Showing posts with label Rep. Matt Gaetz. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rep. Matt Gaetz. Show all posts

Thursday, June 9, 2022

April 11, 2018: Just Because the President is Frustrated, that Doesn't Mean the U.S. Constitution is Negated

 

4/11/18: I think we can assume the president spent another restless night in the West Wing. It turns out Trump is fuming about “an attack on our country in a true sense,” and by that we mean...North Korea? 

Russia? 

No…we mean the F.B.I. raid on Michael Cohen. 




____________________ 

“It would be suicide for the president to want to talk about firing Mueller.” 

Sen. Charles Grassley, (R-Iowa)

____________________ 

 

What do we know about the gentleman in question? We know Cohen has been referred to as Trump’s “pit bull.” We know Cohen likes to compare himself to Tom Hagan, lawyer for the Corleone family in The Godfather. We know he has threatened Trump’s enemies in the past. He has worked the boss out of legal jams related to shady business deals and paid out of his own pocket (or so he claims) to silence porn stars who might have dirt on Trump. We know in December 2015, with Trump already running for president, that Mr. Cohen was excited to see a news story quoting Vladimir Putin, saying Trump was “talented” and “very colorful.” 

Cohen viewed that story through the same lens anyone who works for Donald J. Trump would. Namely: green-colored glasses. This was a chance to cash in! Cohen emailed a friend who had been talking extensively with the Russians in an effort to close the deal and build a Trump Tower in Moscow. “Now is the time,” Cohen told Felix Sater, that friend. “Call me.” 

In those days, Sater  (a convicted felon) was working on drumming up Kremlin support. More emails and phone calls flew back and forth. Negotiations progressed to a point where Candidate Trump signed a letter of intent to build in the Russian capital. Then the business deal stalled. 

Cohen reached out to the Russians again in January 2016. 

Now remember: His boss is running to become the President of the United States. And what is the focus? 

Money.

 

That January, he contacted Vladimir Putin’s private secretary to ask about getting a tower built. According to Cohen nothing lucrative could be arranged. “I decided to abandon the proposal less than two weeks later for business reasons,” he said, “and do not recall any response to my email.” 

Again, don’t miss the point. Trump and his personal lawyer and his felonious friend would have happily worked with Vladimir Putin, the kleptomaniacal leader of a nation ranked first or second on a list of our implacable foes. The moral questions didn’t matter. The money just wasn’t right. 


$$$$$

 

In addition, we now learn that the president had to be talked down from the White House roof Tuesday – not to mention last December, as well. The raids aimed at his lawyer left Trump in a rage. 

Trump spent the day glaring at the television and steaming over how to respond to news of this raid. He might, for example, allow the investigations to continue, potentially clearing his name. If the whole investigation is really a “witch hunt” he has nothing to hide because witches can’t fly. Or he could just fire everyone he can, and maybe a few people he legally can’t. 

In the wake of the Cohen raids, Trump was wallowing in self-pity. He threatened to fire Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. He would put some hack, maybe Fox News howler, Judge Jeanine Pirro, in his place. Then the hack would fire Mueller. Trump would fire Attorney General Jeff Sessions and F.B.I. Director Christopher Wray. 

According to one White House source, behind the scenes the president was acting like a madman. Asked by reporters on Monday if he intended to fire Mueller, Trump responded, “We’ll see what happens. …Many people have said ‘you should fire him,’” he claimed. Then he went with the clincher: “Again, they [the investigators] found nothing and in finding nothing, that’s a big statement.”  

Of course, if we’re being honest no one knows yet what the F.B.I. has found, including the F.B.I. 

What we do know is that to get a search warrant, agents would have to prove to a judge that they had “probable cause” to suspect crimes were being or would soon be committed if they did not quickly act. (See: 4/12/18; 4/25/18; 5/4-5/18; 5/7/18 and  7/2/18 for comparison):

 

* 

TUESDAY, PINOCCHIO SANDERS tells reporters at the daily press briefing that she hates her job lying for Trump and would rather work for the D.C. Sewer Department than keep up the charade. 

No, seriously, she says the president believes he has the power to fire Mueller. If Trump told Sanders he had the power to levitate the Pentagon, she would go out like a parrot and squawk agreement. 

