Month: September 2021

This show concept from CBS sounds like something out of an early George Carlin comedy bit:

Welcome to Divorce Game, brought to you by National Van Lines! Yes sir! If you’re breaking up a home, let National break it up for you!

“The Activist’ has to be most tasteless game-show concept since George Carlin’s “Divorce Game.” Carlin’s was satire. CBS was serious. No, really:

A series that was set to pit activists against each other in pursuit of funding for their causes will instead be a documentary after social media backlash forced the show’s creators to admit that they “got it wrong.”

Global Citizen, the anti-poverty charity and organizer of global fundraiser concerts, co-produced the show.

The initial concept was a five-week reality show that would chronicle six activists facing off in challenges. Their success would be measured in metrics including performance on social media.

The format was immediately met with criticism for both the idea and the judges attached. Cristina Jiménez, cofounder of United We Dream, a youth-led advocacy group for immigrant children, described the show as a “mockery” of the work activists do.

“This is sickening. Are we in the hunger games? Individuals on this panel are questionable. Lol Priyanka Chopra supporting activism?” wrote one person online.

As first reported in Variety, the show will now be a primetime documentary special highlighting the work of six activists and their causes, and all the activists will receive a cash grant.

Whoever greenlit this project at CBS has already updated her/his resume.

Variety has more:

Global Citizen released its own separate statement that included an apology. “Global activism centers on collaboration and cooperation, not competition. We apologize to the activists, hosts, and the larger activist community — we got it wrong,” the philanthropic org said. “It is our responsibility to use this platform in the most effective way to realize change and elevate the incredible activists dedicating their lives to progress all around the world.”

Vulture recounts how the show pitched itself to climate activist Clover Hogan, executive director of Force of Nature, as one that “would bring together activists to collaborate and promote their causes.” Then, as the conversation wound on, it became clear that “the show would set the activists against each other in pursuit of funding.”

Hogan reflects:

There are going to be examples, time and time again, of corporations or private interests trying to commodify, trying to exploit. It’s great that we experience those heated feelings in response, but we need to learn how to channel them into action. Hold these companies and interests accountable. Call them out. The conversation starts with this, but it shouldn’t end with it. Our final goal shouldn’t just be to cancel a TV show. It should be much bigger commentary around what’s not right with the entertainment industry. Why activism is so under-resourced. I’d love for this to be that catalyst.

If corporations are persons, they have no souls. But you knew that. I spent nearly half a century working in and for them. Wouldn’t trust them farther than I can throw them. CBS, I get….

Caveat employee.

There’s something almost desperate about this:

Watch Newsmax host cut the feed and scream at a veteran guest for offering a mild critique of Trump pic.twitter.com/xozk1f5kzH

— Jason S. Campbell (@JasonSCampbell) September 16, 2021

These people are out of their minds. I don’t think this guy is like Tucker Carlson a cynical, opportunistic hack. He’s a believer:

Eventually, the vehemently pro-Trump Newsmax host began prodding Saboe to criticize the Biden administration for the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan and the evacuation crisis that followed.

“I think you and I can both agree this never needed to happen. If the government knew what it was doing, we wouldn’t have Americans in this situation,” Stinchfield said.

“Yeah, I agree with that,” Saboe replied. “I think multiple administrations leading up to this had multiple opportunities to try to set this up for success. And I think that’s not happened, and right now we as a country need to come together and help these people, our allies.”

Stinchfield, meanwhile, took that as an opportunity to heap more praise upon his MAGA icon, saying that “this didn’t happen under President Trump” even though Trump “wanted out of Afghanistan real bad.” He then added that the ex-president didn’t pull out of Afghanistan because “he knew this would happen.” (The Trump administration negotiated the peace agreement with the Taliban in Feb. 2020, which included a promise to reduce troops and eventually withdraw completely by May 1, 2021. It’s also been reported that Trump tried to fully withdraw by Jan. 15 of this year.)

