The spontaneous protests against wearing coronavirus protective gear and for opening up businesses have been seen at hospitals and state capitols. The problem is that they are not so spontaneous after all. Ultra-conservative Libertarian billionaires have put their 30x amplified magnifying glasses to the protesters’ issues.
These billionaires run their money through nonprofits and frequently buy Facebook ads that falsely state, according to The Washington Post:
‘The people are rising up against these insane shutdowns. We’re fighting back to demand that our elected officials reopen America.’
The Post wrote that:
‘A network of right-leaning individuals and groups, aided by nimble online outfits, has helped incubate the fervor erupting in state capitals across the country. The activism is often organic and the frustration deeply felt, but it is also being amplified, and in some cases coordinated, by longtime conservative activists, whose robust operations were initially set up with help from Republican megadonors.’
The Convention of States was founded to add a balanced-budget amendment to the Constitution. Now though, it has placed anti-government anti-coronavirus precaution ads on Facebook:
‘Heavy-handed government orders that interfere with our most basic liberties will do more harm than good.’
The ads have asked for a $5 donation to “support our fight.” However, what the groups really want is the individuals’ personal data. Convention of States’s president and co-founder of the Tea Party Mark Meckler said it was changed or expanded to provide a “clearinghouse where these guys can all find each other.” FreedomWorks is another Libertarian group active in the Tea Party, and it has provided an online calendar showing when the protests are scheduled.
Billionaire Robert Mercer funded the Convention of States Project beginning in 2015. He has funded Acting Director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Ken Cuccinelli and Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Caron. This group also backed the Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.
Meckler said:
‘The major need back in 2009 was no different than it is today — some easy centralizing point to list events, to allow people to communicate with each other.’
Citizens for Self-Governance, which is the umbrella organization over the Convention of States Project, Board President of Eric O’Keefe is a longtime associate of David Koch. He helped manage Koch’s Libertarian run for president in 1980. O’Keefe resides in Wisconsin and said:
‘We’re providing a digital platform for people to plan and communicate about what they’re doing. To shut down our rural counties because of what’s going on in New York City, or in some sense Milwaukee, is draconian.’
Sociologist at Drexel University Robert Brulle’s research is about climate lobbying, He said about Koch’s involvement in anti-quarantine protesters:
‘The involvement of the Koch institutional apparatus in groups supporting these protests is clear to me. The presence of allies on the board usually means that they are deeply engaged in the organization and most likely a funder.’
Featured image is a screenshot via YouTube.
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