Biden supporters begin drawing up revenge lists of Trump allies

Joe Biden supporters have begun drawing up lists of anyone who worked with Donald Trump to hold them “responsible for what they did”.

Joe Biden speaking to media on Tuesday. Picture: Joe Raedle/Getty Images/AFP

Joe Biden called for unity in his victory speech on Saturday night, urging Americans to reach across the aisle and stop seeing each other as “enemies”.

“I understand the disappointment tonight,” Mr Biden said.

“But now let’s give each other a chance. It’s time to put away the harsh rhetoric, lower the temperature. And to make progress, we have to stop treating our opponents as our enemies. They are not our enemies. They’re Americans.”

Many supporters of the President-elect did not get the memo, however.

Prominent Democrats and media personalities are now openly discussing retribution against their political opponents and drawing up “lists” of anyone who supported President Donald Trump.

You better believe it. We just launched the Trump Accountability Project to make sure anyone who took a paycheck to help Trump undermine America is held responsible for what they did. https://t.co/clRu6WSfvL https://t.co/J78dgyHJpG

— Hari Sevugan (@HariSevugan) November 6, 2020

“We should keep and publish a list of everyone who assists Trump’s frivolous and dangerous attacks on the election,” tweeted failed presidential candidate Evan McMullin. “Name and shame forever.”

Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin commented, “Any R now promoting rejection of an election or calling to not follow the will of voters or making baseless allegations of fraud should never serve in office, join a corporate board, find a faculty position or be accepted into ‘polite’ society. We have a list.”

New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted, “Is anyone archiving these Trump sycophants for when they try to downplay or deny their complicity in the future? I foresee decent probability of many deleted tweets, writings, photos in the future.”

In response, several Democrats chimed in to promote their “Trump Accountability Project”, which seeks to create a “permanent record” of everyone “who furthered the Trump agenda”.

“Yes, we are,” former Obama administration staffer Michael Simon replied. “The Trump Accountability Project. Every administration staffer, campaign staffer, bundler, lawyer who represented them – everyone.”

Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett is sworn in. Picture: Nicholas Kamm/AFP

Former Obama spokesman Hari Sevugan also responded to Ms Ocasio-Cortez. “You better believe it,” he wrote. “We just launched the Trump Accountability Project to make sure anyone who took a paycheck to help Trump undermine America is held responsible for what they did.”

In a follow-up tweet, Mr Sevugan threatened that any company that employed someone on his list would also face “consequences”.

“(CNN) just reported White House staff are starting to look for jobs,” he wrote. “Employers considering them should know there are consequences for hiring anyone who helped Trump attack American values. Find out how at the Trump Accountability Project.”

Emily Abrams, a former staffer on failed presidential candidate Pete Buttgieg’s campaign, wrote, “We’re launching the Trump Accountability Project to make sure anyone who took a paycheck (sic) to help Trump undermine America is held responsible for what they did. Join us and help spread the word.”

A Google Spreadsheet shared online purporting to be “the beginning of this effort”, which names Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner, also features an “appointees” tab listing more than 50 sitting judges, including Supreme Court Justices Amy Coney Barrett, Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch.

Every federal law enforcement agency is now very aware of this list https://t.co/o8wjqjDrAu

— Pope-Elect Poso 🇻🇦 (@JackPosobiec) November 7, 2020

Controversial anti-Trump lobby group The Lincoln Project weighed in on the action, posting the photos and contact details of two of the lawyers involved in the Trump campaign’s Pennsylvania election lawsuit. “Make them famous,” the group wrote, in a post that has since been removed for violating Twitter’s rules.

Lincoln Project co-founder Steve Schmidt had earlier tweeted that Mr Biden had “been elected the President” and that “American democracy is under attack by the defeated President”. “He is not acting alone,” he said.

“He is supported in his attack by his White House and campaign staff. He is also supported by several law firms. All of these people are complicit in the assault against American democracy. None of them should ever be forgiven. All of them should pay a brutal price for betraying the American ideal.”

CNN political analyst Joe Lockhart wrote, “This is not meant to be mean or vindictive. But the people around Donald Trump who have enabled him to bring our democracy to the brink have to be held responsible for what they’ve done. They can’t be rewarded for what they’ve done.”

Trump supporters ‘have to be held responsible’. Picture: Brendan Smialowski/AFP

Author Don Winslow wrote in a since-deleted post, “Here’s my 2021 New Year’s Resolution early: Nobody gets off that helped Trump. Nobody.”

New York Times columnist Wajahat Ali said, “You can’t heal or reform the GOP who are now an extremist party. They have to be broken, burned down and rebuilt. When Biden is in power treat them like the active threat to democracy they are. If those who committed crimes aren’t punished then they will be more emboldened.”

Many, including former Clinton secretary of Labor Robert Reich, have called for a “commission” to prosecute former Trump administration officials.

“When this nightmare is over, we need a Truth and Reconciliation Commission,” he tweeted. “It would erase Trump’s lies, comfort those who have been harmed by his hatefulness, and name every politician, executive and media mogul whose greed and cowardice enabled this catastrophe.”

Prominent MSNBC anchor Chris Hayes had the same idea. “The most human and reasonable way to deal with all these people, if we survive this, is some kind of truth and reconciliation commission,” he said.

Many more media personalities and columnists agreed. “Truth and Reconciliation proceedings,” wrote former NPR editor Trey Graham. “And tribunals for Trump admin officials who won’t participate / are found to have lied.”

Ivanka Trump is on the ‘Trump Accountability Project’ list. Picture: Mandel Ngan/AFP

Hollywood celebrities also weighed in. “Again, a Truth and Reconciliation Commission would be highly useful,” wrote actress Quinn Cummings. “Russia is at war with us and (a) cohort of Americans thinks that isn’t true because their skin is white.”

Jamie Lee Curtis wrote, “Now the HARD work of TRUTH and RECONCILIATION!”

Others suggested Trump supporters, not just those who worked directly with the administration, should be shunned.

“I won’t empathise with, support, forgive, understand, make amends for, reconcile with Trump supporters,” tweeted Washington D.C. community organiser Preston Mitchum. “Not a single one. He was a proud white nationalist who proudly raised up many white supremacists. That’s who supported him. And I make no apologies for saying this.”

New York Daily News columnist and former Obama administration official Brandon Friedman said, “Whether Trump supporters are hostile or misled makes no difference to victims of gun violence, an uncontrolled pandemic and heartless immigration policies – all of which are choices. We should reach out to *those* families long before attempting to reconcile with deplorables.”

Freelance journalist Drew Holden, who compiled a lengthy list of the calls for retribution, noted “nothing says ‘healthy democracy’ like ‘now that we’ve won, who has the list of our enemies handy?’”

“We are not some post-genocide society,” he wrote.

“The suggestion that we need a Rwandan-styled Truth and Reconciliation Commission is preposterous. And free societies don’t develop political hit lists. This champagne fascism from the left needs to stop. Now would be a good time.”

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