea Haitz and Will Jones for School Board. All three candidates ran as a far right wing extremist slate. Now two of them are getting training in how to battle policies that aim to help all children feel welcome and accepted at D-51 schools.

The Colorado Times Recorder is reporting that D-51 School Board President Andrea Haitz and D-51 Board Member Angela Lema attended a seminar at a Grand Junction hotel on August 26 called “Save Our Schools,” put on by Heritage Action for America, an affiliate of the right wing Heritage Foundation. The seminar taught people how to fight equity and inclusion policies in schools and provided resources to help them.

What are equity and inclusion policies, anyway?

Knisely flips, agrees to testify against Tina Peters and others

by Anne Landman • August 25, 2022 • 5 Comments

Tina Peters (L), and Belinda Knisely (R)

In a major development in the case against indicted Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, former Deputy County Clerk Belinda Knisley reached a plea deal in which she flipped on Peters, plead guilty to reduced charges and agreed to testify against Peters in court, according to reports today in the Daily Sentinel, the Colorado Sun, Colorado Public Radio, Denver 9News and other news outlets.

Felony charges dropped, no prison time

Knisely had faced three counts of attempting to influence a public servant (class 4 felonies), one count of conspiracy to attempt to influence a public servant (a class 5 felony), and two misdemeanor charges of violation of duty and failing to comply with the Secretary of State. Before the deal, Knisley faced up to 21 years in prison and $2 million in fines.

Audio of 911 calls about Rep. Lauren Boebert’s family harassing neighbors

by Anne Landman • August 15, 2022 • 7 Comments

Five Garfield County Sheriff’s responded to multiple 911 calls on August 4 from neighbors of Lauren and Jayson Boebert about children harassing a residential neighborhood in Silt by driving ATVs up and down a residential street at high speeds of around 50 MPH. Two callers reported the children driving the ATVs were the kids of Jayson and Lauren Boebert. The first told the 911 operator that he stopped one of the children going 50 MPH in a RZR off-road vehicle and asked him to slow down. The child said “fuck off” to the neighbor, went home and got his dad, Jayson. Jayson Boebert then returned in charcoal-gray Ford F150 truck with the child in the passenger seat and started threatening “everybody in the neighborhood,” according the caller. Jayson drove over a caller’s mailbox, destroying it, while the caller was on the phone with the 911 operator. The caller reported Jayson was “dumb as a post,” “looking to fight with everyone in the neighborhood” and was “so irrational.” “When 911 operator asked if there were any weapons, the caller responded that the whole family has guns.

Tina Peters is lying to audience after audience about her divorce: “They took away my husband…these people are criminals.”

by Anne Landman • August 8, 2022 • 9 Comments

Tina Peters repeatedly tells a sad story in interviews and at conferences that she would have been married to her husband for 36 years by now if only Mesa County District Attorney Dan Rubinstein and the FBI hadn’t gone into a Grand Junction nursing home and forced her husband Tom, who she says has “advanced dementia,” to sign divorce papers dissolving their marriage. She tells this story sometimes angrily, and sometimes tearfully, dabbing at her eyes, sniffling and sounding like she’s about to cry. She says the story is evidence of a coordinated plot being carried out against her by a cabal of high-level Democrats who are intentionally harassing her and trying to silence her because of what she’s supposedly revealed about election fraud here in Mesa County. Tina’s “cabal” consists of D.A. Rubinstein, his “criminal” investigators, the FBI, Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold, wealthy financier George Soros and U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland.

Tina Peters’ next big drama to keep the grift going

by Anne Landman • July 30, 2022 • 3 Comments

Tina Peters press release finding fault with the El Paso County recount

Get ready. The next Tina Peters drama is already happening.

Tina is trying hard to set the scene for a hand recount by claiming there is tremendous fault in the El Paso County recount effort, which has barely just begun.

Tina issued a press release yesterday saying the El Paso County Logic and Accuracy test (a precursor to the recount) was an “absolute disaster.”

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

by Anne Landman • July 25, 2022 • 0 Comments

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.

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“10. Points of controversy hereunder will be addressed by a meeting between the Mesa County Board of Health and the Board of County Commissioners.”

“Every business leader or former community leader that walked out of that room said that Janet has lost her mind.”

“Lindell has paid for many of our legal challenges, you know, and their end goal for me, and I’m just going to be really frank and really serious for a minute, is to put me in prison.”

“That is what they want. … I’ve got such an — I can’t even think of a word beyond ‘egregious”– judge, [and] when my chief deputy just made a deal, he was just sorry that she didn’t have to serve prison time.

They’re coming after me, and you know, Mike Lindell and the Legal Offense Fund, you know, these attorneys are not cheap, you know, they have they put a lot of hours [in] ….

What are equity and inclusion policies, anyway?

Felony charges dropped, no prison time