The Benny Show - The Only Question About Ray Epps That Matters | The Answer Will Bring Down The Machine w/ Darren Beattie

Episode Date: July 30, 2022

I sat down with Darren Beattie to talk about Ray Epps after the NY Times did a puff piece on him. Pre-Order: The January 6th Report: The Report of the Select Committee with a Foreward from Darren Beattie https://www.amazon.com/January-6th-Report-Committee-Investigate-ebook/dp/B0B16J4KM5 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

There are very few things that you can be certain of in life. But you can always be sure the sun will rise each morning. You can bet your bottom dollar that you'll always need air to breathe and water to drink. And, of course, you can rest assured that with Public Mobile's 5G subscription phone plans, you'll pay the same thing every month. With all of the mysteries that life has to offer, a few certainties can really go a long way. Subscribe today for the peace of mind you've been searching for. Public Mobile, different is calling. It was freezing cold on the morning of

January 6th, really cold, the kind of cold that gets into your bones and it hurts. It's January in Washington, D.C. D.C. has extreme temperatures, hot and cold. But on the morning of January 6th, man, it was colder than most. I would know because I was there. I've lived in Washington, D.C. for 15 years. And on the morning of January 6th, I had been invited to listen to the president speak. I've listened to the president speak many, many times. I went there and sat and stood and waited. I wandered through the crowd that morning and sort of saw the patriots. Very, very shocking to see that many Trump supporters and MAGA supporters in Washington, D.C. I'd never seen anything like it in my life. Walking down the road, I remember't know if it's exactly Ray Epps, the guy that I heard yelling. But I tell you what, as I rewatched the footage and as I made my way to the metal detectors to get into the secured area to listen to Trump speak, sat actually right behind Alex

Jones. And it was, I don't know, it was a wild speech. Maybe you watched it on TV. Maybe you heard Donald Trump say march peacefully to the Capitol. But what I hear echoing inside of yelling and there was a lot of commotion, but let me tell you a little something. There was no indication at all whatsoever and no push from anyone from the stage or around me to go into the United States Capitol or to attack any police officers or law enforcement. In fact, there were tons of law enforcement all around the event. Nobody was attacking anyone. Everyone was very peaceable. There were people breaking out into song about America. Now, I went home to file away my reports. And on my way home, I remember hearing from my wife, you better get home now because things are happening that are very dangerous. F*** is hitting the fan. When I got home, I turned on the TV and there was the Capitol was being stormed. All hell had broken loose. People were entering the Capitol building, which is a pretty shocking thing to see in Washington, D.C., no matter who you are or where you come from. But I got to tell

you, as you watch the motions of the permanent state and the January 6th committee, you start to get the indication that perhaps there was more to this event than meets the eye. Perhaps there was something happening in the background. And then, ladies and gentlemen, the New York Times, of all places, drops a puff piece on that very same man that I heard yelling that morning. His name is Ray Epps, and the world's expert on Ray Epps and the questions around his mysterious appearance at this event joins us now. Darren Beatty, the publisher of Revolver News, and certainly somebody who has extreme knowledge base on the most mysterious man in January 6th, Ray Epps. Darren, you have a remarkable piece up right now on Revolver called The Hidden Agenda

Behind the New York Times' Desperate Puff piece on Ray Epps. I want to chop wood with this piece and really break it down, but it's a response to the New York Times. Can you tell me about it? Absolutely. So just to let the matter sink in as by way of introduction, the only individual caught on video repeatedly as early as the evening of January 5th, urging people to go into the Capitol is the only January 6th riot participant about whom the New York Times has written a highly sympathetic puff piece. That is very bizarre. And it gets still weirder if we look at the substance of the piece itself. It's this desperate call for sympathy. It almost invokes comparison to these pieces that the media does on people after a hurricane who have lost their houses and everything and said, oh, what a poor situation they're in. What a poor situation Ray Epps is in that he's a victim of so-called conspiracy theories, baseless conspiracy theories that dare to ask obvious questions pertaining to his participation january 6 unfortunately the times piece itself doesn't ask those obvious questions and there are

three real whoppers in this piece whoppers of omission that i'd like to point out one in the entire piece there's no explicit blanket denial on the part of Ray Epps as to having been involved or associated with any kind of government agency. and precise denial through his lawyer, incidentally, a 10-year veteran of the Phoenix FBI field office, saying that he never belonged to any law enforcement agency. Repeating that specific phrase, well, that leaves open a lot of possibilities that are not law enforcement agencies, just to name some, Department of Homeland Security, JTTF, military intelligence, so forth. Number two, the article describes Epps as a Trump supporter who just wanted to travel to DC to back President Trump. Specifically, it was just the last minute deal where Ray Epps went to DC with his son to watch Trump's speech, the speech that you mentioned in your introduction.

