SWITZERLAND
Lausanne tackles toxic soil after shock discovery


Issued on: 16/10/2021 - 

The situation, which has troubling implications for children and eating home-grown food, is unprecedented in wealthy Switzerland, which prides itself on its pristine mountains, lakes and pastures image Fabrice COFFRINI AFP

Lausanne (AFP)

Lausanne, the capital of Olympic sport overlooking Lake Geneva, is reeling after discovering that much of its soil is polluted with toxic compounds belched out by an old incinerator.

The situation, which has troubling implications for children and eating home-grown food, is unprecedented in wealthy Switzerland, which prides itself on its pristine mountains, lakes and pastures.

A domestic waste incineration plant in the Alpine nation's fourth-biggest city -- closed since in 2005 -- is being blamed for the dioxin fall-out.

Dioxins, which belong to the so-called 'dirty dozen' dangerous chemicals known as persistent organic pollutants, have the potential to be highly toxic. They have been shown to affect several organs and systems.

The problem was discovered by sheer chance between January and May this year at a planned new ecological allotment in the city.

For years, pollution monitoring had focused on air and water.

"As we did not look for dioxins, we never found them," Natacha Litzistorf, the city councillor for the environment, told AFP.

The discovery triggered soil analysis measurements at 126 sites across the city. Experts also looked at the risks associated with exposure to polluted soils.

- Pollution map -

This week Lausanne announced that those studies found the dioxin levels, and the expanse of the affected area, were much worse than previously thought.

The city has issued a map showing four concentric rings, with zones containing concentrations in the soil of 20-50 nanogrammes (ng) per kilogramme, 50-100, 100-200 and then above 200 in the middle. A peak of 640 was recorded in the city centre.

The affected zone stretches 5.25 kilometres (3.2 miles) inland and measures around 3.6 kilometres across.

People are instructed to wash fruit and vegetables grown in gardens and allotments and wash their hands after touching soil.

In zones with more than 100 ng toxic equivalent per kg, root vegetables grown in the area must be washed and peeled. Courgettes, cucumbers, gherkins, squashes, marrows and melons grown in the soil should not be eaten.

In all the affected zones, people should not eat chickens raised on the soil, offer or sell eggs from such chickens, while only those in the 20-50 zone can eat their eggs -- though just one per week.

Parents must also stop infants aged under four from ingesting soil, for example by touching their mouths after playing on the ground.

Warning signs have been installed around the city's parks and playgrounds.

- 'Tempt the devil' -

The concentric circles appear to lead to only one source.

"We quickly suspected the cause was linked to a former incinerator," Litzistorf said.

The Vallon plant opened in 1958 and was initially welcomed as a way of dealing with the city's garbage.

"At the time, it was thought much better to site waste incinerators in the city centre to protect agriculture in the countryside," Litzistorf explained.

The dioxin pollution dates from 1958 to 1982, when the Vallon filters were upgraded to environmental norms.

Didier Burgi, who owns a vegetable garden plot, said the discovery had sparked questions among veteran home growers.

"We are not going to eat the squashes. We don't have a lot of them, but there was specific information about them and we're not going to tempt the devil," he told AFP.

The major Chatelard allotment, by the new football stadium on the edge of the city, heard Thursday that it had readings under 20 ng.

Plot holder Jose Torres compared his imperfect tomatoes to the flawless ones in supermarkets.

"Everything you buy is full of chemicals," he said. "From my plot, I know what I'm eating."

Jacqueline Felder, tilling her beans, spinach, lettuce and carrots in the afternoon sunshine, said: "I've been growing vegetables for 15 years. We are not worried.

"People are afraid of everything these days.

"The Earth is our mother. Respect it."

- Next steps -

The World Health Organization says short-term exposure to high levels of dioxins may result in skin lesions, such as chloracne and patchy darkening of the skin, and altered liver function.

Long-term exposure is linked to impairment of the immune system, the developing nervous system, the endocrine system and reproductive functions.

Litzistorf said she was not aware of anyone coming forward with physical conditions linked to dioxin pollution.

But the question of potential liability remains unresolved, as does the issue of what to do next, as the dioxin hunt expands.

Whether the soil can be cleaned up, on such a wide scale, "is the question that everyone is asking", said Litzistorf -- along with who should do it, how, and how much it might cost.

© 2021 AFP

Global law firm stops representing HKU in Tiananmen sculpture row

Issued on: 16/10/2021 - 

The 'Pillar of Shame' sculpture commemorates the victims of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown in Beijing Peter PARKS AFP/File

Hong Kong (AFP)

A top global law firm will no longer represent the University of Hong Kong in seeking the removal of a Tiananmen memorial from its campus after it came under heavy criticism in the United States for helping China purge dissent, the Washington Post reported.

Mayer Brown is the latest international company to face pressure over how its actions in China contradict its more progressive statements in the West.

The eight-metre (26-feet) high "Pillar of Shame" sculpture by Danish artist Jens Galschiot has sat on HKU's campus since 1997, the year the city was handed back to China.

It features 50 anguished faces and tortured bodies piled on one another and commemorates democracy protesters killed by Chinese troops around Beijing's Tiananmen Square in 1989.

"Going forward, Mayer Brown will not be representing its long-time client in this matter. We have no further comment," the firm said in a statement on Friday, the Washington Post reported.

The Chicago-founded firm has worked on civil rights issues in the United States but found itself under criticism from rights groups and US lawmakers over representing HKU to seek removal of the only Tiananmen memorial on Chinese soil.

"It is even worse American law firms are doing the bidding of the Communist Party to erase the memory of the brave, young Chinese students who gave their lives for freedom in Tiananmen Square," Senator Lindsey Graham told Substack newsletter Common Sense.

The eight-metre (26-feet) high sculpture by Danish artist Jens Galschiot has sat on HKU's campus since 1997, the year the city was handed back to China Peter PARKS AFP/File

Senator Ted Cruz also condemned Mayer Brown, saying the "American firms should be ashamed to be complicit" in the sculpture's removal.

In response to the law firm's decision, Galschiot said it would be almost impossible for Western law firms to represent and help Chinese and Hong Kong authorities suppress freedom of expression "without suffering severe damage to their reputation and image".

The controversy was sparked by a letter Mayer Brown wrote on behalf of HKU ordering the now-disbanded Hong Kong Alliance, which used to organise the city's annual Tiananmen remembrance vigils, to remove the statue by Wednesday.

HKU has so far not take any action since the deadline passed and Galschiot said he had requested a hearing with the university over the fate of the statue.

Hong Kong used to be the one place in China where mass remembrance of Tiananmen's dead was still tolerated.

But the city is being remoulded in China's own authoritarian image in the wake of huge and often violent democracy protests two years ago.

Scores of opposition figured have been jailed or fled overseas and authorities have also embarked on a mission to rewrite history and make the city more "patriotic".

