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The Finding Out Part: Proud Boys Face Sentencing

NOTE: Emptywheel is again supporting Brandi Buchman’s coverage of the Proud Boys hearings live from the courthouse in Washington, D.C. Please consider making a donation to emptywheel as she continues her reporting through the final Proud Boys sentencing hearing for Henry “Enrique” Tarrio scheduled for Sept. 5. If you can and are able, you can also support Brandi’s work as a freelance journalist directly here.

From left to right: Proud Boys Zachary Rehl, Ethan Nordean, Henry Tarrio, Joseph Biggs, Dominic Pezzola

Like moths to a flame, many of the Proud Boys sentenced to prison last week for their roles in the seditious conspiracy to stop the peaceful transfer of presidential power on Jan. 6, 2021, appear unwilling or unable to disabuse themselves of the delusions that have led them to exactly where they are today: inside cells, donning jumpsuits or shackles and ordered kept away from the free world and their families for no less than a decade apiece.

Dominic Pezzola, a New York Proud Boy and former Marine who busted open a Senate wing window allowing some of the first rioters to stream inside the Capitol, and forcibly stole a riot shield from a police officer knocked to the ground who believed he would die at the hands of the mob, strode out of a federal courtroom last week shouting “Trump won!” as he pumped

his fist in the air.

Remarkably, less than an hour before receiving his 10-year sentence – the government wanted 20–, Pezzola had begged the court for mercy through tears and vowed he was done with politics.

Joseph Biggs, a former Marine now disgraced with the conviction of seditious conspiracy and a multitude of other felonies, called into a vigil held outside a jail heavily populated by Jan. 6 defendants in D.C. just a few days after he was sentenced to 17 years in prison. The government wanted 33.

“This is just insanity. There is no way in hell any of this stuff can stick. There’s no way you can give somebody terrorism for shaking a fence,” Biggs, a former contributor to Alex Jones’ far-right conspiracy theory peddling InfoWars, railed. “That’s the most insane fucking thing in the world. First, it starts with shaking a fence and what’s next? You shake a hand or accidentally bump into somebody and that’s terrorism… We gotta stand up and fight. And never give up. 17 years? They can kiss my ass. We’re still fighting all the way to the end.”

Biggs then asked the same lawmakers he terrorized nearly 1,000 days ago with a mob of Trump supporters at his back and roughly 200 Proud Boys in the crowd overall, to “get their heads out of their asses” and help free him.

But Trump didn’t win and Biggs wasn’t sentenced to 17 years for merely shaking a fence in the course of peaceful protected protest.

His efforts to bring that fence down, which was bolted inches deep into the steps leading to the Capitol, were done with force and with the implied intent to stop Congress from certifying the election. That forethought was bolstered by the intent and actions of his co-defendants, including Washington state Proud Boy chapter leader Ethan Nordean.

This was decided not just by a jury able to discern evidence clearly enough to evince distinctions between defendants and therefore reach acquittal on some counts, but it was also a point sustained by U.S District Judge Tim Kelly, a Trump appointee. He and the jury defined the Proud Boys’ efforts as an attempt to directly intimidate or coerce the United States government and its officers from doing their duty and initiating the democratic transfer of power.

For the foreseeable future, the Proud Boys and certainly Joe Biggs have appeared to pin all of their hopes for freedom on a pardon from a reelected Donald Trump in 2024. Notably, during an appearance with Alex Jones on InfoWars, Jones – who helped organize the Stop the Steal rally before the attack and who is currently waiting to learn whether $1.4 billion in damages he owes to victims of Sandy Hook will be discharged in bankruptcy – extended an open invitation to Biggs to return to his show.

Biggs gushed and Jones reassured the jailed insurrectionist he was merely a “patsy.” Perhaps in hopes of inspiring fundraising levels, he urged Biggs to “give me a 1776!!”

“1776 brother!” Biggs laughed.

***

At the E. Barret Prettyman courthouse last week, Pezzola, Biggs, Nordean, and their co-defendant, Philadelphia Proud Boy chapter leader Zachary Rehl, were each sentenced by Judge Kelly following their convictions by a jury trial that lasted four months. The only Proud Boy left for sentencing is the group’s leader, Henry “Enrique” Tarrio. He will be sentenced on Tuesday at 2 p.m. ET. The government seeks 33 years for him.

