A right-wing plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer should worry us all

A right-wing plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer should worry us all

https://ca-times.brightspotcdn.com/d...igan-45143.jpg[Michigan’s Democratic governor, Gretchen Whitmer, allegedly was the target in a kidnap plot by right-wing extremists. A second alleged plot centered on the violent attack of the Michigan state Capitol.
(Associated Press)


By SCOTT MARTELLE EDITORIAL WRITER
OCT. 8, 2020 1:10 PM

One of the routine arguments by the pro-gun crowd is that the 2nd Amendment gives them the right to own firearms to protect themselves from a tyrannical government. But what happens when those guns are used to try to topple the government?

Federal and state officials in Michigan announced the arrests today of more than a dozen people on charges related to two alleged plots, one to kidnap Michigan’s Democratic governor, Gretchen Whitmer, and try her for treason, and the other an alleged scheme to attack the Michigan state Capitol with the aim of killing police and other first responders.

Yeah, wacky. But this is where we are. Note that gun-toting demonstrators barged into the Capitol in April during protests over stay-home orders that enraged many on the far right.

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Those were the same demonstrators that President Trump egged on, tweeting “LIBERATE MICHIGAN!” as the armed group intimidated legislators from their perch in the balcony gallery.

Then later, Trump urged Whitmer to make a deal with the armed protesters, tweeting that “Michigan should give a little, and put out the fire. These are very good people, but they are angry.”

Those “very good people” were not to be confused, of course, with the “very fine people” Trump earlier said were among the armed white nationalists who took part in the 2017 Charlottesville, Va., rally that led to the death of a woman protesting the hate-mongers.

And whatever happened to the notion that governments don’t negotiate with terrorists?

Wacky right-wing groups and “lone wolves” are not new to Michigan. Timothy J. McVeigh blew up the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people, including children at a day-care center, in 1995. McVeigh, an Army veteran from near Buffalo, N.Y., was executed for the crime. His accomplice, Terry Nichols of Lapeer, Mich., is serving a sentence of life without parole.

Both men had peripheral connections with the self-styled Michigan Militia, and were motivated to attack the federal building in retaliation for federal law enforcement actions against right-wing extremists at the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, and at a cabin in Ruby Ridge, Idaho, in the 1990s.

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Michigan also was home to Robert Miles, a self-styled minister in the racist Christian Identity church movement who also was part of the Aryan Nations movement that sought to create a white homeland in the Pacific Northwest, and a former head of the Ku Klux Klan in Michigan (he served time for firebombing school buses during a desegregation fight in Flint).

So, yeah, there’s some history there.

Whether these plots were real, or fantastical inventions by the defendants, is unclear. And the federal government doesn’t have a very good record in these things. A decade ago the government charged nine members of the self-styled Hutaree Christian militia group with plotting a violent revolt, including assassinating a law enforcement officer then bombing the funeral.

But the cases fell apart at trial, and the defendants were convicted only on a range of weapons and related charges.

Members of the Hutaree were arrested in March 2010 following an undercover operation by the FBI. Like the charges announced Thursday, that case centered on recordings made by two paid FBI informants.

So who knows how this will turn out.

But even if the accused are guilty of nothing more than sharing violent fantasies about kidnapping a governor, holding an extrajudicial trial on charges of treason, and attacking a state capitol building, it’s a mark of these treacherous times.

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...chigan-whitmer

(Video at Link)

Gov. Whitmer, Media Caught in Another Lie – Anarchist Arrested For Plot to Kidnap and Kill Whitmer Hates President Trump, ‘Trump is a Tyrant’ (VIDEO)

October 8, 2020



https://static.thegatewaypundit.com/...37-600x314.jpgBrandon Caserta


Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer (D) owes President Trump an apology.

The FBI announced on Thursday during a press conference that it thwarted a plot by a so-called “right-wing militia” to kidnap and kill Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer and overthrow the state government.

Early Thursday morning, federal agencies raided a house in Hartland, Michigan and arrested six men: Adam Fox, Barry Croft, Ty Garbin, Kaleb Franks, Daniel Harris, and Brandon Caserta.

Whitmer immediately blamed the plot on President Trump telling the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by.


“Hate groups heard the president’s words as a rallying cry, as a call to action,” Whitmer said blaming white supremacists.

It turns out Brandon Caserta, one of anarchists who was arrested for plotting to kidnap Whitmer, actually hates President Trump and is on video calling Trump a “tyrant.”

“Trump is not your friend dude,” Caserta said.

He says Trump is “a tyrant” and calls President Trump an “enemy.”

