Mayor Ken Moore wins in a landslide, beating Trumpinista Gabrielle Hanson

Mayor Ken Moore (right) wins reelection,
beating challenger Gabrielle Hanson (left) in a
landslide 

by Rod Williams, Oct. 23, 2023- Gabrielle Hanson got swamped in her race to become mayor of Franklin.  Mayor Ken Moore won by a landslide getting 12,822 votes or 79% of the vote, compared to Hanson's 3,322 votes or 21%.  In anybody's book, that is a landslide. 

I am relieved. I thought the race would be close. I thought Hanson might win. It should not have been close and I should have not expected it to be.  However, Gabrielle Hanson's supporters were energetic and loud. They also thought God was on their side.  I wasn't buying the God connection; I'm not quite sure God is a Trump Republican. Her supporters were so sure of victory; however, I thought maybe they had reason to be. 

Actually, my source of information was limited, only hearing from a few people in person and a few more on social media.  However, the press treated it as a close race, and I never saw any polling. Given, that the Williamson County Republican Party has been taken over by the Trumpinistas, I thought maybe that portended a trend. Another reason I wrongly thought the race might be close, is that The Pamphleteer, a local source of news and analysist that I respect, had published a piece called The Battle of Franklin, in which they, in detail, laid out the path to victory for Gabreille Hanson. Wow, they got it wrong.  I will be less trusting of their analytical skills in the future. 

If Franklin would have elected Hanson, it would have indicated that there was no hope for what until Trump were considered mainstream Republicans. It would have indicated that the party was beyond hope of redemption.  If a person like Hanson could have won in Franklin, then the worst of the Trumpinistas could win in any place that was not solidly Democrat. The story of this race had already made national and international news.  A Hanson win would have told the world that Trumpism was not only a national phenomenon at the top but had sunk deep roots to where little Trumpinistas could win anywhere.  If the wealthy, educated, well-governed, decent, conservative, well-mannered people of Franklin had elected Hanson, the message would be that America had truly changed. 

The race between Mayor Ken Moore and Gabrielle Hanson could not have been a clearer choice facing Republicans.  Both Moore and Hanson were Republicans running in a non-partisan race. Moore had been a successful mayor serving since 2011. In 2018 the Tennessee Municiple League named him mayor of the year. He is an orthopedic surgeon and has served as president of the Tennessee Orthopedic Society. He is a member of the Franklin Rotary Club, Building Lives Foundation Board, TMA Group Board, Williamson County and Franklin Chamber of Commerce Board, and chairman of the Columbia State Foundation Board. He is a Sunday school teacher at the Franklin First United Methodist Church. He is a solid citizen and a good man. 

Hanson had numerous scandals surrounding her. She was once arrested for abetting prostitution. She made opposition to the city granting a permit for a gay Pride event a major part of her campaign, then it was revealed that a few years earlier in Chicago, her husband marched in a gay Pride parade wearing nothing but American flag Speedos. She posted a picture of her at an event which she claimed was her with her supporters.  The people with whom she was pictured were not her supporters and it was not a campaign event.  She associated with self-identified neo-Nazis and White nationalist and refused to denounce them. She floated bogus conspiracy theories about the Covenant School shooting. And there was more, but it appeared it did not seem to daunt her support. Hanson is a defender of White nationalist, a hypocrite, and a con artist. Thankfully, she lost. There is hope for the Republican Party, and America. 

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Trumpinista hypocrite Gabrielle Hanson could be Franklin's next Mayor

Mayor Ken Moore
Antifa member?

Gabrielle Hanson

by Rod Williams, Oct. 13, 2023-With all else that is going on locally and in the world, you may have not paid much attention to the drama surrounding Gabrielle Hanson, the MAGA Republican Franklin Alterman who is running for mayor of Franklin. 

There are a lot of Republicans who support Donald Trump and while I think they are misguided and wrong, they are decent people and pretty much mainstream in their political views.  They like Trump policies and think he was a good president. They don't acknowledge or don't care that he tried to prevent the peaceful transfer of power and illegally remain in office. 

There are those MAGA Republicans, and then, there are the weird Trumpinistas: charlatans, conspiracy theorist, white supremist, hypocrites, and con artist.  Trump has attracted a lot of weird people to the party and resulted in some misfit candidates running for office. Gabrielle Hanson is in this category. 

One thing that makes the Gabrielle Hanson race interesting is that thirty years ago she was charged with promoting prostitution, a charge to which she plead no contest. She explained this away and said she was just answering the phone and scheduling appointments and had no idea she was working for an escort service. If that were all, I could overlook a mistake made by a college student needing a job thirty years ago. That is not all. 

