Intelligence Dispatch: Right-Wing Spy Games and the Abortion Abolition Movement's 'Spiritual Battle'

A former British spy, a Gore-Tex heiress, and the espionage operation that targeted Democrats in Wyoming, and the radical abortion abolition movement's strategy of 'spiritual battle.'

This week on Radical Reports: A former British spy was paid by the heiress to the Gore-Tex fortune to hired former operatives of Project Veritas in an apparent political espionage operation in Western states that targeted Democrats and the perceived enemies of former President Donald Trump, and activists associated with the radical abortion abolition movement gathered in Arizona to participated in a conference that framed the movement’s strategic goals as a “spiritual battle.”

What to expect from Radical Reports: Weekly Intelligence Dispatches that provide a briefing on the activities of the Radical Right, Field Notes that provide research profiles of key organizations within the Radical Right, Legislation Watch that provides a breakdown of key legislative priorities of the Radical Right, and the Research Desk that highlights research and analysis from academia of the Radical Right.

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Radical Right in the Spotlight

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi announced last week the creation of a select committee to investigate the Capitol Riot on January 6. Pelosi said the committee would be tasked with examining the “root causes” of the insurrection. The select committee will reportedly consolidate the current investigations being conducted by multiple House committees. The announcement was made a day after the U.S. Department of Justice released never-before-seen video footage of the insurrection from body cameras of Capitol Police.

Must Reads

• Mark Mazzetti and Adam Goldman report how Richard Seddon, a former British spy connected to Erik Prince (founder of the private mercenary firm formerly known as Blackwater), was paid by Susan Gore, heiress to the Gore-Tex fortune (who has bankrolled GOP campaigns and right-wing groups), to hired former operatives of Project Veritas, the right-wing activists group know for publishing deceptively edited videos, in an apparent political espionage operation in Western states that targeted Democrats and the perceived enemies of former President Donald Trump. [The New York Times]

• New details have emerged about the warnings the Trump White House received that the January 6 events “could turn chaotic, with tens of thousands of people potentially overwhelming ill-prepared law enforcement officials,” and the narrative that emerges from reporting by Joshua Kaplan and Joaquin Sapien is that of infighting among right-wing groups, breakdowns in communication, and incompetent leadership leading up to the Capitol Riot. [ProPublica]

• William Allchorn reviews the existing research on right-wing lone actor terrorists and how conspiratorial narratives and other factors are “important for pushing individuals from radical to extremist violent action,” and after review the manifestoes of right-wing actor terrorists concludes that “the broad structures of their conspiracy theories and a sense of in-group loss and betrayal is palpable in their trajectories towards violence.” [CARR]

Intelligence Dispatches

• Anti-abortion activists gathered last week in Arizona for the National Conference of Operation Save America (OSA), a radical anti-abortion group associated with the abortion abolition movement and involved with campaigns that lobby municipal governments to pass ordinances banning abortion providers. Rusty Thomas, national director of OSA, gave opening remarks, and praised a pastor in Louisiana who violated state COVID restrictions during what he derisively call the “plandemic,” credited the lobbying efforts of OSA members for the Southern Baptist Convention passing a resolution that calls for “abolishing abortion immediately,” and promoted the conspiracy theory that the 2020 election was stolen: “There was some serious thievery and usurpation that took place in this nation.” Thomas is stepping down as national director, and Jason Storms, previously the assistant director of OSA, will be taking over as the leader of the organization. Storms is part of a new generation of hardline anti-abortion activists that seek to criminalize not just physicians that provide abortions, but pregnant people who seek abortions: “A mother who has knowingly, willingly chosen to kill her own child out of pure selfish motives, she’s guilty as a murderer in the eyes of the law.” Storms is also an example of the connections between the radical anti-abortion movement and radical right-wing antigovernmental groups—Storms was among the right-wing extremists that stormed the U.S. Capitol building during the January 6th insurrection. 

• The dominant narrative that was expressed by speakers throughout the OSA conference was that men needed to be on the “front lines against abortion,” men needed to be leaders in a “spiritual battle,” and men needed to be strengthened and not “shamed” for their masculinity. “We don’t follow effeminate limp wristed men,” Zack Morgan, outreach pastor at Apologia Church said, who would later add that “men follow courage, that’s what William Wallace said in Braveheart.” Luke Pierson, discipleship pastor at Apologia Church, said that Christians must choose between order and chaos: “Order is men acting like men, disorder is men acting effeminate.” This vision of a muscular Christianity, which has been embraced by Evangelical Christians, has become a central idea within the abortion abolition movement. 

• Thomas articulated OSA’s long term strategy of a “mission to your magistrate,” there was a emphasized the organization’s strategy of legislative lobbying, and involvement in the electoral process through the group’s political action committee. Red State Reform was incorporated as a 501(c)(4) nonprofit in March of 2020, and public advocates for anti-abortion policies through the group’s project Action for Life. Red State Reform has filed lobbying disclosures with the Arizona Secretary of State and Zach Lautenschlager, who previously worked as the director of communications and field operations for the National Association for Gun Rights, is listed as the only lobbyist for Red State Reform. Red State Reform PAC, the group’s political campaign arm, filed campaign finance reports showing limited expenditures and has received less than $2,000 in campaign contributions from Dennis Sarfate, a former professional baseball player and president of Action for Life.

Events on the Right

• The Family Research Council’s campaign arm, FRCAction, will host a School Board Boot Camp to “train a new generation of school board officers to save America’s school.” The Family Research Council, a fundamentalist Christian advocacy organization, has been among the right-wing groups promoting outrage over critical race theory. The webinar will be held online on Tuesday, June 29 from 12:30pm to 4:30pm EDT. 

• The Coalition to Defend America, a right-wing group that is dedicated to “eradicating the socialist policies that harm all families, businesses, schools, and places of worship,” is holding an 4th of July event in Palm Beach, Florida. The 1st Amendment Praetorian, a right-wing militia and self-styled private intelligence firm that offers protection for “Americans being attacked for expressing their political beliefs,” will be participating in the event.

• Wallbuilders, a Christian Nationalist media organization that promotes pseudohistory and pseudoscience in education, is hosting a Teachers Conference that is “designed to equip teachers from both public and private schools with principles and techniques that were used in early American education and thereafter for decades.” The conference will be hosted on July 5-7 and July 8-10 in Aledo, Texas.

• Live Action, an anti-abortion group known for publishing surreptitiously recorded videos of the staff and physicians at clinics that provide abortion, is hosting an Activist Training, that will provide “world-class training from leading pro-life speakers and put your new skills to practice with hands on activism opportunities,” on July 11t-14th in San Francisco, California. (Price Tag: $399)

Coming Up on Radical Reports…

Field Notes: The Christian Right law firm leading the assault on LGBTQ equality.

Mapping the Radical Right: The CPAC Network (Subscribers Only)