Graham Platner, Sarah Unsicker, and Democratic Standards

Search transcript0:000 secondsIn December of 2023, a four-time elected Democrat in Missouri running for attorney general was removed from her committees over a single photograph. The0:099 secondsstory that ran nationally said she’d posed with a Holocaust denier. 7 weeks earlier, that same man had publicly0:1616 secondsidentified himself by name in a national magazine as an FBI informant. Nobody told American voters that part, that the0:2323 secondspolitician was meeting with a man who had publicly said he infiltrated American extremist networks to report back to the FBI. In December 2023, the0:3232 secondsDemocratic Party’s posture was that a single photo with someone tied to right-wing circles could end you.

Today, that same party has a Senate candidate0:4141 secondsin Maine with a tattoo that replicates the insignia of the SS branch that ran Hitler’s death camps. This episode of Game Theory Today is about who decides0:5050 secondswhich story the American people get to hear. The Democratic Party’s behavior and narrative construction deserves a complete professional analysis on0:5757 secondsnational security grounds and that’s what we will do today. I want to be clear that this is analytical content, not partisan. This is not about the1:041 minute, 4 secondsRepublican party or the Green Party or the Block Kequa being any better or any worse. It’s about a specific entity that1:111 minute, 11 secondsengaged in behavior that requires scrutiny because it’s ongoing and so are the risks.

And before I go further, you should know I’m not a neutral narrator1:191 minute, 19 secondshere. I’m one of the people in that photograph. I worked with Representative Sarah Unsuker. So weigh what I say accordingly and check every document I1:271 minute, 27 secondsput on screen because I’m going to put them all on screen. Here’s my standing to read these facts. I’ve been an intelligence analyst since 1997,1:341 minute, 34 secondspublished in my profession since 2000, a published book author in multiple languages since 2006. In 2018, I was named a fellow of the Council of1:431 minute, 43 secondsCompetitive Intelligence. And in 2022, Vladimir Putin personally sanctioned me for my work on foreign interference in1:501 minute, 50 secondsAmerican elections.

I tell you that not to impress you. I tell you that so when I say this is how narrative construction works, you know it’s a professional1:581 minute, 58 secondsjudgment, not a grievance. I’m an expert in how hostile foreign powers plant narratives in the media. and what the Democratic Party did, despite my own2:062 minutes, 6 secondsinvolvement in it, is a technique more often associated with autocratic regimes than with liberal democracies. After more than two years of silence about2:142 minutes, 14 secondsthis story, and given the candidates the Democratic Party has since blessed, it’s important for the American people to reckon with that party’s behavior.2:212 minutes, 21 secondsBefore we get to the malign narrative, we need to establish what happened on a factual basis.

We start with a woman named Sarah Louise Unsuker Nay Edgars.2:302 minutes, 30 secondsSarah was born in Colorado and raised in Plano, Texas. She earned a degree in German literature from Valpariso University and then a jurist doctor from2:382 minutes, 38 secondsthe Washington University in St. Louis Law School, one of the top 20 programs in America. She built a boutique law practice focused on protecting children2:472 minutes, 47 secondsand families in St. Louis courts. She was married with two children and once they were in school, she ran for the Missouri House of Representatives as a2:542 minutes, 54 secondsDemocrat. She beat We Webster Grove City Councilman Greg Mueller. On November 8th, 2016, while the presidential ballots were still being counted, Sarah3:033 minutes, 3 secondsUnuker won House District 91 with over 56% of the vote.

At a time when many liberals were grieving the election of3:103 minutes, 10 secondsDonald Trump, her win was called a bright spot for Missouri Democrats.3:143 minutes, 14 secondsElected in 2016, reelected in 2018, 2020, and 2022. Her peers made her policy chair of the House Democratic3:223 minutes, 22 secondsCaucus. She was a ranking member on the committee handling children and families and she became an advocate for people with disabilities and for Medicaid3:303 minutes, 30 secondsexpansion. She ran uncontested in 2020 for both her seat and policy chair. In 2021, Unsuker heard testimony from3:383 minutes, 38 secondsstudents abused at the Agape Boarding School, a notorious now shuttered institution at the center of numerous civil suits and a federal criminal3:473 minutes, 47 secondsprosecution.

