True Law and Order: Your Human Right of Self-Defense Against Any Threat

Your right to defend your life and the lives of your loved ones when faced with a deadly threat is not bestowed on you by government. Indeed, self-defense is the most fundamental of all human rights, and it's the duty of our elected officials to preserve it.

What most citizens may not know is that we have the right if we know that we are in danger of being harmed or our life or liberty is in jeopardy or peril we have the natural human right defend our selves and family even if it means terminating the life of the individual(s) who pose the threat. It does not matter if the threat is at the hands of a civilian or police who are trying to make an unlawful arrest and/or using excessive and unlawful force. This is backed up by the government and the law of the land.

There are cases, appeals and decisions rendered by the courts which are very clear on self-defense in instances where the citizen defended themselves against officers of the law (i.e. police, marshals, sheriffs, etc...).

 Plummer v. State, 135 Ind. 308, 34 N.E. 968 (1893)

Casselman v. State, 472 N.E.2d 1310 (Ind.App.1985)

Shane Allen WILSON, Appellant-Defendant, v. STATE of Indiana, Appellee-Plaintiff. ~ We reverse and remand. - The following issue is dispositive:

Whether the trial court committed reversible error when it declined to give a proposed instruction that informed the jury about a defendant's right to protect himself when arresting officers use excessive force.
  
John Bad Elk v. United States, 177 U.S. 529 (1900) ~ case in which the United States Supreme Court held that an individual had the right to use force to resist an unlawful arrest and was entitled to a jury instruction to that effect.

Bad Elk v. United States
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued February 26, 1900 Decided April 30, 1900
Full case name	John Bad Elk v. United States
Citations	177 U.S. 529 (more) 20 S.Ct. 729; 44 L.Ed. 874
Prior history	United States v. Bad Elk (C.C.D.S.D. 1899) (unreported)
Holding
Held that an individual had the right to use force to resist an unlawful arrest and was entitled to a jury instruction to that effect.
Court membership
Chief Justice Melville Fuller Associate Justices John M. Harlan · Horace Gray David J. Brewer · Henry B. Brown George Shiras, Jr. · Edward D. White Rufus W. Peckham · Joseph McKenna
Case opinions
Majority	Peckham, joined by unanimous
Laws applied
Common law: Self-defense
Superseded by
Statute

 
Phelps V. Indianapolis Police Department ~

ALSPACH v. STATE - Christopher ALSPACH, Appellant-Defendant, v. STATE of Indiana, Appellee-Plaintiff.~

Self preservation, a natural law, is tied in with the survival of family and ultimately survival of species. Because we are born as individuals the drive to survive is instilled in each person. It then extends to the collective based on what the threat to survival is (i.e. if it will affect the one, the few, the many, or the entire collective) that comes our way. Nothing can take this right away!

Common law history

The English common law has long recognized the right of an individual to resist with reasonable force an attempt of a police officer to make an unlawful arrest.[1] This offered a complete defense if nonlethal force was used,[2] and would reduce a murder charge to manslaughter if a death ensued.[3] In Hopkin Huggett's case,[4] English officials illegally seized a man to serve in the King's army.[5] Huggett and others observed this and fought to free the man.[6] In the course of the fight one of the King's men, John Barry, was killed and Huggett was put on trial for murder.[6] The English court ruled that since the officer was making an unlawful arrest, the most that could be charged was manslaughter.[7] In 1709, in Queen v. Tooley,[8] the English court again found that when resisting an unlawful arrest, the death of an individual would result in a manslaughter charge instead of a murder charge.[9] When the United States separated from England, the common law was adopted by the new American courts and the right to resist unlawful arrest was clearly recognized. 

Self-defence is part of private defence {Self-defense (self-defence in many varieties of English) is a countermeasure that involves defending the health and well-being of oneself from harm.[1] The use of the right of self-defense as a legal justification for the use of force in times of danger is available in many jurisdictions, but the interpretation varies widely}, the doctrine in English law that one can act in ways that would otherwise be illegal to prevent injury to oneself or others, or to prevent crime more generally [1]– one has the same right to act to protect others as to protect oneself. This defence arises both from common law and the Criminal Law Act 1967. Self-defence in English law is using reasonable force against an unjust threat. Self-defence is a justification rather than an excuse (Robinson's classification of defences), that is, the defence is asserting that the actions were not a crime at all.

Carrying over the old English Law or Common Law when it comes to Self-defense lays the ground work.  The foundation, however is firmly planted within the United States Constitution. 

United States Constitution 

Article [II] (Amendment 2 - Bearing Arms)

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

United States Constitution

Article [IV] (Amendment 4 - Search and Seizure)

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Your Right of Defense Against Unlawful Arrest

“Citizens may resist unlawful arrest to the point of taking an arresting officer's life if necessary.” Plummer v. State, 136 Ind. 306. This premise was upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case: John Bad Elk v. U.S., 177 U.S. 529. The Court stated: “Where the officer is killed in the course of the disorder which naturally accompanies an attempted arrest that is resisted, the law looks with very different eyes upon the transaction, when the officer had the right to make the arrest, from what it does if the officer had no right. What may be murder in the first case might be nothing more than manslaughter in the other, or the facts might show that no offense had been committed.”


