In late March, Attorney General Dana Nessel held an open discussion at the Novi Civic Center to sell the new red flag laws—signed by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer only a few weeks earlier—to the voting public.
This event was ostensibly supposed to be an opportunity for the public to actually learn about what was contained in the new laws, but nobody opposing them was allowed to speak.
Setting aside the ominous chill of several undercover state police mingling in the crowd and doing a terrible job of discreetly photographing individuals, the most eyebrow-raising moment was when Nessel and Rep. Kelly Breen promised more laws regulating guns were coming. They didn’t elaborate or provide any additional policy ideas, but they assured their supporters: “We are not done.”
One social media streamer made a fool of himself at the event. I didn’t know who he was at the time, but he was impossible to forget. His intent was to create chaos, draw attention, and pull everyone’s eyes towards him—to generate viral moments for online content. He mugged for cameras, shouted at speakers, made confrontational statements to attendees, and generally behaved badly. I’d even suggest, based on my years of surveillance and counter-surveillance, that his presence at that event was possibly as a mark to paint conservatives in the worst possible light.
Fast forward to mid-November, and Michigan Democrats have paid a steep political price for their overreaching agenda. Now the clock is ticking, and Michigan Democrats are feverishly attempting to write the remnants of their agenda into law before the end of the year.
On the way to Whitmer’s desk is a new law banning firearms at polling centers, absentee ballot boxes, and the voting locations across the state on election days and 40 days out from an election. Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson attempted this ban a year earlier, only to be stopped by the Michigan Supreme Court; but Democrats don’t like losing, so they’re trying to push this through the legislature.
Even more nefarious are Senate Bills 857 and 858, both of which moved out of committee last week and are awaiting votes.
The bills are sponsored by Democratic Sens. Rosemary Bayer of West Bloomfield and Dayna Polehanki of Livonia and codify into law a firearms ban on state Capitol property. The first draft of these bills would have banned firearms in all buildings or properties containing liquor licensing, effectively banning firearms in every restaurant, grocery store, and bar, in addition to the Capitol building, hospitals, and churches. Sen. Bayer later said this was an error.
During committee debate, representatives from the National Rifle Association and Michigan Open Carry questioned the oddity of such an error and how it came into being. Of course, Sens. Bayer and Polehanki provided no answers, and their awkward stares suggested they got caught with their hands in the cookie jar.
Nevertheless, they managed to get the bills out of debate and onto the floor, presumably for votes this week.
And that social media streamer from the March event? He was at this hearing too. Turns out his name is Avi Rachlin, and, right on queue, when embarrassed Senate Democrats badly needed committee debate to end, he shuffled up to the main podium and proceeded to make an obviously scripted speech and say the N-word. Democrat Committee Chairwoman Stephanie Chang immediately gaveled the debate. Polehanki begged local media to immediately report on this terrible event, declaring, “I never thought I’d see the day.”
Within minutes of this video hitting X, political reporters were retweeting and reporting on Rachlin’s moronic behavior and associating him with conservative groups. Within hours, every state media platform and some national news sites had covered it.
Interestingly, while all the coverage seemed laser targeted on a moron, no one was reporting on the actual proposed gun laws, the inexplicable errors in the drafts, or the eloquent arguments by serious speakers, detailing the distinct class warfare at play with the special exceptions to the laws, including that members of the legislature are exempt from them.
Perhaps I’m too cynical or conspiratorial, but it’s an interesting coincidence that when Democrats needed a court jester to pull attention off their controversial agenda, specifically in the case of gun legislation, Rachlin was ready to help.
Whether he is an agent provocateur, a psyop, a self-serving social media content creator, or just an unstable person with a fixation on Michigan politics, one thing is clear: His behavior obstructed real conservative opposition to Democrats’ efforts to regulate gun rights.
Rachlin signed into the Senate hearing as a representative of Groypers for America and used vernacular and speech patterns seemingly pulled directly from the nonsensical rants of its leader, Nick Fuentes. For a group claiming to identify as right-leaning, they spend the bulk of their efforts foiling conservative initiatives and attacking conservative politicians and activists using antisemitic tropes.
All of this is to say, at the conclusion of the hearing, Rachlin seemed quite pleased with himself having the temerity to say the N-word on the Senate floor, and Democrats seemed quite happy to end the debate with a moron saying it.
Why is it every time Avi Rachlin makes an appearance at a public political event the Democrats leave pleased?
J.Z. Delorean is a writer for Michigan Enjoyer and has been a Metro Detroit-based professional investigator for 22 years. Follow him on X @Stainless31.
