It’s no secret that comedian Bill Maher has a sour view of former President Trump, the two have engaged in back-and-forth spats online for years often with no kind word between them.
However, the liberal comedian recently admitted to CNN’s Jake Tapper that he is scared of Trump “on a very personal level,” especially what the first president might do to him if he’s re-elected.
“I am afraid of Trump on a very personal level because I don’t think he likes me. I understand why,” the HBO “Real Time” host told Tapper on Tuesday as part of a CNN primetime special. “And I don’t know what he would do in a second term.”
Maher, 67, told Tapper that after Trump won the 2016 presidential election, “I was afraid for my own wellbeing. I thought I could wind up in Guantanamo Bay. I think I still could.”
“He’s obsessed sometimes. I don’t know. He went on a tear for about eight months when he was president every time, he’d have a rally. I have a list three pages long of the things he’s called me,” he said of the 45th president.
“I mean, he is obviously someone who does not know any boundaries, and, you know, you have to worry when you see what other authoritarian rulers do in other countries to people,” Maher told Tapper of Trump.
“I’m not thinking he’s going to become [Russian President Vladimir Putin] and start pushing people out windows,” Maher said, “but I’m not going to live on the 30th floor anywhere either.”
Trump has slammed Maher as a “radical left maniac.”
Earlier this month, Trump attacked CNN for adding Maher’s “Overtime” post-show segment to its Friday night programming. The cable network, Trump wrote in a Truth Social post, “wants to give wacky liddle’ Bill Maher a shot at bringing them back to just normal ‘bad’ when Bill Maher suffers from the same affliction as CNN — BAD RATINGS!”
By Gage Skidmore from Surprise, AZ, United States of America - Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., CC BY-SA 2.0,
Just in…
The top communications official at Health and Human Services has stepped down after just weeks on the job — as it was revealed he clashed with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. over the deadly measles outbreak gripping Texas, according to multiple reports.
Thomas Corry, the assistant secretary of public affairs, who has only been on the job for a few weeks, announced he was quitting Monday, according to Politico.
This is a breaking news story. Please check back for updates.
President Donald Trump is mourning the death of Village People co-founder and lead singer Victor Willis, whose iconic hit “Y.M.C.A.” became one of the defining songs of Trump’s campaign rallies and victory celebrations.
Willis, who co-wrote the 1978 disco classic and fronted the legendary group for decades, died Tuesday at the age of 74 following what his wife, Karen Huff-Willis, described as a “short, but aggressive illness.”
Trump honored the singer Wednesday in a heartfelt Truth Social post, reflecting on the special connection the two shared through one of the most recognizable campaign songs in modern political history.
“Victor Willis, the lead singer of the Village People, has passed away. He was a really good guy. Our favorite song, ‘Y.M.C.A.,’ has become, over the last few years, our ‘theme song,'” Trump wrote.
The president credited his campaign rallies with helping introduce the song to a new generation of Americans.
“It has brought so much happiness to millions of people. They loved the action, and we loved them and their great and uplifting song.”
Trump added that Willis’ legacy would live on every time the unmistakable opening notes of “Y.M.C.A.” are heard.
“We will think of Victor every time YMCA is played, like today, and all throughout this July Fourth Birthday week. My condolences to his wonderful family and group, Victor Willis will be sorely missed. God Bless Him!!!”
President Trump sent prayers to Victor Willis family
Few songs became more closely associated with Trump’s political movement than “Y.M.C.A.”
Whether closing out campaign rallies, celebrating election victories or walking off the stage after speeches, Trump frequently danced to the Village People anthem—complete with his now-famous fist-pump routine that became a viral internet meme and was copied by supporters around the country.
The tradition continued throughout the 2024 campaign and into Trump’s second inauguration festivities, where Village People themselves performed “Y.M.C.A.” during inaugural events in Washington.
Over time, the president’s signature dance became so recognizable that many supporters simply refer to it as the “Trump dance.”
Trump hit the YMCA dance on the National Mall and thousands of patriots erupted. 🇺🇸🔥 pic.twitter.com/KUss1pufB1
— Pastor Dave Scarlett (@dave_scarlettll) June 26, 2026
While Trump’s use of the song initially generated controversy, Willis eventually defended the president’s continued use of “Y.M.C.A.”
The singer said Trump had legally obtained the necessary political license to use the song and acknowledged that the president’s rallies dramatically boosted its popularity.