“An arrest made with a defective warrant, or one issued without affidavit, or one that fails to allege a crime is within jurisdiction, and one who is being arrested, may resist arrest and break away. lf the arresting officer is killed by one who is so resisting, the killing will be no more than an involuntary manslaughter.” Housh v. People, 75 111. 491; reaffirmed and quoted in State v. Leach, 7 Conn. 452; State v. Gleason, 32 Kan. 245; Ballard v. State, 43 Ohio 349; State v Rousseau, 241 P. 2d 447; State v. Spaulding, 34 Minn. 3621.

“When a person, being without fault, is in a place where he has a right to be, is violently assaulted, he may, without retreating, repel by force, and if, in the reasonable exercise of his right of self defense, his assailant is killed, he is justified.” Runyan v. State, 57 Ind. 80; Miller v. State, 74 Ind. 1.

“These principles apply as well to an officer attempting to make an arrest, who abuses his authority and transcends the bounds thereof by the use of unnecessary force and violence, as they do to a private individual who unlawfully uses such force and violence.” Jones v. State, 26 Tex. App. I; Beaverts v. State, 4 Tex. App. 1 75; Skidmore v. State, 43 Tex. 93, 903.

“An illegal arrest is an assault and battery. The person so attempted to be restrained of his liberty has the same right to use force in defending himself as he would in repelling any other assault and battery.” (State v. Robinson, 145 ME. 77, 72 ATL. 260).

“Each person has the right to resist an unlawful arrest. In such a case, the person attempting the arrest stands in the position of a wrongdoer and may be resisted by the use of force, as in self- defense.” (State v. Mobley, 240 N.C. 476, 83 S.E. 2d 100).

“One may come to the aid of another being unlawfully arrested, just as he may where one is being assaulted, molested, raped or kidnapped. Thus it is not an offense to liberate one from the unlawful custody of an officer, even though he may have submitted to such custody, without resistance.” (Adams v. State, 121 Ga. 16, 48 S.E. 910).

“Story affirmed the right of self-defense by persons held illegally. In his own writings, he had admitted that ‘a situation could arise in which the checks-and-balances principle ceased to work and the various branches of government concurred in a gross usurpation.’ There would be no usual remedy by changing the law or passing an amendment to the Constitution, should the oppressed party be a minority. Story concluded, ‘If there be any remedy at all ... it is a remedy never provided for by human institutions.’ That was the ‘ultimate right of all human beings in extreme cases to resist oppression, and to apply force against ruinous injustice.’” (From Mutiny on the Amistad by Howard Jones, Oxford University Press, 1987, an account of the reading of the decision in the case by Justice Joseph Story of the Supreme Court.

As for grounds for arrest: “The carrying of arms in a quiet, peaceable, and orderly manner, concealed on or about the person, is not a breach of the peace. Nor does such an act of itself, lead to a breach of the peace.” (Wharton’s Criminal and Civil Procedure, 12th Ed., Vol.2: Judy v. Lashley, 5 W. Va. 628, 41 S.E. 197).

You are also within your rights not to answer any questions without a lawyer present, and if possible, to demand a video recording be made of the entire encounter that you or your lawyer keep as evidence, so that federal prosecutors can't get away with charging you with making false statements to a government investigator and testilying (Police perjury (or testilying in United States police slang) is the act of a police officer giving false testimony.) about what you said. See this article.



As a practical matter one should try to avoid relying on the above in an actual confrontation with law enforcement agents, who are likely not to know or care about any of it. Some recent courts have refused to follow these principles, and grand juries, controlled by prosecutors, have refused to indict officers who killed innocent people claiming the subject "resisted" or "looked like he might have a gun". Once dedicated to "protect and serve", far too many law enforcement officers have become brutal, lawless occupying military forces.


“The first law of nature is self-preservation. Cut off that which may harm you. But if it is worth preserving, and is meaningful, nourish it and have no regrets. Ultimately, this is true living and love of self...from within.” ~ T.F. Hodge, From Within I Rise: Spiritual Triumph Over Death and Conscious Encounters with "The Divine Presence"

'You’re almost men': This man brilliantly broke up a street fight between two teenage boys in viral video

Two high school boys brawled in the middle of a residential street as their friends watched, some laughing, others encouraging and one recording.

But ultimately what that video captured was not another ugly street fight. Instead, it showed a remarkable display of humanity from a stranger who intervened with something much more powerful than fists.

