Polk State Attorney Brian Haas is failing the J6er test of history with absurd, miserable cowardice

So let's meet a real State Attorney from 1926. J.C. Adkins didn't hide behind norms that don't exist when risking his life to challenge the Ku Klux Klan with the moral and legal power of his office.

The CCDF¹ and CCDF-wing of the Polk GOP that Sheriff Grady Judd and State Attorney Brian Haas are actively protecting from justice openly embraces the January 6th Capitol Lynch Mob. You don’t need to believe me. Believe them.

Listen to Cathi Chamberlain. The CCDF made this “proud” J6 crank the keynote speaker for its sparsely attended crank event at Mulberry’s Gem Theater on Friday, October 13.

I listened to 40 minutes of this shit very early in the morning so you don’t have to. But if you want to … you can hear/watch it here.

Here are some choice quotes with time stamps. You should read them. These are the people, several of whom claim their families have forbidden from seeing their own grandchildren, that Grady Judd and Brian Haas want to control your schools and lives. Note the worshipful Grady Judd namecheck. J6ers/CCDFers love Grady, with good reason.

“[Donald Trump] is still our legal president.” — 7:30

“That’s me, at the “Stop the Steal” rally” [which was funded in large part by Publix heiress and part-time Lakeland resident Julie Fancelli] — 27:30

“How many of you have been forbidden to see your grandkids? I see a couple hands come up. What’s really scary is we are the terrorists [to the public]” — 29:38

“You have a great sheriff out here, obviously. Yeah you should be real happy about that, Grady Judd.” — 31:00

“Since Nov. 3 2020, when our elections got stolen, and we should never be afraid to say that. Because my lying eyes aren’t lying. I saw it. I’ve seen it. They were stolen. The day we said the words “Biden” and his title together in same sentence, again, we gave our power to the left. I have never once said that title with that man’s name. We cannot legitimize illegitimate behavior. That’s how we need to start thinking.” — 34:09

“Anybody else here that’s willing to admit it, go to D.C. on January 6th? You should be proud. You should be. Thank you all because one day we’re gonna be looked at as the patriots who tried to stop it right when it happened.” — 38:20

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In the 23 years I’ve lived and worked in Polk County, no public official has ever intervened in a local election more blatantly than Sheriff Grady Judd and State Attorney Brian Haas have in 2022 by refusing to do their jobs, morally and legally.

Their protection of the open, gross, stupid criminality surrounding the J6 supporting-CCDF and its bloc of candidates is worth 100s of thousands of campaign dollars.

Judd and Haas, have, in effect donated far more than any PAC through in-kind silence and service to the CCDF’s Jill Sessions, who hired an arch-criminal, church-cheater to run her campaign. They ought to be required to report it on her campaign material.

It’s truly, truly shameful — and comically absurd — at the same time.

Everyone who works for Judd and Haas should be ashamed and humiliated. Your bosses are letting a handful of J6er Cathi Chamberlains and criminal-hiring Jill Sessions, and “T.I.T.S.” Noltes make a mockery of you and the public who pays you.

That’s unless, of course, you just want to live in the stupidest possible dictatorship of J6er criminal cranks. If you do, come throw me in jail and be done with it because I’m not going to participate or help you lie to yourselves and everybody else.

But you won’t even do that.

You’re just going to sit there frozen by your own impotence, bleating excuses. And if you think my public contempt for your impotence and excuses will end with the November election, well … it will not. They’ve made you handmaidens to Ed Shoemaker and J.C. Martin. That will leave a mark; and it should.

Grady Judd should have weeks ago [long before the terrible tragedy of deputy Blaine Lane’s friendly-fire shooting death] arrested and denounced (or cleared publicly) Ron DeSantis-endorsed, CCDF-backed School Board Member-elect Rick Nolte. Nolte has confessed, in writing, on official documents, to cheating in the August primary with 10 election misdemeanors and one election felony. Nolte also confessed, in writing, to spending $2700 in donor money on campaign “shirts” from a Missouri company that doesn’t sell shirts. That could also be a crime.

But Grady Judd’s mad that he doesn’t get to tell parents what their kids can read; and he’s emotionally thirsty for adoration. So he’s having a big pout and won’t do the job we pay him to do. Sheriff “fight 70% murder rate spike with moon pies” is soft on crime and heavy on emo.

