Firebrand - Matt Gaetz - Episode 13: Who Is Ray Epps? (feat. Dr. Darren J. Beattie) – Firebrand with Matt Gaetz

In the wake of the January 6th, 2019 events, the question has been asked for some time by members of Congress: Was the FBI involved in animating criminal activity on January 5th and even before that on the evening before that? And the most detailed, thorough reporting on this question can be found on Revolver News, where we have with us our good friend and former senior advisor, Dr. Darren Beattie. In this piece, we cover the question of whether or not federal agents or assets of the federal government were present on that evening, and if any of them were involved in any way. We also cover the story of Jeremy Brown, a Green Beret who is a Florida man who is joining the Oath Keepers, and he gets an approach from federal law enforcement and a solicitation to join their ranks to be a part of that organization. And so it is not a question of if or if not, but rather, was the FBI trying to infiltrate the group. And if so, what role did the FBI play in those activities? And why did they do so? And who was involved in them? And how did they play a role in it? And was it any of their involvement involved? and was it a good or bad one? And is there any evidence of any involvement by the Department of Justice at all? . And who is responsible for it? And what is the answer to that question? and why was it involved in the first place? ? What role played by the FBI in the events that occurred on that day, and how did it play a part in what happened that day and what was the impact on the day after that day? What was the role of the FBI played in the day and how was it actually involved in it, and what did it have to do with it ? and in the aftermath and what did it do in relation to what happened the next day and in response to it and who s role in any of it who was the most likely to be involved in this? in this article, and why is it so important in the investigation? How did it matter to the most important part in all of all of this of all this? And what happened in the biggest story in the world right now? of course, who s going to be the most thorough reporting right now, and what s the most impactful of it?

00:00:01.000 The embattled Congressman Matt Gaetz.

00:00:03.000 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.

00:00:10.000 Matt Gaetz right now, he's a problem in the Democratic Party.

00:00:13.000 He can cause a lot of hiccups in passing the laws.

00:00:16.000 So we're going to keep running the stories to keep hurting him.

00:00:20.000 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!

00:00:29.000 You are in the right place!

00:00:30.000 This is the movement for you!

00:00:32.000 You ever watch this guy on television?

00:00:35.000 It's like a machine.

00:00:36.000 Matt Gaetz.

00:00:37.000 I'm a cancelled man in some corners of the internet.

00:00:41.000 Many days I'm a marked man in Congress, a wanted man by the deep state.

00:00:45.000 They aren't really coming for me.

00:00:47.000 They're coming for you.

00:00:49.000 I'm just in the way.

00:00:53.000 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.

00:01:04.000 I'm probably going to go to jail.

00:01:06.000 Tomorrow!

00:01:07.000 We need to go into the Capitol!

00:01:10.000 Into the Capitol!

00:01:11.000 I can't!

00:01:15.000 Is then the next day directing people to the Capitol.

00:01:18.000 And as far as we can find, this individual has not been charged with anything.

00:01:22.000 You said this is one of the most sweeping investigations in history.

00:01:27.000 Have you seen that video or those frames from that video?

00:01:33.000 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.

00:01:46.000 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.

00:01:59.000 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?

00:02:12.000 So I'm not going to violate this norm of the rule of law.

00:02:17.000 I'm not going to comment on an investigation that's ongoing.

00:02:19.000 The biggest story in the world right now is on revolver.news.

00:02:26.000 The question's been asked for quite some time by members of Congress, by journalists.

00:02:30.000 Was the FBI involved in animating criminal activity on January 6th and even perhaps before that on the evening of January 5th?

00:02:40.000 And the most detailed, thorough reporting on this question right now found on revolver.news.

00:02:46.000 We have with us our good friend, the publisher of Revolver News, my former senior advisor, Dr. Darren Beattie.

00:02:52.000 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.

00:03:08.000 Jeremy Brown is a Florida man who is joining the Oath Keepers, right?

