Critics ask whether DOJ will give Jimmy Kimmel the Douglass Mackey treatment for 'election interference'



Critics are wondering whether the Biden-Harris Department of Justice will hold Jimmy Kimmel to the same standard to which it held pro-Trump social media influencer Douglass Mackey, who was convicted for supposed "election interference" and sentenced to prison last year for memes.

There is cause to be skeptical. After all, the DOJ has a habit of holding conservatives to a higher standard than its ideological allies.

Former Trump advisers Stephen Bannon and Peter Navarro were convicted for supposed contempt of Congress, whereas Attorney General Merrick Garland and former Attorney General Eric Holder got off scot-free. The proudly pro-abortion DOJ has almost exclusively targeted pro-life activists when it comes to FACE Act charges. The same DOJ adopted a draconian and in some cases "fact-free approach" when prosecuting Jan. 6 protesters after previously treating Black Lives Matter rioters with kid gloves.

The titular host of "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" has recently made a number of desperate appeals to potential voters, asking them to get out and vote — just not for President Donald Trump.

In his monologue Wednesday, the Harris booster said, "You have to vote. If you can vote early, vote early. If you can't vote early, vote on time. If you want to vote for Trump, vote late. Vote very late. Do your voting on Thursday or maybe Friday."

'Biden's DOJ sent Douglass Mackey to prison for sharing this same joke.'

Libs of TikTok responded, "Wasn't Douglass Mackey sentenced to prison for doing something similar? Will @TheJusticeDept investigate Jimmy Kimmel?"

Rep. Mike Collins (R-Ga.) noted, "Douglass Mackey was sent to prison for this."

"Biden's DOJ sent Douglass Mackey to prison for sharing this same joke about Hillary," tweeted former Salomon Brothers and Citigroup investment banker John LeFevre. "Another example of the weaponized lawfare and two-tiered justice that awaits us if Kamala wins."

Mackey chimed in, tweeting, "Jimmy Kimmel told his joke to an audience of millions. The joke meme I sent out didn't even reach more than 100 people until Buzzfeed and Wired reported on it."

Mackey was arrested in 2021, convicted in New York for supposed "election interference," and sentenced in October 2023 to seven months in prison by an Obama-appointed judge, Ann M. Donnelly.

At the time, Trump said, "They're putting Douglass Mackey in jail for sharing a joking meme about Hillary Clinton seven years ago. Nobody ever heard of anything like that."

According to the Biden-Harris DOJ, "Between September 2016 and November 2016, Mackey conspired with other influential Twitter users and with members of private online groups to use social media platforms, including Twitter, to disseminate fraudulent messages that encouraged supporters of presidential candidate Hillary Clinton to 'vote' via text message or social media which was legally invalid."

The Intercept noted that there is no federal law against lying about election mechanisms or the electoral process. Mackey was instead indicted under a Reconstruction-era statue known as Section 241 or the "Ku Klux Klan Act," which prohibits conspiring to "injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate any person" trying to exercise a constitutionally or federally protected right.

The DOJ was evidently proud of the mental gymnastics required to charge the Clinton critic, stating that his prosecution was "groundbreaking."

Mackey is appealing his case to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and the Supreme Court, should that fail.

According to Mackey and amici curiae, "The First Amendment tolerates narrow, clear statutes that target knowingly false speech concerning the time, place, and manner, or other technical mechanics of an election. But Section 241 is not such a statute. This Court should reverse the decision of the district court."

"When I made an election joke, the Deep State used it as a pretext to conduct a fishing expedition against me, subpoenaing all financial records, leases, employment information and pay stubs, and email accounts. Will Jimmy Kimmel enjoy the same?" Mackey tweeted on Thursday.

'Force these scumbags to live by their own rules.'

One X user noted that Kimmel's "violation is worse than what [Mackey was] convicted for, and he transmitted this over federally licensed airwaves. The @FCC, @FBI, #FEC and #DOJ should be contacted, @ABC should be immediately sanctioned, and @Jimmykimmel needs to be investigated. Anything less is selective and preferential justice."

Rob Eno, Blaze Media's director of content marketing, quipped, "It would be a real shame if everyone flooded the US DOJ crime tip line and ask them to charge Jimmy Kimmel with the same crime they charged Douglass Mackey with. A real shame. I'm not telling you to to go this link and do it."

