Northern California county on track to be run by militia-aligned group

[teach1st]

2. Kick and rec with an additional link

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-02-04/extremists-take-over-shasta-county-northern-california-next

What happened in Redding should be a big, blinking warning light to what’s left of the mainstream Republican Party, and to us all that we have an obligation as Californians to protect elections across the state, not just the ones in our backyard.

The far right has made it clear that it hopes to target and drive out elected officials in places where their small numbers have outsized power with the right mix of discontent, propaganda and money. If those officials are replaced by ones willing to put ideology ahead of rules and democracy, we are going to end up with actual election fraud (not the conspiracy sort), school curriculums straight out of the 1950s, and perhaps even sheriffs and district attorneys more interested in power than law.

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Violent takeovers are hard. “Legal revolutions” are easier and more effective.

“They realize that you can’t go out and storm the Capitol, but you can take town hall after town hall,” Browning warned. He pointed out that this tactic has been used by authoritarians before, including in Nazi Germany.