GOP donor Anton Lazzaro sentenced to 21 years for sex trafficking minors in Minnesota
GOP donor Anton Lazzaro sentenced to 21 years for sex trafficking minors in Minnesota
A formerly well-connected GOP donor convicted of giving teenage girls gifts, alcohol and money in exchange for sex has been sentenced to 21 years in prison on sex trafficking charges in Minnesota.
A formerly well-connected GOP donor convicted of giving teenage girls gifts, alcohol and money in exchange for sex was sentenced Wednesday to 21 years in prison on sex trafficking charges.
What all these right wing scumbags do is bad enough, but I find it infuriating that the general public doesn't really get just how many of these Republicans have ties to sexual traffickers or sexual assault cases or similar situations.
Yeah, WE see it, because we follow the news, but most regular folks don't.
Within just a year or two, Republicans have successfully tied those who support gay-causes to somehow being "groomers", but Republicans have had a sexual assault problem for decades and in all that time the left has never been able to tie the two together. Stuff like this always goes back to the fact that the left is so bad at communicating with the general public and going on the offensive against the right. Republicans should have been branded the sexual assault party 10 or 20+ years ago and completely destroy their fake image of being the "family values" party. But to average Joes, traditional old-school values is what the GOP stands for.
I don't see it as actually working. The attempts to smear LGBTQ+ people as groomers only resonate with revolting bigots who want to believe that shit anyway. Everyone else seems to be recoiling from it in horror, especially the younger generations.
Hate to break it to you, but smear attempts do indeed work.
It isn't just Fox News watchers. You repeat a lie enough times and it becomes reality - that was literally the mentality of Nazi propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels.
That's just the honest reality of our world.
The GOP knows that. Why doesn't the Left? So many missed opportunities to crucify the Right and taint their image to the general public.
Speak for yourself. As a trans person, I stopped using Instagram entirely because it got to a point where every top level comment, regardless of the subject matter, was a transphobic one (even ones not even REMOTELY related to LGBTQ+ issues).
It was never like this before the recent GOP push in anti-queer rhetoric. It's the worst it's been in my life, tbh. Worse than when my peers used to casually call things "gay" as an insult. Because this time, the rhetoric is genocidal.
Share this with those in denial: Who is really committing crimes against children?
What the fuck, South Dakota?? Geez.
I think the Bill Clinton saga and guys like Anthony Weiner, to a much lesser degree, provided just enough ammo on this topic that the GOP was able to make a reverse argument. Not that it applies, the way they argue it. There's still a messaging problem, however, as you've mentioned clearly.
The way Democrats handle some of these issues typically only makes things worse. Look at how they bungled the Al Franken issue and forced the poor guy to step down even though he was a great communicator for the party and was one of the few Democrats that was quick on his feet to go on the offensive (not surprising since he was a comedian). Not saying the party should simply brush things under the rug, but for fucks sakes they over do things because of political correctness bullshit.
Same with churches. They know, they just don't care.
Or look at it another way: donate your way into GOP so that your crimes get overlooked.
At this point is there any sane individual that doesn’t see the GOP for what it is? A criminal enterprise dabbling in treason, pedophilia, torture, rape, self service, and who are generally authoritarian pieces of shit.
Anyone voting Republican immediately gets written off by me as a piece of shit. You know why? Because you’re all insufferable, conceited pieces of shit. You should all be ashamed of yourselves, you’re not, but you should be.
Conservatives - always be projecting
Gaslight
Obstruct
Project
What a creepy looking guy. Also, what a creepy attitude:
“I take a lot of offense to the government and court’s notion that I perjured myself in this trial. ... Grooming behavior is the word you used,” he said. “If that’s the case, then I suppose anyone who gives someone a gift, whether it be a cheap gift or a million dollars, is grooming their companion for sex. OK? If that’s the standard that we’re going to apply, then I don’t know how there’s any standard to apply.”
No remorse.
Yes, lets just skip over the minor and sex part of the whole thing.
But his arrest fueled outrage among party activists.
TBF, the sun coming up in the morning fuels outrage among GOP activists.
Permanently Deleted
Every accusation is a confession with these people.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
They likened Lazzaro to financier Jeffrey Epstein, who was arrested in 2019 on federal charges accusing him of paying underage girls for massages and then abusing them at his homes in Florida and New York.
Lazzaro’s indictment in 2021 touched off a political firestorm that led to the downfall of Jennifer Carnahan as chair of the Republican Party of Minnesota.
Prosecutors argued during his trial that Lazzaro enlisted Castro Medina, who he initially paid for sex, to recruit other teenagers — preferably minors — who were white, small, vulnerable or “broken.” He often sent cars to take the girls to his luxury penthouse condo at the Hotel Ivy in downtown Minneapolis, they said.
Lazzaro also helped run the campaign of Republican Lacy Johnson, who failed to unseat Democratic U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, of Minnesota, in 2020.
Several recipients quickly donated those contributions to charity after the charges became public, including U.S. Rep. Tom Emmer, of Minnesota, who received $15,600 but suffered no repercussions.
The government put his net worth in a bond report at more than $2 million but said its calculations didn’t include his “extensive” but hard-to-trace cryptocurrency holdings.
I'm a bot and I'm open source!
Pedocon theory is a theory in the same way the theory of gravity is.
This guy's face is unsettling. His lips are the color of worms that die in a puddle.
Glad he is going to prison.
Who’s protecting the children from the GOP?
My love for you is like a truck, Lazzaro
Would you like some making f*ck, Lazzaro
My love for you is like a rock, Lazzaro
Don’t suck any dicks on your way to prison!
Hopefully someone sex trafficks his butthole in prison for the next 21 years!
Dude sucks; full stop, but we can do better than prison rape jokes
And I shall go you one further, the fact that a lot of people think that prison rape is some kind of justice is directly linked to the poor recidivism stats we have. (I'm in the UK and would like to see more Nordic style rehabilitation type policies.)
Oh he sucks all right, you can ask BUBBA how much he sucks ;)
In all honesty though, he would probably be killed before raped in prison. PREA is considered a worse violation than murder in today's prisons.
That doesn't sound like the trafficking I think of. Anyone know the legal definition in this case? Still a pos of course but doesn't sound like he's like selling them as sex slaves.. Just statutory prostitutes. In any case, fuck im
He had a recruiter. Underage girls. And all paid for. The case was a federal one, too, and that has impacts.
Yikes, oh. Fuck depraved rich cunts
https://www.justice.gov/humantrafficking
That gives a nice quick breakdown/definition of trafficking.
"Human trafficking, also known as trafficking in persons, is a crime that involves compelling or coercing a person to provide labor or services, or to engage in commercial sex acts."
Seems like this falls under coercing.
Got it thanks for the clarification