#racketeer influenced and corrupt organizations act

[tomorrowusa]

The Trump campaign will probably use that image for fundraising aimed at gullible MAGA zombies. Though they'll likely apply some photoshop to it to make him look less like a serial peeping Tom.

#donald trump #first president to get a mugshot #mugshot #republicans #indictments #racketeer influenced and corrupt organizations act #rico #criminal enterprise #election tampering #election fraud #election 2020 #georgia #atlanta #fulton county #fani willis #lock him up!

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Marjorie Taylor Greene is accusing Fulton County Prosecutor Fani Willis — without evidence — of the very crimes Willis has charged Donald Trump with committing.

During an appearance on Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures, the Georgia congresswoman claimed that Willis is “guilty of” crimes under the RICO statutes related to racketeering and corruption, not Trump. She went on to baselessly accuse Willis and the prosecutors who have indicted Trump of “using this giant collaboration basically to affect the 2024 election.”

Willis charged the former president and 18 others with a variety of charges related to efforts to steal the Georgia election for Trump, including a felony violation of the Georgia Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act. RICO charges are used to connect crimes committed in service of a broader objective in order to combine multiple crimes into one case.

“I don’t think [Trump is] going to get a fair trial at all,” Greene said. “As a matter of fact, I don’t think these charges are fair. What Willis is trying to do is exactly what she’s guilty of. She’s charging him with RICO, racketeering and conspiracy.”

Greene claimed the charges against Trump are part of a “grand conspiracy.” “This is a grand conspiracy by the Democrat party to use the justice system at the federal level but also in the states, using these state D.A.’s like in Georgia, Fani Willis,” she said.

The congresswoman further alleged that the charges against Trump are “pure communism.”

“They’re using this giant collaboration basically to affect the 2024 election… This election is not going to be swayed by indictments against President Trump that are really pure communism in America today,” Greene said.

She later added, “This is an attempt to steal the 2024 election from Donald Trump by trying to put him in jail, and they are overwhelmingly going to elect him in the Republican primary, and I’ll argue that he will win the general election.”

Greene did not expand on exactly what Willis’ crimes are beyond “RICO,” nor did she offer evidence. She just whined, “In Fulton county, which is a large Democrat county, he’s not going to get a fair trial and none of this is fair.”

Greene has not yet announced whether she will run for re-election in the House in 2024, telling the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that she is holding out because she may run for Senate or even could possibly become Trump’s running-mate. “I have a lot of things to think about. Am I going to be a part of President Trump’s cabinet if he wins? Is it possible that I’ll be VP?” she told the paper last week.

#us politics #news #republicans #donald trump #conservatives #2023 #gop #rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene #georgia #Fani Willis #Fulton County #fox news #Sunday Morning Futures #rico charges #racketeering #corruption #Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act #twitter #tweet #@acyn #2024 gop nomination #2024 gop presidential primary #2024 elections #2024 presidential race #Atlanta Journal-Constitution #rolling stone magazine #rolling stone

[stephenist]

#rico #indictment #trump #fulton county #fuck trump #fani willis #district attorney #racketeer influenced and corrupt organizations act. #ricola

[reasonsforhope]

Donald Trump charged in Georgia for efforts to overturn the 2020 election

Link here, because WaPo's security measures stop Tumblr previews. Non-paywall link here.

"Former president Donald Trump and 18 others were criminally charged in Georgia on Monday in connection with efforts to overturn Joe Biden’s 2020 victory in the state, according to an indictment made public late Monday night [on August 14, 2023].

Trump was charged with 13 counts, including violating the state’s racketeering act, soliciting a public officer to violate their oath, conspiring to impersonate a public officer, conspiring to commit forgery in the first degree and conspiring to file false documents.

The Recap

The historic indictment, the fourth to implicate the former president, follows a 2½-year investigation by Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis (D). The probe was launched after audio leaked from a January 2021 phone call during which Trump urged Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) to question the validity of thousands of ballots, especially in the heavily Democratic Atlanta area, and said he wanted to “find” the votes to erase his 2020 loss in the state.

Willis’s investigation quickly expanded to other alleged efforts by Trumpor his supporters, including trying to thwart the electoral college process, harassing election workers, spreading false information about the voting process in Georgia and compromising election equipment in a rural county. Trump has long decried the Georgia investigation as a “political witch hunt,” defending his calls to Raffensperger and others as “perfect.”

