Raw Story

MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell pleaded with Donald Trump to put him "in charge" of U.S. elections if the former president is reelected.

Despite Steve Bannon's imprisonment, Lindell appeared on the War Room podcast on Tuesday with guest host Jack Posobiec.

Lindell was scheduled to speak at a Trump rally later in the day, the guest host noted.

"We all know that President Trump is announcing his vice president very soon here," Posobiec pointed out. "Mike Lindell, can you confirm, have you been asked by President Trump to be his running mate on the ticket for 2024?"

"No, I haven't," Lindell replied. "I have not been asked, you guys."

"And I will tell you this," he added, "if he asks me to do anything, I'm hoping it's when we get this, when he gets in, that he puts me in charge of our elections and where we can get our election platforms completely fixed."

ALSO READ: Rep. Byron Donalds, his gigantic Jim Crow myth and a forgotten fact about Black voters

Lindell argued that his so-called Election Crime Bureau should be rolled into the Department of Homeland Security.

"And so that's what I hope that he would do, would have a place for me there, because, in the last three years, I've lived and breathed it," he insisted. "I know what we need to have secure elections, and I really think I could do a great job of getting this country to a great place."

Last month, Lindell said God had given him a plan to "deputize" Trump voters in an effort to prevent election fraud.

Watch the video below from Real America's Voice.

A Republican Senator was subjected to ridicule and scorn at the hands of his own constituents after he declared Monday night that he was advocating openly for "christian nationalism."

U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) made this claim at a gala hosted by the public affairs institute National Conservatism Conference in Washington D.C.

"Some will say I'm calling America a Christian nation, and so I am," Hawley told attendees "Some will say I'm advocating Christian nationalism. And so I do."

Christian nationalism has been dubbed the "single biggest threat" to religious freedom in the U.S. with its condemnation of the LGBTQ community and links to neo-Nazis.

Hawley's remark caught the eye of his Missouri constituents who shared his statement on a state Reddit group Tuesday morning with the question "What do you call Josh Hawley?

Reddit users were quick to flood the feed with accusations of political hypocrisy with self-serving rather than Christian values, with more than 400 responses in about three hours.

"I met him at an industry event right after he was elected the first time," wrote user AnxiousLeisureSuitAnxiousLeisureSuit. "He told us he believed in our cause and would fight to support us, then voted against our bill just a few weeks later. Also I shook his hand and it felt like a cold, raw chicken breast."

"The man says whatever people in front of him want to hear and then does the opposite when voting in the Senate," replied This- Dragonfruit-810. "I’m genuinely shocked more people aren’t outraged at the BS he’s pulled."

Insults hurled at the Republican lawmaker included "Christofascist traitor," "Virginian con artist," and "sycophantic fascist coward."

"Christian Nationalist is Nazi terminology," added user SlothfulKoala. "So I’ll go with Nazi."

Another redditer identified themself as a conservative to condemn the melding of religion and government.

"I am conservative, but I also understand that one of the main principles that the US was founded on is the freedom of religion," they wrote. "In fact, forcing religious beliefs onto people is what the people on the Mayflower were escaping when they came here."

ALSO READ: Attention Lincoln and Reagan: GOP senators scramble history with Trump greatness claim

This is not the first time Hawley outraged constituents. In 2020, news broke that the Republican lawmaker was registered to vote at his sister's Missouri address while in ownership of a $1.3 million house in northern Virginia where may have resided full time.

Nor were his fellow Missourians the lone group to raise an uproar over his Christian nationalism remarks.

New Republic writer Hafiz Rashid called his comment "terrifying."

Yale Review editor James Surowiecki said on X he found Hawley's remark "Historically inaccurate and ethically repulsive."

"Hawley claiming that rationalist deists like Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, and James Madison were 'Christian nationalists' is an embarrassing attempt to rewrite American history to suit his revanchist, ideological zealotry," he added.

"Hawley should read Washington's letter to the Jewish community of Newport, which says that religious freedom in the US is not a matter of Christians indulging non-Christians, but rather an assertion that the only thing required to be an American is that people be 'good citizens.'"

Hawley is up for reelection in November and faces a strong challenge from Democrat Lucas Kunce, a Marine veteran.

Donald Trump's former lawyer Michael Cohen gave a stark warning Tuesday to Americans who are growing nervous about warning of revenge in a second term: it's no joke.

White House correspondent and analyst Brian Karem spoke with Cohen for Salon, during which Cohen pressed voters to understand that Trump has already delivered on his promises to go after his enemies.

