(The Conversation) – After the fall of the al-Assad regime in Syria, large stockpiles of the illicit drug captagon have reportedly been uncovered.

The stockpiles, found by Syrian rebels, are believed to be linked to al-Assad military headquarters, implicating the fallen regime in the drug’s manufacture and distribution.

But as we’ll see, captagon was once a pharmaceutical drug, similar to some of the legally available stimulants we still use today for conditions including attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

Captagon was once a pharmaceutical

Captagon is the original brand name of an old synthetic pharmaceutical stimulant originally made in Germany in the 1960s. It was an alternative to amphetamine and methamphetamine, which were both used as medicines at the time.

The drug has the active ingredient fenethylline and was initially marketed for conditions including ADHD and the sleeping disorder narcolepsy. It had a similar use to some of the legally available stimulants we still use today, such as dexamphetamine.

Captagon has similar effects to amphetamines. It increases dopamine in the brain, leading to feelings of wellbeing, pleasure and euphoria. It also improves focus, concentration and stamina. But it has a lot of unwanted side effects, such as low-level psychosis.

The drug was originally sold mostly in the Middle East and parts of Europe. It was available over the counter (without a prescription) in Europe for a short time before it became prescription-only.

It was approved only briefly in the United States before becoming a controlled substance in the 1980s, but was still legal for the treatment of narcolepsy in many European countries until relatively recently.

According to the International Narcotics Control Board pharmaceutical manufacture of Captagon had stopped by 2009.

“Bashar as Dealer,” Digital, Dream / Dreamland v3, 2024

The illicit trade took over

The illegally manufactured version is usually referred to as captagon (with a small c). It is sometimes called “chemical courage” because it is thought to be used by soldiers in war-torn areas of the Middle East to help give them focus and energy.

For instance, it’s been reportedly found on the bodies of Hamas soldiers during the conflict with Israel.

Its manufacture is relatively straightforward and inexpensive, making it an obvious target for the black-market drug trade.

Black-market captagon is now nearly exclusively manufactured in Syria and surrounding countries such as Lebanon. It’s mostly used in the Middle East, including recreationally in some Gulf states.

It is one of the most commonly used illicit drugs in Syria.

A recent report suggests captagon generated more than US$7.3 billion in Syria and Lebanon between 2020 and 2022 (about $2.4 billion a year).

What we know about illicit drugs generally is that any seizures or crackdowns on manufacturing or sale have a very limited impact on the drug market because another manufacturer or distributor pops up to meet demand.

So in all likelihood, given the size of the captagon market in the Middle East, these latest drug discoveries and seizures are likely to reduce manufacture only for a short time.

Nicole Lee, Adjunct Professor at the National Drug Research Institute (Melbourne based), Curtin University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Netanyahu said in a forthcoming interview, “frankly I’m surprised and disappointed,” according to Politico.

I should think so. Netanyahu, who is on trial on two counts of corruption, operates rather as his namesake, the gangster Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel did in Las Vegas, corrupting or intimidating judges and other officials. Though to be fair to Mr. Siegel, he murdered many fewer people.

The backdrop to the plan of troglodytes in Congress to harass the ICC is that Netanyahu’s government in Israel has run a decade-long campaign of spying and intimidation against the judges of the International Criminal Court, according to an investigation of The Guardian and two Israeli magazines, +972 Mag and Local Call, published by journalists Harry Davies, Bethan McKernan, Yuval Abraham, and Meron Rapoport.

It is important to point out that the same cast of cyber-bullies has run an operation against American universities under the rubric of “Canary Mission,” in coordination with the inquisitorial Ministry of Strategic Affairs. headed by the American Ron Dermer. So reported James Bamford in The Nation. Canary Mission smears and doxes students and professors at American universities who stand for Palestinian rights in an attempt to interfere with their careers and for the purpose of intimidating them and others into silence.

Both operations are Israeli government-inspired but aided by local agents. Despite the US federal law, FARA, which requires agents of foreign governments to register, Israeli such agents have been exempted from such requirements for political reasons, including Canary Mission and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.

The International Criminal Court was envisioned by the internationally-backed Rome Statute in 1998, which came into effect in 2002. The judges are selected by delegates from the 124-member states of the Conference of Parties. Canada, Britain, France, Denmark, Greece, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Portugal, Spain, and Switzerland are among the signatories. So the Israelis were spying on and harassing judges chosen by several NATO countries.