Ibn Ali Miller, a 26-year-old Muslim man from Atlantic City, had run an errand for his mother when he happened upon the group of teens gathered on the neighborhood street corner. In the video that has now been seen by millions, and has been praised by the likes of LeBron James and Snoop Dogg, Miller puts himself between the fighting boys and offers them some tough love.

“You’re almost men, you’re not kids no more,” Miller tells them. “Start acting like it, yo. You’re going to get nowhere like this, yo.”

He condemned their friends for laughing and egging them on. He points to one teen off camera and says, “I know where you’re from, humble beginnings. Your mom and dad worked hard to get where they’re at, yo.” He turns to another. “Your dad’s doing life, you think it’s a game out here? It’s no game out here. It’s real out here, little bro.”

Then Miller tells the two fighting boys he won’t leave until they shake hands. After some coaxing from Miller, they do.

The video, which was posted to Facebook by one of the boys, has been heralded across the Internet for Miller’s courage — putting yourself in the middle of a fight could go dangerously wrong — but also for his instinct to be a role model for the teens. 

“A dozen positive lessons could be taught from that four-minute video alone,” Atlantic City Mayor Don Guardian said in a statement. “He fearlessly spoke so much truth to those young kids. We need more adults in the world that are willing to step in to help pull back our youth from the edge.”

The city council honored Miller, a married father of six, at their meeting on Wednesday evening.

“For him to intervene like that was tremendous and more importantly for the children to listen. That could have went the other way,” Council President Marty Small said in an interview Thursday morning.

“Just look at what is on social media, just look at that,” he added, referring to the negative images and words kids are exposed to every day. “When you see the outcome become the contrary to what you normally see, for this to turn in a positive light, it had a message behind it.”

In a YouTube video posted of the meeting, Miller was visibly emotional as he accepted the council’s recognition. He thanked God, and then he choked up when he talked about his mom.

“When I was young I grew up in the projects and I would get a punishment. She would make me read books, and I’d get asked about a short story or a poem,” he said. “I’m crying because this whole situation deeply saddens me. The fact that it’s unbelievable — this should be very believable, this should be a norm, this should be regular.”

The two teenage boys who were fighting, allegedly over a girl, according to Small, were also honored by the council. Small, who has since spent time with them and took them to dinner after the meeting, said they are still reeling from all the positive attention, particularly from their heroes like LeBron James, who wrote on Twitter:

LeBron James

✔ @KingJames

So dope!!! #Salute the homie who stepped in and spoke real to our young generation. We all need a word or 2 to help! https://twitter.com/dubondabeatz/status/843983629097222145 …

11:59 PM - 20 Mar 2017

It’s a powerful reinforcement for good behavior, the kind of affirmation that could encourage more positive actions.

The three lives are intertwined now in ways they couldn’t have imagined when they met by chance on the street corner Monday. Small said Miller had just driven the boys to Philadelphia for a news appearance.

In his speech, Miller said the attention should be on the boys and their families.

“Not only did they decide not to fight, but they decided to shake hands and display unity,” he said. “Not only do I want to thank my mom but I want to thank the people who raised these men as well, because they raised them to be young men of reason, which seems to be a very, very rare trait in today’s youth.”

How Secretive Manhattan Heiress Rebekah Mercer Became One of the Most Powerful Women in Politics

A decade ago, Mercer was running a Hell's Kitchen bakery. Now she's advising the president.

WBAI Democracy Now show about The Mercers

On December 3, just weeks after being elected President of the United States, Donald Trump escaped the barrage of Cabinet interviews to pay his respects to a family of incredibly wealthy, barely known kingmakers—a family that helped Trump clinch one of the biggest presidential upsets in history.

It was one of his first public outings since the election, a lavish costume party held in Head of the Harbor, a tiny Long Island village with a population of just over 1,000. No press was allowed inside, but they lined the driveway, where black town cars dropped off guests to the "Heroes and Villains"-themed fete. When Trump surprised the crowd, stepping out of an SUV for an unannounced appearance, camera lights popped and the pool reporters shouted, "Who are you going as?"

Wearing his usual look of a boxy suit and printed tie, he mouthed: "Me."

View image on Twitter

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Kellyanne Conway 

✔@KellyannePolls

Honoring the ultimate hero at the Mercer "Heroes and Villains" party on Long Island. Crowd thrilled w/ surprise!

8:55 PM - 3 Dec 2016

 
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The party wasn't hosted by any of his high-profile supporters like the Lefraks (best known for LeFrak City, a 5,000 unit apartment complex in Queens, New York)or Woody Johnson (Robert Wood "Woody" Johnson IV is an American businessman and philanthropist. He is a great-grandson of Robert Wood Johnson I, and the owner of the New York Jets)—or even one of his C-list celebrity cheerleaders, like Scott Baio. The party was put on by a Trump transition executive named Rebekah Mercer and her father, Robert Mercer.

