How RICO Could Be Used Against Leftists

Written By Leeja Miller

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Transcript:

In their ongoing effort to weaponize Charlie Kirk’s killing into a crusade against the left in America, JD Vance this week has endorsed continued doxxing of people who don’t say the correct things about Kirk’s killing, and Donald Trump has vowed to sic Pam Bondi on all of us and slap us with RICO charges. Today we’re discussing how RICO could be weaponized against the left and other ways the Trump regime is doing everything it can to turn up the intensity of political violence in this country.

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One quick aside I wanted to take a moment to address, related to my video from Monday. On Monday I discussed the ideology behind Kirk’s killer as well as ongoing doxxing being perpetrated against private individuals by people like Libs of TikTok, Laura Loomer, and whomstever is behind the website Charlie’s Murderers which has undergone a rebrand and now goes by the “Charlie Kirk Data Foundation” proving once again how much better at branding and messaging the right is than the left, even if it’s full of shit. Anyway yesterday I received an email with a demand letter threatening legal action if I don’t take down or retract my statements, ostensibly about Libs of Tiktok (which is headed by Chaya Raichik) and Laura Loomer, both of whom I’ve done much more extensive episodes about.

Now I didn’t even want to talk about this because the threats don’t hold legal water and this was written by some random uninvolved individual with too much time on their hands, so it’s not worth the breath. But I decided to bring it up only to highlight what is likely going on behind the scenes for all of your favorite political commentators, whether they acknowledge it or not. This person is not a lawyer and clearly used ChatGPT to create a legit-sounding legal letter meant to scare me into compliance. Unfortunately for them I used to literally write these for a living, and also I’m a staunch character and I hate being told what to do [insert Little Edie clip]. Most independent content creators do not have professional legal backgrounds and do not know how to analyze a claim for defamation. Most individuals who make a post about Charlie Kirk and then someone sends them something like this to scare them, do not have professional legal backgrounds and do not know how to analyze a claim for defamation. There is a near 100% probability that I am not the only person who has received a threatening sounding demand letter like this in the week since Kirk’s death. And while it is not the same as death threats it still works to chill free speech, something Charlie Kirk claimed to be a big proponent of, even the mean speech.

So this isn’t legal advice but just so we’re all aware, to bring a valid claim of defamation, a person who is a public figure has to prove that you made a public statement that was factually untrue and wasn’t just an opinion, and that you did so with actual malice, that is you did so knowing the information was untrue or with reckless disregard for the truth. Okay so if it was just an opinion, like, for example, saying that Charlie Kirk was an awful person who deserved to die, that’s not defamatory. And if it was a true statement, like, for example, saying that Libs of TikTok and Laura Loomer have made a concerted effort to publicly dox as many individuals as possible in the week since his death, then that is not defamatory either. If you get a threatening sounding demand letter, it’s still a good idea to consult with an attorney, and if you are a person who makes public commentary as part of your job, it would be a good idea to make sure you have business insurance and that that insurance covers litigation fees. Okay that’s all I’ll say on that, moving on to RICO.

According to reporting from AlterNet, “the Department of Justice has taken down a study showing white supremacist and far-right violence outpaces “all other types of terrorism and domestic violent extremism” in the United States. The DOJ website hosted the study, conducted by the National Institute of Justice, until September 12, 2025.” Again the DOJ removed an official study. It appears the regime is attempting to remove data, per usual, to make it easier to spread their own propaganda and talking points claiming that left-wing violence is ruining this country.