Willis noted that after Trump began regularly playing the song, “Y.M.C.A.” climbed back to No. 2 on Billboard’s Digital Songs chart, adding that the renewed exposure generated millions of dollars in additional royalties for the classic hit.
The Village People later accepted an invitation to perform during Trump’s 2025 inauguration festivities, saying they believed music should help bring Americans together regardless of politics.
From church choir to disco legend
Born in Dallas in 1951 and raised in San Francisco, Willis first discovered music singing in his father’s Baptist church before moving to New York to pursue acting and theater.
He joined the Negro Ensemble Company and appeared in several stage productions before teaming up with French producer Jacques Morali to create Village People.
As the group’s unmistakable lead vocalist and principal songwriter, Willis helped create enduring hits including “Y.M.C.A.,” “Macho Man,” “In the Navy,” and “Go West.” He later fought a lengthy legal battle to reclaim songwriting rights and eventually regained ownership of many of the group’s biggest hits.
Mitch McConnell, Kevin McCarthy, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer attend medal ceremony via Wikimedia Commons
Donald Trump has reignited his feud with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) once again calling for Republicans to oust him from the leadership position.
In a statement Wednesday, Trump described the Kentucky Republican as a “pawn” for Democrats and insisted Republicans should choose another lawmaker to lead.
“Mitch McConnell is not an Opposition Leader, he is a pawn for the Democrats to get whatever they want,” Trump said in his statement. “He is afraid of them, and will not do what has to be done. A new Republican Leader in the Senate should be picked immediately!”
The two Republicans previously enjoyed a friendly and professional relationship for much of Trump’s time in the White House however, the two broke ties after McConnell infamously turned on Trump following the Jan. 6th Capitol riot. Since then Trump has repeatedly attacked the Senator and called for his immediate ouster.
Trump’s most recent attack on McConnell follows comments last week made by the Senate Minority Leader regarding the “quality” of some Republican Senate candidates- many of whom were personally chosen and endorsed by the former president.
“I think there’s probably a greater likelihood the House flips than the Senate. Senate races are just different — they’re statewide, candidate quality has a lot to do with the outcome,” McConnell said.
In Wednesday’s statement, Trump accused McConnell of giving the “Radical Left the Trillions and Trillions of Dollars that they constantly DEMAND” and faulted him for failing to stop passage of the landmark tax, climate and healthcare law known as the Inflation Reduction Act.
President Donald Trump signs Executive Orders, Thursday, April 17, 2025, in the Oval Office. (Official White House Photo by Molly Riley)
Former Bravo reality TV star Jennifer Welch went on an expletive-filled rant demanding people who voted for President Donald Trump three times be banned from Mexican and Chinese restaurants on Thursday.
“I’ve had it with White people that triple Trumped that have the nerve and the audacity to walk into a Mexican restaurant, a Chinese restaurant, an Indian restaurant, go to perhaps their gay hairdresser,” Welch commented on her podcast “I’ve Had It.”
She recalled an instance of seeing “MAGA-looking people” at a Mexican restaurant and said they had “a lot of f—ing nerve” given the Trump administration’s immigration policies.
“Frankly, I don’t think you should be able to enjoy anything but Cracker Barrel,” Welch said. “If you want to triple Trump, if you want to browbeat DEI, if you want to browbeat gay people, you want to browbeat Black people, as you have been doing for four hundred years. And you want to browbeat this generation of immigrants that come over here and open up business earnestly and pay their taxes.”
Welch continued by attacking Trump as a “teeny-weeny mushroom c— piece of s— Cankles McTaco Tits.”
She added, “White people that triple Trumped should be banned, boycotted from enjoying the best thing that America has to offer, which is multiculturalism. Get your fat a– out of the Mexican restaurant. Get your fat a– over to Cracker Barrel because nobody wants to see your f—ing smug a– teeny-weeny, pink arm, big gut around. Nobody wants to see that s—. No one.”
Her co-host Angie “Pumps” Sullivan said she “completely” agreed and went one step further by attacking female Trump voters.
“I want you to give up a credit card in your name,” Sullivan said. “I want you to give up the bank account in your name. And I want you to be completely beholden to a man. I don’t want you to work. I want you to stay home and make cornflakes from scratch for that f—er because that’s what you’re voting for.”
She continued, “When they’re talking about the golden age and ‘let’s make America great again,’ they’re talking about you having less rights than men, not be able to have a credit card, not being able to own anything in your own name. So, triple Trump country club Christian White women, you should have to forfeit those luxuries.”
