More Than Half a Dozen “Stop the Steal” Attendees Were Elected to Public Office Last Night

As you’ve probably heard by now, Tuesday did not go very well for Democrats. In Virginia, a guy who closed his campaign by suggesting he’ll ban Toni Morrison books was elected to serve as governor. In New Jersey, incumbent Phil Murphy eked out a victory, but the numbers were way too close for comfort in a state that Joe Biden won by 16 points. On Long Island, Democrats were hit with “staggering losses up and down the ballot.” Oh, and more than half a dozen people who attended Donald Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally, the one that preceded the attack on the Capitol that left four people dead, were elected to public office.

HuffPost reports that at least eight Republicans who attended the January 6 rally in D.C. won local and state legislature races. While most of last night’s winners claim they didn’t take part in the actual insurrection, just the event that came before it, they all happily gathered to support the then president as he made baseless, outrageous claims that inspired hundreds of people to try and violently overturn the election. As a reminder, it was at that rally where Trump told his supporters, among other things:

• “All of us here today do not want to see our election victory stolen by emboldened radical-left Democrats, which is what they’re doing. And stolen by the fake news media. That’s what they’ve done and what they’re doing. We will never give up, we will never concede. It doesn’t happen. You don’t concede when there’s theft involved.”
• “Our country has had enough. We will not take it anymore and that’s what this is all about. And to use a favorite term that all of you people really came up with: We will stop the steal.”
• “I’ve been in two elections. I won them both and the second one, I won much bigger than the first.“
• “Get your people to fight.”
• “If you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.”
• “And Mike Pence, I hope you’re going to stand up for the good of our Constitution and for the good of our country. And if you’re not, I’m going to be very disappointed in you. I will tell you right now. I’m not hearing good stories.”
• “So we’re going to, we’re going to walk down Pennsylvania Avenue. I love Pennsylvania Avenue. And we’re going to the Capitol.”

Who are these people, now in terrifying positions of power? Per HuffPost:

Among the Jan. 6 attendees who won office on Tuesday were two Republicans reelected to the Virginia House of Delegates: Dave LaRock and John McGuire. Earlier this year LaRock, responding to criticism from a Black elected official about his role in the insurrection, said the official should focus on “the needs of the colored community.” (He later apologized for the comment.) McGuire won his seat despite his Democratic opponent unearthing a photo showing him standing near men in paramilitary gear confronting police on Jan. 6. McGuire had previously claimed he hadn’t heard of the violence at the U.S. Capitol until returning home. The news, he said, had “shocked and horrified” him.

Marie March, a restaurant owner who bragged in a campaign advertisement about her attendance at the Jan. 6 “Stop the Steal” rally and who in a since-deleted Facebook post warned of a “coming Civil War” in which she would be willing to “fight and die” for both her “family” and “small businesses,” also won a seat in the Virginia House of Delegates on Tuesday.

In Nampa, Idaho, rally attendee Natalie Jangula won a city council seat, as did Watchung, New Jersey’s Christine Ead, who falsely blamed the violence on “ANTIFA and other anarchists.” Susan Soloway, who has the distinction of helping organize a bus to transport Trump supporters to the rally, won reelection in Hunterdon County, New Jersey. According to HuffPost, Soloway posted a selfie on Facebook outside of the Capitol, which she later deleted. In Braintree, Massachusetts, a former high school teacher who resigned after a photo of him outside the Capitol was sent to the FBI, won a seat on the local school committee. Per Huffpost, Matthew Lynch received the second most votes in the six-candidate race for three open school committee seats.

At least one race involving a rally attendee has still not been called; in a comment to HuffPost, Monica Manthey, who is still awaiting results in the Annapolis, Maryland, city council race, said, “I’m not a crazy insurrectionist person.” Asked if the insurrection caused her to rethink her support of Trump, she said: “I never rethought my support.”

As HuffPost notes, these victories are a terrifying glimpse of what’s to come; at least 57 state and local GOP officials attended the January 6 rally, and many of them are up for reelection next year. They enjoy the support of the majority of the Republican Party which, after pretending to initially be aghast at the attack on the Capitol, has now moved on. Insurrection, sminsurrection!

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For its next trick, the Supreme Court will flood the country with even more guns

You know what the United States, which saw 11 mass shootings just this past weekend, could use? According to the Supreme Court’s conservative justices, more guns. Per CNN:

The Supreme Court seemed ready to expand Second Amendment rights after hearing arguments for over two hours and expressing skepticism about a New York law that restricts individuals from carrying concealed handguns outside the home for self-defense.… President Donald Trump’s three appointees, justices Neil Gorsuch, Amy Coney Barrett, and Brett Kavanaugh [expressed concern] about the high bar necessary to obtain a permit. “Why isn’t it good enough to say I live in a violent area?” Kavanaugh asked.

