Anti-Trump news outlets smeared New Mexico Republican Senate candidate, Dr. Gavin Clarkson, over spurious allegations as part of a deep state assault designed to sideline his efforts to drain the murkiest part of the swamp on behalf of the Trump administration. Worst of all, his Republican opponents who claim to support President Trump are now hypocritically using the same discredited liberal media sources that concocted the Russia Hoax and Impeachment Witch Hunt narratives to attack him. Why should GOP voters and donors be expected to swallow #FakeNews uncritically?
Clarkson served in the Trump administration as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy and Economic Development at the Department of the Interior. Clarkson provided the Piñon Post with a copy of his resignation letter, which clearly shows he resigned at the end of 2017 to run for Congress in New Mexico. The #FakeNews media, however, claims he was fired eight weeks earlier in November over an “agency scandal.” It turns out that the only scandal happened during the Obama Administration, but according to a former Interior official with first-hand knowledge of the situation, “Federal ethics rules legally prevented Clarkson from addressing the concocted corruption allegations until after he left federal service. It was a total hit job designed to retaliate against him for holding lazy bureaucrats accountable.”
The #FakeNews further claimed Clarkson’s involvement in a tribal loan as a private citizen amounted to unethical activity. The left-wing outlets—which include the George Soros-backed ProPublica, Jeff Bezos’s Washington Post, and the left-wing blog ThinkProgress—argue that a tribal loan’s lack of success somehow indicates malfeasance.
A conversation with a former Interior official that worked closely with Clarkson confirmed that the #FakeNews account couldn’t have been further from the truth. The Inspector General report on the loan actually cleared Clarkson of any wrongdoing. Like many ventures, this one didn’t work out as planned, something President Trump and many successful entrepreneurs can relate to. But liberal journalists who wouldn’t know the first thing about running a lemonade stand frivolously claim there was something amiss here with Clarkson’s legal arrangement as a business consultant.
The left-wing media also ignored the fact that Lois Lerner, the same rogue IRS official who attacked Tea Party groups, was also single-handedly responsible for causing the tribal deal to fail. Disclosing her involvement wouldn’t fit their leftist narrative
That same former Interior official also noted that the Inspector General report didn’t cover Clarkson’s time at Interior. It only covered the Bureau of Indian Affairs from 2010 to 2016, which was when Barack Obama was in charge. Clarkson was appointed to the position by President Trump to clean up the mess left by the previous administration. The coverage wrongly implies the Inspector General focused on Clarkson’s time at Interior.
The #FakeNews insisted that Clarkson’s involvement in the 2010 loan was unknown to agency vetters. That’s not true. Clarkson, disclosed the loan during his background check and White House vetting process, noting that “the White House knew about this and knew it wasn’t much to worry about.”
So why does the establishment want conservative donors to believe the #FakeNews? Clarkson told the Piñon Post that the deceptive articles about his record are being shared among Republican insiders to derail his candidacy.
Let’s take a look at who these insiders are granting credibility:
ProPublica dedicates itself to attacking the Trump administration and undermining the America First agenda. It depends on the generosity of liberal billionaires to exist. Soros’s Foundation to Promote Open Society donated $200,000 to the outlet. The biggest donor to ProPublica is the Sandler Foundation, a progressive non-profit that donates heavily to left-wing causes. ProPublica’s penchant to attack Trump and conservatives has led them to make major mistakes. In 2018, the outlet published false information about Trump’s CIA Director Gina Haspel, and was forced to retract its hit piece.
The Washington Post is currently being sued by the President for libel. The Post has had to retract some of its own anti-Trump reporting. In 2017, the paper retracted a story that claimed Russia hacked a power grid in Vermont. The story was intended to further elevate claims Russia hacked the 2016 election to deliver Trump a win. Its liberal biases are only a mystery to those who live under a rock.
Think Progress was created by the Center for American Progress, the Clintons’ favorite think tank. It routinely smears conservatives and exists solely to push a progressive agenda. Real conservatives would dump their news articles in the trash.
The Republican establishment pretends to stand up for Trump’s agenda, yet spreads the most baseless smears about genuine America First candidates. Clarkson’s hypocritical opponents are Exhibit A.
So can they have it both ways? There is practically a catalog of pro-Trump cliches Clarkson’s primary opponents are repeating like robots. They say the Russia hoax and impeachment witch hunt were #FakeNews but then attack Clarkson with discredited reports from the same outlets that propagated them. The Washington Post declared the impeachment war on day one. Republicans would do well to find another use for such rags.
Gavin Clarkson is the only candidate in the New Mexico Senate race who personally sacrificed something to support President Trump. Risking his academic career, in a 2016 editorial and at a later meeting of Trump’s Native American Coalition, Clarkson publicly lauded the Trump campaign’s economic platform and subsequently praised Trump’s Supreme Court pick, all while his current opponents were hesitant to support President Trump. The socialist cabal at his university eventually fired him because of his service in the Trump administration.
Now he wants to go to Washington to drain the swamp and put America First. It’s no surprise the liberal media wants to stop him, and they have willing partners among the NeverTrump GOP establishment. FakeNews will only win out if grassroots conservatives cower in politically correct silence.
John Block is the editor of the Piñon Post and a longtime New Mexico political activist. With the Piñon Post, John looks to bring true representation to conservatives in the Land of Enchantment and cut through the mainstream media red tape by providing independent, fair, and conservative journalism to New Mexico. Follow John on Twitter @JohnforNM or send him an email to John@PinonPost.com.
Opinions offered by Piñon Post contributors in no way, shape, or form represent the viewpoints of the publication or its editorial staff. Submit an op-ed to the Piñon Post at: news@pinonpost.com.
