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    Before the Capitol Riot, Calls for Cash and Talk of Revolution

    #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }Capitol Riot FalloutInside the SiegeVisual TimelineNotable ArrestsCapitol Police in CrisisAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyBefore the Capitol Riot, Calls for Cash and Talk of RevolutionA network of far-right agitators across the country spent weeks organizing and raising money for a mass action to overturn President Trump’s election loss.A conservative organizer and QAnon adherent, Keith Lee, helped rally a mob outside Congress on Jan. 6.CreditCredit…Timothy Wolfer for The New York TimesDavid D. Kirkpatrick, Mike McIntire and Jan. 16, 2021Updated 1:54 p.m. ETKeith Lee, an Air Force veteran and former police detective, spent the morning of Jan. 6 casing the entrances to the Capitol.In online videos, the 41-year-old Texan pointed out the flimsiness of the fencing. He cheered the arrival, long before President Trump’s rally at the other end of the mall, of far-right militiamen encircling the building. Then, armed with a bullhorn, Mr. Lee called out for the mob to rush in, until his voice echoed from the dome of the Rotunda.Yet even in the heat of the event, Mr. Lee paused for some impromptu fund-raising. “If you couldn’t make the trip, give five to 10 bucks,” he told his viewers, seeking donations for the legal costs of two jailed “patriots,” a leader of the far-right Proud Boys and an ally who had clashed with the police during an armed incursion at Oregon’s statehouse.Much is still unknown about the planning and financing of the storming of the Capitol, aiming to challenge Mr. Trump’s electoral defeat. What is clear is that it was driven, in part, by a largely ad hoc network of low-budget agitators, including far-right militants, Christian conservatives and ardent adherents of the QAnon conspiracy theory. Mr. Lee is all three. And the sheer breadth of the movement he joined suggests it may be far more difficult to confront than a single organization.Rioters after they breached the doors of the Capitol.Credit…Jason Andrew for The New York TimesIn the months leading up to the riot, Mr. Lee had helped organize a series of pro-Trump car caravans around the country, including one that temporarily blockaded a Biden campaign bus in Texas and another that briefly shut down a Hudson River bridge in the New York City suburbs. To help pay for dozens of caravans to meet at the Jan. 6 rally, he had teamed up with an online fund-raiser in Tampa, Fla., who secured money from small donors and claimed to pass out tens of thousands of dollars.Theirs was one of many grass-roots efforts to bring Trump supporters to the Capitol, often amid calls for revolution, if not outright violence. On an online ride-sharing forum, Patriot Caravans for 45, more than 4,000 members coordinated travel from as far away as California and South Dakota. Some 2,000 people donated at least $181,700 to another site, Wild Protest, leaving messages urging ralliers to halt the certification of the vote.Oath Keepers, a self-identified militia whose members breached the Capitol, had solicited donations online to cover “gas, airfare, hotels, food and equipment.” Many others raised money through the crowdfunding site GoFundMe or, more often, its explicitly Christian counterpart, GiveSendGo. (On Monday, the money transfer service PayPal stopped working with GiveSendGo because of its links to the violence at the Capitol.)A few prominent firebrands, an opaque pro-Trump nonprofit and at least one wealthy donor had campaigned for weeks to amplify the president’s false claims about his defeat, stoking the anger of his supporters.Amy Kremer is one of the leaders of Women for America First, which helped sponsor rallies ahead of the riot.Credit…Jacquelyn Martin/Associated PressA chief sponsor of many rallies leading up to the riot, including the one featuring the president on Jan. 6, was Women for America First, a conservative nonprofit. Its leaders include Amy Kremer, who rose to prominence in the Tea Party movement, and her daughter, Kylie Jane Kremer, 30. She started a “Stop the Steal” Facebook page on Nov. 4. More than 320,000 people signed up in less than a day, but the platform promptly shut it down for fears of inciting violence. The group has denied any violent intent.By far the most visible financial backer of Women for America First’s efforts was Mike Lindell, a founder of the MyPillow bedding company, identified on a now-defunct website as one of the “generous sponsors” of a bus tour promoting Mr. Trump’s attempt to overturn the election. In addition, he was an important supporter of Right Side Broadcasting, an obscure pro-Trump television network that provided blanket coverage of Trump rallies after the vote, and a podcast run by the former Trump adviser Stephen K. Bannon that also sponsored the bus tour.“I put everything I had into the last three weeks, financial and everything,” Mr. Lindell said in a mid-December television interview.In a tweet the same month, he urged Mr. Trump to “impose martial law” to seize ballots and voting machines. Through a representative, Mr. Lindell said he only supported the bus tour “prior to December 14th” and was not a financial sponsor of any events after that, including the rally on Jan. 6. He continues to stand by the president’s claims and met with Mr. Trump at the White House on Friday.Mike Lindell, the head of MyPillow, helped fund a bus tour that promoted President Trump’s false election claims.Credit…Erin Scott/ReutersBy late December, the president himself was injecting volatility into the organizing efforts, tweeting an invitation to a Washington rally that would take place as Congress gathered to certify the election results.