This week, Trump said he was working with Pam Bondi to “look into” using RICO to bring racketeering charges against left-wing groups. Even before Charlie Kirk’s killing, Trump was calling on RICO investigations into 95-year old George Soros, the billionaire and longtime Democratic donor. He also said RICO charges should be brought against the people who were booing him to his face when he recently appeared at a restaurant in DC, saying they should be put in jail. If you boo the supreme leader? Straight to jail! [straight to jail]. In reporting from CNN, when asked about the RICO charges, Trump’s former personal lawyer turned deputy attorney general Todd Blanche said, quote “Is it, again, sheer happenstance that individuals show up at a restaurant where the president is trying to enjoy dinner in Washington, DC, and accost him with vile words and vile anger and meanwhile he’s simply trying to have dinner? To the extent that it’s part of an organized effort to inflict harm and terror and damage to the United States, there’s potential investigations there.” So just so we understand what he’s suggesting–the people protesting at his dinner were sent there as part of an organized operation, and their actions, which included waiving flags and yelling “Trump is the Hitler of our time, free DC, free Palestine.” Which is frankly just clever. I don’t know how they got SO close to the president like they were five feet from him screaming at his face, seems like a shortcoming of the secret service more than anything. Anyway, in doing that, they are engaging in an organized effort to inflict harm and terror and damage to the United States. Now it is true that they were affiliated with an organization, and that organization CodePink, has received threats from both sides of the aisle, with Trump threatening them with RICO charges and, back in 2024, after they called for the government to stop funding Israel, Nancy Pelosi threatening them with FBI investigations and alleging they have ties to China, an accusation CodePink has denied, saying their finances are transparent and audited and they don’t receive funds from any foreign governments. Okay but is this enough to bring RICO charges?

RICO is the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations law, originally created in 1970 because organized crime, gangs, the mob, made it really difficult to get at the crime bosses or attack an organized crime syndicate as a whole. Instead they had to try people individually for the crimes they committed–fraud, money laundering, etc., and mob bosses were very good at making sure their underlings did the dirty deeds, leaving it very difficult to pin anything on them. Today, however, the government rarely uses RICO in the way it was originally intended. For example, both R. Kelly and P Diddy were charged with RICO violations.

To successfully bring a RICO claim, prosecutors must prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that a person was engaged in a pattern of racketeering activity connected to an enterprise. SO there must BE an enterprise–this doesn’t have to be an organized business entity, but it needs to be a discrete entity–a crime family, a drug cartel, a political party, an organization, etc. It can’t just be a disparate group of disconnected people. And the pattern of racketeering activity means that there must be at least 2 racketeering activities within 10 years committed through the enterprise. There are numerous activities in the list of qualifying “racketeering activities”--those include robbery, bribery, drug trafficking, fraud, obstruction of justice, money laundering, human smuggling, bringing in or harboring certain aliens, terrorism, and unlawful procurement of citizenship or passports or other citizenship documents. A few of those, like obstruction of justice, terrorism, and crimes related to immigration, should be ringing some alarm bells for you, as those are the very types of crimes the government is accusing numerous individuals of who are trying to exercise their free speech rights or who have committed no crimes at all. So the government must show the individuals being charged are part of an organization or enterprise of some sort and committed or furthered 2 of these activities as part of that enterprise within a 10 year time period. RICO cases are notoriously difficult to bring because prosecutors have to prove so many things, beyond a reasonable doubt–the existence of the enterprise itself, the timeline, the underlying criminal acts, including every element of those acts. This would of course be a bit easier if, for example, Trump named CodePink or George Soros's Open Society Foundations, or “antifa” as terrorist organizations, which he has threatened to do. Just so we’re clear there is no like “antifa” organization hierarchy, there is no leader of the antifa movement, there is no structure or membership lists. Not that that would stop the administration from designating it a terrorist organization, just wanted to put that out there for the record. But labeling anything as “terrorist” then opens up a lot of quasi-legal pathways to go after members and leaders of the group and any organizations or people who support the group. And certain lawmakers are intent on opening up even more legal pathways to go after leftists and leftist organizations.