Hanson claimed she warned police before the Covenant shooting occurred, saying she had no real evidence or tip about it but had a feeling and said it could be a "Holy Spirit thing." However, when Channel 5 examined the bodycam video of when she allegedly told police of the pending shooting, no such claim was made. 

Hanson led an unsuccessful battle to block a Pride festival from being held at a city park in Franklin and then an image surfaced of her own husband wearing nothing but an American flag Speedo at a Pride event in Chicago. That is not a pretty picture. She justified the contradiction. 

Other issues that have drawn attention is that she alleged that the Covenant School shooter was involved in a love triangle with school staff.  

A Franklin ethics board found Hanson violated the city’s ethics code by using her position as an alderman to get gifts and privileges. And there has been more.

The worst, in my view, and the most recent issue regarding Gabrille Hanson is that she has failed to condemn a hate group called Tennessee Active Club.  I am normally quite reticent to call a group a "hate group," because the term is often used to smear people who are culturally conservative.  In the case of the Tennessee Active Club, the term "hate group" is justified. You can read about the Active Club network here. The group is openly white supremacist. Channel 4 News says the group is "a group of self-proclaimed neo-Nazis."

Earlier this week at a forum hosted for candidates for mayor and alderman in Franklin, members of Tennessee Active Club showed up and escorted Hanson and her husband into the event. They said they were there to protect Gabrielle.  It gets weirder. 

The group claims Mayor Ken Moore, who has served as mayor since 2011 is a member of Antifa. Yep, Dr. Ken Moore, Mayor of Franklin, is said to be a member of Antifa. Dr. Moor has served as president of the Tennessee Orthopedic Society, is a member of the Franklin Rotary Club, Building Lives Foundation Board, TMA Group Board, Williamson County and Franklin Chamber of Commerce Board, and chairman of the Columbia State Foundation Board and in 2018 the Tennessee Municiple League named him mayor of the year. The Sunday school teacher at the Franklin First United Methodist Church is said to me a member of Antifa. I know he doesn't look the part, but you never can tell. 

After the appearance of Tennessee Active Club at that event, a call went out from other members of the Board of Alderman to condemn the group.  Gabrielle Hanson refused. She said, “I’m literally not going to denounce whatever it is that they want to be, whether I agree with what they do in their personal life or not,” “If they want to support you and your re-election, and they want to support me, that is their right. We don’t discriminate in this community against anyone. Never did they lay a hand on anyone, and they were very respectful while they were here.”

The city of Franklin is recognized and honored as one of America's best small towns and wins accolades in all kinds of categories. It would be a shame, if the city of Franklin were to elect Gabrielle Hanson as mayor. The world is paying attention to the mayoral race in Franklin. This race has been covered in The New Republic, The Guardian, Rolling Stone, The Daily Beast, Esquire, Vanity Fair, U K's The Daily Mail and many other publications.

Early voting begins Wednesday and runs through Oct. 19. Election day is Oct. 24. If you live in Franklin, please vote for Ken Moore. 

 

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NewsChannel 5 honored with coveted Peabody Award for Gabrielle Hanson investigation. It is an honor well-deserved.

Gabrielle Handson

 by Rod Williams, May 10, 2024- In the era of Trump, we are seeing more and more Republican, or "conservative" candidates run for office who are charlatans, hypocrites, con-artist, conspiracy theorist, and fellow travelers with white supremist run for office. In the city of Franklin Tennessee, one who fit that mold was Gabrielle Handson, who ran for mayor challenging incumbent Ken Moore.

This campaign was so bizarre that if it was a work of fiction, it would have been dismissed as unbelievable. Thankfully Ken Moore won in a landslide. It not for the reporting of NewsChannel 5, that might not have been the case. In a series of more than 20 reports, Phil Williams exposed Handson for what she was. NewsChannel 5 has been honored for this reporting, an award well deserved. 

Below is a summary of some of the reporting that exposed Handson: 

