You can divide people who took Donald Trump’s claims that he actually won the 2020 election into roughly two camps: those who were in the know, and the true believers.
If less charitably inclined, you might call this a divide between the con artists and those who they duped. On one side are politicians, conservative movement insiders, activists, and others who played and continue to play along with the farce that the election was stolen; on the other are legions of people who took them at their word, and believed them. It’s an appeal, directed from the top downwards, to the paranoid style in American politics.
The Oath Keepers, the anti-government militia whose leadership was convicted of seditious conspiracy over its role in the Capitol breach, present an interesting example of this. On the one hand, you have a figure like Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes. It’s clear from Rhodes’ statements before the election, his actions, and virtually everything about him that he was committed to demolishing the American state in its current form. Trump’s bogus election fraud claims may have been a vehicle to that end, but Rhodes was on a mission that was his own.
Then, on the other hand, you have Kellye SoRelle, the Oath Keepers’ former general counsel. SoRelle popped up at key moments around Jan. 6: she was present at a brief, parking garage meeting between Rhodes and Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio; she was described in court records as a go-between for the two. After Jan. 6, she urged Oath Keepers members to delete text messages from the planning phase.
There’s a lot about SoRelle that suggests she’s much more of a true believer than in the know. Her X account is full of bizarre, hard-to-track conspiracy theories.
SoRelle herself was found incompetent to stand trial last year, and was held in federal custody for mental health treatment. The judge later found that she had recovered, paving the way for what happened on Wednesday: SoRelle pleaded guilty to two charges. Unlike Rhodes, she never faced seditious conspiracy allegations; rather, on Wednesday, she pleaded guilty to a felony count of obstruction of justice and a misdemeanor count of trespassing.
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Exhibit A: This ignoramus extraordinaire.
How in hell does this MAGA lawyer know there’s election fraud in the next county? Something smells really bad here.
" Patriots" who don’t even believe in America and what America means.
If you wanted to be honest and with no charity, you would call it the divide between “the dumb and the evil”. But even that is letting “the dumb” off the hook for being evil.
That is many of “the dumb” believed Trump won not because he got more votes but because he got more White or “real American” votes. Many of “the dumb” also thought that by being assholes they were able to steal the 2000 election so being assholes should work in 2020.
That is in my view there really is no distinction between those who tried to overthrow the Government in 2020 to keep Trump in power after losing the election. Anyone who supported the BIG LIE is by definition a BIG LIAR which by definition makes them all evil.
The only real differences within the group of BIG LIARS is not how evil are they but how stupid are they. .
They believe in America like Vidkun Quisling believed in Norway.