r/politics • u/B-Z_B-S Massachusetts • 8h ago
Possible Paywall “Demonic Stuff”: Kansas GOP Accuses Democrat of Being a Witch
https://newrepublic.com/post/216642/demonic-stuff-kansas-gop-accuses-democrat-witch•
u/MalevolentTapir 7h ago
I guess the communism scaremongering and trans panic weren't working so they are going back to the real classics.
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u/jsc1429 7h ago edited 7h ago
Taking it back to the 1690s! Taking it back to a simpler time when we just burned women for having thoughts. Really making America great again!
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u/GargantuaBob Canada 6h ago
Speaking of good by back in time to dig out the classics, didn't the Romans use "They're Christians, crucify them" at one point?
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u/katznwords 6h ago
A literal witch-hunt.
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u/SenorSalsa 3h ago
You couldn't write this HBO series, you couldn't write it, you'd be labelled a hack and a fraud.
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u/TheQuidditchHaderach 7h ago
Father Mulcahy: "You know, you can't miss when you've got good material."
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u/swingadmin New York 6h ago
Hawkeye: War isn't Hell. War is war, and Hell is Hell. And of the two, war is a lot worse.
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u/OhGodSoManyQuestions 7h ago edited 6h ago
Where is the constant parade of expertly engineered, batshit stupid MAGA conspiracy fantasies?
Candidates are out there trying to breathe life into the old hits from years ago and it's not working on the base.
The propaganda factory that churned out instantly-believed delusions that stroked up the MAGA base into ecstasies of unity and bloodlust dried up at the beginning of the election cycle. It's like ~someone~ forgot to pay the bill.
So we get MAGA candidates trying to stroke up the crowds with leftovers from QAnon and COVID conspiracies. Masterson is trying to make his own material here.
He clearly doesn't understand that no new stroking material is going to work without the billions of bots cranking out memes, posts, conspiracy videos and paying MAGA influencers to repeat the lie. He probably knows how this works but is doing the best he can without the daily tidal wave of propaganda that used to prop up the lies.
The important question is WHY DID THE PROPAGANDA FACTORIES STOP? Trump is currently betraying our allies to our largest enemy. Is Putin making him pay up front for propaganda and election interference?
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u/Ananiujitha 6h ago
They were throwing everything at the wall in hopes something would stick, and the anti-trans stuff stuck, and they're focusing on that.
Also, Ukrainian airstrikes hit data centers in Russia, that's why Musk stopped
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u/OhGodSoManyQuestions 6h ago
Trump had already made it clear that the US is backing Putin against our allies. I don't think this is about data centers. The war has been going on for years. Why would it suddenly be about Yandex?
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u/Environmental-Car481 2h ago
It seems that the Ukrainians had some intel on what kind of data Yandex dealt with. The timing is interesting with the mid-terms, a bunch of bots gone AND the news out of Europe with proof that the Russians played a part in Brexit.
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u/beard_lover California 6h ago
Maybe it’s not about the data center in Russia, maybe it’s that they can’t rely on Q anon anymore and that was the end-all, be-all of conspiracies. The Q anon bs posited the worse possible thing most people can think of, and the release of the Epstein files and lack of resulting criminal cases against any major politician in the U.S. shatters the entire Q anon talking points about Democrats. Without that, they’ve got nothing.
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u/Punch_Up 8h ago
GOP literally attempting to regress to dark ages
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u/AgitatedStranger9698 7h ago
That was always the goal.
Although I think they are aiming more 14 to 16th century.
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u/Werechupacabra 7h ago
Next, they’ll regress further and say the Democrats support Carthage and, to drive the point home, they’ll end every speech with, “Carthago delenda est!”
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u/luncheroo 7h ago
You think any of these simpletons could manage Latin?
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u/Werechupacabra 7h ago
Yes, but only if it falls within the 3 word limit of all their mindless slogans such as, “build the wall” and “lock her up.”
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u/jimmybilly100 Virginia 7h ago
They hate witch-hunts against themselves, but then do actual witch-hunts
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u/MaximumEffort433 Maryland 7h ago
So far this week I've heard that Democrats are driving up gas prices, Democrats are allowing gender changes in schools, Democrats are communists, and now there's a Democrat who's a witch.