Haas is *worse* than Judd

But at least Sheriff Emo openly sympathizes and claims to share “values” with the book-banning criminals and grifters and Capitol Lynch Mob lovers of the CCDF. And at least Sheriff “Angst” has a genuine emotional craving for how book-banning criminals and grifters and Capitol Lynch Mob supporters love him.

Grady’s a lot more authentic than Haas in protecting the CCDF, who I suspect agrees 100 percent with me and all decent, normal people paying attention about who the CCDF is. He’s just terrified of the 15 cranks they can turn out to the Gem Theater — and afraid of Ron DeSantis and afraid of the deteriorating Grady Judd, who both deploy these cranks in service of their real power.

Thus, Haas thinks he needs to protect the cranks, too, so he can keep collecting a state attorney check. That’s why he:

1. Refuses to follow the clear public example of his predecessor Jerry Hill — who publicly announced a campaign-defining investigation of misdemeanors — did when confronted with criminal election cheating.

2. Has political dinner with CCDFers/J6ers.

This week I sought the official State Attorney’s Office position on the open criminality surrounding this Polk School Board campaign. I asked specifically:

1. Can you tell me if any of these three areas of interest I cited ARE NOT under investigation by the State Attorneys Office? 

2. Have you cleared of wrongdoing any of the people I have mentioned by name here?

3. Can you confirm rumors of ongoing investigations into all three areas? Rick Nolte himself told a reporter:  “I’m not going to answer this because I was told not to. Since it’s being looked at right now I can’t really talk.”  Is he referring to your investigation?

[I asked a fourth specific question I’m not publishing because it goes beyond the public record into logical inferences.]

It took me 36 hours and second email to get a response. This is from Chris Nelson, executive director the Polk State Attorney’s Office:

Hello Mr. Townsend,

We cannot confirm or deny the existence of a pending investigation. As always, at the conclusion of any investigation, we will make available all reports related to the investigation to you for your review.

Let me translate that for you into real human speak:

Sure, yeah, we’re “investigating.” We’re just waiting until it’s politically safe — after the election — to release a half-ass report about a half-ass investigation that will end up clearing them based their own stupidity and our willful incompetence and lamenting all the division on “both sides.” Leave us alone.

Prove me wrong.

What a real state attorney from history, who took his duty seriously, looks like

Do not get sad or depressed that a handful of J6/CCDF loser cranks have captured your local legal and justice system — and can do whatever they want.

No dictatorship is permanent; and the stupider it is, the less permanent it becomes. Publicly weaponizing the corruption of captured legal and justice systems is one of the strongest tools in pushing back against dictatorships. It helps destroy dictatorial and mob legitimacy and push public officials to do their jobs.

And I have an inspiring example of this to share with you from history. It should shame Brian Haas.

In a recent article, I addressed the similarities and differences between the 1920s Florida Ku Klux Klan and Klan-adjacent universe and Polk County’s modern day CCDF and CCDF-adjacent Republicans in a recent article. TL;DR version:

1. The CCDF universe aspires to 1920s Klan reach and violent extra-legal power, but doesn’t have it yet at the local level.

2. The CCDF is openly supportive of the January 6 Capitol Lynch Mob, which did have 20s Klan-like power on steroids for a day.

3. The CCDF universe has lots of open criminality, just like the Klan did, combined with a general commitment to disruption of decent public order. Indeed, its only “successful” school board politician openly reported committing a felony and 10 misdemeanors in campaign, with no consequence at all, except from me. The CCDF’s two unsuccessful candidates literally hired a CCDF-recruited arch-criminal to run their campaigns.

4. The CCDF enjoys broad, political law enforcement and religious support and official impunity. The 20s Klan did too, until it didn’t.

With that in mind, I want you to meet James Calhoun (J.C.) Adkins, state attorney for Putnam and Alachua Counties (Palatka and Gainesville) in 1926.

What follows is from a Miami Daily News article published on August 29, 1926, at the peak of Klan violence and power in the Florida Klan/Land Crash Summer of 1926.

I quoted it in my book Age of Barbarity: the Forgotten Fight for the Soul of Florida, which chronicles the rise and defeat of the post World War I Ku Klux Klan. I think this article speaks for itself, but note the Adkins’ quotes in bold, anyway:

“Prosecution seen in Florida Flogging Case” — 8/29/26

PALATKA — The stage is set here for the denouement next week of the series of floggings of white and negro men and women which have aroused bitter feelings akin to a feud in Putnam County within the last 18 months.

The coroner’s inquest into the killing of two negroes the night of Aug. 14 by masked men which resulted in the present inquiry has been indefinitely postponed pending recovery of Minnie Pinkney, mother of one of the victims, from the whipping she received on the same night.

