The editorial content in this article are brought to you by a former chief of police and current staff writer for Law Enforcement Today.
In a bombshell report, Western Journal says that according to a Capital Research Center (CRC) report issued Thursday, a far-left advocacy group funded by farther-left Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg facilitated a cash dump of hundreds of millions of dollars to election offices nationwide.
CRC, a conservative think tank noted the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL) dumped money in “an effort to privatize the 2020 election and put Joe Biden in the White House” in last year’s presidential election. In other words, Zuckerberg and the advocacy group in effect colluded to affect the 2020 election.
According to its 2020 IRS Form 990 filing, CTCL issued over $332 million worth of grants, with a significant portion of those funds, the CRC said, going to “elections offices across the country.”
“We’re still combing through them, but it’s already clear that our findings from nine state reports earlier this year—Arizona and Nevada, Georgia, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Texas, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Virginia—will be confirmed in the coming weeks,” CRC researchers Parker Thayer and Hayden Ludwig wrote in their report.
Take a look at that list again—Arizona, Nevada, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin—all “swing” states where the former president lost in some cases by less than 10,000 votes. Think Zuckerberg’s deep pockets didn’t have an effect on last year’s election?
On it’s website, the CTCL describes itself as “a team of civic technologists, trainers, researchers, election administration and data experts working to foster a more informed and engaged democracy, and helping to modernize U.S. elections.”
CTCL was founded by former Democratic campaign operatives—Tiana Epps-Johnson, Donny Bridges, and Whitney May, CRC reports. Western Journal reports that all three worked at the New Organizing Institute for multiple years.
CRC reported that the organization is known as a “Democratic Party ‘Hogwarts’ for digital wizardry,” and had trained a number of Democratic “digital activists” before shutting it down.
CRC noted that Zuckerberg donated $328 million to the CTCL through an organization called the Silicon Valley Community Foundation.
That foundation’s grant to CTCL “was the second-largest it paid out in 2020,” according to the CRC. In fact, CTCL’s website refers to Facebook as one of its largest funders.
So large was Zuckerberg’s money dump into the organization that NPR reported it “saved the election” for Democrats.
The CRC report said that Zuckerberg’s cash dump helped to facilitate “private drop-boxes across key cities to hoover up mail-in ballots, bypassing the U.S. Postal service, in what was effectively the country’s first mail-in election—thanks to last-minute election law changes by Democratic secretaries of state and endless pressure from activist groups like the National Vote at Home Institute.”
One thing missing from the “election law changes” are the respective state legislatures, which under Article II, Section I, Clause II of the United States Constitution is decides how electors are chosen.
Unfortunately, the Supreme Court dropped the ball in refusing to hear challenges to these clearly unconstitutional election law changes. What these groups did was engage in a form of ballot harvesting, which is ripe for fraud and abuse.
For example, according to Sandy Juno, retired clerk of Brown County, Wisconsin said in June that after CTCL dumped money into Green Bay, “the mayor’s office and chief of staff began to take over election functions.”
“And that is not something under state statutes they have the authority to do,” Juno said, noting “because under Wisconsin law, municipal clerks, the county clerk, and the Wisconsin Elections Commission are the individuals charged with running elections.”
She continued, “As we got closer to the November election, we found out that this outside group had come in and was basically trying to redo our forms and documents that we use statewide. And these people were from out of state and had no business doing that.”
Biden won Wisconsin, an overwhelmingly red state, by less than 20,000 votes, with only cities such as Madison, Milwaukee, Kenosha, and Green Bay going his way. The rest of the state was solidly red.
This wasn’t lost on Juno.
“They were working primarily with out five major Democratic base cities. So they were breaking the consistency of documents and processes and procedures used statewide.”
In other words, they apparently broke the law.
Law Enforcement Today recently reported on a judge in Wisconsin threatening to have two Democratic Wisconsin mayors arrested for failure to cooperate with an election integrity probe. For more on that, we invite you to:
DIG DEEPER
WISCONSIN- A retired Wisconsin Supreme Court justice investigating the state’s 2020 elections is threatening to jail two Democratic mayors if they don’t sit for depositions in the probe soon.
