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The 65 Project is Canceling Lawyers Who Dare to Represent Republican Politicians
Run by David Brock and funded by George Soros the 65 Project is an all out war on the 6th Amendment to the Constitution.
UPDATE No1: Obama's General Counsel of the FBI revealed that the DOJ is going to prosecute Trump's current lawyers. Andrew Weissmann advised Trump's lawyer to "stop talking" and "get the best defense counsel you can possibly get." This is the latest effort to stop Trump from being able to retain legal counsel.1
UPDATE No2: The three-member D.C. bar disciplinary committee agreed that Rudy Giuliani’s handling of litigation in Pennsylvania crossed ethical lines — a preliminary finding that could result in the suspension or loss of his law license.2
UPDATE No3: Michael Teter represents Ray Epps.
THE BACKSTORY
Without saying a word David Brock slid into a low club chair thickly upholstered in well-worn leather. In a motion that betrayed the seriousness of his habit, he deftly extracted a fresh Davidoff 702 Double R cigar secreted in a special pocket his tailor sewed into his Savile Row sportcoat. Wrapped in an oily Ecuadorian leaf it lit easily revealing an earthy and dense profile with notes of dark chocolate and coffee with cream.
Anyone watching his belvederian performance might have missed the tall footman delicately placing a pre-war Baccarat crystal tumbler filled with Pappy Van Winkle next to the political operative. With his long silver hair pomaded behind his ears, his Dominican cigar in his right hand, and his Kentucky whiskey in his right Brock had come a long way from his days as an orphan in Hackensack, New Jersey. Today he was one of the most powerful men in Washington D.C. with backing from even more powerful men like George Soros.
It was in this room that David Brock would share his plan to build a political machine that would make William Magear Tweed blush; a machine that would effectively deprive Republicans of their 6th Amendment right to counsel. Brock’s Media Matters for America pioneered the use of the ‘fact-check’ that is now widely copied and exploited by Big Tech to silence, suppress, and censor conservative ideas. Brock’s new machine would put the final nail in the coffin of the Grand Old Party once and for all.
The power of Brock’s plan was in its simplicity - use the legal profession’s own regulatory bodies to make life a living hell for anyone who dared to represent a Republican. With just a few dozen full-time lawyers proactively filing bar complaints and filing motions for sanctions he estimated he could keep several hundred lawyers busy defending themselves while deterring thousands more from representing a Republican ever again. Brock would later tell Axios that his goal was “not only bring the grievances in the bar complaints but shame them and make them toxic in their communities and in their firms.”3
When he was sure he had the attention of the men in the smoke-filled room Brock leaned forward and began discussing how elections were being decided far too frequently by judges and lawyers. He reminded them of the tragic outcome of Bush v. Gore just twenty years earlier. Brock sat back and began explaining that elections were political matters never intended to be within the purview of the judiciary. Instead, he argued they were, instead, intended to be within the purview of powerful men like Colonel George Brinton McClellan Harvey.
Col. Harvey, a protégé of publisher Joseph Pulitzer, became the managing editor of the flagship newspaper of the Democratic Party at the young age of twenty-seven. Like Brock, Harvey aligned himself with powerful Democratic industrialists like William C. Whitney and Thomas Fortune Ryan - the billionaires of their times. With their backing, Harvey was able to purchase prestige magazines like the North American Review, Harper’s Weekly, and the Metropolitan Magazine.
Brock stood as he described in meticulous detail Col. Harvey’s suites at Chicago's Blackstone Hotel during the 1920 Republican convention. Reportedly the hotel staff was forced to clear the entire floor as the cigar smoke billowing from Harvey’s suite was too thick for the hotel’s nonpartisan guests. Brock quoted William Safire’s often repeated description of the Colonel’s smoke-filled rooms as a “place of political intrigue and chicanery, where candidates were selected by party bosses in cigar-chewing sessions.” In attendance were Senators Wadsworth, Calder, Smoot, Watson, McCormick, Lodge, and Grundy, and these men - not some white-shoe lawyer and black-robed judge - decided who would be the next President of the United States - in a ‘smoked-filled room’. Harry Truman would later point out that “the smoke-filled room was nothing new but Harding's nomination dramatized the tag and made it stick."4
Brock convincingly argued that to preserve the Democratic Party’s control over the nation’s election infrastructure and the outcome of elections in general, judicial interference had to be put in check. He argued that if Republicans could be deprived of legal representation they’d be unable to bring their grievances forward eliminating the possibility of judicial interference altogether. Brock insisted legal interference from the GOP was very real and could derail the important election work being accomplished by their associates - activists like David Becker5.
Becker’s organization, Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC), flush with millions from the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative and even more from George Soros-affiliated groups, effectively controls the voter roles in 32 states.6 The GOP is very aware of the power that data provides the Democratic Party and they're doing everything they can to stop him.
In fact, Becker’s efforts are under attack by GOP-backed lawsuits such as the Public Interest Legal Foundation against the District of Columbia for their use of ERIC’s voter systems.7 Brock pointed out that this attack was only possible because two Public Interest Legal Foundation lawyers - Noel Johnson DC Bar No. 1011583 and Kaylan Phillips WI Bar No. 1068004 - feel 'safe' representing Republicans.