Mossad, Israeli intelligence, directed an operation against Fata Bensouda, the former prosecutor of the court, during whose tenure the court found that it had jurisdiction over the Occupied Palestinian Territories because Palestine, a non-member observer state of the United Nations, had acceded to the Treaty of Rome in 2015. The Guardian story alleges that Israeli operatives attempted to bribe her, showing up at her private home, to come to a different decision.

The Hill Video: “Ex-Israeli Spy Chief THREATENED ICC Top Prosecutor, Pressures Her To Drop Netanyahu Probe: Report”

Israel’s control of telecommunications in Palestine allowed it to tap into any fact-gathering calls ICC officials made to the Occupied West Bank. Israel intensively spied on Palestinian human rights NGOs sending dossiers to the ICC, using the Pegasus spyware that has so harmed journalists and activists, which was developed by a company with close ties to the Israeli government. Pegasus has been banned in the United States by the Biden administration. At one point, Israeli officials attempted to discredit the Palestinian NGOs working with the ICC by falsely accusing them of having terrorist links. Sound familiar?

Mossad director Mossi Cohen, a close crony of Netanyahu, appears actually to have stalked Bensouda, “turning up unannounced and subjecting her to unwanted calls,” according to Davies et al. Some of the stalking was done in New York, so perhaps the zealous New York City officials who were so concerned with students having tents on campus might open an investigation into an actual crime? Mossad also started a smear campaign against a relative of Bensouda in hopes of discrediting her, an operation that failed.

Her successor, British Prosecutor Karim Khan, said that the ICC under his tenure faced “several forms of threats and communications that could be viewed as attempts to unduly influence its activities.”

As for Canary Mission, Bamford wrote at The Nation, “Like all of Israel’s espionage and covert operations in the United States, Canary Mission’s links to Israeli intelligence—and the Mission’s American financiers—are well hidden. But as a result of a slipup on a tax form a few years ago, those links began to be revealed. And in the process was exposed the role played by one of the wealthiest families in California, headed by publicity-shy billionaire Sanford Diller, a major Trump backer who had donated $6 million to a pro-Trump political committee . . . For donations to a variety of causes, the Diller family maintains the Helen Diller Family Foundation. But in order to get a tax break, they turn the funds over to a much larger trust, the Jewish Community Federation of San Francisco, which then channels the Diller family donations. According to The Forward (formerly The Jewish Daily Forward), in 2016 the Diller Foundation donated $100,000 through the Jewish Community Federation to an obscure Israeli nonprofit called Megamot Shalom. Untraceable, off the grid, unheard of, Megamot Shalom was actually the front for Canary Mission.”

So these individuals donating to Megamot Shalom were breaking the Foreign Agents Registration Act Law, attempting to smear and blackball American professors and students on behalf of the Israeli Ministry of Strategic Affairs. There is almost certainly a RICO offense here.

These two stalking operations, of ICC judges and of American universities, are intended to allow the large scale theft of Palestinian land by Israeli squatters to proceed unhindered, and to shield Israel from the consequences of its war crimes against the Palestinians. The vicious crackdown on protesters against the genocide in Gaza in US universities is being actively connived at by the Dillers of the world. American parents should be outraged that Trumpie Zionists are conspiring to put their children in jail for having a conscience.

Attorney General Merrick Garland must look into Canary Mission and sanction its donors and agents for FARA violations, not to mention a vast conspiracy to interfere with Americans’ first amendment rights and to libel them. It is coming for our children, for God’s sake.

( Michigan Advance ) – Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson said she “wasn’t surprised” by news that former President Donald Trump allegedly pressured Republican members of the Wayne County Board of Canvassers to refuse to sign the certification of the 2020 presidential election.

Benson, a Democrat who spent most of 2020 warning about the potential for disinformation over election results, told CNN that the revelation, first reported late Thursday night by the Detroit News, was further evidence of Trump’s efforts to upend a free and fair election.

“It’s quite extraordinary,” said Benson. “We had a gut feeling and had lots of different pieces of evidence to suggest that this was happening. So, I wasn’t surprised by anything that was revealed or any of the revelations in the recording.”

The News said it had reviewed a recording of a phone call Trump made on Nov. 17, 2020, to the two GOP Wayne County canvassers, Monica Palmer and William Hartmann. 

“We’ve got to fight for our country,” the News reported Trump said on the recording. “We can’t let these people take our country away from us.”

Also reportedly on the call, which the News said was recorded by a person present with Palmer and Hartmann at the time, was Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel, a Wayne County resident and niece of U.S. Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah).

“If you can go home tonight, do not sign [the certification]. … We will get you attorneys,” McDaniel is reported to have told Palmer and Hartmann. 

Trump is then said to have added: “We’ll take care of that.”