In a comment to Fox News, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson attacked Welch’s comments as “out of touch with reality” based on Trump’s “historically diverse coalition.”
“Rich liberal white women love to pretend to be champions of diversity until they are confronted by diversity of thought. President Trump was elected by a historically diverse coalition of Americans from all races, religions, and orientations. As per usual this reality star is out of touch with reality,” Jackson said.
Daniel Ramirez from Honolulu, USA, CC BY 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons
With Thanksgiving less than one week away, some of America’s greatest patriots are still questioning whether they’ll be able to put food on the table for their families.
While President Joe Biden seems content ignoring America’s heroes the Coalition to Support America’s Heroes is stepping in to pick up the slack.
In 2004, the Coalition to Salute America’s Heroes was established to ensure that in return for the sacrifices they made for us during the war on terror, wounded veterans and their families would receive all the support needed to restore their hope and rebuild their lives. Now, the Coalition is working to make sure every veteran has a Thanksgiving feast of their own. However, as one of the sole nonprofits providing direct emergency relief funds for veterans, they work overtime with limited resources as the organization experiences a downturn in charitable giving.
Out of more than 40,000 veteran service organizations (VSO) the Coalition to Support Americas Heroes is the only nonprofit organization that provides direct emergency relief funds, veterans are often directed to the Coalition by VSOs, Veterans Affairs, or other non-profits like the Wounded Warrior Project.
This Thanksgiving is already facing roadblocks due to sky-high inflation but coupled with a record amount of requests for help from veterans means the Coalition is struggling to keep up with demand. Each year, the Coalition gives hundreds, or even thousands of veterans funds to help alleviate the financial pressure that inevitably comes around the holidays.
However, according to the American Farm Bureau Association, the costs for holiday staples such as turkey, sweet potatoes, and stuffing have surged since the same time last year.
The price of a 16-pound turkey has risen from $23.99 last year to $28.96, marking a 21% increase as an outbreak of the avian flu impacts poultry flocks across the country. The costs for cubed stuffing mix, one dozen dinner rolls, and a 30-ounce can of pumpkin pie mix have surged 69%, 22%, and 18%, respectively.
Coalition president and CEO David Walker says that the organization is now seeing an unprecedented need from struggling veterans as the country rebounds from a years-long COVID-19 pandemic which also exacerbated mental health issues and suicidal urges in veterans. With Thanksgiving around the corner, more than 240 calls have come into the Coalition in the past week, which is three times the number of calls from the first two weeks in October.
“The need that the Coalition provides is as essential now, if not more so than when we started because the battlefront has moved into the home,” Walker said. “Veterans call in using words like ‘evict’ or ‘repossess’ and the Coalition steps in to prevent them from using words like homelessness, divorce, or suicide.”
A Marine, identified as C.T. for privacy purposes, served in Iraq where he suffered a serious spinal injury during his tour. After C.T. returned home from his tour he found that Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) hindered his ability to find a reliable job and he found himself in debt and facing eviction. The Coalition to Support America’s Heroes immediately intervened and paid C.T.’s debt and is currently working to place him in a job where he feels at ease and where his PTSD won’t be a problem.
“This was one of the most amazing surprises, the dollar amount is awesome my kids and I would like to Thank you!! But the thought of you guys not leaving me and my dependents BEHIND means more than anything,” another veteran wrote to the Coalition.
“Every year is hard being away from my children, this act of kindness from your organization is more than thoughtful it’s priceless. Not just saying you care but showing it. My Goal is to help Veterans once I address some Mental and physical issues. This has relieved some pressure financially and giving some motivation. I SALUTE you guys!” J.D. continued.
A.K, another Coalition recipient, was awarded a purple heart after being struck by a mortar while serving in the Army in Iraq while her husband and child waited for her to return home. A.K. sustained severe injuries, a traumatic brain injury, and suffers from PTSD due to her brave service in Iraq. However, sky-high inflation coupled with unexpected home repairs caused A.K. to fall behind on mortgage payments, putting her family at risk of eviction. Thanks to the Coalition’s tremendous work A.K. and her family managed to catch up on their bills and will get to spend the holiday together giving thanks.
One veteran living in southern California expressed gratitude to the organization, “I just want you to know how happy this organization has made me; you have given me a sense of relief and joy during a very difficult year. I am so thankful for everything this organization has done for me and for all me fellow brothers and sisters in and out of uniform. Thank you for thinking of me when I didn’t think anyone was.”