The Details

“Trump and the other Defendants charged in this Indictment refused to accept that Trump lost, and they knowingly and willfully joined a conspiracy to unlawfully change the outcome of the election in favor of Trump,” the indictment states.

A total of 41 charges are brought against 19 defendants in the 98-page indictment. Not all face the same counts, but all have been charged with violating the Georgia Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Willis said she has given those charged until Aug. 25 to surrender.

Among those charged are Rudy Giuliani, the former New York mayor who served as Trump’s personal attorney after the election; Trump’s former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows; and several Trump advisers, including attorneys John Eastman, Sidney Powell and Kenneth Chesebro...

Prosecutors brought charges around five subject areas: false statements by Trump allies, including Giuliani, to the Georgia legislature; the breach of voting data in Coffee County; calls Trump made to state officials, including Raffensperger, seeking to overturn Biden’s victory; the harassment of election workers; and the creation of a slate of alternate electors to undermine the legitimate vote. Those charged in the case were implicated in certain parts of what prosecutors presented as a larger enterprise to undermine the election."

-via The Washington Post, August 14, 2023

#trump #donald trump #trump indictment #fani willis #district attorney #united states #us politics #good news #2020 election #january 6 #georgia #fulton county #criminal justice #racketeering #rudy giuliani #sidney powell #john eastman #fuck trump

[liberalsarecool]

Ms. Willis ties them all together by levying one charge against Mr. Trump and each of the 18 other defendants under Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act, or RICO, accusing Mr. Trump and his co-conspirators of functioning as a criminal gang.

Trump and his gang will be on TV. They are toast. All that remains will be the bootlickers and fellow miscreants.

#fanni willis #georgia #RICO #fani willis

[brf-rumortrackinganon]

So here’s a plot twist

Yesterday, P.Diddy’s home was raided by DHS, the Department of Homeland Security.

It came after a lawsuit was filed in late February by another music producer. The lawsuit accuses P.Diddy (or Puffy Combs or whatever his name is now) and some associates of sex trafficking, sexual assault, and RICO crimes.

We don’t know if the raid was connected to this lawsuit or to the ones Cassidy filed in November 2023.

Because there’s an international audience here — RICO stands for The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) of 1970, which is used charge criminal organizations as a whole. Before RICO, only the people who committed crime could be arrested, charged, sent to trial, etc. But now with RICO, the law can go after people who organize crime - ie the people who keep their hands clean while others do the dirty work. RICO is mostly well known for being used to bring the mafia down, but has also been used in cases such as Iran-Contra, Trump University, and FIFA World Cup Russian and Qatar bribery allegations.

So RICO crimes are very serious. But that’s not the plot twist.

The plot twist is that the lawsuit - which, remember, was filed by a third party (ie not government) - names Prince Harry as a prospective recipient of P.Diddy’s services:

Affiliation with, and or sponsorship of Mr. Combs sex-trafficking parties gamered legitimacy and access to celebrities such as famous athletes, political figures, artist, musicians, and international dignitaries like British Royal, Prince Harry.

In other words: Prince Harry went to parties hosted or sponsored by P.Diddy in which victims of sex trafficking were present and/or on offer.

Sound familiar?

It’s Epstein/Prince Andrew, Ginger Edition.

And what further twists the knife is that Ron Burkle is *also* being implicated in the P.Diddy lawsuit! Burkle, as you may know, was an Epstein partner and he also owns Soho House…so it’s very possible that if the Burkle side of this is investigated more, there’s potential for Soho House to get pulled into it.

There isn’t a whole lot that we know about these parties or Harry’s involvement/attendance. We don’t know when they took place (e.g., before Meghan came onto the scene or post-Megxit) or what actually happened or if Harry participated in anything. From a picture in the Daily Mail about this, it’s probably pre-Meghan, as the picture shows a young, happy Harry with P.Diddy at a party.

What we do know is that Harry is the only person mentioned by name to attend these parties.

Plot twist.

Here’s the Daily Mail’s story.

Lawsuit filing here. Do be advise that there’s a trigger warning for very graphic details.

#sussexes #rumors #brf

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Michael de Adder, Washington Post :: [Robert Scott Horton]

* * * *

Letters From An American

Tonight, just before midnight, the state of Georgia indicted former president Donald J. Trump and 18 others for multiple crimes committed in that state as they tried to steal the 2020 presidential election. A special-purpose grand jury made up of citizens in Fulton County, Georgia, examined evidence and heard from 75 witnesses in the case, and issued a report in January that recommended indictments. A regular grand jury took the final report of the special grand jury into consideration and brought an indictment.  

