Russian Roulette Pt 5 – An Infiltrated and Divided Party, The Puppet Masters Of The PA GOP Press The Nuclear Button

Over the past two weeks, I wrote four articles – Russian Roulette – The Death Of The PA Republican Party By Its Own Hand, Russian Roulette Pt 2 – A Coalition of Patriot Groups Takes Action While County GOPs Put 5 Rounds in the Revolver And Begin To Pull The Trigger, Russian Roulette Pt 3 – Inaction Results In PA County GOPs Suiciding The PA GOP, and Russian Roulette Pt 4 – Cumberland County Chair Equates Unlawfully Ousted Republican Committeemembers To Antifa And Cancer – regarding numerous PA county GOPs that have been investigating committeemembers, holding hearings, and removing duly elected committeemembers simply because those committeemembers supported unendorsed Republican candidates or refused to support an endorsed candidate. Even though these committeemembers are the unpaid workhorses of the Party every election cycle, a number of county GOPs see them as a threat because they didn’t rollover and just support whomever the puppet masters decided would be the anointed…err…endorsed one.

But now, more information has come to light, including a Zoom call by Chairman Tabas that appears to have been wholly ineffective, Northampton County GOP Chair Glenn Geissinger filing what are contended to be false criminal complaints against four commiteemembers and thereafter apparently falsely contending that state committee authorized him – as a result of the allegedly bogus complaints – to preclude their attendance at meetings, and in relation to Cumberland County, a group chat, where an apparently appointed committeewoman – who replaced a conservative committeemember – boasted about her substantial ties to the Democratic Party. You simply cannot make this stuff up, folks.

So, where to start? I guess the Tuesday night Zoom call.

Most state committeemembers received notice last Monday of a 20 minute Zoom call, being called for by Chairman Tabas for Tuesday night. I was extremely hopeful that Chairman Tabas was going to take the exact action I implored him to take in my original letter to him of June 28th – tell all county chairs to immediately cease any investigations or hearings relative to committeemembers supporting Republican candidates in the primary that were not endorsed, reinstate any already removed members, and unite our Party. As I am not a state committeemember, I was not invited; however, Bucks County State Committeemember Frank Masciotro posted about the call, shortly after it ended. He summed the meeting up as “a waste of time” because “Tabas is supporting his county chair positions and actions but should instead support the committee men and women who do all the work for the party and candidates.” Chairman Tabas, in relation to the removed members, said that “the county chairs should offer them things to do to get back into the Gop [sic] to prove themselves as worthy committe [sic] men or women.” Inline this with, another committeemember told me that Chairman Tabas suggested that chairs “have them work off their offenses, like door knocking and registering mail-in voters.”

HARD STOP – these members are already the unpaid workhorses of the Party, did nothing wrong, and were unlawfully removed, and now you want to penalize them further to be part of a Party that could care less about upholding the rule of law and which took unlawful action against them? This has to be the most ridiculous thing I’ve heard in my entire life and I can say that having heard some extremely ridiculous things. And of course, then there’s the pesky fact that a motion was made during the state committee meeting in February to remove current members of the PA House, who are also state committee members, for their votes in support of Democrat Mark Rozzi for Speaker of the House – which, as explicitly stated by the State Committee Bylaws, REQUIRE removal of those members – only for it to be tabled, indefinitely. But don’t worry, the dysfunction within the Party gets better…

Friday morning, a blog article – NorCo GOP Chair Bans Four State Committee Members Under Criminal Investigation – was posted by liberal blogger Bernie O’Hare. In the article, he explicitly declares that “Northampton County Republican Chair Glenn Geissinger has conformed [sic] that he has banned four committee members from attending monthly meetings until a criminal investigation of their behavior has concluded” and that “Geissinger informed me that the state committee authorized him to disallow these state committee members until the criminal matter is resolved.” So, the first question that comes to mind is why would Northampton Co GOP Chair Geissinger contact a liberal blogger about this issue? What is perhaps more interesting is the timing. The article was posted at midnight on July 28th. Thus, it would seem, given the duration of the Northampton County GOP meeting on July 28th, that Chair Geissinger was either already or immediately after in communication with O’Hare…

