Daily Beast

Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/GettyMark Robinson, the hardcore conspiracy-theorist Republican running for governor in North Carolina, has been posting through it ever since his rise to power in 2021 as the state’s first-ever Black lieutenant governor.He’s called the Holocaust “hogwash” and described the Nazis as “upstart amateurs in terms of manipulation and murder.” Robinson’s also drawn the attention of online extremist groups, including the white supremacist forum Stormfront, a website founded in the 1990s by a Ku Klux Klan leader in Alabama.Robinson’s ties to the forum were previously reported in a Washington Post story in March, which mentioned a 2021 thread praising him as “the negro N. Carolina Lt. Gov” who “goes off on CRT, trans, jews, and anti-Americans. LOL!”Read more at The Daily Beast.

NetflixTikTok is on the verge of being banned in the United States, and Dancing for the Devil: The 7M TikTok Cult won’t alter its reputation as a tool utilized by conniving Asian power players to manipulate and brainwash young Americans. Derek Doneen’s three-part docuseries is an eye-opening story about aspiring dancers, social media, and a Korean pastor accused of various offenses ranging from financial fraud and sexual abuse to coercing adherents to sever all ties with their families and friends. If it features more than a few frustrating plot holes that undercut its comprehensiveness, it remains a startling look at the ease with which 21st-century hucksters can ply their trade online.“I cannot be defeated!” proclaims Robert Shinn in one of many audio recordings featured in this bingeable affair (May 29). The preacher, however, has never met a foe as formidable as Netflix, and Dancing for the Devil: The 7M TikTok Cult takes him to brutal task for his myriad wrongdoings. Shinn is the founder and leader of the Santa Ana-based Shekinah Church, a religious outfit that, as evidenced by the material on display in Doneen’s docuseries, indulges in speaking-in-tongues craziness and promotes generic mumbo jumbo about heaven and hell, and its leader as the “Man of God” capable of guiding people to the former and away from the latter. Central to Shinn’s teachings is the idea that the faithful must completely detach from their loved ones in order to pledge allegiance to the Almighty (and him). The closer to Shinn, the closer to God—and getting into his orbit means working for peanuts and catering to his every whim.Such notions are straight out of the Cult 101 playbook, and thus the revelation that Shinn was filching most of his followers’ earnings is about as surprising as the dawn of each new day. As far back as two decades ago, Shinn had a guiding interest in celebrity, going so far as to executive produce two (crummy-looking) movies and to attempt to launch entertainment careers for his right-hand man Daniel and his daughter Kloe. When those didn’t pan out, he shrewdly turned to a group of dancers who were trying to make it big on TikTok. It was here where Shinn made a serious mark, beginning with his recruitment of James “Bdash” Derrick, a rising star in the scene who served as a de facto recruiter for Shinn’s church. When Shinn saw that this might be a lucrative opportunity to extend his reach into TV and film, he formed a management company called 7M Films and signed a host of additional dancers eager to parlay their hard work into fame and fortune.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Mark Peterson/ReutersNo one can predict a criminal jury verdict with anything approaching scientific accuracy. This includes lawyers, judges, and, most certainly, political commentators.This is the mystery of the truth-divination system we call a criminal justice system. We let two white knights (the presumption of innocence clothes both prosecution and defense in white) joust and whoever wins is determined to be representing the side of truth. Juries decide which side wins.After the Trump trial verdict, we will never know exactly what factored into the jury’s decision—whether it be conviction, acquittal or hung jury—because no one account can capture even how one human mind makes decisions, much less twelve of them.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Illustration by Elizabeth Brockway/The Daily Beast/GettyCrowning the song of the summer used to be easy: “Hot in Herre,” “Crazy in Love,” “Umbrella,” “Call Me Maybe,” “Despacito,” and “Old Town Road” were all incontestable champions of their time. As the monoculture has crumbled in recent years, determining a winner has gotten harder—but we’ll be damned if we don’t try, so we’re back to debate: What is this year’s song of the summer?Sure, the season is young and anything could happen—hot-weather king Calvin Harris has been teasing a new song with Miley Cyrus, and we still have albums from Peso Pluma and Normani on deck for June. But from chart-friendly superstars like Post Malone and Ariana Grande, to up-and-comers like Shaboozey and Chappell Roan, there are still plenty of contenders to choose from. See our picks below.“Espresso” by Sabrina CarpenterRead more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/Getty/ABC/Disney/FX/Netflix/HBOThere are some people who see summertime as an opportunity to spend more time outdoors. But there are other, more logical people who see it as the perfect chance to watch mountains of television. These people are in luck this season, with a veritable onslaught of content arriving from June to August. (Y’know, as if that isn’t also true of every other month of the year. But we digress.)From a new Star Wars spinoff and more House of the Dragon to a third helping of The Bear, a historic season of The Bachelorette, and Natalie Portman’s first-ever leading role in a TV series, summer 2024 looks like it’ll have many reasons to keep us out of the sun for days on end. Below, we have a guide to 24 of the shows to have on your radar from now until Labor Day.Star Wars: The Acolyte Season 1Read more at The Daily Beast.

