An Oath Keeper Did Security For the Capitol Rally. Now, He's A Republican Candidate for N.J....

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Ilya Marritz
@ilyamarritz
an Oath Keeper who was on the Capitol grounds during the 1/6 insurrection is a candidate for the NJ Assembly

He blames antifa for the violence & says Trump was robbed

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via @mattkatz00
Edward Durfee outside the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021
An Oath Keeper Did Security For the Capitol Rally. Now, He’s A Republican Candidate for N.J....
What does it mean for Republican party in NJ when an Oath Keeper who was at the Capitol attack runs for office?
gothamist.com
1:58 PM · Apr 9, 2021

https://gothamist.com/news/an-oath-keeper-did-security-for-the-capitol-rally-now-hes-a-republican-candidate-for-nj-assembly

On January 6th, Edward Durfee donned a radio earpiece and an “Oath Keepers New Jersey” cap as he worked a security detail outside the U.S. Capitol for the far-right Oath Keepers, whose members are now fingered by the feds for conspiring to violently stop the Electoral College vote count that would certify Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 election.

Three months later, Durfee filed paperwork to be the Republican candidate for the state Assembly back home in New Jersey—and he was backed by the Bergen County Republican Organization, the official GOP chapter in the state’s most populous county.

Durfee, a 66-year-old IT consultant from Northvale, is a long-shot Republican candidate in an overwhelmingly Democratic district. But his candidacy, first reported last week by Politico New Jersey, points to a crossroads facing Garden State Republicans. Although county Republicans are putting him on the ballot underneath the gubernatorial nominee, the front-runner for that nomination, former Assemblyman Jack Ciatterelli, is distancing himself from Durfee. When told of Durfee’s activities on January 6th, campaign communications director Stami Williams said: “Jack believes anyone who stormed the Capitol on January 6 should be held fully accountable for their actions by a court of law, and certainly would not support anyone who participated in the insurrection running for office as a Republican.”

A dozen purported Oath Keepers have been arrested for offenses that include “conspiracy,” which means prosecutors are making a case that some Oath Keepers organized and planned the storming of the Capitol, and weren’t just caught up in the moment. The Oath Keepers have become a face of the January 6th riots. The group is made up of former and current police officers and members of the military driven by a belief that political leaders are plotting to take their rights away. The group gets its name from the “oath” they take to protect the country from enemies foreign and domestic.

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