Gretchen Whitmer
Remember a while back when it hit the news that the FBI busted up a ring of people who were looking to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer at the height of the Covid-19 lockdown insanity? Buzzfeed News has just published a lengthy story examining the plot and what led up to the bust.

The piece is framed as this big exposé on right-wing domestic terrorism culminating in the plot to kidnap the Governor of Michigan.

The only problem? Yeah, it looks like it might have been a setup from the start.

no big surprise
Now, remember, this is from left-wing Buzzfeed. Not some conservative news outlet or Alex Jones conspiracist network.

Here is the important conclusion from the Buzzfeed story that, for some reason, they don't see as a very important issue.

The FBI had informants in the group, taking orders from the FBI. And it turns out that, again, under the direction of the FBI, these informants encouraged the illegal actions. According to the Buzzfeed investigation the FBI, "had a hand in nearly every aspect of the alleged plot, starting with its inception."

You read that right. The FBI and their informants/infiltrators were key figures in HATCHING the plot that led to the arrest of more than a dozen men who were supposedly radical terrorists.

Buzzfeed goes as far as to raise this VERY serious issue, "The extent of their involvement raises questions as to whether there would have even been a conspiracy without them."

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!

This entire plot that made national news about a band of "rightwing" militia members kidnapping the governor of a state was orchestrated by the FBI from the beginning?

Here are just some examples of why Buzzfeed came to this conclusion.
A longtime government informant from Wisconsin, for example, helped organize a series of meetings around the country where many of the alleged plotters first met one another and the earliest notions of a plan took root, some of those people say. The Wisconsin informant even paid for some hotel rooms and food as an incentive to get people to come.
So, one of the FBI informants actually went out of his way to try to bring together nut cases from around the country, putting them together in the same place, and planting the idea of kidnapping in their head.

That's just for starters.
The Iraq War vet, for his part, became so deeply enmeshed in a Michigan militant group that he rose to become its second-in-command, encouraging members to collaborate with other potential suspects and paying for their transportation to meetings. He prodded the alleged mastermind of the kidnapping plot to advance his plan, then baited the trap that led to the arrest.
Here's another FBI co-conspirator who rose up to second-in-command of the group and encouraged them to bring in more and more people. He prodded the leader into actually going through with the plan. He paid their way to meetups! Would this plot even have come together without the FBI doing all this?

This is a case where 15 people were charged and, according to Buzzfeed, the group also included MORE THAN A DOZEN POLICE AND FBI INFORMANTS.

NEARLY HALF OF THE GROUP WAS MADE UP OF THE FBI INFORMANTS.

This does not seem like some grand multi-state conspiracy by a bunch of right-wing lunatics. Seems more like a conspiracy by the FBI to gather together a bunch of fringe anti-government people online and put them together and encourage them to commit a crime for which they could be arrested.

The Buzzfeed article shows the plot in great detail. Under the direction of the FBI, their informant brought multiple groups together to form a larger group and then convinced the larger group to plot to commit the crime.

But don't worry guys, even though the FBI planned the kidnapping plot and brought all the key players together, they were bad guys after all. As evidence of this, Buzzfeed presents this group of memes that were shared among the "terrorist" group.

Gretchen Whitmer 2
You see, they shared memes calling Whitmer a Commie and a Nazi. LOCK 'EM UP!

guy in jail
Before the FBI got involved this was a group of meme sharers who were libertarian/anarchists and pro-second amendment advocates. There was absolutely no serious plot to do any serious harm until the FBI got involved and started baiting the group into violence, according to the report.

One of the defendants has pled guilty, and will likely flip to assist the prosecution, but the rest have pled not guilty and at least one defendant has filed an entrapment suit.

And, from what we see here, it looks like he might have a strong case for entrapment.

And, it's important that while this didn't come from a mainstream journalism outfit, it did come from Buzzfeed. Buzzfeed is about as far left as you can go, and they are not AT ALL sympathetic to the defendants in the case. And still, the woke lefties at Buzzfeed recognize that the plot might not have taken place if the FBI didn't instigate it.

While there's no defense of people willing to go along with an elaborate kidnapping plot, if this report is right, what the FBI did here is beyond the pale.