• Gabrielle Hanson lifted social media images of a diverse group of people to falsely claim on social media that those images reflected support for her campaign. Using AI search tools, Williams tracked down some of the women in one of the photos, who said that they did not know Hanson and did not support her race for mayor. 
• Hanson, who was running for mayor on a pro-morality campaign, had been arrested and convicted for promoting prostitution in Dallas in the mid-90s. As NewsChannel 5 prepared to air its report, Hanson released a video claiming that she had been an unwitting call taker in a high-end prostitution ring. Those claims were put into doubt by evidence that she had been known in Dallas under an alias (Julie Newhouse/Neuhaus).
• During a subsequent court proceeding, the candidate for mayor denied under oath that she had ever used an alias, but NewsChannel 5 uncovered documents from Florida that directly linked her to an application to operate in a fictitious business name, J. Neuhaus and Associates.
• While Gabrielle Hanson told voters that she and her husband lived in Franklin, Tennessee, NewsChannel 5 discovered that, in Chicago, they had also claimed to live there as Tommy Hanson repeatedly ran for Congress.
• Despite Hanson’s vigorous efforts to block Pride events in Franklin, NewsChannel 5 uncovered a photo of Tommy Hanson wearing nothing but an American flag Speedo at a Pride parade in Chicago as he campaigned for Congress. A newspaper story at the time quoted him as saying he participated in the event at the encouragement of his wife.
• Gabrielle Hanson had claimed to have warned a local police officer about a premonition before Nashville’s deadly Covenant School shooting. But Williams obtained the officer’s bodycam video, which proved that her bizarre claims were false.
• When a group of suspicious characters showed up at a candidates forum allegedly to provide security for Hanson, Williams approached them and quickly identified them as white supremacists and “literal Nazis.” Williams immediately confronted Hanson about her ties to the hate group.
• Williams directly connected Hanson’s campaign to efforts by the white supremacists and neo-Nazis to intimidate local residents who opposed the controversial candidate.
• Video from a tent revival in a local parklinked Hanson to the Christian nationalist movement now sweeping parts of the country.
• One of Hanson’s allies, Jeff Feldman, claimed an impressive professional biography that fell apart under questioning by Williams.
• Jeff Feldman initially denied making controversial social media posts threatening to use guns on local teens, but he inadvertently admitted while being interviewed that the posts were indeed his.

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If you live in Franklin, Tennessee, please vote for Ken Moore for Mayor.

Mayor Ken Moore
Antifa member?

Gabrielle Hanson

by Rod Williams, Oct. 13, 2023-With all else that is going on locally and in the world, you may have not paid much attention to the drama surrounding Gabrielle Hanson, the MAGA Republican Franklin Alterman who is running for mayor of Franklin. 

There are a lot of Republicans who support Donald Trump and while I think they are misguided and wrong, they are decent people and pretty much mainstream in their political views.  They like Trump policies and think he was a good president. They don't acknowledge or don't care that he tried to prevent the peaceful transfer of power and illegally hold on to power. 

There are those MAGA Republicans, and then, there are the weird Trumpinistas: charlatans, conspiracy theorist, white supremist, hypocrites, and con artist.  Trump has attracted a lot of weird people to the party and resulted in some misfit candidates running for office. Gabrielle Hanson is in this category. 

One thing that makes the Gabrielle Hanson race interesting is that thirty years ago she was charged with promoting prostitution, a charge to which she plead no contest. She explained this away and said she was just answering the phone and scheduling appointments and had no idea she was working for an escort service. If that were all, I could overlook a mistake made by a college student needing a job thirty years ago. That is not all. 

Hanson led an unsuccessful battle to block a Pride festival from being held at a city park in Franklen and then an image surfaced of her own husband wearing nothing but an American flag Speedo at a Pride event in Chicago. That is not a pretty picture. She justified the contradiction. 

Other issues that have drawn attention is that she alleged that the Covenant School shooter was involved in a love triangle with school staff.  

A Franklin ethics board found Hanson violated the city’s ethics code by using her position as an alderman to get gifts and privileges. And there has been more.

The worst, in my view, and the most recent issue regarding Gabrille Hanson is that she has failed to condemn a hate group called Tennessee Active Club.  I am normally quite reticent to call a group a "hate group," because the term is often used to smear people who are culturally conservative.  In the case of the Tennessee Active Club, the term "hate group" is justified. You can read about the Active Club network here. The group is openly white supremacist. Channel 4 News says the group is "a group of self-proclaimed neo-Nazis."

Earlier this week at a forum hosted for candidates for mayor and alderman in Franklin, members of Tennessee Active Club showed up and escorted Hanson and her husband into the event. They said they were there to protect Gabrielle.  It gets weirder. 

The group claims Mayor Ken Moore, who has served as mayor since 2011 is a member of Antifa. Yep, Dr. Ken Moore, Mayor of Franklin, is said to be a member of Antifa. Dr. Moor has served as president of the Tennessee Orthopedic Society, is a member of the Franklin Rotary Club, Building Lives Foundation Board, TMA Group Board, Williamson County and Franklin Chamber of Commerce Board, and chairman of the Columbia State Foundation Board and in 2018 the Tennessee Municiple League mayor of the year. The Sunday school teacher at the Franklin First United Methodist Church is said to me a member of Antifa. I know he doesn't look the part, but you never can tell. 

After the appearance of Tennessee Active Club at that event, a call went out from other members of the Board of Alderman to condemn the group.  Gabrielle Hanson refused. She said, “I’m literally not going to denounce whatever it is that they want to be, whether I agree with what they do in their personal life or not,” “If they want to support you and your re-election, and they want to support me, that is their right. We don’t discriminate in this community against anyone. Never did they lay a hand on anyone, and they were very respectful while they were here.”