Prosecutors sought 20 years for Pezzola, he was given 10. They sought 33 years for Biggs, he was given 17. Nordean faced a 27-year recommended sentence but received just 18 years, matching Oath Keeper founder Elmer Stewart Rhodes for the stiffest sentence yet handed down to any of the extremists charged and convicted of seditious conspiracy.

The Justice Department sought 30 years for Rehl, and Kelly sentenced him to 15, noting as he rendered his decision how the son and grandson of Pennsylvania police officers perjured himself blatantly on the stand more than a dozen times as he denied – despite clearly visible footage of him – pepper-spraying police who were battling to keep the Capitol under the control of the U.S. government.

Yet, it seems increasingly unlikely that the judge will venture into those high climbs and may instead deliver a sentence closer to what Nordean and Rhodes received.

Given their tenor at trial and their mostly self-serving apologies that comprised their remarks before learning their fates, it would also seem things are today not very much different than they were for the Proud Boys in the fall of 2020 or that first fateful week of 2021.

Their minds are heavy still with toxic propaganda. Their egos remain front and center and from their mouths, they continue to sputter drivel echoing a lie told by a man that, for whatever reason they appear unable to fully grasp even now, has helped pave the road to their ruin and continued suffering.

***

ETHAN NORDEAN

To his credit, before he was sentenced, Nordean at least correctly called Jan. 6 a “tragedy.” And he at least offered an apology “for my actions that day and to anyone who I directly or indirectly wronged,” he said.

But he also qualified those remarks and others. What he regretted the most, he told the court, was “not being a better leader” on Jan. 6, speaking nothing of all the times in the lead-up to the day that he failed to disavow fellow Proud Boys in private messages of their violent notions or how he actively recruited men to come with him to Washington.

In court, he said it took him time to “humble” himself and to “accept my situation,” as the trial unfolded, he told Judge Kelly.

“I thought of myself merely as an individual, removing blame and accountability for myself… [but] I had to face a sobering truth. I came to Jan. 6 as a leader; I came to keep people out of trouble and keep people safe,” he said.

Still deflecting responsibility, omitting discussion of how he vilified police and effectively couching his crimes in the language and context of a well-intended general who merely lost control of an unforeseeably mutinous troop, he nonetheless maintained that he tried to “deescalate.”

U.S. Capitol Police Officer Shae Cooney testified at trial in February that it was Nordean who screamed at her, calling her a “pig” as he whipped people up into a frenzy and knocked over the metal fencing that allowed the mob to rush past her. She and other officers near her were beaten with “thin blue line” flags, pelted with frozen water bottles, knocked down and nearly trampled, and doused in chemical spray.

“I had ample opportunity and I did nothing. There is no excuse for what I did… adding myself to a chaotic and dangerous situation in the Capitol building was sorely irresponsible,” Nordean said Friday, his voice clear and even.

Unlike all of his co-defendants at sentencing so far, the Jan. 6 ground leader did not appear to cry.

Before he sentenced him, Kelly told Nordean that what disturbed him was not just Nordean’s actions before and on Jan. 6, but afterward, too. Nordean expressed regretting nothing and when there was talk among Proud Boys of going further, of possibly ramping up for another Jan. 6-style takeover in the days after the attack, he didn’t back down. Not before the inauguration. Not after.

In a text message on Jan. 12, 2021, Proud Boy Ethan Nordean defends his efforts “on the ground.” (Source: DOJ Trial exhibit)

 

In a text message from Jan. 20, 2021, Ethan Nordean discusses plans moving forward for Proud Boys in the “fragile time” after Jan. 6. (DOJ trial exhibit)

 

Proud Boy Ethan Nordean (aka Rufio Panman) text message from Jan. 27, 2021, discussing preparing the group for its next move. (DOJ trial exhibit)

Nordean’s attorney Nick Smith argued for leniency and at one point contended that while Jan. 6 was regrettable, the charge of seditious conspiracy didn’t fit because what the defendants did only really amounted to something in the category of a national embarrassment. The subsequent crimes that sprang forth should be deemed more humiliations to a branch of government and nothing more. Kelly entertained Smith briefly but was sharp on the singular point appearing lost on the defense: the Proud Boys’ actions culminated at a crucial, positively critical constitutional moment. Early last week, Kelly denied all requests for acquittal and retrial.

“If we don’t have the peaceful transfer of power in this country, then we don’t have anything,” Kelly said, his voice slightly exasperated.

