The FBI and the House GOP have become incubators for right-wing extremism, which seems bad!

Friday, March 3, 2023
BY JULIA CLAIRE & CROOKED MEDIA
- Kimberly Guilfoyle ([link removed]) using her speaking slot at CPAC to…sell gold.

Another hot update on the sham GOP House investigations—strap in!

* The inaugural hearings before the new GOP-led House committee investigating the “weaponization” of the federal government (give us a fucking break) are not going as planned for Republicans. The first three witnesses to testify privately before the committee have offered little firsthand knowledge or evidence of any wrongdoing or violation of the law ([link removed]) according to Democrats on the panel who have listened to their depositions. The three, instead, appear to be a group of aggrieved former FBI officials who have trafficked in right-wing conspiracy theories, including about the January 6 insurrection, and received financial support from a top ally of disgraced former president Donald Trump, Kash Patel.


* Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee fleshed out some of their conspiracy theories in a 316-page report released last night ([link removed]) . The witnesses have promoted dissolving the FBI, cited baseless claims that the January 6 insurrection was planned by Democrats, made Nazi allusions, and claimed that rioter Ashli Babbitt was murdered. According to the report, one witness suggested that it would be better for Americans to die than to have any kind of domestic intelligence-gathering program.

* Official government-oversight reports have described FBI investigations into right-wing extremism and White nationalist terror threats as “woefully inadequate.” ([link removed]) Most recently, new reports reveal that the Justice Department clashed with the FBI for months over how aggressively to probe Trump for stealing classified documents from the White House to take to his private residence, with senior FBI officials on the case angling to drop the investigation entirely before the August 8 search of Mar-a-Lago.

Right-wing conspiracy theorists have other friends in high places, as well.

* A member of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s senior staff met this week with Micki Witthoeft ([link removed]) , the mother of Ashli Babbitt, who was shot and killed by a Capitol police officer when she breached a set of doors just outside the House chamber during the January 6 insurrection. Babbitt’s mother also met briefly with House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer. These meetings with Babbitt’s mother and relatives of the January 6 defendants underscore the new House majority’s overt sympathy to traitors who tried to overthrow democracy. Cool! Good stuff!

* Other House Republicans took meetings with supporters and relatives of January 6 defendants as well, including, you guessed it, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA). Greene told CBS News “We’re actually looking at doing oversight of the D.C. jail,” where dozens of January 6 defendants are being held in pretrial detention. Retired Capitol Police Sgt. Aquilino Gonnell, who was injured during the Capitol attack, criticized McCarthy for allowing his staff to meet with Babbitt’s mother, saying ([link removed]) , “It’s a total betrayal of what I risked my life for on Jan. 6.”



It’s clear that the FBI has a right-wing extremist problem, and so does the House of Representatives, but elected Democrats could actually start to fix the former issue if they wanted to. FBI Director Christopher Wray is a Trump appointee, and will serve out the rest of his ten-year term until 2027, because President Biden didn’t have the good sense to fire him the minute he was sworn in. Republicans would have cried “Saturday Night Massacre” in bad faith for a few weeks, but that’s better than having the guy who regularly goes on Fox News to pander to the far-right leading the nation’s largest domestic law-enforcement bureau. Democrats defer to Republicans on “crime” too often. It’s why all of our modern Democratic presidents have chosen Republicans to head the FBI, it’s why President Biden is siding with the GOP in nullifying the District of Columbia’s new criminal code. Elected Democrats need to stop running away from the crime bogeymen like scared children, especially because Republ
icans are so clearly faking it when they pretend to care about law and order.
Los Angeles! Lovett or Leave It will be at Dynasty Typewriter every Thursday night as the weekly residency continues, and so can you. Show tickets for March through June are now on-sale at www.crooked.com/events.