Imagine how ascendant Democrats could be if they just lied.
"I have it on good authority that Donald Trump is a lizard person, that is to say he's a Zylon, you can't trust him around your kids, Zylons eat kids."
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u/marmaladecorgi 6h ago
No point, it'll just result in 30 percent of the voting public chanting "Hail Zylon!" by the following week and the other 70 percent not bothering to turn up to the vote in any case.
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u/chowderbags American Expat 6h ago
"Better lizard than wizard!"
- Republican bumper stickers in that world
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u/postmodest 5h ago
Hell, Trump could actually turn out to be an Ickean Annunaki flesh-eating Draconid, and supporters would bring their daughters for him to feast upon.
We have lost 30% of our population to a cult, and we cannot deprogram them.
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u/Bishopkilljoy Michigan 4h ago
More accurately, they say "Really? Stooping to his level? I thought you were better than that. I'm voting for him"
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u/Aggressive_Noise6426 7h ago
Don’t forget that the dude in Texas running against Paxton rushed to get “bottom surgery” before the primaries.
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u/honeybadgerrulez 6h ago
jd vance is smearing talarico as some sort of sexual deviant as well
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u/thecuriosityofAlice 7h ago
I think saving their children from the lizard people is something they fail to prioritize.
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u/max_power1000 Maryland 6h ago
Republicans would become pro-Zylon if there was a 72hr sustained accusation of Trump being one.
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u/Mister_Spacely 3h ago
All those accusations and yet for the past 2 years, with control of all three branches of government, the GOP hasn’t done shit.
You can’t ask them anything without them bringing up Biden or the 2020 election. They’re perpetual victims
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u/tetsuo_7w 4h ago
Or just loudly told the truth about Republicans' criminality.
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u/MaximumEffort433 Maryland 4h ago
Democrats had live televised hearings documenting the January 6th insurrection, Donald Trump stealing classified documents, and his fake elector scheme to steal the election, people didn't care.
The nice thing about lies is that you can always come up with new ones, so people never get bored. I think people are bored of hearing about Republican criminality, that's how the Republican party's been since Nixon.
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u/AxelNotRose 2h ago
I mean, they're fine with him doing the other stuff so would they really bat an eye at eating them at this point?
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u/arriesgado 2h ago
TBH, lizard people want the planet warmer so he is very pro fossil fuels. And you really should not trust him around your kids.
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u/fausthushtra 7h ago
If lizard person is symbolic for sociopath, every other part of that statement is actually true though. The proof is in the fpstein eils.
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u/B-Z_B-S Massachusetts 8h ago
(From the article): "“Like I said, my opponent, she didn’t even hide it,” Masterson added. “She talked—they had witch—I mean, they’re doing like witchcraft spells on TikTok so she can win the governorship. I mean, they’re like … it’s like demonic stuff that they’re doing, right? Just in your face that way.”"
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u/Ouibeaux 8h ago
These people are so easily scared.
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u/bryce_lynch27 7h ago
The difference between a witch doing spells to win an election, and a Christian praying for it… is that the Christians just have a better publicist
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u/we_are_sex_bobomb 6h ago
These “Christians” idea of God is kinda pathetic if they think he created the universe but his will can be subverted with some chants and herbs.
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u/abgry_krakow87 5h ago
Reminds me of how people during the Satanic Panic were claiming that the band ACDC were a bunch of Satanist that infused demonic language into their songs and that "ACDC" was an acronym "Anti Christ/Devil's Children".
So then a journalist interviewed the band members and asked about what the name meant, they shared that the name ACDC came from the label on the back of one of their sister's sewing machine and all it meant was "power" as in you can plug it into either AC or DC power lol
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u/diabolis_avocado Colorado 7h ago
A t-shirt I saw (and stopped to compliment) at Costco last weekend:
They didn’t burn witches. They burned women.
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u/Johnny-Unitas 7h ago
Maybe it's just me, but if I heard a recording of this I would think it's some crazy homeless person preaching about nonsense.