This morning, O’Hare has posted another article, GOP Infighting Is a County and Statewide Problem, as a result of my appearance on the Bobby Gunther Walsh show on Friday morning. Beyond doubling-down on the fact that the banning of the four members was authorized, he now contends that the authorization came from “counsel for the state GOP committee” and that I was incorrect that Chair Geissinger reached out to him the night of the meeting, but rather that he:

was first aware of this disgusting intrusion into the private lives of two committee members almost immediately after it happened because I spoke with the victims. I decided not to write about it then because the victims of this attack have been violated and writing about it would cause more pain. I then received an email from “Another Concerned Republican”, chiding me for refusing to write a story…Last Thursday, I heard a rumor that Geissinger had banned four state committee members from meetings because they are subjects of that investigation. In my view, when four elected state committee members are banned from participating in their county’s meetings, that’s a story. But I needed to verify. I contacted Geissinger, and he confirmed that the rumor was accurate. He declined to go into detail or name them, but did say he was authorized to proscribe these members by the state committee’s counsel. Prince stated that Geissinger’s actions were unsanctioned, so I contacted Glenn again on Saturday. He reiterated that he had received authorization. Prince was obviously misinformed.

But what about the Chair Geissinger’s original statement to O’Hare that state committee (i.e. Chairman Tabas) and later general counsel to the GOP (i.e. Tom King, Esq.) authorized him to preclude these four members from attending meetings until the complaints are resolved? Well, from the information I’ve received, that was a lie and Chairman Tabas was livid Friday morning upon learning of O’Hare’s original post, as neither he nor GOP Counsel Tom King ever authorized the banning of members at the Northampton County Republican Committee meeting.

What is extremely interesting to me, as I’ll explain further below, is the positive comments that O’Hare makes in the comment section of the original article about Geissinger, including that he’s allegedly part of the “tea party” faction in Northampton County and that he’s being disparaged. And then, there are his further comments in support of Geissinger in his second article, referring to Geissinger as “appear[ing] normal in comparison” to the other members and the fact that O’Hare admits that he was contacted by two other committeemembers regarding the original incident. Just how many alleged Republican on the Northampton County Republican Committee are communicating – and seemingly in real time – with O’Hare, a proud liberal bogger? What if the Republican Party, at least in some counties (or even more broadly), has been infiltrated by the Democratic Party; whereby, as part of the grand scheme, after being successful with the infiltration by one or more members, the handlers connect them with other Democratic operatives to allegedly boast their “conservative values and ideals” and their alignment with fractions of the Republican Party to make those groups mistakenly believe they have a representative on the committee. That’d be too conspiracy theorist or the work of fiction – straight from the CIA playbook on how to overthrow a government – right?

Recently, a group text exchange between Cumberland County Chair Lou Capozzi and the Cumberland County committeemembers, post-purge, was sent to me. Remember, this is the Chair, who post-purge, equated the nine unlawfully removed committeemembers and their supporters to “Antifa” and a “cancer.” In this recent exchange, Chair Capozzi bemoans the support for the unlawfully removed members in the press and otherwise and is responded to by Angelique Cinaci-Hartman, who I was informed was appointed by Chair Capozzi to fill a vacancy caused by a conservative committeemember quitting the committee rather than go through the sham expulsion hearing. What is her response? Well, it is extremely telling.

Committeemember Cinaci-Hartman declares, in pertinent part

I am from Philly and rode the blue wave for years working for Judges, campaigning for Rizzo, Casey and the likes. My father was a true Teamster and I attended many union meetings and walked the picket lines with him at the age of 9 and then made my way into the spotlight at young age 13!

If you want to see her complete response, you can here:

So, we have an individual, appointed by the Cumberland County Chair, overtly espousing her Democratic views and the response gets “liked” by at least one person on the committee at the time of the screenshot. Any guess as to who that committeemember is? Take a guess, because Angelique is still a committeemember and hasn’t been threatened with removal…But, nothing to see here…

And we could go back in a time a couple months prior where then-Montgomery County Chair, attorney Liz Preate-Havey, resigned – which, per the Bylaws would automatically install the Vice Chair – but Preate-Havey named herself interim-Chair and then hired armed security for the meeting to select a new chair, where individuals, such as Stan Casacio, were threatened and effectively precluded from running against Preate-Havey’s choice for replacement. One member recounted:

There was no opportunity for others to run and campaign for the position.  At our endorsement meeting for the primary, Liz and company hired armed policemen for the event and any contrary opinion was met with aggression.  A member got up to speak and the legal council for the county immediately starting yelling at this person and shutting them down.  Then other people got up in attempts to force Roberts Rules of Order they too were shouted down…It was an awful meeting and I felt like we were very much strong-armed into doing whatever Liz wanted.  It very much felt like Democrats were in charge.  

