McConnell team raised worries about attack on Biden inauguration

[brooklynite]

Source: Politico

Two days after pro-Donald Trump rioters attacked the Capitol, then-national security adviser Robert O’Brien got a call from Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell and an aide who asked him to look into something he’d been hearing: retired military personnel sympathetic to Donald Trump might be preparing to prevent Joe Biden’s inauguration.

“[H]e was concerned that there were reports that there were retired military personnel who were sympathetic to the president and might be organizing,” O’Brien said in the interview. McConnell’s own national security aide, Robert Karem, was on the call as well and raised similar concerns about Navy SEALs, O’Brien said.

O’Brien described this call in testimony to the Jan. 6 select committee during a newly revealed Aug. 23 interview. He told the panel he had never heard similar concerns from other sources and doubted their accuracy, but he told the two men he would check with John Ratcliffe, then the director of national intelligence. Ultimately, he said, those fears amounted to nothing, and he acknowledged they occurred in a period of massive concern and preparation for the safety of Biden’s inauguration.

“I think we could’ve repelled a Chinese airborne invasion of Washington that day,” he said.

Read more: https://www.politico.com/news/2022/12/24/mcconnell-team-raised-worries-about-attack-on-biden-inauguration-ex-nsa-obrien-told-jan-6-committee-00075581

[Midnight Writer]

1. Wasn't Mitch and the GOP outraged when the FBI warned about ex-military being radicalized?

But he knows that warning was true.

What a duplicitous ass.

[LudwigPastorius]

2. Two days AFTER the insurrection attempt, McConnell springs into action.

Fuck off with that CYA "tip", Mitch.

[KS Toronado]

3. Could this have been plan "D" in tfg's plans to stay in office?

[rubbersole]

4. In Roger Stone's plan "D".

[KS Toronado]

5. Oh, tfg's future cellmate?

[rubbersole]

6. tfg isn't smart enough to have thought up any of this. Stone has been practicing the dark arts...

In politics since Nixon. I'd love to see them be cellmates. If Roger actually ended up in a cell he better hope they don't turn off the security cameras...

[stopill]

7. He was concerned

I have Susan Collins was concerned too.
But they didn't say anything to stop the attempted coup

[Mr. Ected]

8. Any ex-military "sympathetic" to Trump means party-first, Constitution-be-damned ex-military

They need to be identified and court martialed. A new federal court ruling paves the path:

In a 2-1 vote, the D.C. Circuit ruled on Tuesday that it is constitutional for the military to court-martial retired servicemembers for post-retirement crimes.

The appeals court panel’s ruling reverses a federal judge's decision. Two Trump-appointed judges — U.S. Circuit Judges Neomi Rao and Justin Walker — were in the majority. with Clinton-appointed U.S. Circuit Judge David Tatel dissenting.

[Rebl2]

10. Start with Flynn

[Efilroft Sul]

9. Honestly, I was half-expecting Trump to green light a Blackwater operation.

If the MAGA rabble failed you on sixth, you call in the professionals for the twentieth.

Fortunately, that didn't happen. But I'd bet Erik Prince was considered by Trump.

[jaxexpat]

13. I'd bet Erik Prince didn't appreciate checks that he knew would bounce.

[Efilroft Sul]

14. Exactly! Trump having a history of not paying contractors probably saved the Republic, LOL.

[NullTuples]

11. Interesting timing, waiting until after it was clear that the coup had failed...

I mean, sure - it could just be coincidence. But McConnell is also very conniving and duplicitous.

[jaxexpat]

12. I believe they're funded to repel a Chinese airborne invasion any and every goddamn day!

Is that NOT the expectation? But I get it. This was Trump's boy. His skills at analogy are not good.

That they even breathe makes me boil. If you don't believe that, just look at these smilies!

[Buckeyeblue]

15. Former military would have known how tight security was going to be on 1/20

Any move to attack would have sent them home in a body bag. I think McConnell was being a bit of an ass in claiming that former military was coming after Biden. He knew word would get back to Biden. This was meant to play a mind fuck on Biden, not save the republic.

If McConnell was interested in saving the republic he would have voted to convict Trump on impeachment charges.

But no one wanted to go after Trump because he was plan A to Republicans sweeping the mid-terms. Now that that didn't happen, they are all doing what they can to distance themselves from Trump.

It takes a good bit of time for the stench of a skunk to fade.