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Economist Paul Krugman. (photo: Getty Images)
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Investigators move the body of Michael Forest Reinoehl after he was shot and killed by law enforcement on September 3, 2020 in Lacey, Washington. (photo: Nathan Howard/Getty Images)
ALSO SEE: In His Last Hours, Portland Murder Suspect
Said He Feared Arrest
Police Don't Have Their Story Straight About the Killing of Michael Reinoehl
Tess Owen, VICE
Owen writes: "Two different police jurisdictions involved in the killing of Michael Forest Reinoehl are giving divergent accounts of how it happened - and a third account, from a bystander, is fueling rumors on the left and the right."
He'd been on the run since he was named as a suspect in the fatal shooting of a supporter of the far-right Patriot Prayer last weekend.
It’s also being picked up by media outlets across the country.
The official account from the Thurston County Sheriff’s Department in Washington state is that Reinoehl, a self-described antifa activist, was running away when he was shot dead by officers with the “Fugitive Task Force.”
“During the attempt to apprehend him, shots were fired at the suspect in the vehicle and he fled from the vehicle on foot,” they said in a statement, which also noted that the incident occurred around 7 p.m. local time. “Additional shots were fired at the suspect and he was pronounced deceased at the location.”
Meanwhile, the U.S. Marshals leading the task force said they “attempted to peacefully arrest Reinoehl” and only shot him when he “produced a firearm, threatening the lives of law enforcement officers.”
“Task force members responded to the threat and struck the suspect, who was pronounced dead at the scene,” they asserted in a statement. No officers were harmed.
Wild eyewitness accounts
In the absence of a cohesive narrative from the authorities, wild eyewitness accounts are gaining steam. Neighbors Chase Cutler and Chad Smith told the Olympian newspaper that they were working on cars in the area when they saw several unmarked SUVs pull up to the suspect, who was in his car.
“The man got out of his vehicle and began to fire what they believe was an assault rifle at the SUVs,” the Olympian reported. “They said they heard 40 or 50 shots, then officers returned fire, hitting the man.” “It reminded me of a video game,” Cutler told the outlet. Neither he nor Smith responded to VICE News’ request for comment.
This alternate narrative describing “40 to 50” shots has shaped conversation about the shooting on the right — and has even made its way into headlines in the New York Post and Daily Mail.
A Chad Smith quoted in the Seattle Times gave a totally different version of events than the one he (or another Chad Smith) had given the Olympian. (A public records search of men named Chad Smith in Lacey, Washington, returned 31 options).
Chad Smith told the Seattle Times that he was eating dinner outside when a car “accelerated down the street and turned abruptly into an apartment complex.”
Smith told the Seattle Times that he and two other men went to go see what had happened, and then heard what he described as “bursts of semi-automatic fire.” Then, he said, he saw the suspect get out of his car, pull out his gun, and start shooting at officers. “At that point the suspect was shooting and walking backwards,” Smith told the Seattle times. Officers fired back more, he said. The entire shooting was about a minute to a minute and a half long.
“I thought it was fireworks”
Jashon Spencer, who describes himself as a resident of the area, posted a graphic video of the aftermath showing a man — presumably Reinoehl — lying on the ground as someone attempts to give him CPR. “I think he’s dead — yeah, I think he’s dead, for real,” Spencer says on the video. “I was sitting in my backyard when all I heard was, ‘pop, pop, pop, pop, pop….I thought it was fireworks at first.”
Later he pans the camera down. “See all those yellow markings? Those are bullets — they let loose on him,” he says.
The Thurston County Sheriff’s Department, citing the ongoing investigation, declined to say definitively whether Reinoehl discharged or brandished his weapon. However, they confirmed to VICE News that he had a handgun on his person — not a rifle.
Rumors and conflicting accounts are also circulating on leftist social media. For example, Resistance Media, which has nearly 69,000 followers on Facebook, wrote: “witnesses reported 2 SUVs pull up beside Michael and immediately fired 30 to 40 shots into his vehicle.”