According to the retired justice, Michael Gableman, he believes the two mayors are engaged in a “cover-up” intended to stall his investigation, USAA News is reporting.
Earlier this week, Yahoo News reported that Gabelman is trying to obtain court orders forcing Madison Mayor Satya Rhodes-Conway and Green Bay Mayor Eric Genrich to decide between answering his questions or being thrown in jail.
“[Green Bay Mayor] Eric Genrich and [Madison Mayor] Satya Rhodes-Conway have chosen to ignore the subpoenas issued by the Wisconsin Assembly because they have no intention of answering uncomfortable questions about what they did with the millions of dollars in Zuckerberg money that they took,’ Gableman alleges.
That refers to money given by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg for the purposes of electioneering efforts on behalf of Democrats, in particular Joe Biden in swing states such as Wisconsin.
“Reasonable minds might wonder whether the millions of dollars each of these mayors received from the Zuckerbergs may have induced them to do something other than treating all candidates fairly and impartially and whether those mayors used the Zuckerberg money to get the vote out for Joe Biden,” Gableman alleged.
“They are trying to run and hide from accountability to the citizens they are supposed to serve. Why go through all of this legal evasion, maneuvering and expense unless they do not want the public to know what they have done?”
According to the two mayors, Gableman never provided them with specific dates and times for them to be interviewed. In fact a lawyer for Genrich said he was planning to pursue legal action against Gableman, alleging his work was “shoddy.”
Jeffrey Mandell, a lawyer for the city of Green Bay sent a letter to Waukesha County Circuit Court Judge Ralph Ramirez alleging the former justice’s work was so shoddy he would seek legal sanctions against him.
In his letter, Mandell argued that Gableman had filed the wrong type of lawsuit in the wrong court. He alleged that the type of case Gableman brought would only be used when private individuals have disputes over money.
“Based on our initial review, the Petition is not only lacking in legal merit and built upon a gross distortion of the relevant facts, but it departs so greatly from legal standards that Mayor Genrich intends to serve the Special Counsel with a motion for sanctions,’ Mandell wrote.
In October, Mandell wrote Gableman’s chief of staff, noting that his understanding was he was not seeking immediate testimony from Green Bay officials. Since no response was received from Gableman’s office, they assumed the had an immediate need to meet with him, Mandell wrote.
In a similar vein, Madison City Attorney Michael Haas sent a letter on Nov. 2 to Gableman advising him his understanding that based on past discussions with Gableman’s team, it wasn’t necessary for someone form Madison to testify “unless we are provided with a more specific scope of inquiry and reach an agreement on other details such as the format and length of any deposition.”
Haas claims neither Gableman nor his office responded to that letter.
Rhodes-Conway repeatedly has claimed she would be happy to discuss how the 2020 election was conducted, however insists such testimony should be made in public, not behind closed doors as Gableman wishes. On Thursday, she said Gableman’s team possessed an “abject lack of professionalism.”
In the case of Zuckerberg, he initially gave money to five mayors of Wisconsin allegedly for COVID relief, however those monies were later redirected toward a “get out the vote” campaign. According to Gableman, Zuckerberg’s actions amounted to a scheme by David Plouffe to defeat former President Donald Trump, which he is calling election interference.
In Wednesday testimony before the Wisconsin Committee on Campaigns and Elections, Gableman said he was investigating the relationship between former Facebook employee Michael Spitzer Rubenstein and the two mayors.
In fact, it is reported that Genrich actually turned over the election in his city to Democratic operatives tied to Zuckerberg, who spent $8.8 million in only five Wisconsin cities.
Gableman told the committee, “It’s very clear that Mark Zuckerberg’s goal was to defeat Donald Trump and elect Joe Biden.”
Gableman is threatening to subpoena Rubenstein for a deposition.