President Joe Biden, a Democrat, won Michigan over GOP President Donald Trump by over 154,000 votes. Biden secured about 68% of the votes cast for president in Wayne County and Trump received about 31% of votes in the county. The blue county is home to Detroit, Michigan’s largest city and is 79% African American.

After initially voting against certifying the Wayne County election results, Palmer and Hartmann relented after sharp criticism from members of the public and voted to approve them, as the Advance reported at the time. 

Benson said on social media that moment was a turning point.

“Hundreds – hundreds (!) – of citizens showed up to the meeting of the Wayne County Canvassing Board to remind them of their duty under the law to ensure their votes counted,” she said. “Their voices mattered. Their votes mattered. In my view that turned the tide. Citizens and election officials in Wayne County and statewide didn’t flinch, stood firm, and demanded their votes be certified as required under the law.”

However, the News says it was 30 minutes after the meeting ended that Trump called, saying it would look “terrible” if they ended up signing the certification after initially voting in opposition.

Former President Donald J. Trump is seen in silhouette holding an umbrella as he talks to members of the press on the South Lawn of the White House Tuesday, Dec. 10, 2019, prior to boarding Marine One to begin his trip to Hershey, Pa. | Official White House Photo by Joyce N. Boghosian via Flickr Public Domain

Following the phone call, Palmer and Hartmann left the canvassers meeting without signing the official certification document. Then they tried to rescind their votes the following day, an effort that proved unsuccessful and paved the way for certification in Wayne County, but also ultimately at the state level, confirming Joe Biden’s win in Michigan. He would be awarded all 16 of the state’s electoral votes.

“Had Trump succeeded in delaying or preventing a county or statewide certification in Michigan, that precedent would have been used to delay or block certification in Pennsylvania (which was certifying the following week), Georgia and so on, paving the way for the false slate of electors. We knew we were the first domino to go and that what Michigan did would impact the others,” said Benson on the social media platform X.

Trump also met with Michigan GOP leaders in the White House on Nov. 20, 2020, including former Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey (R-Clarklake) and House Speaker Lee Chatfield (R-Levering). Republicans have claimed they weren’t pressured to overturn election results.

The News reported that while Hartmann has since died, neither Palmer nor McDaniel and Trump, through spokespeople, disputed a summary of the phone call when presented to them. The paper noted, however, that Palmer in the past described the conversation with Trump as, “Thank you for your service. I’m glad you’re safe. Have a good night.”

The News said those comments weren’t included in the segments of the call the paper reviewed.

McDaniel, a former Michigan GOP chair, said she stands by her statements made at the time that there was “ample evidence” that warranted an election audit. 

Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung told the paper that Trump’s actions “were taken in furtherance of his duty as president of the United States to faithfully take care of the laws and ensure election integrity, including investigating the rigged and stolen 2020 presidential election.”

Despite continued allegations of election fraud, no evidence has been validated, while multiple judges, many of them Trump appointees, have rejected every legal attempt to overturn the results.

Trump also faces both state and federal charges for illegally attempting to interfere in the election process. 

The day following the phone call to Palmer and Hartmann, Trump further boosted the pressure to stop the certification by making unproven and inaccurate statements.

“The numbers have not improved, it is still 71% out of balance”, stated Wayne County, Michigan,  Canvassers. “There is widespread irregularities in poll numbers.” There are “more votes than people”. The two harassed patriot Canvassers refuse to sign the papers!,” he posted on social media.

Similar false conspiracies were later brought up during a now-infamous Michigan House committee meeting featuring Rudy Giuliani, who was then serving as Trump’s personal attorney. Giuliani, who is also facing charges in Georgia for election interference, filed for bankruptcy on Thursday, days after a jury ordered him to pay nearly $150 million to two former Georgia election workers for defamation.

Peter Bondi, managing director of the nonprofit Informing Democracy, expressed concern about what Trump will do after the 2024 election if he loses again.

“Following Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election, it’s easy to predict that he will loudly call for every local election official to refuse to certify the results of the election in 2024. What we can’t predict is how many will actually listen to him,” Bondi said. “Unfortunately, from what we’ve seen in Michigan, Arizona, and elsewhere, we know that some may follow his command, breaking their oath and disregarding the votes of the citizens they’ve sworn to serve — and in many cases breaking the law.”

Benson, meanwhile, was asked by CNN’s Abby Phillip that in light of the recording, if she thought charges should be sought against Palmer or McDaniel.

