Members of the Libertarian Party of Colorado spoke during a Free Julian Assange Rally at the Capitol yesterday. The Denver rally was part of a nationwide series of events to bring attention to the plight of Wikileaks founder Assange, who in 2010 published a series of leaked documents provided by U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning showing, among many other things, evidence of U.S. war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan. Assange is currently appealing a U.S. extradition order in the U.K.
Supporters read a letter written by U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, calling for the charges against Assange to be dropped. “The prosecution of Julian Assange for carrying out journalistic activities greatly diminishes America’s credibility as a defender of these values, undermining the United States’ moral standing on the world stage, and effectively granting cover to authoritarian governments who can (and do) point to Assange’s prosecution to reject evidence-based criticisms of their human rights records and as a precedent that justifies the criminalization of reporting on their activities. Leaders of democracies, major international bodies, and parliamentarians around the globe stand opposed to the prosecution of Assange,” the letter notes.
Jacob Luria, the campaigns director for the Libertarian Party of Colorado who challenged Rep. Brianna Titone (D-Arvada) during the November election, spoke in defense of Assange. “No government has actually been able to or has tried to disprove any of the information that’s come out,” he said. “None of the information that has come out has put any people’s lives in danger. No secret agents or operatives that are in countries that need their identities protected, even if they are doing operations we would not advise of, it is still important to protect those identities. Knowing this, I don’t see any good reason why Julian Assange is being attacked, other than ultimately America is an empire in decline.”
Jessica Fenske, a Libertarian candidate for Arvada City Council, criticized local media. “My story is more about the corporate journalism that is more corporate propaganda,” she said. “As most of you know, they don’t talk about [Assange] actually at all.”
Fenske then described a recent Twitter spat with a Denver-area broadcast journalist. “A few months ago, a corporate journalist started threatening one of my friends,” she said. “He started texting him threats. He started making threats about how he’s going to dox my friend. This is a corporate, ethical, professional journalist.”
Fenske’s friend is Kyle Bauer, a Twitter troll who uses the name “Cerebral Pisces” and is allegedly behind the host of parody accounts based on 9News anchors, which make racist, homophobic posts about local media personalities from 9News, the Colorado Times Recorder, and others.
“I’m a Libertarian, so of course I have a podcast,” said Fenske. “So we had to do a podcast on what happened. All we did was expose what he did. We gave out all our information. We showed what happened. So fast forward two months, and now I’ve decided I’m running for City Council in Arvada. Like 12 hours after I posted that I was running, the same reporter did the same thing to me that I called him out for. Within 12 hours, he posted this about me. He said, ‘If you live in the city of Arvada, this may be of interest to you. An anti-vaxxer who hates the government is seeking to become part of the government. She also hates local journalists.’ He went on to post my affidavit, but nothing redacted.”
Fenske’s affidavit for Arvada City Council is a public record, available on the City of Arvada’s website, alongside all the other candidates’ affidavits.
Fenske’s podcast consists of livestreams of her consuming alcohol with guests and discussing various political issues like COVID vaccine conspiracies, LGBTQ people, and Libertarian politics.
Fenske also bragged about using her platform to harass the journalist who shared her affidavit. “Unfortunately for him, it blew up,” she said. “It went viral with nearly 2 million views. Everyone shared it to make fun of him and call it out again. [I gained] 10,000 followers from it in that week.“
Fenske is running against incumbent Bob Fifer this November.