“Be there, will be wild!” Mr. Trump wrote.The next day, a new website, Wild Protest, was registered and quickly emerged as an organizing hub for the president’s most zealous supporters. It appeared to be connected to Ali Alexander, a conspiracy theorist who vowed to stop the certification by “marching hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of patriots to sit their butts in D.C. and close that city down.”Mr. Alexander could not be reached for comment, but in a video posted to Twitter last week, he denied any responsibility for the violence.While other groups like Women for America First were promoting the rally where Mr. Trump would speak — at the Ellipse, about a mile west of the Capitol — the Wild Protest website directed Trump supporters to a different location: the doorsteps of Congress.Wild Protest linked to three hotels with discounted rates and another site for coordinating travel plans. It also raised donations from thousands of individuals, according to archived versions of a web portal used to collect them. The website has since been taken down, and it is not clear what the money was used for.“The time for words has passed, action alone will save our Republic,” a user donating $250 wrote, calling congressional certification of the vote “treasonous.”Another contributor gave $47 and posted: “Fight to win our country back using whatever means necessary.”Mr. Lee, who sought to raise legal-defense money the morning before the riot, did not respond to requests for comment. He has often likened supporters of overturning the election to the signers of the Declaration of Independence, and has said he is willing to give his life for the cause.A sales manager laid off at an equipment company because of the pandemic, he has said that he grew up as a conservative Christian in East Texas. Air Force records show that he enlisted a month after the Sept. 11 attacks and served for four years, leaving as a senior airman. Later, in 2011 and 2012, he worked for a private security company at a U.S. military base in Afghanistan.In between, he also worked as a police detective in McKinney, Texas.He had never been politically active, he has said. But during Mr. Trump’s presidency, Mr. Lee began to immerse himself in the online QAnon conspiracy theory. Its adherents hold that Mr. Trump is trying to save America from a shadowy ring of pedophiles who control the government and the Democratic Party. Mr. Lee has said that resonated with his experience dealing with child crimes as a police officer.His active support for Mr. Trump began last August when he organized a caravan of drivers from around the state to show their support for the president by circling the capital, Austin. That led him to found a website, MAGA Drag the Interstate, to organize Trump caravans around the country.By December, Mr. Lee had achieved enough prominence that he was included in a roster of speakers at a news conference preceding a “March for Trump” rally in Washington.“We are at this precipice” of “good versus evil,” Mr. Lee declared. “I am going to fight for my president. I am going to fight for what is right.”He threw himself into corralling fellow “patriots” to meet in Washington on Jan. 6, and at the end of last month he began linking his website with the Tampa organizer to raise money for participants’ travel..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-c7gg1r{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:0.875rem;line-height:0.875rem;margin-bottom:15px;color:#121212 !important;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-c7gg1r{font-size:0.9375rem;line-height:0.9375rem;}}.css-rqynmc{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:0.9375rem;line-height:1.25rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-rqynmc{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-rqynmc strong{font-weight:600;}.css-rqynmc em{font-style:italic;}.css-yoay6m{margin:0 auto 5px;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-yoay6m{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-1dg6kl4{margin-top:5px;margin-bottom:15px;}.css-16ed7iq{width:100%;display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;-webkit-box-pack:center;-webkit-justify-content:center;-ms-flex-pack:center;justify-content:center;padding:10px 0;background-color:white;}.css-pmm6ed{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;}.css-pmm6ed > :not(:first-child){margin-left:5px;}.css-5gimkt{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:0.8125rem;font-weight:700;-webkit-letter-spacing:0.03em;-moz-letter-spacing:0.03em;-ms-letter-spacing:0.03em;letter-spacing:0.03em;text-transform:uppercase;color:#333;}.css-5gimkt:after{content:’Collapse’;}.css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transition:all 0.5s ease;transition:all 0.5s ease;-webkit-transform:rotate(180deg);-ms-transform:rotate(180deg);transform:rotate(180deg);}.css-eb027h{max-height:5000px;-webkit-transition:max-height 0.5s ease;transition:max-height 0.5s ease;}.css-6mllg9{-webkit-transition:all 0.5s ease;transition:all 0.5s ease;position:relative;opacity:0;}.css-6mllg9:before{content:”;background-image:linear-gradient(180deg,transparent,#ffffff);background-image:-webkit-linear-gradient(270deg,rgba(255,255,255,0),#ffffff);height:80px;width:100%;position:absolute;bottom:0px;pointer-events:none;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}#masthead-bar-one{display:none;}.css-1cs27wo{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1cs27wo{padding:20px;}}.css-1cs27wo:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}.css-1cs27wo[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-1cs27wo[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-1cs27wo[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-1cs27wo[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-k9atqk{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-k9atqk strong{font-weight:700;}.css-k9atqk em{font-style:italic;}.css-k9atqk a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;border-bottom:1px solid #ccd9e3;}.css-k9atqk