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Ron DeSantis told the creator of Libs of TikTok she could hide out at his mansion after her identity became public

Dec 28, 2022, 20:29 IST
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A screengrab of Chaya Raichik appearing on Fox News on December 27, 2022.Tucker Carlson Today
  • Chaya Raichik appeared on Tucker Carlson's show on December 27.
  • She told Carlson that Ron DeSantis offered her refuge after her identity was revealed in April.
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Chaya Raichik told Tucker Carlson that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis offered her his official mansion as a place to hide out after her identity was revealed in April.

Raichik appeared on "Tucker Carlson Today" on December 27, a show on the Fox News streaming service Fox Nation, and showed her face for the first time.

Before April, Raichik had been totally anonymous, until her identity and job as a real-estate agent were reported by Taylor Lorenz in The Washington Post.

Lorenz noted that Raichik, who went by her screen name Libs of TikTok, was growing in popularity in right wing circles for reposting clips from other users, predominantly LGBTQ ones, and mocking them in the captions.

Raichik's TikTok account was banned from TikTok in March, but she has built up a following of some 1.7 million people on Twitter.

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Raichik gave her first in-person interview on Tuesday to Carlson, who lauded her as a journalist who was fighting the "violent" left. When he asked her about the Post's reporting, and whether anyone offered her help, Raichik said that someone from Gov. DeSantis' team called her.

"She said, 'The governor wanted me to give you a message. He said if you don't feel safe, you or your family, if you need a place to go, to hide, to stay, you can come to the governor's mansion,'" Raichik said. "She said, 'We have a guest house for you, and you can come and stay as long as you need.'"

The Florida governor's mansion is a 30-room property in Tallahassee, the Florida state capital. According to Florida's Department of Management Services it was designed to mimic The Hermitage, the home of former President Andrew Jackson in Nashville, Tenneessee.

Raichik said that when she got the call she "was almost in tears." She did not say whether she acted on the offer.

"He took time out of his extremely busy schedule to send someone to call me to make sure I'm safe," she said. "It was incredible, I don't even have the words for it."

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Raichik has become a prominent right wing figure over the past two years. In the interview with Carlson, she also repeated her claims about the LGBTQ community being a "cult" whose members "brainwash people."

She said she wanted to start doing in-person events because she was "ready for the next step."

Her appearance also made her vulnerable, though, as after just a few hours, she appeared to have been spotted in videos from the US Capitol on January 6. Extremism and disinformation researcher Chad Loder documented videos and images in their newsletter and said it had persuaded them that Raichik was there. However, Loder also noted that nobody had been arrested for simply attending.

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