Latest Fever Swamp Theory: Trump Miami Protests Are a Trap
Extreme supporters of Donald Trump are spreading the word to remain non-violent at the protests of his indictment in Miami — less because violence is unjustified and more because they believe the demonstrations are a trap, set by the feds, to snare MAGAdonians in Jan. 6-style legal trouble.
On his Telegram channel Tuesday, Ali Alexander — the infamous organizer of the Stop the Steal rallies and the officially-sanctioned protests on Jan. 6 — shared a letter from attorney Joseph D. McBride, who has represented many Jan. 6 defendants in Federal Court. “Protest peacefully,” Alexander advised: “Take it from one of my many patriot lawyers!”
McBride’s open letter — titled an “ADVISORY for JUNE 13, 2023, MIAMI PROTESTS” — hyped up the demonstrations as “the most consequential Trump-related event” since the unrest at the Capitol, but insisted: “You must proceed with caution, because political dissent is viciously persecuted in Joe Biden’s America.”
McBride warned: “Agitators, provocateurs, and crisis actors have been deployed to ruin the day,” adding that “although you are peaceful your political adversaries are not.” McBride insisted that the Department of Justice, “wants throngs of arrests to justify the false assertion that Donald Trump is a violent leader and that you, his political opponents, should be imprisoned because you are dangerous.”
McBride’s Jan. 6 client list includes the man filmed putting his feet up on Nancy Pelosi’s desk, and Alexander, whom McBride prepped for his hours-long deposition before the Jan. 6 Committee. Reached through his law office on Tuesday morning, McBride insists “I have evidence” to back up his crisis-actor claims, but said he could not share it because he was “protecting my sources.”
McBride alleges to Rolling Stone, “We have intelligence that groups are on the ground, and that people are going to sow discord.” And when pressed on this assertion, McBride insisted, “I am not a conspiracy theorist. I’m deeply concerned person who doesn’t want to see people get fucked by the government,” adding that he “doesn’t trust the government as far as I can spit.”
His final message to MAGA protesters: “Don’t take the bait.”
These fringe theories may have been seeded by a sitting member of Congress.
McBride’s letter cites, and echoes the substance, of a wild, June 11 statement from GOP Rep. Clay Higgins of Louisiana: “They want J6 again, in Miami,” he warned of the Department of Justice and FBI. “They want MAGA conservatives to react to this… and in doing so, set yourselves up for targeted persecution and further entrapment.” In a related tweet, Higgins suggested the media are in on the plot, and he implored Trump’s followers: “do NOT trip the wire they’ve laid for you.”
Higgins has recently become infamous. On the day of Trump’s indictment, the congressman alleged on Twitter that the legal action was “a perimeter probe from the oppressors,” and advised his followers to “buckle up” and “know your bridges” — interpreted by many as a call to prepare for civil unrest.
The latest far-right messaging feeds off a widespread belief among the MAGA faithful that Jan. 6 itself was, at least in part, a setup, with FBI agents and Capitol Police supposedly masquerading as protesters and duplicitously goading (inherently righteous) MAGA protesters into illegal actions. This theory built off earlier, debunked, conspiracy theories blaming the Jan. 6 violence on Antifa agitators.
Messaging to avoid violence because of potential federal entrapment is also filtering down into the fever swamps. At the ultra-MAGA message board, The Donald, commenters responded to a popular post titled, “Trump Urges Miami Indictment Protesters to Stay Peaceful” with a long string of messages alleging that under-cover feds would be in the crowd, stirring up trouble.
“Too bad the FEDS deployed will not be heeding the advice of POTUS45,” reads the top comment in the thread, followed by a warning from user “PapaPepe” that the “Fed front is gearing up.” A user named “RobbyTheRedneck” chimed in: “Remember, the FBI wants a violent riot. They will be there pushing for it and opening doors. Be careful. Leave your cell phones behind and turned off.”
When a commenter posted a message that went against the grain, and seemed to encourage a fight — “If your movement wants to make change it has to get over its fear of violence” — others pounced on the poster as though he were a fed. “Agent, we see your kind here all the time, and somehow you think you are stealthy,” wrote one. “You are not.”