For once there were rumblings among Republicans, however gingerly they decided to rumble. Sen. Charles Grassley, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, was at the forceful end of the spectrum. “It would be suicide for the president to want to talk about firing Mueller,” he warned. 

Sen. Milksop Mitch McConnell was waiting to be enrolled in the Witness Protection Program and could not be reached for comment. 

Speaker of the House Paul Ryan gave it all up and announced he would retire at the end of his term. 

Sen. Joni Ernst, of Iowa, a war veteran, and someone from whom you might expect a little courage, punted when it came to upholding the U.S. Constitution. “No,” she said, she didn’t see why the Senate should pass legislation to protect Mueller from being fired, “because I don’t think the president’s going to do it – and do you think the president would sign that legislation?” 

Ha, ha, good one Sen. Ernst. “Checks and balances.” So passé.

 

Other Republicans at least had something to offer. Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana gave the president the benefit of the doubt and said he thought Trump was “too smart” to get rid of Mueller. “I think it would provoke some sort of reaction by Congress. I think he knows that,” Kennedy said. Besides, “the president can’t just fire Mr. Mueller, Kennedy added. “He’s got to direct Mr. Rosenstein to fire him, and I don’t think Mr. Rosenstein would do it.” 

Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn said firing Mueller wouldn’t do the president any good. “The facts will come out one way or the other.” Mueller and his team would be expected to compile a report, even if he were fired, and that report would be made public, whether to exonerate Trump or not. 

Finally, when I called my own Republican senator, Rob Portman, and left a message, I got a lengthy email response. In a key paragraph, Portman provided the kind of response that gave a shred of hope: 

Former FBI Director Robert Mueller is well qualified to oversee this probe and I continue to support his efforts to fully investigate this issue. Determining the extent of Russian efforts to influence our democratic process is a matter of national security and is far more important than partisan politics. Special Counsel Mueller’s investigation should be allowed to run its full course, and he should remain in charge.

 

In the House of Representatives, however, abject cowardice has been more the rule of the day. 

 

“I think the president is very frustrated.” 

These lawmakers have elections to win every other year, and what matters most to them is 2018, not 1215, when, in the Magna Carta, the English enshrined the rule of law. A bill to protect Mueller, sponsored by Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN.) has the backing of almost every Democratic member of the House. One Republican, Rep. Walter Jones of North Carolina, is supporting the bill. 

In theory, this would be the chance for all members of the House to prove we still have three coequal branches of government and that two are working to protect fundamental principles. 

Sadly, it’s not happening with these clowns and cowards. Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL.), one of the head clowns on the House Judiciary Committee, has been calling, instead, for a panel to bring in Attorney General Sessions, Deputy A.G. Rosenstein, and Special Counsel Mueller to explain the thinking behind their investigative efforts. “I think the president is very frustrated,” Gaetz explains. 

There it is in a terrifying nutshell. If the president is frustrated, then the guiding principles laid down by the Founding Fathers in 1787, including the belief that no man is above the law, may be swept aside.




Friday, April 29, 2022

October 23, 2019: President Trump Refers to Witnesses as "Human Scum" and "Dangerous to Our Country."

 

10/23/19: Fresh developments Wednesday demolish what shreds of logic the White House has left. 

 

“They are human scum.” 

New evidence accumulated almost hourly, even as a group of 25 GOP House members staged a “lunch counter” sit-in that required neither intelligence nor courage. Determined to stop witnesses from testifying behind closed doors, shouting angrily about how their party was being kept in the dark, they stormed the high security hearing room where House Intelligence Committee meetings are held. Led by intrepid presidential ass smoocher, Rep. Matt Gaetz, the “protesters” delayed the testimony of Laura Cooper, a Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Russia, Ukraine, and Eurasia, for five hours. 

It was later noted by members of the free press that Republicans weren’t really being kept in the dark. At least 13 protesters were members of one of the three committees involved in the impeachment inquiry. That meant those 13 had the right to be inside the hearing room any time they chose. 

(In all, 47 Republicans sat on one of the three committees and could sit in and listen at their leisure. No protest required.)



Ms. Cooper testifies.

 

At 4:01 p.m., the last of Gaetz’s band of sunshine patriots got hungry, or sleepy, or had to pee and left the room. Ms. Cooper had a chance to testify and answered questions for three hours. The Defense Department had tried to block her testimony, but she is thought to be one of several officials who agreed military aid to Ukraine must go forward. The Democrats believed she had knowledge of why the funding was delayed. 

