Episode 13: Who Is Ray Epps? (feat. Dr. Darren J. Beattie) – Firebrand with Matt Gaetz
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The embattled Congressman Matt Gaetz.
Matt Gaetz was one of the very few members in the entire Congress who bothered to stand up against permanent Washington on behalf of his constituents.
Matt Gaetz right now, he's a problem in the Democratic Party.
He can cause a lot of hiccups in passing the laws.
So we're going to keep running the stories to keep hurting him.
If you stand for the flag and kneel in prayer, if you want to build America up and not burn her to the ground, then welcome, my fellow patriots!
You are in the right place!
This is the movement for you!
You ever watch this guy on television?
It's like a machine.
Matt Gaetz.
I'm a cancelled man in some corners of the internet.
Many days I'm a marked man in Congress, a wanted man by the deep state.
They aren't really coming for me.
They're coming for you.
I'm just in the way.
As far as we can determine, the individual who was saying he'll probably go to jail, he'll probably be arrested, but they need to go into the Capitol the next day.
I'm probably going to go to jail.
Tomorrow!
We need to go into the Capitol!
Into the Capitol!
I can't!
Is then the next day directing people to the Capitol.
And as far as we can find, this individual has not been charged with anything.
You said this is one of the most sweeping investigations in history.
Have you seen that video or those frames from that video?
I said at the outset, one of the norms of the Justice Department is to not comment on impending investigations and particularly not to comment about particular scenes or particular individuals.
I was hoping today to give you an opportunity to put to rest The concerns that people have that there were federal agents or assets of the federal government present on January 5th and January 6th.
Can you tell us, without talking about particular incidents or particular videos, how many agents or assets of the federal government were present on January 6th, whether they agitated to go into the Capitol and if any of them did?
So I'm not going to violate this norm of the rule of law.
I'm not going to comment on an investigation that's ongoing.
The biggest story in the world right now is on revolver.news.
The question's been asked for quite some time by members of Congress, by journalists.
Was the FBI involved in animating criminal activity on January 6th and even perhaps before that on the evening of January 5th?
And the most detailed, thorough reporting on this question right now found on revolver.news.
We have with us our good friend, the publisher of Revolver News, my former senior advisor, Dr. Darren Beattie.
And Darren, really, I want to start with this story in the middle because I think there's an experience that you describe in the piece that creates the right lens and frame to evaluate some of these people like Ray Epps, and it's the story of Jeremy Brown.
Jeremy Brown is a Florida man who is joining the Oath Keepers, right?
He is signing up for this group and he gets an approach from federal law enforcement and a solicitation, really, to join their ranks, to inform on the Oath Keepers, to be a part of that organization.
And so it is not a question whether or not federal law enforcement was trying to infiltrate the Oath Keepers.
We know that from Jeremy Brown.
Revolver.News has had a piece on Jeremy Brown.
Before we get into REABs and the rest of the piece, just set the frame on what we know about what federal law enforcement was trying to do before January to try to get into some of these militia groups.
Well, that's a great question.
And the story is a very broad one.
And incidentally, we have a major follow-up piece coming up that really dives into the Jeremy Brown situation.
And I would say This follow-up piece is going to be pretty much a smoking gun in the very concrete sense of that term.
As for Jeremy Brown, for listeners who might not be aware, he is a Green Beret.
He was a member of the Oath Keepers militia, and he made some noise several months ago by going public with the fact that prior to January 6th, Some elements of, I believe it was the JTTF, approached him and basically made a very hard pitch to say, look, you make a little bit of extra money, work with us, inform on us.
It's a win-win situation.
And to his credit, I would say, to his great credit, not only did he He refused this offer, but he went publicly with it and presented video evidence of exactly what the proposal was, almost like Project Veritas style.
It's quite a remarkable video in its own right.
If you're hearing stuff, or you're being around your group, and someone's like, hey, we're training tonight, and it's wild, some shit's gonna go down.
You calling us and letting us know, and we can prevent the next big thing, it'd be great.
We're here to clear your name.
We're also here, if you want to work with us in the future, and we hear stuff in your circles that bothers us, and not ex-wife, your stuff, like, because we can't get involved in civil matters, but you hear of a pending, We'd love to hear from you.
And again, I can't make any promises, but if you provide information that prevents something big, the government pays for that.
The government...
Right here, I know how to work.
And I don't want to overwhelm you, and I don't want to say we get your fingerprint picture and sign you up today, but we think that we can help you, and you can help us, and we can definitely, on this side of things, less aggravation.
We did a first piece on Mr. Brown, basically responding to a very curious development in his case, which is this, that very recently he was given the full kind of FBI treatment.