Manhattan Billionaires the Mercers Own Breitbart

Trump didn't stay at the event long; by midnight he was home watching Saturday Night Live and tweeting critiques about Alec Baldwin's portrayal of him. But it's no wonder Trump stopped in to pay respects to the Mercers. You may not know her name, but Rebekah, a mysterious heiress turned bakery owner turned political player, was quietly pulling strings for the Trump campaign for most of 2016—and has quickly become one of the most influential figures in American politics.


Nobody in the Mercer family has ever spoken publicly about their political motivations or involvement. (Rebekah has never been interviewed on the record and, for this article, multiple inquiries to her spokesperson were unanswered. Robert told the Wall Street Journal in 2010, "I'm happy going through my life without saying anything to anybody.") And those close to the family refuse to reveal personal details about them. But the family's immense political power is indisputable.

Robert has spent at least $32 million supporting conservative candidates for office, according to Bloomberg Businessweek. And the Center for Responsive Politics points out that he was one of the largest donors in the 2016 Republican race.

Though he's not shy about throwing his weight behind conservative causes, Robert prefers to remain in the background. According to a recent Wall Street Journal profile, the hedge fund titan once told a colleague he preferred the company of cats to humans. So, it's his more sociable middle daughter who has become the face of the family, meeting with power players and initiating deals. She sits on boards of conservative foundations he funds, including the Heritage Foundation, and has reportedly been seen walking arm-and-arm with him at events he funds like the Jackson Hole Summit, a conference promoting the gold standard. Politico just put her as 21 on their PlayBook Power List.

By Rebekah's most public—and influential—role so far is as an executive on Trump's 16-person transition executive committee, which advises the president-elect on Cabinet appointments and organizing his White House.

A COOKIE SHOP FOR PRESIDENTS
A decade ago, Rebekah was selling cookies. In 2006, one of her favorite New York bakeries, the tiny Ruby et Violette in Hell's Kitchen, was shutting down, so she and her sisters jumped in to rescue it.

"It was our favorite place for cookies," Heather Sue, an avid poker player, told Fox News. "We'd get them for parties, weddings, christenings. We'd make up reasons to get them. Then one night, I'm playing poker at the Borgata and I get a call that Ruby et Violette is closing." She said she called her sisters declaring: "We're going to buy a bakery."

This would be no ordinary bakery. The company no longer maintains a storefront; now based in Queens, according to its LinkedIn page, it delivers—and counts Bill Clinton and George W. Bush among its fans. In fact, both former presidents sent personal thank you letters, posted on the bakery's website. "Dear Jenji, Bekah, and Heather Sure: Laura and I were delighted to receive your cookies," starts the hand-signed note from Bush. "Thank you for all the delicious gourmet cookies — they were gone fast! You were kind to send them, and I appreciate your thoughtfulness," reads the Clinton letter. According to Bloomberg, billionaire conservative activists Charles and David Koch's Virginia-based nonprofit Freedom Brothers also caters events with their cookies.

It's no wonder politicians fawn over the treats. With pockets as deep as the Mercers, it doesn't hurt to try to curry favor however you can.

The Mercers weren't always this rich. Rebekah, known as Bekah to friends, grew up in Yorktown, Westchester, with older sister Jenji and younger sibling Heather Sue. At the time, Robert worked at IBM.


"Rebekah is not a Marie Antoinette," Amity Shlaes, a member of the Calvin Coolidge Presidential Foundation board, which gets Mercer funding, told The Washington Post. "Her father was a research scientist at IBM. Her family did well late. She understands what it means to make economic decisions."

Rebekah is not a Marie Antoinette. She understands what it means to make economic decisions.

The big Mercer money came when Robert began working for the ultra-mysterious Renaissance Technologies hedge fund on Long Island in 1993. In 2009, Robert became the co-CEO of Renaissance, which author Sebastian Mallaby called "perhaps the most successful hedge fund ever" in his 2011 book More Money Than God.

Robert and his wife Diana moved into an extravagant Long Island mansion, which they dubbed "Owl's Nest," closer to the Renaissance offices. The home is so palatial, the family created Owl's Nest Inc., a company used to manage household staff. In 2013, the service staff sued Robert for allegedly penalizing them for doing things like failing to close a door or not refilling the shampoo. The case was dismissed a few months later and appears to have been quietly settled.

While her father climbed the ranks at Renaissance, Rebekah attended Stanford University from 1994 to1997, studying biology, mathematics and operations research, according to her LinkedIn page. (Though her degrees come from Stanford, she also lists four years spent at Cornell from 1991 to 1994.)

At Stanford, Rebekah met her future husband, French-born Sylvain Mirochnikoff, according to The Washington Post. Mirochnikoff has gone on to become a managing director at Morgan Stanley. Rebekah flirted with finance as well, working a short stint on Wall Street after Stanford, according to reports.