“Trump and the other Defendants charged in this Indictment refused to accept that Trump lost” the 2020 presidential election, the indictment reads, ”and they knowingly and willfully joined a conspiracy to unlawfully change the outcome of the election in favor of Trump. That conspiracy contained a common plan and purpose to commit two or more acts of racketeering activity in Fulton County, Georgia, elsewhere in the State of Georgia, and in other states.” 

The indictment alleges that those involved in the “criminal enterprise” “constituted a criminal organization whose members and associates engaged in various related criminal activities including, but not limited to, false statements and writings, impersonating a public officer, forgery, filing false documents, influencing witnesses, computer theft, computer trespass, computer invasion of privacy, conspiracy to defraud the state, acts involving theft, and perjury.” 

That is, while claiming to investigate voter fraud, they allegedly committed election fraud. 

And that effort has run them afoul of a number of laws, including the Georgia Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, which is broader than federal anti-racketeering laws and carries a mandatory five-year prison term. 

Those charged fall into several categories. Trump allies who operated out of the White House include lawyers Rudy Giuliani (who recently conceded in a lawsuit that he lied about Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss having stuffed ballot boxes),  John Eastman, Kenneth Chesebro, Jeffrey Clark, Jenna Ellis, and Trump’s White House chief of staff Mark Meadows. 

Those operating in Georgia to push the scheme to manufacture a false slate of Trump electors to challenge the real Biden electors include lawyer Ray Stallings Smith III, who tried to sell the idea to legislators; Philadelphia political operative Michael Roman; former Georgia Republican chair David James Shafer, who led the fake elector meeting; and Shawn Micah Tresher Still, currently a state senator, who was the secretary of the fake elector meeting. 

Those trying to intimidate election worker and witness Ruby Freeman include Stephen Cliffgard Lee, a police chaplain from Illinois; Harrison William Prescott Floyd, executive director of Black Voices for Trump; and Trevian C. Kutti, a publicist for the rapper formerly known as Kanye West. 

Those allegedly stealing data from the voting systems in Coffee County, Georgia, and spreading it across the country in an attempt to find weaknesses in the systems that might have opened the way to fraud include Trump lawyer Sidney Powell; former Coffee County Republican Committee chair Cathleen Alston Latham; businessman Scott Graham Hall; and Coffee County election director Misty Hampton, also known as Emily Misty Hayes.  

The document also referred to 30 unindicted co-conspirators.

Trump has called the case against him in Georgia partisan and launched a series of attacks on Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis. Today, Willis told a reporter who asked about Trump’s accusations of partisanship: “I make decisions in this office based on the facts and the law. The law is completely nonpartisan. That's how decisions are made in every case. To date, this office has indicted, since I’ve been sitting as the district attorney, over 12,000 cases. This is the eleventh RICO indictment. We follow the same process. We look at the facts. We look at the law. And we bring charges."

The defendants have until noon on August 25 to surrender themselves to authorities.

Letters From An American

Heather Cox Richardson

#Robert Scott Horton #Washington Post #Michael de Adder #political cartoon #Letters From An American #Heather Cox Richardson #Fani Willis #RICO #Georgia #Indicted #TFG

[trendfilmsetter]

Major News Stories for the Day: July 13th:

~ 🎬The SAG-AFTRA Union has agreed to strike starting tomorrow halting all U.S based movies/tv series that are currently in production.

~👮‍♂️The Secret Service has concluded its investigation of cocaine found in the White House due to lack of evidence.

~👕 The fast fashion Chinese based clothing company Shein is being charged with the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) in which independent artists are suing Shein for stealing artwork and designs.

~ 📚A school board in Temecula, California voted to ban a textbook that mentioned Harvey Milk in it. California governor Gavin Newsom is stepping in to challenge the ban.

#sag aftra #sag strike #screen actors guild #shein #Shein Rico #gavin newsom #harvey milk #secret service #white house #biden

[etakeh]

The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO, targets organized criminal enterprises and was created in the 1970s to more effectively prosecute the mafia. Since then, RICO statutes have been used against participants in the 2019 college admissions scandal, anti-abortion groups, insider traders, and now, environmental and climate justice activists.