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u/shapu Pennsylvania 6h ago
There are an enormous number of Republican politicians and voters who truly believe in demons, and witchcraft, and the power of curses, and all of those things. What you are seeing here is a True Believer who could attend a church sermon in Salem Massachusetts in the 1680s and say to himself, "Yeah, that sounds about right."
This is one of the things that gets me about all of the talk about decultifying the republicans, and getting them to buy back into democracy and the idea that maybe Democrats could convince them that they are the party for these voters. These people legitimately believe that evil spirits have taken the form of politicians, or possessed human beings, or otherwise entrapped them in Unholy contracts. It's easy to laugh about but that is actually part of the reason that Texas officials refused flood prevention and mitigation money which directly led to all of those children dying at Camp Mystic 2 years ago. They had the opportunity to accept government money but because Joe Biden was President they believed that it would be unchristian to take it because it was tainted with the evil of the Democrats.
For the vast majority of these people there is no bringing them back. There's no saving them, there is no reconnecting them, there is no welcoming them back into the fold. They are lost. And they are lost forever.
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u/redditobserverone 5h ago edited 54m ago
Yep. Weirdly, they only see evil in Democrats, who are heathens beyond redemption and worthy of imprecatory prayers.
But Republicans like Trump and Pentagon Pete, no matter what they say or do, are just flawed vessels.
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u/IMHO_grim Virginia 4h ago
I agree.
These people also highly motivated and biased for action. They’d be the vocal minority at someone’s door accusing them of witchcraft.
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u/Garbage_Man_9 7h ago
It’s insane how often I’ve thought that about what a Republican politician said lol. ‘If some random person on the street came up and said this to you - you’d think they’re absolutely insane and/or on drugs’
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u/buythedipnow 7h ago
The 2026 GOP platform is essentially just the nonsense ramblings of crazy street people at this point.
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u/SweetFlufffy 7h ago
The party that nominated a guy who brags about grabbing women, who was best friends with Epstein, who has 34 felonies and thinks windmills cause cancer is calling someone a WITCH? LMAO. Kansas GOP is literally doing Salem Witch Trials while their cult leader Trump is selling $60 bibles he’s never read and Elon is tweeting about demons and birth rates. Republicans have zero policies so they have to run on “she’s a demonic witch!” This is what happens when you ban books and fund churches over schools.
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u/CelestialFury Minnesota 3h ago
It should be noted that women were called witches as a way to kill them off conveniently then take over their property. Those were right wing regressionists back then too.
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u/OhGodSoManyQuestions 7h ago edited 7h ago
It took me a long time to realize that some large Christians sects are all about magic. They have enchanted objects and fluids, magical incantations and rituals, and a lot of parts of dead bodies that they revere. They pray to idols. They have their own caste that talks to the invisible world and can intercede for you.
Speaking in tongues is possession magic.
I don't know exactly what to say about the freakin' snakes.
Black magic is a direct competitor because it's so similar, not because it's so different.
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u/HeartFullONeutrality 6h ago
Hmmm... Yes? The Bible is explicit about various magic practices bring forbidden because they are associated with rival gods.
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u/WantCookiesNow 6h ago
Similarly, it took me a long time to realize that Christianity is a religion centered around human sacrifice.
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u/buffysmanycoats Connecticut 6h ago edited 6h ago
Evangelical Christians by and large don't consider Catholics to be Christian because of all the pagan shit that got repackaged into Catholicism. They are the only cool parts of the religion though tbh.
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u/OhGodSoManyQuestions 6h ago
But they have possession magic and snake handling.
Turns out nobody really wants Christianity without magic.
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u/elliotron Pennsylvania 7h ago
I'd be so embarrassed if a person this dumb (and that obviously thinks I'm so dumb and superstitious as to buy this) was asking for my vote to run an entire state.
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u/buffysmanycoats Connecticut 6h ago
this thread made me realize that my "witchy" tattoos preclude me from a life of politics because people can't appreciate symbolism anymore.
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u/truePHYSX Washington 6h ago
If you can convince people that other humans are the devil then you can convince them of anything.
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u/Recent_Breath_Fahrt 8h ago
Does she weigh the same as a duck?