The Newsmax star reiterated that he believes “this is a hostage situation,” and declared his respect for the work Saboe has done in getting Americans out of the country. But the tone wildly shifted as soon as the former Army captain brought up the fact that Trump drastically decreased the number of special immigrant visas given to Afghan allies.

“We do respect, Grant, that veterans—and I being one—and our friends are over there,” Saboe said. “We follow this closely from multiple administrations, and we know that Trump administration’s efforts here were fairly weak, that they were trying to limit the number of people that would get out and so there were coordination problems.”

An enraged Stinchfield immediately attempted to interject, first claiming they were running short on time before seemingly losing his temper and demanding producers ditch Saboe’s feed.

“Cut him off, please. Cut him off now! Cut him off now,” the conservative host shouted. “You’re not going to blame this on President Trump on my show!”

While pointing his finger into the camera, Stinchfield continued to scream:” I appreciate the work that you’re going. God bless you for being a veteran, god bless you for trying to get Americans out, but don’t come on this program and take the talking points of the left and blame President Trump! That’s not helping anybody.”

The former NRA-TV host would continue his tirade a while longer—despite previously claiming he was out of time. He complained that Saboe didn’t call Americans stuck in Afghanistan “hostages” while lecturing the war veteran, whom he had just kicked off the air, for not fully blaming the entire situation on the Biden administration.

“I’m mad about that, man. I really am!” Stinchfield fumed in conclusion.

By the way, the word is that the White Power types are organizing against Afghan refugees. I wonder what side this guy will end up on?

There have been oceans of ink spilled trying to figure out what makes Tucker Carlson tick. It turns out that it’s the same thing that makes Lindsey Graham tick and Marco Rubio tick and all the rest of the right wing rank opportunists who simply have no morals or principles: fame, money, influence. This piece in the New Republic gets to the nub of it:

In February 2009, when he took the stage at the Conservative Political Action Conference, Tucker Carlson was in the midst of an identity crisis. Five years earlier, he had been a victim of what was arguably the first viral takedown of the internet era. Jon Stewart, then at the height of his Daily Show fame, appeared on CNN’s Crossfire, told the hosts they were ruining the country, and singled out Carlson in particular as a “dick.” Crossfire limped along for three more months before being canceled. Carlson then spent the next four years in the wilderness, appearing on Dancing With the Stars and hosting Tucker, which was canceled for low ratings in early 2008, on MSNBC, still a year or two away from deciding it would be the liberal cable news network. In 2003, a fresh-faced 34-year-old Carlson had released a memoir, Politicians, Partisans, and Parasites, which cataloged and celebrated his meteoric rise through the burgeoning world of cable news. Now, however, Carlson was on the verge of flaming out.

“I don’t want to hurt anybody’s feelings, but I lived here in the 1990s and I saw conservatives create many of their own media organizations,” Carlson said in 2009, at Washington’s Omni Shoreham Hotel. “I saw many of those organizations prosper, and I saw some of them fail. And here’s the difference: The ones that failed refused to put accuracy first. This is the hard truth that conservatives need to deal with. I’m as conservative as any person in this room—I’m literally in the process of stockpiling weapons and food and moving to Idaho, so I am not in any way going to take a second seat to anyone in this room ideologically.” Watching the clip today, one can feel Carlson’s agitation; trained in the measured pace of TV speak—speaking too slowly makes you seem dumb, while speaking too quickly makes you seem nervous—he is talking at a speed somewhere between Lionel Messi and Usain Bolt.

“If you create a news organization whose primary objective is not to deliver accurate news, you will fail,” Carlson said, his voice building to crescendo. “The New York Times is a liberal paper … but it’s also a paper that cares about whether they spell people’s names right; it’s a paper that cares about accuracy. Conservatives need to build institutions that mirror those institutions.”

The audience booed. Then the heckling started. Carlson attempted to defend himself. “I’m merely saying that at the core of their news gathering is gathering news!” he yelped at one inaudible audience member. “Why aren’t there outlets that don’t just comment on the news, but dig it up and make it?”