They go, they turn over everything in your house, they search everything you have, they intimidate the hell out of you, and they arrested him for a very bizarre reason.
It was a trespassing charge because he had been On the capital grounds, which in itself is an important point.
You're technically trespassing if you're on the capital grounds, and that's defined as being within the barriers set up for that specific day on January 6th.
Trespassing, one might assume, meant you went into the capital.
Absolutely not.
All it means is that you were technically past the basically artificial temporary barriers set up for January 6th.
And this is an even more kind of egregious, petty, and really vindictive type charge And this goes for everyone charged with this, not just Jeremy Brown, because as we show in this original Revolver News piece on Jeremy Brown, we have video of very mysterious, suspicious characters well in advance of everyone descending near the Capitol.
We have video footage of people cutting up the fences.
And so a lot of people who were technically breaking the law in the sense of trespassing on Capitol grounds didn't even know it because various actors had cut open the fences and removed a lot of the barriers.
And so you had people set up in this booby trap where probably hundreds if not thousands of people were technically breaking the law.
So I'll pause in case you—I don't want to keep going on.
No, I think it's a good point.
The initial perspective that I think viewers and listeners need to have is that it was a clear objective of federal law enforcement to get into these militia groups— Before there was any riot, before there was any violence at the Capitol of any kind.
So then the question becomes why?
And you and I had a previous discussion about how this is a modus operandi for federal law enforcement to infiltrate these groups and then to try to bring these groups That really brings us to the explosive moment that has all the world on Revolver.News right now.
That is the story of Ray Epps.
When Attorney General Merrick Garland was coming into the Judiciary Committee, no less than the Lincoln Project took note of the fact that Thomas Massey and I had gathered with other colleagues to review video that I think you had initially discussed on Revolver News,
a video of Ray Epps, this individual, very clearly and in a very, I would say, organized way, going from group to group the night of the 5th, Trying to get people to agree that the unifying, organizing principle of this rally was going to be to enter the Capitol building.
Not to have big cheers for Donald Trump, not to have booze outside for Nancy Pelosi, but in fact to enter the envelope of the building.
Tomorrow, we need to go into the Capitol!
Into the Capitol!
I don't even like to say it because I'll be arrested.
Well, let's not say it.
We need to go...
I'll say it.
All right.
We need to go in...
Shut the f*** up, Boomer.
...to the Capitol.
We are speaking.
We are going to the Capitol where our problems are.
It's that direction.
We spread the word.
All right.
No, David, one more thing.
Yeah, so can we go up there?
No?
When we go in, leave this year.
You don't need to get shot.
You're going to arrest us all?
USA! USA! USA! USA! When that became apparent, Massey showed it to us and said he was going to question Attorney General Garland on whether or not Ray Epps was an asset or an agent of the federal government in some way.
And what was interesting was that the Attorney General did not take the opportunity to Dispel this theory.
You then have developed that theory out, and there's something that I really pulled out of the piece that was specific.
You talked about the lists of people who were wanted or who were identified by federal law enforcement, and then Ray Epps just falls off the list.
How should people think about that event?
Right.
Now, this is really a remarkable story, and just as A small bit of additional kind of table setting to provide context within which to understand this Epps piece.
So with the case of Jeremy Brown, we know that they're looking for informants.
And the New York Times, incidentally, did a piece fairly recently acknowledging that, yes, there were at least one, probably several informants.
They acknowledged A proud boy member who was inside of the Capitol and texting with his FBI handler contemporaneously throughout the day.
So we know that they're informants, but the case of Ray Epps suggests something different, and it suggests a much darker version of the FBI government involvement thesis.
That Revolver.News has adduced and it's much darker because of this.
First of all, it would be bad enough if they had informants, they knew in advance what was going on and they did nothing to stop it and just allow the event to happen and exploit it for political reasons.
But it's much darker if it's not simply that they're informed and do nothing, but the people who play a key proactive instigating role in having this happen are actually federal Agents themselves that I think escalates the severity of culpability on the part of the federal government and it certainly seems like this might be the case with Epps.
You described Epps as being a man walking about a psychological paradox as the events of January 6th are unfolding because he seems to be singularly driven by this desire to get people to enter the Capitol.
But then he is overwhelmingly concerned with no harm to officers or nothing that would impair the operations of potentially other people that could have been acting at the behest of the federal government.
When you dug deeper into the video, what were the tells that this didn't strike you as a genuine MAGA grandfather who merely showed up to this out of support for Donald Trump?
No, I mean, that's an excellent question.
And I think what really kind of sells this piece and sells this story, really, not just the piece, is the video footage itself.
So I'd strongly encourage you to play some of the footage so the audience can see.