For once, there was at least a snippet of good news for the president, if one were trying to guess at what Cooper said behind closed doors. According to Politico, Democrats emerged “tight-lipped” from the hearing room after she finished. This time, a Republican, Rep. Mark Meadows, seemed happy to talk. He said parts of what Cooper said conflicted with the account of Ambassador Taylor.

 

Whatever news was leaking to the president was clearly rankling. By lunchtime, Trump was describing Taylor and other witnesses as “Never Trumpers.” In fact, he dived off the deep end and landed on his head in an empty, concrete pool. At 12:48 p.m., he let rip on Twitter: “The Never Trumper Republicans, though on respirators with not many left, are in certain ways worse and more dangerous for our Country than the Do Nothing Democrats. Watch out for them, they are human scum!” 

Yes, the President of the United States said that. These witnesses were “human scum” and “dangerous for our country.” 

Anyone who cared about “our country” should have been appalled. It was a statement worthy of the worst dictators in all recorded history: Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Putin, Assad and Kim Jong-un. 

You had to be singularly obtuse to miss the fact that several witnesses so far had been placed in their positions by…Donald J. Trump. 

And again: All had testified under oath.

Tuesday, March 22, 2022

March 31, 2021: Rep. Matt Gaetz - Sounding Creepy

 

3/31/21: It’s a tough day for Trumpophiles. One of the heroes of their crowd, Rep. Matt Gaetz, is under investigation for carrying a minor across state lines for the purposes of sex. 

 

____________________ 

“There’s no age that you can’t be sexy.” 

Retweet by Matt Gaetz

____________________

  

He may of course be innocent. 

We of the liberal persuasion do not chant, “Lock him up,” until there has been a trial, if necessary, and a guilty verdict if merited. 

But if ever anyone looked like the type who might resort to enticing a minor across state lines for sex, Matt is the man. 

A number of old tweets from Gaetz have not aged like Dom Perignon. My least favorite comes from August 2019. Someone named Bebe Rexha tweeted: “There’s no age that you can’t be sexy.” 

Gaetz retweeted, saying, “I say we change Florida’s welcome signs to this.”

 

This one isn’t a whole lot better, although you could see where it might be completely innocuous.


 

Anyway, no chanting, “Lock Matt up!” until all the facts are known and his case, if any, adjudicated. That’s the American way, even if Gaetz’s favorite former president and his favorite former president’s fans never could figure that out.

 

I am reminded, however, of his previous comments regarding Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, whose ideas he called “dangerous for America.” In a pervy kind of way, he also said she was “attractive,” and said he’d swipe right – a la Tinder – to do a bill with her. There was also his comment, in regard to her tweet on helping communities ravaged by the War on Drugs. 

Dear, weird Rep. Gaetz thought an appropriate response was to reply, “You had me at hello.” 


Finally, as an official older person, I learned in checking up on Gaetz that – at least according to a hip young writer –the fire emoji, is “the universal symbol for ‘u + me = yes, tonight?’” 

Eight days after her dad got thumped in his bid for a second term, Matt slapped that emoji on a picture posted by Tiffany Trump. He tossed in a heart emoji, a face emoji with hearts for eyes, and a thumbs up emoji. 

I’m old and too lazy to copy and paste the proper emojis to my text. So here’s a link to the story. 

And here’s the picture:



 

* 

SPEAKING OF creepy: The Supreme Court of New York has rejected Tiffany’s dad’s appeal to terminate a defamation lawsuit brought by Summer Zervos. Dad stalled it out while president. Now his claim that defending himself in a trial would take away from his time to defend America, work on a healthcare plan, which we never saw, and go golfing all the time, no longer pertains. 

Zervos is one of nearly two-dozen women to accuse then-Citizen Trump of sexual abuse and harassment of varying kinds. Zervos is the only one then-Candidate-for-president Trump singled out by name and called a liar. 

Chances are good that Citizen-again Trump will have to provide a deposition. If you’ve ever read his comical responses to Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s questions, where he was allowed to have a lawyer help him write them, and filled them out like a take-home test in elementary school, you know he’s going to have almost zero chance of avoiding a stinging civil case loss. 

Plus, a bunch of other accusers are likely to be deposed by Zervos’ lawyers to support her claims.