In October, Wisconsin’s Democratic Attorney General Josh Kaul sued Gableman in court to block subpoenas issued to the state’s Elections Commission, while the former justice argued that Kaul and the commission don’t have the authority to sue him.
A hearing in the case filed against the two mayors is slated for Dec. 22. The suit filed by Kaul in Dane County is scheduled to be held the next day.
According to Mandell, Green Bay is trying to get the Waukesha case either thrown out, delayed, or combined with the Dane County case.
Gableman filed his lawsuit on Monday, announcing it on Wednesday when he appeared before the Committee on Campaigns and Elections. Yahoo said the lawsuit didn’t show up in the state’s database of court cases, however PBS Wisconsin obtained copies and posted them online Thursday. Officials from Madison and Green Bay said they had not yet been served with the lawsuits, but had seen the online copies.
Gableman is looking to interview the two mayors about grants they had received from Zuckerberg’s organization, the Center for Tech and Civic Life to assist in running their elections during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The center provided grants to over 200 Wisconsin communities, however the vast majority went to the five major cities in Wisconsin.
Courts have ruled the grants were legally permitted; however Republicans claim they were improper because a majority of the money went primarily to cities with large populations of Democrats.
Biden only defeated Trump by 21,000 votes in the state, a less than 1% margin of victory. Despite court rulings upholding Biden’s “victory,” Republicans argue more review is necessary and has provided Gableman and his team a budget of $676,000.
For more on how Americans seem to be fighting back against Democrat’s overreach, we invite you to:
DIG DEEPER
The following contains editorial content written by a retired Chief of Police and current staff writer for Law Enforcement Today.
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USA- While the election of Republican Glenn Youngkin in Virginia has garnered much of the headlines this past week, with Youngkin defeating Clinton acolyte and former governor Terry McAuliffe, a number of lesser-known Republican election victories spell big trouble for Biden and his big government, American Marxist agenda.
As Fox News host Tucker Carlson noted, the American people have had enough…in other words, we are mad as hell and we’re not going to take it anymore.
If Tuesday night’s election results showed us anything, it is that the American people are not going to take the shenanigans taking place in our country lying down. As Carlson said, we are at an “inflection point.”
Writing an editorial for Fox News, Carlson noted:
“There’s a limit to which you can push the American population before they gently and politely push back through democratic means. And that’s exactly what we just saw.”
Simply put, the power class in this country didn’t see (or possibly didn’t care) that Americans were tiring of government overreach. And probably they thought it was just a matter of Americans complaining out loud while voting the way they always have when they got to the voting booth.
Luckily for a wide swath of America, they were dead wrong. The American people put their votes where their mouths are.
Look at Texas, for example. In one district, an overwhelmingly Hispanic one at that, Republicans were able to flip that seat which went to Biden by 14 points one year ago.
In this case, Republican John Lujan won shooting a hole in the myth that Hispanics always vote Democrat and moreover, they are in favor of open borders. How so? Lujan called for border security. Even Hispanics it turns out are in favor of countries having actual borders. Who would have known?
Let’s go about 1,400 miles north-northeast to Minneapolis, an overwhelmingly liberal Democratic city which served as ground zero for the George Floyd riots in the summer of 2020.
In response to Floyd’s death, the far left American Marxists in the city called for the dismantling of the Minneapolis Police Department and changing it to a Department of Public Safety, and a measure was on the ballot this past week which would have done just that.
So what happened? The vote went down in flames, as did several of the city council members who had supported the measure. Why? Because people above all want to feel safe, and in Minneapolis, voters grew tired of out of control crime and chose to support their police department.
This also served as a slap to far-left anti-Semite Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN), who was one of the chief supporters of dismantling the police.
Heading east to Democratic stronghold New Jersey, last year they voted for the cognitively impaired Joe Biden by 16 points over then-President Trump so surely Gov. Phil Murphy, whose COVID death rate of seniors was worse than even Killer Cuomo would still be reelected with an overwhelming margin, right?
