Documents obtained by conservative watchdog group The Media Research Center (MRC) reveal that the Biden administration weaponized taxpayer dollars against mainstream conservative groups and the GOP. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) awarded over $350,000 in grant funding in FY 2022 to a University of Dayton program, known as PREVENTS-OH, as part of the DHS’ Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention Grant Program (TVTP).
DHS’ website describes the TVTP program’s mission as establishing or enhancing capabilities to prevent targeted violence and terrorism through creating modules on media literacy and online critical thinking and identifying the risks and protective factors to prevent ideologically-fueled violence.
A seminar was held at the University of Dayton’s Human Rights Center, where researcher Michael Loadenthal from the University of Cincinnati linked organizations such as the Republican National Committee (RNC), The American Conservative Union Foundation (CPAC Foundation), the Heritage Foundation, the National Rifle Association (NRA), and Fox News to radicalized fringe neo-Nazi paramilitary groups like The Base and the white supremacist website The Daily Stormer.
The presenter showed attendees a “Pyramid of Far-Right Radicalization,” which also included conservative media outlets like Breitbart News and the Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN), and groups like PragerU and Turning Point USA.
1/🚨EXPOSED: @theMRC has uncovered a DHS anti-terrorism program that’s been weaponized against conservatives.
80 grants & 39.6 million taxpayer dollars later, here’s a look at how @JoeBiden & @SecMayorkas are outsourcing their efforts to conflate conservatives with terrorists🧵 pic.twitter.com/uw7Cdj0sPC
— Heritage Foundation (@Heritage) May 25, 2023
Rutgers University professor Alexander Hinton drew a comparison at the seminar between the Trump administration and the Khmer Rouge, the brutal regime led by Pol Pot, responsible for the mass killing of nearly two million Cambodians in the 1970s.
Speaker Nicole Widdersheim, Washington Deputy Director at Human Rights Watch and recent Senior Policy Advisor for the Center for the Prevention of Genocide at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, said that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is an extremist who may have envisioned carrying out “another Holocaust” with his proposed civilian state force to assist the National Guard when responding to emergencies.
During another seminar, Loadenthal encouraged “antifascists” to engage in illegal activities, and exert “pressure” on financial institutions and companies to deplatform conservatives.
9/ Another speaker in that same seminar, @NWiddersheim, considers @RonDeSantis an extremist and suggested that he might have envisioned carrying out another Holocaust with his then proposed civilian state force to assist the FL National Guard in responding to emergencies. pic.twitter.com/LBkyI2lGmH
— Heritage Foundation (@Heritage) May 25, 2023
A DHS employee participated in virtual session of the Seminar to talk about the agency’s programming. Later, PREVENTS-OH referenced the seminar in their grant proposal to DHS. Through a spokesperson, DHS denies funding, organizing, or endorsing the seminar and terrorism-pyramid graphic. Instead, they—ironically—suggested they are in the business of leaving Americans exercising their constitutional rights the hell alone. DHS’ response:
Similarly, the presented chart was not developed, presented, or endorsed by the Department of Homeland Security, and was not part of any successful grant application to the Department of Homeland Security. DHS does not profile, target, or discriminate against any individual for exercising their constitutional rights protected by the First Amendment.
MRC accused the Department of lying, asserting that they did fund the program and pointing to an internal memo it obtained, showing that DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas designated the program as a high priority for the Biden administration. In a statement, Vice President of MRC, Dan Schneider wrote:
DHS is lying through its teeth once again. DHS did indeed fund the PREVENTS-OH program a year after a graph and documents were presented that equated Nazis to conservatives, Christians, and Republicans.
Laughably, the DHS Ohio grantee quickly scrubbed its website following this report, something innocent groups don’t do. But it is too late; we have already copied it. We also have proof that ‘PREVENTS-OH’ actually hosted the conference and that DHS was an active participant, including featuring a senior DHS official at the conference.
Mayorkas should step down immediately, and Congress should launch a criminal investigation and make appropriate criminal referrals so our judicial system can hold people accountable for their lawlessness.
Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) tweeted that the findings were, “[c]ompletely disgraceful. The Biden admin’s weaponization of government to target conservatives is profoundly dangerous.”
The NRA also voiced its opposition in a social media post, calling the use of public funds “outrageous,” writing “Protecting 2A isn’t terrorism, it’s patriotism.” The GOP-lef House Judiciary Committee tweeted the story with the simple caption, “Wow.”
The Heritage Foundation has called for a Congressional investigation, writing:
Lacking all self-reflection, there were interestingly no mentions of 2020’s “summer of love” where leftists caused at least $2 billion in damage across the U.S., the consequences of which the America’s poor and middle class are still facing.
There was also no mention about the extremism of a President abusing his power to try and force a nation to take an experimental drug without consent, or the fact that a substantial portion of the country supported punishing those who wouldn’t comply.
Whether it’s the FBI, DOJ, IRS, or DHS, it seems the Biden admin will weaponize any part of the federal government against its political opponents, including by conflating them with terrorists.
During Biden’s tenure, DHS has awarded 80 grants totaling almost $40 million in taxpayer funding to target forms of domestic extremism. Biden routinely touts “Extremist MAGA Republicans” as the greatest threat to “democracy,” unveiling the well-polled term in a controversial stump speech given ahead of the 2022 midterm elections, while using U.S. military members as props for his partisan appeals.
In May 2022, it was reported that the term was a creation by leftist think tanks, for maximum spooky factor:
…the Biden catchphrase was the product of six full months of research by the Center for American Progress Action Fund. Plus, of course, private polling by Hart Research and the Global Strategy Group.
The MRC reports confirm what many conservatives know, by proxy or personal experience, that the Biden regime is politically targeting and persecuting citizens in a departure from the U.S. Constitution and American civic principles.
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