a:visited{color:#333;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;border-bottom:1px solid #ddd;}.css-k9atqk a:hover{border-bottom:none;}Capitol Riot FalloutFrom Riot to ImpeachmentThe riot inside the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday, Jan. 6, followed a rally at which President Trump made an inflammatory speech to his supporters, questioning the results of the election. Here’s a look at what happened and the ongoing fallout:As this video shows, poor planning and a restive crowd encouraged by President Trump set the stage for the riot.A two hour period was crucial to turning the rally into the riot.Several Trump administration officials, including cabinet members Betsy DeVos and Elaine Chao, announced that they were stepping down as a result of the riot.Federal prosecutors have charged more than 70 people, including some who appeared in viral photos and videos of the riot. Officials expect to eventually charge hundreds of others.The House voted to impeach the president on charges of “inciting an insurrection” that led to the rampage by his supporters.The fund-raiser, who has identified himself as a web designer named Thad Williams, has said in a podcast that sexual abuse as a child eventually led him to the online world of QAnon.While others “made of steel” are cut out to be “warriors against evil” and “covered in the blood and sweat of that part,” Mr. Williams said, he sees himself as more of “a chaplain and a healer.” In 2019, he set up a website to raise money for QAnon believers to travel to Trump rallies. He could not be reached for comment.Trump supporters boarded a bus from Massachusetts to Washington on the night before the riot.Credit…Joseph Prezioso/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBy the gathering at the Capitol, he claimed to have raised and distributed at least $30,000 for transportation costs. Expressions of thanks posted on Twitter appear to confirm that he allocated money, and a day after the assault the online services PayPal and Stripe shut down his accounts.Mr. Lee’s MAGA Drag the Interstate site, for its part, said it had organized car caravans of more than 600 people bound for the rally. It used military-style shorthand to designate routes in different regions across the country, from Alpha to Zulu, and a logo on the site combined Mr. Trump’s distinctive hairstyle with Pepe the Frog, a symbol of the alt-right that has been used by white supremacists.Participants traded messages about where to park together overnight on the streets of Washington. Some arranged midnight rendezvous at highway rest stops or Waffle House restaurants to drive together on the morning of the rally.On the evening of Jan. 5, Mr. Lee broadcast a video podcast from a crowd of chanting Trump supporters in the Houston airport, waiting to board a flight to Washington. “We are there for a show of force,” he promised, suggesting he anticipated street fights even before dawn. “Gonna see if we can do a little playing in the night.”A co-host of the podcast — a self-described Army veteran from Washington State — appealed for donations to raise $250,000 bail money for Chandler Pappas, 27.Chandler Pappas outside the the Oregon statehouse last month.Credit…Mathieu Lewis-Rolland/ReutersTwo weeks earlier in Salem, Ore., during a protest against Covid-19 restrictions, Mr. Pappas had sprayed six police officers with mace while leading an incursion into the State Capitol building and carrying a semiautomatic rifle, according to a police report. Mr. Pappas, whose lawyer did not return a phone call seeking comment, had been linked to the far-right Proud Boys and an allied local group called Patriot Prayer.“American citizens feel like they’ve been attacked. Fear’s reaction is anger, anger’s reaction is patriotism and voilà — you get a war,” said Mr. Lee’s co-host, who gave his name as Rampage.He directed listeners to donate to the bail fund through GiveSendGo, and thanked them for helping to raise $100,000 through the same site for the legal defense of Enrique Tarrio, a leader of the Proud Boys who is accused of vandalizing a historically Black church in Washington.By 10:45 a.m. the next day, more than an hour before Mr. Trump spoke, Mr. Lee was back online broadcasting footage of himself at the Capitol.“If you died today and you went to heaven, can you look George Washington in the face and say that you’ve fought for this country?” he asked.CreditCredit…GhoSToRM143, via PeriscopeBy noon, he was reporting that “backup” was already arriving, bypassing the Trump speech and rally. The Proud Boys and Oath Keepers were among the groups that went directly to the Capitol.“Guys, we got the Three Percent here! The Three Percent here that loves this country and wants to fight!” Mr. Lee reported a little later, referring to another militant group. “We need to surround this place.”Backed by surging crowds, Mr. Lee had made his way into the Rotunda and by 3 p.m. — after a fellow assailant had been shot, police officers had been injured and local authorities were pleading for help — he was back outside using his megaphone to urge others into the building. “If we do it together,” he insisted, “there’s no violence!”When he knew that lawmakers had evacuated, he declared victory: “We have done our job,” he shouted.Reporting was contributed by More

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    The First Step Toward Unity Is Honesty