00:03:14.000 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.

00:03:27.000 And so it is not a question whether or not federal law enforcement was trying to infiltrate the Oath Keepers.

00:03:34.000 We know that from Jeremy Brown.

00:03:36.000 Revolver.News has had a piece on Jeremy Brown.

00:03:39.000 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.

00:03:51.000 Well, that's a great question.

00:03:53.000 And the story is a very broad one.

00:03:55.000 And incidentally, we have a major follow-up piece coming up that really dives into the Jeremy Brown situation.

00:04:02.000 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.

00:04:12.000 As for Jeremy Brown, for listeners who might not be aware, he is a Green Beret.

00:04:18.000 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.

00:04:46.000 It's a win-win situation.

00:04:47.000 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.

00:05:02.000 It's quite a remarkable video in its own right. 0.98

00:05:08.000 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.

00:05:15.000 You calling us and letting us know, and we can prevent the next big thing, it'd be great. 0.88

00:05:20.000 We're here to clear your name.

00:05:23.000 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.

00:05:37.000 And again, I can't make any promises, but if you provide information that prevents something big, the government pays for that.

00:05:45.000 The government...

00:05:46.000 Right here, I know how to work.

00:05:49.000 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.

00:06:03.000 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.

00:06:18.000 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.

00:06:28.000 It was a trespassing charge because he had been On the capital grounds, which in itself is an important point.

00:06:36.000 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.

00:06:46.000 Trespassing, one might assume, meant you went into the capital.

00:06:50.000 Absolutely not.

00:06:51.000 All it means is that you were technically past the basically artificial temporary barriers set up for January 6th.

00:06:59.000 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.

00:07:23.000 We have video footage of people cutting up the fences.

00:07:29.000 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.

00:07:42.000 And so you had people set up in this booby trap where probably hundreds if not thousands of people were technically breaking the law.

00:07:50.000 So I'll pause in case you—I don't want to keep going on.

00:07:55.000 No, I think it's a good point.

00:07:57.000 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.

00:08:13.000 So then the question becomes why?

00:08:15.000 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.

00:08:40.000 That is the story of Ray Epps.

00:08:43.000 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,

00:08:58.000 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.

00:09:17.000 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.

00:09:27.000 Tomorrow, we need to go into the Capitol!

00:09:30.000 Into the Capitol!

00:09:34.000 I don't even like to say it because I'll be arrested.

00:09:36.000 Well, let's not say it.

00:09:37.000 We need to go...

00:09:38.000 I'll say it.

00:09:39.000 All right.

00:09:40.000 We need to go in... 1.00

00:09:41.000 Shut the f*** up, Boomer. 1.00

00:09:42.000 ...to the Capitol. 1.00

00:09:46.000 We are speaking.

00:09:47.000 We are going to the Capitol where our problems are.

00:09:51.000 It's that direction.

00:09:54.000 We spread the word.

00:09:56.000 All right.

00:09:57.000 No, David, one more thing.

00:09:58.000 Yeah, so can we go up there?

00:09:59.000 No?

00:10:00.000 When we go in, leave this year.

00:10:03.000 You don't need to get shot.

00:10:04.000 You're going to arrest us all?

00:10:06.000 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.

00:10:30.000 And what was interesting was that the Attorney General did not take the opportunity to Dispel this theory.

00:10:38.000 You then have developed that theory out, and there's something that I really pulled out of the piece that was specific.

00:10:46.000 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.

00:10:57.000 How should people think about that event?

00:11:00.000 Right.

00:11:00.000 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.

00:11:10.000 So with the case of Jeremy Brown, we know that they're looking for informants.

00:11:15.000 And the New York Times, incidentally, did a piece fairly recently acknowledging that, yes, there were at least one, probably several informants.

00:11:24.000 They acknowledged A proud boy member who was inside of the Capitol and texting with his FBI handler contemporaneously throughout the day.