Not so much. Despite (apparently) eking out a victory over political newcomer Jack Ciattarelli by less than 20,000 votes. This is in New Jersey, an overwhelmingly Democratic state.
Aside from Murphy’s near defeat, there is also the case of a truck driver Edward Durr, who spent only a couple of thousand dollars in his campaign for New Jersey state senate against the longtime president of the body, Steve Sweeney. And won.
As Carlson noted, don’t bet that the truck driver won’t do a better job than the longtime bureaucrat in that seat. Carlson also noted the sweet irony of the party calling for the firing of truck drivers for not submitting to the COVID jab lost an election to a truck driver.
That takes us to Virginia, where Youngkin spanked McAuliffe. Youngkin was a political novice running for his first political office. The defeat of McAuliffe by the novice Youngkin cannot be underestimated. After all, McAuliffe brought in all the “big guns”—Obama, Biden, Harris, and the nauseating Stacey Abrams.
He even violated IRS regulations by having Abrams campaign inside churches and Harris cackle through a video played exclusively in black churches. Sadly for McAuliffe, his pandering didn’t work.
Also let’s remember—Democrats think they are the party of the little guy, including Hispanics. News flash…according to Fox News, Hispanics voted for Youngkin by a nine-point margin. How strange is that?
After all, Youngkin was portrayed by his opponent throughout the campaign as a racist. However when everyone and everything is “racist,” the word loses its meaning…just dog whistling by the left. Clearly the American people are tired of hearing that word used to define everything the left doesn’t agree with.
Winsome Sears, a black woman of Jamaican descent won her race as lieutenant governor of Virginia. As Sears said in her victory speech, America is not a racist country, despite what the American Marxists continually claim.
Sears: There are some who want to divide us, and we must not let that happen. They would like us to believe we are back in 1963 when my father came. We can live where we want. We can eat where we want. We own the water fountains. We have had a black president elected not once but twice. And here, I am living proof.
God Bless Winsome Sears. She said what most Americans believe…we are an inherently good and decent people. We are not racist. This is not a racist country.
As Carlson said, media outlets and others, what he calls the “propaganda machine”—NBC News, The Atlantic, The White House—“Stop lying…stop picking the scab…stop trying to divide us by how we look.”
This is something for which we could truly hope. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem like the Democrats have learned a damn thing. In fact as Carlson noted, McAuliffe was so tone deaf that he actually brought in the president of the American Federation of Teachers, Randi Weingarten to screech and scream at a rally.
Weingarten, the face of Critical Race Theory which sparked Virginia parents into action engaged in an unhinged, screaming rant, a kind of “in your face” screed which showed that McAuliffe was unconcerned about Youngkin’s rise in the polls.
As Carlson said, McAuliffe’s message was clear—“we don’t care about you at all, you play no role in this, this is an inside game.” In other words, “go pound sand, Virginia voters.” And it all blew up in McAuliffe and the Democrats face.
What does all of this mean for 2022? Is there a lesson here? For Republicans, there clearly is. Run good candidates and ignore the white noise coming from the left.
It is clear that Democrats learned nothing from Tuesday night’s results across the country, from Seattle to New Jersey. In fact, they are doubling-down on their agenda.
That was made clear when they rammed through Biden’s very unpopular infrastructure bill. You can be sure that every Republican who voted for that bill will be the recipient of a primary next year as well as some Democrats who won close races last November.
The fact is the American people are tired and they can see that Democrats have no plan to help them out. They believe throwing good money after bad is the solution and a majority of the American people see right through it. That was proven last week.
For more on the pre-election shenanigans in Virginia, we invite you to:
DIG DEEPER
Law Enforcement Today recently reported on churches in Virginia which were apparently violating IRS regulations regarding nonprofits by showing videos of Kamala Harris. IRS regulations, upheld by case law expressly prohibit churches from engaging in any political campaign activity.
Apparently that matters not to Democrats, who called in another heavy hitter Sunday, failed Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams.