On Friday, eight pro-democracy activists were sentenced to between six and 12 months over an unauthorised assembly last year.

© 2021 AFP

WHITE PROPERTY OWNERS
Texas Republicans want to use federal Covid funds for tax relief — but only for homeowners

Joshua Fechter, The Texas Tribune
October 15, 2021

Texas House Republican Caucus on Facebook.

Texas Republicans want to use billions in federal pandemic relief to send checks to homeowners just ahead of next year's November elections — and call it property tax relief.

House lawmakers are pushing a proposal that would put $525 checks in the mailboxes of some 5.7 million homeowners who claim a homestead exemption — by tapping $3 billion sent to the state under the federal American Rescue Plan Act, the $1.9 trillion stimulus bill aimed at pandemic relief.

Senate Bill 1, which passed out of the House on Friday afternoon, is a roundabout way for Republican legislators to deliver on a longtime pet issue — property tax relief — without running afoul of a federal rule barring the use of stimulus dollars for tax cuts.

The bill originally came over from the Senate as a straight-up tax cut bill. House lawmakers gutted the Senate proposal to use it as a vehicle for the $3 billion in checks for homeowners. Now, lawmakers in both chambers will have to work out a compromise.


House lawmakers have justified the use of federal relief money, saying their plan addresses "negative economic impacts" resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic "including assistance to households."

Not all households would benefit. Excluded from that relief are renters, who make up more than a third of Texans.

"Here's the problem: A third of Texans don't own their property," state Rep. Gene Wu, D-Houston, said during debate on the House floor. "So none of this $3 billion would go to the one-third of Texans who rent. Not a penny."

Republicans argued that renters have already been taken care of because Texas has already received $2 billion in federal stimulus money for rent relief, state Rep. Jim Murphy, R-Houston, said.

"I think everyone has been hit hard by the pandemic, Mr. Wu," said state Rep. Morgan Meyer, a Dallas Republican who carried the bill in the House. "Everyone."

The checks would arrive no later than Sept. 1 — about a month before voters head to the polls next year for early voting in the November midterm elections. Dick Lavine, senior fiscal analyst with the liberal-leaning Every Texan, blasted the proposal as a "transparent political ploy."


"They'll have to print the check on legal size paper to fit the signatures of all the people who want to take credit for it," Lavine said.

Republicans tried to head off criticism that the checks would be politically timed.

The bill previously gave Comptroller Glenn Hegar until July 1 to identify property owners eligible to receive the money. Meyer amended the bill to move that date up to May 1, possibly allowing homeowners to get paid sooner.

The House proposal is significantly different from a $2 billion tax cut proposal that sailed through the state Senate last month intended to take about $200 off of an average Texas homeowner's tax bill.

That measure — authored by state Sen. Paul Bettencourt, a Houston Republican and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick's point person on property taxes — would use $2 billion in state surplus funds to "buy down" public education funding normally collected by school property taxes, which make up most of a homeowner's tax bill.

A homeowner whose property is worth $300,000, the median value of a Texas home, would see $200 in temporary tax relief under the Senate proposal — though that could grow depending on how much the Texas economy grows by next June.

Bettencourt did not respond to a request for comment.

Republicans are under pressure from the party's right wing to tackle the state's high property tax burden in one way or another.

Gov. Greg Abbott added property tax relief to the third special session agenda in September — after primary challenger Don Huffines, a former state senator, blasted Abbott for initially leaving it off the table. Abbott had included it in previous sessions this year, but nothing passed.

Patrick, meanwhile, called legislation cutting property taxes his top priority for this special session, which has a packed agenda that includes figuring out how to spend $16 billion in federal coronavirus relief dollars and redrawing the state's political maps.

CRIMINAL CRYPTO CAPITALI$M
Crypto firms Tether, Bitfinex to pay US$42.5 million to settle US CFTC charges

Signage is seen outside of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) in Washington, D.C., U.S., August 30, 2020. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly 

16 Oct 2021 

Cryptocurrency Tether and crypto exchange Bitfinex will pay US$42.5 million to settle civil charges from the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) over allegedly making misleading statements and making illegal transactions.

Firms doing business as Tether agreed to pay US$41 million to resolve CFTC charges they made misleading claims about Tether's cryptocurrency stablecoin, the CFTC said in a statement on Friday. According to the regulator, at various times from June 2016 to late February 2019, Tether made misleading or untrue statements about whether it held sufficient US dollar reserves to fully back up its US dollar tether token.

In a separate order, firms doing business as Bitfinex agreed to a US$1.5 million penalty over charges their controls were not adequate to keep US customers from illegally engaging in retail commodity transactions on the exchange. This violated US law and a 2016 settlement with Bitfinex over similar allegations, the CFTC said.

Bitfinex cryptocurrency exchange website taken September 27, 2017.

 REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/IllustrationNext 

Neither Tether or Bitfinex, which are controlled by the same parent company, admitted nor denied the findings.

In a statement on its website, Tether challenged the CFTC's statements, saying the agency's findings were that Tether's dollar reserves were not all in cash in a bank account titled in Tether's name at all times, rather than that the tokens were not fully backed.

CFTC Commissioner Dawn Stump, a Republican, affirmed the agency's findings that the "assurance provided to tether customers was not 100 per cent true, 100 per cent of the time" and that "wrongdoing occurred", according to a statement published alongside the CFTC orders.

However, Stump raised concern that the resolution - the first time the CFTC has applied the definition of "commodity" to a stablecoin - would sow confusion among cryptocurrency firms and investors.

Man tied to QAnon conspiracy announces bid for Congress
Issued on: 15/10/2021 

The conspiracy theorist group QAnon (supporters pictured August 2020) claims without evidence that the pandemic is a conspiracy by a cabal of Satanist paedophiles who control the world 

Kyle Grillot AFP/File

Washington (AFP)

A website administrator that many consider to be behind the QAnon conspiracy movement that fired up supporters of Donald Trump has announced he will run for a Republican seat in Congress.

Ron Watkins announced in a video posted on Telegram Thursday that he would contest a House of Representatives seat in Arizona that is currently held by a Democrat, in the election next year.

Echoing Trump's unsupported complaints about the 2020 presidential election, Watkins said voter fraud was a key issue.

"President Trump had his election stolen, not just in Arizona but in other states, too," he said.

"We must now take this fight to Washington DC to vote out all the dirty Democrats who have stolen our republic."

Watkins and his father Jim Watkins ran the 8chan and successor 8kun message boards that became a hub for conspiracy theories.

In 2017 they began publishing anonymous, cryptic postings by "Q" claiming bizarre child exploitation and deep state plots.

Over the next three years that snowballed into the QAnon movement boasting hundreds of thousands of followers in the United States and thousands more in other countries.