The couple went on to have four children, and it's been reported that today Rebekah home schools them. But Rebekah and her husband have donated to a foundation for Manhattan's elite Dwight School, as indicated by the organization's annual reports. And in a 2012 newsletter for the bilingual Ecole Internationale de New York, Rebekah praised the school, saying:

"My husband is French, and his entire family lives in Paris. Our children require fluency in French so that they can understand their heritage and converse with their relatives … We couldn't ask for a better school for our children."

Rebekah and Mirochnikoff's paper trail of donations and real estate give a peek into their intensely private Manhattan life. The pair donates regularly to the Frick Collection, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Morgan Library, and the Central Park Conservancy. They've even made gifts to GLAAD, according to the organization's annual reports.

Still, while they were making a name for themselves in donor circles, the Mercers managed to stay unknown to the general public for years. In 2015, they began making headlines when they connected with then-Texas Senator Ted Cruz. A Page Six article highlights a party at Rebekah and Mirochnikoff's $28 million apartment in the 41-story Heritage at Trump Place on the Upper West Side (they bought six apartments and combined them, according to public records). The event was in honor of Cruz, whose defeat in the 2016 Republican primaries would lead them straight to Trump.

BRINGING STEVE BANNON INTO THE FOLD

Until 2006, Rebekah was registered as an independent. Since becoming a Republican, she has, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, supported a wide range of conservative politicians, from Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton and junior Nebraska Ben Sasse to businesspeople-turned-presidential candidates Carly Fiorina and Herman Cain.

Pinning down the Mercers's specific political motivations is tricky. Robert and Rebekah have directed money to anti-abortion groups and a Christian college, according to Bloomberg Businessweek, which also reports the father and daughter "don't talk about religion."

They secretly funded ads for a research chemist named Arthur Robinson during his run for Congress in Oregon. Robinson believes climate change is a hoax, thinks nuclear radiation could be good for you, and insists he can extend the human life span by studying human urine. Robinson told the Bloomberg Businessweek that political ads supporting him just began popping up—he had no idea who was behind them until a third party revealed it was Robert.


Rebekah sits on the boards of Heritage Foundation, an influential conservative think tank, the Goldwater Institute, a conservative and libertarian public policy think tank, and Reclaim New York, a nonprofit focused on transparency and the city's affordability. (Heritage and Goldwater representatives didn't respond to requests for comment about her work.)

"Rebekah Mercer's vision for Reclaim is that it will educate New Yorkers and prepare them to demand a more affordable, ethical, responsive and effective government," a Reclaim spokesman told Town & Country. "Ms. Mercer believes that increasing citizen engagement on issues impacting their families and their businesses will pressure politicians to enact vital reforms."

How Steve Bannon Joined Forces with Donald Trump

Rebekah founded Reclaim New York with a familiar name: Trump's controversial chief strategist Steve Bannon. In 2011, the Mercers invested $10 million to the then-relatively unknown website Breitbart, according to Bloomberg Politics. After the site's founder Andrew Breitbart died in 2012, Bannon took the reigns.

Bannon, who describes himself as an "economic nationalist," shares with the Mercers an apparent desire to shake up the Republican establishment. Breitbart isn't the Mercers' only connection to Bannon. Rebekah was also reportedly a director for his Government Accountability Institute, which funded research for the books Clinton Cash and Bush Bucks.

After years of spreading their funds around, the Mercers went all-in last year for conservative candidate Ted Cruz, putting millions towards a Super PAC to support his run for the presidency. "Keep the Promise," which was run by pollster Kellyanne Conway, was rebranded as the "Defeat Crooked Hillary PAC" after Cruz dropped out of the race in May 2016.


Just weeks after Cruz left the race, Rebekah and Conway were invited to Trump Tower to have a lunch of salads and sandwiches with Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner, according to The Washington Post.

JARED KUSHNER AND IVANKA TRUMP IN THE LOBBY OF TRUMP TOWER LAST NOVEMBER.

GETTY

"Ivanka and Rebekah bonded over parenting young children and being the daughters of hard-charging, successful fathers, according to people familiar with their conversation," wrote Post reporter Matea Gold. "Rebekah's sister Jenji and her mother were already fans of the real estate developer, according to a friend. And now Rebekah was on board: The family would help Trump."

Her influence was swift. It was Rebekah who convinced Trump to appoint family allies Conway and Bannon as co-campaign chairs in a surprising staff shakeup last summer, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Though we didn't see them making the cable news show rounds or taking the stage in Cleveland at the Republican National Convention, the Mercers' fingerprints are all over Trump's win and subsequent transition.

WHAT ROLE, IF ANY, WILL MERCER PLAY IN A TRUMP ADMINISTRATION?
Since signing on to Team Trump, the Mercers have remained fervent in their support — even through the worst of the campaign scandals. When a tape was released of the Republican candidate telling Access Hollywood host Billy Bush that he used his fame to "grab [women] by the pussy," the Mercers released a rare statement reiterating their conviction.