 

* 

FINALLY, in other court-related news, two police officers injured in the Capitol Hill riot have sued Donald. 

Their story is worth a read. 

 

POSTSCRIPT: Tucker Carlson invited Rep. Gaetz to come on his show and explain his side of the story. Gaetz, who could be innocent, flubbed his chance so badly even Carlson admitted afterward, that was “one of the weirdest interviews I’ve ever conducted.” 

Gaetz did claim the Department of Justice and F.B.I. have tape of an individual trying to extort money from his family, by lodging a bogus sexual misconduct claim against him. So, he could be…yes…innocent. 

And then there’s that guy he allegedly brought to the White House in 2019, to meet that other guy who ran the place, who was definitely the porn-star-banging type. The guy he brought, Joel Greenberg, was indicted last summer on a range of charges…including sex-trafficking a child.

 

Other highlights of Gaetz’s career include bringing a Holocaust denier to hear the 2018 State of the Union address. In 2017 he was the only member of the House or Senate “to vote against a law that gave the federal government more power and money to fight human trafficking.” 

Still. Still. There’s no smoking gun! Gaetz could be innocent! There’s just that general air of creepiness.

 

BLOGGER’S NOTE (3/21/22): We try to be fair. So, we should point out that Zervos eventually dropped her suit against the former president. Not sure why – possibly, her lawyers felt Trump’s comments might be covered by free speech.

Monday, March 21, 2022

April 5, 2021: Rep. Matt Gaetz Had to Pay for Sex?

 

4/5/21: Last week, I wrote that Rep. Matt Gaetz might soon be accused in an investigation involving sex trafficking of minors. I said that it was too soon to start chanting, “Lock him up!” 

Now it might be time to clear our throats. 

CNN has reported that the Florida lawmaker and Trump-suck-up enjoyed showing colleagues – on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives – pictures of naked women he had slept with. 

No class. 

Not illegal.



Matt thought it was funny to wear a gas mask during COVID-19.

(See “BLOGGERS NOTE” below.)



The New York Times has also added details to an increasingly sordid story; and reporters say they’ve seen text messages and receipts. 

Investigators believe Joel Greenberg, a pal of Matt’s, who was indicted last year, “met the women [involved in this story] through websites that connect people who go on dates in exchange for gifts, fine dining, travel and allowances. 

Dates? Okay. 

Still legal.

 

Greenberg is alleged to have introduced the women to randy Matt, who also had sex with them. In fact, one of the women allegedly agreed to have sex with a third associate of the two. 

Kind of like prostitution.

 

The Times has seen plenty of documentation, it would appear, although what it will prove is a separate matter: 

In encounters during 2019 and 2020, Mr. Gaetz and Mr. Greenberg instructed the women to meet at certain times and places, often at hotels around Florida, and would tell them the amount of money they were willing to pay, according to the messages and interviews.

 

One person said that the men also paid in cash, sometimes withdrawn from a hotel ATM.

 

Some of the men and women took ecstasy, an illegal mood-altering drug [emphasis added], before having sex, including Mr. Gaetz, two people familiar with the encounters said.

 

In some cases, Mr. Gaetz asked women to help find others who might be interested in having sex with him and his friends, according to two people familiar with those conversations. Should anyone inquire about their relationships, one person said, Mr. Gaetz told the women to say that he had paid for hotel rooms and dinners as part of their dates.

 

Thursday night, Rep. Gaetz’s office issued a complete denial: 

“Matt Gaetz has never paid for sex,” the statement said. “Matt Gaetz refutes all the disgusting allegations completely. Matt Gaetz has never ever been on any such websites whatsoever. Matt Gaetz cherishes the relationships in his past and looks forward to marrying the love of his life.”

 

It didn’t help when Congressman Gaetz’s spokesperson suddenly resigned and told at least one reporter he did so “out of principle.”

 

Since at least one of the girls Greenberg and Gaetz are said to have paid was 17, you can see the Two G’s might be getting nervous. Gaetz is a lawyer by training. So he should know going in that penalties may be stiff. Offering anyone under age 18 items of value in exchange for sex is a violation of federal child sex-trafficking laws. That would include providing anything of value: such as fancy meals, hotel rooms, drugs, alcohol, and even cigarettes. Conviction means a mandatory prison sentence of ten years. 