At the core of their myriad conspiracy theories was their belief that there was a secret cabal in Washington trying to undermine Trump.

Followers of the movement were convinced they were receiving top-level intelligence and encouragement to take action from inside Trump's circle.

Amid a number of violent incidents and rising threats, the FBI said last year that it was keeping an eye on QAnon as one of several potentially dangerous right-wing fringe groups.

Composite image of Ron Watkins. (Screengrabs.)

But no one knew who Q was. Many suspected it was the operators of 8chan themselves, the Watkins.

The original founder of 8chan, Frederick Brennan, who turned the site over to them in 2016, and Travis View, a leading investigator of QAnon, both suspected the two Watkins.

Q stopped posting in December after Trump lost the election, and around the time Ron Watkins became active in Trump's campaign to show that voter fraud cost him the election -- a claim never backed by evidence.

While the QAnon movement has lost steam, two Republicans who had endorsed it won seats in Congress, and adherents of the movement took part in the violent attack on Congress on January 6.

Media Matters, which has studied the group's political influence, said in August that at least 45 people who have supported or endorsed QAnon are running for Congress in the 2022 election.

© 2021 AFP

‘I’m not Q’: Arizona congressional candidate Ron Watkins denies starting satanic cult conspiracy theory

Bob Brigham
October 15, 2021

Ron Watkins @az_rww on Twitter.

Republican congressional hopeful Ron Watkins denied being "Q" from the QAnon conspiracy theory during a Friday interview with the Arizona Republic.

"I have never written a Q post. I'm not Q," Watkins claimed. "I don't have any idea about who Q is."

Although Watkins denied having "any idea" about who Q may be, the newspaper reported, "Watkins said he has his own theory about who Q might be. But said he has no proof and would not share his theory."

Watkins, who has never held public office, also discussed the legislation he would introduce as a member of the House of Representatives.

"Watkins spoke about at least one of his legislative priorities. He said he was drafting a bill that, if it were enacted, would have ensured more coverage of stories about a supposed stolen laptop belonging to President Joe Biden's son, Hunter," the newspaper reported. "The bill would ensure, Watkins said, that the government does not get involved in censoring online content."

  

QAnon’s Ron Watkins Is Running For Congress. How Did We Get Here?

The man who did more than anyone to facilitate the rise of the QAnon cult is now running for office in Arizona.

By David Gilbert
15.10.21



RON WATKINS APPEARS ON ONE AMERICA NEWS (OAN)


Back in May, Ron Watkins announced that he was launching a new venture called Alien Leaks. Essentially, Watkins wanted to make WikiLeaks, but for information about UFOs.

The site was a complete and utter failure. In fact, it attracted so few leaks that Watkins had to post his own close encounter three months later when he claimed to have seen an alien craft flying over his apartment in Sapporo, Japan—at a moment he just happened to be filming the right part of the sky.

When I contacted Watkins about Alien Leaks, I took the opportunity to ask him about what appeared to be his admission in Cullen Hoback’s HBO documentary that he had in fact posted on 8chan as Q, the mysterious leader of the QAnon movement.

Rather than answering my questions directly, Watkins sent me a video of himself in the Japanese wilderness dressed as some sort of cowboy samurai. The video made little sense, especially since Watkins was speaking on camera but the sound came from a voiceover track he had recorded separately.

At the time, with former President Trump out of office and Q gone silent, many people believed that this was the beginning of the end of QAnon, and of Watkins’ moment in the spotlight.

But on Thursday, Watkins showed his ability to reinvent himself once again, announcing that he’s planning to run as a Congressional candidate in Arizona—where he claims he now lives.

How did we get to the point where one of the people who’s most responsible for the rise of QAnon believes that running for public office is a viable option?

Waktins was born in the late 1980s, after his father, Jim Watkins, met a South Korean woman while he was serving in the U.S. military. Watkins moved around a lot as a child due to his father’s job as a helicopter engineer with the army.

After his parents divorced when he was a teenager, Watkins lived mostly with his mother and attended high school in Mukilteo, Washington, where he graduated in 2005.

Meanwhile, Jim Watkins had retired from the U.S. military and had established a Japanese porn website hosted in the U.S. to circumvent Japan’s strict pornography laws. Then, in 2014, he seized an opportunity to take control of a hugely popular online imageboard called 2channel, the precursor to 4chan and 8chan. The founder of the site claims Watkins stole it from him.

The younger Watkins decided to get involved in his father’s businesses, and in 2014 suggested that they contact Fred Brennan, who had founded 8chan as a a "free speech friendly” 4chan alternative in the wake of the Gamergate controversy.

Brennan was at the time struggling to manage the site, and so the Watkinses swooped in and took control, keeping Brennan on board as an employee in the Philippines, where the Watkinses were based at this point.

The partnership between Brennan and Jim Waktins broke down and the father-and-son duo took full control of the site. Then, in early 2018, the nascent QAnon movement moved from 4chan to 8chan, and everything changed.

The mysterious Q began posting on 8chan exclusively, and as the conspiracy movement grew so did traffic to Watkins’ website.

However, at the time, the person who was in control of the 8chan board where Q was posting said that the account was hijacked and that someone else began posting as Q.

For many, this was evidence that Ron and Jim Watkins had decided to take control of the QAnon movement for their own benefit. Analysis of the “Q drop” before the move to 8chan and after it, clearly show there were two distinct authors, but aside from Waktins’ own “admission” on Hoback’s documentary, there is no conclusive proof that Watkins was behind the posts.

In fact there is evidence that due to his location in the globe and the timing of certain Q drops, Watkins could not have been Q.

As well as QAnon, 8chan gained notoriety for hosting child abuse imagery, and several mass shooters posted manifestos on the site prior to beginning their killing sprees. In the space of six months in 2019, the perpetrators of the Christchurch mosque shootings, the Poway synagogue shooting, and the El Paso shooting all used 8chan to disseminate their respective manifestos.

The result was that 8chan was deplatformed for several months, but it soon returned under a new name, 8kun.

But whether or not Ron Watkins was Q is moot. As administrator of the site, he facilitated the QAnon movement to grow to an unprecedented scale, helping it move from the obscure website into the mainstream.

The movement has torn families apart, driven people to conduct acts of horrific violence, and helped fuel the widespread belief that the 2020 presidential election was fraudulent. QAnon conspiracies have also now become deeply intertwined with mainstream GOP politics.

Ron’s transformation from QAnon facilitator to Congressional candidate began on Election day 2020.

On that day, he announced that he was resigning from 8kun. In the days and weeks that followed, as former President Donald Trump began his long and seemingly-never-ending campaign to discredit the election results, Watkins saw an opportunity.

Using the Twitter account where’d amassed hundreds of thousands of followers as the Q facilitator, he began tweeting about Dominion Voting Machines and obscure election processes, claiming—without evidence—that there was mass vote rigging taking place.