"If Mr. Trump had told Billy Bush, whoever that is, earlier this year that he was for open borders, open trade, and executive actions in pursuit of gun control, we would certainly be rethinking our support for him," reads the statement to The Washington Post. "We are completely indifferent to Mr. Trump's locker room braggadocio."

We are completely indifferent to Mr. Trump's locker room braggadocio.
After that fiasco, research firm Cambridge Analytica was one of the very few that remained confident that Trump would still win the election. Robert is reportedly a major backer of the relatively unknown strategic communications company, which also worked with Leave.EU in the U.K. ahead of the Brexit vote.

So, while many may have been shocked when Trump clinched the Electoral College late November 8, the Mercers surely felt vindicated.

One of Trump's first actions as president-elect was to name Mercer associate Bannon as chief strategist, sparking outrage from the Anti-Defamation League as well as politicians on both side of the aisle because of his work with Breitbart, which Bannon himself told Mother Jones was a "platform for the alt-right," an online movement with white supremacist views.

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We at @ADL_National oppose the appt of Steve Bannon to sr role at @WhiteHouse bc he & his alt-right are so hostile to core American values

9:09 PM - 13 Nov 2016

 
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Rebekah also played a part in lobbying against Mitt Romney as Secretary of State and in favor of Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions as attorney general, according to The Wall Street Journal. Sessions is popular in his home state, holding elected office for two decades, but his appointment has faced backlash due to his civil rights record and accusations of racism.

Although she's clearly a voice Trump trusts, it doesn't appear Rebekah will play a formal role in his administration. It's more likely she'll help from the outside, serving a leadership role in an organization supporting his agenda, likely a super PAC or nonprofit, according to The Wall Street Journal.

While we may never hear directly from Rebekah or her father, it seems they're just getting started. Trump told The Wall Street Journal: "The Mercers are incredible people who truly love this country and go all out to protect America and everything it stands for."

Donald Trump Backed by Billionaire Family: What Do The Mercers Really Want?

Trump arrives at the Mercers' annual costume party in December of last year.

What Does the Billionaire Family Backing Donald Trump Really Want?

The Mercers are enjoying more influence than ever with their candidate in the White House—but no one seems to know how they intend to use it.

She owns a cookie store. He loves model trains. They both hate the Clintons. And beyond that, not much is clear about the motivations of the Mercer father-daughter duo of Republican mega donors who have become two of the most powerful people in the country over the last 18 months.

Hedge-fund billionaire Robert Mercer and his daughter Rebekah were among the earliest and strongest backers of Donald Trump while other elite donors still disdained him. It turned out to be a good investment. But now, with their favored candidate freshly installed as president of the United States, it remains unclear what they believe, or what they hope their investment will yield.


The Mercers have been a quiet but constant presence in the background of Republican politics since the beginning of the 2016 cycle. They started the campaign as backers of Ted Cruz, pouring millions into one of the main super PACs supporting his candidacy. Their data firm, Cambridge Analytica, was hired by the Cruz campaign. They switched to support Trump shortly after he clinched the nomination, and he eventually hired Cambridge Analytica, as well. Their top political guru is Steve Bannon, the former Breitbart News chairman and White House chief strategist. They’re close, too, with Trump’s campaign manager Kellyanne Conway, who also has a senior role in the White House. They never speak to the press and hardly ever even release a public statement. Like Trump himself, they’ve flouted the standard playbook for how things are done in politics.

Clues to their policy preferences can be found in their family foundation’s pattern of giving. For example, they have given more than once to groups questioning climate-change science. But their donations have flown to groups all over the conservative political map, ranging from libertarian organizations to movement conservative groups to the Koch brothers’ Freedom Partners Action Fund to Breitbart. That scattershot approach suggests the family has some ideological flexibility.

No one seems to know what motivates the Mercers or what policies they want to see enacted, even people who have worked closely with them or for projects funded by them. While they’ve poured money into conservative causes, they’ve also invested in projects explicitly aimed at overturning the modern conservative movement, like Breitbart News, in which they reportedly invested $10 million, and Trump himself. And the mystery of their ideological motivations is made all the more striking by their success in helping Trump reach the White House. A recent Wall Street Journal story on the Mercers concluded: "It isn’t clear what specific policies or positions, if any, the Mercers are seeking for their support of Mr. Trump."

“All I can take away is that they just want to be power players,” said a former Breitbart News staffer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of a non-disclosure agreement. “I don’t know what their principles are. I don’t know how you switch from Ted Cruz to Donald Trump so quickly.”


“Most of these people I think I understand,” said a Republican operative who has been engaged on several Mercer-led efforts. (Like most people quoted in this story, the operative declined to be identified for fear of legal or professional consequences for speaking publicly about the Mercers.) “I don’t understand the Mercers.”