"When Donald Trump turns around and says that he's going to use SEAL Team Six as his own private force to incarcerate his political opponents, and the comment that people make is, 'You know Donald, he just talks stupid s--t. He's not going to do anything,' the point of the unconstitutional remand of me is don't discount what he's telling you," said Cohen.

"He's already foreshadowing what he intends to do. And when you say, 'That's not possible. He won't do it. He can't do it.” He's already done it to me. It was a practice run."

Cohen said Trump knows how to do it now, and he's not afraid to appoint people to help with his efforts.

Recently he's mentioned plans to target former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY), who was kicked out of the Republican House leadership after she agreed to serve on a committee to investigate Trump's attempt to overthrow the 2020 election. Trump's former vice president, Mike Pence, became a target when Trump railed against him on social media on Jan. 6. The crowd chanted "Hang Mike Pence" and erected a gallows outside the U.S. Capitol.

"Why people want to ignore, when the guy is telling you himself what he wants to do, I do not understand," Cohen continued. "It makes no sense. And this is what the White House needs to put forth to the American people: You cannot sit back and do nothing."

Writing in his book "Revenge," Cohen talked about life as a Trump target behind bars. The Department of Justice, down to a Bureau of Prisons employee, tried to force the ex-Trump lawyer to sign away his First Amendment rights to score his freedom. Cohen believes Trump was using the government against him to keep him quiet about the plethora of things he watched Trump do over the years.

Now, as the election approaches, Cohen isn't afraid to admit that he's considered asylum if Trump takes office in 2025.

Cohen told Raw Story that, after his lawsuit against Trump was dismissed, no Trump foe was safe.

"It's a terrible, terrible decision," Cohen said. "This goes well past me."

Journalists writing for non-state outlets in Russia and Hungary have been targeted or jailed. Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich has been in a Russian prison since March 2023. Putin has claimed he's a spy and not a reporter.

During her Monday show, MSNBC host Nicolle Wallace confessed that Trump's promises of revenge are making her two-journalist household nervous about what could happen under a new Trump regime.

Read also: 'Radioactive for the Republican Party': Trump's 'woman problem' said to be worsening'

See the full interview with Cohen below or at the link here.

“Lied about every single thing”: Michael Cohen on Trump's debate performance www.youtube.com

Confronted on CNN by chilling comments made by the architect behind the authoritarian Project 2025 hinting at bloodshed if Donald Trump is not re-elected, the best Sen. Marco Rubio could come up with was, "Think tanks do think tanks stuff."

The Florida Republican was put on the spot on CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday when host Dana Bash played a clip of Heritage Foundation president Kevin Roberts telling a Real America News host, "We are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless ― if the left allows it to be."

With Project 2025 stocked with multiple former Donald Trump aides, Bash pressed Rubio, who is in the running to be Trump's running mate, with, "Are you comfortable with that?"

"Well, he's not running for president is he?' Rubio attempted "I mean our candidate is Donald Trump. I didn't hear Donald Trump say that. Donald Trump's running on common sense, on restoring common sense versus the lunacy of the last four years and the far left and the shadow government that now is running our country. "

"Think tanks do think tank stuff, they come up with ideas, they say things," he continued. "Look, I like Heritage Foundation. I agree with some of the things they stand for, but there's a bunch of scholars and people to turn around and work on different projects, but our candidate for president is Donald Trump and Donald Trump is running on restoring common sense, working-class values and making decisions on the basis of that, not an ideological lunacy, which is what we've seen over the last four years."

"Is that what Project 2025 is? An ideological lunacy?" Bash retorted.

"No, I think it's the work of a think tank of center-right think tank and that's what think tanks do.," Rubio demurred.

Watch below or at the link.

CNN 07 07 2024 09 22 59 youtu.be

Tank tracks still fresh on his field in southern Gaza’s coastal area of Al-Mawasi, Nedal Abu Jazar lamented the damage war has wrought on his trees and crops.

“Look at the destruction,” the 39-year-old farmer told AFP, holding an uprooted tomato plant.He pointed to his greenhouse’s metal frame and its white plastic sheeting strewn across the plot, inside an area designated a humanitarian zone by the Israeli army “People were sitting peacefully on their farmland … and suddenly tanks arrived and fired at us, and then there were (air) strikes.”

Abu Jazar said the Israeli operation in late June destroyed about 40 dunams (10 acres) of land and killed five labourers.

His is not an isolated case. Across Gaza, 57 percent of agricultural land has been damaged since the war began, according to a joint assessment published in June by the UN’s agriculture and satellite imagery agencies, FAO and UNOSAT.

The damage threatens Gaza’s food sovereignty, Matieu Henry of the Food and Agriculture Organization told AFP, because 30 percent of the Palestinian territory’s food consumption comes from agricultural land.

