On April 9, Democratic Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer extended the anti-Coronavirus measures set forth in her March 10 Executive Order 2020-4. Among these:
- No person or entity shall operate a business or conduct operations that require workers to leave their homes or places of residence unless those workers are necessary to sustain or protect life or to conduct minimum basic operations.
- “Essential workers” were defined as those “necessary to sustain or protect life.”
Governor Gretchen Whitmer
Individuals were allowed to leave their home and travel as necessary to:
- Engage in outdoor physical activity, so long as they stayed at least six feet from people from outside their own household.
- Perform their jobs as critical infrastructure workers after being so designated by their employers.
- Perform necessary government activities.
- Obtain necessary services or supplies for themselves, their family or household members, their pets, and their vehicles.
- Care for a family member or a family member’s pet in another household.
- Care for minors, dependents, the elderly, persons with disabilities, or other vulnerable persons.
- Visit an individual under the care of a health care facility, residential care facility, or congregate care facility.
- Attend legal proceedings or hearings for essential or emergency purposes as ordered by a court.
- Work or volunteer for businesses or operations that provide food, shelter, and other necessities of life for those who are poor, disabled, or suffering because of the COVID-19 emergency.
- Attend a funeral, provided that no more than 10 people are in attendance.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) urged Americans to wear masks and keep at least six feet from their fellows. And most of the nation’s governors issued stay-at-home orders that banned large gatherings—including visits to parks and beaches.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Yet President Donald Trump openly encouraged defiance of those orders. On April 17 he issued a series of tweets to his supporters:
“LIBERATE MINNESOTA!”
“LIBERATE MICHIGAN!”
“LIBERATE VIRGINIA, and save your great 2nd Amendment. It is under siege!”
All these states had Democratic governors—and had been targeted for Right-wing protests. Large numbers of men and women stood closely together, with most of them not wearing masks. They claimed their “freedoms” were being infringed upon.
Whitmer, who had defied the Republican legislature by extending her stay-at-home order, was denounced as a Nazi, with protesters displaying signs like “Heil Whtmer.”
(It is a hallmark of Right-wingers to accuse their opponents of being what they are themselves—Fascists.)
On April 30, a protest at the Michigan Capitol Building featured treasonous Confederate flags and hangman’s nooses. Some signs displayed swastikas. Many of the demonstrators were armed with AK-47s.
That protest was organized by the Michigan Conservative Coalition, a group co-founded by a GOP state representative and his wife, who is on the advisory board for an official Trump campaign group called Women for Trump and is also the co-founder of Michigan Trump Republicans.
Another of the event’s promoters, Greg McNeilly, is a longtime political adviser to the wealthy DeVos family, which includes Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos and her brother, Erik Prince, founder of the notorious Blackwater mercenary group.
On May 1, demonstrators—many of them heavily armed—again descended on the state capital in Lansing, protesting Whitmer’s extension of her emergency declaration that kept some businesses closed amidst the plague. And, once again, President Trump sided with the protesters.
On May 1, Trump tweeted in support of the Michigan demonstrators. Just as German Fuhrer Adolf Hitler blamed his opponents for the violence he stoked, so did Trump. Aiming his tweet at Whitmer, he wrote: “These are very good people, but they are angry. They want their lives back again, safely! See them, talk to them, make a deal.”
Writer Steven Pressfield summed up the immorality of these protests: “Why are we asked to wear surgical or face masks in public, to practice social distancing and to observe self-quarantining? Because these practices are not for the individual alone but for the protection of the whole [community].”
Washington Governor Jay Inslee tweeted: “The president’s statements this morning encourage illegal and dangerous acts. He is putting millions of people in danger of contracting COVID-19.
“His unhinged rantings and calls for people to ‘liberate’ states could also lead to violence. We’ve seen it before.”
Trump had two hidden agendas for ending “stay-at-home” orders.
First, from the moment he took office on January 20, 2017, he had claimed credit for a booming economy—even though this was largely the creation of his predecessor, Barack Obama.
Now, with thousands of businesses closed because of Coronavirus, that economy was essentially dead.
Coronavirus
Trump knew that Presidents who preside over faltering economies usually don’t win a second term. And Trump not only lusted to win a second term but—as he has repeatedly “joked”—become “President-for-Life.”
Second, Trump was desperate to return to his Nuremberg-style rallies. There he could hurl insults at virtually everyone and bask in the fanatical worship of his followers. These rallies acted as fuel to his campaign.
So now he went to any lengths to “reopen” the country–including soliciting violent resistance to the laws of governors he didn’t like.
