Controversial Ohio Radio Host Among Militiamen Arrested with Ammon Bundy in Oregon

Last night, federal authorities jumped into action in Oregon, the climax of a nearly-month-long stand-off involving anti-government militiamen taking marching orders from extremist clown Ammon Bundy. Six individuals were arrested, and one killed. Among the people walking away in government-issued handcuffs: an Ohio radio host with track record of demagogic blather. 

Pete Santilli, a 50-year-old former Marine from the Cincinnati area, was picked up with the Bundy crowd and is currently facing a charge of conspiracy to impede federal officers. According to a release from the FBI, Santilli was taken into custody without incident. 

This all began on January 2, when anti-government types under Bundy took control of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in protest against perceived government overreach. The standoff became a Bunker Hill for extremists looking for a reason, any reason. It was hard not to hear Waco and other ugly situations rumbling in the background. 

Santilli had come to Oregon to basically live-stream the revolution, posting constant updates and feeds on the takeover. Last night, Santilli was reporting that Bundy and others had been taken into custody after an exchange of gunfire with law enforcement before he was grabbed by authorities. According to OregonLive.com, he was on-air in the moments building up to his own arrest. 

Before Oregon, Santilli was a known quantity in the Southern Ohio rightsphere. He hosted an online radio show called “Off the Hook in the Morning.” The position gave him the opportunity to mouth controversial bullshit and share on-air skull sessions with fellow lunatic weak-sauce Americans like Ted Nugent (who used the opportunity to compare President Obama to a Nazi). Case in point, in 2013, Santilli got cranked up about Hilary Clinton and said he wanted her “tried, convicted and shot in the vagina.”

When the charmer got some national heat for the comments, he doubled down, according to Media Matters: 

I was very specific in my commentary that’s all over the press today in that regard — that I don’t want her to die. I’ve actually done something and said something that’s less humane: I want her to suffer.

Whereas people like you, who are rational and logical and lawful and constitutional want to bring the death penalty to her by hanging for treason. I want the opposite: I want to shoot her in the vagina, and let her suffer right before my eyes on behalf of all of the people who have died at her hands.

It appears his soapboxing has already landed Santilli on government watch lists. That file is probably only fatter now after Oregon.

Oregon can keep him. 

This article appears in Jan 27 – Feb 2, 2016.