The Democrats project. When they accuse the GOP of doing some dirty deed, they are usually guilty of doing it themselves.
This story is another in the long line of the ‘do as I say not as I do’ Democrats. But it took a disturbing and dangerous turn. Look, the guy belongs in jail, but his close ties to the very top of the Democratic party needs to be thoroughly investigated.
From The Daily Wire: The former Sheila Jackson Lee staffer who posted the private information of Republican senators during the final hearing for then-Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh has been sentenced to four years in prison for his crime.
Jackson Cosko was described by prosecutors as having “self-righteous entitlement” and believing “that he could violate the sanctity of the United State Senate at will and threaten individual Senators as he pleased,” The Daily Caller’s Luke Rosniak reported. Rosniak further wrote prosecutors sought to make an example of Cosko because his crime allegedly led to other incidents of attacks on political opposition.
Cosko is the son of the CEO of a major construction company who has ties to House Speaker Nance Pelosi (D-CA) and Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA). Cosko previously worked as a staffer in Sen. Maggie Hassan’s (D-NH) office, but had since moved on to working for Lee. While senators questioned Kavanaugh and Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, who accused the now-Associate Justice of groping her while they were both in high school some 30 years ago, Cosko snuck into his former boss’ office to use a computer to publish the private information of some of the Republican senators who supported Kavanaugh.
Another staffer in Hassan’s office recognized Cosko and reported him, so he sent the staffer an email threatening to “leak it all” if the staffer told anyone what he had done.
“Emails signal conversations gmails. Senators children’s health information and socials,” Cosko wrote to the staffer.
Cosko pleaded guilty in April “to crimes related to an unparalleled effort to ransack a Senate office, extorting a Democratic senator, illegally harming Republicans for their political views, and blackmailing a witness,” Rosniak reported.
From The Daily Caller: “The defendant operated under the belief that he was entitled to inflict emotional distress upon United States Senators and their families, simply because they disagreed with the defendant and had different political views,” prosecutors wrote. “The government believes that there appears to have been an increase in similar criminal harassment, particularly through social media channels, by people across the political spectrum.”
In a sentencing memo, prosecutors described “a months-long series of burglaries and sophisticated data theft offenses directed at the office of United States Senator Maggie Hassan; to a separate set of ‘doxxing’ offenses through which he maliciously released personal information of Senators Lindsay Graham, Orrin Hatch, Mike Lee, Rand Paul, and Mitch McConnell; and to obstruction of justice, because he attempted to silence a witness by threatening to release the private health information of a Senator’s children, because he corrupted another person and persuaded her to attempt to ‘wipe down’ the scene of his burglaries, and because he attempted to destroy evidence in his own apartment.”
A former aide to Sen. Maggie Hassan and Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee is headed to prison Wednesday for what prosecutors said was the largest known data theft in Senate history.
The former aide, Jackson Cosko, pleaded guilty in April to crimes related to an unparalleled effort to ransack a Senate office, extorting a Democratic senator, illegally harming Republicans for their political views, and blackmailing a witness.
“The government believes that a significant sentence would help to make clear that difference of political opinion do not entitle people to engage in politically motivated, criminal attacks threatening elected officials with whom he disagrees, and would thereby encourage respect for the law, and deter future criminal conduct,” prosecutors wrote.
Prosecutors said Cosko had “self-righteous entitlement” and a “belief that he could violate the sanctity of the United States Senate at will and threaten individual Senators as he pleased.”
He wanted to use stolen data “to punish people who disagreed with his politics” by publishing the personal information of Republican Sens. Lindsey Graham, Orrin Hatch, Mike Lee, Rand Paul, and Mitch McConnell, the memo says, which noted that Cosko laughed about his actions.
