Multiple Putin Apologists to Appear at February 19 “Rage Against The War Machine” Rally

Newsweek is report­ing that Ver­min Supreme, a for­mer Lib­er­tar­i­an can­di­date for pres­i­dent, has recent­ly denounced his involve­ment in the par­ty due to what he per­ceives as a lack of effec­tive­ness and cred­i­bil­i­ty. Specif­i­cal­ly, he took issue with the par­ty’s new­ly installed lead­er­ship and their han­dling of an upcom­ing anti-war ral­ly, which he believed was being under­mined by con­tro­ver­sial demands and mes­sen­gers. The Feb­ru­ary 19 “Rage Against The War Machine” ral­ly includes demands such as pro­mot­ing imme­di­ate peace in Ukraine, glob­al nuclear de-esca­la­tion, the abo­li­tion of the CIA and the mil­i­tary-indus­tri­al com­plex, and the dis­band­ment of NATO, among oth­ers. Accord­ing to Newsweek, while these demands are not uncom­mon in the anti-war move­ment, Ver­min Supreme dis­agreed with the mes­sen­gers and ulti­mate­ly decid­ed to dis­tance him­self from the par­ty. Sched­uled to speak at the ral­ly are sev­er­al apol­o­gists for Vladimir Putin and his inva­sion of Ukraine, includ­ing the fol­low­ing indi­vid­u­als already cov­ered by the Glob­al Influ­ence Oper­a­tions Report (GIOR):

• For­mer Hawaii Con­gress­woman Tul­si Gab­bard, known for pro-Russ­ian con­spir­a­cy the­o­ries on Ukraine and her polit­i­cal cam­paign sup­port from a Putin apol­o­gist and an accused Russ­ian spy:
• For­mer U.S. Con­gress­man Ron Paul, whose Ron Paul Insti­tute for Peace and Pros­per­i­ty (RPIPP) has been report­ed to “reg­u­lar­ly advo­cates posi­tions that regur­gi­tate Russ­ian nation­al­ist talk­ing points, min­i­mize xeno­pho­bic and illib­er­al atti­tudes preva­lent in the for­mer East­ern bloc, or excuse author­i­tar­i­an tendencies.”
• Jour­nal­ist Max Blu­men­thal, a reg­u­lar con­trib­u­tor to pro­pa­gan­da out­lets like Rus­sia Today and Sput­nik who has been described as among the most influ­en­tial left-wing ampli­fiers of pro-Russ­ian pro­pa­gan­da in the West

The event will also fea­ture Ron Paul Insti­tute Exec­u­tive Direc­tor Daniel McAdams, who, accord­ing to Newsweek, made the fol­low­ing state­ment sup­port­ing Rus­sia and employ­ing themes also espoused by Vladamir Putin:

Do you want your kids to be forced to go to drag queen shows with per­verts or do you want to live in a coun­try where it is ille­gal for adults to sex­u­al­ly attack your chil­dren?” he tweet­ed ear­li­er this week. “I’m with Rus­sia. 100%. Let the “lib­er­tar­i­ans” lose their s*** over this: I’m with Putin!”

Newsweek also report­ed that “The straw that broke the camel’s back” for Ver­min Supreme was:

.…the ini­tial inclu­sion of speak­ers like Scott Rit­ter, a for­mer Unit­ed Nations weapons inspec­tor and con­trib­u­tor to Russ­ian pro­pa­gan­da out­let Rus­sia Today who was twice charged for attempt­ing to solic­it sex from under­cov­er offi­cers pos­ing as chil­dren. (Rit­ter has since been removed from the pro­gram, accord­ing to a web­page adver­tis­ing the event.)His ini­tial inclusion—plus the inclu­sion of speak­ers with pro-Russ­ian sympathies—only sought to under­mine what­ev­er mes­sage the par­ty hoped to advance, crit­ics claimed.

Read the full Newsweek report here.