Such claims quickly got the attention of right wing networks like One America News and people in Trump’s orbit, like “Kraken” lawyer Sidney Powell and Trump’s former personal attorney Rudy Guiliani.

Soon, Watkins was appearing on TV as a cyber security expert, even though he had no experience in this area.

After the Jan. 6 Capitol riots, Watkins was banned from Twitter, but seamlessly moved to Telegram, where he amassed an even greater following. Here he began to drive his followers’ attention to Maricopa County, Arizona, where a bogus election “audit” had been authorized.

In between founding his Alien Leaks website—and launching a career as an NFT artist—Watkins continued to boost election conspiracies. He appeared virtually at the Cyber Symposium of MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, where his presentation was interrupted when he was told he might be breaking the law by talking about data taken from machines in Mesa, Colorado.

Like Lindell, Watkins loved to tell his followers that something huge was just around the corner, whether it was Trump’s return to office or some explosive lawsuit that would expose widespread vote rigging. But in the end, just like the mysterious Q, Watkins never delivered.

And so it was with the Cyber Ninjas report in late September. Watkins and many others on the right predicted it would provide vindication for their claims of vote rigging. In the end, all it did was further confirm that the election in Maricopa County was run properly and President Joe Biden won it.

But rather than retreating to the dark corners of the internet, Watkins clearly felt that now was the time for him to come into the light.

And so last week he landed in Arizona, weeks ahead of his appearance at a big QAnon conference in Las Vegas. He has spent his time showing how completely unathletic he is, repeatedly failing to get a meeting with Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich, and hobnobbing with some of the state’s most prominent Republicans.

And on Thursday the transformation was complete: Watkins announced he was running for the House seat in Arizona’s first district, where he will have a crowded primary as Republicans try to unseat incumbent Democrat Rep. Tom O’Halleran. And like so many other Republican candidates running in 2022’s midterms, he pegged his decision to run on the baseless belief that the election was a fraud.

“We must stay vigilant and keep up the pressure, both here in Arizona, and throughout the country to indict any and all criminals who have facilitated election fraud,” Watkins said in a video posted to his Telegram channel.

“President Trump had his election stolen, not just in Arizona but in other states too. We must now take this fight to Washington, D.C. and vote out all the dirty Democrats who have stolen our Republic.”

Watkins’ candidacy has already garnered the support of many of the biggest influencers in the QAnon community, but he’ll need more than that in order to secure the Republican nomination.

And Fred Brennan, who worked alongside Ron when Jim Watkins took over 8chan, believes he is missing something vital to win an election.

“Charisma is not optional for a politician,” Brennan told VICE News, adding that he felt the additional scrutiny on Watkins will turn out badly for him and his father.

“I actually welcome him submitting himself to the political process because all it's going to do is just create greater scrutiny into the fact that he has no legitimate source of income and his entire persona in Q is based on lies,” Brennan said.

But not everyone is convinced. Cullen Hoback, who spent a lot of time with Watkins believes that he does have charisma and that his online skills could be enough to get him elected.

“Elections are a popularity contest where facts no longer seem to matter,” Hoback told Vice News. “He’s got a base of followers who he’s strung along with wild promises. Nothing needs to come true. In fact, the more he tricks his followers, the more clever they think he is. Maybe his ability to read from a script isn’t great, but he’s playing a different game. He’s highly skilled at memetic warfare, trolling, and has a passionate army of ‘digital soldiers’ on the ready. In person, I think even Fred would begrudgingly admit Ron can be quite charming. Assuming Ron maintains the steam to keep up the act, he could find himself in a similar situation as Trump—a troll who gets memed into a position of power.”

Election deniers are organizing by state on a QAnon-linked platform to take over the Republican Party

Propelled by conservative media personalities, extremists and election deniers are organizing state by state on Pilled.net

Molly Butler / Media Matters
WRITTEN BY JUSTIN HOROWITZ
MMFA
PUBLISHED 10/07/21 1

Election deniers and extremists are organizing state by state on the QAnon-linked website “Pilled.net” in an attempt to “take the Republican Party over” and undermine local election administration.

This effort has been heavily promoted by former Trump adviser Steve Bannon on his War Room: Pandemic podcast over the past year. Alongside Republican activist Dan Schultz, Bannon has encouraged his listeners to pursue local election jobs that are often left vacant due to lack of public knowledge of the positions.

As explained by ProPublica, precinct officers play an important part in deciding how local elections are run, and the responsibilities of the positions differ by state. These positions can “have a say in choosing poll workers” and even “help pick members of boards that oversee elections,” among other responsibilities.

On the September 27 edition of conservative media personality John Fredericks’ show Outside The Beltway, the host discussed Schultz’s plan to “take the Republican Party over” and “end the Joe Biden regime in its tracks.”

During the interview, Fredericks played a video from Schultz’s group showcasing his “precinct strategy” website. Schultz also promoted a new button on his website to “connect with other conservatives in your state” and suggested the site allows users to “privately and securely communicate and collaborate with one another.” Fredericks responded, saying that is “exactly what we need.”

The button that Schultz referred to takes users to Pilled.net to sign up for a group named “Precinct Strategy.” However, if users were to go to the Pilled.net homepage by clicking the pill icon in the top left corner, they would see that the website is riddled with QAnon-linked content that has been banned by mainstream social media platforms.

QAnon is a baseless conspiracy theory that claims former President Donald Trump is secretly working to take down leading Democratic officials, global pedophilia rings, and his purported enemies in the “deep state.” It has been labeled a domestic terrorism threat by the FBI and QAnon followers have been linked to numerous incidents of violence, including the deadly January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

For example, QAnon influencer Zak Paine has an active account on the Pilled.net site with over 6,000 followers. Paine, who uses the pseudonym RedPill78, was part of the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol.


Patriots’ Soapbox, a livestream outlet devoted to the conspiracy theory, also has a profile on Pilled.net that posts similar content. Other extremist content on the site includes discussions of the chemical compound adrenochrome with QAnon influencer Jordan Sather and suggestions that liberal elites and celebrities are actually pedophiles who “will be exposed.”

Media Matters has previously reported on Bannon and Schultz’s calls to action being amplified and distributed by QAnon influencers and shared on far-right message boards. Schultz himself has appeared on a number of QAnon podcasts to encourage supporters to get involved with GOP precinct officer positions. Unfortunately, his plan seems to be working.

US offers to pay relatives of 10 killed in botched Afghan drone strike

Issued on: 16/10/2021 - 

A relative of Ezmarai Ahmadi stands next to a vehicle that was damaged in a US drone strike in the Kwaja Burga neighbourhood of Kabul August 29 that killed 10 people including seven children Hoshang Hashimi AFP

Washington (AFP)

The United States said Friday it has offered to pay unspecified compensation to relatives of 10 people in Afghanistan including seven children who were killed by mistake in a US drone strike as American forces were completing their withdrawal.

