Seth Abramson

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

@JaneBIVL @Speaker_of_Os AARs are usually done by the participants in an event. If I called this merely an NYT AAR it might suggest the NYT was complicit in January 6. But *also*, this NYT AAR was done using *primarily* assistance from third parties—independent digital researchers. So it works both ways. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

RT @blumosquedesign: I absolutely encourage everyone to subscribe. Seth is a phenomenal writer and the work that he is doing is meticulous… — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

RT @SethAbramson: (🔐) NEW at PROOF: The New York Times Has Just Published An Excellent Third-Party After-Action Report on the Battle at the… — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

NOTE/ As noted in the report, I’ve nothing to do with the NYT Visual Investigations Unit or the Sedition Hunters. I’m not a part of the latter group and am not in contact with them. But I thank them for the work they’ve done with the NYT, which helped make *this* report possible. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

FEED/ If for any reason you don’t wish to subscribe to PROOF but want to leave a tip of any size for this thread (or any other), you can use this link at my website (https://t.co/Lw88I2r1KP) or the tip button in my bio (located as indicated in the image below): https://t.co/LIqbbEobwB — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

PROOF/ To get the full story of the events discussed above—with countless links and videos and analyses and more—subscribe to PROOF below ($5/month, cancel anytime). This new reporting intersects with too many past PROOF reports—all on the site—to count. https://t.co/52z1I7bjWE — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

CONCLUSION5/ The Battle of the Capitol was launched by the Proud Boys; it was *won* by Stop the Steal. And Stop the Steal was in contact with Trump as to the very topic it brought to bear on January 6—the logistics of a permitted event it and Donald Trump knew would never happen. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

CONCLUSION4/ When you understand that 200 men couldn’t have taken the Capitol on January 6—they needed *thousands* of non-paramilitary persons led to them at a specific time and to a specific point by people with whom they were in cahoots—you understand the Battle of the Capitol. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

CONCLUSION3/ While such ties do exist—Roger Stone was a Trump adviser pre-insurrection, so his ties to *both* the Proud Boys *and* Oath Keepers are a Trump tie with those organizations—the truth of the matter is that the Capitol was stormed by the Proud Boys *and Stop the Steal*. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

CONCLUSION2/ Journalists’ focus on the Proud Boys has aided Trump by making it seem that either (a) the Proud Boys acted alone (or at most with the Oath Keepers) and/or (b) federal prosecutors and Congress will have to show Proud Boy and Oath Keeper ties with Trump’s White House. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

CONCLUSION/ This is only a summary of the breaking PROOF report atop this thread. You need to see the video and read the report yourself—especially because it underscores how the insurrectionists’ victory in the Battle Before the Capitol allowed them to *take the whole building*. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

50/ ...to remove the bike racks Alexander, Jones, and Team Trump would later claim were moved by the FBI—allowing a Stop the Steal mob *led by Owen Shroyer on a bullhorn* to swarm the front plaza of the Capitol in *seconds*—the well-coordinated Battle Before the Capitol was won. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

49/ for months by that point, as had Stone (indeed, Stop the Steal co-leader Stone had a Proud Boy—Jacob Engels—with him *at all times* during Insurrection Week). Alex Jones was good friends with many of the Proud Boys. So when Proud Boys materialized at just the right moment... — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

48/ Alexander not once but *twice* worked to ensure his Insurrection Week HQ and the Proud Boys’ HQ would be the same building (the first booking got cancelled). He got the Proud Boys rooms at the Marriott (his HQ). And he’d been using the Proud Boys as his protective detail... — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

47/ If you guessed that the man in question was *Ali Alexander*, then damn—you’re getting good at this. PROOF was the media outlet that broke this startling but seemingly esoteric (unsexy) news back in May (🔐): https://t.co/c9VVSyCoS2 — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

46/ All right, we’ve come to the point at which we’re going to play a guessing game a second time. But I think this time everyone is better prepared than before. Can you guess which *one man* organized the Insurrection Week lodging for all of the Proud Boys and their leadership? — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

45/ One can’t just act rowdy and get a mob to form and follow. Someone must whip up the mob in advance; someone must convince the mob (again, in advance) that they can do something and go somewhere that is actually illegal; and that someone *must* coordinate with the rowdies. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

44/ Simple fact: the Proud Boys didn’t have the manpower to storm the Capitol on January 6. 200 men—such as that term can be applied here—was not enough. They knew it wasn’t. Riling up “normies” wasn’t just part of the battle plan, it was *essential* to it. But they needed help. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

43/ But again we find a strange flaw in how many journalists’ think, and despite the NYT noting repeatedly the Proud Boys’ references to “normies,” they don’t tell their readers anything about these unsexy “normies”—even though they were *80%* of those who stormed the US Capitol. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

42/ “Normies”? Yes. The New York Times’ account of the Proud Boys’ battle plan is so interested in the fact that the Proud Boys kept talking about “riling up the normies” (non-Proud Boys) on Insurrection Day that they even put this phrase *in the web address of the NYT report*. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

41/ Per the NYT, it’s at this moment the Proud Boy leadership designates a sub-group to peel off and go around to the other side of the Capitol. These men become the men whose invisible hands *remove all the bike racks* from being in the way of a group of “normies” now arriving. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

40/ But then—in the video in the report atop this thread—something happens. A chant is heard, growing louder and louder, closer and closer. It sound like a very large group. “STOP! THE! STEAL! STOP! THE! STEAL! STOP! THE! STEAL!” It grows louder and louder, still off-camera. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

39/ Reporters don’t talk about this because an empty plaza isn’t sexy. The Battle of the West Portico! The Battle Under the Scaffolding! Those are sexy things to report on: blood, violence, screams, bear spray, weapons, and a crazed mob waving flags. An empty plaza? Not so much. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

38/ The couple was as stunned as the reporters. Why was the front of the Capitol empty when there was supposed to be an event there? Why was the field *behind* the reporters empty when—if you knew about Stop the Steal’s permit—there was supposed to be an event *there*? A mystery. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

37/ PROOF has this footage in its report. Sirens in the distance. A murmur of anticipation everywhere. Reporters milling about, unsure of what’s happening and checking phones. And then, suddenly, a couple that shows up and can be heard asking about an event that never occurred. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

36/ So now let’s return to that international news crew sadly stuck at the front of the Capitol—its camera trained on the *very steps* Alexander and Trump were supposed to be at—even as every news report in the world was saying that all the action was happening on the other side. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

35/ So right after the insurrection—in videos PROOF reported on and included in articles—Jones, Alexander, and Stone all went public saying that they had had conversations with Trump *personally* involving the coordination of the march’s logistics. And the Guilfoyle calls leaked. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

34/ He’d included in his speech that he was going to the Capitol. There were far too many witnesses to his pre-insurrection discussions with the USSS about going to the Capitol. Emails had been sent by others. And he’d trusted the wrong people—men who weren’t loyal enough to him. — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

RT @SethAbramson: (🔐) NEW at PROOF: The New York Times Has Just Published An Excellent Third-Party After-Action Report on the Battle at the… — PolitiTweet.org

Seth Abramson @SethAbramson

33/ But Trump had made some mistakes. Fatal ones. — PolitiTweet.org