John Knefel via Media Matters
government’s enforcement of food safety laws as an opportunity to attack trans kids, arbitrarily conflating two unrelated issues for the sole purpose of maligning children and the LGBTQ community.
Carlson’s guest was Jeremy Loffredo, reporter for the far-right Canadian outlet Rebel News, which has spread Covid vaccine misinformation and has a history of climate change denialism. Carlson invited Loffredo on to discuss the story of Amos Miller, an Amish farmer who has violated food safety regulations for years. Carlson and Loffredo framed the issue as an example of government overreach in violation of Miller’s “religious beliefs.” In fact, Miller’s farm is a public health risk; the Food and Drug Administration found listeria in his raw milk in 2016 and has been attempting to get him to comply with regulations since then, according to Lancaster Online.
Loffredo argued that the Biden administration was singling out and punishing Miller because his farm doesn’t use fertilizer or gasoline – two commodities whose price has been affected by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“Amos has completely eliminated any risk coming from the international or domestic politics of the Biden administration and they're coming after him for it,” Loffredo said.
“Maybe if he promises to put more chemicals in the milk that turn kids trans, they'll lay off,” Carlson responded. As the Daily Beast notes, Carlson’s bizarre comment echoed his friend Alex Jones’ infamous remarks about chemicals turning frogs gay.
The government is seeking $305,065 in total costs related to Miller’s regulatory non-compliance and subsequent refusals to pay his initial fines.
Miller has also associated with a group the Department of Justice describes as part of the sovereign citizen movement, which neither Carlson or Loffredo mentioned. The group, Prairie Star National, claimed to represent Miller in court despite not being licensed to act as court officials, and the judge forced Miller’s actual lawyer to remain on the case. Sovereign Citizens hold to an anti-government ideology that claims its adherents aren’t bound by state or federal law. Members of the movement are typically associated with tax avoidance and the kind of regulatory malfeasance Miller has engaged in, although some in the movement have also been involved in acts of violence directed at state actors.
Carlson incorporated the enforcement action into a broader persecution narrative that he offers his viewers every night. “So they went after gyms, organic farmers, and churches,” Carlson said, referring to the Biden administration. “So maybe they’re against anything that’s wholesome and edifying, that makes you stronger and healthier, and in favor of everything that diminishes you and makes you more dependent.”
“Amos would have been past this a long time ago had Amos not been listening to extreme advice,” Miller’s lawyer told Lancaster Online. “He has this extreme group of people who are very antigovernment. They really bent his ear.”
Carlson has repeatedly claimed that the Biden administration is deploying armed agents of the state to target and jail conservatives for their political beliefs. Most recently, he incorrectly told his viewers that new funding for the IRS would be spent on militarizing the agency to audit and raid the homes of Biden’s political enemies and working-class conservatives. In reality, the funding is directed towards increasing the agency’s capacity to investigate and prosecute extremely rich individuals and corporations for tax avoidance. Approximately 1 percent of the new funding is going towards hiring agents who are allowed to carry arms, according to the New York Times.
This segment is more evidence that Carlson will use any occasion to reverse-engineer an attack on an outgroup, be that trans children, migrants, or any of his other regular targets.
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