In a statement the Pentagon also said it was working with the State Department to relocate to the United States any of those relatives who wish to leave Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.

The offer to pay these people was made Thursday in a meeting between Colin Kahl, the under secretary of defense for policy, and Steven Kwon, the founder and president of an aid group active in Afghanistan called Nutrition and Education International, the Pentagon said in a statement.

That organization employed Ezmarai Ahmadi, who was wrongly identified as an Islamic State militant by US intelligence on August 29 during the final days of the chaotic US evacuation from Kabul.

US intelligence tracked his white Toyota for eight hours before targeting the car with a missile, killing seven children and three adults, including Ahmadi.

US Central Command commander General Kenneth McKenzie said at the time that American intelligence had seen the vehicle at a site in Kabul that had been identified as a location from which IS operatives were believed to be preparing attacks on the Kabul airport.

Three days earlier an Islamic State-Khorasan suicide bomber had killed scores at the airport, including 13 US service members.

But last month US officials conceded the drone attack was an error.

In the meeting Thursday "Dr. Kahl noted that the strike was a tragic mistake and that Mr. Ezmarai Ahmadi and others who were killed were innocent victims who bore no blame and were not affiliated with ISIS-K or threats to US forces," said a statement attributed to Defense Department spokesman John Kirby.

"Dr. Kahl reiterated Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin’s commitment to the families, including offering ex gratia condolence payments," he added without saying how much money was offered.

Last month relatives of the people killed in the attack demanded compensation and a face to face apology.

Austin has apologized for the botched attack. However, Ahmadi's 22-year-old nephew Farshad Haidari said that was not enough.

"They must come here and apologize to us face-to-face," he told AFP in a bombed-out, modest house in Kwaja Burga, a densely populated neighborhood in Kabul.

Haidari, whose brother Naser and young cousins also died in the blast, said on September 18 that the US had made no direct contact with the family.

In the meeting Thursday NEI chief Kwon spoke of how Ahmadi worked with that aid organization "over many years, providing care and lifesaving assistance for people facing high mortality rates in Afghanistan."

© 2021 AFP

COP26 MEETS CLASS WAR
SUMMIT STRIKES
COP26: When and where will strikes take place in Glasgow during climate change summit?


Harry Williamson
Dan Vevers
15 Oct 2021

A SERIES of strikes are set to cause chaos across Glasgow next month when COP26 begins.

Delegates and world leaders are set to descend on the city next month for the UN climate change conference, but strike action may overshadow the summit.

3The RMT union has warned no trains will be running during COP26Credit: PA

3Binmen in Glasgow have voted to go on strike during the climate conferenceCredit: Kenny Ramsay - The Sun

WILL TRAIN SERVICES BE RUNNING DURING COP26?


Rail workers have voted to go on strike during the climate summit amid an ongoing dispute with ScotRail.

Unions have warned there will be no trains running during the major conference.

It comes as the RMT union turned down an offer of a 4.7 per cent pay rise over two years, saying it was a “lousy, rotten” offer.

ScotRail has said it will try to have some trains running in Glasgow during COP26 and the rail provider is still probing what impact the strike will have.

Ongoing strike action has seen ScotRail services disrupted on Sundays.


WILL BINS BE EMPTIED DURING COP26?

Bin collectors in Glasgow have voted to strike during COP26 amid their dispute with COSLA, which represent Scottish councils.

A total of 96 per cent of Glasgow binmen in the GMB union voted in favour of strike action as they rejected a pay offer of £850-a-year increase for staff earning up to £25,000 a year from COSLA.

Refuse workers under GMB, Unite and Unison are all calling for a £2,000 pay rise.

Union bosses have slammed the underfunding, saying services have been "neglected" and the people who deliver them have been "let down".

'HYPOCRISY'

Gary Smith, leader of the GMB, has called the streets of Glasgow “filthy” and said it was “hypocrisy” for the city to host the climate summit.

ARE SCHOOL STAFF GOING ON STRIKE?

Janitors, cleaners and cooks in Glasgow schools are set to strike amid their own pay dispute.

A total of 97 per cent of GMB members in the city's schools voted to strike during COP26.


Glasgow council bosses said it is “impossible to say” on how the strike action would impact schools and whether they would have to close.

A union boss warned that the Scottish Government could be embarrassed on an “international stage” if the demands of cleansing staff are not met.

COP26: Scots warned there ‘will be ZERO ScotRail trains running’ during Glasgow climate change summit

A total of 600 school staff are joining refuse and rail workers, meaning almost 1,500 Glasgow City Council employees will be on strike during COP26.

Tory local government spokesman Miles Briggs said: “With just weeks to go, there is a real risk that a wave of strikes are going to overshadow the crucial COP26 conference.

“Cuts from both SNP administrations in Holyrood and in Glasgow have meant many vital local services have been neglected and the people who deliver them have been let down.

“It is time for the SNP leadership in Glasgow to step up to the mark and make every effort to resolve this situation.”

Glasgow union organiser Chris Mitchell, said: “The eyes of the world will be on Glasgow during COP26, and our politicians now have a choice.

“Will they fairly reward the frontline workers who got the country through the pandemic, or will they risk embarrassing the city and the country on an international stage?”


A COSLA spokesman said: “We appreciate everything that local government workers have been doing. We continue with ongoing, constructive negotiations.”

Asked if schools might have to close due to the GMB action, a Glasgow City Council spokeswoman said it was “impossible to say what the impact would be”.

But she added: “Holding this action only in Glasgow at this time will have disproportionate and unfair local impact in pursuit of a national campaign. We urge them to think again about the timing of this.”


Scots transport minister Graeme Dey claimed the vote by RMT members to take action was “no longer valid” due to a new and “very fair” pay offer.

Asked by BBC Radio Scotland why ScotRail workers were striking, Mr Dey replied: “I have no idea… you would have to put that question to them.”

He added: “An offer was made, has been made, it’s there and it’s a very fair offer.”

But union bosses hit out at the “lousy, rotten offer” of a 4.7 per cent pay bump over two years, saying that it required “members to sell hard-earned terms and conditions in order to get a pay rise”.


RMT Scotland organiser Michael Hogg said: “This offer is not worthy of consideration, it’s a kick in the teeth to workers.”

The Scottish Government has been contacted for comment.

Cooks and janitors in Glasgow schools will also go on strike during the climate summit

Credit: Alamy

China’s Shenzhou-13 spacecraft docks for six-month mission

From left, Chinese astronauts Zhai Zhigang, Wang Yaping, and Ye Guangfu, wave before leaving for the Shenzhou-13 crewed space mission at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in northwest China (Chinatopix/AP)


SAT, 16 OCT, 2021 - 04:55
ASSOCIATED PRESS REPORTER

China’s Shenzhou-13 spacecraft carrying three Chinese astronauts docked at its space station on Saturday, kicking off a record-setting six-month stay as the country moves toward completing the new orbiting outpost.