“I have great faith in our Attorney General Dana Nessel,” she responded. “She just today announced charges in a very different inquiry against former state employees for abusing their power [Robert and Anne Minard]. So when the law is violated, she will ensure there is accountability. So we’ll see how that unfolds. I think the other thing to remember here is at the end of the day, the commissioners and folks on the Wayne County Board of Canvassers did their job. They certified the election, as the state board did as well. So despite attempts to bribe or cajole or interfere, influence, it was unsuccessful. And democracy prevailed, in part because hundreds of citizens showed up that night to demand that the law be followed. And indeed, it ultimately was.”

Mark Brewer, an elections lawyer and former Michigan Democratic Party chair, was more blunt.

“Lock ‘em up: Trump, Palmer, Ronna Romney McDaniel, and everyone else who was part of this criminal scheme,” he posted.

Jon King

Jon King is the Senior Reporter for the Michigan Advance and has been a journalist for more than 35 years. He is the Past President of the Michigan Associated Press Media Editors Association and has been recognized for excellence numerous times, most recently in 2022 with the Best Investigative Story by the Michigan Association of Broadcasters. He is also an adjunct faculty member at Cleary University. Jon and his family live in Howell.

Published under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.

Michigan Advance

Applying a different standard to a powerful person reflects only contempt for the rule of law.

Mitchell Zimmerman

Mitchell Zimmerman is an attorney, longtime social activist, and author of the anti-racism thriller Mississippi Reckoning.

Alphonse “Scarface” Capone (d. 1947) was a liquor smuggler in Chicago and head of an organized crime conspiracy in that city. When bars declined to take their covert supplies under the table from Capone, he had them blown up. Some 100 persons died in this massive terror campaign, and they were only a small number of his victims. This is how he tried to present himself in one of his mug shots — sober, unworried, defiant. In fact, he was an impetuous, vain, violent man. Like Trump, Inc., he did not pay his taxes, and ultimately went down for it.

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1920s Prison Mug Shot Of Gangster Scarface Al Capone Looking At Camera Chicago Illinois US. (Photo by Charles Phelps Cushing/Classicstock/Getty Images)

Or here’s a young John Gotti, looking distinctly unreformed and unreformable. He became an enforcer for the Gambino family in New York, specializing in narcotics trafficking and loansharking, not to mention murder. In fact, he took over the Gambino crime family after having his competition removed. In 1985, he had his rival for the top post, Aniello Dellacroce, gunned down in front of a restaurant, in the same way that Trump tried to erase Joe Biden’s presidential victory by violence on the part of his shock troops. In 1990, FBI agents and NYPD detectives, having carefully built a case against him with authorized electronic surveillance and using his close associate “Sammy the Bull” Gravano as an informant, arrested Gotti on “multiple counts of racketeering, extortion, jury tampering, and other crimes.” Here is another similarity to Trump, who was also charged with racketeering. Like Gotti, Trump was viewed as likely to threaten and tamper with the jury. In Gotti’s case the jurors remained anonymous.

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In this handout, Italian-American gangster John Gotti (1940 – 2002) in a mug shot, US, 30th March 1965. (Photo by Kypros/Getty Images)

Finally, let us consider another populist politician, this time a Democrat, James Traficant of Ohio. A sitting congressman, he was convicted in 2002 of 10 counts of racketeering, bribery and fraud. Traficant defended John Demjanjuk, a retired auto worker who was accused of having been a Nazi prison camp guard and who was extradited to Germany. He stood against foreclosure on some of his constituents’ homes. But he was thought to be in the back pocket of organized crime in northern Ohio. In a different era, he hit some of the same notes of popular discontent as Trump later would. But like Trump, he was corrupt to the core and his methods were often criminal. Like Trump, no one knew what to make of his hair. He does not look so much angry in his mug shot as smug and confident, unbowed, and in a way defiant. He insisted on defending himself at his trial. There is an old saw that a man who defends himself has a fool for a client. He lost badly, and became the first representative to be expelled from Congress since the Civil War era. There may be another parallel here, in that Trump may end up being ineligible for office because of his various crimes, according to the 14th amendment.

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UNDATED PHOTO: Former U.S. Rep. James Traficant (D-OH) is seen in this undated photo. Traficant was sentenced July 30, 2002 to eight years in prison for bribery, tax evasion and racketeering. The House of Representatives voted 420-1 to expel him last week, making Traficant only the second member of Congress kicked out since the Civil War. (Photo by Summit County Jail/Getty Images)

We can leave aside those presidents tried for crimes against humanity and massacres, such as Saddam Hussein of Iraq (executed in 2006) or Slobodan Milosevic of Serbia. Trump rode roughshod over people’s civil rights, including in Portland, Or. and Lafayette Park, but those are not among the charges against him. He stands accused of sedition and conspiracy to overturn an election. There also isn’t a good parallel to South Korea, which has routinely tried and imprisoned former presidents on embezzlement and corruption charges. Although there are questions about whether the Trumps illicitly used the White House to enrich themselves further, DJT is not being tried on those grounds.

