A concerted MAGA misinformation campaign is being used to reduce the gravity of the January 6th attack.
The MAGA mindset as a national characteristic isn’t unique in the world experiencing a quantifiable trend toward authoritarian nationalism. The MAGA variant is unique only because of the power it holds. MAGA influences American votes.
The power of each American vote has no equal.
MAGA and the 2024 Elections
Because of that power, the 2024 Presidential election promises to be more momentous than most preceding it. The election will be the first since the violent physical attack staged at the United States Capitol building while Congress was in session. The stated intent of that attack was to reverse the results of the election whereby Joe Biden defeated the incumbent Donald Trump.
Here is where the discussion of MAGA divergence from the norm begins to coalesce. A recent CBS News/YouGov poll regarding future presidential elections is eye opening. Slightly more than half (51%) of respondents thought “losses will be accepted peacefully.” The remaining 49% thought “there will be violence over losses.”
That’s American Civil War language. That language and the poll responses are direct results of the MAGA movement and of it’s leader.
January 6th Condemnation ==> Acceptance
The initial response from many high ranking Republicans to the January 6th attack was either condemnation or silence. In the near immediate aftermath of the attack, leaders of both chambers of Congress condemned the attacks.
They both blamed then President Trump.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell – January 2021
President Trump claims the election was stolen. The assertions range from specific local allegations to Constitutional arguments to sweeping conspiracy theories.
Mitch McConnell Senate Floor opening remarks – January 6th, 2021
Dozens of lawsuits received hearings and courtrooms all across our country.
But over and over, the courts rejected these claims, including all star judges that the president himself had nominated.
Nothing before us proves illegality anywhere near the massive scale … that would have tipped the entire election.
Nor can the public doubt alone justify a radical break, when the doubt itself was incited without any evidence.
The mob was fed lies.
Mitch McConnell Senate Floor speech January 19, 2021
They were provoked by the president and other powerful people, and they tried to use fear and violence to stop a specific proceeding of the first branch of the federal government, which they did not like.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy – January 2021
This is so un-American,.
Kevin McCarthy from an undisclosed location to Fox News – January 6th, 2021
I condemn any of this violence.
I could not be sadder or more disappointed with the way our country looks right now. People are getting hurt.
Anyone involved in this, if you’re hearing me, hear me loud and clear: This is not the American way. This is not protected by the First Amendment. This must stop now.
I say he (Trump) has responsibility.
Kevin McCarthy in a KERN (Bakersfield, CA) radio interview – January 12, 2021
He told me personally that he does have some responsibility.
I think a lot of people do.
The president bears responsibility for Wednesday’s attack on Congress by mob rioters. He should have immediately denounced the mob when he saw what was unfolding. These facts require immediate action by President Trump.
Kevin McCarthy on the House floor – January 13, 2021
(Trump needs to) accept his share of responsibility, quell the brewing unrest and ensure President-Elect Joe Biden is able to successfully begin his term.
Some say the riots were caused by antifa. There is absolutely no evidence of that. Conservatives should be the first to say so.
The Republican leadership of Congress condemned the actions of a violent mob attacking THEM pursuing their responsibilities to all American people. There isn’t a whiff of equivocation from either man. Many of their Republican colleagues were loudly of the same opinion.
The passage of time and the inner workings of the MAGA movement were brought to bear on those who chose a path of resistance.
Kevin McCarthy Kisses The Ring
Kevin McCarthy’s opinion of the January 6th attack didn’t hold out very long. In the wake of ten House Republicans voting to impeach Trump, McCarthy traveled to Florida to visit the former president at his house.
The visit came 16 days after McCarthy said Trump had admitted he bore responsibility for the attack. It was 15 days after Kevin blamed Trump on the House floor and then called for him to reduce the temperature of his MAGA faithful.
Trump is famously thin-skinned and demanding of absolute loyalty. That loyalty, once given, is rarely (if ever) returned and is proven to be fragile when things get squirrelly.