The spacecraft was launched by a Long March-2F rocket at 12.23am local time on Saturday and docked with the Tianhe core module of the Tiangong space station some six and a half hours later.

The two men and one woman are the second crew to move into the space station, which was launched last April. The first crew stayed three months.

The spaceship Shenzhou-13 is launched from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre

 (Li Gang/Xinhua via AP)

The trio will set a new record for the length of time spent in space by Chinese astronauts as the country moves towards complete the orbiting structure.

The first crew members at the station conducted two spacewalks and deployed a 33ft mechanical arm before returning from their 90-day stay in mid-September.

The new crew includes two veterans of space travel – pilot Zhai Zhigang, 55, and Wang Yaping, 41, the only woman on the mission – and Ye Guangfu, 41, who is making his first trip to space.

Sinema rakes in Pharma and finance cash amid reconciliation negotiations

The senator raised more than $1.1 million in the third quarter. About 90 percent of it came from outside her home state.


Sinema is not up for reelection until 2024. But her campaign account has been a landing spot for donors nonetheless. | Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images


By HAILEY FUCHS
POLITICO US
10/15/2021 
Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) raised more campaign money in the last three months than in any quarter since she became a senator. And she hit that $1.1 million haul with a big assist from the pharmaceutical and financial industries, whose political action committees and top executives stuffed her coffers in the middle of negotiations on Democrats’ massive infrastructure and social spending bills.

Sinema has emerged as a key player in those negotiations, with the reconciliation bill needing support from all 50 Democratic senators. But Sinema and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) have made it clear they will not support the original $3.5 trillion price tag for the bill, and Sinema has also objected to including far-reaching prescription drug pricing proposals, certain proposed tax increases and other party priorities.

As those objections have been registered, Sinema’s Senate campaign has cashed checks from industries facing potential losses or other disruptions. She received $27,800 from PACs of pharmaceutical companies from July through September — up from $5,000 in the three months prior, according to her campaign finance filings.

Sinema’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

The pharmaceutical industry has spent millions of dollars on ads and lobbying to fight new rules and regulations that would amount to hundreds of billions of dollars in savings for the government — and consequential losses for the industry’s bottom line.

Her individual donors also included a who’s who of powerful people in the pharmaceutical industry. Top donors included the pharma giant Gilead’s CEO, Daniel O’Day, who gave $5,000 this past quarter. Another $2,900 came in from Eli Lilly CEO David Ricks. The executive chair of Merck’s board, Kenneth C. Frazier, also gave $2,900, as did the chair and CEO of Bristol Myers Squibb, Giovanni Caforio. The CEO of Genentech, Alexander Hardy, gave $2,500. Meanwhile, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America’s executive vice president for policy and research Jennifer Bryant, senior vice president for federal advocacy Anne Esposito, and executive vice president for public affairs Debra DeShong each gave $1,000.

Little of the $1.1 million Sinema raised came from her constituents. Nearly 90 percent of Sinema’s cash from individual contributors came from outside Arizona.

Sinema is not up for reelection until 2024. But her campaign account has been a landing spot for donors nonetheless. Sinema never raised more than $700,000 in a quarter during the last Congress, but she has now topped $1 million twice in the last two quarters of 2021.

Manchin — who, like Sinema, is not up for reelection in 2024 — also had his most prolific fundraising quarter in recent years. His campaign brought in about $1.6 million during the three month period. And like Sinema, very little of that came from individual constituents in his home state.

Manchin, who has pushed back against the administration’s climate change agenda, cashed in on donations from energy and gas companies, including $2,500 from the PAC for ConocoPhillips, $5,000 from a PAC for Pioneer Natural Resources, and $2,500 from a PAC for The National Stripper Well Association. Willie Chiang, the CEO of Plains All American Pipeline, gave $5,000 to Manchin, as did Joe Gorder, the CEO of Valero Energy. Michael K. Grimm, CEO of Rising Star Petroleum, gave $2,500, and employees of ConocoPhillips, including the company’s CEO Ryan Lance, gave a total of $18,700.

Meanwhile, PACs for the financial services industry — another sector facing potential new regulation in Congress — gave more than $50,000 to Sinema, according to her campaign filing. Goldman Sachs president John Waldron made a maximum donation of $5,800. Two senior managing directors at Blackstone — Giovanni Cutaia and Eli Nagler — collectively gave $5,700, and a managing director of government relations there, Alex Katz, donated $1,000.

The Winklevoss twins, the American investors who battled with Mark Zuckerberg over the founding of Facebook and gained wider fame from the movie “The Social Network,” both maxed out to Sinema this quarter. The brothers are involved in cryptocurrency, a field that falls under the jurisdiction of the Senate Banking Financial Institutions and Consumer Protection Subcommittee, on which Sinema sits.

Other donations trickled in to Sinema from top D.C. lobbyists. Those include Steven Elmendorf, partner and co-founder of the firm Subject Matter, who represents the likes of Goldman Sachs and Pfizer (and gave $1,000), and Arshi Siddiqui, a partner at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld who used to work for Speaker Nancy Pelosi (and gave $2,400). Thomas Daschle, a former Democratic senator-turned lobbyist, gave $2,900, and two in-house lobbyists at Comcast — Leo Muñoz and Mitch Rose — gave $500 each.

Those with interest in the battle over potential tobacco and nicotine taxes from Congress were generous, too. John Hoel, an in-house lobbyist for Altria Client Services, a major tobacco company, gave $500. The Cigar Association of America’s PAC donated $1,000. Additionally, a PAC for the National Association of Truckstop Operators, a group with ties to big tobacco companies which has fought the potential taxes, gave Sinema $5,000.

Sinema’s role in negotiating down President Joe Biden’s agenda has brought her ire from the party’s progressive activists. Recently, groups of protesters followed her into the bathroom and traveled to the Boston Marathon race — which Sinema did not run — to advocate for the Biden administration’s spending plans.

INFECTION

Dozens of Oregon law enforcement officers have been members of the far-right Oath Keepers militia


By Jonathan Levinson (OPB)
Oct. 15, 2021 

An analysis by OPB of hacked data uncovers police officers, sheriff’s deputies and military in Oregon who had joined the far right militia group since 2009.

In early summer 2018, it looked as though Oregon voters might get a chance to ban assault weapons in the state.

It was barely two months since a shooter had killed 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.

The proposed Oregon ballot measure met stiff legal challenges and was kept off the ballot, but not before militia groups like the Oath Keepers used the proposed gun restrictions as a rallying cry to bring hundreds of people out to a gun rights rally in Salem.

And those recruitment efforts by the Oath Keepers appear to have had some effect.