    AdvertisementContinue reading the main storyOpinionSupported byContinue reading the main storyThe First Step Toward Unity Is HonestyMore Republicans need to be honest that the election wasn’t stolen. Law enforcement needs to be transparent about the threats facing the nation.The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values. It is separate from the newsroom.Jan. 13, 2021Credit…Illustration by The New York Times; photograph via Getty ImagesIt has come to this: Lawmakers are telling journalists that they were casting their impeachment votes in a climate of threats where they feared for their own and their families’ safety.“After freshman G.O.P. Rep. Nancy Mace announced she would be opposing President Donald Trump’s bid to overturn the election, the single mother of two feared so much for her life that she applied for a concealed carry permit and sent her kids hundreds of miles from D.C.,” Politico reported this week.“There will be folks that try to kill us,” a Republican congressman, Peter Meijer, told CNBC.A representative democracy cannot function under the threat from violent extremists determined to overturn the results of a presidential election that they lost. Americans — whether elected officials or regular citizens — should not live in fear that they could be attacked or killed for doing their jobs or supporting a particular candidate. The peaceful transition of power is one of America’s proudest national traditions, but it is not a foregone conclusion. Transitions are the sum of many acts, the result of both parties putting aside their differences in service of national unity.To prevent more bloodshed in the days and months ahead and to ensure that those responsible for the attack on the Capitol are held to account, the nation needs to hear from two key groups of people: the people who encouraged the violence and those charged with preventing it.Republican lawmakers who objected to the electoral vote results on the grounds of mythical election fraud should immediately and publicly apologize, repudiate their lies and admit that Joe Biden won the election fairly.There is no honest factual dispute about the outcome of the election. Despite all the baseless, inflammatory allegations about shredded ballots and dead people voting, every state certified its vote tally without contest. State and federal courts threw out virtually every one of the dozens of cases President Trump and his allies brought alleging fraud or irregularities, because they never presented any credible evidence of it.Of course, the Republicans who’ve suggested otherwise knew this to be the case long before the Capitol was attacked on Jan. 6. Mr. Trump’s supporters in Congress knew it as they raged on television and Twitter about a rigged election — and raised money off the effort. They knew of the risks of violence from groups like the Proud Boys, who openly planned to attend the Jan. 6 rally.A handful of such Republicans seem dimly aware of the profound harm they’ve caused. “What we saw last week was not the American way,” Kevin McCarthy, the House Republican minority leader, said Wednesday. “Neither is the continued rhetoric that Joe Biden is not the legitimate president. Let’s be clear: Joe Biden will be sworn in as president of the United States in one week because he won the election.”At this point, political courage demands that leaders reject the dead-end ideology of “stop the steal,” which only encourages more violence from true believers and opportunistic extremists. Only by accepting responsibility and speaking the truth can Republicans begin to make amends.Then there is the more immediate concern: Law enforcement agencies owe the American people more regular updates on efforts to prevent further violence than they’ve received to date. Yes, these officials are busy tracking down the perpetrators of the Capitol attack and watching for any future eruption of organized chaos, but the nation has now gone a full week without an opportunity to question either Christopher Wray, the F.B.I. director, or Jeffrey Rosen, the acting attorney general.When the Trump administration finally arranged a news conference on Tuesday, six days after the attack, it was left to the acting U.S. attorney for Washington, D.C., Michael Sherwin, to explain that the investigation was “unmatched” in scope and that the department had “literally thousands of potential witnesses” around the country.For an administration that has failed time and again to perform the most simple tasks of governance, this halfhearted response is worrisome. So far we’ve had to rely on amateur Twitter detectives and local news reports to get even basic details about the attack: who organized it, why the Capitol was so easily breached, who committed which crimes, why attackers were allowed to walk away even after beating to death a Capitol Police officer and what is being done to prepare for the next wave of threatened attacks.Right now the priority must be reassurance, especially in light of last week’s systemic failure by multiple law enforcement agencies. During national emergencies, it’s critical that federal authorities be answerable to the public, so that they can be asked questions that demand answers.Questions like, why more heed was not taken of an internal warning issued by a Virginia field office of the F.B.I., on the day before the riot, that extremists were planning for “war.” The office had monitored online chatter that included specific calls for violence: “Get violent. Stop calling this a march, or rally, or a protest. Go there ready for war. We get our President or we die. NOTHING else will achieve this goal.”This contradicts the claim by one senior official that the F.B.I. had no information leading it to expect that violence would break out at the Capitol. Perhaps there was a good reason this particular evidence did not result in better preparedness, but it’s hard to know when the public is kept in the dark.Another question: How many members of law enforcement and the military participated in last week’s riot? In the wake of the rampage, several Capitol Police officers have been suspended and more than a dozen others are being investigated, either for their own involvement in the attack or for showing support for the rioters. One Secret Service officer is reportedly under investigation for posting comments on Facebook accusing lawmakers who confirmed Mr. Biden’s electoral victory of treason.All Americans are responsible for resolving political differences without violence. But those who have been elected to represent this nation, and who swore an oath to protect and defend the Constitution, bear the most responsibility of all.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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    GOP Candidate Leticia Remauro Under Fire for Saying ‘Heil Hitler’ at Virus Protest

    AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyG.O.P. Candidate Under Fire for Saying ‘Heil Hitler’ at Virus ProtestLeticia Remauro, who is running for Staten Island borough president, has apologized for making a “bad analogy.”Credit…Leticia Remauro, via TwitterJan. 12, 2021Updated 6:50 p.m. ETA Republican political operative who is running for Staten Island borough president apologized on Tuesday after she drew widespread condemnation for saying “Heil Hitler” during a protest against coronavirus restrictions.The politician, Leticia Remauro, made the remark as she was recording a video of herself during a protest on Dec. 2 outside Mac’s Public House, a tavern in Staten Island that has become a rallying point against virus restrictions. The video drew attention after it was sent to a reporter with NY1, who shared it on Twitter on Monday night.In the video, Ms. Remauro expresses support for Mac’s and other small businesses.She then pans to a line of officers outside the tavern, saying that she is there to “stand up for our right, the right to pay taxes so that we can pay the salaries of these good men and women, who yes are only doing their job, but not for nothing, sometimes you’ve got to say ‘Heil Hitler,’ not a good idea to send me here, we’re not going to do it.”Ms. Remauro has been involved in Staten Island politics for some 30 years. In 2000, she headed up the campaign of George W. Bush in New York, and her marketing firm was recently employed by the congressional campaign of Nicole Malliotakis, who unseated a Democrat in November with the help of President Trump.The video, which emerged on Monday, drew widespread outrage on social media from politicians and the public, with many people calling for Ms. Remauro to renounce her candidacy for borough president. Some people also called on Ms. Malliotakis to condemn Ms. Remauro’s words.In a post on Twitter on Tuesday, she said her words were a “VERY BAD ANALOGY likening the actions of the de Blasio & Cuomo against small businesses to those of a Nazi dictator.”In an emailed statement on Tuesday, Ms. Remauro said there was “never an appropriate comparison to be made” to Nazi Germany or Hitler.“What I said is not reflective of anything I feel or think about the horrors of the holocaust or the enduring trauma impacting survivors and subsequent generations, or the vital forever necessity of holocaust education,” Ms. Remauro said.Ms. Remauro lists herself on LinkedIn as the president and chief executive of the Von Agency, a marketing and public relations firm. According to data from the Federal Election Commission, Ms. Malliotakis’s congressional campaign paid the Von Agency $90,158.98 for media consulting from 2019 through 2020.Ms. Remauro’s partner at the Von Agency handled advertising on social media for the campaign, according to Ms. Malliotakis’s congressional office. Ms. Remauro also worked for six months on Ms. Malliotakis’s unsuccessful mayoral campaign in 2017.Ms. Malliotakis did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But in her own post on Twitter, she condemned Ms. Remauro’s words as “shocking and wrong.”“At a time when anti-Semitism is on the rise across our city and especially on Staten Island, there is no excuse for such words being uttered,” she said.The Anti-Defamation League, a civil rights group, reported a record number of anti-Semitic incidents in the United States in 2019, more than in any year since the group began keeping track four decades ago.The emergence of the video came days after a violent mob supporting Mr. Trump broke into the U.S. Capitol, drawing heightened scrutiny of neo-Nazis and other white supremacists who were part of the riot and have supported the president. Photographs from last Wednesday’s riot show a man parading the Confederate flag through the Capitol, and another wearing a black sweatshirt emblazoned with the words “Camp Auschwitz.” Social media posts from Ms. Remauro suggest she was present in Washington last week where people broke into the Capitol building. But she told The New York Post that she had been in her hotel room during the rioting and had not participated.In a tweet in September, Ms. Remauro said that “there will be no peaceful inauguration,” no matter the winner, and blamed Antifa.“This isn’t about getting rid of Trump its about bringing down America,” she said.According to her campaign biography, she served as a community liaison to Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani and Gov. George E. Pataki, and worked on a diversity program for Goldman Sachs. She has also been the chair of the Staten Island Republican Party.In addition to running for borough president, Ms. Remauro was until recently the chair of the board of the Staten Island Hebrew Public Charter School, according to the school’s website. Jonathan Rosenberg, the president and chief executive of the school, said Ms. Remauro had offered her resignation on Monday night, and the school accepted it.She is also the secretary of the Staten Island Downtown Alliance, a business advocacy group.Ms. Remauro has posted several videos in recent months about the challenges businesses face because of the pandemic. In a video she posted on Facebook in December, she said, “I have no words except I don’t feel like I live in America anymore.”“I feel like we live in some other communist country,” Ms. Remauro said.Azi Paybarah contributed reporting.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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    Trump Seeks Respite in Texas, Where G.O.P. Allies Face Pressure

    AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyTrump Seeks Respite in Texas, Where G.O.P. Allies Face PressureIn visiting the border, Mr. Trump hoped to change the focus from a mob attack on the U.S. Capitol. But Texas is also reeling from the turmoil in Washington.President Trump touring a portion of the border wall near Alamo, Texas, on Tuesday.Credit…Doug Mills/The New York TimesJames Dobbins and Jan. 12, 2021, 6:28 p.m. ETALAMO, Texas — President Trump’s choice of Texas for his first public appearance since the Capitol mob attack was not accidental: The state not only showcases the border wall, which Mr. Trump is celebrating in his presidency’s chaotic last days, but the Republican Party’s success in limiting the game-changing Democratic gains that flipped states such as Arizona and Georgia.Democrats do not hold a single statewide office in Texas, though the party has made big inroads in large cities around the state. Mr. Trump handily carried the state while eroding the Democratic Party’s dominance in counties along the border with Mexico, winning over many Hispanic voters who had not come out to support Republicans in the past.“Anyone who thinks Trump has lost support in Texas should stop listening to mainstream media,” said Julie McCarty, chief executive of the True Texas Project, a statewide conservative group. “If anything, recent events have only solidified support for him.”In visiting the border, Mr. Trump perhaps hoped to change the focus of public attention from the U.S. Capitol rampage by his loyalists last week to the wall he built along portions of the Mexican border, one of his signature projects.But in choosing to take a farewell lap in one of the most Trump-friendly states in the country, the president may have underestimated the degree to which Texas has been roiled by the political turbulence that followed the Nov. 3 election and the president’s attempts to upset the country with baseless claims of electoral fraud.As his plane touched down in the Rio Grande Valley on Tuesday, the local McAllen Monitor printed a full-page ad from critics of the president, using the Spanish term that roughly translates as “get out of here”: “You are not welcome here,” it said. “Fuera!”In Alamo, a South Texas town of about 20,000 that was the focus of Mr. Trump’s visit, several people expressed confusion as to why the president had chosen to visit at such an unsettling time. Authorities in the town, which has no affiliation to the Alamo Mission site in San Antonio or the 1836 battle in the war to create a slaveholder Texas republic, said they had “no details” about the presidential visit because the Trump administration had not informed them ahead of the trip.At the Aztek Barber Shop in Alamo, Alejandro Silva, 27, said he held nothing against Mr. Trump and did not have an opinion about the border wall.“But he shouldn’t be visiting now,” said Mr. Silva, a mechanic. “He should leave office and leave everyone alone.”The Republican Party and its politicians in Texas have been called on by donors and constituents to answer for the chaos in Washington in which hundreds of the president’s supporters rioted in the Capitol, leaving five people dead.AT&T, the telecommunications and entertainment colossus based in Dallas, said it was suspending contributions to members of Congress who voted last week to object to certified Electoral College votes for President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. Lawmakers targeted by the move included 17 Texas Republicans.The Houston Chronicle, the hometown newspaper of Senator Ted Cruz, called on Mr. Cruz to resign over his amplification of Mr. Trump’s baseless claims of election fraud. Revealing fissures among Republicans in the state, criticism of Mr. Cruz is also coming from some elected conservatives, including State Representative Lyle Larson of San Antonio.Upset with Mr. Cruz’s public pronouncements in recent days, Mr. Larson said on Twitter that the junior senator from Texas “needs to be quiet and stop embarrassing himself, his family and our state. A few others from Texas should join him.”Mr. Trump used the visit Tuesday to promote his aim of curbing immigration from Latin America. Mr. Trump advanced the border wall over the objections of tribal nations, local landowners and environmental groups, waiving dozens of laws, including measures protecting endangered species and Native American burial sites.The Rio Grande Valley is the busiest transit point for unauthorized immigration into the United States. The Trump administration made the region a focus of its enforcement efforts, including construction of new sections of wall, though it encountered resistance from many private landowners along the border.“One of the big elements of the wall that makes it so successful is we can have far fewer people working now, they can be working on other things, other things related to crime and drug prevention,” said Mr. Trump, sounding somewhat subdued, during a brief speech on Tuesday afternoon in front of a section of the wall.Despite the criticism over Mr. Trump’s visit from Democrats and immigrant-rights groups, dozens of the president’s supporters turned out in the Rio Grande Valley to voice support for the president as his motorcade made its way through the area.Elsewhere in Texas, signs of backing for Mr. Trump were also on display outside the State Capitol in Austin, where several dozen protesters, some clad in tactical gear and armed with multiple handguns, hunting knives and other weaponry, gathered to express support for the president on the first day of the Texas legislative session.Samuel Hall, the leader of the right-wing protest, said Mr. Trump’s border visit highlighted what Mr. Hall described as the president’s accomplishments on border security.