The closes parallel is former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro, who faces as many as 16 trials, one of which began in June. He is charged with spreading misinformation about the election in the months leading up to it. If found guilty he could be barred from politics for 8 years.

In 2019, former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf was convicted of treason because he had suspended the country’s constitution in 2007. Musharraf made a military coup against elected Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in 1999 and held a phony referendum, whereby he because president. This is not so hard since in a referendum you have no opponent and the only candidate people can vote for is you. Musharraf was not the first military dictator to make himself president of Pakistan, in fact he was the fourth, after Generals Ayyub Khan, Yahya Khan, and Zia ul-Haq.

Musharraf, however, went further than ruling according to provisions in the constitution for a national emergency. In 2007 he dismissed the Supreme Court and replaced it with one to his liking, and in November of that year he actually set aside the constitution, restoring it a month later, in December.

Pakistan was in so much turmoil that Musharraf couldn’t control the situation, so he agreed to the holding of new elections in 2008, won by Asaf Ali Zardari after his wife, Benazir Bhutto, was assassinated. Musharraf went into exile. The legal establishment, however, still minded his attempt to tinker with it and in 2013 they began proceedings against him for treason in connection with his suspension of the constitution. In 2019 the trial in absentia wrapped up with Musharraf being sentenced to death. The pawerful Pakistani officer corps had lobbied against one of their own being treated like this, but to no avail. Musharraf was sentenced to death in absentia, given that he lived in Dubai then. He died on Feb. 5, 2023.

Since US prosecutors have not considered Trump’s crimes to constitute a form of treason, he does not face the death penalty, though he is 77, so he could easily die in jail if he is convicted and imprisoned. In Georgia, he can’t get less than five years if he is convicted of the racketeering and other charges, because of mandatory sentencing guidelines. He also cannot be paroled or pardoned before spending 5 years in prison.

An Atlanta, Georgia, grand jury indicted former President Donald Trump on Aug. 14, 2023, charging him with racketeering and 12 other felonies related to his alleged attempts to overturn his 2020 election defeat in the state.

Eighteen of Trump’s allies and associates, including former Trump attorney Rudolph Giuliani and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, were also indicted for racketeering and other felony charges for their alleged involvement in the scheme.

This marks Trump’s fourth indictment in five months – and the second to come from his efforts to undo the election results that awarded the presidency to Joe Biden. Fani Willis, the district attorney of Fulton County, Georgia, started investigating Trump’s involvement in this alleged scheme, as well as that of Trump’s colleagues, in February 2021.

In January 2021, one month before the investigation started, Trump placed a phone call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and pressed him to “find” enough votes to overturn Biden’s win.

The Conversation U.S. spoke with Anthony Michael Kreis, a scholar of Georgia’s election laws, to understand the significance of the charges laid out in the 98-page indictment. Here are five key points to understand about the precise nature of the charges and why racketeering is at the center of them.

1. Racketeering is different from conspiracy charges

With a Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations, or RICO, charge, Willis presents a narrative that there were a large number of people involved in this case, but that they didn’t necessarily sit down at some point and over cocktails and say, “We are going to engage in this criminal act,” which would be a traditional conspiracy case. She is painting this picture of people winking and nodding and working toward this end goal of overthrowing the election, but without some kind of expressed agreement.

The Georgia RICO law allows her to rope in a lot of people who allegedly were involved with this kind of approach.

To be able to bring conspiracy charges, she would have to have an expressed agreement and a concrete act in furtherance of that conspiracy. And here there really wasn’t quite a plan – it is essentially a loose organization of people who are all up to no good.

2. Georgia – and Willis – have used racketeering charges before

Traditionally in Georgia, RICO has been used to prosecute people engaged in very violent kinds of activity – for street gangs and the Mafia, in particular. It has also been used in other contexts.

When major Hollywood actors and directors, and sports coaches, were implicated on sexual harassment charges, they were put on trial and their credentials were taken away. They faced hefty fines. Even the 45th President of the U.S., Donald Trump, has been indicted for sexual harassment and rape, for misappropriating government documents, and now, for seeking to overturn a national election and invalidate the Constitution.

In many countries in the Middle East, matters tend to be different. Even if those charged are found guilty, they and their backers can buy judges, lawyers and prosecutors.