A bill was proposed by Senator Ted Cruz along with other Republican lawmakers back in July called the Stop Financial Underwriting of Nefarious Demonstrations and Extremist Riots, or Stop FUNDERS Act. The act would add rioting to the list of offenses that could be part of a RICO investigation and prosecution. Under the criminal code, a riot includes an act of violence that creates clear and present danger or results in damage or injury to property or people, or the threat of such acts. This bill would put a target on the back of any entity that helps to organize a demonstration or protest, and anyone who shows up to those protests, no matter how peaceful they try to make it. Again, a riot includes the mere threat of property damage. It is not a stretch for the regime to take this and run with it and say any peaceful gathering of people constitutes a threat of property damage, I mean look at them they’re crazy lunatic leftists, they’re rioting in the streets. Any act of resistance against ICE could be deemed a riot and thrown into a RICO case, which comes with the potential of 20 years in prison. Beyond that, and this ties into the MAGA trolls who are interested in doing whatever they can to harass people who speak out against the regime, RICO has a civil component. Any private individual can bring a civil RICO suit if they can claim they’ve been injured by a RICO violation, and they get treble damages if they win. Again, actually bringing and proving a RICO claim is really difficult because of the quantity of elements needed to prove the case, and the civil statute of limitations is a relatively short 4 years, and the amount of work means very high lawyers fees, but in a civil context the burden of proof is lower, a simpler preponderance of the evidence instead of beyond a reasonable doubt. And you better bet there are tons of right-wing funded legal orgs chomping at the bit to represent pro bono anyone with a viable RICO claim especially if riots get added to the RICO statute. Then, any individual business owner whose property got defaced, any person who claims they suffered an injury because of a protest, could say it’s all a big racketeering conspiracy, sue individuals and the organizations associated with the protests, and potentially win damages times three. This is enough to chill peaceful protests across the country, as already cash-strapped organizations would have to fear major, costly litigation as a consequence of any demonstration, no matter how peaceful.

Add on top of RICO any of the numerous other legal pathways that open up if you designate a group as a terrorist organization. This includes freezing assets, seizing assets, kicking members of the group out of the country, and criminalizing anyone who donates, volunteers, or participates in activities of the group as having provided “material support” to a terrorist organization. These threats that Trump and Vance and others are lobbing at CodePink, at George Soros, at Soros-funded organizations, at the Ford Foundation, calling them terrorist organizations, come with weighty consequences, many of which would likely simply result in the shuttering of those organizations, not necessarily in actual criminal prosecutions. I think they would collapse before they even got the RICO case out the door. This fits perfectly with the process I outlined on Monday–they’ve spent the past 5 decades slowly building up right-wing propaganda pushers in Universities and think tanks and the media, they have owners of the major media entities either in their back pocket or on notice–Trump just sued the New York Times for $15 billion dollars for defamation, the latest in a long string of attacks against the media. Now all that’s left to do is to dismantle any remaining bastions of non-right wing ideology left. Get the universities to come to heal through threats of defunding, accusations of harboring Hamas supporters, threats against their tax exempt status, federal investigations, and more. Sue the non-right wing media until they comply or fold. Defund NPR and PBS. Now this is their opportunity to dismantle the think tanks, foundations, non-profits, and civil society groups that don’t espouse their right-wing ideology, through threats of defunding, removing tax exempt status, and potentially now designation as terrorist organizations and potential RICO lawsuits. Meanwhile the regime’s minions like Chaya Raichik, Laura Loomer, and the trolls in all our email inboxes do the work of silencing and threatening individuals. It only takes a handful of individuals as targets, being made into examples, charged with RICO violations for showing up to a protest, charged with providing material support to a “terrorist group” to instill fear into a large portion of the population, to scare them into silence and compliance. The regime understands the power of that fear and they are now weaponizing the death of one man at the hands of an individual who appears to lack any formal political affiliation or ideology into the pretext needed to carry out their fear campaign.

So, what do we do? Certainly never shut up, that’s for sure. Call your senators and representatives, ESPECIALLY if they are in the senate or house judiciary committee, to tell them you oppose S.2376 in the Senate or H.R.4620 in the house, those are the bills trying to add rioting to the RICO statute. Don’t shut up about that, it’s an easy sell, too, just say Ted Cruz is trying to add rioting to the RICO statute so they can prosecute protestors as organized criminals. Yeah that sounds bad. But also, do your due diligence, protect yourself, and don’t make it easy for them. I’m not encouraging anyone to do anything illegal of course I’m just saying hypothetically if I were to do anything I would maybe consider looking into how to post things anonymously online, I’m sure there are guides, and I would also consider covering my face and tattoos if I were to hypothetically turn up at a peaceful protest. Just spitballing here. I assume but of course am not endorsing that there are many people on various short form video apps and elsewhere sharing very helpful information about hiding your identity, etc. Probably that exists I couldn’t tell you though of course, I don’t know, I’m just a baby.

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And if you liked this episode, you’ll like the one from Monday about the ideological motivations behind Charlie Kirk’s murder. Spoiler: it is probably the dumbest video I’ve ever made!

Leeja Miller
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Is Charlie Kirk’s Killer A Leftist?