Speaking as a Philly Democratic committeewoman who has spent two years researching Proud Boys:

Proud Boys are white supremacists who violently terrorize their political opposition.

And when Trump tells his people to illegally "observe," they're who he's talking to.

After I started writing about the Proud Boys, they showed up at my home at nearly midnight as a gang.

They vandalized my home, tried to get my neighbor to fetch me for them, and then told him to tell me, "tell that fat bitch she better shut up."

That was after they'd harassed me online endlessly and made threats against my pets.

When we organized a counter-protest to their planned rally in support of the Kenosha killer, they announced they were going to come to my neighborhood and rally in front of my house.

The cowards didn't appear and actually hold that rally (they were vastly outnumbered by counter-protesters), but they did take the time to patrol back and forth right repeatedly in front of my porch, while appearing to be carrying a firearm. https://twitter.com/gwensnyderPHL/status/1307702977499746306?s=19

Their "terrorist" shit is pure projection.

I'm an elected Democratic official, I spent a decade working at local nonprofits, I'm a professional researcher.

I'm a boring middle-aged woman, and they terrorize me because I'm political opposition and I write about them.

One of the reasons they terrorize me is that they think I'm secretly Jewish.

That's an incorrect assumption, but it doesn't matter.

They're virulent racists and antisemites.

They often assume their enemies must be Jewish.

That racism and antisemitism is a reality that they've demonstrated again and again.

They say vile shit about Jewish people.

They publicly talked about lynching Ilhan Omar.

They're white supremacists, and they are terrorists. https://twitter.com/gwensnyderPHL/status/1311141481860730880?s=19

The Philadelphia police aren't a help.

When the PB came to my home, the responding police officer said they were "just" trying to scare me.

When they rallied downtown this past weekend police got caught on the scanner calling them "friendlies."

They celebrated it.

The Proud Boys aren't just white supremacist gang members.

They're brownshirts.

They see themselves as violent enforcers for Trump.

Nationally and in Philly, they read his words as orders from a general to his paramilitary troops.

Trump knows that.

In Philadelphia, it is ILLEGAL to monitor polls without a poll watcher certificate from the city.

The "observing" he's telling these paramilitaries to do here isn't poll observation.

It is voter intimidation, and it is a gross violation of election law.

I've been a poll watcher at nearly every primary and general election for five or six years now.

For reasons rooted in personal experience, I'm worried about that worm being literally unsafe this year, for myself and ESPECIALLY for folks in Black neighborhoods.

Let's be very clear that Trump telling his supporters to go commit election crime is a direct extension of his "stand by" orders to the Proud Boys.

He understands that they are his brownshirts, a paramilitary arm of his base.

That is who he wants out intimidating Black voters.

Again, I speak from personal experience when I say that violent intimidation is what the Proud Boys exist to do.

He is effectively ordering brownshirts to scare Black folks from the polls.

He is trying to steal the election any way he can, very much including with brownshirt violence and intimidation at the polls.

He won't commit to a peaceful transition of power if he fails, because he's planning a brownshirt-defended coup.

That's what "stand by" means.

He's telling his violent brownshirts to intimidate voters at the polls, and to stand by and be ready to do worse in the streets if he needs to take a second/permanent term by coup.

He won't condemn the brownshirts or militias because they are his foot soldiers.

This is fascism.

The only way we counter it is with mass, militant, and sustained mobilization that concretely disrupts fascism's functioning.

I've said for a long time now that this means being ready to take and hold the streets for a sustained period of time when he inevitably attempts to claim a second term through theft or coup.

It means meaningfully disrupting the economy with general strike in that scenario.

It also means counteracting this ongoing attempt at theft by voting against him.

That goes even for those who aren't Biden fans.

It's a means of countering his efforts to legitimize himself through election theft.

And after last night, it's pretty clear that it ALSO means mobilizing to provide community defense against brownshirt intimidation at the polls.

Escorting, actual legal election monitoring, immediate and mass reporting of and outcry at intimidation, counter-action.

The situation is dire, folks.

I can't emphasize that enough.

We are in an extremely precarious and dangerous position.

We are experiencing fascism, and we lurching with incredible rapidity towards totalitarianism.

This is life or death.

ICE is running concentration camps, forcibly sterilizing immigrants and murdering them with a combination of disease and deliberate neglect.

Secret police are in unmarked vans kidnapping protesters.

Cops are gassing Black communities with abortifacients.

The president is telling white supremacist brownshirt paramilitaries to commit election crimes in majority-POC cities in swing states and "stand by" on street violence.

This is not a drill.

The time on the clock is very close to midnight.

The frog is very nearly boiled.

Remember your history, and figure out what kind of German you want to be in this incredibly critical time.

Think about and decide how you are going to militantly counter fascism in November.

Now.

Remember the lessons of history.

Think, decide, and prepare.

If you wait until the moment comes, it will be too late.

The end.