00:11:33.000 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.

00:11:46.000 That Revolver.News has adduced and it's much darker because of this.

00:11:51.000 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.

00:12:01.000 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.

00:12:25.000 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.

00:12:41.000 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.

00:12:54.000 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?

00:13:07.000 No, I mean, that's an excellent question.

00:13:09.000 And I think what really kind of sells this piece and sells this story, really, not just the piece, is the video footage itself.

00:13:17.000 So I'd strongly encourage you to play some of the footage so the audience can see.

00:13:21.000 And the Revolver News piece, I think, has the most comprehensive kind of database of all the footage.

00:13:27.000 One of our clips is called, like, Where's Waldo, where we follow Ray Epps throughout his journey to the Capitol starting January 5th.

00:13:35.000 And then going into January 6th.

00:13:38.000 But you're absolutely right.

00:13:40.000 It was not as though there was any kind of plan in the case of the Trump supporters to go in.

00:13:46.000 We have footage of him on January 5th.

00:13:48.000 He's dealing with all of these disparate groups and there's fighting with BLM and everyone has their own agenda.

00:13:54.000 Some people are there for this reason and that reason.

00:13:57.000 And he repeatedly goes to group after group saying, look, Focus on what we're here for.

00:14:02.000 The Capitol is where our problems are.

00:14:04.000 We need to go into the Capitol.

00:14:06.000 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.

00:14:12.000 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?

00:14:21.000 This was the same guy who was at the barricade on January 6th as Trump was giving his speech.

00:14:28.000 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.

00:14:38.000 And as for his demeanor and disposition, I think this is a really good point that you also gestured toward.

00:14:45.000 And that is this.

00:14:46.000 If I could use one word to describe the conduct and demeanor of Ray Epps, It is professional.

00:14:54.000 And I don't say that entirely derisively.

00:14:57.000 I have to have some degree of admiration just for how cool and collected and detached.

00:15:04.000 And there are a lot of emotions on that day.

00:15:07.000 A lot of people were riled up. 0.98

00:15:08.000 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. 0.95

00:15:15.000 But Ray Epps, what's amazing about him is there's zero emotion. 0.94

00:15:19.000 This guy is a cold, He's a cool cucumber and a cold professional and he knows what he's doing.

00:15:26.000 And he's an excellent, he's very proficient at crowd control.

00:15:29.000 And so here you have this guy Epps just like calmly saying, go to the Capitol, go to the Capitol.

00:15:34.000 People just listen to him.

00:15:36.000 It's actually quite amazing.

00:15:38.000 But that's one of the many kind of red flags that is in the Revolver News piece.

00:15:45.000 We have a number of red flags that typically identify a provocateur.

00:15:49.000 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.

00:16:06.000 And that is exhibited throughout Epps' experience on January 5th and the 6th.

00:16:13.000 Where is this guy now?

00:16:15.000 Do we know anything about his whereabouts or any interactions he's had with any law enforcement?

00:16:22.000 We actually don't.

00:16:23.000 And again, there's so many little gems in this piece.

00:16:28.000 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.

00:16:50.000 And it's curious that the feds don't seem to be interested, but what's even more curious is that initially they were.

00:16:57.000 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.

00:17:08.000 They were very interested.

00:17:10.000 And they did their usual shtick where they say, we are calling on the public's help.

00:17:14.000 Help us identify this man.

00:17:16.000 And then the internet, being what the internet is, a remarkable vehicle, identified him within days, and then crickets.

00:17:24.000 The feds weren't interested in nothing about him until five months later, they scrubbed his face And named completely from their public database.

00:17:34.000 And we were able to interpolate the exact day that they scrubbed it.

00:17:39.000 And just by coincidence happened to be the very day after Revolver News ran an extensive piece on his former...

00:17:49.000 Well, there were these three principal militia groups that the federal government discussed as animating the violence.

