Five Victims of the Deep State

Despite the emerging mainstream media narrative that a second Trump term would be a “dictatorship” and the death knell for American democracy, it is in fact Democrats who, through their grip over legions of unelected federal bureaucrats and the approval of their allies in the media, have done the most to abuse power and undermine freedom and democracy in an effort to destroy their political opponents.

Here are five victims of the Deep State whose stories attest to the  authoritarian and anti-democratic nature of the modern left.

James O’Keefe

Among the more notable instances of the Deep State’s war on conservative Americans is the Biden administration’s targeting of James O’Keefe, conservative journalist and founder of Project Veritas.

In November 2021, the Biden FBI raided O’Keefe’s home and seized his cellphone, which had included confidential information and communications with his lawyers. Suspiciously, just days later, the New York Times published information extracted from his cellphone—establishing in the minds of countless ordinary Americans the clear possibility of media collusion with the Deep State and the weaponization of federal law enforcement against Americans citizens.

At the time of his arrest, O’Keefe had been investigating the diary of Ashley Biden, Joe Biden’s granddaughter—generating concern among even mainstream media outlets regarding the Biden administration’s treatment of conservative journalists.

Under O’Keefe’s leadership, Project Veritas had revealed droves of information related to COVID-19 vaccines, government corruption, and other issues—and his targeting by the Biden administration is almost certainly no coincidence.

Mark Houck

In an instance of the Deep State’s brazen anti-Christian streak, last fall the FBI sent a team of armed agents to raid the home of Mark Houck, a Catholic pro-life activist and father of seven in Pennsylvania. Houck was arrested and charged with violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act – a law that is supposed to equally protect pro-life pregnancy centers and abortion clinics from harassment – stemming from an incident outside an abortion center last year.

As video evidence shows, Houck was praying the rosary outside a clinic with his son when a pro-abortion activist approached and verbally harassed them. Houck later explained how the abortion activist shouted expletives at his son, which prompted Houck to shove him to the ground. For this act, Houck faced 11 years in prison and a $350,000 fine.

Thankfully, Houck was acquitted by a jury earlier this year. But that did not do anything stop the impression that the Biden administration is deliberately targeting faithful Catholics and others who dissent against the political, social, and cultural views of the Deep State.

Lauren Handy & Pro-Life Activists

Not unlike the Mark Houck case, earlier this year a Washington, D.C. jury convicted five pro-life activists—Lauren Handy, Herb Geraghty, Heather Idoni, William Goodman, and John Hinshaw—of violations of the FACE Act in a move that some observers saw as an act of retaliation against the pro-life community following the June 2022 Dobbs decision, which returned the power to regulate abortion to the states.

The politicized nature of DOJ’s prosecution of these five pro-life activists was laid bare when the Biden administration did nothing as left-wing arsonists vandalized at least 88 crisis pregnancy centers in the months following the release of the Dobbs decision.

Though FBI and Biden administration officials have repeatedly attempted to reassure the American people that they are taking threats against churches and pro-life pregnancy centers seriously, those who defend the unborn remain skeptical.

Michael Flynn

In December 2017, former Trump U.S. National Security Advisor Michael Flynn pleaded guilty to making false statements to the FBI regarding his contact with the former Russian ambassador to the United States during the Trump presidential transition period as a part of the now thoroughly discredited Russiagate hoax. Evidence later revealed, however, that the DOJ withheld exculpatory evidence in Flynn’s case, and he withdrew his plea.

Flynn was ultimately pardoned by Trump in 2020, but that doesn’t change the fact that the Deep State apparently broke the law to try to lock up one of its political enemies.

“Never again should any family or individual be so viciously targeted, maligned, smeared, and threatened such has been the experience of my family and I. Not you and your loved ones, not me nor President Trump, our First Lady, and the Trump children,” Flynn wrote in a statement following his pardon.

“Stand with me today in renouncing this betrayal of trust that has burdened our nation and proclaim with one united voice across this land that we will never again allow the rightful power of the citizens of this country to be uprooted, undercut, usurped, or held hostage by a coup against our nation, a duly elected President or any future president of these United States.”

Carter Page

Like Flynn, Carter Page, a former foreign policy advisor to Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, was a victim of the left’s Russiagate hoax. Under the secret orders  of James Comey, the FBI not only conducted electronic surveillance (including cellphone monitoring and searches of email accounts) against Page, but also “physical searches” targeting him, including “physical premises or personal property” and “overseas surveillance.”

Through its searches, the FBI collected confidential material belonging to the Trump campaign.

Page later stated that his “life was put at risk thanks to all the death threats I was getting then based on the fake news,” causing him to go “on the run and [change his] locations frequently to stay safe.” As Senators Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Ron Johnson (R-WI) noted, the FBI’s justification to obtain FISA warrants targeting Page was “riddled with significant flaws”—yet another confirmation of the jarring extent to which the Deep State will go to frame, discredit, and persecute those it perceives as political threats.

While there are likely too many Americans who have been unduly targeted and victimized by the Deep State to count, one thing is clear: until conservatives get serious about dismantling the administrative state and restoring government of, by, and for the people, unelected bureaucrats will continue to imperil Americans’ constitutionally guaranteed rights and freedoms.

Aaron Flanigan is the pen name of a writer in Washington, D.C.