The novelty of Smith’s arguments aside, Kelly fell back on what Nordean said and did. It was Nordean who suggested Proud Boys “fash the fuck out.” They understood too, he said, that Jan. 6 was “the day that was the last stop on the train to make sure their preferred candidate stayed in power.”

Calling for terrorism enhancements to apply to Nordean’s sentence, Assistant U.S. Attorney Jason McCullough underlined that Nordean was the figure all other Proud Boys turned to in the fray. Witnesses for the prosecution who pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy testified to this. Evidence and testimony showed how he stepped in when Tarrio, the organization’s founder, could not. (Tarrio was arrested before the raid on the Capitol but watched from afar.)

Nordean marched side by side with Rehl, and Biggs, and it was Nordean, McCullough noted, who recruited and “seduced men like Dominic Pezzola [with the idea] that violence is the answer.”

Judge Kelly would apply a terrorism enhancement to some of the charges at sentencing. The judge said he did not believe the defendants intended to kill anyone on Jan. 6. He also remarked that he would “probably never sentence someone 15 years below the guideline in my entire career.” The recommended sentences, he added, seemed to “overstate” the crime.

When she delivered her victim impact statement ahead of sentencing, U.S. Capitol Police Officer Shae Cooney broke down at the lectern. Through her sobs, she recalled how she lost a friend that day.

“Someone who I worked with for almost three years, I was standing right next to him when we started fighting and later that night he was gone,” Cooney said, referring to fallen Officer Brian Sicknick through choked-back tears. “Every day we have to be reminded he’s not here anymore because the people in this courtroom decided they weren’t happy with how an election went and their best idea was to break into the Capitol, fight police officers, and overturn an election.”

“We understand people were upset and angry. We tried to talk to them as best we could to show we understood they were angry and whatnot, and that this was not going to fix anything… it didn’t matter how much talking we did that day. There were too many people that just wanted to keep going and get through us as much as possible,” Cooney said.

So many people have taken their lives because of what happened to them on Jan. 6, she told the court.

Metropolitan Police Officer Jeffrey Smith killed himself after Jan. 6. Fellow Metro Police Department officers Gunther Hashida and Kyle DeFretag died by suicide. U.S. Capitol Police Officer Howard Liebengood also committed suicide four days after Jan. 6.

Officer Sicknick died after suffering multiple strokes following his confrontation with rioters.

JOSEPH BIGGS

At his sentencing, Biggs told the court that his “curiosity got the better of me” on Jan. 6. All of his violent rhetoric was just that – talk. It was a way for him to cope, he said.

Last week, when cuddling up to Judge Kelly and before he said the Justice Department could “kiss his ass” when speaking to supporters gathered at the D.C. jail, Biggs told the judge he respected the process and outcome though he freely admitted he would appeal.

“I don’t have any grudges toward any of you. I don’t hate the prosecutors. I prayed for all of you. I’m going to leave this situation a better person,” Biggs said, his speech rushed and his emotions high as he spoke.

He continued: “I had time to think about who I am and who I want to be with all my time in solitary confinement… I don’t want to be a person affiliated with any more groups unless it’s my daughter’s PTA.”

Biggs went on to claim that the assault of his daughter by someone he knew had twisted him up in the run-up to the insurrection. He also claimed that after Jan. 6, that was his “last time” with the Proud Boys and he had planned to tell everyone he was “done.”

Crying, Biggs pleaded: “I’m not a terrorist. I don’t hate people.”

But, Kelly told him, he did play a role leading people and riling others up against lawmakers and police. He was instrumental in the Proud Boys’ so-called “Ministry of Self Defense” and Biggs for weeks was key in leading operations for the channel that acted covertly to coordinate efforts for the 6th.

It was Biggs who wanted to find “real men” to “get radical” with and it was Biggs’ overt calls for violence and civil war that littered the group’s private and public correspondence. It was Biggs whom Tarrio turned to and whom Tarrio told members he relied on, along with Nordean, to make decisions. And when it finally came to it, it was Biggs, Kelly said, who helped yank down the fence and wave people inside with an intent to intimidate Congress.

Proud Boy Joe Biggs is seen gesturing to rioters below, indicating where a nearby opening is for those to come inside the Capitol. (DOJ trial exhibit)

Biggs was the only Proud Boy to breach the Capitol twice. He saw officers fighting for their lives and brushed past them at the Columbus doors. He took a selfie once inside and stole an American flag as he marauded through the building.

