Just about the time you thought the Alito story couldn't get worse, it did. The New York Times reports that there was not just the upside down American flag insurrectionist message flying high and proud above Alito's home, but he also flew the Appeal to Heaven flag over his beach house last summer.
This time, it was the “Appeal to Heaven” flag, which, like the inverted U.S. flag, was carried by rioters at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Also known as the Pine Tree flag, it dates back to the Revolutionary War, but largely fell into obscurity until recent years and is now a symbol of support for former President Donald J. Trump, for a religious strand of the “Stop the Steal” campaign and for a push to remake American government in Christian terms.
If you thought the upside-down American flag was a symbol of the insurrection, the Appeal to Heaven flag is ten times worse. Not only was it carried by the insurrectionists, it was and is a symbol of the Christian nationalist movement, as former FBI agent Peter Strzok observes in the video above.
"This is now the second time we've had two different flags flown in front of Alito residences that resonate very strongly with the January 6th insurrectionists," Strzok said.
"I was reading or glancing through that New York Times article and it does make reference to the New Apostolic Reformation Movement, which I think we'll come to learn a lot about," he continued. "This is not just a conservative Christian ideology. This is an extreme vision of imprinting Christianity into American governance, into the interpretation of the Constitution."
And yes, it matters. A lot, as Strzok further observed.
"When people go into a courtroom, and you know, I did throughout my career, there's an expectation that the judge you're facing is a neutral arbiter, that they don't have beliefs one way or the other, that they are going to judge and process the trial in an objective way," he explained.
Putting an exclamation point on it, he went on. "And when you have a Supreme Court justice, the highest justice in the land, flying flags that not only are associated with January 6th insurrectionists, but really with people who have extraordinarily extreme views of what role Christianity should have in America."
"And when you back that out and you think about Alito's commentary on decisions like Dobbs and elsewhere, it paints a very concerning picture of what, one, this Supreme Court justice believes, and two, that he simply doesn't care about the appearances he's creating by flying these flags upside down or with certain causes in his various homes."
Golly, ya think?
Nicolle Wallace followed up that observation with a rhetorical question of her own.
"What are the odds that two of nine justices would be this closely associated with the first ever violent transfer of power in the United States of America? One, by sending emails to participants in the fake electors plot in various state legislatures and the other, by flying two flags over his house, both of them carried by the insurrectionists themselves on January 6th. What are the odds? Two of nine."
Gosh, and both of them appointed by Republicans? Who would've guessed?
There's basically only one response to this news, in two parts. First, Alito must recuse himself from all January 6 cases and second, Senate Democrats must ABSOLUTELY and IMMEDIATELY open an investigation into Thomas and Alito's conduct. Haul Roberts, Thomas and Alito down to a hearing room and get some answers. Stat.