We have also learned that Greenberg was indicted again on additional charges this week. He is accused of submitting fake claims to receive pandemic relief aid. Then he allegedly tried to bribe a government official.

 

Mr. Greenberg is a scofflaw. He goes on trial in June; but he was sent to jail in March for violating the terms of his bail. 


Other odds and ends to the story: 

Did Gaetz divert campaign funds in order to pay women for sex? 

Were fake IDs provided for some of the women? 

Even Gaetz’s denial of wrongdoing, delivered during an appearance on Fox News, rang hollow. “Providing for flights and hotel rooms for people that you’re dating who are of legal age is not a crime,” he said. 

Guilty? Not guilty? We’ll wait and see.

 

Sleazy? Yeah. Definitely sleazy – which, if you have been following Gaetz’s political career, is no surprise.

 

* 

GAIL COLLINS, writing a humorous piece for the Times, notes that while Rep. Gaetz has never managed to pass a single bill during his two terms in Congress, he has managed to appear on Fox News at least 179 times.


BLOGGER’S NOTE: Gaetz thought it would be funny to flaunt mask rules in Congress. So he donned a gasmask to mock the idea – of what? – keeping others safe? A check on March 21, 2022, shows that nearly 73,000 Floridians have died from COVID-19.

April 30, 2021: Newsmax Settles - Matt Gaetz Needs a Pardon

 

4/30/21: As we noted previously, April has been the “cruelest month” for Team Trump. In the waning days of April, it only got crueler.

 

____________________ 

“No evidence that such allegations were true.” 

Newsmax apology

____________________

  

First, Newsmax, the right-wing television network, has been forced to settle a defamation lawsuit – and pony up an undisclosed pile of cash – for lying about Dominion Voting Machines and one of its employees, Dr. Eric Coomer. Newsmax had claimed that the company helped rig the last election. 

By legal standards, Dr. Coomer got almost instant relief. He filed his suit on December 22. Newsmax promptly  crumbled.

 

Among other absurdities, the cable channel had reported that Coomer took part in an “Antifa conference call” to make sure Biden and not Trump won in November. The network has withdrawn its claims and offered abject apology: 

[We] subsequently found no evidence [emphasis added] that such allegations were true. Many of the states whose results were contested by the Trump campaign after the November 2020 election have conducted extensive recounts and audits, and each of these states certified the results as legal and final.

 

The network also added, “On behalf of Newsmax, we would like to apologize for any harm that our reporting of the allegations against Dr. Coomer may have caused to Dr. Coomer and his family.” 

(That would include having to live in hiding for the last six months and fielding multiple death threats.)

 

Sadly, a recent poll by CNN shows that 70% of Republicans still don’t believe Biden had enough votes to win the election. Even worse, 50% still believe there’s “solid evidence” to support that myth.

 

* 

A pardon priced at $250,000 in bitcoin? 

IF SLEAZE is your style, Rep. Matt Gaetz, one of Rejected-President Trump’s favorite cheerleaders, is facing potential indictment on a variety of charges, including sex-trafficking a minor. New evidence keeps surfacing. 

The Daily Beast is in possession of a damning letter and emails sent by Gaetz friend Joel Greenberg. 

If you’ve never heard of Joel, he’s facing an impressive array of 33 charges. In the waning days of the Trump administration, knowing he was in legal jeopardy, he wrote Roger Stone (seven-time felon, and pal of the president) and asked Stone about a pardon for himself and Rep. Gaetz.

 

Of the 17-year-old, who was the alleged victim of sex trafficking, he said: 

On more than one occasion, this individual was involved in sexual activities with several of the other girls, the congressman from Florida’s 1st Congressional District and myself. From time to time, gas money or gifts, rent or partial tuition payments were made to several of these girls, including the individual who was not yet 18. I did see the acts occur firsthand and Venmo transactions, Cash App or other payments were made to these girls on behalf of the Congressman.

 

Even better, according to the Orlando Sentinel, Greenberg is alleged to have offered Stone $250,000 in Bitcoin if he could convince his pal Donald to grant him and Gaetz a pair of pardons. 

In a separate email, Greenberg informed Stone that he had ditched his legal team. “My lawyers that I fired, know the whole story about MG’s involvement,” he explained. “They know he paid me to pay the girls and that he and I both had sex with the girl who was underage. So naturally they think that is my golden ticket.” 