“You waved people in. You entered the Senate gallery and made comments afterward that justified and celebrated what happened,” Kelly said.

A terrorism enhancement would apply to the charge involving the metal fence, the judge was quick to distinguish, because its removal was integral to rioters advancing and getting inside the Capitol. But he was shy to label Biggs a terrorist in the general sense.

“It’s not my job to label people a terrorist and my sentence today won’t do that. There are sentencing guidelines here that talk about adjustments and departures for conduct and then lay it out and label it terrorism and my job is to apply this. You asked me not to label you a terrorist, that’s for other people to argue about,” Kelly said.

Prosecutors warned the judge in their sentencing memo: “A conviction for serious felonies, and the accompanying substantial prison sentence, might unfortunately only redouble Biggs’s commitment to embracing extreme measures to achieve his political aims. The Court must accordingly impose a sentence long enough to prevent Biggs from leading another violent conspiracy against the government while he is still motivated and equipped to do so.”

In court, McCullough told the judge the Proud Boys, especially with leaders like Biggs at the helm, brought the nation to the “edge of a constitutional crisis” because that was precisely what they set out to do. Buildings may not have been bombed, mass casualties may not have occurred, McCullough argued, but the Proud Boys created an atmosphere on Jan. 6 that has yet to dissipate.

People are afraid to go to polling places or inaugurations for fear of political violence, he said. (In fact, threats and harassment of poll workers are up according to a recent study by the Justice Department.)

The Proud Boys didn’t need weapons of mass destruction, McCullough said.

“It just takes slick propaganda in an environment where you can encourage people to basically say it’s you against them,” he said.

Before Biggs was carted out of the courtroom by a marshal, Kelly told the parties he would have imposed precisely the same sentence had the terrorism guideline not applied.

“I know this is not the outcome you wanted or the government either,” Kelly said. “But I wish you the best of luck in your relationship with your daughter moving forward. I’ll just say that. I think it’s an appropriate sentence but I do wish you the best of luck with your daughter.”

ZACHARY REHL

Of all the Proud Boys to face sentencing last week, it was Rehl who became the most undone after prosecutors laid out their request.

“Zachary Rehl deserves every day of the sentence the government has requested for him here [of 30 years],” Assistant U.S. Attorney Erik Kenerson said Thursday.

Rehl helped “raise an army” of Proud Boys who shared in his belief that the 2020 election was stolen and that the only means of recourse to stop the transfer of power was to put a halt to proceedings on Jan. 6, Kenerson said.

“What is particularly pernicious in this conspiracy is the glorification of violence… the willingness to brawl in support of their cause to achieve results they could not otherwise,” the prosecutor emphasized.

Rehl looked at “vigilante violence” as a means to an end and when he recruited members to the Proud Boys, it was the most violent footage of their ideological or political opponents being brutalized that he tapped. He endorsed violence as just one piece of the strategy to “take back the country” and had been doing so since as far back as 2019 when he first started to associate with the group, Kenerson said.

Though the son and grandson of police officers, Rehl nonetheless encouraged violence against law enforcement when he advanced on the Capitol and then used violence to break a standstill on the Capitol’s West Plaza by assaulting an officer with pepper spray, Kenerson said.

At trial, prosecutors destroyed Rehl’s testimony after a series of questions emerged about his whereabouts on the West Plaza as well as what codefendant he was or wasn’t in contact with as he breached the building.

An intense exchange under cross resulted in Rehl melting down spectacularly and stumbling through a series of denials – to a mind-boggling degree – over footage played in court that depicted a man who looked and dressed identical to Rehl down to every detail spraying an irritant right at an officer.

Kenerson, who unwound Rehl at trial like so much thread from a spool, recalled how the Proud Boy’s testimony was “combative, evasive, and incredible.”

And it was. At one point, Rehl asked a jury to believe that he and others who stormed the Capitol did so because they thought stages were erected on the plaza for them, like at a rock concert. He was even unwilling to concede to prosecutors that the black glasses on the man that appeared to be him were in fact black and not, as Kenerson pointedly asked him during a tense minutes-long volley, pink?

From left to right: DOJ trial exhibits show Proud Boy Zachary Rehl outside the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021; taking a selfie inside a lawmaker’s office and spraying a chemical irritant at a police officer

Since the trial ended, Rehl continued to mock proceedings and not just that, but lie about them, Kenerson noted to Judge Kelly. That included when Rehl falsely told the Gateway Pundit in a post-trial interview that the trial was under a media blackout.