According to Newsmax, Abrams visited three black churches on Sunday in Norfolk, Virginia to campaign for Democrat Terry McAuliffe, former governor of the state who is running again. Nobody panders like Democrats.
Abrams, who has still not conceded the 2018 governor’s race in Georgia, also joined McAuliffe, at an early voting station for a rally. She urged residents of Virginia to vote, noting “what you say in 2021 will show the world who we are in 2022 and 2024 and beyond.”
Abrams and McAuliffe appeared maskless, which appears to violate Gov. Ralph Northam’s emergency order they must be worn. This is especially dangerous for Abrams, who clearly has comorbidities which makes her susceptible to the coronavirus.
On Sunday Abrams told a church audience that in he past, she believed combining politics and church was wrong (apparently unaware that it also violates IRS regulations).
However, she claimed, her parents told her church and politics always intersect, with her mother allegedly telling her “Politics is always in the church” while her father allegedly said the Bible was “one of the most intense political texts ever written.”
According to Yahoo News, Abrams was permitted by at least two of the churches to speak from the pulpit during which she pushed McAuliffe’s candidacy.
Both Second Calvary Baptist Church and Faith Deliverance Christian Center allowed Abrams to speak.
“I am the daughter of not one but two pastors,” Abrams said at Second Calvary.
The pastor wore a black T-shirt that read “VOTE” and told his congregation the election is “a very important election.”
The pastor at Faith Deliverance, Sharon Riley claimed “God had a plan” for Abrams in her losing her 2018 race saying that her work for “voting rights” has made her one of the most “significant” Americans.
Her work has paid off handsomely for Abrams, who was in debt when she started her 2018 gubernatorial campaign and now owns two homes totaling $1.4 million. Gotta love politics.
McAuliffe has been calling out the so-called “big guns” as the Virginia race has tightened significantly lately, with Republican Glenn Youngkin closing to a dead heat with the former Clinton adviser. The Cook Political Report last month changed the race from “leans Democratic” to “toss-up.”
Among those who have come to the state to campaign for McAuliffe includes “DOCTOR” Jill Biden, former (and current shadow) President Barack Hussein Obama, and the current occupant of the White House, Joe Biden.
The appearance of McAuliffe and Abrams outside an early voting location could constitute illegal electioneering under Commonwealth of Virginia Codes. According to § 24.2-604, it reads:
- During the times the polls are open and ballots are being counted, or within one hour of opening or after closing, it is unlawful for any person (i) to loiter or congregate within 40 feet of any entrance to any polling place; (ii) within such distance to give, tender, or exhibit any ballot, ticket, or other campaign material to any person or to solicit or in any manner attempt to influence any person in casting his vote;
In case you missed it, below is our report on the insufferable Kamala Harris’s video message to Virginia (black) churches from earlier this week.
DIG DEEPER
The following contains editorial content which is the opinion of the writer, a retired Chief of Police and current staff writer for Law Enforcement Today.
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VIRGINIA- Pandering– catering to special interests without any principles, such as a politician who says to whatever group he/she is addressing just what they want to hear to win their support, contributions, or favors.
Pander, meet Kamala Harris.
Gateway Pundit reports that Kamala Harris has recorded a video, which will be played at some 300 black-only churches in the Commonwealth of Virginia to coerce black voters into voting for feckless Democrat Terry McAuliffe for governor.
The effort, which was originally reported by CNN should present some legal problems for the McAuliffe campaign, but in 2021 America, where we operate under two disparate systems of rules and justice, we won’t hold our breath.
First, an excerpt from the CNN report:
More than 300 black churches across Virginia will hear from Vice President Kamala Harris between Sunday and election day in a video message that will air during morning services as part of an outreach effort aimed to boost McAuliffe. [emphasis added]
In the video, first obtained by CNN, Harris said her time growing up in Oakland’s 23rd Avenue Church of God taught her it was a “sacred responsibility” to “lift up the voices of our community.”