In short, there is no chance McCarthy’s Mar-A-Lago jaunt was anything but supplication to the de-facto MAGA and Republican party leader. Bending his knee to Trump would bring rewards of firehoses of small donations and an endorsement for Speaker of the House if the Republicans won the majority in 2022.
Today, President Trump committed to helping elect Republicans in the House and Senate in 2022.
Kevin McCarthy after his January 28, 2021 Mar-A-Lago meeting with Trump
A Republican majority will listen to our fellow Americans and solve the challenges facing our nation.
Kevin McCarthy did eventually gain the House Speaker position, but only after an historic number of voting rounds.
As far as loyalty returned, Donald Trump did nothing to quell the unrest with the MAGA Republican foes of McCarthy to ease the path to the speakership. Trump also stayed on the sidelines when the same MAGA Republicans led by Matt Gaetz voted to oust McCarthy from the speakership. You’d think that would be a teaching moment for McCarthy and others regarding Trump one-way loyalty, but it will not be. Guaranteed.
Trump’s Second Impeachment
The second impeachment of Donald Trump as it pertains to further galvanization of MAGA culture is a larger topic worthy of a later Season Two episode. It’s pertinent to the current topic because it marked further divergence from fact and it pertains directly to a current case before the U.S. Court of Appeals in D.C.
Donald Trump’s lawyers state their client has presidential immunity from criminal prosecution for his alleged crimes related to the January 6 insurrection attempt. Their argument is the former president cannot be prosecuted for ANY crime unless he has first been impeached and convicted. The end result would be that a sitting president would be immune unless the House impeached him or her AND two thirds of the Senate convicted him or her.
Mitch McConnell had been coy about how he would vote should the House impeach Trump for his role in January 6th. The House did exactly that January 13, 2021, a week before Trump’s term expired. McConnell voted to acquit Trump that same day, with Senate voting 57-43 to let Trump off the hook. McConnell did have some strong words explaining his actions that day, including the reason for his vote.
(the rioters were) fed wild falsehoods by the most powerful man on Earth. Because he was angry he’d lost an election.
Former President Trump’s actions that preceded the riot were a disgraceful, disgraceful dereliction of duty. Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day.
… impeachment was never meant to be the final forum for American justice. We have a criminal justice system in this country. We have civil litigation. And former Presidents are not immune from being held accountable by either one.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell – floor speech, January 13, 2021
The belief McConnell expressed about the role of impeachment versus judicial prosecution after the president exited office may be important as the immunity appeals work their way to, perhaps, the Supreme Court.
To his credit, McConnell has remained steadfast in his assertions regarding the former president.
The FBI Instigated The January 6th Attack
A quarter of Americans polled recently believe the FBI instigated the January 6th attack. Trump voters are different, 44 percent of them believe it.
The poll questions went further to discover the primary news source of the respondents.
The Post-UMD poll finds 39 percent of Americans who say Fox News is their primary news source believe the FBI organized and encouraged the Jan. 6 attack, compared with 16 percent of CNN or MSNBC viewers and 13 percent who get most of their news from ABC, CBS or NBC.
A quarter of Americans believe FBI instigated Jan. 6, Post-UMD poll finds
The above results are entirely predictable.
Fox News Amplifies One Website Story
The source of the FBI story is a June 14, 2021 story on a right wing website run by Darren Beattie. Beattie is a former Trump and Gaetz speechwriter. The White House fired him in 2018 for his attendance and panel appearance at a white nationalist meeting. Trump then rehired Beattie in 2020 for an organization dedicated to preserving overseas Holocaust memorials.
Because of his political experience, Beattie had the chops to construct a false flag narrative plausible to many people. His story has citations in it to build the image of a journalist rather than a propagandist at work. Stories like this are pervasive and impossible to debunk once repeated by a “telephone game” to target MAGA consumers.