It’s been more than a decade since the justices have decided a significant Second Amendment case and now the conservative-leaning court has the opportunity to reexamine the scope of the right to keep and bear arms in a case brought by an affiliate of the National Rifle Association. The court could potentially allow more guns to be carried on some of the busiest streets in the largest cities in the nation, at a time when the Biden administration has vowed to push for enhanced gun regulations.

The case at hand, New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, concerns a New York law that requires residents to obtain a license to carry a concealed weapon and demonstrate that they face a “special or unique danger to their life.” Which seems…more than reasonable! New York solicitor general Barbara Underwood argued on Wednesday that if the justices rule against the law, they could jeopardize other laws that restrict handguns in places like courthouses, airports, bars, schools, houses of worship, and subways.

To which Justice Samuel Alito basically responded, “Yeah, and? More people should be carrying guns on the subway.”

Get ready for even more COVID-vaccine disinformation

If you thought the anti-vaxxers were bad before, just wait. Per NBC News:

[Dr. Natasha] Burgert and many other doctors, public health experts, and misinformation researchers are anticipating a flood of anti-vaccine propaganda featuring younger children following last week’s vote by a Food and Drug Administration advisory committee to authorize Pfizer-BioNTech’s lower-dose COVID vaccine for children ages five to 11. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices unanimously recommended the COVID vaccines for five-to-11-year-olds on Tuesday. CDC director Rochelle Walensky signed off on the approval later in the evening, opening the door for more than 28 million children to start receiving vaccinations on Wednesday morning.

Some fringe groups have already begun pushing the kinds of videos that the modern anti-vaccine movement was built upon: intimate, unverified videos and testimonies of children with alleged vaccine injuries that are visceral and effective, even while they give a false picture of the overall safety and importance of vaccines.… Vaccine advocates are pointing to a recent example spreading quickly on social media as a harbinger for the kind of graphic misinformation that they fear most.

The video, first posted to a fringe anti-vaccine website and then spread through mainstream sites including YouTube and Facebook, is only 30 seconds long, but devastating. In a carousel of vignettes, a young girl with a beaming smile digs in the dirt, dances on her front lawn, and celebrates over cake with her family. It then cuts to a closeup shot of the girl’s face as she cries out in pain, her head wrapped in bandages and a tube through her nose. Later, three adults hoist her limp body into a wheelchair, then it quickly cuts to her hospital gown, an intravenous line in her hand and ends, lingering on a video of her legs as she shakes uncontrollably.

According to NBC News, the ad was paid for by the Vaccine Safety Research Foundation, an anti-vaccine group founded just last month by Silicon Valley entrepreneur Steve Kirsch, who has recently been railing against vaccines, which he calls “toxic,” and advocating unproven COVID cures.

“They’re going to get their claws into a new group of hesitant families that otherwise have got all of their vaccines on time,” Burgert said. “I’m concerned that they’re going to be able to use their manipulation tactics and psychological tactics to harness a new group of formerly pro-vaccine families into vaccine hesitancy.”

The Republican Party is one week away from adding book burning to its official platform

Elsewhere!

Dems keep butting heads after Virginia shellacking (Politico)

The GOP Got Away With All of It (Intelligencer)

Biden Calls Vaccine for Kids “Giant Step” to Defeat Pandemic (Bloomberg)

Fed set to begin pulling plug on massive aid to economy (Politico)

When Bonuses and Raises Aren’t Enough, Try Manicures and Free Clothes (WSJ)

NYC Cabbies Win Millions More in Aid After Hunger Strike (NYT)

The founder of Papa John’s has a fresco in his house of “Moses getting circumcised” (Bloomberg)

“Willy arrived just in time to see Adams—definitively Adams—leave his apartment, climb into the car from the passenger side, shimmy into the driver’s seat, then drive the car up onto the sidewalk.” (Curbed)

— In Major Shift, NIH Admits Funding Risky Virus Research in Wuhan
— Matt Gaetz Reportedly Screwed Six Ways From Sunday
— Joe Biden Reaffirms Trump’s Has-Been Status Over Jan. 6 Documents
— The Metaverse Is About to Change Everything
— The Weirdness of Wayne LaPierre, the NRA’s Reluctant Leader
— The Jan. 6 Committee Is Finally Getting Trump Allies to Spill
— Jeffrey Epstein’s Billionaire Friend Leon Black Is Under Investigation
— Facebook’s Reckoning With Reality—And the Metaverse-Size Problems to Come
— From the Archive: Robert Durst, the Fugitive Heir
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