FSU Shooter A Bible-Quoting Christofascist

 

ICYMI, we have another emotionally disturbed person drawn to Christofascist ideology acting out in a deadly rampage:

A Florida State University student accused of killing two people and injuring six others in a shooting at the university on Thursday is the son of a local sheriff’s deputy, authorities say, and spent time training with law enforcement and serving on a sheriff’s advisory council in the years before his alleged attack.

When he was taken into custody after being shot and injured by university police, Phoenix Ikner, 20, was carrying a handgun that used to be the service weapon of sheriff’s deputy Jessica Ikner, according to officials and records. 

Police have not disclosed any potential motive in the shooting. There don’t appear to be any connections between the suspect and any of the victims, Tallahassee Police Chief Lawrence Revell said Friday.

Since the shooting, Ikner’s previous classmates from his time at Tallahassee State College have said his political beliefs were extreme and they were made uncomfortable with his “concerning rhetoric” – including describing Civil Rights icon Rosa Parks as being “in the wrong,” defending the use of Nazi symbols, and disparaging pro-Palestinian and Black Lives Matter protesters. It’s not clear if politics was a factor in Thursday’s shooting. [snip]

The suspected gunman suffered from emotional dysregulation for which he had been prescribed medication, according to the law enforcement source. Investigators were told during interviews with family members that he had stopped taking some of this prescribed medication, the source added. It’s too soon to say whether this may have played a role in Thursday’s violence but will likely be probed as investigators dig into his background.

On Instagram, an account with Ikner’s name and photo that was taken offline after he was publicly identified included a biblical quote on its profile: “You are my war club, my weapon for battle; with you I shatter nations, with you I destroy kingdoms.” 

Phoenix Ikner is a registered Republican, according to Florida voter registration records. He was quoted in January in an FSU student newspaper article about anti-Trump protests in advance of the president’s inauguration.

“These people are usually pretty entertaining, usually not for good reasons,” Ikner was quoted as saying. “I think it’s a little too late, he’s (Trump) already going to be inaugurated on Jan. 20 and there’s not really much you can do unless you outright revolt, and I don’t think anyone wants that."  [snip]

Two brothers, Lucas and Logan Luzietti, said they took a national government class with Ikner at Tallahassee State College in the spring of 2023, where Lucas described Ikner espousing “concerning rhetoric.”

Logan recalled a conversation about gentrification where Ikner said Black people were ruining the property value of his neighborhood. Ikner also criticized Rosa Parks for refusing to give up her seat on an Alabama bus, Logan said. Ikner also claimed Joe Biden was not the legitimate president of the United States, Lucas said.

“He would joke about the deaths of minorities,” Lucas said. “He talked about how Stonewall was bad for our society,” he added, referring to a pivotal moment in the LGBTQ+ civil rights movement...

Ikner belonged to Charlie Kirk's incel fascist "Turning Point USA," which sums up all you need to know.

Ikner's victims were food service employees at the University:  Tiru Chabba, 45, devoted husband and father of two, and Robert Morales, devoted husband and father of a daughter.  Neither had any known connection to the little Nazi shooter.  Six others were wounded or injured in Ikner's attack.

(Photo:  Ikner, with cross, before violating the 6th Commandment/ via CNN/ social media)

Oklahoma Rigs Process To Buy "Trump Bibles"

 

The Christofascist MAGAt running the school system in Oklahoma has a genius plan for spending taxpayer dollars to violate the First Amendment's establishment clause while lining a certain very un- Christian cult leader's pockets.  Gary Legum has the humorous, yet deadly serious, take:

Two wingnuts have recently faced very simple conundrums. Luckily, there is a simple solution to satisfy them and absolutely no one else.

First, Donald Trump needs a shitload of money, partly because he is a cheap grifter of the highest caliber who probably still has the first dollar he ever earned screwed into the floor somewhere, and partly because thanks to much of his grifting, he has legal bills that approach the GDP of several mid-size Latin American nations.

At the same time, Oklahoma’s Bible-humping, Libs of Tik Tok-loving state Education Secretary Ryan Walters needs a metric fuck-ton of Bibles to fulfill his requirement that every classroom in his state have one so teachers can explain to all the children, even the Jewish and Muslim and Hindu and Shinto ones, that Jesus is the only true God and they better embrace him posthaste if they don’t want to spend eternity back-stroking through the Lake of Fire or having red-hot pokers shoved up their urethras by a cackling and bloated Rhys Ifans, or whatever torments await them in the afterlife for not being Christians.