Today, Carlson is the most important right-wing voice in the country. He has leapfrogged over Sean Hannity and Fox News’s other stars. Rising voices on the right, many mirroring Carlson’s faux-populist shtick, remain in his shadow. In July, Carlson drew more than three million viewers per night in his 8 p.m. Eastern slot, crushing competitors Chris Hayes (1.4 million) and Anderson Cooper (947,000).

On Fox, CNN’s Brian Stelter told me, Carlson “is the heir to Bill O’Reilly,” but without a boss at the network like Roger Ailes, Carlson “has even more power than O’Reilly ever did.” Carlson, in many ways, now occupies the space Donald Trump did only a few months ago. The outrageous things he says during his show quickly spread on Twitter. They’re blogged about as proof of just how deranged the right has become on any number of issues—crime, immigration, race, vaccines, education, health care. Often, Carlson turns that outrage into fodder for the next night’s program—a cycle resembling the one Trump rode to the White House with his rallies in 2016.

The transformation of The Daily Caller is the Rosetta Stone moment of Carlson’s career, a period during which he learned his lesson. He never sought respectability again.

But his journey to the top of conservative media began with that CPAC speech. There has always been a nastiness and racial grievance at the core of Carlson, but, for much of his early career, he also sought a degree of respectability. At the time, there was still a somewhat respectable conservative media in existence. Carlson’s wobbly ascent in right-wing media eerily reflects the gradual stripping away of that respectability, as well as its increasing radicalization.

Much more at the link.

Carlson has always gone with the flow. Now he is riding the crest of the wave as the nation’s premiere, right wing propagandist. His unique contribution is that he’s providing an intellectual rationale for the GOP’s neo-fascism by pushing The Great Replacement theory among other things.

But none of it is sincere. He is a complete phony doing it because it’s a good career move to feed the racist Republican beast lies and propaganda. I would say that he’s a lot like Donald Trump except Carlson is a lot smarter than Trump and knows exactly what he’s doing. Trump is a narcissistic,con man but in his heart he is also a true MAGA.

That’s all there is to it. Unfortunately, it doesn’t mean that it isn’t powerful. Telling the rubes the nightmarish fairy tales that stimulate their lizard brain is extremely potent. And very, very dangerous.

I don’t pretend to understand this. I always knew that conservative evangelicals were Republicans. But I had taken them at their word that they were acting on a set of conservative principles they believed were inspired by Biblical teachings. Sure, it was an identity as much as a religious affiliation but I thought it was sincere.

Their deification of Donald Trump has shown that they were not sincere. It is all identity and has nothing to do with the religion itself. If it did they would not supporting the amoral, libertine Donald Trump:

Since Donald Trump was elected president in 2016 due in part to strong support from White evangelical Protestants, many observers have wondered what impact this political alliance might have on the evangelical church in the United States. Would there be an exodus from the church on the part of those who do not share their fellow evangelicals’ enthusiasm for the former president? If so, would this leave behind a smaller evangelical population, or would any such defectors be replaced by Trump-supporting converts to evangelicalism? And would White evangelicals who backed Trump in 2016 stick with him in 2020?

Contrary to what some may have expected, a new analysis of Pew Research Center survey data finds that there has been no large-scale departure from evangelicalism among White Americans. In fact, there is solid evidence that White Americans who viewed Trump favorably and did not identify as evangelicals in 2016 were much more likely than White Trump skeptics to begin identifying as born-again or evangelical Protestants by 2020.

Additionally, the surveys do not clearly show that White evangelicals who opposed Trump were significantly more likely than Trump supporters to drop the evangelical label. The data also shows that Trump’s electoral performance among White evangelicals was even stronger in 2020 than in 2016, partially due to increased support among White voters who described themselves as evangelicals throughout this period.How we did this

These findings come from the Center’s American Trends Panel (ATP), which provides a unique window into the relationship between Trump and evangelicals because it has been collecting data from a single group of respondents at various points in time since 2014. In this analysis, we examine responses from ATP members who participated in each of two surveys – one conducted right after the 2016 election, and another conducted following the 2020 election.