The state’s blind eye towards schools like Agape and Circle of Hope sharpened her focus on protecting3:543 minutes, 54 secondschildren from the institutions already meant to protect them. On September 22nd, 2021, Sarah Ensker met me for the4:014 minutes, 1 secondfirst time. She reached out to ask about my experience with Missouri family court corruption. We sat down for coffee and I described what I believed to be systemic4:104 minutes, 10 secondscorruption and routine commission of federal felonies. A few days later, the US Department of Health and Human Services published a report about4:174 minutes, 17 secondsroughly a thousand Missouri foster kids going missing each year and the risk that they would be sex trafficked.

Fresh4:254 minutes, 25 secondsoff our discussions, Unsuker asked if I knew about this as an intelligence analyst. I’d already read the HHS report4:334 minutes, 33 secondsand I sent her a link to it. She then asked me to testify before her Children and Families Committee on the risk to Missouri children from transnational4:414 minutes, 41 secondsorganized crime. And on October 5th, 2021, I did not having governance in place to keep track of kids is good news for one group4:504 minutes, 50 secondsof people, organized crime, uh they are principally behind most of the trafficking4:584 minutes, 58 secondsaccording to the United Nations. So when you lose kids out of that system for whatever reason, that’s who picks up the slack.5:075 minutes, 7 secondsSo in your professional opinion, how does Missouri rank?

I mean as as with5:135 minutes, 13 secondsthis OIG report of our data collection in your professional opinion I think it’s catastrophic. I think we are in a5:215 minutes, 21 secondscrisis mode and I’ve been saying this for a long time.5:255 minutes, 25 secondsThis is the crossroads of America in all the good ways and all the worst ways. Um and organized crime here has been well known uh since prohibition and before.5:375 minutes, 37 secondsIn 2023, Sarah Unuker announced her campaign for Missouri Attorney General.5:425 minutes, 42 secondsShe participated in a debate with another Missouri Democrat, Elad Gross, a civil rights attorney who had never held office. When an audience member asked5:505 minutes, 50 secondsthe candidates about organized crime, Gross treated it as a relic, guys with Tommy guns.

Unsker said unequivocally5:575 minutes, 57 secondsthat it was a present danger driven by transnational organized crime. Hold that in your mind. a four-time elected legislator, former policy chair with a6:066 minutes, 6 secondsdocumented history on the record dealing with the most serious kinds of crime.6:126 minutes, 12 secondsThat’s the person whose story the Democratic Party was about to overwrite by brute force. a woman with a top law degree who served her party as a6:216 minutes, 21 secondsstalwart policy expert who’d never shown any flirtation with extremist ideology of any kind, no history of extreme6:286 minutes, 28 secondsopinions, and little deviation from her focus on protecting children.

But she was now on record about transnational6:356 minutes, 35 secondsorganized crime and child trafficking in Missouri, a state where the federal government had identified children disappearing from the foster system into6:446 minutes, 44 secondsexploitation by the most dangerous foreign criminals. In 2023, she ran her campaign with the help of an expert in organized crime and foreign election6:526 minutes, 52 secondsinterference, me. and I introduced her to a colleague who had approached me in 2022 saying he worked regularly with federal law enforcement and wanted to help the work Unseer and I had begun.7:037 minutes, 3 secondsThat man was Charles C. Johnson. I’d long held a low opinion of Johnson.

I had called him worse than unflattering things on Twitter because of his proximity to Steve Bannon and Wikileaks.7:157 minutes, 15 secondsBut Charles had told me it was an act to get inside right-wing extremist networks and that he reported to the FBI. His7:227 minutes, 22 secondsaccount was corroborated by FBI special agent Jonathan Buma who went public about his relationship with Johnson in Business Insider in October 2023.7:327 minutes, 32 secondsKeep the dates in mind because they matter. Unsuker never met Charles C.7:367 minutes, 36 secondsJohnson before December 3rd, 2023. Their conversation was about novel technologies to keep foster kids from7:447 minutes, 44 secondsbeing lost and about using genomic genealogy to clear the cold case backlog in prosecutor’s offices.