Conservative commentator Matt Walsh tweeted, "I'm dead serious when I say if Trump wins he should have Jimmy Kimmel arrested and jailed. Force these scumbags to live by their own rules."

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Blaze Media investigative journalist Steve Baker says Justice Department will be charging him for his Jan. 6 reporting



Blaze Media investigative journalist Steve Baker on Thursday said the U.S. Department of Justice will be charging him for his Jan. 6 reporting.

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"My attorney has just been notified by @FBI that I am going to be charged by @TheJusticeDept for my journalistic efforts on #Jan6," Baker wrote Thursday on X. "I have to self-surrender on Tuesday. Charges are yet unknown. Stay tuned for more information to follow this afternoon."

What are the details?

Baker on Thursday told Blaze Media that FBI Special Agent Craig Noyes contacted his attorney in North Carolina and that Noyes said he doesn't know what the charges are — and won't know until the judge signs off on the warrant.

Baker also told Blaze Media that if the Justice Department goes forward with charges, travel restrictions will be placed on him, which will hamper his reporting, as he's based in North Carolina but works a great deal in Washington, D.C., covering trials, viewing Jan. 6 videos, and speaking face-to-face with elected officials.

Given Baker has been writing Blaze Media investigative stories on Jan. 6 since early October, Baker said he "cannot help but think the timing [of the impending charges] is suspect."

Blaze Media's editor in chief, Matthew Peterson, spoke out Thursday regarding the message Baker said the FBI delivered to his attorney.

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What's the background?

Baker discussed his Jan. 6 legal saga in a pair of October commentary pieces for Blaze Media (here and here).

In them, Baker said he'd been under federal investigation for the better part of two years following his independent journalistic work on Jan. 6, which began before he joined Blaze Media.

More from Baker's first commentary:

I made no effort to hide what I was doing on January 6. I did two different interviews that same day with WUSA, a CBS News affiliate in Washington, D.C. I also uploaded a short YouTube video commentary later that same evening.

Upon returning to my home in Raleigh, North Carolina, I socked myself away for five days, doing a frame-by-frame analysis of my own videos. I then wrote and published on January 13, 2021, a 9,500-word opus to my blog detailing what I experienced that day, titled, “What I Saw on January 6th in Washington, D.C.”

That piece, and a February 24, 2021, follow-up, “Who was ‘Up the Chain’ on January 6?” has been viewed and read by hundreds of thousands of readers on my blog and various social media pages.

I always expected that I would be contacted by the FBI at some point, at the very least to acquire my videos for the bureau's investigations. I did no violence or property destruction on January 6, and I certainly did not interfere with the election certification, as I didn’t enter the Capitol Building until well after both the Senate and House of Representatives had been evacuated.

After the FBI made initial contact with Baker in July 2021, Baker said he and his attorney met in person with FBI Special Agents Gerrit Doss and Craig Noyes in North Carolina on Oct. 18, 2021. At the conclusion of the interview, Baker said he and his attorney volunteered to turn over Baker's Jan. 6 videos, but nothing came of that.

Baker said his attorney got a Nov. 17, 2021, email from assistant U.S. attorney Anita Eve saying that Baker could expect to be "charged within the week" — and that the charges would be interstate racketeering and property damage, which Baker said were bogus. With that, Baker said he and his attorney informed the media that he — an independent journalist — was being prosecuted for his coverage of Jan. 6.

Eve was forwarded a copy of Baker's press release, telling his attorney that she was "not thrilled" with it. His attorney replied, “Mr. Baker is obviously feeling threatened by the charges and is using his First Amendment right to garner support. ... Are you suggesting that he refrain from making further statements? ... He has nothing to hide. But he does have a right to speak truthfully about his experiences and share his opinions. ... It’s not fair to ask him to be silent while he endures federal prosecution.” His attorney again volunteered to turn over Baker's Jan. 6 videos.

Despite the threat of charges "within the week," Baker said he didn't hear from Eve's office for nearly two years — and in August 2023, his attorney accepted service of a grand jury subpoena, signed by Eve, for all the Jan. 6 videos Baker personally recorded.

Baker wrote in his second commentary that "grand juries generally are not convened for misdemeanor offenses but rather for felony charges." Curiously, he added that renewed interest from the Justice Department coincided perfectly with his discussions with Blaze Media to become a contributing investigative journalist and columnist.