But these can’t be just any Bibles. When Walters opened bids to Bible vendors to supply Oklahoma’s schools with this First Amendment violation last Monday, he announced that the Bible he will choose must be not only a King James version of the Good Book. It must also be one that also contains copies of America’s Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, the Pledge of Allegiance, and who the hell knows what else, maybe a lyrics sheet for Casting Crowns’ “Only Jesus” or all the “Left Behind” books, why not, might as well include all the sacred evangelical texts.

Luckily, there is a solution to both Trump’s and Walters’s problems: Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the USA” Bible, which is based on the King James version, contains copies of America’s founding documents, and is endorsed by Trump, who licensed his name and image for use in selling the book. So he gets money, Walters gets his Bibles, all the children’s souls get saved, everyone’s happy except for lots of parents, lawyers, state officials, organizations concerned with maintaining the separation of church and state, and all the kids who are going to get Jesus shoved down their throats like a double dosage of Robitussin.

Of course, Walters has to pretend he’s not shoveling taxpayer funds into Donald Trump’s pockets, lest he draw the ire of state officials or voters or judges who might, despite the current Supreme Court’s efforts, still believe in the First Amendment’s governing of religion in publicly funded spaces. So this is an ostensibly open bidding process, albeit one that will only last two weeks instead of the usual four and has only one possible winner. And that winner is not going to be, say, Mardel Christian and Education, a vendor that sells 2,900 versions of the Bible, not one of which meets Walters’s requirements.

The “God Bless the USA” Bible costs $60 a pop and Walters wants 55,000 copies for a total outlay of $3.3 million. Which is a nice chunk of change to pull out of an underfunded education system, but can you really put a price on saving the eternal souls of every schoolchild in Oklahoma? You cannot...

This is a microcosm of how a kleptocratic, authoritarian national government under the Malignant Loser would operate.  It'll be a telebangelist- type money- vacuuming scheme on steroids from the minute the Malignant Loser would be sworn in.  Everyone, from the Heritage Foundation ("Project 2025" and Leonard Leo) to the vast right- wing noise machine and everything in between, will have an opportunity to dip their beaks into the Federal trough, as long as the cult leader gets his piece of the action. 

For the moment, it looks like there's some opposition brewing to Minister of Religious Edumacation Walters's plan:

It should be noted that Walters is facing a lot of pushback in his own state. A former Oklahoma state attorney general is pretty sure Walters’s policy violates state law. Also, school districts don’t necessarily have to follow this edict, since the state supreme court has said local school districts have control over their own curricula...

We'll see if Oklahoma's sheeple good citizens also have any say in how this unfolds.

(Image:  MAGAt Walters and Bible follower Trump / Office of Oklahoma State Superintendent, Brendan Smalowski, Getty Images)

Yes, "Project 2025" Is Still Trump's Christofascist Plan, Cont.

 

Don't let anyone tell you that the Christofascist plan for another racist convicted felon Malignant Loser administration isn't "Project 2025." We just quoted Timothy Snyder's warning on the Malignant Loser's situational distancing himself from the Christofascist roadmap (see QOTD, below).  

But one of its feral fascist architects, Russell Vought, helpfully steps forward to say the quiet part loud:

Russell Vought sounds like a general marshaling troops for combat when he talks about taming a “woke and weaponized” federal government.

He recently described political opposition as “enemy fire that’s coming over the target,” while urging allies to be “fearless at the point of attack” and calling his policy proposals “battle plans.”

If former President Donald Trump wins a second term in November, Vought may get the opportunity to go on the offensive.

A chief architect of Project 2025 — the controversial conservative blueprint to remake the federal government — Vought is likely to be appointed to a high-ranking post in a second Trump administration. And he’s been drafting a so-far secret “180-Day Transition Playbook” to speed the plan’s implementation to avoid a repeat of the chaotic start that dogged Trump’s first term.