“Two SUVs (no flashing lights reported),” wrote one Twitter user with the name “Anti-Fascist Bunnies”. “30-40 shots. Sounds like termination with extreme prejudice.”
Despite the ongoing investigation into the shooting, and scant details about what actually happened, Attorney General Bill Barr is claiming Thursday’s events as a victory for law enforcement. “The tracking down of Reinoehl — a dangerous fugitive, admitted Antifa member, and suspected murderer — is a significant accomplishment in the ongoing effort to restore law and order to Portland and other cities,” he said in a statement.
Reinoehl, a 43-year-old father of two, was hiding out at an apartment complex in Lacey, Washington, about 120 miles north of Portland, and had been on the run since he was named as a suspect in the shooting and killing of a far-right protester during a rally last weekend. In a conversation with a local freelancer published by VICE News, Reinoehl appeared to confess to the crime and claimed he’d acted in self-defense. The interview aired on VICE TV on Thursday night.
U.S. Marshals were looking for Reinoehl at the request of the Portland Police Department, who’d issued a warrant for his arrest earlier Thursday.
His death at the hands of police — and the conflicting narratives — comes at a particularly charged moment for Portland, and the country as a whole. Reinoehl had been a regular presence at the protests that have raged through Portland for more than 90 consecutive days, since the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Last Saturday, a caravan of pro-Trump activists drove into downtown Portland to confront protesters. It was during that protest that Reinoehl encountered Aaron “Jay” Danielson, who’s been described as a supporter of the far-right group Patriot Prayer. In the interview that aired on VICE TV, Reinoehl said he acted in self-defense, though he did not overtly admit to shooting and killing Danielson.
In a DOJ statement, Barr said officers shot and killed Reinoehl when he “attempted to escape arrest and produced a firearm.” “The streets of our cities are safer with this violent agitator removed,” Barr said, “and the actions that led to his location are an unmistakable demonstration that the United States will be governed by law, not violent mobs.”
Postmaster General Louis DeJoy is accused of giving employees bonuses to cover up his political donations to GOP candidates when he was chief executive of New Breed Logistics. (photo: Tom Williams/AP)
The Legal Lines Louis DeJoy's Alleged Campaign Contribution Reimbursements May Have Crossed
Amber Phillips, The Washington Post
Phillips writes: "Campaign finance laws are set up to prevent precisely what former employees of Postmaster General Louis DeJoy allege he did: lean on employees to donate money to political candidates and then reimburse them for it using company money."
“There are a lot of things in campaign finance law you can get away with, a lot of gray area or places where the law is weak,” said Meredith McGehee, the executive director of Issue One, which advocates for stronger campaign finance laws. “This is one place where the law is clear and has been enforced.”
The law is clear, but it’s less certain whether DeJoy could face consequences. Let’s walk through specific ways this could be illegal and what, if anything, could happen to DeJoy.
First, here’s a summary of the allegations: Five people who worked at DeJoy’s former company, New Breed Logistics, told The Washington Post that they were encouraged to attend fundraisers DeJoy held and give thousands of dollars to GOP candidates. Two former employees said DeJoy engineered bonuses for these people that covered the cost of the donations, plus any taxes they would pay on their bonuses. Campaign finance records reviewed by The Post suggest that this could have gone on from about 2000 to 2014, when DeJoy sold the company.
DeJoy’s spokesman told the Post that DeJoy was not aware that any employees had felt pressured to make donations, but did not directly address the assertions that DeJoy reimbursed workers for making contributions. He pointed to a statement in which he said DeJoy “believes that he has always followed campaign fundraising laws and regulations.”.
Campaign finance experts say there are three federal laws these allegations seem to break, all of them serious.
1. Covering up the source of donations
The Post tallied up at least $1 million in donations to Republican candidates from New Breed employees when DeJoy headed the company. DeJoy, already a prolific Republican fundraiser, couldn’t legally give all that money to candidates’ campaigns himself because there are limits on how much one person can give. So he’s accused of obscuring his donations by having other people — employees who worked for him — write checks, and then paying them back through the company.
Experts say that’s a pretty straightforward case of masking where the donations are coming from to give more than is allowed. It’s also common in these cases for the money to be masked via bonuses.
