The New Face of the Patriot Movement-- a Kansas-raised Teenager

Auburn, Kan.-- In one of dozens of YouTube videos posted this past month featuring teenager Victoria Sharp, who is from these parts, she flashes a wide smile when an online broadcaster offers to produce “The Victoria Sharp Show.”

It would play to a patriot movement audience.

“Will you please be the spokesman for our youth concerning our Constitution and our freedoms?” asked the broadcaster.

“Yes,” she said.

As for hosting a show, Sharp, 18, said she needed time to rest after her harrowing afternoon near the occupied Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon.

On Jan. 26 she witnessed authorities shoot dead one of the occupiers whose pickup truck had plowed past a roadblock.

So began Sharp’s rocket ride to stardom on the websites and radio shows that peddle in government conspiracies.

She says she watched from the truck’s back seat as Robert “LaVoy” Finicum stepped out, raised his hands and declared, “If you’re going to shoot, then just shoot me.” Then authorities fired on him in the snow. The FBI says that Finicum, who was a militia spokesman during the recent standoff, reached toward a jacket pocket where a handgun was found.

Overhead footage shows he left the truck with hands up but then moved at least one hand toward his coat.

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