The only problem with that, Ray Epps did not go to this speech. Ray Epps, the alleged Trump supporter, sporting a red Trump hat while in this viral video calling for people to go into the Capitol, traveled all the way from Arizona to D.C. ostensibly to hear the speech, and he doesn't go to the speech. In fact, it's even weirder than that. Not only does he not go to the speech, plays hooky from the speech, he happens to mosey around and end up right by the peace monument, right by the site of that first and decisive initial breach. And he's just positioned there before the Proud Boys, who according to the official narratives are the ones that kicked off the whole thing. He's positioned there before the Proud Boys even get there. So he travels all the way to DC, he skips the speech, and just by sheer

coincidence, he happens to be positioned at the right place at the right time. What's more remarkable than the coincidence is the fact that the New York Times has access to this guy, represents him as a Trump supporter, says he went all the way there to listen to the speech, and doesn't point out that he didn't go to the speech and ask him why. Third, and this is probably the biggest one that we're all wondering, the New York Times fails to explore it. Where does he get this idea to urge everyone into the Capitol? Is this something that he just comes up with out of the blue? He's the only person saying it on the 5th. So where did he get the idea? And when the buying temperature of the crowd was so negative, it was so out of place, this suggestion,

that the crowd immediately called him a Fed. And yet, despite the negative buying temperature, he pursued it, repeatedly urging people to go in the Capitol. Why? So it's almost a double-layered issue here. One layer is how crazy it is that Ray Epps did all of these things. And he's taken off the FBI most wanted list under mysterious circumstances and so forth. But the other layer is the New York Times has an opportunity to ask these questions and report on them. And instead of doing that, it ends up doing a puff piece on Ray Epps. A puff piece on the guy whose behavior in January 6th

was so egregious that the New York Times in its own video documentary on January 6th, ominously titled The Day of Rage, features Ray Epps multiple times and narratively describes him as being one of the handful of protesters who had a plan in advance to storm the Capitol. He's so egregious, he's put on the FBI most wanted list, one of the first 20 people. And now he goes from that to being unarrested,

unindicted, the only January 6th participant about whom Adam Kinzinger will have anything nice to say and defensive to say, and the only January 6th participant about whom the New York Times will write a puff piece. So I'll leave it at that for the audience to digest. Welcome to the month of July, or as we call it on this show, MAGA month. This is a month where we celebrate America

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I have two follow ups to this. One, having been at the speech, having sat right next to Alex Jones, Alex Jones pushed me out of the way in the middle of Trump's speech and grabbed his security and ran across a field. Now, I thought this was very odd. And what was happening was during the actual speech, you had the initial reports of a breach at the Capitol. And Trump had not even begun speaking if you match the timelines up. And what had occurred to me afterward and during interviews with Alex Jones is that he realized what was about to happen and he needed to get out of there. I mean, he gives an interview. He said, I couldn't believe it. We had walked into a trap and we had walked into a, uh, something that was going to be orchestrated and used against us.

Um, and that was the urgency. It was wild to see at the time. I haven't quite reflected on the entire experience at all, frankly, and never told anyone about it except for right now. The reason why I think was shocking to a guy who many would call a conspiracy theorist, Alex Jones, is that everything around this speech was lively and happy, peaceful. The president of the United States had said to be peaceful and to go march around the Capitol. And what we just found out from the January 6th committee was that there was another stage set up on the other side of the Capitol where there was going to be a second rally, thus the march to the Capitol. And so it really does seem like the timelines, frankly, just do not mesh at all in this instance and in this scenario. Has your reporting found that? Well, the timeline is absolutely critical here. The initial breach on the west side of the Capitol, where I mentioned Ray Epps was very conveniently positioned ahead of time, instead of going to the Trump speech, Trump's speech, as you point out,