Among the small cadre of Trump advisers who has a mechanic’s understanding of how Washington operates, Vought has advised influential conservative lawmakers on Capitol Hill, held a top post in the Trump White House and later established his own pro-Trump think tank. Now, he’s being mentioned as a candidate to be Trump’s White House chief of staff, one of the most powerful positions in government. [snip]

Led by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, Project 2025 is a detailed 920-page handbook for governing under the next Republican administration. A whirlwind of hard-right ambitions, its proposals range from ousting thousands of civil servants and replacing them with Trump loyalists to reversing the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of medications used in abortions. Democrats for months have been using Project 2025 to hammer Trump and other Republicans, arguing to voters that it represents the former president’s true — and extreme — agenda...  (our emphasis)

Charitably speaking, that's the most anodyne description of the plan. Once again, Democracy Docket lays out the agenda's overarching goals:

1. Restore the family as the centerpiece of American life and protect our children.
   
2. Dismantle the administrative state and return self-governance to the American people.
   
3. Defend our nation’s sovereignty, borders, and bounty against global threats.
   
4. Secure our God-given individual rights to live freely—what our Constitution calls “the Blessings of Liberty.”

The rest of the document sketches out, in detail, how the next Republican administration can execute their goals on these four fronts. That includes comprehensive outlines on what the White House and every single federal agency should do to overhaul its goals and day-to-day operations — from the Department of Agriculture to the Department of Defense, Small Business Administration and Financial Regulatory Agencies. Every sector of the executive branch has a detailed plan in Project 2025 that explains how it can carry out an ultra-conservative agenda. 

Thus, this primary document

... lays out what is essentially a “Christian nationalist vision of the United States, one in which married heterosexuality is the only valid form of sexual expression and identity; all pregnancies would be carried to term, even if that requires coercion or death; and transgender and gender-nonconforming people do not exist.”

The Malignant Loser's cowardly disclaimers notwithstanding, Vought and others in the Christofascist biosphere fully intend to implement "Project 2025" should their cult leader Malignant Loser return to the Oval Office.  What electoral considerations would restrain him then, as they do now?  After all, he promised his Christofascist followers they wouldn't have to vote anymore because everything would be fixed. You know, through "Project 2025" following the suspension of elections in America.  

We, along with many others, keep bringing up the danger of this Christofascist plan for governance because the truth, often repeated, is the best disinfectant.  The Malignant Loser and his Christofascist "Project 2025" plan need to be taken seriously and literally.

(Photo: Vought / AP file )

Poll: Opposition To "Project 2025" Grows With Knowledge

 

Turns out the more voters know about "Project 2025," the MAGAt cult's fascist agenda for governance, the less they like it (click to enlarge):

That's why it's important to keep hammering the MAGAt Republican Party and their cult leader on the sheer un- American extremism of it, however much they seek to deny authorship.  Get up to speed on it (go to link above).  Explain to people what it means for them in their lives, and how its economic and social policies would devastate them and those around them.

There are two sides in this election: one that stands for democracy and one that doesn't.  It's on every one of us to make sure democracy wins that fight.

Anti-Choice Zealots Dropped At Trump's Direction

The Malignant Loser, who will say anything to get elected and to stay out of prison, has apparently ordered his minions at the Republican Nazional National Committee to soften platform language and to keep a pair of anti-choice zealots from the party's platform committee. According to Politico:

"Two hardline anti-abortion delegates to next week’s GOP platform committee have been stripped of their positions, according to several members of the Republican National Committee, underscoring a broader fear among evangelicals and other social conservatives that the party is poised to moderate its stance on abortion at the direction of former President Donald Trump.

The Trump campaign’s efforts to block the two South Carolina delegates from the platform committee and replace them with loyalists is described in several affidavits as “interference from paid RNC staff … to circumvent the will of the delegation.”

The shakeup, which has not been previously reported, comes as anti-abortion groups petition Trump, his campaign advisers and members of the RNC not to make significant changes to the party’s platform on abortion." (our emphasis)

The Malignant Loser knows that the issue of a woman's right to her reproductive freedom is a new third rail in general elections, and his embrace of taking down Roe v. Wade is a constant theme -- and problem -- of his.

Of course the far-right Bible thumpers are part of a cult of personality, not of faith or principle. The Malignant Loser's the least religious of any modern President, and has reportedly mocked his religious followers behind their backs. He's violated more of the Ten Commandments than he's followed, but for the Christofascists, it's all about a deal with the devil to gain power and get regulations and legislation passed to remove the church / state separation. While party platforms are mostly symbolic, this episode reinforces the fear the Malignant Loser has for the anti-choice issue and the contempt he has for his "flock."