Rather than charging individuals with specific crimes they committed, RICO indictments target alleged criminal organizations in which people collaborate to commit a series of interrelated crimes in furtherance of a common criminal goal. For charges to stick, prosecutors must prove that those charged engaged in a “pattern of racketeering” activity involving “at least two acts” in furtherance of “one or more incidents, schemes, or transactions.”

This is a very interesting read.

A disturbing, annoying, ridiculous read.

It feels desperate, you know? Childish even.

#rico #Atlanta #stop cop city #Weelaunee Forest

[seymour-butz-stuff]

On May 31, 2023, the Atlanta Police Department deployed a SWAT team to arrest Marlon Kautz, Adele MacLean and Savannah Patterson. These three people weren’t fugitives from justice or drug kingpins, but rather volunteer board members of a local charity. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation then charged these trustees of the Network for Strong Communities Inc. with charity fraud and money laundering. Charges under Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, a very expansive state version of federal RICO laws, may also be pending. As a charity expert who researches nonprofit governance, I am struck by how unusual this scenario is. This story strikes close to home for me as well. A friend of mine was arrested three months ago by the Atlanta police while attending a related music festival organized by the “Stop Cop City” protesters.

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

President Joe Biden’s campaign knocked former President Donald Trump on the third anniversary of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack for refusing to sign an Illinois loyalty oath that says he won’t advocate to overthrow the government.

The WBEZ/Chicago Sun-Times reported Saturday that Trump did not voluntarily sign the loyalty oath this year when he and his campaign registered for the primary ballot in Illinois. The former president signed the oath in 2016 and 2020.

Candidates who sign the oath – including Biden and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis – attest that they “do not directly or indirectly teach or advocate the overthrow of the government of the United States or of this state or any unlawful change in the form of the governments thereof by force or any unlawful means.”

It also requires candidates to attest that they do not support communism or affiliate with communist organizations. The oath is “a vestige of the red-baiting era of the former U.S. Sen. Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s,” according to WBEZ/Chicago Sun-Times.

“Donald Trump can’t bring himself to sign a piece of paper saying he won’t attempt a coup to overthrow our government,” said Michael Tyler, communications director for the Biden campaign, in a statement Saturday. “We know he’s deadly serious, because three years ago today he tried and failed to do exactly that.”

Former President Donald Trump addresses the audience during a campaign event Saturday, Jan. 6, 2024, at the DMACC Conference Center in Newton.

Trump faces a federal criminal indictment for his alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election. The former president and 18 of his allies also face an indictment in Georgia for allegedly conspiring to change the outcome of the 2020 election and violating the state’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations, or RICO Act.

The Trump campaign did not explain why the candidate did not sign the oath, but instead issued a statement predicting the former president would defeat Biden at the polls.

#us politics #news #republicans #donald trump #conservatives #illinois #2024 #loyalty oath #2024 elections #biden administration #president joe biden #WBEZ #Chicago Sun-Times #Michael Tyler #the news globe

[ausetkmt]

Topline

A Georgia judge on Friday denied bond for Harrison Floyd, the only one of 18 co-defendants in former President Donald Trump’s election interference case in Fulton County to stay in jail, and the former Black Voices for Trump leader has a history of politics and legal trouble.

Key Facts

Floyd, a 39-year-old U.S. Marine veteran, served as the director of the political group Black Voices for Trump during the 2020 election cycle, and was charged last week in the Fulton County case with violating Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, for influencing a witness and conspiracy to commit solicitation of false statements.

According to the indictment, Floyd pressured Ruby Freeman, an election worker in Fulton County, after she refused to change the results of the county’s vote in the 2020 election for Trump, with Freeman testifying before the House January 6 Committee last year that she was forced to leave her home for two months and quit her job after receiving threats after the election.

Floyd, a graduate of George Washington University, had become a prominent Republican in Georgia in recent years, running in 2019 for a Congressional seat.

Floyd dropped out of the race just over a month after announcing his candidacy, saying he “might be the guy doing this in the future,” while expressing his support for a GOP state representative in his place (Democrat Carolyn Bourdeaux won the district in 2020).

In 2020, Floyd led the organization Black Voices for Trump, and also served as executive producer of right-wing outlet Bright News and as a partner at Washington D.C.-based Commonwealth International, according to his LinkedIn page.