Trump hadn't even finished his speech by the time the initial breach occurred around 1253. But the timing is everything because everything converged to allow that initial breach to occur. Just another whopping coincidence that opens up a whole other can of worms that probably be, you know, best for when I come on again, is that the pipe bomb, this infamous pipe bomb that has all kinds of bizarre things about it was found at just a time in order to supply an excuse to the Capitol Police on the West Side that they had to divert their police officers to go and address the pipe bombs at the DNC and the RNC. And so the pipe bomb, the response to the pipe bomb, the time it was found and reported and all those details just happened to converge precisely on the timeline with that initial breach. And initially, you know, Sund and others said, oh, the pipe bombs must have been planted as a diversion tool because of that timeline convergence with the initial breach. So there are so many things that

happen in order to allow this initial breach to occur. One of them, I believe, was Ray Epps being there. He's caught also on footage telling another individual, when we go in, leave this here, referring to bear spray. That type of speech, when we go in, when we do this, that's been used in other conspiracy cases to charge people with conspiracy, an individual like George Tanio. So there's so many things going on with Epps. He's a critical part, in my view, of the story of that first and decisive breach of the Capitol at that decisive time. And the January 6th committee seems to have very little interest in him. The Department of Justice

seems to have very little interest in him, despite the fact that, as I mentioned, this is the only guy on January 5th telling people, telling a bemused crowd, we need to go into the Capitol repeatedly. I think at the very least, the public deserves to know his account of where he got that idea. Let's say, and I think the chances of this happening are very slim, but let's say that Ray Epps agreed to sit down to an interview with you. What would be your questions to Ray Epps that the New York Times miraculously failed to ask? Well, the questions that I just mentioned, I would ask for a full denial, one that doesn't lean on the specific phrase, law enforcement, because as I mentioned, there are a lot of government entities that are not

law enforcement that could conceivably have provided some kind of structure for a mission like what I think Ray Eps's was. So I would ask him in precise terms to deny that. That would be the first one. The second one is I would ask him why he didn't go to Trump's speech, which is a very weird thing for a guy traveling all the way from Arizona to hear the speech. And instead of going to the speech, he orchestrates the movement of people to the Capitol in a very methodical fashion. And then he happens to be pre-positioned right at the point of the initial breach point of the Capitol. I'd ask him how that happened.

And then finally, I'd ask, where did you get the idea to urge people into the Capitol? And why were you so doggedly insistent on that mission, despite getting negative feedback on January 5. And then we would proceed from there but I think just as a first pass, the public deserves to know his answers to the public and I've really welcome and indeed encourage him to do so, because my personal view on the matter is that Ray Epps has a crisis of conscience, I think he's conflicted. mission, but it's very possible that he didn't understand the full nature and full ramification of this mission. And in retrospect, he deeply regrets being a part of it. And so I hope that his conscience will get the better of him and that the American people will finally learn the truth about what really happened on January 6th. Referring back to your article, Jim Comer has said that he's going to launch, and Kevin McCarthy has backed him up on this, they're going to launch their own January 6th commission. It seems to be hedging here in the New York Times, talking about mysterious texts that Ray Epps sent to his nephew, other communications that Ray Epps had, as though they were preparing for these to be made public.

Your thoughts on this? Yes, that's an excellent point. And it's a bizarre thing to see this piece in the Times in the first place. You would think, given that Ray Epps is such a smoking gun for what I call the Fed's direction, why would they want to sort of re-up Epps and kind of revisit the public's attention on this individual. Well, the only sensible explanation for this is that this is the beginning of another round of damage control in anticipation of revelations along the lines that you described. There's reference to a text message that he sent his nephew where he admits that, well, what's readily available on video is that he's orchestrating the movements of people to the Capitol on January 6th. But he talks about this in

the text. I wonder exactly what his wording was. I wonder exactly what he said, how he described it. So we might learn about that. There's a case for an individual called Ryan Samsell again in the sort of iconic footage of Ray Epps whispering into somebody's ear FBI regarding what Epps told him. And I think that through the course of the trial, more information will come out that might further complicate the official narrative. And I think that's probably part of the story as to why the New York Times is running this otherwise just extremely bizarre sympathy piece for someone like Epps, when from their point of view, it'd be better if the public forgot his name entirely. Yes, because he'd been on the fringes And been sort of memory hold He was taken off, am I correct? He was taken off the FBI's most wanted list? Right, he was taken off the most wanted list

And Revolver.News was the first to report this The timeline of that is also very interesting I've forgotten the exact date But we actually interpolated using the Wayback Machine up to a five minute interval, the time that it was taken off the list. And it was taken off at a time that was the next, the day after Revolver News ran a major piece on federal involvement in January 6. And I think a couple days after a viral Twitter thread was going around, asking these questions about EPS. And so he was taken off right at the time that this whole Fed surrection idea was reaching a critical point of virality. And there's been really no mention of him ever since by the FBI, other than fruitless interrogations of people like Merrick Garland. Congressman Massey

asked Merrick Garland about him. Garland said, I can't comment on this. And other than that, there was a bizarre situation where sort of citizen reporters who went to Ray Epps' ranch to confront him. And Epps, of course, you know, sped out back into his property like a bat out of hell. He ran away. He didn't want to answer any questions. But apparently those citizen reporters the next day themselves received a kind of threatening, intimidating visit from the Phoenix FBI field office. Now, the reason that this is and there's video of this, I've seen the video. I don't obviously know the full circumstances of it, but the video is legit.