Recently, a scandal involving corruption broke in Gilan, a province in northern Iran.

In Gilan, two men, holding high positions of power, both in charge of the local branch of the “vice and virtue” department, while holding others responsible for “indecent behavior,” are now accused of engaging in sodomy. Sodomy in the Penal Code of the Islamic Republic carries a severe penalty, lashes and, potentially, the death sentence.

“All sexual activities that occur outside a traditional, heterosexual marriage (i.e., sodomy or adultery) are illegal. Same-sex sexual activities that occur between consenting adults are criminalized and carry a maximum punishment of death—though not generally implemented.”

Almost a year ago, Mahsa Amini, the young Kurdish woman who became a global symbol of women’s struggle in Iran, was beaten to death for having a little hair shown. The man who hit her on the head and caused her death was never tried nor taken to jail. He was protected by a judicial system that is utterly corrupt.

A revolutionary situation ensued. Some called it the first feminist movement in the world. All over Iran and the world people came out in the streets to show support for Iranian women in their quest for equality and their wish to be free of mandatory hijab and other restrictions.

Now there are at least two well-known cases, one of a married cleric who went on TV and preached piousness while at night engaged in sodomy with his brother-in-law. His name is Mehdi Hagh Shenas and he has long been the direct representative of Supreme Leader Khamenei in Gilan. He is shown in one of his TV shows, in clerical robes, discussing the cause-and-effect relationship between sin and illness. “Lacking decency and moral depravity are both sinful,” he proclaimed.

Then there is the case a Mr Seghati, who also engaged in sexual relations with a man while he held the position of the director of what is called the Department of Commanding Right and Forbidding Wrong, a moral injunction that goes back to the Koran.

A few years ago, Saeed Tousi, Khamenei’s favorite Koran reader was exposed as a child sex predator, taking young boys to Hajj pilgrimage in Mecca and raping several of them. A court acquitted him.

In an interview with BBC Persian, he denied reports that the office of the Supreme Leader had influenced the outcome in his case.

The young cleric who engaged in sexual relations and text messages with his in-law suffered the harshest punishment meted out for this kind of behavior by being defrocked; others were temporarily marginalized and then given other positions. All the while, hundreds of women and men are stopped, detained, and given long sentences for harboring the ordinary desires of any young person.

In the Islamic Republic of Iran, those who commit crimes and are closely related to Khamenei’s beyt (household) have never been held responsible. They are protected by the system–a corrupt system that holds the victim in contempt and releases the criminal.

In 2021, a blogger and the founder of Amad News, Ruhollah Zam, whose father had named him after Ruhollah Khomeini, exposed the corruption of the regime’s officials. He was later abducted while traveling to Iraq from France, kidnapped, and taken to Iran. He was in prison for nearly a year and later, without ever being told that he had been sentenced to death, was executed.

The married judge who sentenced him to death had also texted with a woman asking for sexual favors.

Ruhollah Zam’s crime? He had exposed a regime of corruption.

A year later, his father, who had worked closely with the regime, defiantly took off his clerical robe in protest of his son’s unjust execution.

When asked in a townhall meeting in NYC, at Columbia university in 2005, the then newly elected President of Iran Ahmadi Nejad responded to a question about the suppression of gays in Iran, by saying that “We don’t have gays in Iran!” eliciting laughter from the audience.

Hypocrisy is rife in many places. Arguably the most notable example in this country is that of Trump’s personal lawyer, Roy Cohn, who went after gays (and communists) during the McCarthy era and later came out of closet. He was the epitome of evil.

In Iran, too, “pious” men are often the most hypocritical and dishonest men who, not only engage in lewd behavior, but engage in unspeakable suppression of our women. This is the well-known problem of clergy malfeasance, from which Iran is not immune, to say the least.

They have never been tried nor held responsible.

Such are the laws of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and such laws must be eliminated.

Iran needs a total overhaul in every sector and in every aspect of its society especially in its corrupt judicial system.

 

( Michigan Advance ) – After Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced charges Tuesday against 16 Michigan residents tied to a scheme to submit false electoral votes in support of former President Donald Trump, elections experts and GOP officials are responding to the charges.

“My department has prosecuted numerous cases of election law violations throughout my tenure, and it would be malfeasance of the greatest magnitude if my department failed to act here,” Nessel said in a statement released Tuesday.

According to an affidavit in support of the charges filed by Howard Shock, a special agent investigator with the Michigan Department of Attorney General, 14 out of 16 individuals identified to the state as Republican Party candidates for elector allegedly met at the Michigan Republican party headquarters on Dec. 14, 2020. 