Johnson had7:527 minutes, 52 secondspublicly declared himself an FBI confidential human source codeamed genius working in his own words on7:597 minutes, 59 secondsforeign interference in American elections. He did that in a national outlet weeks before the photograph. So8:068 minutes, 6 secondswhen Unseer met him, she met him on that basis, a man who had publicly presented himself as an FBI source on exactly the8:148 minutes, 14 secondssame subjects that she worked on. Now is Johnson a controversial figure? Yes. The Anti-Defamation League has characterized8:228 minutes, 22 secondshim as a Holocaust denier. He disputes that label and has litigated over it.8:278 minutes, 27 secondsI’m not here to adjudicate that.

Here’s the point, and it’s a professional one.8:318 minutes, 31 secondsWhen a public figure has two documented, publicly available descriptions attached to him, self-declared FBI informant and8:398 minutes, 39 secondsADLsighted Holocaust denier, and the press runs only one of them. That’s not reporting. That’s selection. Somebody8:488 minutes, 48 secondschose which file to open. The Democratic Party and the American corporate media made the same selection. Watch the8:558 minutes, 55 secondsconstruction step by step. December 3rd, 2023, Uner meets Charles Johnson for9:019 minutes, 1 secondcoffee. December 4th, Unsuker starts asking state officials whether they’re coordinating with federal officials on missing foster kids as required by law.9:119 minutes, 11 secondsThe answer she gets on the record is no.9:159 minutes, 15 secondsDecember 6th, 2023.

The Riverfront Times runs a story about her posting a photo with Charles Johnson, who is described9:239 minutes, 23 secondsonly as a Holocaust denier. She was a candidate, and I can tell you as her campaign manager, Riverfront Times did9:309 minutes, 30 secondsnot contact the campaign for comment or fact check. On the strength of that narrative, Sarah Ense was removed from9:389 minutes, 38 secondsher committees by Crystal Quaid on December 7th. On December 8th, the Associated Press ran a story with no9:459 minutes, 45 secondsnamed author built on the words of one person, House Minority Leader Crystal Quaid. The candidate side not in it. I9:539 minutes, 53 secondswas the campaign manager. As first person witness, the campaign again was not contacted for comment before publication.

Several outlets ran10:0210 minutes, 2 secondsversions of this same pattern. the party leader characterization, the opponent’s framing, no call to the person being characterized, and no mention of the10:1010 minutes, 10 secondsinformant disclosure that was already public. Then in February of 2024, when Sarah Uncer tried to file to run for governor as a Democrat, the party apparatus refused to accept her filing.10:2210 minutes, 22 secondsThat was reported by the Associated Press. The campaign was not contacted.10:2710 minutes, 27 secondsThere was more back and forth, but the narrative was baked in. Unsuker had a basil lemonade with a man the Anti-Defamation League had labeled.10:3510 minutes, 35 secondsThere was a picture.

No other context was required. That he was there in his capacity as a federal informant and that the discussion was about protecting10:4410 minutes, 44 secondschildren irrelevant to the Democratic party. That was the standard they set.10:5010 minutes, 50 secondsThe party demonstrated with Unuker that it can end a candidate over an association. So watch where that power10:5710 minutes, 57 secondsgets used and where it doesn’t. Exhibit one, Maine 2026. A Democratic Senate candidate had a tattoo resembling the11:0511 minutes, 5 secondsTotten cop, the insignia of the SS branch that ran the death camps. He says he didn’t know what it was and had it11:1311 minutes, 13 secondscovered. He kept running.

This isn’t that he had coffee with somebody with a Nazi tattoo. It’s his tattoo. The11:2111 minutes, 21 secondsDemocratic Party has no problem associating with him. Vermont’s Senator Bernie Sanders endorsed him. Exhibit11:2911 minutes, 29 secondstwo. New Jersey 2026. Adam Hamawi, an Egyptian-B born surgeon and US Army veteran, won the Democratic primary in11:3711 minutes, 37 secondsNew Jerseys 12th district and is favored to win in November. He has a documented association with Omar Abdul Raman, the11:4511 minutes, 45 secondsblind chic, convicted in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing conspiracy. Court testimony shows Hamawi knew him from11:5411 minutes, 54 secondsboyhood, traveled with him, provided translation, and testified for him at the 1995 federal trial.