And so these citizen journalists get visited by Phoenix FBI officials and the journalist asks, so is this about Ray Epps used to be the head of the Arizona chapter of the Oath Keepers. The Oath Keepers is like the most demonized, quote unquote, militia group associated with the narrative of January 6th. Imagine the New York Times leaving that out. Imagine the Phoenix FBI field office not having heard of this guy who used to be the head of the state chapter of this main militia group. And to make it, to just put icing on the cake, Epps' lawyer is a 10-year veteran of that very Phoenix FBI field office. So these are kind of interesting circumstantial details for the most powerful stuff is in our two-part series on Ray Epps. But I think these additional details,

that I'm not saying they're dispositive or anything, they just add weirdness and suspicion to an already deeply, deeply suspicious case for Mr. Ray Epps. The new Mitsubishi Outlander brings out another side of you. Your regular side listens to classical music. Your adventurous side rocks out with the dynamic sound

Yamaha. Regular you owns a library card. Adventurous you owns the road with super all-wheel control. Regular side, alone time alone time adventurous side journeys together with third row seating the new outlander bring out your adventurous side mitsubishi motors drive your ambition perhaps you could help us by understanding who ray epps it not asking like the mean who is ray epps right there? There's the meme, obviously,

that already has drawn a conclusion. But what is his background? Did he work in law enforcement? Did he work for our military? Did he work for the Federal Bureau of Investigation? Who is Ray Epps? Well, Ray Epps, again, he has this very specific statement through his lawyers, his denial, which is saying, I do not and I've not ever worked for a law enforcement agency. And the denial really kind of, in every sentence, it adds law enforcement agency. And so I was saying, that is curious, because the specific law enforcement agency reference leaves open a lot of possibilities along the lines of military intelligence, Department of Homeland Security, role in that initial breach, including the person that I mentioned that he said, when arrangement are, as of yet, unknown. But if I were to speculate, my guess would be he's actually probably not directly associated with the FBI. And he's probably involved with a group that's more closely aligned with military and ex-military that conduct sort of counterterrorism

operations. And frankly, this type of stuff goes all the way back to the 90s with sort of creating militia groups as honeypots to attract people who might be perceived as a threat to the government. You saw a huge push of this in the 90s under Clinton. And actually, another interesting connection, the person whose portfolio was the domestic, quote unquote, domestic extremism portfolio under Clinton was none other than Merrick Garland, who happens to be the current Attorney General of the United States. So it's almost like they're getting the band back together to do a 2.0 version of this crackdown on inconvenient political groups. So two final questions on the subject. You have brought to bear a great amount of evidence in this piece of other January 6th defendants having the book thrown at them for what is arguably lesser organizing, to say it acutely. January 6th defendant, George Tanios. Am I saying

that correctly? Yep. Tanios. George Tanios faces serious conspiracy charges for saying, hold, hold, hold, not yet. It's still early. So that is written down inside of his charging documents. But that seems like small potatoes compared to multiple days of saying, and this is just quoting the man on video. I don't know Ray Epps' soul. I don't know his brain. I don't know much about his background, but I'm quoting the man on video and living color go into the Capitol. We're going into the Capitol. We have to go in. Right. That that that shit, Darren, is wild because having been you know, I was around the night before, you know, I lived in Washington, D.C. I covered riots, rallies, all manner of every conceivable event in Washington, D.C., from the March for Life to the Antifa burning down the White House. Right. Hear me when I say no one

was saying go into the Capitol, not the president and not like the goon squad. No one was saying go into the Capitol. And so it does seem like there is at the very least on its face, not taking anything to fair, nothing about Ray Epps. It does seem to be an absolute smack in the face hierarchy because Ray Epps, by my viewing of the evidence, is the most guilty individual currently on camera operating on January 6th. Would you agree with that assessment? Well, I don't know about the most. There's another individual called Scaffold Commander who remarkably, unlike Epps, never even made it onto the FBI most wanted list in the first place and who, unlike Epps, remains completely unidentified. And he's one of the stars of our second part of the Ray Epps series. I would

put him up there with Ray Epps. But yes, there's something about the special virality and the nature of this guy on January 5th saying, go into the Capitol, into the Capitol repeatedly. And incidentally, prefacing both exhortations with the expectation that he would be arrested. And both times he said, you know, I probably shouldn't say this because I'll get arrested, or I'm probably going to go to jail for this, but he's like acknowledging in the sentence that he's encouraging illegal behavior. And I guess that would be another question I'd ask Epps if he would agree to an interview is, well, you said you'd probably get arrested. Why haven't you got it? What's your what's your prevailing theory for that?