“He had some problems building the wall,” Mr. Hall admitted, “but that’s because there was opposition in Congress.” He said he believes that Mr. Trump won the election, and spoke of the upcoming inauguration of Mr. Biden as a possibility, not a certainty.“If President Biden is inaugurated, I will pray for him and for our country,” Mr. Hall said. “We’re going to be in a lot of trouble.”Samuel Hall, founder of Patriots for America, speaking to a rally at the Texas State Capitol on Tuesday as officers of the Texas State Police stood by.Credit…Ilana Panich-Linsman for The New York TimesMatt Long, who identified himself as head of the Fredericksburg, Texas, Tea Party, shouted through a bullhorn in an apparent attempt to influence Republican legislators inside. “The magic R is going to lose if you don’t grow a spine!” he shouted. “You have nothing to fear except the next election!”Garry Mauro, a Democrat and former Texas state land commissioner, said Texas has continued to provide a reservoir of support for the increasingly isolated president, partly because of a massive hiring spree in recent years by immigration agencies along the border that have served as the tip of the spear for Mr. Trump’s anti-immigration drive.“He’s looking for whatever small victory he can claim,” Mr. Mauro said of the president’s visit. “There’s no statewide elected officials in Texas that are going to take him on for coming here, and there aren’t many states where you can say that.”In South Texas, Zak Borja, 21, a student and food service worker, arrived at 6 a.m. to secure his spot along the president’s motorcade route for himself and other supporters of Mr. Biden. Only six showed up to join Mr. Borja; they were soon overwhelmed by dozens of Trump supporters shouting conspiracy theories and chanting, “We are the media.”“He is coming to Texas to put on a show that he has done something, when in reality he has only incited violence and divided our community,” Mr. Borja said. “He’s only here to stroke his ego, a charade, to make it look like he’s done something.”James Dobbins More

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    State Capitols ‘on High Alert,’ Fearing More Violence

    #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }Capitol Riot FalloutliveLatest UpdatesInside the SiegeInauguration SecurityNotable ArrestsIncitement to Riot?AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyState Capitols ‘on High Alert,’ Fearing More ViolenceOfficials around the country are bracing for any spillover from last week’s violent assault on the U.S. Capitol. State legislatures already have become targets for protesters in recent days.A member of the Georgia State Patrol SWAT team looked on outside the Georgia State Capitol after the opening day of the legislative session on Monday in Atlanta.Credit…Brynn Anderson/Associated PressNeil MacFarquhar and Jan. 11, 2021Updated 8:22 p.m. ETIt was opening day of the 2021 legislative session, and the perimeter of the Georgia State Capitol on Monday was bristling with state police officers in full camouflage gear, most of them carrying tactical rifles.On the other side of the country, in Olympia, Wash., dozens of National Guard troops in riot gear and shields formed a phalanx behind a temporary fence. Facing them in the pouring rain was a small group of demonstrators, some also wearing military fatigues and carrying weapons. “Honor your oath!” they shouted. “Fight for freedom every day!”And in Idaho, Ammon Bundy, an antigovernment activist who once led his supporters in the occupation of a federal wildlife refuge in Oregon, showed up outside the statehouse in Boise with members of his organization carrying “wanted” posters for Gov. Brad Little and others on charges of “treason” and “sedition.”“At a time of uncertainty, we need our neighbors to stand next to and continue the war that is raging within this country,” Mr. Bundy’s group declared in a message to followers.State capitals across the country are bracing for a spillover from last week’s violent assault on the U.S. Capitol, with state legislatures already becoming targets for protesters in the tense days around the inauguration of the incoming president, Joseph R. Biden Jr.Gone is a large measure of the bonhomie that usually accompanies the annual start of the legislative season, replaced by marked unease over the possibility of armed attacks and gaps in security around statehouses that have long prided themselves on being open to constituents.“Between Covid and the idea that there are people who are armed and making threats and are serious, it was definitely not your normal beginning of session,” said Senator Jennifer A. Jordan, a Democratic legislator in Georgia who watched the police officers assembled outside the State Capitol in Atlanta on Monday from her office window. “Usually folks are happy, talking to each other, and it did not have that feel.”Dozens of state capitals will be on alert in the coming days, following calls among a mix of antigovernment organizations for actions in all 50 states on Jan. 17. Some of them come from far-right organizations that harbor a broad antigovernment agenda and have already been protesting state Covid-19 lockdowns since last spring. The F.B.I. this week sent a warning to local law enforcement agencies about the potential for armed protests in all 50 state capitals.In a video news conference on Monday, Gov. Gavin Newsom of California said that “everybody is on high alert” for protests in Sacramento in the days ahead.The National Guard would be deployed as needed, he said, and the California Highway Patrol, responsible for protecting the Capitol, was also on the lookout for any budding violence. “I can assure you we have a heightened, heightened level of security,” he said.In Michigan, the state police said they had beefed up their presence around the State Capitol in Lansing and would continue that way for weeks. The commission