Last week, as he prepared to receive his sentence and read from his remarks, Rehl’s body was wracked by waves of tears, each of his words punctuated or paused by a sniff or a guttural clearing of his throat. He originally had a 10-page statement written out, he said, but on the advice of his counsel, Norm Pattis, he opted to focus “on what’s important in this room: my daughter and wife.”

Rehl told them he let them down and, that seeing them in court was difficult but the circumstances were his fault.

“A complete lapse in judgment cost me everything,” he sobbed.

Pattis lay a hand on Rehl’s back as his client lamented that his daughter would now lose his military benefits. He worried it may “still be a possibility” that he could lose more people in his life. He apologized to prosecutors for “blaming them” instead of himself for how things turned out.

Crying hard, he sputtered: “I am done peddling lies for people who do not care about me.”

He called Jan. 6 “despicable.”

“I did things I regret,” he said.

Like Nordean, Biggs, and Tarrio, Rehl was convicted of seditious conspiracy, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstructing an official proceeding, conspiracy to prevent officials from discharging their duties, impeding officers during a civil disorder, and destruction of property.

In the weeks before Jan. 6, Rehl was involved with Tarrio’s brainchild, the group’s exclusive “Ministry of Self Defense.” After the attack on Congress, Rehl told members “We should have held the Capitol.” He said he was proud of what he accomplished yet frustrated more hadn’t been done. It was Rehl who called for firing squads for people who “stole” the election.

“‘Everyone should have showed up and taken the country back,’” Judge Kelly said in court on Thursday, reciting Rehl’s own words after the insurrection back to him.

“I mean my god!” Kelly exclaimed.

Rehl’s statements were “chilling,” he added.

Pattis urged the court to believe that Rehl was another casualty in the nation’s political discourse and had been swept up in the “crisis of legitimacy in this country.”

Rehl believed Trump when he said the election was stolen and fell for it “hook, line and sinker,” Pattis said.

The defense attorney has argued this point in court yet also wiles away his time on social media sharing things like Trump’s appearance with Tucker Carlson on Twitter late last month or suggesting Trump’s own looming trial dates are politically timed with the coming primaries and election.

DOMINIC PEZZOLA

But for the fact that he was acquitted of the topmost charge of seditious conspiracy and that he failed to play a significant leadership role among the Proud Boys, the 45-year-old Rochester, New York man might have received a sentence closer in line with his co-conspirators. Instead, he was sentenced to 10 years in prison.

Pezzola has already told supporters he thinks he will be out in one.

The image of Pezzola busting open a Capitol window with a stolen police riot shield wielded above his head is one of the most memorable images of Jan. 6.

And Pezzola has always been out front, according to prosecutors.

Tarrio first put Pezzola out front on his social media a week before the insurrection as a “literal poster child” for their organization, McCullough said, stamping an image of a warrior-like Pezzola with the hashtag, #LordsofWar #J6. Pezzola didn’t have a huge social media footprint but would often reply to Tarrio’s posts online rapidly. He also made it to the cover of The Washington Post when attending a pro-Trump rally in November.

Pezzola had proven himself to the Proud Boys at a Stop the Steal rally in D.C. the following month and was taken into the fold in short order thanks to a vote of confidence from Jeremy Bertino, a Proud Boy who would plead guilty to seditious conspiracy in October 2022.

Once inside the Capitol, he celebrated with a victory smoke. And if there were questions over the depth of his involvement in the greater seditious conspiracy, the jury at least found this video damning enough of his involvement in the conspiracy to obstruct,

“I knew we could take this motherfucker over if we just tried hard enough,” Pezzola said in a selfie video he filmed inside the Capito less than 20 minutes after he powered through police, glass, and a crushing mob.

Kenerson told Kelly this was precisely the sort of violent political activity that Pezzola wanted to be a part of when he joined the group in 2020.

When he took the stand, Pezzola was arrogant and combative with prosecutors under cross-examination and offered half-apologies and concessions. He told them he took the riot shield from U.S. Capitol Police Officer Mark Ode out of fear for his own safety. He quibbled over whether he had pulled the shield away from Ode; he suggested at another point that Ode “lost” it in the scuffle. He blamed police for the violence of the day and he made himself out to be a defense and weapons expert.

At sentencing, Pezzola’s attorney Steven Metcalf sought to seek credit for his client’s “accepting of responsibility” for some of his crimes when he was on the stand.