People wearing hats and patches indicating they are part of Oath Keepers attend a rally at Freedom Plaza Tuesday, Jan. 5, 2021, in Washington, in support of President Donald Trump.
Jacquelyn Martin / AP

Not long after the pro-gun rally in Salem, Portland police officer Joseph Webber appears to have joined the Oath Keepers militia, an anti-government, anti-immigrant extremist group that was thrust into the national security spotlight for its role in the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol insurrection.

According to data leaked earlier this month and reviewed by OPB, Webber — who is still a Portland police officer — is among more than two dozen current and former police officers, sheriff’s deputies, corrections officers, and members of the military in Oregon who appear to have joined the Oath Keepers militia since the group was founded in 2009. OPB compared data in the Oath Keepers leak against public records, social media and state law enforcement certification information to verify the information.

Reached by phone on the same number appearing in the leaked database, Webber denied joining the group before hanging up. He didn’t respond to follow-up text messages.

Portland Police Chief Chuck Lovell said he expects officers to follow the bureau’s conduct and professionalism policies whether on or off duty. Potentially applicable policies include a prohibition against associations with people advocating criminal behavior or actions which might discredit the bureau or city.

Lovell told OPB this case has been referred to internal affairs for investigation.

The hacked Oath Keepers data was sent to the transparency group Distributed Denial of Secrets, which provided the information to journalists and researchers. In several cases across the country, journalists and citizen sleuths have been able to confirm law enforcement and military members using the leaked data. New York City police officers and a detective in the Hudson County prosecutor’s office were in the leaked data, prompting investigations from those two agencies.

The data include names, membership join dates and contact information for nearly 40,000 people across the country who at one point paid dues to the organization, including more than 1,000 names in Oregon and Southwest Washington. Except where people paid the approximately $1,000 for a lifetime membership, it’s not clear from the data if people are still members.

Oath Keepers in Oregon law enforcement

The earliest law enforcement officer in the state to join was Multnomah County Sheriff’s Deputy Phillip Farrell, who signed up in 2009, according to the hacked records. Farrell retired from the Sheriff’s office in 2014 and, until 2019, worked as an instructor at Oregon’s corrections officer academy, according to his LinkedIn, where he recently liked a cartoon of a U.S. Border Patrol agent on horseback. The cartoon — a reference to recently controversial actions taken by Border Patrol — stated the agent is not a villain and that the Haitian immigrant depicted is a lawbreaker, not a victim.


In this screenshot from retired Multnomah County Sheriff's Deputy Phillip Farrell's LinkedIn, a cartoon depicting U.S. Border Patrol and a Haitian immigrant says the Border Patrol officer is not a villain and the Haitian immigrant depcited is a lawbreaker, not a victim.
Screenshot/Facebook /

Farrell did not respond to multiple phone calls and text messages.

Multnomah County Sheriff Mike Reese, who did not take office until after Farrell retired, called membership in an anti-government organization like the the Oath Keepers reprehensible.

“MCSO has a number of policies addressing members’ behavior(s) that may bring discredit to the Office of Sheriff and/or could be criminal, discriminatory or harassing in nature,” department spokesperson Chris Liedle added in an email.

In some cases, people who signed up for the Oath Keepers listed skills or experience they could contribute to the group.

Related: California sheriff defends his past membership in the extremist Oath Keepers militia

“I currently work in a highly stressful environment,” one recently retired corrections officer from Oregon wrote. “I am professionally trained in restraint applications, use of chemical agents, taser deployment, basic first aid and firearms. I have the skills to de-escalate highly volatile situations.”

Current Nyssa, Oregon, police officer Nicholas Codiga joined the Oath Keepers in 2015, according to the leaked data. Codiga, who used to work for the Warm Springs Police Department, also appears to have shared content mocking Indigenous people on his social media accounts. In one Facebook post, a man who appears to be Codiga is photographed putting his face through a cutout that has long black braids, an orange prison jumpsuit and is holding a “WSPD detention center” sign.

OPB reached Codiga by calling the phone number in the leaked data. After confirming his identity, he hung up as soon as a reporter mentioned the Oath Keeper

In this screenshot from Nyssa police officer Nicolas Codiga’s Facebook account, a man who appears to be Codiga is photographed putting his face through a cutout that has long black braids, an orange prison jumpsuit and is holding a “WSPD detention center” sign. Codiga, worked previously for the Warm Springs Police Department.
Screenshot/LinkedIn /

The Nyssa Police Department also hung up on OPB immediately after a reporter identified themselves. Nyssa City Manager Jim Maret said Codiga is transferring to a different law enforcement agency next month, but declined to say where. Maret said he didn’t know of a city policy prohibiting membership in militia groups.

Coos County Sheriff’s Office Sgt. Shane Shobar joined the Oath Keepers in 2013 and wrote to the group, “I come from a long line of military members that have served from WWII to present time.”

Reached by phone, Shobar said he is no longer a member.

“That was years ago, and it was just co-workers and I talking about it, but that was it,” Shobar told OPB. He said patriotism motivated him to join. Asked if he thought being a member of an anti-government militia might conflict with his role as a law enforcement officer, Shobar said he didn’t give it any thought.

Shobar is currently a defendant in a federal civil rights lawsuit, along with Coos County Sheriff Craig Zanni and jail medical staff, over allegations that an inmate’s medical needs were ignored, leading to the person suffering kidney failure, nerve damage and permanent incontinence.

Zanni, who has been sheriff of Coos County since 2010, did not respond to multiple emails requesting comment.

Joining the Oath Keepers is as easy as submitting your name and contact information along with payment, which ranges from $50 to $1,500. The group also asks for a copy of a member’s DD214, verifying their military service, or other proof that they are a first responder. According to the Oath Keepers’ website, prospective members are then “vetted” and gain access to a “members only” online forum.

Former military police officer and current corrections officer at Snake River Correctional Institution Jerod Edmondson told OPB that when he joined the Oath Keepers in 2014, it was because he thought it was a veterans organization. He said he is not still a member and wasn’t aware of the group’s anti-government views when he joined.

Edmondson appears to have shared content on his Facebook page calling for “all illegals” to be deported, suggesting George Soros paid protesters “to riot and burn down Ferguson,” and that Muslim members of Congress are trying to destroy the country from within.


A Facebook screenshot of former military police officer and current corrections officer at Snake River Correctional Institution Jerod Edmondson. The post calls for “all illegals” to be deported, suggesting George Soros paid protesters “to riot and burn down Ferguson,” and that Muslim members of Congress are trying to destroy the country from within.
Screenshot/Facebook /

Edmondson is among six current and former Oregon corrections officers who appear to have joined the militia.

The Oregon Department of Corrections said employees have constitutionally protected speech rights that include off-duty political speech.