that oversees the Statehouse voted on Monday to ban the open carry of firearms inside the building, a move Democratic lawmakers had been demanding since last year, when armed protesters challenging government Covid-19 lockdowns stormed the building.Two of those involved in the protests were later arrested in what the authorities said was a plot to kidnap Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and put her on trial.Michigan’s attorney general, Dana Nessel, took to Twitter to warn the public away from the Statehouse, saying it was not safe.Images from the Wisconsin state legislature in Madison showed large sheets of plywood being readied to cover the ground-floor windows. In St. Paul, Minn., the Statehouse has been surrounded by a chicken-wire fence since early last summer, when social justice protests erupted over the killing of George Floyd in neighboring Minneapolis.Workers boarded up the Wisconsin State Capitol building in Madison on Monday.Credit…Todd Richmond/Associated PressPatricia Torres Ray, a Democratic state senator, said the barrier had served to protect the building and the legislators, but concerns remained about possible gaps, such as the system of underground tunnels that link many public buildings in Minnesota to allow people to avoid walking outdoors in the winter.Gov. Jay Inslee in Washington ordered extra security after an armed crowd of Trump supporters breached the fence at the governor’s mansion last week while he was at home. State troopers intervened to disperse the crowd.In Texas, Representative Briscoe Cain, a conservative Republican from the Houston suburb of Deer Park, said that the legislature in Austin was likely protected by the fact that so many lawmakers carry firearms.“I have a pistol on my hip as we speak,” Mr. Cain said in a telephone interview on Monday. “I hope they’re never necessary, but I think it’s why they will never be necessary.”The Texas Legislature, dominated by Republicans, meets every two years and was scheduled to begin its 140-day session at noon on Tuesday.There may be efforts to reduce the presence of guns in the Capitol, Mr. Cain said, but he predicted that they would be doomed to failure given widespread support for the Second Amendment.In Missouri, Dave Schatz, the Republican president of the State Senate, said hundreds of lawmakers had gathered on Monday on the Statehouse lawn in Jefferson City for the swearing-in of Gov. Mike Parson and other top officials. Although security was tight, with the roads around the building closed, the presence of police and other security officers was normal for the day, Mr. Schatz said, and no fellow legislators had buttonholed him so far about increased security.“We are far removed from the events that occurred in D.C.,” he said.In Nevada, a Republican leader in Nye County posted a letter on Friday that likened recent protests of the election results across the country to the American Revolution, declaring: “The next 12 days will be something to tell the grandchildren! It’s 1776 all over again!”The letter — written by Chris Zimmerman, the chairman of the Nye County Republican Central Committee — prompted a rebuke over the weekend from Representative Steven Horsford, a Democrat who represents the county.Gov. Mike Parson of Missouri and his wife, Teresa Parson, waved outside the State Capitol in Jefferson City, escorted by members of the Missouri Highway Patrol during the governor’s inauguration celebration.Credit…Jeff Roberson/Associated PressNext door in Clark County, Nev., which includes Las Vegas, Democratic officials sent out a public safety alert on Sunday about potential violence across the state, warning, “Over the past 48 hours, the online activity on social media has escalated to the point that we must take these threats seriously.”While most of the protests announced so far are expected to focus on state capitals, law enforcement and other officials in various cities have said they believe that other government buildings could also be targeted.Federal authorities said on Monday that they had arrested and charged one man, Cody Melby, with shooting several bullets into the federal courthouse in Portland, Ore., on Friday night. Mr. Melby had also been arrested a couple of days earlier when, the police said, he tried to enter the State Capitol in Salem with a firearm.Some of those protesting in Oregon and Washington said they were opposed to state lockdown rules that prevent the public from being present when government decisions are being made.James Harris, 22, who lives in eastern Washington State, said he went to the Capitol in Olympia on Monday to push for residents to be full participants in their state’s response to Covid-19. He said he was against being forced to wear masks and to social distance; the lockdowns are “hurting people,” he said.Mr. Harris is a truck driver, but he said the virus control measures had prevented him from being able to work since March.Georgia already has seen trouble in recent days. At the same time that protesters were swarming into the U.S. Capitol in Washington last week, armed Trump supporters appeared outside the statehouse in Georgia. Law enforcement officers escorted to safety the secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, who had refused President Trump’s attempts to depict the presidential election as fraudulent.Senator Jordan noted that many of the security measures being put in place, including the construction of a tall iron fence around the Capitol building, were actually decided on during last summer’s social justice demonstrations, when protesters surrounded many government buildings.Now, she said, the threat is coming from the other end of the political spectrum.“These people are clearly serious, they are armed, they are dangerous,” Ms. Jordan said, “and from what we saw last week, they really don’t care who they are trying to take out.”Contributing reporting were More