On Saturday, a massive fire broke out at the Edisto Beach home of Diane Goodstein, a South Carolina Circuit Court judge who was born and raised in the Palmetto State.
Photos and videos from the scene show it being engulfed in flames and totally destroyed. Two family members and another person were in the home at the time of the blaze. They all escaped, thankfully, but sustained injuries:
Circuit Court Judge Diane Goodstein was walking her dogs on the beach in Edisto Island, S.C., about an hour south of Charleston, when the fire began, according to officials. Her husband, former state Sen. Arnold Goodstein, their son, Arnold Goodstein III, and one other occupant were forced to jump from the burning building from an elevated first floor to escape the blaze, officials said.
The three occupants were rescued by kayak from the home’s backyard due to the area’s marshy terrain, Colleton County Fire-Rescue told ABC News. One occupant was airlifted to Medical University of South Carolina hospital in Charleston and the other two were taken there via ground transportation, according to Colleton County Fire-Rescue.
Almost immediately, the Usual Suspects sprang into action, blaming the Trump administration for criticizing Goldstein over a TRO she issued in early September that barred the state’s election commission from handing over its voter registration info to the DOJ:
Circuit Court judge Diane Goodstein issued a temporary restraining order to halt the process on Sept. 2, saying that “there is a likelihood that immediate and irreparable damage will result to Plaintiff if her personal information data is released in violation of her right to privacy.”
Harmeet Dhillon, DOJ Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights, pushed back on the ruling at the time, vowing to press on:
Between that, unconfirmed reports of Goodstein allegedly receiving threats after the ruling, and White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller harshly criticizing the judge in the Oregon National Guard case on the same day Goodstein’s house went up in flames, it was enough for the liberal outrage machine to do its thing:
This is Newsom’s comms director:
After the tweets from Newsom’s office in particular, however, Dhillon was alerted to alleged threats that DOJ staffers said they saw in the comments:
According to a screenshot, one ominous-sounding post from an X account that no longer exists declared, “I’m just saying Harmeet Dhillon’s address can’t be hard to find.” The screenshot also showed that after the person was asked what they were saying, they replied, “I’ll let you know in two weeks.”
Those posts appear to have been made in reply to a post from Izzy Gardon, Newsom’s communications director.
In response, Dhillon indicated she’d made some referrals to the U.S. Marshals office:
On Monday, the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) announced that so far, they’d found no evidence that the fire was intentionally set, a message that SC Gov. Henry McMaster shared on X:
SLED Chief Mark Keel has announced that at this point in the investigation there is no evidence the horrific fire at Judge Goodstein’s Edisto home was intentionally set. I echo Chief Keel’s call for everyone to exercise good judgment and avoid sharing unverified information while the investigation continues.
The news had Dhillon once again implicating Newsom’s comms guy in the alleged threats against her:
As a side note, most of the “reporting” and hyperventilating from the media and the left on this story leave out the very inconvenient fact that subsequent rulings in the case in the weeks that followed were against the plaintiff who had originally sued to stop the release of the information:
Sept. 11: SC Supreme Court lifts block on state from sharing voter data with DOJ
Oct. 1: Circuit Court judge sides with SC in case over voter data release to DOJ
The investigation into the cause of the fire is ongoing. We’ll keep you posted on developments.
– Stacey Matthews has also written under the pseudonym “Sister Toldjah” and can be reached via X. –
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