WATCH: (At Link)


https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/202...-tyrant-video/

Mainstream media thinks people will not search for the truth. Many new sources for finding more information.

Suspect Charged in Gretchen Whitmer Kidnap Plot Had Anarchist Flag

October 8, 2020

Kyle Olson


https://media.breitbart.com/media/20...ta-640x480.pngFacebook4:15


United States attorneys in Michigan charged six individuals on Thursday with an alleged plot to kidnap Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) and overthrow the state’s government.

The feds have charged Adam Fox, Barry Croft, Ty Garbin, Kaleb Franks, Daniel Harris, and Brandon Caserta, the Detroit News reported. Twelve individuals were charged in all.
Via the News:

The investigation dates to early 2020 when the FBI learned through social media that individuals were discussing the violent overthrow of several state governments and law enforcement.

In June, Croft, Fox and 13 others from multiple states held a meeting in Dublin, Ohio, near Columbus, according to the government.

“Several members talked about murdering ‘tyrants’ or ‘taking’ a sitting governor,” an FBI agent wrote in an affidavit unsealed on Thursday. “The group decided they needed to increase their numbers and encouraged each other to talk to their neighbors and spread their message.”

“The group talked about creating a society that followed the U.S. Bill of Rights and where they could be self-sufficient,” the FBI agent wrote, according to the paper.

“They discussed different ways of achieving this goal from peaceful endeavors to violent actions. At one point, several members talked about state governments they believed were violating the U.S. Constitution, including the government of Michigan and Governor Gretchen Whitmer.”

Several media outlets, including the New York Times and the UK Daily Mail have attempted to cast the individuals as “right-wing” and “Trump supporters,” but at least one suspect, Brandon Caserta, held views more nuanced than that.

Breitbart News reviewed Caserta’s Facebook profile shortly before it was deleted.

In several YouTube videos, Caserta opined about rights and the illegitimacy of government.

“The Constitution is illegitimate,” he said in one posted on May 16, 2020, which was removed after Caserta’s account was terminated.

“Authority doesn’t exist, dude,” Caserta said, seated in front of an anarchist flag, “and, like, the law doesn’t exist.”

In another video, Caserta walked around his apartment with a camera and wondered, “How do I really know if I suck?”

Other videos, including some Breitbart News reviewed on Caserta’s Facebook page prior to deletion, the suspect criticized the police, calling them “obedient order-followers.”


One video was captured by Twitter user Robby Starbuck:

(Video At Link)

In none of the videos did Caserta express support for Trump explicitly or otherwise.

They have all been removed from YouTube.

According to the charging document, Garbin, Fox, Croft, Harris, Franks, and others met in July in Ohio to discuss their plot.

“The attendees discussed attacking a Michigan State Police facility, and in a separate conversation after the meeting, GARBIN suggested shooting up the Governor’s vacation home, which is located in the Western District of Michigan” in Antrim County.

The suspects allegedly nixed attempting to abduct the governor from the state capitol, where the governor seldom is.

Nine days later, the alleged conspirators proposed seizing Whitmer from the governor’s official summer residence on Mackinac Island, a popular tourist attraction in northern Michigan.

“Snatch and grab, man. Grab the ****in’ Governor. Just grab the bitch. Because at that point, we do that, dude — it’s over,” Fox allegedly said, according to the document.

From there, they proposed transporting Whitmer to Wisconsin to conduct a “trial.”

Fox, Croft, Garbin, Franks, Harris, and Caserta were charged with Conspiracy to Commit Kidnapping, which carries a sentence of up to life in prison.


https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2...-hates-police/

Whitmer conspiracy allegations tied to boogaloo movement NBC News

• Michigan kidnapping conspirators also considered taking Virginia gov, FBI agent says
  
  “They discussed possible targets, taking a sitting governor, specifically issues with the governor of Michigan and Virginia based on the lockdown orders," the agent said at a hearing Tuesday.
• ​

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY Office of Public Affairs

Acting Secretary Wolf Condemns Attempted Kidnapping of Governor’s Whitmer and Northam after Tuesday’s Federal Hearing

Acting Secretary Wolf released the following statement after defendants appeared Monday in federal district court on charges related to a plot to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer. “I applaud state and federal law enforcement successful efforts to thwart the plan of violent extremists to kidnap Governor Whitmer of Michigan and Governor Northam of Virginia. Last week, we released the DHS Homeland Threat Assessment that outlines this very threat. There is no place in our society for violent extremists in any form —we will stand against them at every turn.”