So where does this leave us? Well, the PA Patriot Coalition previously informed Chairman Tabas that numerous members and group were talking about boycotting the upcoming and future elections, if committee persons were removed for their support of unendorsed Republican candidates in the past Primary, with many of them echoing the mantra “if they don’t want us, then they don’t need us” in relation to future elections. As the PA GOP has allowed these removals to occur and has failed to direct their immediate reinstatement, it appears the line in the sand has been crossed and it will be to the detriment of our appellate court candidates. Of course, I previously called on them to immediately denounce these actions and demand the reinstatement of these removed members; however, to my knowledge, no statements have been issued, which is extremely disconcerting if we all believe in true Republic ideals.

But who is behind all of this? Recently, former gubernatorial candidate John Ventre submitted a letter to the editor of TribLive, describing how he believes Commonwealth Partners Chamber of Entrepreneurs and its Founder and CEO Matthew Brouillette are the masterminds behind all of this because, in part, due to “his disdain for Donald Trump, Doug Mastriano, Joe Gale and any MAGA candidate.” And this was echoed by Bill Lawrence’s recent article regarding the Zoom call and Chesco United meeting. In Ventre’s letter to the editor, he declares that Brouillette “gloated over the more experienced Supreme and Appellate Court Republicans losing to controllable, less experienced Republican candidates. Of course, his group throws millions at controllable candidates when they oppose Trump-like candidates.” And he’s absolutely correct.

Immediately after the Primary, Brouillette posted the following on his Facebook page, and shortly thereafter, his article PA Primary Unveiled a Crisis for Both Political Parties, wherein both articles he refers to Judge McCullough and myself as the Mastriano/Trump candidates.

What is interesting is that beyond Commonwealth Partners’ substantial financial support for my former primary opponent, it was my opponent who received not only Mastriano’s endorsement, but also, a $10,000 donation from his committee. But yet, Brouillette contends I’m the Mastriano candidate…Are you beginning to now see how the game is played? And I will give them this, it is FAR from a game of checkers…

But, unfortunately, that’s only the tip of the iceberg. When you start to investigate who is behind the funding of Brouillette and a web of Political Action Committees in Pennsylvania that seemingly control who become the Republican candidates, as Spotlight PA reporter Stephen Caruso reported in his article Pa.’s richest person has spent at least $18 million on the 2022 primary — mostly to influence one issue, it all goes back to one person – Jeffrey Yass – a registered Independent who financially supports Democratic and allegedly Republican candidates. But the question remains, are those supported candidates true Republicans? Or, even if some or all are, does he elect to support the weaker Republican primary candidate to ensure a Democratic or mostly Democratic win in November?

And the pieces all begin to fall into place…

If you had told me eight months ago that our Party had been infiltrated and taken over, I would have probably chuckled to myself. I always knew we had dysfunction within our Party, but I never dreamed that it was to this level – and perhaps it wasn’t and this is a more recent phenomenon but I have a hard time believing this was implemented in the short term. I believe this is more akin to the Democratic playbook of having liberal candidates elected to the school boards over more than a decade before the issue came to light during COVID in relation to CRT and other indoctrination that was occurring within our schools. After all, it does feel eerily similar. But regardless, here we are; a Party that has been clearly infiltrated by those who do not share our core beliefs and who are utilizing us as useful idiots, right on the cusp of the 2024 elections. They have infiltrated us to such a degree that not only are they no longer concerned with being overt about who they are and their intent but they have us in a stranglehold and have pressed the nuclear button to completely destroy the PA Republican Party. Our Party’s only chance at survival is if a leader steps forth, joined by true Patriots, to take it back