Michigan governor’s alleged kidnapping conspirators sought to ‘ignite’ civil war

A man who pleaded guilty to participating in a plot to kidnap Michigan’s Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer told a courtroom that his alleged co-conspirators sought to “ignite” a civil war and disrupt the 2020 presidential election before they were targeted in a stunning FBI sting.

Star witness Ty Garbin, who described building a mock set of the governor’s home to practise how they would plan to break in, said the group “wanted to cause as much a disruption as possible to prevent Joe Biden from getting into office.”

“It didn’t have to be,” he said during testimony in US District Court on 23 March. “It was just preferred.”

He said kidnapping the state’s Democratic governor would serve as the “ignition” for civil war “and hopefully other states or other groups would follow suit.”