The 14 electors, alongside Kenneth Thompson and James Renner, who were chosen to replace the absent elector candidates Terri Lynn Land, a former secretary of state, and Gerald Wall are believed to have signed a number of documents as the “duly elected and qualified Electors for President and Vice President of the United States of America from the State of Michigan,” including a document submitting 16 electoral votes for former President Donald Trump and former Vice President Mike Pence. 

Neither Land nor Wall signed these documents. 

According to the affidavit, the individuals who signed the documents falsely asserted their status as duly elected and qualified electors, in addition to claiming they met in the state Capitol. 

Instead, the lawfully designated electors met in the Capitol in Lansing on Dec. 14, 2020, following state and federal law, and cast their votes unanimously for President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, who won the state by more than 154,000 votes.

Here are the 16 people charged:

Kathy Berden, 70, of Snover: A Michigan Republican national committeewoman.

William (Hank) Choate, 72, of Cement City: Served as chairman of the Jackson County Republican Party.

Amy Facchinello, 55, of Grand Blanc: A trustee on the Grand Blanc Board of Education who ran on right-wing values and has posted QAnon content on social media.

Clifford Frost, 75, of Warren: Ran for the 28th District seat in the state House of Representatives in 2020, but lost in the Republican primary.

Stanley Grot, 71, of Shelby Township: A GOP powerbroker in Macomb County, serving on the Shelby Township Board of Trustees. as well as the township clerk. In 2018, he ran for secretary of state but abruptly dropped out of the race, which became the center of an alleged payoff scandal that resulted in then-Michigan Party Chair Ron Weiser paying a $200,000 state fine for violating campaign finance law.

John Haggard, 82, of Charlevoix: A plaintiff in a case against Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 election. 

Mari-Ann Henry, 65, of Brighton: As of June 29, 2022, Henry’s LinkedIn listed her as the treasurer of the Greater Oakland Republican Club. 

Timothy King, 56, of Ypsilanti: A plaintiff in a case against Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 election. 

Michele Lundgren, 73, of Detroit: Ran for the 9th District seat in the state House of Representatives in 2022, but lost in the general election.

Meshawn Maddock, 55, of Milford: Former co-chair of the Michigan Republican Party and vocal proponent of Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. She attended a pro-Trump event on Jan. 5, 2021, in Washington, D.C., the day before the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. She is the co-owner of A1 Bail Bonds, a bail bondsman company, along with her spouse, GOP state Rep. Matt Maddock.

James Renner, 76, of Lansing: Served as a precinct delegate in 2020 for Watertown Township.

Mayra Rodriguez, 64, of Grosse Pointe Farms: Ran for the 2nd District seat in the state House of Representatives in 2022 as a Republican, but lost to nowHouse Speaker Joe Tate (D-Detroit).

Six of the 16 GOP electors charged: (clockwise) Kent Vanderwood, Meshawn Maddock, Marian Sheridan, Kathy Berden, Stanley Grot and Clifford Frost

Rose Rook, 81, of Paw Paw, a former Van Buren County GOP chair who also served on the executive committee of the county party. 

Marian Sheridan, 69, of West Bloomfield: Co-founder of the Michigan Conservative Coalition, a right-wing group founded by the Maddocks. Sheridan was also a plaintiff in a case to decertify the 2020 election in Michigan.  

Ken Thompson, 68, of Orleans: An Ionia County Republican who served as a precinct delegate and as the chair of Ionia County Republican Party’s August convention in 2022.

Kent Vanderwood, 69, of Wyoming: Mayor of Wyoming and vice president of the Timothy Group, which advances Christian organizations. 

On Jan. 5, 2021, the National Archivist of the United States reportedly received the certificate casting votes for Trump and Pence. According to the affidavit, the return address on the envelope holding the document had “Kathleen Berden, Chair of the Michigan Republican Electoral College” listed as a return address. A copy of the document was sent to the Michigan Department of Attorney General. 

Investigators reviewed another document retained by the United States Senate Archives, where Berden was also listed as the return address. The Document was signed by 16 people identifying themselves as “the duly elected and qualified Electors for President and Vice President of the United States of America from Michigan.”

The investigators later confirmed that two envelopes had been mailed from the East Lansing Post Office on Dec. 15, 2020, with Berden’s name, address and title printed on the envelope.

The affidavit also said Michigan State Police Forensic Scientist Mckenzie Weyh confirmed Berden, Choate, Vanderwood, Frost, Henry, Rook, King and Renners’ signatures on the false certificate of votes. 