With only days until Thanksgiving and Christmas on the horizon, America’s heroes deserve support and comfort, and now is the time to say “thank you” to those to have sacrificed so much.
Follow the link HERE to contribute and give a veteran a Thanksgiving meal!
David B. Gleason from Chicago, IL, CC BY-SA 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons
OPINION – The insane leftist overreaction to the reversal of Roe v Wade continues with Joe Biden’s woke Pentagon now providing leave and taxpayer funding for female troops wanting to go out of state to murder their unborn children.
Despite the ready availability of contraceptives throughout the United States, and the availability of abortions in almost all states up to 10 weeks, and with exceptions for rape, incest, and danger to the life of the mother beyond that, Biden’s DoD thinks it is somehow necessary for the American taxpayer to pay for travel to get abortions.
This is outrageous.
And far too many Americans, conservative or just plain reasonable, are too cowed by the media and the left to say anything or question the insanity.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, who has proven to be an absolute embarrassment, announced in a memo how the Pentagon, and taxpayers, will begin paying for female troops and their family members to travel for abortions, under the guise of diabolical leftist doublespeak called ‘access to reproductive healthcare.’
The Pentagon memo repeatedly avoids using the term abortion in the memo and replaces it with the innocuous-sounding ‘reproductive healthcare.’
“The practical effects of recent changes are that significant numbers of service members and their families may be forced to travel greater distances, take more time off from work, and pay more out-of-pocket expenses to receive reproductive health care,” the secretary wrote.
According to Biden’s Pentagon, post-Roe abortion restrictions are hurting recruiting and retention, which is totally unproven and helps divert for the Pentagon’s wokeness being a primary factor in scaring away potential recruits from traditional upbringings.
Under federal law, DOD funds and facilities may only be used to perform abortions where the life of the mother would be endangered if the fetus were carried to term or in a case in which the pregnancy is the result of an act of rape or incest. The most recent statistics show that between 2016 and 2021, a total of 91 abortions were performed in military medical treatment facilities.
That’s a relatively small number. Still, Austin says that:
The department is examining this [Supreme Court] decision closely and evaluating our policies to ensure we continue to provide seamless access to reproductive health care as permitted by federal law.
So, despite the fact that DoD already provides abortions in case of danger to the life of the mother, and provides a slew of contraceptives, and guidance, for its male and female troops, Austin believes the Pentagon and taxpayers should pay for these female troops and their families to travel out of state to get abortions beyond those rules.
This, even though federal law prohibits abortions outside the above-noted parameters.
As National Review writer under the pen name Robert M. Berg notes:
To begin with, there is no reason for the DOD to issue any statement regarding Dobbs. The DOD needs to adjust exactly zero policies to comply with this ruling. It does not affect service members. Yet our DOD leadership could not resist weighing in on a political issue, while taking a swipe at one of the three branches of government enshrined in the Constitution that the military is sworn to uphold.
The DOD has no business reviewing and commenting on Supreme Court decisions. So why do it?
The implication is so that it can find ways to provide abortions to American service members, in clear violation of U.S. law and against the intent of the U.S. Congress. If Congress wants to weigh back into this and provide funds for abortion, then that is its job. It most certainly is not the job of the DOD to question one branch of government and look to circumvent another.
The writer, an active-duty combat-arms officer with 20-plus years of service, adds:
Indeed, following Austin’s comments, the DOD had to issue an official response clarifying its policy. The official memorandum put out by Undersecretary of Defense Gilbert R. Cisneros Jr. softly walked back Austin’s initial statement. The opening paragraph of the memorandum references Secretary Austin’s statement and pretends to echo his message.
However, the first factual statement the memo references is the federal law that restricts DOD funding of abortions. The majority of the memo rehashes that the Dobbs case does not in fact affect military service members. So why even issue a memo at all? That is made clear near the end, when the memo takes veiled political shots at the Supreme Court and issues a statement of intent to try to find ways to circumvent Congress by funding service members’ abortions.
The memo states, “the implications of the Supreme Court’s decision are complicated and must be evaluated against various state laws, together with the views of the Department of Justice.” This statement seems wholly unnecessary, as the entirety of the rest of the memo keeps saying no policies need to be changed. Again, then why do we need a review?
The writer concludes:
Such actions [only] erode the confidence the American public has in our military and damage our ability to field an effective fighting force. It is no coincidence that, the more political the DOD becomes, the more it must deal with issues such as falling respect for current military service members and difficulty recruiting new ones.