Floyd had been charged in a separate case in May with second-degree assault and arrested for allegedly attacking an FBI agent who had served him a grand jury subpoena in the Department of Justice’s investigation into efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

According to a complaint in federal District Court in Maryland, Floyd refused to accept the subpoena, putting his finger to the face of one of two FBI agents who arrived at his residence, yelling: “You haven’t given me anything; I don’t know who the f**k you are.”

Later that night, Floyed called 911, accusing the agents of accosting him and saying: “They were lucky I didn’t have a gun on me, because I would have shot his fucking ass,” the Huffington Post reported.

Forbes has reached out to Floyd’s court-listed attorney in Maryland, Carlos Salvado—Floyd does not have an attorney listed in the Georgia case.

On Friday, Fulton County Judge Emily Richardson denied bond for Floyd after he determined he posed a flight risk and a risk to commit further criminal felonies if released on bail (Georgia state law requires defendants to be determined to pose no “significant risk of fleeing” and pose no “threat or danger to any person” or of committing a felony to be released on bail).

What To Watch For

Richardson said in her determination on Friday that the terms of Floyd’s bond “will be addressed,” but that the full terms fall on Fulton County Judge Scott McAfee, who is overseeing the case. Floyd, however, has contested his bond denial, telling Richardson on Friday: “There is no way I’m a flight risk. I showed up here before the president was here.”

Tangent

Trump was indicted by a grand jury in Fulton County last week on 13 felony counts, including racketeering, solicitation of violation of oath by a public officer, conspiracy to commit forgery, false statements and conspiracy to impersonate a public officer.. After just over a week, Trump surrendered to authorities in a brief procedure on Thursday, posting a $200,000 bond after giving a mug shot and his fingerprints before promptly leaving Georgia. All 18 of his co-defendants also turned themselves in by Friday, with Pastor Stephen Lee becoming the last to do so before the 12 p.m. deadline, following a group of former Trump aides and attorneys, as well as so-called fake electors in Trump’s legal team’s dubious plot to overturn the results of his election loss to President Joe Biden.

Further Reading

Trump Co-Defendant Harrison Floyd Denied Bond: Why He’s Still In Jail (Forbes)

#Who Is Harrison Floyd: Trump Co-Defendant And Black Voices For Trump Leader Still In Fulton County Jail #harrison floyd #trumpets #black trumpers #liars #election fraud #rico #fulton county jail #locked up #Georgia #Fani T Willis DA #Black Voices for Trump

[tomorrowusa]

Donald Trump was indicted for the fourth time this year.

This set of charges is related to Trump's efforts to steal the 2020 presidential election. Because the charges have to do specifically with the attempts by Trump and his co-conspirators to grab Georgia's electoral votes through actions in Georgia or related to improper pressure on state officials, this comes under Georgia's jurisdiction.

Fulton County covers the state capital Atlanta. So it was up to Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis to proceed with the investigation. Ms. Willis made the announcement of the indictments close to midnight local time on Monday as seen in the video above.

Two things struck me as particularly interesting. Some of the counts in the indictment fall under the Georgia version of the RICO Act (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act). RICO prosecutions are best known for going after Mafia figures. Trump often acts like a petty Mafia don – so this seems appropriate. Also, because this is a state rather than a federal prosecution, a president cannot pardon anybody found guilty. So Trump couldn't pardon himself and the various GOP presidential candidates could not pardon him there if elected.

It's been typical of Trump and the MAGA Mafia to accuse others of alleged misdeeds which they themselves have committed. They basically tried to steal the 2020 election while organizing a riot on January 6th under the ironic slogan "stop the steal".

The terrorist assault on the US Capitol occurred just four days after Trump's infamous phone call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. If you can stomach it, listen to the entire 62 minute call.

Raffensperger lets Trump do most of the talking as the latter repeatedly incriminates himself while droning on and on and on.

As tabulated by CNN, here are updated totals of the counts which Trump now faces.

Read the 96-page Georgia indictment here.

Trump and his co-conspirators have until August 25th to surrender.

#trump indicted in georgia #donald trump #georgia #fulton county #election meddling #election 2020 #fani willis #brad raffensperger #lock him up! #Youtube

[beardedmrbean]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear a bid by anti-abortion activists to throw out more than $2 million in damages they were ordered to pay Planned Parenthood after secretly recording video of abortion providers in a scheme to try to show the illicit sale of aborted fetal tissue for profit.