According to Shock, Lundgren reportedly confirmed she signed the document, and had signed it with Facchinello. 

In a tweet posted on Aug. 23, 2022, Lundgren said she “attested to nothing” posting a page filled with signatures from the accused electors alongside an image of certificate of votes for president and vice president from Michigan casting electoral votes for President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden in the 2008 election.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shock also cited multiple instances where Maddock and Sheridan admitted to casting their votes for Trump and Pence alongside the 14 other candidates for elector. 

The affidavit also notes that Grot allegedly told Detroit Free Press reporter M.L. Elrick that he had signed the document in support of Trump. Thompson also allegedly admitted to signing in an interview with Daily News reporter Elisabeth Waldon. 

In response to the charges, the Michigan Republican Party issued an unsigned statement saying the charges “sparked valid concerns regarding the possible misuse of power” by Nessel’s office. It also accused Nessel of “defending systemic election corruption,” and seeking to deconstruct the influence of the Republican Party’s activists and leaders through fear of prosecution. 

The Michigan GOP is chaired by Kristina Karamo, a Republican former secretary of state candidate who rose to prominence for denying the results of the 2020 election Trump lost to Biden. Karamo also refused to concede her 2022 defeat to Benson, again making unproven allegations of voter fraud. 

Norman Eisen, executive chair of the States United Democracy Center, said that Nessel did the right thing in issuing charges. Eisen previously served as special counsel and special assistant to former President Barack Obama for ethics and government reform from 2009 through 2011.

“No one in Michigan should be able to forge election related documents with impunity,” Eisen said. “The [attorney general] and her office have often charged others who have created false and fraudulent documents, including Democrats.”

When election security is assaulted, the electoral system will respond, Eisen said. 

“Those who want to attack the election system in any way will have to think twice after [Attorney General] Nessel’s charges yesterday,” Eisen said.

Alongside Michigan, New Mexico, Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are looking into groups who reportedly submitted false documents claiming Trump won the 2020 election.

Eisen said Nessel’s decision puts wind in the sails of other state law enforcement officials.

“Every state will have to look at its laws… but that’s OK. The [attorney general] has done her job here. And every state will learn from it and benefit from it and make their own decisions,” Eisen said.

“Others need to know in the future that they are not going to be able to forge election related documents or participate in conspiracies to overturn the lawful results in Michigan or as a part of, as here, a nationwide game,” he said.

After charges were announced, two West Michigan state representatives called on Vanderwood to step down from his responsibilities as mayor of Wyoming. 

“Among the Republicans accused of attempting to overturn the results of those free and fair elections is Wyoming Mayor Kent Vanderwood. I strongly believe that in light of these extremely serious allegations, the right thing for the mayor to do is resign,” said Rep. Phil Skaggs (D-East Grand Rapids) in a statement. 

Rep. John Fitzgerald (D-Wyoming) also issued a statement calling for Vanderwood to recuse himself from his duties until a verdict has been issued on the charges against him. 

“These allegations — attempting to overturn Michigan’s lawful election — not only demonstrate poor judgment, but they also describe actions that are un-American, dangerous and wholly inappropriate for any person in a position of public trust to perpetrate,” Fitzgerald said.

“Every resident of Wyoming deserves to have trust in our local institutions and leaders. While these charges move through the courts, I do not believe that our city, nor its residents, are best served under the leadership of an indicted mayor,” Fitzgerald said.

The city of Wyoming also issued a statement about the charges against Vanderwood. 

“We are aware of the charges against Kent Vanderwood. These actions did not take place in his capacity as a city official. With any charges, there is a legal process that needs to be followed.”

 

Vanderwood did not respond to requests for comment. Maddock, Grot, Sheridan and Lundgren also did not respond to requests to comment about the charges they were facing. 

In a report from FOX-2 in Detroit, Maddock responded to charges, denying any wrongdoing. 

“We didn’t do anything wrong. We know we didn’t do anything wrong. We’re not fake electors. I was a duly elected Trump elector. There was no forgery involved,” Maddock said.

Maddock and the other 15 individuals charged are scheduled to appear in District Court 54-A in Lansing on Thursday, Aug. 10 according to the court’s calendar. Nessel is listed as the prosecutor. 

Advance reporter Anna Liz Nichols contributed to this report. 

 

Kyle Davidson

Kyle Davidson covers state government alongside health care, business and the environment. A graduate of Michigan State University, Kyle studied journalism and political science. He previously covered community events, breaking news, state policy and the environment for outlets including the Lansing State Journal, the Detroit Free Press and Capital News Service.

 

Via Michigan Advance

 Published under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.