As Baker told Blaze Media on Thursday, he'd been "poking the bear rather aggressively."

Later that same August, Baker and his attorney delivered a flash drive containing his videos to FBI Special Agent Noyes.

Baker concluded his second commentary with the following promise: "The truth is, my life hasn’t been destroyed. Yet. But many others have been. I intend to show through my investigations that many lives have been destroyed for no good reason — and that cannot stand."

How are others reacting?

Bradford L. Geyer, an attorney who represented now-imprisoned Oath Keeper Kenneth Harrelson — who Baker said was unjustly accused on Jan. 6 — on Thursday told Blaze Media that "since Jan. 6, few reporters have uncovered as many vital stories as Steve Baker. It sadly seems plausible that the decision to charge him is influenced by his recent reporting and the new stories he's in the process of breaking. If the government believes this will silence him, we predict it will be sadly mistaken. Journalists play a critical role in upholding transparency and informing the public, making it vital for them to operate without undue interference from law enforcement. Providing journalists with protections and a buffer ensures the preservation of a free press, safeguarding the democratic principles of open discourse and accountability. Sadly, it seems that the historical high bar for investigating journalists at the Justice Department has been conspicuously lowered in some cases. Given the stakes, all journalists should rally to Steve Baker’s defense."

Anything else?

Baker's first Jan. 6 analysis came in October, following countless hours in a House subcommittee office looking at frame after frame of Jan. 6 closed-circuit video — and it had him wondering: did the security chief for then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi perjure himself in the Oath Keepers trial?

Soon after, the slow pace of getting an unrestricted look at everything recorded on video prompted Blaze Media editor in chief Matthew Peterson's appeal to House Speaker Mike Johnson to release all the videos. On Nov. 17, Johnson did just that.

Baker's investigative efforts also resulted in two additional analyses, both focusing on Capitol Police Officer Harry Dunn: "January 6 and the N-word that wasn't" and "Harry Dunn's account of January 6 does not add up. At all."

Just days ago, Baker alleged he uncovered major irregularities involving Dunn, Capitol Police, the press, and U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Maryland).

Here's Baker speaking to Glenn Beck, founder of TheBlaze, on Oct. 4 about his first Jan. 6 investigative story for Blaze Media:

Pelosi’s Head of Security Likely PERJURED Himself With Jan 6 LIE | Blaze Media EXCLUSIVEyoutu.be

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Biden administration begs to keep spying on American citizens despite concerns over abuses



Elements of the intelligence community implored the Senate Judiciary Committee Tuesday to reauthorize Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act so that the Biden administration can continue spying on American citizens' private communications.

Top officials from the FBI, the CIA, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the National Security Agency, and the Department of Justice described 702 as "invaluable" and "indispensable," at times invoking the 9/11 Islamist attacks on the United States as lasting justification for far-reaching warrantless surveillance, even though thousands and possibly even millions of Americans may have been caught up in the resulting dragnet.

Deputy directors George Barnes of the NSA, David Cohen of the CIA, and Paul Abbate of the FBI issued a joint statement along with Chris Fonzone, general counsel with the ODNI, and Matthew Olsen, assistant attorney general for the DOJ's National Security Division, claiming 702 "helps protect Americans" every day, sparing them from "terrorist plots, weapons of mass destruction, malicious cyber activity, and hostile state behavior from China and Russia."

The intel officials suggested 702 is not only "an elegant solution to an operational challenge created by the advent of the Internet" but a "cornerstone of our Intelligence Community's efforts to identify and understand a broad range of challenges our country faces in an increasingly complex and dangerous world."

They further indicated that 246,073 targets were authorized for "collection" under 702 last year alone.

Section 702 is a provision of FISA enacted by Congress in 2008 that enables the government to spy on foreign nationals located outside the United States with the coerced aid of electronic communication service providers.

According to the ODNI, Section 702 was necessary because by the mid-2000s, "many terrorists and other foreign adversaries were using email accounts serviced by U.S. companies. Because of this change in communications technology, the government had to seek individual court orders, based on a finding of probably cause, to obtain the communications of non-U.S. persons located abroad."

Going through the courts "proved costly because of the resources required and because the government couldn't always meet the probable cause standard, which was designed to protect U.S. persons and persons in the U.S."

