Josh Hawley reveals he has raised $3M since the Capitol riot and proposes plan to stop 'mega-corporations' by banning mergers and making anti-trust punishments tougher
- Sen. Josh Hawley raised more than $3 million since January's Capitol riot, a change in his fortunes as he initially lost some donors for his role
- Hawley was the first senator to sign onto a House GOP-led effort to challenge some of the Electoral College vote counts on January 6
- That effort was backed by former President Donald Trump, who was pushing to his supporters that the election results could still be overturned
- Hawley, as well as Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, have been awarded with financial support from small dollar donors as they stay aligned with Trump
- Hawley has used his notoriety to pitch ideas that aren't typically in line with the politics of the modern Republican Party
- On Monday, Axios reported on legislation Hawley is rolling out that aims to stop 'mega-corporations' and toughens up anti-trust laws
Sen. Josh Hawley raised more than $3 million since January's Capitol riot, a change in fortunes for the Missouri Republican who initially lost some donors for his role in challenging the 2020 presidential election results.
Politico reported Monday that Hawley received more than 57,000 donations during 2021's first quarter, raising nearly $600,000 in the two and a half week period following the January 6 MAGA riot, even though he'd stopped actively fundraising.
In the first quarter of 2019, directly after winning election, Hawley raised just $43,000, Politico said.
Hawley's fundraising totals were similar to those of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, as both lawmakers continue to be aligned with the Trump-wing of the Republican Party and have seen small-dollar donor fundraising success.
Hawley has used his notoriety to pitch ideas that aren't typically in line with the politics of the modern Republican Party, such as an idea to 'trust-bust' big companies.
Sen. Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican, has raised $3 million in the first quarter of 2021, raking in hundreds of thousands of dollars in the weeks after the January 6 MAGA riot
Sen. Josh Hawley gives a clinched-first salute to supporters of President Donald Trump who were gathering outside the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6
Later, that mob broke into the Capitol in a violent incident that killed five in the immediate aftermath
Axios reported Monday on Hawley's 'Trust-Busting for the Twenty-First Century Act,' which would ban mergers and acquisitions made by firms with a market cap over $100 billion.
It would lower the threshold to prosecute companies using existing federal antitrust laws.
It would require companies that lose federal antitrust lawsuits to 'forfeit all their profits resulting from monopolistic conduct.'
And finally it would empower the Federal Trade Commission to regulate 'dominant digital firms.'
'This country and this government shouldn't be run by a few mega-corporations,' Hawley told Axios.
The GOP 'has got to become the party of trust-busting once again,' he continued.
'You know, that's a part of our history,' Hawley added.
Hawley was speaking about Republican President Teddy Roosevelt, the Progressive-era leader known for breaking up big businesses.
The more recent iteration of the Republican Party has been friendly to big business, however a number of GOP lawmakers have gone to war with the large tech firms, for showing, in their view, an anti-conservative bias.
Hawley's plan goes further than just threatening to break up 'big tech,' Axios points out, noting that its rules applying to mergers extending to banking, health, retail and media.
'We tried it the way that the big corporatists wanted,' Hawley told Axios. 'And it hasn't been a success for the American consumer, for the American producer or for the American economy.'
Publisher Simon & Schuster canceled Sen. Josh Hawley's book (pictured) over his role in the MAGA riot
Hawley has been trying to brand himself as a Republican Party thought leader, though the book he had been working on, titled 'The Tyranny of Big Tech,' got canceled by publisher Simon & Schuster in the aftermath of the January 6 riot.
'As a publisher it will always be our mission to amplify a variety of voices and viewpoints: at the same time we take seriously our larger public responsibility as citizens, and cannot support Senator Hawley after his role in what became a dangerous threat,' Simon & Schuster said.
Hawley shot back calling those who work for the publishing house a 'woke mob.'
Hawley was the first senator who said he'd support a House GOP plan to challenge some of the Electoral College votes from swing states - an effort former President Donald Trump supported, as it extended the farce he was feeding to his supporters that the election result could be overturned.
That narrative - that the election was 'stolen' - motivated the MAGA mob to take over the Capitol Building, a violent incident that killed five in the immediate aftermath.
Lawmakers are able to object, debate and then vote on states' tallies during the mandatory January 6 session - but the votes for that effort to be successful simply weren't there, nor does Congress truly have the power to overrule the Electoral College count, most scholars believe.
Report: Facebook Has Ignored ‘Politically Manipulative Behavior’ by Third-World Dictators and Politicians
The Guardian alleges in a recent report that Facebook has continued to allow world leaders and politicians to use its platform to lie to the public and harass political opponents, especially in third-world countries, despite being alerted to evidence of the situation.
In a recent report titled “Revealed: the Facebook loophole that lets world leaders deceive and harass their citizens,” the Guardian alleges that Facebook has repeatedly allowed world leaders and politicians to use its platform to deceive the public and harass opponents despite being alerted to the situation.
The Guardian states that it has seen extensive internal documentation showing how Facebook reacted to more than 30 cases across 25 countries of “politically manipulative behavior” that was detected by Facebook staff. Its investigation appears to show that Facebook allowed its platform to be abused in poor, small, and non-western countries in an effort to prioritize addressing issues that attract media attention or largely affect the United States and other wealthy countries.
Political manipulation that affected countries such as the U.S., Taiwan, South Korea, and Poland, were allegedly dealt with quickly while action taken against manipulation in countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Mongolia, Mexico, and much of Latin America was slow to happen, if at all.
Sophie Zhang, a former data scientist who worked within Facebook’s “integrity” organization to fight inauthentic behavior, commented: “There is a lot of harm being done on Facebook that is not being responded to because it is not considered enough of a PR risk to Facebook. The cost isn’t borne by Facebook. It’s borne by the broader world as a whole.”
Zhang added: “Facebook doesn’t have a strong incentive to deal with this, except the fear that someone might leak it and make a big fuss, which is what I’m doing. The whole point of inauthentic activity is not to be found. You can’t fix something unless you know that it exists.”
A Facebook spokesperson told the Guardian:
We fundamentally disagree with Ms Zhang’s characterization of our priorities and efforts to root out abuse on our platform.
We aggressively go after abuse around the world and have specialized teams focused on this work. As a result, we’ve taken down more than 100 networks of coordinated inauthentic behavior. Around half of them were domestic networks that operated in countries around the world, including those in Latin America, the Middle East and North Africa, and in the Asia Pacific region.
Combatting coordinated inauthentic behavior is our priority. We’re also addressing the problems of spam and fake engagement. We investigate each issue before taking action or making public claims about them.
However, Facebook did not dispute Zhang’s assertions about her time working at the company. Read more about the alleged manipulation by political leaders at the Guardian here.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan or contact via secure email at the address lucasnolan@protonmail.com
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