Rebekah Mercer “talks business. She talks data, she talks trends, she talks messaging,” said another Republican operative who has worked with the Mercers. “I have never really been in her presence where she’s talked policy.”

Asked to describe what’s motivating them, Bannon himself was vague.

“Really incredible folks,” Bannon said in an email. “Never ask for anything. Very middle class values as they came to their great wealth late in life.”

* * *

Robert Mercer got his start at IBM, working there for over 20 years. He went to Renaissance Technologies in 1993. It’s there that Mercer, already well into middle age, became wealthy. Renaissance, based in East Setauket, Long Island, includes three hedge funds managing over $25 billion in assets, as well as the mysterious Medallion Fund, an employees-only fund that has made its investors unimaginably rich. Mercer’s co-CEO is Jim Simons, a major donor to Democrats; one Republican operative with connections to the Mercers who spoke on condition of anonymity joked that the pair were trying to “hedge the political system.”


Rebekah, known as Bekah, is one of Bob and Diana Mercer’s three daughters. Along with her sisters Heather Sue and Jennifer (“Jenji”), she owns Ruby et Violette, a cookie store in New York (the cookies are now sold exclusively online). Rebekah, 43, is married to a French Morgan Stanley executive, Sylvain Mirochnikoff, with whom she has four children. Mercer did not respond to requests for comment for this story.

Bob Mercer, 70, is an enigmatic figure who has a reputation for rarely speaking publicly. Nearly everyone spoken to for this story used some variation of the word “brilliant” to describe him. There’s a touch of eccentricity, too; “I know a couple things you can bond with Bob Mercer over is he hates the Federal Reserve and loves model trains,” said one Republican operative who has worked on Mercer-backed initiatives. (Mercer once sued a model train manufacturer, alleging that he was overcharged for a model train set installed in Owl’s Nest, his expansive Long Island estate).

Whatever her actual beliefs, there’s one thing upon which people who have worked with Rebekah Mercer agree: She has a keen understanding of politics and likes to be involved in the day-to-day running of projects she’s involved in. Many donors like to play strategist, much to the annoyance of the actual strategists in their employ. But Mercer appears to be more successful at it than most.

“Almost all donors want to pretend they’re Karl Rove. They all want to play political mastermind,” said one of the Republican operatives who has worked on Mercer-funded projects. But “I would say that Rebekah is as smart at politics as you could be without ever having been at the grunt level.”

“Her political instincts were always on the money,” said Hogan Gidley, a former Mike Huckabee aide who served as spokesman for the Make America Number One PAC which became the Mercers’ pro-Trump vehicle during the general election. “We would be talking about how a certain ad should look or changes we should make to an ad, and she would just offer an idea that would just elicit instantaneous agreement. It wasn’t because they were largely funding the PAC, it was because she was right.”


Gidley said Mercer was on every conference call related to the super PAC’s operations. Even so, he didn’t get a clear sense of Mercer or her father’s ideology.

“They’re libertarians who understand that they might have to make compromises with social conservatives,” said one person in the non-profit world who is a recipient of multiple Mercer grants. “They’re just as at home at the Cato Institute as they would be at the Heritage Foundation on general issues.”

The Mercers, the non-profit activist said, appeared to have two goals this election cycle: “They’ve been fighting the Clintons forever, and they wanted to back the winning horse.”


That first goal has been clear for some time. The Mercers have for years had their hands in the cottage industry of anti-Clinton activity in and around the conservative movement. According to tax records from the Mercer Family Foundation, they gave nearly $3.6 million to Citizens United between 2012 and 2014, which sued for access to Clinton Foundation-related emails last year and whose president David Bossie also got a senior job on the Trump campaign. They’ve also invested in the Government Accountability Institute, which publishes the conservative author Peter Schweizer. Schweizer’s book Clinton Cash was an influential source of talking points for Trump allies during this election cycle, providing fodder for one of Trump’s early salvos against Clinton in a speech in June and regularly populating the pages of Breitbart. Bannon co-founded GAI with Schweizer; Rebekah Mercer has sat on the board.

The Mercers’ activities during the election cycle are among the clearest public evidence of how their beliefs, whatever they might be, translate into action.

At first, the Mercers went in for Cruz. They backed Keep the Promise 1, one of the main super PACs supporting Cruz, to the tune of $11 million. Like other campaigns with which the Mercers have been involved, including Trump’s, the Cruz campaign engaged the Mercers’s data firm Cambridge Analytica. Cruz campaign officials clashed with Cambridge over the particulars of the contract and lodged complaints about the product itself, according to multiple sources familiar with what happened; in one instance, the Cruz campaign was paying for a database system, RIPON, that had not been built yet, leading to a contentious argument. They also caught wind of work Cambridge had done for the Ben Carson campaign; working on more than one primary campaign is a no-no for vendors. Elsewhere in Mercer-world, there were other signs of trouble when it came to Cruz. In January, before the primaries had even begun, Breitbart News began attacking Cruz, insinuating that he was ineligible to be president because of his Canadian birth (a line also in heavy use by Trump at the time). Meanwhile, the Mercers were still publicly behind Cruz.