Hamayi was never12:0212 minutes, 2 secondscharged with anything, and he’s a decorated veteran. Senator Tammy Duckworth credits him with saving her life. He’s also called Israel’s conduct12:1112 minutes, 11 secondsin Gaza genocide and run against Israel’s influence in American politics.12:1612 minutes, 16 secondsNone of that slowed him down. The Congressional Progressive Caucus, Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Okasiocortez, Rashida Clyde endorsed him by name. I’ll12:2512 minutes, 25 secondsnote the asymmetry honestly. The attacks on Hamawi came mostly from the right and from pro-Israel groups. And his own party’s progressive wing rallied to him.12:3412 minutes, 34 secondsThe opposite of what happened to Unsuker, who was attacked from inside her own party.

But the bottom line is the same. A documented association with12:4212 minutes, 42 secondsthe blind shake didn’t end him. The party elevated him. Exhibit 3, Florida, 2026.12:5012 minutes, 50 secondsLev Parnes, convicted of fraud, convicted in connection with funneling foreign money into American elections. A12:5812 minutes, 58 secondsparticipant in the 2019 Ukraine operation that also ran through Andre Durk, designated by the US Treasury as an active agent of Russian intelligence.13:0813 minutes, 8 secondsParnes has claimed he helped build MAGA.13:1113 minutes, 11 secondsIn 2026, he’s running for Congress as a Democrat this time on an anti-corruption message. The Democratic Party has no13:2013 minutes, 20 secondsproblem associating with him.

So, let’s name the pattern of selection. In 2023, the Democratic Party’s posture was one13:2713 minutes, 27 secondsphoto, one person the ADL has flagged one time. That’s it. Anti-semitism, they said, is the worst thing in the world.13:3613 minutes, 36 secondsThey partner with the ADL to define it, and you won’t be merely beaten at the polls. You will not be allowed to run in the party where you currently hold13:4413 minutes, 44 secondsoffice, where you have been the state party’s policy chair. The party talks to the press. The press doesn’t call you for a quote. They don’t fact check the13:5313 minutes, 53 secondsnarrative. Not even the part where the man in the photo is on the record, confirmed by an FBI special agent as an informant who infiltrated those very groups for the federal government.

Nope.14:0314 minutes, 3 secondsOne photo. That’s all it takes. After the story runs, you’re thrown off your committees. No hearing where you can call witnesses or offer evidence. And14:1114 minutes, 11 secondsyour constituents who had representation on those committees, they don’t get a say either. One photo, political death14:1714 minutes, 17 secondssentence. Skip ahead two years. There’s a man, not just with a Nazi tattoo, but a death camp operator tattoo, and he’s14:2714 minutes, 27 secondsfine. There’s a man with a documented association with a convicted terrorist cleric, and he’s fine. Then there’s a14:3514 minutes, 35 secondsconvicted felon who took money traceable to an olgarch tied to Russian organized crime and who took part in the 2019 operation that also ran through a14:4414 minutes, 44 secondsTreasury designated Russian agent, an operation aimed at the 2020 Democratic candidate Joe Biden, and he’s fine.

In14:5214 minutes, 52 secondsfact, he was the subject of a documentary produced by Rachel Matto. He gets reinvented without a hint of self-awareness as the anti-corruption15:0115 minutes, 1 secondcandidate. A man with a literal conviction for financial fraud. Four candidates, one political party. One had15:0915 minutes, 9 secondsher reputation torn to shreds for being photographed with a federal informant.15:1415 minutes, 14 secondsAnd consider the context. This year, the Southern Poverty Law Center, America’s most famous civil rights organization,15:2115 minutes, 21 secondswas federally indicted over a program of paying sources inside extremist groups.15:2615 minutes, 26 secondsThe SPLC has pleaded not guilty and calls it a vindictive prosecution.