“The speech interests of our employees, while significant, are not absolute and there are limitations, including for off-duty speech and/or conduct,” DOC spokesperson Jennifer Black said in a statement. She added speech could be an issue if it affects the department’s mission or “business interests.”
Ties to extremism

The Oath Keepers militia was founded by Army veteran and Yale Law School graduate Elmer Stewart Rhodes in 2009. The group recruits people with experience in law enforcement and the military to prepare for what the organization characterizes as an inevitable armed conflict with the U.S. government.

The organization has been involved in or planned a number of criminal and violent actions over the past decade, according to University of Albany Assistant Professor Sam Jackson, who wrote a book on the Oath Keepers.

“It’s really problematic if you have members of law enforcement saying, for example, that they’re not going to comply with federal court orders because they think those federal court orders are unconstitutional,” Jackson said.

The Oath Keepers gained national attention in 2014 when the group helped back Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy in an armed standoff with federal officers. Three months later, Lake Oswego police officer Vaughn Bechtol appears to have joined the organization. Bechtol is one of six Oregon law enforcement officers who joined in the months following the Bundy Ranch standoff, according to the hacked data.

In this April 2015 file photo, rancher Cliven Bundy speaks at an event in

 Bunkerville, Nev.
John Locher / AP

“I read their mission statement at the time about military and law enforcement officers upholding their oath of office. I felt that lined up with my values,” Bechtol told OPB in an email. “As I did more research into the group after signing up, I realized they did NOT represent my values. I have never participated in any events, meetings, or discussions with any member of that group and I firmly stand against what they represent now after the atrocities of Jan. 6.”

Lake Oswego Police Department policies don’t explicitly mention militia groups but include multiple prohibitions against on- or off-duty behavior which would discredit the department.

“We expect our officers to share the responsibility of embodying our values while serving our community,” Assistant City Manager Madison Thesing said in a statement.

Thesing said violations of policy are investigated but did not specify if this incident would be.

“Some people might have joined Oath Keepers with a minimal understanding of the group,” Jackson said. “But if you had any real level of engagement with the group you would see their promotion of conspiracy theories, their calls to prepare for violence… Do we really want members of our law enforcement community to be absentmindedly joining civic organizations even if they ... aren’t a pernicious extremist organization like the Oath Keepers? I would hope that the people who we are entrusting with firearms and arrest privileges have better discernment than that.”

Related: 'This Land Is Our Land': OPB podcast examines the rise of a far-right movement

Oregon Oath Keepers also participated in another armed federal dispute in 2015 at Sugar Pine Mine in Southern Oregon.

Codiga is one of two Oregon law enforcement officers who joined around the time of the Sugar Pine Mine standoff, according to the data.

Core to the Oath Keepers’ ideology are a list of 10 hypothetical orders they say they will not obey, including any orders to disarm Americans, to force Americans into concentration camps, to invade any states, to support foreign peacekeepers on U.S. soil, or to subject civilians to military tribunals.

The group has been closely aligned with extremist causes since its inception following the election of Barack Obama, the nation’s first Black president. Oath Keepers founding member and former board member Richard Mack is the founder of the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association, a group that believes county sheriffs are the highest government authority and have the right to ignore state and federal laws.

A number of Oregon sheriffs have aligned themselves with Mack’s movement over the years. In 2013, then-Linn County Sheriff Tim Mueller led eight other Oregon sheriffs in sending a letter to then-Vice President Joe Biden stating they would refuse to enforce any new federal gun laws. More recently, sheriffs from across the state took a page from Mack’s movement and told Gov. Kate Brown they would not enforce state mask mandates, though no state officials asked law enforcement to enforce COVID-19 health guidelines.

Some on the leaked list of Oregon officials, like Shobar and his former colleague, retired Coos County Sheriff’s Office Sgt. Robert Kramer, joined the militia in 2013. At the time, local chapters in Southern Oregon were taking on community service projects and championing popular local political issues, according to High Country News.

“I’m into defending the country but not physically overthrowing it at this point,” Kramer told OPB, adding that he only went to one Oath Keepers meeting.

Kramer, who retired in 2018, said he didn’t like that people were “stepping outside of the legal bounds” on Jan. 6., and he said the attacks on law enforcement at the Capitol “cut me a bit.”

Though Kramer said he is no longer a member of the Oath Keepers and was never active in the group, his views line up with at least one of their core beliefs: The U.S. government is waging a war against its own citizens.

“I really do believe with this administration and what they’re doing, they’re trying to push us into some kind of civil war,” Kramer said. “And I think they want to do that so they can come down hard on us.”
Present threat

Oath Keepers in Oregon told Gov. Kate Brown in a 2019 Facebook post that she was risking a civil war after she ordered the Oregon State Police to bring back 11 Republican senators who had fled the statehouse to block climate change legislation from passing. That same month, militia threats forced the state Senate to close for a day

.

In this photo taken Sunday, June 23, 2019, a small crowd of local Republicans show their support of a Republican walkout outside the Oregon State Capitol in Salem, Ore. The gathering took place only a day after the Senate President ordered the statehouse to close over a "possible militia threat."

Sarah Zimmerman / AP

Approximately 22 Oath Keepers have been charged for their role in the Jan. 6 insurrection in Washington, D.C., though none of those people reside in Oregon. In the investigation’s largest single indictment, at least 18 Oath Keepers face conspiracy charges for their alleged role in plotting to thwart the certification of the Electoral College vote. Five have pleaded guilty and court documents suggest Rhodes, who hasn’t been charged, is a central focus of the investigation.

While some Oregon law enforcement officers joined the Oath Keepers years ago, the leaked data suggests others like Webber and retired Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office reserve deputy Todd Steward joined well after the militia group had firmly established itself and its views on the national stage.

Related: Oregon lawmakers cancel session due to potential militia threat

Clackamas County Sheriff Angela Brandenburg told OPB she supports the state Legislature’s recently passed legislation HB 2936, which states “membership or participation in hate groups, racial supremacist organizations or militant groups erodes public trust in law enforcement officers and community safety.”

“The Legislature has made it clear to every law enforcement organization in the state that it is a conflict for law enforcement personnel to be a member or participate in these groups,” Brandenburg said. “My office will uphold this standard of conduct.”

Portland Police Chief Chuck Lovell said officers have different backgrounds and life experiences. He said Webber’s potential membership in a militia is a reminder “that laws and our directives mandate that police do not act on any personal beliefs, but must uphold the Constitution at all times.”

Rep. Janelle Bynum was the chief sponsor of HB 2936, which strengthened law enforcement background checks and allows departments to check applicant social media accounts. But it’s not always possible to screen for something like membership in a militia organization.

“It’s not just a policing issue, it’s a community issue,” Bynum said. “What is an acceptable level of association with people who believe in white supremacy or racial superiority? The true change comes from within. Some of it you can mandate but not most of it.