“Cambridge Analytica's data science team had an excellent relationship with the Cruz campaign: we were part of the campaign starting from day one and all the way through the primaries and caucuses until the final day, and we continue to work with many of the principals from the campaign,” a spokesman for Cambridge Analytica said. On the work they had done for the Carson campaign, the spokesman said “Cambridge Analytica is large enough to work on more than one campaign at any given time, and we take FEC firewall regulations very seriously. We would not work with multiple clients if we did not have the scale to provide devoted resources to ensure full compliance with firewalling procedures.” And on RIPON, the Cambridge Analytica spokesman said “Ripon was being used by many senatorial and gubernatorial candidates in the 2014 mid-terms. Some bespoke modifications were requested by the Cruz campaign and we were of course happy to make those for them.”


The Breitbart stories were troubling to Cruz staff, who had seen Breitbart as an ally and who didn’t think they had any reason to doubt the Mercers’ loyalty.

What Cruz’s staff may not have taken into account was the behind-the-scenes influence of Steve Bannon.

“I don’t think [the Mercers are] as nationalistic as Steve,” said a Republican operative who has worked for the Mercers. “Steve is an unapologetic nationalist. I don’t think the Mercers are as much.” But “they share a real disdain for elitism. That’s what sort of binds them together.”

Another of the Republican operatives described Bannon as the “Obi-Wan Kenobi” to Rebekah Mercer, and a third was even more pointed: “Svengali.” Bannon is “really, really, really influential” with Mercer, said the former Breitbart employee. The Mercers, the former employee said, made their wishes known through Bannon, who would sometimes cite the company’s financial backers as a reason for Breitbart not to do a story. Bannon didn’t respond to a request for comment about this.

That highlights a third apparent goal, which became clearer over the course of the campaign: dismantling the establishment.

The Mercers made two public statements over the course of the campaign.. The first came after Ted Cruz’s dramatic speech to the Republican convention in which, amid booing, he refused to endorse Trump and told people to “vote your conscience.”

“Last summer and again this year, Senator Ted Cruz pledged to support the candidacy of the nominee of the Republican Party, whomever that nominee might be,” the Mercers said in a statement to The New York Times afterward. “We are profoundly disappointed that on Wednesday night he chose to disregard this pledge. The Democratic Party will soon choose as their nominee a candidate who would repeal both the First and Second Amendments of the Bill of Rights, a nominee who would remake the Supreme Court in her own image. We need ‘all hands on deck’ to ensure that Mr. Trump prevails. Unfortunately, Senator Cruz has chosen to remain in his bunk below, a decision both regrettable and revealing.”


The second came after the release in October of the Access Hollywood tape that featured Trump boasting to Billy Bush about groping and kissing women without permission. The tape was too much for many of the Republicans who had begrudgingly come around to Trump; some rescinded their endorsements, and there was pressure on Trump to drop out of the race.

But not from the Mercers, who dismissed the tape as “locker room braggadocio” in a statement to the Washington Post:

“America is finally fed up and disgusted with its political elite. Trump is channeling this disgust, and those among the political elite who quake before the boombox of media blather do not appreciate the apocalyptic choice that America faces on Nov. 8.”

The rare statement provided an unusual glimpse into the Mercers’s views, reflecting a disdain for an elite political class of which they themselves are members.

This disdain could be one reason why the Mercers have not constructed their own donor network to rival  that of the Koch brothers, or Paul Singer. Most elite Republican donors tend to favor establishment candidates like Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio. The Mercers, tied as they are to the anti-establishment fervor sweeping the Republican Party in recent years, don’t fit in. But their distance from their peers has only made them more relevant.

While everyone respects Rebekah Mercer as serious and smart, several sources said she could be prickly, and one of the operatives who has worked with her described her as a “difficult person.” That reputation may make it harder for her to build the relationships necessary for consolidating a network of other donors.

Mercer exerted a considerable amount of behind-the-scenes influence during the transition, weighing in even on subplots like choosing a new chair of the Republican National Committee. She had an official spot on the transition executive committee. But her role going forward is less clear. She’s expected to help lead an outside group pushing the president’s agenda in the vein of Obama For America. It’s not clear what other donors will be involved. Though already there are signs of trouble; Politico reported that the Mercers were backing out of the group, which is to be led by Trump campaign digital director Brad Parscale and Mike Pence aide Nick Ayers. It’s unclear how the situation will resolve itself.

“Whether she tries to get other donors involved with her own thing remains to be seen,” said one of the Republican operatives who has worked with the Mercers. “She always tries, she’s just not very good at it. She’s not a people person … But she seems serious and this is more than just a hobby for her.”

ROSIE GRAY  JAN 27, 2017