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Warning: The following article contains graphic and sexually explicit content. Reader discretion is advised.
CV NEWS FEED // A Maryland Democratic Party operative and LGBTQ activist allegedly sent sexually explicit messages conveying his desire to “rape” a 14-year-old boy.
Michael Knaapen served in a volunteer capacity as the chairman of the state party’s LGBTQ+ Diversity Leadership Council (DLC) until he was reportedly removed from this role this week, shortly after the accusations against him surfaced.
On Friday, journalist and Predator Poachers founder Alex Rosen posted a video to X (formerly Twitter) documenting an encounter between him and Knaapen. The video has since gone viral.
In confronting Knaapen, Rosen read a section of the message that the Democratic activist allegedly wrote to what he thought was a 14-year-old boy. “I want to rape you,” read the text message. “I want to see how much of a f***** you are.”
“I like the fantasy and he seemed to enjoy it,” Knaapen said in an attempt to explain. “And I didn’t know this person and never intended to.”
Rosen went on to read more of the party volunteer’s alleged message to the child, including a section in which Knaapen appeared to speak about his penis, writing: “It’s okay if you want to jerk off looking at it.”
As Rosen read, Knaapen also allegedly wrote to the boy “Stop by this morning so I can stretch your hole, f*****. Can’t wait to make you my little bull.”
“Yes,” Knaapen said after Rosen read the words, appearing to acknowledge that he wrote them.
Also in the clip, Rosen asked Knaapen how long he had served in his position with Maryland’s Democratic Party.
Knaapen answered that he had held the role since last fall, and clarified that it was an unpaid volunteer position.
Also on Friday, journalist Andy Ngo posted to X a screenshot of Knaapen’s LinkedIn page.
Per the screenshot, Knaapen’s page read: “I don’t want to be an activist. I want to be an ‘effectivist.’”
The “About” section of the page stated: “I work in patient advocacy and aging/disability policy. I sit on the Board of a disability service coordination center and am a member of the Maryland Democratic Party Executive Committee.”
Per the Maryland Democratic Party DLC’s archived webpage, “Michael Knaapen (Mike, he/him) is a native Wisconsinite who has lived in Montgomery County, Maryland, for all but one of the past ten years.”
The webpage continued:
Mike is a lifelong Democrat eager to ensure that LGBTQ voters are informed and prepared to support the party, and that the party remains the political home of LGBTQ voters – not just because it is their only option in the face of Republican bigotry, but because the party is actively seeking to empower, serve, represent, and protect LGBTQ Marylanders.
Seamus Coughlin, a Catholic animator who runs the popular YouTube channel FreedomToons, replied to Ngo on X:
literally all you have to do to be safe as a pedo is join one of these organizations because once you do, no matter how creepy or obvious you are, anyone who calls you a creep is the bad guy and youre a poor innocent victim of bigotry.
Comedian and political commentator Tim Young wrote: “And the Democrat party will never denounce this guy. They’ll probably call him the victim.”
Rosen’s Predator Poachers describes itself as “a group of independent journalists and private citizens who travel the country conducting intervention-style sting operations to catch child predators.”
“PREDATORS ARE EVERYWHERE,” the group continues on its website:
Operating quietly, they try to position themselves with easy access to children, from infants to toddlers to teens. With social media and online gaming now so prevalent, predators have unprecedented access to kids. They manipulate vulnerable kids from behind a keyboard, escalating to evil that causes lifelong damage to victims.