The case is unresolved and politically charged, and you should treat the15:3415 minutes, 34 secondsallegations as allegations. But here’s the part its own defenders concede. They don’t deny the SPLC placed paid sources15:4215 minutes, 42 secondsinside hate groups. They argue it was legitimate intelligence gathering, the kind the FBI also does. In other words,15:5015 minutes, 50 secondsrunning sources inside extremist groups is normal, defensible counter extremism work. Yet, two years ago, a single15:5815 minutes, 58 secondsconversation with one self-declared federal source was enough to rewrite Sarah Unuker’s entire life story. These16:0716 minutes, 7 secondsare different states, different party organizations.

I’m not claiming one office pulled every string. What’s consistent isn’t a person. It’s the16:1616 minutes, 16 secondsstandard and the narrative machine that applies it. And the standard doesn’t track conduct. None of this was ever16:2316 minutes, 23 secondsabout Sarah Unsecur’s behavior, which by any measure is exemplary. She took a top legal education that could have made her wealthy and used it to protect the16:3216 minutes, 32 secondsvulnerable and serve the public honorably. And for that matter, none of it was really about Charles C. Johnson either. A man unquestionably mixed up16:4016 minutes, 40 secondswith shady characters, but who was on the record doing what America’s most famous civil rights group has apparently done for decades.

Whether this story is16:4916 minutes, 49 secondswritten about you is the rosy one or the ruinous one appears not to depend on what you did, but on how you’re judged16:5616 minutes, 56 secondsby some unaccountable part of the Democratic Party’s orbit, convenient or inconvenient. That’s what I want you to sit with. Not the other team is evil.17:0617 minutes, 6 secondsSomething quieter and more disturbing than a major party in America with the help of the press can take a documented17:1317 minutes, 13 secondspublic record decades of a person’s life and overwrite it with a story that is false at every level. Factually, Sarah17:2117 minutes, 21 secondsEnse was not an anti-semite, not a covert conservative, nothing but a lifelong liberal and a defender of the powerless.

And here’s the inconvenient17:3017 minutes, 30 secondstiming. She had just begun examining the role of transnational organized crime in child trafficking and not long after her political career was destroyed.17:4117 minutes, 41 secondsThe reason given was anti-semitism and bad associations. But measured against what the party and its candidates have17:4817 minutes, 48 secondsdone this year, that reason doesn’t track.17:5317 minutes, 53 secondsThere’s no evidence that it’s really why they did what they did to Sarah Unuker.17:5817 minutes, 58 secondsThe Democratic Party needs to explain itself. Its leadership and its donors shouldn’t be allowed to hide this. They need to say on the record why a death18:0718 minutes, 7 secondscamp tattoo is acceptable this year.

Why a documented association with a convicted terrorist is acceptable this year, but a single photo with a federal18:1618 minutes, 16 secondsinformant two years ago was not. The leaders of the Democratic Party shouldn’t be able to hide behind a loose network of incurious reporters and rival candidates to do this kind of thing.18:2718 minutes, 27 secondsThey should answer for it. The American people deserve that. Sarah Unuker doesn’t sit in the Missouri House anymore. She’s relocated more than a18:3518 minutes, 35 secondsthousand miles from the seat she held four times and she’s rebuilding her life. I’m not asking you to take my account on faith. I’ve shown you the18:4218 minutes, 42 secondsfilings, the headlines, the dates.

Check them all. Then ask the question I think is owed an answer. The party proved with18:4918 minutes, 49 secondsSarah Unuker that it can end a candidacy over an association. It should explain why it did that to her and why it hasn’t18:5718 minutes, 57 secondsdone this to the others. That’s not a partisan question. It’s a question about whether anyone gets to rewrite your story without answering for it. I’m Eric Garland. This is Game Theory Today.19:0819 minutes, 8 secondsThese are the questions that a professional intelligence analyst asks.19:1219 minutes, 12 secondsYou can draw your own conclusions. And that’s rather the point. Keep thinking.Sync to video time