 

The Radical Right's Plans For Health Care Under Another Trump Regime

 

The Christofascist MAGAts from the Heritage Foundation have their policy roadmap ("Project 2025") laid out for the convicted felon buffoon Malignant Loser to follow should he be elected.  It covers all elements of government and proposes radical (almost too bland a descriptor) changes.  Here's what Joan Walsh says would be in store for health care should the convicted felon buffoon find himself in the Oval Office again:

Roger Severino, a prominent attorney for the Christian right, led the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Civil Rights during the Trump administration. In 2017, The Atlantic called him “the man behind Trump’s religious-freedom agenda for health care.” The profile contrasted Severino’s sparsely decorated office—adorned with a crucifix and a Clarence Thomas bobblehead—with his elaborate domestic agenda.

During Severino’s time there, Trump’s Department of Health and Human Services weakened the Affordable Care Act; strengthened the ability of healthcare providers to claim religious exemptions from providing all kinds of medical care, from abortion to birth control to vasectomies to gender-affirming care; and created a Conscience and Religious Freedom Division in his office. Under Severino’s legal counsel, HHS cut teen-pregnancy prevention programs and prioritized abstinence in its Title X family-planning grants. Backing Severino’s crusade was his boss, HHS secretary and former Eli Lilly president Alex Azar, best known for helping Trump botch his Covid response and presiding over his border policy of separating migrant children from their parents. Azar came to call his department “the Department of Life.”

In his chapter of Project 2025’s Mandate for Leadership, Severino promises to make HHS the “Department of Life” again—and to go even farther than Azar did. The plan outlines how HHS would use its power as a federal agency to dramatically curtail access to reproductive health services. Severino pledges that HHS will restrict access to birth control, rescind the FDA’s approval of medication abortion, and abolish what he calls “mail-order abortion”—the latter by using the long-dormant Comstock Act to prosecute anyone who provides such medication by mail. HHS will also focus on weeding out programs geared to the rights of LGBT people, especially anyone who is transgender. It would direct subsidies for childcare facilities to parents themselves—all in a punitive, misguided effort to shore up the nuclear family. This isn’t a public health document; it’s a theocratic manifesto, an attempt at ensuring public health through ultra-orthodox Christianity...

There's much more detail at the link, including repealing the provisions for Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices, end the Head Start program, neuter the Centers for Disease Control (except to have them collect data in order to police abortions), and more dystopia.  Walsh sums up:

So that’s what HHS will do under Trump: Ban abortion. Police marriage. Force women to give birth, even if they don’t want to. Force women to marry men, and vice versa, even if they don’t want to. Privatize Medicare. Tighten restrictions on Medicaid. And if you feel like you’d rather not live this way? Severino wants to criminalize “euthanasia,” too.

There's a way to avoid this nightmare, at least for now.  It comes on Tuesday, November 5.  FFS, spread the word.

BONUS:  The "devout Catholic" Severino is quite a piece of work, as is his wife Carrie, who runs the "Judicial Crisis Network."  A real Clarence/ Ginny Thomas Christofascist power couple.

(Photo:  Severino, the architect of an American "Handmaid's Tale" / via YouTube)

The Seeds Of Fascism Are Sprouting

 

In Texas, Christofascism has already arrived:

In this sprawling state of just over 30 million people, supposedly First Amendment-protected protests for causes like Black civil rights or against the slaughter of civilians in Gaza can, and probably will, expose you to arrest or state violence, risk your schooling or your job, or — when all else fails — leave you in danger of deadly vigilante justice. [Gov. Greg] Abbott’s pardon was the last bootheel on Texans’ right to dissent. [snip]

Everything that’s happening in Abbott’s Texas — the relentless war against liberalism and education itself, the influence of a corporate oligarchy, the surge of Christian nationalism, the war on feminism that features its strict abortion ban, and its own state military and militarized cops now deployed against its own people — is textbook fascism. The crackdown on dissent is the flame that keeps this downward spiral going. Knowing that attending a protest can expose you to legalized vigilante murder is just pouring more Texas crude on the fire...

They're still working on installing it in Ohio:

What a joke. In a pique of partisan petulance, the gerrymandered-for-life Republican supermajorities in the Ohio Statehouse have visited yet another national embarrassment on the state. “I think we’ve officially sunk lower than Alabama at this point,” Ohio House Minority Leader Allison Russo, D-Upper Arlington, dryly observed about the state’s descent into autocratic hell. The latest humiliation from Columbus making headlines was entirely self-inflicted by MAGA-pandering pols. 