“Conservative” Evangelical Christianity can no longer be considered a religion. It’s a cult. And their God is Donald Trump.

He wanted so badly to help Dear Leader pull off his coup. He just didn’t have the guts to totally usurp the constitution and become a full blown traitor to his country. Sad!

Eight months after the events of Jan. 6, former Vice President Mike Pence is generally seen as one of the key figures who did the right thing when it mattered. Despite intense political pressure, from Donald Trump and others, the Republican fulfilled his legal obligations and helped certify the results of the 2020 presidential election after the insurrectionist riot that put him in serious danger.

What we didn’t know is that Pence really didn’t want to fulfill his legal obligations.

A new book from The Washington Post’s Bob Woodward and Robert Costa includes details that haven’t previously been reported about just how eager the then-vice president was to do the wrong thing. As the Post reported yesterday:

So intent was Pence on being Trump’s loyal second-in-command — and potential successor — that he asked confidants if there were ways he could accede to Trump’s demands and avoid certifying the results of the election on Jan. 6. In late December, the authors reveal, Pence called Dan Quayle, a former vice president and fellow Indiana Republican, for advice.

Quayle, fortunately, made clear to his ally that he had no choice in how to approach his responsibilities. “Mike, you have no flexibility on this,” Quayle told Pence. “None. Zero. Forget it. Put it away,” he said.

Pence, unsatisfied and reluctant to honor his commitments, kept pushing, exploring ways to help Trump remain in power, despite having lost the election. Quayle found the ideas “preposterous and dangerous,” according to the Woodward/Costa book. Pence nevertheless inquired about whether he could perhaps delay the election certification.

“Forget it,” Quayle told him, adding, “Mike, don’t even talk about it.”

Pence reportedly replied, “You don’t know the position I’m in.”

As the world saw in January, the then-vice president ultimately played by the rules, a day after telling Trump in the Oval Office that his role was to simply “open the envelopes” as the Senate certified the results of the election.

“I don’t want to be your friend anymore if you don’t do this,” Trump reportedly replied, apparently referring to his coup scheme. He later told Pence, “You’ve betrayed us. I made you. You were nothing.”

And while reports of Trump’s child-like tantrum are hardly surprising, it’s the larger takeaway that matters: Pence has been heralded in recent months for prioritizing the rule of law, overcoming presidential pressure, and ignoring those who urged him to be corrupt. The Woodward/Costa book casts the Hoosier in a new light: Pence didn’t want to prioritize the rule of law; he was prepared to succumb to presidential pressure; and he actively explored ways to corrupt the process.

Or put another way, Pence was prepared to do the wrong thing; he just couldn’t find a credible way to pull it off. Far from the image of a heroic figure who valiantly put the integrity of our political system above all, Pence grudgingly did his duty after concluding he didn’t have a choice.

I honestly don’t know if there’s ever been a more pathetic figure in American politics. (Well — there is Lindsey Graham…) The man has no pride, no self-respect.

I had wondered about his allegedly heroic actions on January 6. He was apparently afraid that the Secret Service was going to abduct him so that the counting couldn’t continue that night. If that’s the case, he knew a coup was being attempted and he realized that he was on the wrong side of it. I guess it’s to his credit that he came back and did what he had to do that night but that’s literally the least he could do.

And after the MAGA insurrectionists, inspired by their Dear Leader, chanted “hang Mike Pence” he’s now out there trying to curry their favor. But what else is new? Trump has a way of making all these Republican officials ostentatiously lick his boots after he insulted them in the most egregious ways possible. Getting grown adults who know better to bow down to him truly is his greatest talent.

The demonstration planned for Saturday is probably going to be poorly attended. There is no draw — No stars or GOP officials are attending. And the Trumpers are being told they can’t wear their favorite costumes so what’s the point?