The justices turned away the appeal by David Daleiden and his group, the Center for Medical Progress, of a lower court's decision in 2022 upholding most of the damages in a lawsuit by Planned Parenthood, a women's healthcare and abortion provider, accusing the defendants of conspiracy, eavesdropping and other claims. The lower court rejected the argument made by the defendants that with the secret recording they were exercising their right to free speech under the U.S. Constitution.

The justices announced their action on the first day of their new nine-month term.

Planned Parenthood filed suit in 2016 against Daleiden and his California-based organization in federal court in San Francisco seeking monetary damages, accusing them of violating the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) and engaging in fraud, trespassing, breach of contract and illegal secret recording.

The case before the Supreme Court centered on whether Planned Parenthood, even though it did not sue for defamation, should have to overcome strict limits that the justices through past rulings have placed on damages that public figures may recover for alleged harms related to a publication.

Various activist groups on the left and right conduct undercover operations often involving secret recording. Daleiden and his team portray themselves as investigative journalists and have said that the judgment against them in the suit threatens undercover reporting, a technique that can help expose wrongdoing and corruption.

Planned Parenthood has said the defendants are "ideological activists" - not journalists - whose videos were heavily edited as part of a smear campaign aimed at destroying the organization.

Using a shell company and fake identification, the activists gained access to Planned Parenthood and National Abortion Federation conferences and other locations where they recorded staff using hidden cameras.

The Center for Medical Progress released videos in 2015 purporting to expose Planned Parenthood officials trafficking in aborted fetal parts, sparking controversy, congressional inquiries and investigations in various states.

Planned Parenthood denied profiting from fetal tissue donation for medical research. Lower courts concluded that the videos did not contain evidence of wrongdoing.

A jury sided with Planned Parenthood in the lawsuit, and a judge awarded $2.4 million in damages - including for security costs to prevent future infiltration and targeting of doctors and staff - as well as more than $13 million in attorneys' fees and costs that are the subject of a separate appeal.

The San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld most of the award last year, concluding that the First Amendment did not protect the defendants.

Noting that damages had been awarded for harms related to the infiltration, not to Planned Parenthood's reputation, the 9th Circuit said, "Invoking journalism and the First Amendment does not shield individuals from liability for violations of laws applicable to all members of society."

Daleiden and another activist also face an upcoming criminal trial in California in connection with the secret recordings.

#nunyas news

[vague-humanoid]

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Sidney Blumenthal: DeSantis was paraphrasing a social philosopher on the psychological basis of authoritarian movements. Eric Hoffer was an itinerant longshoreman whose book The True Believer, on the mentality of Naziism and Communism, published in 1951, drew praise from President Dwight Eisenhower in one of his first press conferences. Hoffer described how individuals erased their volition and critical thinking by submerging themselves into movements led by demagogues. “The fanatic,” Hoffer wrote, “is perpetually incomplete and insecure. He cannot generate self-assurance out of his individual resources – out of his rejected self – but finds it only by clinging passionately to whatever support he happens to embrace.” The demagogue appeals to restoring the good old days. “A glorification of the past can serve as a means to belittle the present.” Through propaganda, “people can be made to believe only in what they already ‘know’”. Enemies must be identified as the source of decay. “Finally, it seems, the ideal devil is a foreigner. To qualify as a devil, a domestic enemy must be given a foreign ancestry.” But, Hoffer wrote, it would be a mistake to give too much credence to the ideas of demagogues. “The quality of ideas seems to play a minor role in mass movement leadership. What counts is the arrogant gesture, the complete disregard of the opinion of others, the singlehanded defiance of the world.”

Eisenhower, who had led the armies that defeated Hitler, wrote a letter in 1958 warning against authoritarianism. Citing Hoffer, he stated that “dictatorial systems make one contribution to their people which leads them to tend to support such systems – freedom from the necessity of informing themselves and making up their own minds concerning these tremendous complex and difficult questions”. DeSantis, who has attempted and failed to supplant Trump by whipping up hysteria against the menace of “wokeness”, more or less got one of Hoffer’s memorable quotes right. “Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.” In Georgia, on 14 August 2023, Trump was indicted on 41 felony counts with 18 co-defendants for conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election results under the state’s Rico statute – the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. The problem in applying Hoffer’s aphorism to Trump is that with him it was always a racket.

#political #TFG #Sidney Blumenthal #The Guardian #Eric Hoffer #The True Believer #The Fanatic