While allegedly intended to zero in on foreign nationals abroad "who are expected to possess, receive, or communicate foreign intelligence information," the FBI acknowledges that those targeted "may send an email or have a phone call with a U.S. person."

Accordingly, under Section 702, Americans can be subject to warrantless surveillance and have their phone calls, text messages, emails, and other communications both tapped and stored as a consequence of 702.

The New York Times reported that the data belonging to Americans spied on without a warrant is generally stored by the government for five years and can be searched by analysts at the aforementioned agencies by using Americans' identifiers, such as names, Social Security numbers, passport numbers, and email addresses, as query terms.

Critics of 702 suggest that these queries provide the state with the ability to circumnavigate the Fourth Amendment's requirement that the government first acquire a warrant before violating citizens' privacy.

The Times noted that an audit released in December revealed a number of instances in which "F.B.I. analysts queried the Section 702 repository using Americans' identifiers for unapproved reasons, such as vetting potential informants or maintenance workers."

During Tuesday's hearing, the FBI admitted there had been 278,000 "unintentional" back-door search queries of the 702 database for the private communications of Americans between 2020 and 2021 alone.

According to the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, various Jan. 6 protesters, 19,000 donors to a Congressional campaign, and BLM protesters were among those subjected to the warrantless searches, reported the Register.

Despite the widespread and routine abuse of 702, Abbate maintained it was still worth preserving.

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), on the committee, later noted, "FBI’s tone on FISA was shockingly defiant and at times indignant at today’s hearing. That’s really something for an agency that has admitted to 278,000 'accidental' warrantless searches of American citizens."

The Utah senator stressed that Americans' constitutional rights were being violated and the intelligence agencies' track record of abuse left little hope that their proposed reforms would make a difference, even if executed in the first place.

\u201c\ud83e\uddf5 Why should we ever trust the @FBI & @TheJusticeDept to fix its own problems internally?\u201d
— Mike Lee (@Mike Lee) 1686674155

Lee later tweeted, "Democrats and Republicans agree that FBI can’t be trusted to wield its FISA authority responsibly. It’s time to clip FBI’s wings. I’m working on bipartisan FISA reforms to protect Americans from warrantless 'backdoor' FISA searches.'"

"The FBI has, right now, an unlimited hubris that you believe you are unaccountable," committee member Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said during the hearing. "You don’t believe you’re accountable to the United States Congress, and you don’t believe you’re accountable to the American people, and you are doing damage."

While Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) admitted 702 "has been abused," he suggested that Congress "reauthorize this program and build in some safeguards," reported the Register.

Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said, "I will only support the reauthorization of Section 702 of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act if there are significant reforms. ... And that means first and foremost, addressing the warrantless surveillance of Americans in violation of the Fourth Amendment."

Top FBI, DOJ Officials Grilled About Biden Whistleblower, FISA Abuse In Senate Judiciary Committee youtu.be

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Lauren Boebert reported to FBI for joking about Biden's teleprompter issues



Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert (R) was reported to the FBI on Sunday after she made a joke about President Joe Biden's most recent teleprompter snafu.

The Republican lawmaker on Sunday tweeted, "We need to terminate this Presidency." She followed her statement with, "End quote. Repeat the line."

\u201cWe need to terminate this Presidency. \n\nEnd quote. Repeat the line.\u201d
— Lauren Boebert (@Lauren Boebert) 1657460771

It was a direct reference to Biden's speech on abortion Friday, during which he repeatedly read aloud his teleprompter cues and made other misstatements. The president announced that he had signed an executive order directing various federal agencies to protect abortion access after the Supreme Court ruled states may regulate abortion, overturning its Roe v. Wade decision.

During his speech, Biden recounted the story of a 10-year-old who purportedly was raped and had to travel from Ohio to Indiana to obtain an abortion because her home state had enacted an abortion ban.

“Ten years old and she was forced to travel out of the state to Indiana to seek to terminate the presidency and maybe save her life,” Biden said Friday, mistakenly substituting the work "presidency" for "pregnancy."

Biden made several other errors for which he was mocked on social media. After reading a quote from the majority opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, for example, Biden said "repeat the line." It was an instruction to repeat the quote, not a statement he was supposed to make in his address.