Brock made it clear that his goal is to make representing Republicans like the Public Interest Legal Foundation VERY dangerous. These attacks on ERIC are only beginning as earlier this year Michigan’s Republican-appointed auditor general determined that ERIC is in breach of its agreement with the state8 - findings that no doubt will attract more Republican-backed lawsuits. Becker himself has been the target of ethics complaints lodged by Republican lawyers when he was with the DOJ for merely making disparaging and nasty remarks about Republicans (despite the fact they were well deserved).9
WAR ON THE 6TH
Informally known as the ‘War on the 6th’, David Brock’s effort to remove political decision-making from the courtroom and return it to smoked-filled rooms has begun in earnest. Leveraging various nonprofits under David Brock’s control with funding from billionaires like Pierre Omidyar and George Soros, The 65 Project10 is managed by Michael Teter.
Of course, invention and innovation often have many ‘mothers’ and Democratic operative and former Clinton official Melissa Moss has made it clear that The 65 Project was actually her baby. Officially a senior advisor to Michael Teter and David Brock, Moss hatched plans to air television ads in battleground states including Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin targeting GOP lawyers. She’s also pushing the American Bar Association to implement rules barring their members from lodging certain types of election challenges.
To buttress the group’s legitimacy Moss recruited a cavalcade of advisors including former Democratic Senator Tom Daschle, former Utah Supreme Court Chief Justice Christine Durham, Roberta Ramo former president of the American Bar Association, and toxic anti-Trumper Paul Rosenzweig.
Repeating Brock’s stated goal of shaming lawyers in an effort to make them toxic Moss hopes the organization can “deter right-wing legal talent from signing on to any future GOP efforts to overturn elections—including the midterms, or 2024.” Recognizing that “the littler fish are probably more vulnerable to what we’re doing. You’re threatening their livelihood. And, you know, they’ve got reputations in their local communities.”
Inspired by Brock and Teter, Michigan Democrats launched one of the earliest efforts to harass and shame lawyers who represented Republicans in the 2020 election. In fact, they successfully convinced an Obama-appointed judge to sanction every lawyer who worked on election litigation for President Trump in Detroit including:11
Stefanie Lynn Junttila Esq. (MI) - Disbarment Letter12
Gregory Rohl Esq. (MI) - Disbarment Letter13
Scott Hagerstrom Esq. (MI) - Disbarment Letter14
Julia Z. Haller Esq. (DC)
Brandon Johnson Esq. (DC)
Lin Wood Esq. (GA)
Howard Kleinhendler Esq. (NY)
Emily Newman Esq. (VA)
Sidney Powell Esq. (TX)
The court ordered15 each lawyer to pay the legal fees of the Democratic National Committee, Michigan Democratic Party, City of Detroit, and Governor Gretchen Whitmer and attend various legal education classes. The judge also referred the case to the Michigan Attorney Grievance Commission asking for the disbarment of each of the lawyers.
For their part, Michael Teter and his team at The 65 Project announced they were filing ethics complaints against 111 attorneys in 26 states. The following are the complaints I was able to find:
Kurt Olsen Esq. (MD) - Disbarment Letter16
William Olson Esq. (VA) - Disbarment Letter17
John Eastman Esq. (DC) - Disbarment Letter18
Kenneth Klukowski Esq. (DC) - Disbarment Letter19
Kenneth Chesebro Esq. (NY) - Disbarment Letter20
Jenna Ellis Esq. (PA & CO) - Disbarment Letter21
Linda Kerns Esq. (PA) - Disbarment Letter22
Bruce Marks Esq. (PA) - Disbarment Letter23
James Bopp Esq. (PA) - Disbarment Letter24
Ronald Hicks Esq. (PA) - Disbarment Letter25
Carolyn B. McGee Esq. (PA) - Disbarment Letter26
Anita Milanovich Esq. (PA) - Disbarment Letter27
Marc Scaringi Esq. (PA)- Disbarment Letter28
Brian Caffrey Esq. (PA) - Disbarment Letter29
Walter Zimolong Esq. (PA) - Disbarment Letter30
Senator Ted Cruz Esq. (TX) - Disbarment Letter31
Cleta Mitchell Esq. (DC) - Disbarment Letter32
Joseph diGenova Esq. (DC) - Disbarment Letter33
Boris Epshteyn Esq. (NY) - Disbarment Letter34
Paul Davis Esq. (TX) - Disbarment Letter35
William Calhoun Esq. (GA) - Disbarment Letter36
James Troupis Esq. (WI) - Disbarment Letter37
David Brock, Michael Teter, and Melissa Moss have inspired others to pick up the torch and target Republican lawyers themselves. For example, The Lincoln Project is actively targeting larger firms in an attempt to convince their associates to pressure their partners into refusing to do business with Republicans. Their efforts are so prolific there have even been calls on President Biden to denounce their tactics and Twitter took the extreme step of removing their tweets calling for violence against two lawyers.38 Here is an example of one of their campaigns:
Another group called the Un-American Bar operates a website that lists every lawyer, firm, and lawsuit supportive of President Trump and/or Republicans. They’ve worked closely with a left-wing activist group called Shutdown DC to create mailing lists and scripts targeting various law firms.39
Still, another group called Lawyers Defending American Democracy (LDAD) led by former Democratic Massachusetts Attorney General Scott Harshbarger has targeted Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton with an ethics complaint filed with the State Bar of Texas.40 They've also filed ethics complaints against John Eastman Esq., former Assistance Attorney General Jeffrey Clark, former Attorney General William Barr, Rudy Giuliani Esq., and General Michael Flynn.
