Ivan Raiklin, a prominent election denier and Trump supporter, sits in the audience during a House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government hearing.Graeme Sloan/Sipa/AP

I found the “Secretary of Retribution” on Tuesday, sitting on a couch on media row during the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee. As an associate filmed him with a phone camera, Ivan Raiklin was railing against enemies of former President Donald Trump. The self-styled Retribution Secretary had an ominous message: “Constitutional sheriffs,” he warned, were going to round up all the people on Raiklin’s “Deep State target list” in live-streamed “swatting raids” so they could be punished for treason.

Those who wanted to avoid such a fate, he said, had until September 3 to “come out as a whistleblower,” by reaching out to Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) or Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.) to help with their investigations into the “weaponization” of government. Then, he said, “We will spare you. Everyone else will be treated as a co-conspirator.”

It’s the kind of crazy talk that the Trump campaign has tried hard to dial back this week at the gathering of the Republican faithful. Many of MAGA world’s most controversial stars, such as conspiracy theorists Alex Jones and Roger Stone, who featured prominently at the 2016 GOP convention, have been largely sidelined. This year, speakers have focused on unity, comity, and winning in November in the wake of the assassination attempt against Trump. But Raiklin doesn’t seem to have gotten the memo.

A former Green Beret and military intelligence officer, a lawyer, and a failed Virginia US Senate candidate, Raiklin also calls himself the “Deep State Marauder.” He’s a colleague of former Trump National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and has been traveling the country with him this year as part of Flynn’s ReAwaken American tour. He’s also helped promote Flynn’s new movie, in which he has a cameo. When I saw the film at a screening in Charleston, West Virginia, Raiklin was on stage with Flynn, after playing the heavy and booting out all the media.

Raiklin was involved with Flynn’s efforts to help overturn the results of the 2020 election. He is the author of the “Operation Pence Card” memo, which proposed that Vice President Mike Pence could........

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