Our lovely legislative overlords torpedoed what should have been an easy bipartisan fix to a ballot scheduling snafu that still threatens to keep President Joe Biden off the general election ballot in Ohio. Ballot adjustment in a presidential election year is a non-issue. But Republican lawmakers decided to make it one by picking a fight and stomping their feet when things didn’t go their way. Like toddlers who need a nap. 

The straightforward legislation the GOP-controlled Ohio Senate and Ohio House blew up (for no good reason) would have remedied a problem with candidate filing deadlines in state election law that has come up before in presidential election years with Democrats and Republicans. It has typically been resolved as a bipartisan matter without incident. Until now. (Hence the Russo observation)...

In Louisiana, it's Christofascism with the emphasis on Christo:

The Louisiana legislature just passed a bill mandating the display of the Ten Commandments in all public school classrooms. And this one is very close to becoming law. Texas attempted such a thing last year, but the bill passed by the Texas Senate died in the Texas House. Similar bills were introduced in South Carolina and Utah but have not yet become laws. At the moment, however, it appears the Louisiana bill will go all the way to being signed by the governor.

Note that none of these bills differs significantly from one passed in Kentucky in 1978 and declared unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1980. The current Supreme Court, however, seems to think a little establishment of religion never hurt anybody. James Madison, the chief author of the Bill of Rights, would no doubt disagree. The current conservative justices like to call themselves “originalists,” meaning they claim to interpret the Constitution to mean what the authors intended it to mean. But the justices can be remarkably creative in deciding what the authors meant.

The Louisiana bill mandates the text of the Ten Commandments to be used, which appears to be an abridged version of Exodus 20:1-17 from the King James Bible, with all the “thees” and “thous” intact. Just so we’re all clear, the classroom display must begin with the words “I AM the LORD thy God.” The Commandments must be printed on a poster or framed print no smaller than eleven by fourteen inches in a large, easily readable font. And it must be prominently displayed in every classroom and every building in every school in Louisiana that receives public funding, including universities...

Meanwhile, your Bootsies, Noems, Youngkins, et. al., continue their democracy demo apace, paving the way for the Second Coming of the Golden Calf/ Malignant Loser.

A Guide To A Trump Second Term

 

The Malignant Loser's 2024 campaign, a.k.a. the Revenge and Vitriol Tour, is promising some purely fascist policies in a second term, aimed at destroying his real and imaginary enemies, ripping up Dem programs no matter how popular or beneficial, allowing foreign adversaries (e.g., Russia) to dictate our foreign policy, and making sure our democracy ends under his feet. CNN has a useful synopsis of what the reckless sociopathic narcissist has in store for America. A few examples:

• Trump has made immigration and the border a central campaign issue, successfully pressuring Republicans to reject a major bipartisan border deal last month and making a trip to the southern border on February 29, where he touted his previous hard-line immigration policies.
• Last November, Trump promised to replace the Affordable Care Act, known colloquially as Obamacare, in a series of posts on Truth Social. A Trump-backed effort to repeal and replace Obamacare failed in 2017 after three Republicans senators joined with Democrats to vote against the bill.
• Trump has promised to use the Department of Justice to attack critics and former allies. In several videos and speeches, the former president also laid out plans to gut the current justice system by firing “radical Marxist prosecutors that are destroying America.”
• “I will take Biden’s executive order directing the federal government to target the firearms industry, and I will rip it up and throw it out on day one,” Trump said at the 2023 National Rifle Association Institute for Legislative Action leadership forum last April.

The entire list is, as you can imagine, reactionary and punitive to the extreme. And we didn't even mention his intent to sign a national ban on abortion, despite his lies to the contrary. Need any more reasons to deny this despicable criminal and his party a victory in November?

 

The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly

 

The good:

Two signature laws of the Biden administration are spreading hundreds of billions across the country, funding everything from new roads in Florida to broadband lines in Alaska to green energy projects in California.

But where that $442 billion (so far) will have the most impact are places where voters are least likely to support Joe Biden in November, according to a new Yahoo Finance analysis of the latest White House data.

The largest recipients of funds approved by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act — when measured on a per capita basis — are four states that Biden himself lost by at least 10 points in 2020: Alaska, Montana, North Dakota, and Wyoming.

Of the 18 states where residents are set to benefit the most from the money on a per-capita basis, 12 were won by Donald Trump in 2020.

This geographic quirk highlights one of President Joe Biden’s most persistent election-year challenges: Americans who aren’t feeling — or are simply unimpressed — by his signature accomplishments after three years in office.