HBOAndrew Jarecki’s original 2015 docuseries The Jinx was about whether Robert Durst killed three different people: his first wife Kathie, who went missing in 1982; his best friend Susan Berman, who was executed in 2000; and his neighbor Morris Black, whom he admitted to dismembering in 2001. The Jinx—Part Two, meanwhile, has to this point been about his arrest and trial, both of which have long been public record. Consequently, unlike its predecessor, it hasn’t been building to a jaw-dropping bombshell; instead, as its closing episode confirmed, it’s always been something more depressingly chilling: a portrait of rampant, repugnant complicity.Unsurprisingly, tonight’s season (and series) finale focused less on Durst’s death behind bars—an already known fact—than on how he managed, for decades and in the face of overwhelming evidence of guilt, to weasel his way out of trouble. The simple answer, it turns out, is money, which buys support, silence, lies, and the morality of the weak, manipulatable, and greedy. It’s a case study of the fact that, for a particular kind of monster, selling one’s soul to the devil is a very good deal.The Jinx—Part Two’s penultimate installment concluded with the question of why Durst’s second wife Debrah Lee Charatan—who sent her attorney Alan Abramson to the trial in her place—needed a lawyer at all, much less one who was present in court. This mystery speaks to the series’ primary argument: namely, that rather than a “lone wolf” who got away with murder on his own (until he didn’t), Durst was a fiend who used his wealth and power to amass a cabal of conspirators. It’s fitting, then, that following his sentencing hearing, during which he receives life in prison without the possibility of parole, he’s largely abandoned by his friends and former cohorts, whom he cries out to in messages left on answering machines in his pitifully gravelly, frail voice (Stewie! Susie! Debrah!). Finally, the killer is alone.Read more at The Daily Beast.

William B. Plowman/NBC via Getty ImagesFormer Democratic Rhode Island congressman Patrick J. Kennedy has joined other members of the family to endorse President Joe Biden instead of his own cousin, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., for president in 2024.During an interview on CNN’s State of the Union, Kennedy, a mental health and addiction advocate, called Biden “the best president we’ve ever had on mental health.”“And frankly, he’s also put the most money to community mental health around the country. So there is no other choice than Joe Biden. If you care about this addiction crisis and this mental health crisis, Joe Biden is your candidate,” he said.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/HBOHere we go: The main boys of The Sympathizer, Captain (Hoa Xuande) and Bon (Fred Ngyuen Khan) are on their way back to Vietnam to stage the second Vietnam War. Because, you know, everyone is looking for a sequel to that one. Huge hit around the world. Why not do it again?Claude (Robert Downey, Jr.) is on the ground in Thailand—their layover—and ready to welcome them back. “You boys have landed on the lips of your motherland,” he says, slapping Captain on the back. As if we needed more of this awkward sexual obsession with motherhood. The militia goes to party at some club in Thailand, which Captain accurately describes as “a farewell party on death row.”Amidst the naked women, Claude asks Captain to speak with him in private. Claude has heard from the General (Toan Le) that Captain fears this mission will be unsafe. Well, Claude says, its safety depends on how classified this mission has managed to stay—it is a secret, is it not? Captain sweats. Then, Claude reveals Captain’s worst nightmare: The entire conversation at Sonny’s (Alan Trong) place was recorded, in which Captain revealed that he was a Communist spy, showing his entire hand.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Chip Somodevilla/Getty ImagesAfter a disastrous weekend at the Libertarian National Convention, Donald Trump claimed he would’ve cinched the third-party nomination after being disqualified for not filing the correct paperwork.On Sunday, Libertarian Party Chair Angela McArdle ruled that because the former president did not actually submit nominating papers, he was not qualified to receive her party’s nomination.Trump, as usual, had an alternative version of events, posting on Truth Social Sunday his reasoning for not submitting the correct documents, while adding his thoughts on the “enthusiasm” of the crowd, who were in fact booing the former president for the most part.Read more at The Daily Beast.

Photo Illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/Steve Gregg/Valentina LavrinenkoKHARKIV, Ukraine—Valentina Lavrinenko, 60, is fighting back tears while trying to heat some Ukrainian borscht over a small gas stove at her daughter's apartment in Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine. The city is being pounded by Russian bombs daily, resulting in frequent power cuts.It has been over a year and a half since Skyler Gregg, an American volunteer in the Ukrainian army, died at the frontline. The eastern Ukrainian city of Kupiansk, where Valentina used to live with her husband Viktor, had been under Russian occupation for seven months until the Ukrainian Army sent the Russians fleeing n September 2022.She recalled the young American arriving almost like a knight on a white horse. His Colgate smile and kind soul are impossible for her to forget. Skyler, from Washington state, helped Valentina and Viktor reconnect with their daughter and son via Starlink in 2022 after the liberation. It melted Valentina's heart.Read more at The Daily Beast.