The extremist forums that cheered on the Jan. 6 Capitol attack have soured on the planned Saturday rally in Washington, insisting without evidence that the event is a secret government plot to arrest more people involved in the riot.

Users in extreme far-right Facebook groups and extremist forums such as TheDonald and 4chan, which previously hosted pictures of users streaming into Washington hotel rooms and even maps of the Capitol tunnel system in the days before the Jan. 6 riot, are largely steering users away from the upcoming event. 

Those posting on these forums say they largely believe the event to be a setup for a “false flag” event or “honeypot,” in which they’ll be entrapped and coerced to commit violence by federal agents.

The shift offers a window into how the dynamics among some of the most active and extremist online forums have changed in the aftermath of Jan. 6, which has led to hundreds of arrests. Paranoia drives many conversations, and it appears to be inhibiting some extremists’ ability to organize on the open web.

“Now explain how we’re supposed to protest without the FBI busting down your door and you ending up in a DC jail with no court date. I was at the Capitol on J6,” one user wrote on TheDonald. “Any protest after J6 is primed to be a false flag. And you can’t talk about that ‘next level’ here either without the feds busting down your door.”

The “Justice for J6” rally is hosted by Matt Braynard, who worked for Donald Trump’s campaign as director of data and strategy in 2016, and his organization Look Ahead America, according to its website. Look Ahead America is also planning rallies in 17 other cities across the country on the same day. He said rumors of “false flag” attacks are planted by naysayers who want Trump supporters “to be led to thinking that nonaction or violent action is the only answer.”

“There are voices on the left and the right trying to discourage patriotic Americans from believing that the election system cannot be fixed, that voting doesn’t matter, and that public demonstrations like ours are ‘false flag attacks’ and are futile,” he said.

The Department of Homeland Security has estimated about 700 people will attend the event. Law enforcement is bracing for the event by installing temporary fencing and activating an “increased presence” from the Metropolitan Police Department. 

Don’t get too excited though. The MAGAs have doubled down:

As former President Donald Trump and his allies continue to push false claims that the 2020 election was stolen by Democrats, most Republicans now think supporting Trump’s claim that he won to be a crucial part of their own partisan identity, according to a new poll.

In a new CNN poll released Sunday, 59 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents say that believing Trump won the 2020 election is “important” to being a Republican⁠—36 percent indicated that it’s “very important” and 23 percent “somewhat important.”

Of the 40 percent who say that believing Trump won is not important to being a Republican, 15 percent indicated that it’s “not too important” and 25 percent “not important at all.”

Additionally, 61 percent of Republicans consider support for Trump to be a crucial part of what it means to be a Republican—34 percent say it’s “very important” and 27 percent “somewhat important.” Only 23 percent say supporting Trump is “not at all important” to what it means to be a Republican.

Being a Trumper means never having to say you’re sorry.

I’m afraid this will be a reality for America until Trump shuffles off his mortal coil.

Heather Cox Richardson reminisces about how her Letters from an American newsletter came to be two years ago. She has persisted through the turmoil and scandal of the last two years buoyed by the kindness of her readers as we all watch to see whether government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall (or shall not) perish from the earth.

Richardson writes:

If you are tired, you have earned the right to be.

And yet, you are still here, reading.

I write these letters because I love America. I am staunchly committed to the principle of human self-determination for people of all races, genders, abilities, and ethnicities, and I believe that American democracy could be the form of government that comes closest to bringing that principle to reality. And I know that achieving that equality depends on a government shaped by fact-based debate rather than by extremist ideology and false narratives.

And so I write.

But I have come to understand that I am simply the translator for the sentiments shared by hundreds of thousands of people who are finding each other and giving voice to the principles of democracy. Your steadfast interest, curiosity, critical thinking, and especially your kindness—to me and to one another—illustrates that we have not only the power, but also the passion, to reinvent our nation.