The city of Franklin is recognized and honored as one of America's best small towns and wins accolades in all kinds of categories. It would be a shame, if the city of Franklin were to elect Gabrielle Hanson as mayor. The world is paying attention to the mayoral race in Franklin. This race has been covered in The New Republic, The Guardian, Rolling Stone, The Daily Beast, Esquire, Vanity Fair, U K's The Daily Mail and many other publications.

Early voting begins Wednesday and runs through Oct. 19. Election day is Oct. 24. If you live in Franklin, please vote for Ken Moore. 

 

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Franklin's MAGA mayoral candidate Gabrielle Hanson poses with self-proclaimed neo-Nazi in new post

By: Phil Williams, FRANKLIN, Tenn. (WTVF) Oct. 18, 2023— A photo posted Tuesday on the Telegram social media app shows controversial Franklin mayoral candidate Gabrielle Hanson posing with a self-proclaimed neo-Nazi for what appears to be a recorded conversation between the pair.

Hanson, who has refused to dissociate herself from the white supremacists who recently showed up at a candidates forum in support of her campaign, is shown sitting next to Sean Kauffmann, head of the Tennessee Active Club. (link)

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The Increasingly Bizarre Political Campaign of Gabrielle Hanson

God's candidate for mayor? Critics say new Gabrielle Hanson video shows rise of Christian nationalism

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Group revokes endorsements of Franklin's Gabrielle Hanson, Jeff Feldman after NC5 investigation

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Perverts and Hypocrites for Donald Trump

 by Rod Williams, Feb. 9, 2024- I am surprised and dismayed and sometimes disgusted by the type of people who have become Trumpinista candidates, high-profile political activists, and pundits. 

First of all, I am continuously amazed that it is Republicans who are the party of American weakness abroad and pandering to tyrants. I am also surprised to see Republicans more concerned with lambasting Bud Light beer rather and addressing the coming insolvency of Social Security. Durning my lifetime, it was the Republican Party that was the party of sober reflection and rational policy proposals. The Republicans were the adults in the room. Not so much anymore. 

Beyond policy however, there is something else that has shocked me about the change in the Republican Party, or at least the Trump wing of the party, and for all practical purposes the party only has one wing. Ever since Trump came on the political scene, we have seen an explosion of Republican nut-jobs, con-artists, and carnival-barkers, charlatans, and moral degenerates. What is it that makes these kinds of people the face of the Republican Party? I guess when the head of the Party is found civilly liable for rape, has had numerous bankruptcies, has engaged in shady business practices, and faces 91 criminal charges, then that kind of sends the green light that kindred spirits are welcome as Republican leaders.   

Not all of this new breed of Republican candidates and leaders are bad people. Some are just light-weight showmen. Dr. Oz comes to mind. Others inflate their resume and give one reason to question their honesty, like our own Andy Ogles. There seems to be a lot of these.  And then, there are those who are the moral hypocrites and deviants. 

Take the case of Gabrielle Hanson who ran as God's ordained candidate in the race for mayor of Franklin, yet had a record of facilitating prostitution, had affiliation with known Nazis, whose husband had marched in a gay Pride parade wearing nothing but American flag motif Speedos, and had several other things that would cause one to question her sincerity and morality. 

And then there is the case of Scott Presler. Donald Trump is pushing to oust Ronna McDaniel as chair of the Republican Party and replace her with Presler.  Presler was a co-founder of Gays for Trump during the 2016 election.  I don't think that he is gay should disqualify him. In fact, Republicans should be more welcoming to gays. It we agree on economic and foreign policy, then we are on the same side, regardless of what you do in the bedroom.  However, Presler didn't keep his sex in the bedroom and engaged in sexual activity inside a Virginia Beach office the RNC shared with the state party, and posted explicit pictures of the encounter on Craigslist.

And then there is the case of Bridget Ziegler. She is the co-founder of Mom's for Liberty the organization that tries to ban age-inappropriate books from school libraries, fights the teaching of Critical Race Theory and otherwise pushes back against the liberal dominance of public schools. She is a school board member of the Sarasota School District and is half of a Florida Republican power couple. Her husband, until recently, was Chair of the Florida Republican Party.  They also have other positions of responsibility in government and the conservative movement. It turns out that they are swingers and engaged in a threesome with a woman who ended up accusing Christain Ziegler of rape. The above video explains of lot of this saga.  

One can oppose teaching kindergarteners about homosexuality and oppose indoctrination derived from Critical Race Theory and still be a swinger, I guess. Still, for head an organization that is rallying the most religious among us to be led by a swinger, strikes me as hypocrisy. 

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