“I believe that my friend Terry McAuliffe is the leader Virginia needs at this moment,” says Harris, before praising McAuliffe’s “long track-record of getting things done for the people of Virginia.”
Harris implores congregants to vote following church service. The McAuliffe campaign has embraced “Souls to the Polls,” block-party style events featuring top campaign surrogates after church near polling locations, to drive voter turnout.
This election is the first year Virginians will be able to vote on Sunday.
As a point of information, Harris was seven years old when her parents separated and she moved to Montreal. It is extremely doubtful that Harris, now 56 remembers what she was taught as a young child in a church in Oakland. That doesn’t matter because Harris, just like her boss Biden, isn’t immune to a bit of exaggeration.
Further, Harris is being pushed as being an “African American.” From her biography:
“Kamala Devi Harris was born on October 20, 1964, in California. Her mother, a Tamil Indian named Shyamala Gopalan Harris worked as a breast cancer scientist. Her father, a Jamaican named Donald Harris, serves as a Stanford University economics professor.” [emphasis added]
Black, yes. African American? Hardly.
Yet, the McAuliffe campaign is sending her out, using her “race” to pander to black voters. How condescending and demented is that? Sadly, the pandering will probably prove effective.
That brings us to the legality of what is being done. Remember, churches are tax-exempt organizations. As such, churches are strictly prohibited from engaging in political campaign activity. It appears, by playing a campaign message from Harris during church services touting the campaign for a single candidate, the McAuliffe campaign and Harris are operating in violation of the law and IRS regulations.
In an IRS publication which addresses “Charities, Churches and Politics,” it addresses a 1954 law approved by Congress, with an amendment introduced by then Sen. Lyndon Johnson which prohibited “501 (c)(3) organizations—which includes charities and churches—from engaging in any political campaign activity.”
In fact, the IRS notes that Congress has revisited the ban since that time and has in fact strengthened the ban, with the latest update coming in 1987 whereby Congress clarified that the prohibition included statements opposing candidates.
In defining 501(c)(3) organizations, the IRS specifically defines such an organization as one:
“…which does not participate in, or intervene in (including the publishing or distributing of statements), any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for public office.”
Seems pretty clear. By playing a video by Harris, touting the campaign specifically of McAuliffe, his campaign is clearly in violation of IRS rules. While IRS rules do permit churches or other nonprofit organizations to advocate or lobby for (or against) issues in the political arena, they cannot actively campaign for specific candidates or they risk losing their 501(c)(3) status.
Under the IRS regulations for 501(c)(3) organizations, the IRS writes:
The regulations further provide that activities that constitute participation or intervention in a political campaign on behalf of or in opposition to a candidate include, but are not limited to, the publication or distribution of written statements or the making of oral statements on behalf of or in opposition to such a candidate. [emphasis added]
There is also case law affirming the IRS regulation regarding nonprofits, in this case churches and campaign activity.
Branch Ministries v Charles O. Rossotti CA 95-0724 (PLF) saw the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issuing summary judgment dismissing the church’s case and upholding the constitutionality of the ban on political activity. The plaintiffs had alleged they were being targeted due to conservative views and their First Amendment right to free speech was being infringed.
The court wrote: “The government has a compelling interest in maintaining the integrity of the tax system and in not subsidizing partisan political activity, and Section 501(c)(3) is the least restrictive means of accomplishing that purpose.”
Fox Business reports that included within the behemoth $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation bill is nearly $78 billion in new funding for the IRS which will have tens of thousands of new IRS hit men otherwise known as agents to target low and middle-income taxpayers with more than $600 in the bank. Meanwhile, it’s simply fine and dandy for Democrats to skirt IRS regulations on conducting political campaigns within our churches.
As former NBA star Charles Barkley famously said a couple of years ago:
‘We need to start holding you Democrats accountable,” Barkley said on Michael Smerconish’s SiriusXM radio show. “Because they’ve been taking black people’s votes—and they only talk to black people every four years. All of these politicians only talk to black people every four years because they want their vote.”
Pandering—Democrats are experts at it.
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