Richardson speaks for me. Thank you for coming back, day after day, to listen to us rant.

Another Heather, this blog’s proprietor, began writing here New Year’s Day 2003 after attracting a following at Atrios’s blog. She wrote that being invited to write by Atrios was “kind of like having Eddie Van Halen invite you up on stage to join him in a guitar solo.”

That’s how I felt when Digby invited me to join her in August 2014. (We’d met at a conference in 2009.) I began writing occasional commentaries for the Asheville Citizen-Times in mid-September 2003, got named an official (unpaid) “community columnist” in 2005, and finally started up my own blog in March 2006. (It’s still out there gathering electrons.) Eventually, a local rabble-rouser invited me to join Scrutiny Hooligans (R.I.P.) before Digby asked me to fill in over a weekend. The weekend never ended. The Citizen-Times’ then-editorial editor, a Digby fan, greeted me at an event, smiled broadly, shook my hand and said, “My friend, you have arrived.”

And so I write.

Rising early to write each day, three time zones ahead of Digby, is not only a matter of passion “to reinvent our nation.” It is a matter of mental health (as much as daily exercise). In such times, I suspect it is for Richardson as well. The platform allows me to play the inside-outside game. Inside Democratic Party politics and outside throwing occasional rocks. As I told a cynical friend recently, it beats feeling like political road kill:

Sometimes in politics you get run over. But being in the fight means I stopped feeling like road kill decades ago. The antidote to cynicism and despair is stepping back into the fight the way Rick Blaine does at the end of Casablanca. I told him it’s empowering especially when you feel powerless.

Also, the struggle must bring out the Irish in me, I said.

Is this a private fight or can anyone join?

Thanks be to Digby.

White people are scared shitless of losing social status in a browning America. I’ve argued repeatedly that while a component of that involves race and racism, the deeper driver behind the freak-out is more primal: loss of power.

Shifting demographics in this country are not just statistical anymore, but increasingly visible to the naked eye. When you enter a room, skin color has long been a handy shortcut for knowing who is who in the pecking order. As the assembly grows browner, Whites worry that, should they become a minority in these United States, they will be treated like one. They know well how America treats its minorities. They and their forebears have been doing the treating since at least 1619.

Julia Craven conjectured that this year’s white freak-out over critical race theory (CRT) was about just that. She examines data from NBC News to back up that theory (Slate):

Reporters found that the districts hosting some of the most combative debates over diversity and inclusion initiatives—including just teaching about racism—have seen a steady increase in students of color attending its schools. In Gwinnett County, Georgia, where parents have squared off over critical race theory, there has been a 52.4 percent increase in students of color since 1994. And in Loudoun County, Virginia, where the rights of transgender students and teaching racism have become ugly, loud battleground issues, there has been a 29.5 percent increase in that span of time.

If you’ve been following how whiteness has evolved since the 2016 election, this isn’t surprising. But it is nice to have the numbers to back it up. It reminded one of my colleagues of a similar, equally unsurprising yet very real finding following the Capitol riot. Political scientist Robert Pape, after going through polling and demographic data, discovered that most people who participated in the riots came to D.C. from places where residents were terrified of being replaced by people of color and immigrants. More specifically, as the New York Times put it, “counties with the most significant declines in the non-Hispanic white population are the most likely to produce insurrectionists.”

“If you look back in history, there has always been a series of far-right extremist movements responding to new waves of immigration to the United States or to movements for civil rights by minority groups,” Pape told the New York Times. “You see a common pattern in the Capitol insurrectionists. They are mainly middle-class to upper-middle-class whites who are worried that, as social changes occur around them, they will see a decline in their status in the future.”

What we see is backlash. Minorities, Blacks in particular, have long served an informal function in America’s informal caste system. Their role is to remain at the bottom of the social ladder where no White people want to be.