Several times during Biden's speech, he also said "end of quote" after reciting a quote. "End of quote" is a normal teleprompter cue to let the speaker know that the quote he or she is citing is over.

Boebert's tweet declaring that the presidency must be "terminated" was clearly making fun of Biden's speech. But humorless Twitter users mass-reported the tweet to the FBI, as well as the Department of Homeland Security and the Justice Department, claiming she was inciting violence against the president.

Progressive pundit Keith Olbermann said Boebert's "gun-humping fetishism crossed the line from mind-numbingly MAGA-ism to something @fbi @TheJusticeDept and @SecretService needs to be visiting her about, today." His tweet was part of a thread about the "worst persons in the world."

\u201c\ud83e\uddf57/7 But our winner: @laurenboebert whose gun-humping fetishism crossed the line from mind-numbingly MAGA-ism to something @fbi @TheJusticeDept and @SecretService needs to be visiting her about, today.\n\nLauren Boebert: today's Worst. Person. In the WORLLLLLLLLD!\u201d
— Keith Olbermann (@Keith Olbermann) 1657536810

Writer Tara Dublin accused Boebert of making "a threat against the legitimately elected President of the United States."

"Lock her up, @FBI. End quote. Repeat the line with the rest of the Sedition Caucus," Dublin tweeted.

\u201cWell, that sure sounds like a threat against the legitimately elected President of the United States, Squeaky\n\nLock her up, @FBI. End quote. Repeat the line with the rest of the Sedition Caucus #LouderThanMAGA\u201d
— Tara Dublin (@Tara Dublin) 1657468069

Another verified user asked the FBI if Boebert's tweet qualified as a "terroristic threat."

Dozens of other unverified accounts called on federal law enforcement to investigate Boebert's tweet, with hysteric references to the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol and names like "white supremacist terrorist" thrown at Boebert. All because of a joke.

But these complaints raise the question, if "terminate this presidency" is a violent threat, what is "terminate this pregnancy"?

FBI criminal investigation into Hunter Biden and 'his associates' remains active: reports



A Department of Justice official has confirmed that an FBI criminal investigation into Hunter Biden remains active, according to multiple reports.

What are the details?

Sinclair' Broadcasting Group's James Rosen tweeted Thursday, "A @TheJusticeDept official confirms that in 2019, the @FBI opened up a criminal investigation into "Hunter Biden and his associates," focused on allegations of money-laundering, and that it remains open and active today."

EXCLUSIVE: A @TheJusticeDept official confirms that in 2019, the @FBI opened up a criminal investigation into "Hunt… https://t.co/SP9zknhjmL
— James Rosen (@James Rosen)1604007000.0

Rosen also interviewed former Hunter Biden business partner Tony Bobulinski, who claims Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden was aware of and profited from foreign business deals involving his son.

According to the report relayed through Sinclair's 190 television stations nationwide:

Bobulinksi said he was first introduced to the former vice president in May 2017 by Hunter and Jim Biden in Beverly Hills, California.

He claimed they talked about the Biden family business plans with China, despite the Democratic nominee on several occasions denying he had any involvement, including the final presidential debate when Biden said, "I have not taken a penny from any foreign source ever in my life."

In reaction to Rosen's report, an FBI spokesman told the Washington Examiner, "We have no comment, in keeping with our standard practice of neither confirming nor denying the existence of an investigation."

Fox News reported last week that the laptop connected to Hunter Biden was linked to an FBI money laundering probe launched in 2019, but the outlet noted, "it is unclear, at this point, whether the investigation is ongoing or if it was directly related to Hunter Biden."

As TheBlaze previously reported:

The laptop in question has been at the center of a firestorm of controversy after the New York Post ran a story alleging that a copy of the laptop's hard drive, which was provided to them by former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, contained emails from Hunter Biden to his foreign business partners, in which he appeared to leverage his relationship with then-Vice President Joe Biden and in which his partners claimed to have successfully obtained a meeting with Joe Biden due to Hunter's efforts.

Former Fox News correspondent Adam Housley reported last week on Twitter that according to "multiple FBI sources," the agency's "investigation into the laptop has been ongoing since December of 2019."

Housley added that according to the agents, "They knew right away it wasn't a Russia operation. It went right to the top of the FBI because a Biden name was attached. That's normal with any well known name. The question that needs asking, why wasn't any info about Russia/Ukraine shared with Congress?"