Very well said Mr. Berg.
I can only pray Congress will investigate and reverse this new policy once the GOP takes control of the House, and possibly Senate, in a mon
Opinions expressed by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of Great America News Desk.
Ted Eytan from Washington, DC, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons
ANALYSIS – Two Proud Boys leaders have been sentenced to more than a decade each in jail after being convicted of the rarely used ‘seditious conspiracy’ charge for storming the Capitol.
They tried to overturn President Donald Trump’s 2020 election loss, which they considered fraudulent.
These sentences are much less than the three decades of jail time proposed by prosecutors but still very long prison terms for a few hours of rioting.
And yes, I understand that the rioting was at the U.S. Capitol and that the certification of the Electoral College vote was in process. I also understand these two guys and the two others convicted on this same charge were intimately involved in organizing what became violent chaos that day.
I was there, at the Capitol, as an observer with a TV camera crew. And I denounced the violence the next day. It was outrageous.
I believe any violent rioter who attacked police or media, or anyone else, on Jan. 6 should be put in jail – as should all the BLM rioters who earlier caused $2 billion in damages throughout the country and injured 2,000 cops months earlier.
But a decade or two behind bars for ‘conspiracy’?
Biggs and Rehl are the first Proud Boys convicted of the Civil War-era seditious conspiracy charge to be sentenced for their roles in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack.
The sentences kicked off a series of hearings scheduled for this week and next, where punishment will be meted out against the former chairman of the Proud Boys, Enrique Tarrio (who was not in D.C. on Jan. 6 but was unbelievably arrested earlier for burning a BLM banner!), and two other members of the group.
All were convicted of seditious conspiracy and other crimes at a landmark conspiracy trial this spring. But was what they did really as bad as the Biden Justice Department tries to portray?
Seditious conspiracy is a broad statute that concerns attempts to overthrow the government, levy war against it or prevent, hinder or delay the execution of any law. It also can be applied in cases where suspects seize any government property and carries up to 20 years in prison if convicted.
Partly because seditious conspiracy allegations carry so much political weight, prosecutors have generally been hesitant to bring such charges in the past. “Seditious conspiracy charges are rarely used in American jurisprudence,” said Jeffrey Ian Ross, a criminologist and expert on political crime at the University of Baltimore. Prosecutors can be wary of issuing such charges, even in cases that may fall under its broad statute, he added.
In the only similar case in the 20th century, federal prosecutors secured a seditious conspiracy conviction against Puerto Rican nationalists who stormed the Capitol building in 1954.
These four armed Puerto Rican independence militants entered the House floor and fired dozens of bullets around the chamber, wounding five legislators.
The four shooters and co-conspirators were convicted of seditious conspiracy and spent over two decades in jail until Jimmy Carter commuted their sentence in 1979.
In that case, however, the perpetrators had firearms and used them to try to kill Congressmen. That’s a pretty big difference.
The last successfully prosecuted seditious conspiracy was in the mid-1990s, when authorities charged Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman and nine Islamist co-conspirators for plotting to bomb the United Nations, the FBI building, and several other landmarks around New York City.
Again, this was very serious and involved planning mass murder and terrorism.
There is little or no evidence that any Jan. 6 rioters planned any offensive violence.
To date, of those charged in relation to Jan. 6, former Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes holds the record with an 18-year sentence, after he was convicted of seditious conspiracy earlier this year.
Even Rhodes, who is not believed to have actually stormed the building, is alleged to have plotted to bring weapons to the area and coordinate militia movements.
In the weeks before the insurrection, Rhodes allegedly purchased tens of thousands of dollars worth of weapons and began communicating to other Oath Keepers in an encrypted group chat. “We aren’t getting through this without a civil war,” he messaged days after the presidential election. One Oath Keeper admitted as part of a plea deal last year that he brought an M4 rifle to a Comfort Inn hotel near the Capitol, while Rhodes and others allegedly discussed “quick reaction force” teams that could move into Washington DC with firearms. Once inside the Capitol, prosecutors state in their indictment that one group of Oath Keepers moved in a military “stack” formation and went in search of the speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi.
And at first glance, this does seem serious.
But Rhodes claims that despite earlier texts about possible ‘civil war,’ Oath Keepers who entered the Capitol went “totally off mission” and that he was only there to prevent his militia members from getting into trouble.
He has also stated that the armed ‘reaction force’ in Virginia was there to respond if armed leftist antifa thugs attacked pro-Trump protestors.