But Kelly was not persuaded.

“And at the end of the day, even before we get to his testimony, well, he did take the stand and he did testify that there was no conspiracy. You’re entitled to that I suppose, but the jury convicted him of conspiracy. Not seditious conspiracy, but conspiracy. It makes it hard to waltz in and say, I should get acceptance of responsibility,” Kelly said. “I don’t think in his trial testimony he took responsibility for robbing or assaulting Officer Ode and he was convicted of those things as well.”

He credited Metcalf for the “creative” argument but rendered Pezzola’s “acceptance” as performative.

Addressing Pezzola, Kelly said: “You really were in some ways, the tip of the spear that allowed people to get into the Capitol.”

“You opened the Capitol like a can opener,” Kelly remarked.

Nonetheless, the judge departed downward on the sentence because he believed, as he did with the other defendants, that the terrorism enhancement overstated the Proud Boys’ conduct. They didn’t mean to cause massive loss of life, he said.

Speaking to the court before he was sentenced, with his mother, daughter, and wife crying behind him, Pezzola was emotional.

“I stand before you a changed and humble man,” he said before promptly ignoring what the court had ruled earlier. “But nonetheless a man who has always taken responsibility for his actions.”

He apologized to his wife for “magnifying” their personal life to the public. He apologized to his daughters for missing milestones. Mercy, he told the judge, would make or break his family. Pezzola’s wife, Lisa Magee, who was unable to speak a word without crying, told the judge she wasn’t making excuses for her husband but she noted, “As I said on the stand, he’s a fucking idiot.”

Her life had been turned upside down because of her husband, she said. Their children were ashamed to show their faces or reveal their names to strangers.

Pezzola’s 19-year-old daughter begged the judge to look at her father, extending her arm to and pointing in his direction across the court where he sat clutching a wad of tissue. Pezzola’s face was flush red, and he wiped tears away. He gave her a good life, she said. She never got in trouble and that was thanks to him, she said. His mother, sobbing through her statement, told the judge “I know my son” and called him “my hero.”

Before he sentenced Pezzola, Kelly repeated to him a speech he delivered to each of the defendants.

“The peaceful transfer of power is one of the most precious things we had as Americans. Notice I said had because our tradition of unbroken peaceful transfers of power – that string has now been broken. We can’t just snap our fingers and get it back.”

Pezzola had his eyes cast down on the table as Kelly spoke.

After he stood to accept his sentence but before he declared “Trump won!” and threw his fist in the air, a wry smile creeping across his face, he turned to his family in the pews to look at them. Whether he realizes it fully or not, it may have been one of the last times, in a very long time, that he sees them without bars or thick glass obstructing his view.

On Visibility and [dis]Covering Kenneth Chesebro

Yesterday, CNN reported that Kenneth Chesebro, identified as co-conspirator 5 in Trump’s DC indictment and charged in the Georgia one, in both indictments for actions limited to the fake electors scheme, trailed Alex Jones while he was present at the Capitol on January 6, apparently recording Jones’ actions and words for most of the time he’s at the Capitol.

CNN cites Ryan Goodman — who has steadfastly refused to look closely at much of the crime scene video evidence (much less credit the investigators who have meticulously catalogued it) — making a nonsense legal argument about the significance of Chesebro’s actions, one that clings to a cognitive distance between the white collar planning, to which he assigns Chesebro, and the blue collar execution of the attack).

Ryan Goodman, a law professor at New York University who previously served as the special counsel to the general counsel at the Department of Defense, told CNN that Chesebro’s presence on the Capitol grounds could be cited by prosecutors.

“Regardless of Chesebro’s potential criminal liability for being in the restricted areas of Capitol grounds, this evidence could be cited by prosecutors as further proof that Chesebro was not operating as a bona fide legal advisor but rather was an activist aligned in the cause to overturn the election,” Goodman said. “It undercuts defenses Chesebro might mount that he was functioning only in the role of providing legal advice for clients.”

The NYT version of the same story makes an equally nonsensical observation about what it means, claiming that this is the first evidence that “different tentacles of the efforts to keep Mr. Trump in power [] overlapped.”

Until now, there appeared to be different tentacles of the efforts to keep Mr. Trump in power that had not overlapped. But Mr. Chesebro hinted at those connections in an email exchange with John Eastman, another lawyer who was instrumental in the plan to pressure Mr. Pence with the fake elector scheme.