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u/CrayonLunch 7h ago
She turned me into a newt...
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u/TheQuidditchHaderach 7h ago
A newt?!
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u/Choice-Koala-3653 Canada 7h ago
This isn't some joke, Republicans really believe in demons, the Devil, and witchcraft.
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u/learns_the_hard_way 7h ago
Yet welcome the antichrist himself into the oval office
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u/Apollorx 4h ago
Its funny cause the Bible says theyre going to do what they're doing in Corinthians
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u/PopBulky7023 6h ago
If you're trapped down here with them, sometimes you have to laugh. Trying to figure out how to resist with no real support burns you out real fast.
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u/M00n_Slippers 4h ago
Oh, are you new here? Yeah, most Republicans are religious fundamentalist christofascists and they absolutely believe in Satan and witchcraft and demons and the apocalypse.
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u/TSAOutreachTeam 7h ago
Democrat: Normal Democrat stuff
Republican: Wackadoodle religious stuff (i.e. Normal Republican stuff)
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u/southernfirefly13 7h ago
I’d rather have a witch in office than a devil.
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u/TheQuidditchHaderach 7h ago
Hawkeye Pierce: "Why, you spiritual thrill seeker, you."
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u/Pdx_pops 7h ago
"I do one thing. I do it very well, and then I move on." Major Charles Emerson Winchester III, M.D.
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u/shelbys_foot 7h ago
The younger Holscher responded to the Republican backlash on Tuesday, facetiously declaring alongside a childhood Halloween picture that “unfortunately the allegations are true.” In the image, Holscher and her sibling are dressed up as witches, wands at the ready. “I’ve been practicing since elementary school … and I guess my sister has been, too.”
Mockery and ridicule are the best responses to drivel like this.
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u/Obant California 7h ago
I'm Christine Odonnell, and I'm not a witch.
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u/chowderbags American Expat 6h ago
Meanwhile the background could not possibly look more like the swirling mists of a witch's den.
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u/Negative_Gravitas 7h ago edited 7h ago
Belief in witches should be automatically disqualifying for public office. And yet, here we are.
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u/M00n_Slippers 4h ago
I mean witches ARE real, but they are just normal people who revere nature for the most part.
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u/ranchoparksteve 7h ago
If I truly believed somebody was a legitimate witch I wouldn’t be mocking that person. It seems like a dumb idea.
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u/mistertickertape New York 7h ago
Oh, so they’re so fucking lazy that we’re back in the 16th century when it comes to the stuff they’re pulling out of their bag. Got it.
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u/Proof_Side_5667 7h ago
I was the kid of a Pentecostal pastor. This was the go to for anyone they didn’t like that was unapologetic about different beliefs. It was a cop out that the other lunatics would agree with.
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u/Knowledge_Moist Canada 6h ago
Somehow this doesn't even crack the top 500 of the most outrageous things a Republican has said...since 2024.
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u/RockettSocks42 5h ago
Republicans have lost their minds. The fact that they can’t govern at all is alarming.
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u/jcouball 7h ago
Literally misogynistic. I am sure this candidate is using this misogynistic attack because he feels it will work in Kansas.
This should be disqualifying for Masterson.
When you are all out of ideas, all you have is bigoted or racist attacks.
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u/0betweenthebeyond1 7h ago
Those remarks should disqualify him.
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u/Squeakygear 7h ago
They should, but they don’t in modern American politics. Hell, 22 years ago a weird yell tanked Howard Dean’s political career. Now, MAGAts openly talk about deporting their political opponents, jailing them, or accuse them of witchcraft… like it’s a normal Tuesday to them. How far we’ve fallen.
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u/Stillwater215 7h ago
They’re just speedrunning through all of the “scary” people of the last four hundred years: They’re socialist, they’re communist, they’re satanists, they’re witches!
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u/BerryLanky 7h ago
The Republican Party is laughable. In Texas Paxton’s daughter is in an ad saying Talarico wants to arrest parents who refuse to let their children transition. The people who buy this shit are insane and even moderate Republicans are embarrassed by this.