Join Jon Lovett for a ton of great shows, featuring all-star lineups of comedians, actors, and journalists, including some of the most famous Friends of the Pod you know and love. Plus, something a little different is happening the week after next. We don’t want to give it all away, but the incredible Maria Bamford will be co-hosting a special night of comedy on March 16.

Don’t miss this one – grab your tickets now at CROOKED.COM/EVENTS ([link removed]) before they sell out!
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Walgreens, the United States’ second-largest pharmacy chain, confirmed Thursday that it will not dispense abortion pills in several states where they remain legal ([link removed]) , a decision the company made out of caution amid a shifting policy landscape and threats from state officials bolstered by anti-abortion activists. Some 20 Republican state attorneys general wrote a letter to Walgreens in February ([link removed]) threatening legal action against the company if it began distributing the drugs, which are currently the most widely-used method of medically ending pregnancy. The Biden administration moved in January to allow retail pharmacies to dispense the pills as part of a broader effort to preserve and expand access to abortion as more states passed bans. That decision followed a multi-year analysis by the
FDA that found that the pills are safe and effective to use without a doctor’s visit—a conclusion Republican state attorneys general and anti-abortion groups are now challenging in court.

South Carolina lawyer Alex Murdaugh was sentenced to life in prison without parole for the murders of his wife and son ([link removed]) .


The pandemic-era additional aid available through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) came to an end on Wednesday ([link removed]) , threatening the estimated 31 million low-income Americans who rely on the program.


Amazon has paused construction on its second headquarters in Virginia amid the company’s largest-ever layoffs ([link removed]) , and reassessment of work-from-home protocols.


Nobel Peace Prize winner and human rights activist Ales Bialiatski was sentenced to 10 years in prison today by a court in his native Belarus ([link removed]) for “financing protests” in a trial condemned by the E.U. as a “sham.”


Anti-fascist investigators have identified Dallas Erin Humber as one of the main propagandists behind the neo-Nazi outfit The Terrorgram Collective ([link removed]) . Humber lives in Sacramento, CA, and in addition to slinging homicidal White Nationalist bile, appears to have been a dildo saleswoman. Girlboss alert!!


A police officer and a civilian were killed during violent protests in Bogota, Colombia, on Thursday ([link removed]) where members of rural and indigenous communities blocked access to an oil field and set a fire to demand corporate giant Emerald Energy help fix roads.

Online counseling service BetterHelp has agreed to return $7.8 million to customers to settle with the Federal Trade Commission ([link removed]) after an investigation found that the company shared data it had promised to keep private.

Russian troops and mercenaries shelled the last access routes to the besieged Ukrainian city of Bakhmut today ([link removed]) , bringing the Kremlin closer to its first major victory in over six months after the bloodiest period of the war thus far. A bridge in the adjacent town of Khromove was damaged by Russian tank fire. Ukrainian soldiers were working to repair damaged roads, and additional troops were heading toward the frontline in a show that they are not prepared to surrender, and additional Ukrainians were digging new trenches for defensive positions. Russia has spent the last few months encircling the city of 70,000 they hope to take as a prize after a costly winter offensive.
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The Willow Project is a disastrous Western Arctic drilling plan that could generate as much carbon as 76 coal plants emit in a year, jeopardize the health and traditional practices of nearby Alaska Native communities, and devastate local wildlife like polar bears, migratory birds, and caribou. Help us stop the Willow project. ([link removed])

ConocoPhillips is planning this massive oil drilling project in the Western Arctic, and the Biden administration has less than 30 days to finalize its decision to grant or deny permits to ConocoPhillips. You can pressure the administration to do the right thing. Tell President Biden to halt it for good. ([link removed])

The influx of funding for the IRS is resulting in—get this—a functioning tax service ([link removed]) .

Nearly 60 years after he was first recommended for the United States’ highest military honor, retired Col. Paris Davis, one of the first Black officers to lead a Special Forces team, finally received the Medal of Honor today for his exemplary service in the Vietnam War ([link removed]) .
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