But no, it's it's and it's not like it was just some drunk guy on the street who just was, you know, coming up with nonsense. The same guy who was saying this was there early in the morning on January 6. He was a Where's Waldo type figure on January 6. He was everywhere directing people to the Capitol. And he admits this himself in the text message referred to in the Times saying that he was orchestrating the movements of people to the Capitol. And he was just happened to be pre-positioned at the initial breach site, at the right place, at the right time. He talks to the guy that I mentioned who did go into the Capitol. He said, when we go in, and by the standards of conspiracy applied to George Tanios, for him to say, when we go and leave this

here, they have a conspiracy case on him because the guy actually did go into the Capitol, the guy he said that to. And then two seconds before that initial and decisive breach, he whispers into the ear of one of the first people who bust down the barricades. And it's not like I'm just noticing this. Everybody noticed it. The FBI noticed it initially when they put him on his most wanted list. The New York Times noticed it when they made him a star of their own documentary and how scary the January 6th stuff was. And now all of a sudden, he's become the darling of the January 6th committee and the New York Times. It sounds like they're hedging. My final question for you, Darren, what is to become of this man in this story? You end your piece, and I encourage everyone to go read it. And I also

must encourage everyone to pre-order a copy of the January 6th committee report. Darren Beatty has an introduction for it, and we'll make sure that there is a link in our description of this video for a pre-order for that report. I very much look forward to reading it. But you end your piece here, Darren, on Revolver News, which of course we are always referencing and often citing, saying that the game is up if you find a single person working in concert with law enforcement. Now, the FBI was asked point blank by Ted Cruz whether you had agents in the audience. And of course, you get the sources and methods wrote response. Right. But is this why the, as you put it, and I quote, regime janitors are janitors at the New York Times know that it's going to official narrative, that no one will dare do it.

And they're going to pull out all the tools of intimidation that they have in order to make that a reality. Luckily for us, for the American people, and for people who care about the truth, I think they're too late on this. They needed to do the damage control effort probably back October of last year. They're too late. Everybody knows about Ray Epps now. He's almost become this iconic mimetic figure due to just how blatant his activity was. And I, you know, despite how formidable the resources are that the regime has at its disposal, I don't see them putting this back in the tube. They got there too late. And I think it's only going to get worse for them. One follow up to what you just said. What would you advise if you got a phone call from Comer, Jim Jordan tonight, what would you advise them to do as

pursuant a January 6th Truth and Reconciliation Committee? Well, that's a great question. At the very least, I would expect them to subpoena Ray Epps and not only subpoena Ray Epps and interview him, but make public the interviews that have already been conducted with Ray Epps. January 6th committee has already interviewed him at least once. And while they're busy, you know, making a great spectacle about some low level staffer, making up fabulous tales of Trump, you know, grabbing the steering wheel, they could actually be, you know, educating the public on what this guy said, who was the first known person to say, let's go into the Capitol. So I would focus on

that if we have the opportunity in the near future. Little grandmothers with 25 cent American flags from Walmart are rotting in federal prison. And, and the guy saying we must go into the Capitol and then standing at the barricades, is it driving around in an RV living his best life? Yeah. They say a trailer, but it's really an RV. It's a, there's a nice RV. You can see it in the photos. Nice RV. Clarence Thomas would be proud. Exactly. Please ladies and gentlemen, visit Revolver News. Go to revolver.news. You got to see their reporting. And most importantly, subscribe. It's going to be the best subscription you'll make

in a very long time. They're an incredible site and they're doing God's work. And it's all because of Darren Beatty. Darren, thank you so much for being on the program. Thank you so much. Former MLB All-Star Sean Casey, aka The Mayor, keeps hitting it out of the park. Take my 30 years of experience. Take the wisdom and knowledge I've learned from the failures when I got sent down my rookie year,

all the injuries I had to overcome. Your mind is the most important thing you have in life. Be relentless, keep charging. It matters how you talk to yourself, how you look at the world. That matters. We talk about that. I don't know. I'm fired up. Baseball's back and it's going to be incredible. I love it. The Mayor's Office with Sean Casey from Believe. Follow and listen on your favorite platform.