And the Revolver News piece, I think, has the most comprehensive kind of database of all the footage.
One of our clips is called, like, Where's Waldo, where we follow Ray Epps throughout his journey to the Capitol starting January 5th.
And then going into January 6th.
But you're absolutely right.
It was not as though there was any kind of plan in the case of the Trump supporters to go in.
We have footage of him on January 5th.
He's dealing with all of these disparate groups and there's fighting with BLM and everyone has their own agenda.
Some people are there for this reason and that reason.
And he repeatedly goes to group after group saying, look, Focus on what we're here for.
The Capitol is where our problems are.
We need to go into the Capitol.
And it would be one thing if this were just a one-off crazy guy making an offhand suggestion, that was the end of it.
But the very same guy who was saying we need to go into the Capitol to the shock and consternation of these Trump supporters, like, what are you talking about?
This was the same guy who was at the barricade on January 6th as Trump was giving his speech.
So before the crowd went there, And the very first breach of the Capitol occurred literally two seconds after this same Ray Epps whispers into somebody's ear.
And as for his demeanor and disposition, I think this is a really good point that you also gestured toward.
And that is this.
If I could use one word to describe the conduct and demeanor of Ray Epps, It is professional.
And I don't say that entirely derisively.
I have to have some degree of admiration just for how cool and collected and detached.
And there are a lot of emotions on that day.
A lot of people were riled up.
A lot of people got caught up in the crowd psychology, let their anger get the best of them, and then they did something stupid that they regretted.
But Ray Epps, what's amazing about him is there's zero emotion.
This guy is a cold, He's a cool cucumber and a cold professional and he knows what he's doing.
And he's an excellent, he's very proficient at crowd control.
And so here you have this guy Epps just like calmly saying, go to the Capitol, go to the Capitol.
People just listen to him.
It's actually quite amazing.
But that's one of the many kind of red flags that is in the Revolver News piece.
We have a number of red flags that typically identify a provocateur.
And one of them is just Kind of a combination of kind of radical extreme suggestions like let's go into the Capitol, a combination of that with a kind of weird emotional detachment from the content of what someone is saying.
And that is exhibited throughout Epps' experience on January 5th and the 6th.
Where is this guy now?
Do we know anything about his whereabouts or any interactions he's had with any law enforcement?
We actually don't.
And again, there's so many little gems in this piece.
And one of them that you alluded to is that even though now it seems like the Feds are entirely uninterested in this guy who, by all accounts, by all what it seems from looking at the video, it's apparent that if anyone's a kind of major orchestrator in the first act of this so-called breach of the Capitol, it would be him.
And it's curious that the feds don't seem to be interested, but what's even more curious is that initially they were.
And Epps' face was actually one of the first 20 faces that the FBI put on their January 6 most wanted list that anyone in DC would have seen, like they had the posters everywhere.
They were very interested.
And they did their usual shtick where they say, we are calling on the public's help.
Help us identify this man.
And then the internet, being what the internet is, a remarkable vehicle, identified him within days, and then crickets.
The feds weren't interested in nothing about him until five months later, they scrubbed his face And named completely from their public database.
And we were able to interpolate the exact day that they scrubbed it.
And just by coincidence happened to be the very day after Revolver News ran an extensive piece on his former...
Well, there were these three principal militia groups that the federal government discussed as animating the violence.
The Proud Boys, the Three Percenters, and the Oath Keepers.
But we keep coming back to the Oath Keepers.
It was a revolver piece that really exposed Stuart Rhodes as kind of the Forrest Gump of federal law enforcement activity.
He kind of appears everywhere randomly and then seems to always evade any type of consequence or capture.
He's the founder of the Oath Keepers.
And then we see the Jeremy Brown piece where someone who is involved with the Oath Keepers, getting involved with the Oath Keepers, is recruited by the federal government with actual video evidence.
And then you also see this Ray Epps individual as the Arizona head of the Oath Keepers.
I asked you in a prior discussion whether or not the Oath Keepers itself was a Fed operation, and you said that you surmised probably there are a lot of people that just joined the Oath Keepers because they thought politicians ought to keep their oaths.
And that it was a way for them to express their political view, but from a leadership standpoint, There really are questions here.
I'll share with you this.
Thomas Massey became very skeptical of the Ray Epps cover story when he was advertised as a man who had a grass-fed dairy farm on five acres in Arizona.
And since Thomas Massey actually has a working cattle operation, he saw how ridiculous it could be that someone actually would have grass-fed cattle in Arizona on such a small plot of land As to sufficiently scale it, it almost looked like the type of story someone would create as a cover story.