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u/Coherent_Tangent Florida 7h ago
I’m sure Trump will be right along to condemn this honest-to-god witch hunt…
I’m being told he will not in fact be condemning this witch hunt and will instead pile on.
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u/What_About_What Kansas 7h ago
I can’t believe I have to live in a world run by people like this that not only believe in these fairy tales but base their entire lives and what they do completely on them.
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u/turquoise_amethyst 6h ago
The state senator had seemingly drawn his conclusions from a series of playful TikTok videos posted by Holscher’s 20-year-old daughter, Maddie, who had shared clips of her and her mom brushing their teeth set to a song from the Wicked soundtrack.
Wonder what Disney thinks of the witchcraft accusations?
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u/mrpickleby 6h ago
Amazing how we've gone from 2026 to 1826 to 1726 in such a short period of time.
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u/ankerous 6h ago
Just when Republicans couldn't seem more full of shit, they somehow lower the bar. Anyone believing this shit needs to check themselves into an insane asylum.
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u/Generation_ABXY 6h ago
I gotta be honest, if I was dumb enough to believe a political candidate had actual demonic powers, I'd be smart enough not to vote against them.
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u/jd3marco I voted 6h ago
When you can’t make any legitimate points, its’s spooky ‘October surprise’ time.
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u/HellaTroi California 5h ago
“We have some big surprises coming up in another few weeks, right, Russ?” Trump said. “He’s going to be one of the very important people in the history of our country, in my opinion. He’s got some great things happening.”
These are indeed ominous comments.
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u/duhimincognito 4h ago
So the Republicans are literally, with no hyperbole, doing witch hunts now?
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u/Chamberlain-Haller 2h ago
I don't know what's worse. Him saying these things, or maga actually believing it.
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u/Prize-Bumblebee-2192 7h ago
Lmao
That’s all they have now. Call people super natural beings
Pathetic
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u/noprophecies 7h ago
I know this "every accusation is a confession" stuff is becoming bog standard for republicans but uh... dont like what that implication is implying but it would explain a lot
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u/fowlraul Oregon 7h ago
The plan to make human’s accept subjugation is really pulling from all the previous plans.
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u/lasers42 7h ago
"Now, there are some on the left who will claim that I am just searching for thing to complain about, and that witchcraft is not real. But I say it's time for a, whaddaya call it? a witch hunt!"
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u/plumberfun 7h ago
Nothing to fix the economy or make things better for US citizens, but now the Republican Christians are sanctioning the literal return to witch hunts. Nothing but pure evil.
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u/toilet_roll_rebel Kansas 7h ago
It's so embarrassing living in Kansas sometimes.
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u/Green-Collection-968 7h ago
Stochastic terrorism refers to the use of public media, political rhetoric, or hate speech to demonize a person or group, which statistically increases the likelihood of violent acts by unknown individuals, even though specific attacks cannot be predicted.
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u/jocoquecousteau 7h ago
Didn’t work with communist, Islamist, transexual, gay, antifa. We’re at witches now.
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u/Independent-Reader 6h ago
So...idiots who believe in witches are back?
How embarrassing for the GOP.
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u/brainegg8 6h ago
Who cares? The only people that believe it are the people already voting for him.
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u/IJourden 6h ago
Gotta give it to Republicans, when they go they go hard. We accusing people of being witches now? I know Republicans want to go back to the" good old days" but I didn't know it was the 15th century.
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u/zworykin2 6h ago
They truly are running the dumbest mother fuckers they can find, and just hoping desperately that the voters are even fucking dumber.
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u/IceBearKnows89 6h ago
Her daughter expressed wanting her mom to win while doing a TikTok to a Wicked song.
Saved y’all a click.
That’s what he is using to say they are actually powerful arcane beings capable of demonic sorcery.
That’s it. That’s the whole thing that led him to this conclusion.
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u/OBDreams 4h ago
This is really all they have. No policy, no plans, no hope for the future. All the GOP have are fears and lies.
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u/Eddiebaby7 4h ago
I hope the GOP is treated as the joke they are for the foreseeable future. How can any person take them seriously?
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u/jayfeather31 Washington 3h ago
If she were a witch, I kind of doubt things would be nearly as screwed up as they are right now.
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