The root premise of the lie is easier to sell because of a basis in a single fact. The FBI was watching the proliferation of right wing paramilitary organizations willing to directly attack government targets. To forestall the actions of these groups, they installed undercover operatives. These operatives were successful thwarting a plot to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer. That success became a platform Beattie used to build his conspiracy claims. For example, he postulated FBI operatives encouraged the action and entrapped conspirators because they were embedded.
Fox News Puts FBI Misinformation Into Heavy Rotation
Federal agents directly incited people on Jan. 6, 2021, and “intentionally entrapped” American citizens.
Tucker Carlson – Patriot Purge series released November, 2021
While it may not be the first time Fox News pushed the false FBI story, Fox commentator Tucker Carlson put his shoulder to the wheel and pushed hard. Carlson produced a three part documentary “Patriot Purge” for the Fox News subscription service. In it, he included a Beattie interview that gave voice to conspiracy theories put forth in the blog piece. It has all been thoroughly debunked, but the damage was done once it hit the air.
Republicans Amplify The FBI Influence Story
The usual people began spamming social media with finger pointing at the FBI using the Beattie piece as “evidence”. Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz tweeted about it the next day using a clip from Carlson’s show on Fox. That post was retweeted 7,600 times, “liked” 14,000.
Georgie Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene then retweeted Gaetz’s post the next day to keep the ball rolling. Her retweet was retweeted 4,200 times, “liked” 9,000.
The exposure for a complete set of lies professionally packaged by a major network employee that TWO people managed is impressive. The Gaetz tweet and the retweet by Greene account for 11,800 impressions of misinformation. Lies. Each of those nearly 12,000 impressions on ONE platform could have then been spread another “x” times within days.
Matt lies, Math Doesn’t
That’s how things go viral on social media. It’s a coordinated effort to influence people with repetition of statements they want to believe. Triggering anger results in further spreading of the story. It doesn’t even matter if the retweeter hated the message and posted it angrily. That misinformation becomes widely accepted by the target culture, the MAGA culture in this case.
Gaetz took his support a step further, though. He sent a letter to Christopher Wray, the Trump-appointed director of the FBI, on June 15, 2021. In the letter, Gaetz demanded answers to his three questions by August 1. Gaetz demanded to know how many federal undercover agents or operatives were present at the Capitol during the “siege” (quotation marks Gaetz’s) and what roles did they play. Click here for an image of that letter.
The Fake FBI Story Is Baked In The MAGA Mind
The misinformation of the FBI being responsible for the attempted insurrection has become a “fact” in the MAGA world. The MAGA culture attack on law enforcement institutions like the FBI benefits one person more than any other, Donald Trump.
By the way, there was Antifa, there was FBI, there were a lot of other people there too leading the charge. You saw the same people that I did.
Donald Trump campaign in Sioux Center, Iowa – January 5, 2024
January 6th Attack Criminals Are Hostages
A barbaric Hamas attack featuring a hostage taking event war triggered a war in the Middle East, still expanding as of this writing.
Trump and his associates are obviously aware of the war. Because of this, they’re aware the word “hostage” is active and explosive enough to use as a culture war trigger word. This proved out on the campaign trail and elsewhere.
The J6 hostages, I call them. Nobody’s been treated ever in history so badly as those people.
Donald Trump campaign rally in Iowa – January 5, 2024
(their imprisonment) will go down as one of the saddest things in the history of our country. And they went there to protest a rigged election.
They ought to release the J6 hostages. I call them hostages. Some people call them prisoners. I call them hostages. Release the J6 hostages, Joe. Release them, Joe. You could do it real easy, Joe.
Donald Trump campaign rally in Iowa – January 6, 2024
A narrative thus blessed by Trump is injected into the MAGA spin machine by other Republicans.
Kentucky Republicans passed a House resolution on January 6th, 2024 declaring the party believes protesters (emphasis mine) are being wrongfully detained for exercising their constitutional rights. The resolution was identical to another introduce in the state Senate. The resolution states many Americans are having their First, Fifth and 14th constitutional amendment rights stripped of them by being “held without due process” for exercising their right to free speech.
Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik represents a rural area of upstate New York, much of it within the visit worthy Adirondack Park. It’s very conservative and went for Trump in both 2016 and 2020. Stefanik has lately become a very public facing spokesperson for the MAGA ideology and former president Trump.
Kristen Welker:
Do you think that the people who stormed the Capitol should be held responsible to the full extent of the law –Rep. Elise Stefanik (R, NY):
Meet The Press – NBC – January
I have concerns about the treatment of January 6th hostages. I have concerns – we have a role in Congress of oversight over our treatments of prisoners. And I believe that we’re seeing the weaponization of the federal government against not just President Trump, but we’re seeing it against conservatives. We’re seeing it against Catholics.
MAGA Rewrites An Event Televised Live
The former president watched the events of January 6th, the events for which he has been indicted, unfold on live television as did millions worldwide. Trump was the only one of those millions with the power to stop those events with one tweet. He did not, going to so far as to respond “So what?” when informed Pence was in danger of being hanged by the rioters.
Tune in to Fox News or any other similar media outlet expecting to hear any mention of that and you will be disappointed.
The Speed Of Misinformation
Technology accelerates broadening the rift between two well defined factions, both fueled by anger that can be agitated quickly.
Are you going to believe me, or are you going to believe your eyes?
Chico Marx – Duck Soup
The MAGA side of the rift, however, is populated with individuals cut out of the herd by constant references to an expanding culture war. People are free to believe anything as they are free to vote for a candidate they choose. The problem is how much of the belief system is built upon a foundation of fiction.
The proliferation of false information and the speed at which it travels makes the problem of misinformation exponentially worse than ever before. Purposeful disinformation campaigns are being waged by numerous financed and organized of resources with a robust infrastructure at their disposal. That machine can be activated in moments to manufacture “truth” from obvious falsehoods in minutes.
January 6th Accuracy Is Important
The January 6th disinformation campaign is worth noting as an outlier because the entire event was televised live. Many of us watched it unfold from the rally speech until the election was finally ratified by Congress.
The success of the MAGA spin machine is impressive. Some MAGA people believe it was some tourists getting a little rowdy. Ignoring or minimizing the level of violence is necessary. Disregarding organized militia members wearing tactical gear ascending the Capitol steps in single file is mandatory.
Proving truth has no chance of penetrating the MAGA culture war fog. Debunking projects, no matter how thorough, are useless for that purpose. As for one of the most important events in recent history, the MAGA mind is now corrupted.
Research and Supporting Information
- Unindicted Co-Conspirators in 1/6 Cases Raise Disturbing Questions of Federal Foreknowledge – Revolver News
- Why the new false flag conspiracy theory that FBI orchestrated Capitol attack is wrong – Politifact
- CBS News poll on Jan. 6th attack 3 years later – CBS News
- Dec. 14-18, 2023, Washington Post-University of Maryland poll – Washington Post
- Senator McConnell on Attack on the U.S. Capitol – CSPAN
- McConnell Condemns Republican Objections To Electoral College Results – NPR
- GOP leader describes Capitol chaos as ‘un-American’ – The Hill
- McCarthy says Trump ‘bears responsibility’ for Capitol riot – Politico
- McCarthy and Trump discuss Republicans’ plans to win House majority at Florida meeting Thursday – CNN
- Three ‘Trump-said-what?’ statements in weekend of rallies across first-up Iowa – Palm Beach Post
- Meet the Press – January 7, 2024 – NBC
- Kentucky GOP passes resolution recognizing Jan. 6 protestors as ‘unconstitutionally held’ – Spectrum News
- Federal agents directly incited people on January 6th, 2021, and “intentionally entrapped” American citizens. – Politifact
- Tucker Carlson’s wild, baseless theory blaming the FBI for organizing the Jan. 6 Capitol riot – Washington Post
- Standing By: Right-Wing Militia Groups and the United States Election – ACLED
- McConnell blames Trump but voted not guilty anyway – CNN