In just one remarkable recent example, a Bloomberg News/Morning Consult poll found that Donald Trump wins by a tally of 42% to 38% on the question of whom voters most trust to handle infrastructure.

That’s even after Biden signed a landmark infrastructure bill into law in 2021 and after four years in office that saw Trump take no significant action on the issue...

This a good news/ bad news item.  The good news is that people's lives are being improved in those "left behind" places where the Malignant Loser is popular.  The bad news is, of course, that it won't matter electorally because hatred trumps (yes) good works, plus you can't fix stupid. Also, let's not just leave it to "Americans who aren't feeling -- or are simply unimpressed -- by his signature accomplishments."  The corporate media can take its share of the blame for not doing its job in communicating those accomplishments, choosing instead to focus on divisive/ faux issues spoon fed them by the Christofascist Republican media operation.

The bad:

... “Historically speaking, the forces now in control of the Republican Party represent the most significant threat to basic constitutionalism we’ve experienced since the Civil War,” Mr. [historian Jon] Meacham, who has helped devise some of President Biden’s speeches, told me. “That’s not a partisan point; it’s just the fact of the matter. And I’m not talking about particular policies, about which we can and should disagree. I’m talking about the self-evident willingness of a once-noble party to embrace lies and the will to power over essential democratic norms.”

Since 2015, I have repeatedly warned Republicans about Mr. Trump, describing him as the kind of demagogue the founders feared, malignant and malicious, a man with a disordered personality. At this point eight years ago, I said that while the struggle for the Republican nomination was over, the struggle for the soul of the party was not.

Once Mr. Trump won the presidency, I knew it was. He and the Republican Party fused ideologically; it’s now a populist rather than a conservative party. It’s instincts are nativist, protectionist and isolationist. But the most significant fusion is ethical and moral. The Republican Party keeps getting darker. It has become anti-intellectual, conspiracy-minded and authoritarian, intemperate and brutish, transgressive and anarchistic. And there’s no end in sight.

Mr. Trump is a human blowtorch, prepared to burn down democracy. So is his party. When there’s no bottom, there’s no bottom.

The next 34 weeks are among the more consequential in the life of this nation. Mr. Trump was a clear danger in 2016; he’s much more of a danger now. The former president is more vengeful, more bitter and more unstable than he was, which is saying something. There would be fewer guardrails and more true believers in a second Trump term. He’s already shown he’ll overturn an election, support a violent insurrection and even allow his vice president to be hanged. There’s nothing he won’t do. It’s up to the rest of us to keep him from doing it.

The author, Peter Wehner, as most who have followed politics over the past 40 years know, is a staunch conservative who (some might argue) once helped provide the foundation for what he now condemns.  But the Malignant Loser's dangerous demagoguery, his singular moral depravity, and his authoritarianism have moved Wehner to our side of the battle line.

The ugly:

New details are emerging after a man was found dead in Harvest on Thursday.

The Madison County Sheriff’s Office said the body of 54-year-old Derek Franklin Walls was found inside a home at 1790 Capshaw Road.

Kyle Hayden Lewter, 36, was arrested and charged with his murder.

Now, a day after his arrest, Lewter is now additionally charged with sexual torture - sexual abuse using inanimate object. At this time it is unknown if these charges are related to the murder of walls.

The Madison County Sheriff’s is waiting to release the actual cause of death from the autopsy report.

An uncle who lived nearby checked on Walls on Thursday but he didn’t answer the door.

The uncle then called the sheriff’s office. Deputies responded and found Walls dead in the hallway.

Walls’ daughter Shelby Thorson launched a GoFundMe for funeral expenses. The family hopes to raise $5,000.

“My dad’s life was taken from him in the middle of the night on March 6,” Thorson wrote on the GoFundMe. “Due to this unexpected passing nothing was in place to help with any of the funeral expenses. I would like to have a small service where everyone can get together in remembrance of my father.”  [Wait for it...]

Lewter is listed as a member of the Madison County Young Republicans according to its website. Lewter was also listed as a point of contact. He also was a campaign chairman for State Sen. Tom Butler.  (our emphasis)

Maybe the next time Handmaiden actress and Alabammy Sen. Katie Britt wants to cite an example of sexual violence, she should use that of this home state cult member.  Unlike her recent smear, it would have the advantage of being true, though it wouldn't fit her party's nativist narrative.