Finally, Hillary Clinton’s lawyer, Marc Elias, is using funds and resources provided by the Democratic National Committee to disqualify Republican candidates for supporting an insurrection against the United States by backing then-President Donald Trump in congressional votes. Elias is relying on an obscure post-Civil War constitutional provision intended to keep Confederacy supporters from public office. Currently, Rep. Paul Gosar, Rep Andy Biggs, and Mark Finchem are all facing lawsuits attempting to bar them from public office under the 14th Amendment.41
THE RESULTS
Sadly, only a few high-profile lawyers like Professor Alan Dershowitz have come out against the War on the 6th effort explaining, “It was only 22 years ago when lawyers like me sought to block the election of President George W. Bush, believing as we did that Al Gore actually received more votes than Bush in Florida and was the rightful winner. We lost in court. But back then no one suggested going after the hundreds of lawyers who tried to prevent Bush’s certification. A dangerous weapon, like the 65 Project, unleashed by Democrats will surely be used by Republicans at some future time.”
At the end of the day, the War on the 6th is just Brock’s starting point. His ultimate goal is to create a world where left-wing ideology and the legal system are one and the same - a reality that in my opinion would be the end of the American Experiment. In the meantime, Brock and his colleagues will continue their war and attempt to rule the nation from the safety of their smoke-filled rooms…
https://www.axios.com/2022/03/07/trump-election-lawyers-disbar
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/news/a25291/smoke-filled-room-history/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidjbecker/
https://thefederalist.com/2022/08/11/democratic-operatives-control-voter-rolls-in-31-states-report-shows/
https://publicinterestlegal.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/1-Complaint-DC-ERIC.pdf
https://audgen.michigan.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/r231023521-4999.pdf
https://legalnewsline.com/stories/555822683-mark-zuckerberg-beneficiaries-promoting-fair-elections-not-exactly-non-partisan-as-advertised
https://the65project.com/
https://www.courthousenews.com/trump-lawyers-sanctioned-for-filing-frivolous-election-lawsuit-in-michigan/
https://www.michigan.gov/-/media/Project/Websites/AG/election/Junttila_atty_complaint_-_signed.pdf?rev=70e4a983224644f3bd2a7334757fa93a
https://www.michigan.gov/-/media/Project/Websites/AG/election/Rohl_atty_complaint_-_signed.pdf?rev=900de7900d78431b80f22c6f0bbd7ab9
https://www.michigan.gov/-/media/Project/Websites/AG/election/Hagerstrom_atty_complaint_-_signed.pdf?rev=f9e29223e30c4a29928ddf0bcf4eb162
https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/powell-wood-sanctions.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Olsen-Kurt-Public-Final-pdf.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/William-Olson.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/John-Eastman.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Kenneth-Klukowski.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Kenneth-Chesebro.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Jenna-Ellis.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Linda-Kerns.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Bruce-Marks.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/James-Bopp.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Ronald-Hicks.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Carolyn-McGee.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Anita-Milanovich.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Marc-Scaringi.pdfI
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Brian-Caffrey.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Walter-Zimolong.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Ethics-Complaint-Against-Senator-Ted-Cruz.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/The-65-Projects-Ethics-Complaint-Against-Trump-Attorney-Cleta-Mitchell.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/The-65-Projects-Ethics-Complaint-Against-Trump-Attorney-Joseph-diGenova.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/The-65-Projects-Ethics-Complaint-Against-Trump-Attorney-Boris-Epshteyn.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/The-65-Projects-Ethics-Complaint-Against-Vexatious-Attorney-Paul-Davis.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/The-65-Projects-Ethics-Complaint-Against-Insurrectionist-Attorney-William-Calhoun.pdf
https://the65project.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/The-65-Projects-Ethics-Complaint-Against-False-Elector-Andrew-Hitt-and-Trump-Attorney-James-Troupis.pdf
https://thefederalist.com/2020/11/10/biden-must-denounce-the-lincoln-projects-dangerous-targeted-harassment-of-lawyers/
https://thefederalist.com/2020/11/13/left-wing-activist-group-launches-strategic-harassment-campaign-targeting-trump-election-lawyers/f
https://ldad.org/letters-briefs/cdc-responds-to-ethics-complaint
https://web.archive.org/web/20220407180444/https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/07/us/politics/insurrectionists-congress.html
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