If you can convince the lowest white man that he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll even empty his pockets for you. — Sen. Lyndon Baines Johnson of Texas to Bill Moyers (1960)

In their study, “Racial Winners and Losers in American Party Politics,” political scientists Zoltan Hajnal and Jeremy Horowitz found that blacks, Latinos and Asians fare better under Democratic presidents.

Sean McElwee, then with Demos, elaborated :

Similarly, in absolute terms, whites do better under Democratic than under Republican leadership. But that doesn’t really matter. People weigh their well-being relative to those around them. There is strong evidence that whites often oppose actions against inequality because of “last place aversion,” the desire to ensure that there is a class of people below oneself. Among white voters, racial bias is strongly correlated with lower support of redistributive programs. For example, research shows that opposition to welfare is driven by racial anger. Approximately half of the difference between social spending in the U.S. and Europe can be explained by racial animosity.

As I added:

Two of McElwee’s links go to Stanford studies suggesting how last-place aversion explains why, for example, “individuals making just above the minimum wage are the most likely to oppose its increase.” (Last-place aversion, by the way, holds “for both whites and minorities.”) It works like this (emphasis mine):

By the logic developed in the above evolutionary models, not only would humans care about relative position in general but a strong aversion to being near last place would arise because in a monogamous society with roughly balanced sex-ratios, only those at the very bottom would not marry or reproduce. Indeed, being “picked last in gym class” is so often described as a child’s worst fear that the expression has become a cliché.

Craven concludes that the CRT backlash is “an extension of those desperate grasps to maintain power and limit interactions with people of color,” and “motivated by the same desire to protect whiteness, its stature, and the privilege it bestows.“

Same as it ever was.

I’m just going to leave this here. Watch it all You won’t regret it.

Here is how the Nicki Minaj story was covered on CNC3 Television in Port of Spain, Trinidad. I assure you this is worth all 2:20 and it's probably better than any U.S. network covered the story pic.twitter.com/LjO1CMlq1z

— Timothy Burke (@bubbaprog) September 15, 2021

Not one US news net did it as well as they did with this inane story.

These people are now assiduously working to destroy the secret ballot. Democracy was nice while it lasted:

Pennsylvania Republicans moved on Wednesday to seek personal information on every voter in the state as part of a brewing partisan review of the 2020 election results, rubber-stamping more than a dozen subpoenas for driver’s license numbers and partial Social Security numbers.

The expansive request for personal information, directed at Pennsylvania’s Department of State and approved in a vote by Republicans on a State Senate subcommittee, is the first major step of the election inquiry. The move adds Pennsylvania to a growing list of states that have embarked on partisan-led reviews of the 2020 election, including a widely criticized attempt to undermine the outcome in Arizona’s largest county.

Democrats in the State Senate pledged to fight the subpoenas in court, saying at a news conference after the vote on Wednesday that the requests for identifiable personal information were an overreach, lacked authority and potentially violated federal laws protecting voter privacy.

“Senate Democrats, going forward, intend to take legal action against this gross abuse of power by filing a lawsuit, challenging in the courts, and to ask the courts to declare the Senate Republicans’ actions in violation of separation of power, as well as declaring that they had no authority to issue these subpoenas,” said State Senator Jay Costa, the minority leader.

Democrats control several of the top offices in Pennsylvania — including those of governor, attorney general and secretary of state — and it was not immediately clear what legal basis they might have to challenge the subpoenas. Nor was it clear how the transfer of information would begin to take place, if it does proceed, or which people or entities involved in the review would control the information. While the review will be funded by taxpayers, its potential cost has yet to be revealed.

The Department of State did not respond to requests for comment or issue a statement on the subpoenas.

Josh Shapiro, the attorney general of Pennsylvania and a Democrat, vowed to fight the subpoenas as well.

“There are legal consequences to turning over people’s private, personal information without their permission,” Mr. Shapiro said in an interview. “My office will not allow that to happen. And people can be assured that we will take whatever legal action necessary to protect their private personal information from this charade.”

They know this is bogus. They are intimidating voters and licking Donald Trump’s boots. That’s it.