00:17:56.000 The Proud Boys, the Three Percenters, and the Oath Keepers. 0.92

00:17:59.000 But we keep coming back to the Oath Keepers.

00:18:02.000 It was a revolver piece that really exposed Stuart Rhodes as kind of the Forrest Gump of federal law enforcement activity.

00:18:12.000 He kind of appears everywhere randomly and then seems to always evade any type of consequence or capture.

00:18:19.000 He's the founder of the Oath Keepers.

00:18:21.000 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.

00:18:33.000 And then you also see this Ray Epps individual as the Arizona head of the Oath Keepers.

00:18:41.000 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.

00:18:54.000 And that it was a way for them to express their political view, but from a leadership standpoint, There really are questions here.

00:19:01.000 I'll share with you this.

00:19:02.000 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.

00:19:14.000 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.

00:19:33.000 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.

00:19:44.000 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?

00:19:54.000 Well, I mean, there are several...

00:19:56.000 Operative questions.

00:19:57.000 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?

00:20:09.000 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?

00:20:18.000 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.

00:20:34.000 But given their disposition and their interests, I don't see them being kind of cooperative in any type of question.

00:20:42.000 I think really what matters is increasing the pressure, increasing the exposure.

00:20:48.000 And so I have to commend you.

00:20:50.000 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.

00:21:03.000 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.

00:21:30.000 This is not AG Garland's first rodeo.

00:21:34.000 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.

00:21:45.000 He oversaw the prosecutions in the Oklahoma City cases, which is beyond the scope of this discussion that are extremely dark and extremely dirty.

00:21:55.000 And remember, this period in the early 90s was right when the government started Implementing a robust infiltration operation into militia groups.

00:22:07.000 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.

00:22:18.000 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.

00:22:31.000 He said, In order to destroy the militia movement, the feds had to become the militia movement.

00:22:40.000 And this is basically what Merrick Garland oversaw in the 90s, and this is precisely the same thing.

00:22:47.000 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.

00:22:59.000 He's playing his hits from the 90s, and that's what's going on.

00:23:04.000 The parallels are simply unavoidable at this point.

00:23:07.000 Everyone knows there were no good hits out of the 90s, but we will ask Merrick Garland the pointed question that revolver ripens.

00:23:15.000 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.

00:23:24.000 Following January 6th, were there people that you took off of any of the wanted lists that Were federal assets or federal agents?

00:23:35.000 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?

00:23:44.000 And if he answers that question in the affirmative, we know it's Epps.

00:23:48.000 And we know they weren't just there collecting intelligence, they were driving people into the building.

00:23:52.000 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.

00:24:01.000 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.

00:24:16.000 And his specific mission was to get people into that Capitol building.

00:24:20.000 And he seemed to know exactly what he was doing.

00:24:23.000 Darren, what's next?

00:24:25.000 The Revolver has been the place that's been breaking all these stories you mentioned earlier.

00:24:30.000 There may be a Jeremy Brown story coming.

00:24:32.000 But what are the leads you're looking into to drill this thing down further?

00:24:37.000 Well...

00:24:38.000 As I alluded to, we have a smoking gun piece.

00:24:42.000 I think this will be the most dispositive piece.

00:24:46.000 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.

00:24:56.000 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.

00:25:14.000 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.

00:25:21.000 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.

00:25:38.000 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.

00:26:02.000 Well, thank you for the great work at Revolver.

00:26:04.000 I will be enjoying that new smoking gun piece as a premium member.

00:26:08.000 I've just signed up so I get it all ad-free.

00:26:11.000 Thanks for the great work you do.

00:26:13.000 Look forward to chatting with you again soon, Darren.

00:26:15.000 Absolutely.

Firebrand - Matt Gaetz - October 28, 2021

Episode 13: Who Is Ray Epps? (feat. Dr. Darren J. Beattie) – Firebrand with Matt Gaetz

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