A Washington state lawmaker who moonlights as a wannabe theocrat has stumbled into FBI scrutiny over a how-to guide he wrote on killing non-believers and establishing a Christian theocracy.
Five-term Washington state Rep. Matt Shea has been circulating a manual for holy war in the United States, the Seattle Times reported.
The four-page document, titled “Biblical Basis for War,” goes point-by-point over how a Christian theocratic movement could – and should – exterminate its opposition in a battle to win a hypothetical holy war.
At the outset, Shea’s holy army would issue terms of surrender to its enemies. The demands include “stop all abortions,” “no same-sex marriage,” “no idolatry or occultism,” “no communism,” and “must obey Biblical law.”
If the rest of the country refuses to “yield” to these terms, the document advocates a final solution: “kill all males.”
Most of the document veers into the absurd.
Under “Things for a Holy Army,” Shea remembers to include “Circumcision/Saved,” after Sacrifice/Worship/Prayer.
Referencing the last Civil War, Shea writes in the holy war how-to-manual that “war is not waged against nations but against man (no scorched earth or Sherman’s march to the sea).”
The document was leaked to the press by a local libertarian activist named Tanner Rowe, who in a Facebook video called the plan “theocratic bullshit.”
Shea replied to Rowe and the Seattle Times in a Facebook video of his own, furiously claiming that he wasn’t angry over the incident while showing off his historical knowledge by claiming that the Mayflower compact was “a covenant with God to advance Christianity.”
“The counter-state is working overtime,” he said, adding that “there are two main counter-states in America: Marxists and Islamists.”
He went on to criticize a recent Rolling Stone profile of him as an example of a “Maoist insurgency model.”
“In fact, I’ve been wanting to do this video for a long time,” Shea said, repeating angrily that he wasn’t upset. “Yesterday, the Rolling Stone [sic] posted an 8,000 word article that was essentially a slander smear piece – a hit piece – against me.”
The Rolling Stone article – published last week – details Shea’s fantasy of creating a “51st state” with freedom for guns and rule by God. The story goes into depth on Shea’s ties to local white nationalist movements
Shea has used his time online to promote far-right conspiracy theories, including the idea that global warming is a conspiracy to “manipulate the public mind.”
He also frequently met with and supported rancher Cliven Bundy’s uprising against the Bureau of Land Management, which he opposes for the despotic act of charging fees for grazing on federally maintained land.
The holy war manual made its way to Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich.
“I gave it straight to the FBI,” Knezovich told the Seattle Times.