Placid on the surface, this city was tense tonight anticipating the reopening on Tuesday of the secret investigation J.C. Adkins, state’s attorney, is making of the whippings by masked bands. Between 50 and 60 victims of the mob have been brutally flogged in the last year and six months, his investigation to date has shown, Adkins declared when he recessed the probe this week.

“I confidently expect to discover and bring to justice those guilty of these outrages,” Colonel Adkins said tonight. “More than 35 witnesses I have questioned have given me valuable information, and I expect to complete my preliminary investigation by hearing the other 50 witnesses I have subpoenaed.”

Ramifications of his investigation have shown the flogging outrages general over a large portion of Florida, Adkins said.

“As the investigation progresses I feel that I should issue a call to all fair-minded Florida citizen to put a stop to this flouting of liberty,” Adkins stated. “I have made a report to Gov. John Martin and will report fully to him at the conclusion of my investigation.”

“The information will be presented to the October grand jury, as I do not think it will be necessary to call a special grand jury before that time.”

Adkins said he had discovered that in every flogging case the masked men and hooded men had appeared to have been intoxicated. Clarifying his statement that men wearing Ku Klux Klan regalia had been responsible for the outrages, Adkins declared:

“I have not charged the klan with responsibility for these crimes against liberty. I repeat that the whippings were perpetrated by men wearing klan masks and hoods. The grand dragon of the klan in Florida has seen fit to issue a denial that any member of his organization had a part in the Putnam County floggings.

“It has always been my understanding that a whipped dog is the one who howls.

“I advised the grand dragon that one man I questioned refused to state whether or not he was a member of the klan and have asked the grand dragon if the man did not answer through a sense of shame or because it would be a violation of the klan’s rules...”

The prosecutor would not comment on reports that he received threats unless he ceased his investigation, but admitted that several witnesses had told him they were threatened with death if they told of being whipped.

That same edition of the Miami Daily News had a story from Lakeland, where I live now, detailing a Klan/mob flogging of a 17-year-boy “unmercifully with a knotted rope” for … reasons.

Now, let’s compare J.C. Adkins with Brian Haas:

We cannot confirm or deny the existence of a pending investigation. As always, at the conclusion of any investigation, we will make available all reports related to the investigation to you for your review.

And then compare that to Haas’ former boss Jerry Hill, who announced his 2014 investigation of judge candidate Christine Thornhill in public, rather than cover for her in order to cheat voters like Haas is doing for the CCDF and its candidate Sessions.

We, in fact, are looking into some possible irregularities in the campaign. We are in discussions with her attorney, Gary Trombley of Tampa.

Hill then forced Thornhill out of the race with a misdemeanor plea deal a couple days later.

“The whipped dog is the one who howls”

J.C. Adkins never secured a single conviction of anyone in connection with this vast Florida mob violence. The grand jury refused to indict the man accused or murdering Minnie Pinkney’s son and nephew.

But Adkins’ dangerous work produced a 300-plus page investigative report into the Klan and its law enforcement backers that led Gov. John Martin to threaten martial law if the mob brutality didn’t stop. I would sacrifice a body part to get my hands on that report. I have never been able to find it.

(J.C. Adkins’ son and namesake became a Florida Supreme Court justice. If the family sees this and knows where any copy of that 1926 Klan report might be, please please contact me.)

So J.C. Adkins lost the legal battle, thoroughly. But the public principles he fought for won the war over time. His public execution of his job — under real threat of violence — became a powerful weapon in defeating the Klan and its adjacent mobs as quasi-official governing forces. He didn’t even suffer personally for it — although he could have.

And I have to chuckle upon re-reading the article and finding this trash talk phrase aimed at the “Grand Dragon” …

“It has always been my understanding that a whipped dog is the one who howls.

Ninety years later, “a hit dog will holler” became the flashiest quote of the 2018 governor’s race. Nothing said in the pursuit of power is ever new.

Unlike Andrew Gillum or Brian Haas, J.C. Adkins had the character and capacity to actually whip the dog with his official power and actually make it howl. In doing so, he changed Florida vastly for the better.

That’s why I’m still writing about him 100 years later; and nobody in the year 2122 will even know Brian Haas or Cathi Chamberlain existed.

1. The so-called “County Citizens Defending Freedom” is Polk County’s version of anti-social GOP rage groups like “Mom’s For Liberty.”