That is: to flip on Gaetz and get some of the 33 charges thrown out. But he promised he wasn’t going to flip. 

Stone, of course, got his own pardon – mainly because he didn’t flip on the president – and  it’s likely Greenberg figured birds of a felonious feather flock together.



Two convicted felons, and Gaetz, middle.

(Greenberg, right, plead guilty recently.)


Stone suggested that Greenberg play up his support for the president in a letter to the White House, asking directly for pardon. 

Greenberg replied: 

And while I haven’t had any communication with MG he absolutely has to know that the sex charge they hit me with would be what they would hit him with. All he has to do is explain to POTUS the situation and his exposure, and it would be very easy to do.

 

MG is like a son to POTUS. MG is like a brother to me.

 

Honestly, I would have thought MG would have reached out to me or tried via a third party. One conversation with POTUS and he can get this done and it all goes away.

 

Yes, indeed. Who deserves a pardon more than a couple of Trump buddies, involved at the very least in paying young women for sex! 

Basically, soliciting prostitution.

 

* 

SPEAKING OF sleazy dudes, Rudy Giuliani woke up at six a.m. one recent morning to hear federal agents shouting, “Open up, search warrant.” 

Apparently, Department of Justice officials believe Rudy should have registered as a foreign agent, back when he and Donald were working to dig up dirt in Ukraine on the Biden family. 

So far, details are murky. Rudy may be innocent, as we always note before trials begin. Still, it doesn’t help his case to know that Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, two close associates who were working with him in Ukraine, have long since been indicted. And they were indicted when Trump was still in office. So when Sean Hannity tries to convince viewers that the Biden team is going after Rudy unfairly, Hannity is, as he so often is, full of hot air that smells like donkey dung on his breathe. 

One area of interest involves Rudy’s efforts to get the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, Maria Yovanovitch, fired. DOJ suspects that Rudy put national interests aside and had her axed because a couple of Ukrainian pals – known for their own corruption – wanted her gone.

 

We also know that Rudy, Lev, and Igor were paid handsomely by a variety of shady Eastern European characters. Part of Rudy’s work involved trying to save Ukrainian businessman Dmitry Firtash from being extradited to the U.S. on bribery and conspiracy charges. Rudy claimed at the time that he was only interested in Ukraine because he and President Trump were anxious to cleanup corruption in foreign lands. 

And while he was at it, he would earn a few hundred thousand dollars representing corrupt Ukrainian business leaders. 

Just for kicks.

 

* 

HAVING HAD his Twitter megaphone knocked from his grip, Trump has been reduced this spring to howling about the Oscars in an official press release. The ratings were way down, he grumbled. Format was terrible. They needed go back to calling the show “The Academy Awards.” They needed a real host. 

More importantly, the former president wanted to drum up hate for Hollywood with his base. “These television people spend all their time thinking about how to promote the Democratic Party,” he moaned, “which is destroying the County, and cancel Conservatives and Republicans.”



 

Rather than ranting about Hollywood, this blogger would have thought Mr. Trump might have issued his long lost healthcare plan.

 

POSTSCRIPT: In other odds and ends of sad news for Team Trump: Brendan Hunt, 37, a big supporter of Rejected Don, has been convicted of threatening to kill members of Congress. Hunt missed out on a chance to riot in the Capitol on January 6, but made up for it two days later by posting a video online. It was sweetly titled: “KILL YOUR SENATORS: Slaughter them all.”

 

It took a jury only three hours to decide that Hunt was serious, and dangerous, and ought to cool down in jail.

 

Also arrested: Robert Chapman, after bragging on Bumble, a dating website, that he had been part of the Capitol Hill riot. One woman he contacted about a date replied, “We are not a match.”

 

Then she called federal authorities.

 

Finally, Don Wagner, a Republican official in Orange County, California got the kind of reaction he deserved when he asked the county health director a stupid question. “In the vaccine, we heard about an injection of a tracking device. Is that being done anywhere?” he asked Dr. Clayton Chau.

 

Dr. Chau hesitated to answer for several seconds, then couldn’t help himself and started laughing.

 

He quickly apologized, adding, “There is not a vaccine with a tracking device embedded in it that I know of exists in the world. Period.”