July 24, 2023 11:43 AM UTC
16 Feedback- by: Colorado Pols
The 2022 Republican nominee for governor of Colorado, Heidi Ganahl, has been working to re-establish her model after dropping to Gov. Jared Polis by nearly 20 factors final 12 months in what’s usually thought-about to be one in every of the worst statewide marketing campaign within the state’s historical past. Final spring, Ganahl re-launched the podcast she used as a thinly-pretensed marketing campaign automobile throughout her lengthy indecisive pre-campaign interval, and in Could started teasing a serious new initiative she was a part of.
In late June, Ganahl went public with the main points, and…properly, right here it’s:
Whats up fellow Patriots! One thing the Ganahl family has finished to combat the woke agenda is switching our on a regular basis merchandise from woke companies (no extra Goal and we’re sticking sturdy to that) to ALL American-made manufacturing. Let me introduce you to the America-first parallel economic system!
We’re shifting our spending on common on a regular basis gadgets from low-cost CCP producers to scrub, American-made, American-worker manufacturing. To date, we’ve cherished all of the merchandise and nothing feels higher than understanding that our cash is being properly spent in alignment with our values. Wish to study extra? Head to patriotswitch.com/heidi 🇺🇸
What’s “Patriot Change,” you ask? Because the Day by day Beast reported over a 12 months in the past, it’s nothing new:
Scott McKay, a Q-backer who wields a tomahawk on stage and overtly fantasizes concerning the homicide of Democrats in his movies, seems at QAnon rallies throughout the nation below the identify “Patriot Streetfighter.”
In posts on the messaging app Telegram in March [2022], McKay urged his followers to organize for the launch of a mysterious mission known as “Operation Tomahawk.” Revealing little concerning the mission, he promised that he was launching an “financial warfare platform” that may tackle liberal companies and “choke them out.”
“We’re going to have hundreds of thousands after which tens of hundreds of thousands of individuals collaborating on this,” McKay declared in a video.
McKay’s Operation Tomahawk turned out to be Patriot Change, one other direct-selling enterprise primarily based on multi-level advertising and marketing. [Pols emphasis] This time, QAnon followers are being urged to purchase their merchandise by means of Patriot Change, thereby “supporting corporations that promote freedom.” In a video to his followers, McKay promised that they’d earn commissions by recruiting new individuals to promote by means of the corporate.
Patriot Change is what’s generally known as a multi-level advertising and marketing operation, just like well-known longstanding outfits like Amway and Herbalife whose enterprise mannequin relies upon as a lot or extra on the recruitment of recent salespeople than the precise promoting of merchandise. These companies are infamous for promising giant incomes from a home-based enterprise, when in reality solely a small fraction of contributors make any cash in any respect. Extra typically, “enterprise homeowners” are manipulated into stocking up on merchandise they don’t want to satisfy gross sales objectives and quit in frustration after dropping hundreds of {dollars}.
What makes “Patriot Change” completely different? Nicely, it’s a multi-level advertising and marketing scheme for patriots! The organizers on the high of the pyramid seem to have merely draped the identical outdated scheme with culture-warrior MAGA rhetoric to deflect from the whys and wherefores of the enterprise mannequin. We’ll concede it’s a novel strategy that may catch even some conscious of MLM scams within the summary off their guard. In Ganahl’s case, it seems that she began her personal Patriot Change affiliate a few months after “America’s Mother,” far-right Mesa County whacktivist and one-time marketing campaign supervisor for Rep. Lauren Boebert Sherronna Bishop. Relying on the way it’s organized, that might make Ganahl part of Sherronna Bishop’s “downline,” or subordinate salespeople who earn money for these up the pyramid.
Both method, it’s notable that the 2022 Republican nominee for governor of Colorado has turned to pushing one of many oldest and most infamous enterprise schemes in American historical past, albeit with a brand new MAGA “patriot” twist. After Ganahl constructed and offered off a really profitable dogsitting enterprise earlier than her run for governor, we’ve got to name this a tragic descent right into a a lot much less credible method to earn a residing.
The one factor we will add is that the MAGA motion, which Ganahl proudly spoke for as “the MAGA candidate Colorado has been ready for,” was the sufferer of one of many biggest scams in American historical past. That makes them a simple mark for being scammed repeatedly.