“If almost 60 percent of the agricultural land has been damaged, this may have a significant impact in terms of food security and food supply.”

The Gaza Strip exported $44.6 million worth of produce in 2022, mainly to the West Bank and Israel, with strawberries and tomatoes representing 60 percent of the total, according to FAO data.

That number fell to zero after the October 7 attack on southern Israel that resulted in the deaths of 1,195 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 38,098 people, also mostly civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.

The damage assessment on the agricultural land comes as the UN’s hunger monitoring system estimated in June that 96 percent of Gaza faces high levels of acute food insecurity.

Contacted by AFP, the Israeli army said it “does not intentionally harm agricultural land”.

In a statement, it said Hamas “often operates from within orchards, fields and agricultural land."

No work, no income

The impact is worse in the Palestinian territory’s north, where 68 percent of agricultural land is damaged, although the southern area encompassing parts of Al-Mawasi has seen the most significant increase in recent months due to military operations.

UNOSAT’s Lars Bromley told AFP the damage is generally “due to the impact of activities such as heavy vehicle activity, bombing, shelling, and other conflict-related dynamics, which would be things like areas burning.”

Near the southern city of Rafah, 34-year-old farmer Ibrahim Dheir feels helpless after the destruction of 20 dunams (five acres) of land he used to lease, and all his farming equipment with it.

“As soon as the Israeli bulldozers and tanks entered the area, they began bulldozing cultivated lands with various trees, including fruits, citrus, guava, as well as crops like spinach, molokhia (jute mallow), eggplant, squash, pumpkin and sunflower seedlings,” he said, before listing more damage in a testimony of the area’s past agricultural abundance.

Dheir, whose family exported its produce to the West Bank and Israel, now feels destitute.

“We used to depend on agriculture for our livelihood day by day, but now there’s no work or income.”

Lasting damage

Farmer Abu Mahmoud Za’arab also finds himself with “no source of income”.

The 60-year-old owns 15 dunams (3.7 acres) of land on which crops and fruit trees used to grow.

“The Israeli army passed through the land, completely wiping out all trees and crops,” he told AFP.

“They bulldozed and shelled the land, turning it into barren pits.”

The harm done to farmland in Gaza will last far beyond tank tracks and explosions, said Bromley of UNOSAT.

“With modern weaponry, a certain percentage is always going to fail. Tank shells won’t explode, artillery shells won’t explode … so clearing that unexploded ordnance is a massive task,” he said.

It will require “probing every centimetre of the soil before you can allow the farmers back onto it”.

Despite the risks, Dheir wants to return to farming.

“We want the war to stop and things to return to how they were so we can farm and cultivate our lands again.”

John Ullyot, a former aide to Donald Trump, was scolded Sunday after he attacked Vice President Kamala Harris as a "DEI hire."

During a panel discussion on Newsmax, Ullyot claimed that former President Barack Obama was running a "monarchy" that would select the Democratic presidential nominee.

"Barack Obama, with his henchmen, his aides, have been running the show under President Biden, and now you've got a situation where it's really up to him who it's gonna be," Ullyot said. "But bottom line here is that it's gonna go to Kamala, if anybody, because she was a DEI hire."

"She was hired because President Biden said when he was a candidate that he wanted to hire a woman to be his number two, and then after the BLM riots, then he got a lot of pressure to have a Black woman from a lot of Black women's groups, and he did that," he added.

Newsmax host Sarah Williamson and Democratic columnist Ellis Henican condemned Ullyot's remarks.

"Okay, the DEI thing I strongly disagree with here, but this is not my place to have the disagreement," Williamson said.

"Yeah," Henican agreed. "You shouldn't talk, John, you shouldn't talk like that. It makes you sound like a racist. Don't talk like that."

ALSO READ: Why I'm sticking with Joe Biden

"Look, it's the party that embraces DEI," Ullyot replied. "Those are the guys that put identity above qualifications."

"Don't talk like that," Henican insisted. "In the end, the reality is that whichever one of these candidates is being focused on, that's who's in trouble."

"So this week, it's been Biden," he continued. "He had a rotten debate performance. But next week, Trump will say something like, oh, maybe we should execute the daughter of the former Republican vice president."

Over the weekend, Fox News contributor Charlie Gasparino also attributed Harris's vice presidency to Diversity ­Equity and Inclusion policies.

"The American public may soon be subjected to DEI writ large in the next president of the United States, if Kamala Harris finds her way to the top of the Democratic ticket while Joe Biden wilts away as the party’s presidential nominee after his horrific ­debate performance," Gasparino wrote for the New York Post.

Watch the video below from Newsmax or at the link.