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“STAND BACK AND STAND BY”—FOR A KIDNAPPING: PART THREE (END)
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on October 21, 2020 at 12:26 amMichigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer was born on August 23, 1971. She earned a BA degree in Communications from Michigan State University in 1993 and a Juris Doctor from Detroit College of Law at Michigan State University in 1998.
In 2000, she ran for the Michigan House of Representatives and was elected to represent the 23rd legislative district. She was reelected in 2002 and 2004. In March, 2006, Whitmer won a special election to the Michigan State Senate. She was elected to a full term in November, and reelected in 2010. Owing to term limits, she couldn’t run for reelection in 2014 and left office in 2015.
On June 21, 2016, judges of Michigan’s 30th Judicial Circuit Court unanimously selected Whtmer as Ingham County Prosecutor. Outgoing prosecutor Stuart Dunnings had been arrested on March 14, 2016, and charged with 11 counts of involvement with a prostitute. Whitmer served the remaining six months of his term, which expired in December, 2016.
On November 6, 2018, Whtmer was elected to a four-year term as Governor of Michigan.
Standing five-feet-eight-inches tall and with a slender physique, Whitmer bears a striking resemblance to Bridget Moynahan, who plays District Attorney Erin Reagan on the CBS police drama, “Blue Bloods.”
Gretchen Whitmer
She has two daughters from her first marriage. In 2011, she married dentist Marc P. Mallory, who has three children from his own previous marriage. They live in East Lansing, Michigan, with their children.
From the moment Whitmer issued her stay-at-home order to stem the COVID-19 pandemic in Michigan, she became a target for President Donald Trump.
On September 29, Trump faced off with his Democratic challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden, in the first of three scheduled Presidential debates.
When Trump refused to condemn white supremacists, moderator Chris Wallace challenged him to do so.
“What do you want me to call them?” asked Trump. “Give me a name.”
Biden suggested the Proud Boys, a violent Right-wing group.
Trump’s response: “Proud Boys, stand back and stand by. But I’ll tell you what, I’ll tell you what, somebody’s got to do something about Antifa and the Left, because this is not a Right-wing problem.”
Donald Trump
On October 8, 13 Right-wingers were charged in a terrorism plot to kidnap Whtmer. The terrorists intended to overthrow several state governments that they “believe are violating the US Constitution,” including the government of Michigan, according to a federal criminal complaint.
Interviewed on TV that afternoon, Whitmer said: “I knew this job would be hard, but I’ll be honest, I never could’ve imagined anything like this.
“Just last week, the President of the United States stood before the American people and refused to condemn white supremacists and hate groups like these two Michigan militia groups.
“‘Stand back and stand by,’ he told them….Hate groups heard the President’s words not as a rebuke, but as a rallying cry, as a call to action. When our leaders speak, their words matter. They carry weight.”
Trump’s response to the kidnapping plot swiftly followed: “Governor Whitmer of Michigan has done a terrible job,” he tweeted. “She locked down her state for everyone, except her husband’s boating activities.”
Trump claimed credit for the arrests: It was “my Justice Department” that foiled the kidnapping. The credit actually belongs to the Michigan Justice Department, the FBI which Trump is attacking, and local police.
In an interview on CNN on October 8, Whitmer said: “You know, the fact that after a plot to kidnap and to kill me, this is what they come out with. They start attacking me, as opposed to what good, decent people would do, [which] is to check in and say, ‘Are you OK?’”
Democratic Presidential candidate Joe Biden telephoned her immediately after the announcement of the failed plot. “I think that tells you everything that’s at stake in this election,” Whitmer said. “It tells you everything you need to know about the character of the two people on this ballot that we have to choose from in a few weeks.”
Joe Biden
The plot had been known to the FBI for months. The agency arranged for a confidential informant to travel to Dublin, Ohio, on June 6 for a meeting with about 15 of the conspirators.
“Several members talked about murdering ‘tyrants’ or ‘taking’ a sitting governor,” according to the federal criminal complaint.
In several recorded conversations, plotter Adam Fox said he needed “200 men” to storm the Capitol building in Lansing and take hostages, including Whitmer. He explained they would try the governor of Michigan for “treason” and would execute the plan before the November 2020 elections.
Immediately after discovering the plot, the FBI warned the governor’s security detail. Whitmer’s security was greatly tightened.
In April, Right-wing protesters had rallied at the state Capitol, gridlocking the streets and demanding that Whitmer lift her stay-at-home order. Armed demonstrators entered the state capitol—where it is legal to openly carry firearms—and demanded an end to Michigan’s state of emergency.
Having learned from this near-tragedy, Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson announced on October 16 that residents will not be allowed to open-carry firearms “in a polling place, in any hallway used by voters to enter or exit, or within 100 feet of any entrance to a building in which a polling place is located.”
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