In the largest manhunt in FBI history, more than 1,100 people have been arrested on charges related to the Capitol assault. Of those, 597 defendants have had their cases adjudicated and received sentences. About 366 of them have been given jail time.
The vast majority of these Jan. 6 defendants, though, accepted plea deals for minor, nonviolent offenses such as trespassing or obstructing an official function. Many of them still got jail sentences totally out of proportion to their alleged crimes.
And these four got the worst of it.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of Great America News Desk. It was first published in American Liberty News.
Democrats are still reeling after Donald Trump’s landslide victory…
Democrats are turning on Joe Biden after Vice President Kamala Harris‘ loss to the former President.
They say his advancing age, questions over his mental acuity and deep unpopularity put Democrats at a huge disadvantage. According to reports from Politico, Democrats are livid that they were forced to embrace a candidate who voters had made clear they did not want — and then stayed in the race long after it was clear he couldn’t win.
“He shouldn’t have run,” said Jim Manley, a top aide to former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. “This is no time to pull punches or be concerned about anyone’s feelings. He and his staff have done an enormous amount of damage to this country.”
“He’s a good man who can be proud of his accomplishments. But his legacy is in tatters,” Manley said. “The country is headed in a very dangerous direction and it’s due in part to his arrogance.”
“She ran an extraordinary campaign with a very tough hand that was handed to her,” Mark Longabaugh, a Democratic strategist and former adviser to Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), said of Harris. “The truth of the matter is, Biden should have stepped aside earlier and let the party put together a longer game plan.”
“There was a Biden weariness,” James Zogby, a three-decade veteran of the Democratic National Committee, said of the shift among the electorate in recent years. “And he hung on too long.”
Senior Harris campaign advisor David Plouffe also seemingly blamed Biden for Kamala’s poor Election Day performance.
In what many perceived as a swipe at Biden, Plouffe wrote on X: “We dug out of a deep hole but not enough. A devastating loss.”
Plouffe dismantled his X account late Wednesday after receiving backlash for his remarks.
According to Fox News White House senior correspondent Jacqui Heinrich one source in the Biden camp branded Plouffe a “sanctimonious ass” and another told her the tweet was “unproductive” – adding: “Joe Biden is the President of the United States and won without [Plouffe]. He successfully beat Donald Trump – something [Plouffe] never did.”
Obama staffers are trying to pin blame on Biden for Harris’ loss.
Reacting to Plouffe’s tweet, one Biden-world source called Plouffe a “Sanctimonious a**” – another said “I find this so unproductive. Joe Biden is the President of the United States and won with out you. He… https://t.co/cdJnlcmG0Q
A Trump supporter has been sentenced to seven months in prison after he was convicted of election interference over social media posts.
Douglass Mackey was accused of a “scheme to deprive individuals of their constitutional right to vote,” after a Twitter account he ran under the handle “Ricky Vaughn” posted memes in the lead-up to the 2016 presidential election. One image showed a black woman standing in front of an “African Americans for Hillary” sign and said “Avoid the Line. Vote from Home,” “Text ‘Hillary’ to 59925.”
The Justice Department said around 4,900 unique telephone numbers texted the hotline although it was unclear how many were participating in the joke rather than trying to cast their ballots.
Former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey suspended Mackey from the platform.
Earlier this week, U.S. District Judge Ann M. Donnelly, an Obama appointee, sentenced Mackey, claiming that his actions were “nothing short of an assault on our democracy” and amounted to attempts “injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate” people from exercising their right to vote according to Courthouse News Service.
“Voting is the right that secures all other rights we hold dear,” Department of Justice Attorney Erik David Paulsen said. “They were committing fraud, one that was aimed at one of our most sacred rights in our democracy.”
Prosecutors also took aim at Mackey for derogatory posts he had made toward black people and women, but Donnely said her sentence did not have to do with his political beliefs. “You are not being sentenced for your political beliefs or for expressing those beliefs,” she said.
James Lawrence, an attorney for Mackey, previously said in an interview with The Daily Wire that his memes were satirical and were therefore not relevant to the law he purportedly violated. Mackey faced as many as 10 years in prison.
Some have contended that Mackey’s right to free speech had been violated in a politically motivated case by the Biden administration. “It’s a three-fer: the prosecutorial creation of a crime Congress has not prescribed, the trivialization of civil-rights law, and the intrusion of government as a monitor of political speech,” former federal prosecutor Andy McCarthy wrote in an opinion piece for National Review.