Darren, the most instructive part of the revolver piece was actually your direction to me, to the Congress, to follow up with Merrick Garland on a specific question.
Now that we've had this hearing, now that Garland has really demured on the opportunity to clear all this up, what is the operative question?
Well, I mean, there are several...
Operative questions.
I think the question that you allude to in the Revolver News piece simply refers to, have there ever been people who have been put on their most wanted list who actually turned out to be informants?
And, you know, that's not a question that's going to lead to a kind of bombshell answer like, you know, was Ray Epps an asset or was Stuart Rhodes an asset?
But it is something that has the advantage that it's not something that's directly related to one of their It's a question that's tailored to kind of Avoid that typical evasive response.
But given their disposition and their interests, I don't see them being kind of cooperative in any type of question.
I think really what matters is increasing the pressure, increasing the exposure.
And so I have to commend you.
I have to commend Representative Massey for doing a great job and sort of setting this up to be To be the kind of the popular piece that it was that now everyone's paying attention to.
And I do think because the whole kind of tee-up for the piece began with an interrogation of Attorney General Garland, I think this is important to say, and this is something we talked about in the conclusion of the revolver piece, is that this one-sixth Domestic War on Terror, Patriot Act 2.0, that they're setting up all Trump supporters to be domestic terrorists.
This is not AG Garland's first rodeo.
AG Garland is somebody who goes all the way back to the 90s, and he was, in fact, the preeminent Domestic extremism prosecutor in the 90s under Clinton.
He oversaw the prosecutions in the Oklahoma City cases, which is beyond the scope of this discussion that are extremely dark and extremely dirty.
And remember, this period in the early 90s was right when the government started Implementing a robust infiltration operation into militia groups.
It started with an organization called PATCON, an operation called PATCON, in which the Feds literally set up a fake militia group as a honeypot.
And in fact, in an excellent piece on foreign policy by a mainstream, quote-unquote, domestic terrorism, domestic extremism researcher called Jay Berger, he describes it thusly.
He said, In order to destroy the militia movement, the feds had to become the militia movement.
And this is basically what Merrick Garland oversaw in the 90s, and this is precisely the same thing.
In order to preempt this fictional idea of a MAGA insurrection, The Feds had to become the insurrection, and Merrick Garland is playing his same old tunes.
He's playing his hits from the 90s, and that's what's going on.
The parallels are simply unavoidable at this point.
Everyone knows there were no good hits out of the 90s, but we will ask Merrick Garland the pointed question that revolver ripens.
I'm announcing that I am sending a letter to the Attorney General, and my suspicion is that my colleagues from the Judiciary Committee will be joining that letter asking this question.
Following January 6th, were there people that you took off of any of the wanted lists that Were federal assets or federal agents?
Did any of the decisions to remove those people come as a consequence of cooperation between the federal government and the people that were animating the violence?
And if he answers that question in the affirmative, we know it's Epps.
And we know they weren't just there collecting intelligence, they were driving people into the building.
And if the answer is that it wasn't, Well, then we'll have to do more research to determine whether or not these questions raised in Revolver have the darkest possible answer.
But when you look at the history of Michigan, when you look at the history that you just laid out of some of the top officials at DOJ, And when you look at that level of professionalism, I think you said in the piece, Ray Epps was a man on a mission.
And his specific mission was to get people into that Capitol building.
And he seemed to know exactly what he was doing.
Darren, what's next?
The Revolver has been the place that's been breaking all these stories you mentioned earlier.
There may be a Jeremy Brown story coming.
But what are the leads you're looking into to drill this thing down further?
Well...
As I alluded to, we have a smoking gun piece.
I think this will be the most dispositive piece.
Up until now, we've been presenting pieces that have shaped the narrative, that ask extremely disturbing questions that I think the American people deserve the answers to.
But we have a piece coming up that goes beyond asking extremely pointed and disturbing and informed questions, and just is a factual representation of Really serious foreknowledge on the part of the federal government, and that's really all I'll say.
That's the most I've said publicly, and so that's all I'll say, but we have this major piece that we're working on.
Actually, the original intent was to have that come out first, but thanks to Massey, who blew up the Epps piece, we had a piece on Epps in the works for months that we just put in abeyance, and we said, look, now it's time to strike Strike while it's hot.
So we did the Epps piece and I think it was a tremendous success in great part to Massey's amplification of this and really, you know, you and it's just so important for people in Congress to take up this issue precisely, especially because the commission itself is such a corrupt disgrace.
Well, thank you for the great work at Revolver.
I will be enjoying that new smoking gun piece as a premium member.
I've just signed up so I get it all ad-free.
Thanks for the great work you do.
Look forward to chatting with you again soon, Darren.