Brigitte Gabriel, Jenna Ellis, Expose ‘Consultant’ Ryan Girdusky as Being Paid $15,000 a Month by Formerly Anti-Trump JD Vance, Then Damage Control Ensues

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Brigitte Gabriel of ACT For America tweeted a bombshell report last night about a U.S. Senate Candidate from Ohio, JD Vance. Vance has a PAC according to Gabriel, that is “paying influencers to tweet about how ‘great’ he is”. Another word for this is astroturfing. It’s different than running ads because many don’t know the people claiming that JD Vance is great are potentially being paid to do so.

This is similar to a video game maker paying money to a social media influencer who does gaming streams to tell his fans a game is great. Perhaps the influencer doesn’t actually think the game is that great, perhaps he does.

The original tweet drew responses from Jenna Ellis, supporting Gabriel, as well as Girdusky and some who defended him, and many others with varying opinions. Girdusky is a mildly popular Twitter personality and author who also says he is in political consulting, among other things.

“WOW. It’s not everyday something like this crosses my desk. It appears that JD Vance’s PAC is paying influencers to tweet about ‘great’ he is. When I promote someone it’s because I BELIEVE in them. Apparently @RyanGirdusky gets paid $15,000/month to promote Vance.” says Gabriel as she posts the screenshots of the FEC data:

Arizona Senator Wendy Rogers dropped a cryptic tweet but many, including former Trump attorney Jenna Ellis, knew exactly what it was about.

Girdusky and some of his supporters on Twitter made the case that nothing is being done wrong and that this is just politics as usual. But some other tried to make a case that Girdusky went out of his way to conceal that he was getting paid by Vance, in their insinuations. Live streamer “Beardly Beardson,” said that Girdusky should have put #ad on all his pro-Vance tweets.

Ellis had a Twitter argument with Girdusky that can be seen below in part:

Matthew Tyrmand tweeted a DM showing Girdusky being defensive in the past when asked if he worked for Vance:

“.@RyanGirdusky– July 1st, 2021. An opportunity for transparency on day of your joke of a paymaster @JDVance1’s announcement of his run. If ever there was moment to come out as Team Vance… From then on you evaded & obfuscated. But regulated transparency pulled back the curtain.”

Ellis added to that:

“I mean, I was very proudly Team Trump. You only respond like that if there’s something to hide.”

Girdusky pushed back at Gabrielle implying she supports Josh Mandel, an opponent of Vance, and that that is why she is attacking him. She didn’t deny it but implied that her attacks are done in her free time and are not something she’s paid to do. She also hinted that she was friends with Mandel.

It’s unclear, but hard to tell if anyone is accusing anyone of doing anything illegal, but rather dishonest and unethical in the eyes of many instead. Some have said that it wouldn’t be so bad if the people who are touting JD Vance and getting paid simply said so in the beginning, or if Vance just ran lots of ads that would be ok. But many think there is a major astroturfing campaign going on, which is to say Vance isn’t really that popular with people who aren’t being paid by him. Gabriel told Girdusky to “Just add Team Vance to your bio and move on.”

Girdusky said in other tweets that he works for various people and doesn’t need to add everyone to his bio. But the Vance discussion has been a big one in the Twitterverse, as many look to someone who can fill the Trump void. Many America First proponents like Nick Fuentes, who is now banned from Twitter, have been warning people about Vance because of his history of being anti-Trump, voting for Evan McMullin in 2016, and having been associated with left-leaning CNN at one point.

Vance has said he’s no longer anti-Trump, but many don’t think it’s genuine. Although his opponent, Josh Mandel hasn’t exactly broken out in popularity himself, many still don’t think Vance is the next Trump, which he is apparently trying to be.

America First Twitter pundit “Chief Trumpster” had a lot to say on his feed last night, including this:

“The real question to ask is who else Vance is paying off. Guessing it isn’t just one person!”

Vince Dao, of “American Populist Union”, tried to partially defend Girdusky and Vance, saying that Vance may not be the best, but the payment thing isn’t that strange.

“Many attacks on him are valid, this is not. This is a pretty common practice in campaigning. It’s literally just a form of advertising, no different from buying conventional ads.”

In a live stream by Beardly Beardson last night though, he attacked Dao as being naive at best, because astroturfing in his opinion is the opposite of what people who supported Donald Trump would ever want to see in a candidate since it can come across as quite disingenuous. We will update this developing story as we can.

Damn Dean tweeted:

One account said under Chief Trumpster’s tweet:

“Didn’t he work for CNN at one time and he said alot of Hateful things about Trump and us supports of him.. I never trusted JD Vance and I hope people dont vote him in”

It remains to be seen how the Vance campaign does in this primary to run for U.S. Senate, but many are beginning to wonder if he is more than meets the eye, and not in a good way. This also may make it harder for him to get the ever sought-after Donald Trump endorsement, but only time will tell.

Ian MacDonald
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