“With the facts presented, it’s a run-of-the-mill but very illegal corporate straw donor scheme,” said Adav Noti, a former top lawyer with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) and now with the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan campaign finance watchdog.
“A wink and a nod to provide reimbursement crosses the [legal] line,” McGehee said.
2. Using corporate money to cover up these donations
Companies can’t give to political candidates. In fact, before the 2010 Citizens United case, they couldn’t give money to politicians at all. (Now they can contribute via political action committees.)
DeJoy’s company is accused of paying bonuses to employees who gave money directly to candidates since about 2000. That would be a clear violation of the most basic tenets of campaign finance law.
“Corporate contributions through bonuses and potentially coercing people to make this contribution are among the most serious violations of campaign finance laws,” said Lawrence Noble, a former general counsel for the FEC who is now with the Campaign Legal Center. “Because you are taking prohibited contributions from a corporation, and you’re funneling it through employees.”
In 2014, the former head of the Fiesta Bowl corporation was sentenced to eight months in prison for a scheme to have employees make political contributions and reimburse them with bonuses. In 2006, Freddie Mac had to pay nearly $4 million in fines for using corporate resources for political fundraising.
Noble said what stands out in the DeJoy allegations is how synchronized the donations-to-bonuses cycle is alleged to have been. “It’s rare to see it that blatant,” he said.
3. Potentially coercing employees to give
There’s a potential third allegation in the article, but it would be tough to prove based on what we know and the nature of the law. It can be difficult to know whether an employee was solicited or forced to donate. The former is legal in some cases and unethical in others; the latter is illegal.
The FEC has narrowed its definition of coercion over the years, making it even harder to pin that down, said Melanie Sloan with the government watchdog group American Oversight.
There is more leniency in the law for senior executives to be cajoled into giving, said Noti of the Campaign Legal Center. The law is stricter for rank-and-file employees.
A number of the New Breed Logistics employees quoted by The Post seem to be pretty senior. David Young, the company’s longtime human resources manager, said: “No one was ever forced to or lost a job because they didn’t, but if people contributed, their raises and their bonuses were bumped up to accommodate that.”
But another former employee told The Post that he thought his job or chance to move up was tied to giving, which experts said would be illegal. A former plant manager said his boss told him that donations to former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani’s 2008 presidential campaign were “highly recommended.”
“I took that to mean my job is on the line here, or things won’t go smooth for me here at New Breed if I didn’t contribute,” said the plant manager, Steve Moore.
Other people backed up Moore on feeling coerced to give. As The Post reports:
DeJoy and trusted aides at the company made clear that he wanted employees to support his endeavors — through emails inviting employees to fundraisers, follow-up calls and visits to staffers’ desks, many said.
“He would put pressure on the executives over each of the areas to go to their employees and give contributions,” one former employee said.
What could happen to DeJoy?
Chief executives have gone to federal prison for similar schemes, but that’s unlikely to happen to DeJoy, according to experts who spoke with The Fix. They gave us a few reasons for that.
The statute of limitations on federal campaign finance violations is five years. These donations seem to have petered out six years ago, according to Post reporting.
The federal agency that would open a civil investigation, the FEC, doesn’t have a quorum right now because of a lack of appointees.
DeJoy’s status as postmaster general during an election that will rely heavily on votes by mail may protect him. The Justice Department could open a criminal investigation. It has a long-standing policy of not opening election-related investigations this close to an election.
The allegations facing DeJoy also violate campaign finance laws in North Carolina, which is where New Breed was headquartered. There is no statute of limitations for felonies there. Josh Stein, the state’s Democratic attorney general, released a statement noting the story.
Several officials said any state investigation would start with the State Board of Elections, and could wind up in the hands of either the district attorney in Guilford County, Where New Breed was headquartered, or the district attorney in Wake County, where the SBE is located. The SBE has not yet commented publicly on the allegations.
At the very least, these allegations dump fuel on the political fire surrounding DeJoy, which started over suspicions that he is conducting Postal Service business in a way that benefits President Trump.
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