In late December 2020, the two lawyers discussed how to get a case before the Supreme Court. Mr. Chesebro told Mr. Eastman as they discussed filing a legal action that in terms of the highest court, the “odds of action before Jan. 6 will become more favorable if the justices start to fear that there will be ‘wild’ chaos on Jan. 6 unless they rule by then, either way.”

The pressure on state legislators brought to bear by Stop the Steal, ginned up at rallies headlined by Jones and Alexander, has always been a necessary component of the fake electors plan. The Georgians charged in the Trump side of the fake elector charges in the Georgia indictment, Robert Cheeley and Scott Hall, were also coordinating with the people pressuring Ruby Freeman. The political violence was not an afterthought, it was part of the plan.

Indeed, Thomas Joscelyn, a key author of the January 6 Report, noted that this overlap is in no way new and reminded that Jones and Owen Shroyer were in contact with the Proud Boys who are awaiting sentencing on their sedition conviction.

There is no firm dividing line between those orchestrating the political conspiracy to overturn the election and the extremists who led the attack on the Capitol.

He cited back to the passage of the report describing that Jones’ entourage was in direct contact, in real time, with the Proud Boys, even as they kicked off the riot.

Other, more prominent members of the Proud Boys appear to have been in contact with Jones and Shroyer about the events of January 6th and on that day. Records for Enrique Tarrio’s phone show that while the attack on the Capitol was ongoing, he texted with Jones three times and Shroyer five times.124 Ethan Nordean’s phone records reflect that he exchanged 23 text messages with Shroyer between January 4th and 5th, and that he had one call with him on each of those days.125 Records of Joseph Biggs’s communications show that he texted with Shroyer eight times on January 4th and called him at approximately 11:15 a.m. on January 6th, while Biggs and his fellow Proud Boys were marching at and around the Capitol.126

Those ties have remained close. Indeed, Jones and Shroyer — who were asked to lead Trump’s mob to the Capitol by someone in Trump’s immediate vicinity — have shared a lawyer, Norm Pattis, with former InfoWars employee and seditionist Joe Biggs for over a year; Pattis has also even taken over the defense of Zach Rehl.

But the limited visibility J6C had on that key node, the Jones entourage (largely because of their obstruction), ultimately prevented it from connecting all the dots and indeed the full extent of those dots remains obscure.

Even before you add Chesebro to the equation, in that entourage you had Jones who understood he was sent to lead the mob by Trump himself (J6C concludes it must have been conveyed through Caroline Wren, though for reasons I included in this post, that’s not entirely convincing). You had Shroyer, who shared that understanding, and who was coordinating with those launching the attack. And in addition to his frequent updates from Wren and coordination with Garrett Ziegler (now a central player in the Hunter Biden information operation led by Rudy Giuliani), Ali Alexander was also coordinating closely with Paul Gosar’s office — the guy who’d kick off the challenges. And all of them have exceptionally close ties to Roger Stone, including membership in the Friends of Stone list.

And, as CapitolHunters reminded in response to this coverage — and backed with a new researcher-compiled video of Jones’ movements that day — Jones played an absolutely central role in the success of the attack, first by bringing reinforcements to those leading the attack, and then, once he got there, by leading a huge chunk of those mobsters to the East side of the Capitol, where they’d serve a crucial role in a second, pincer attack on the building.

The convergence of first Jones and then key members of two militias on the East doors is the easiest place to see that the attack on the Capitol wasn’t random, but — at least in key movements — was fairly well executed. That convergence — and collection of evidence showing the import of Jones’ actions, for which people have already done time — has been an investigative focus from the start.

And Chesebro was there, capturing Jones’ actions.

Jones is a blowhorn-wielding asshole. But he commands almost the same kind of rabid loyalty as Trump does (Alexander estimated that a third of the attendees that day were Jones’ people). And via whatever means (the new Jones compilation video makes me wonder about potential uneven understanding of the events of the day, between Jones, Alexander, and Jones’ handlers) Jones played a central role in events of the day.

That entourage was a bunch of men checking in with at least Wren and possibly Ziegler, with Gosar’s office, and with the Proud Boys as they launched the attack on the Capitol. That entourage led a mob from the Ellipse, and then wittingly or not, deployed the mob where they would be the most effective, right there on the East steps before a second major breach would occur.

That’s the background one should bring to the images showing Chesebro, someone always associated with the plotting in the Willard, filming Jones as that entourage moved around the Capitol.

It’s not clear who sent him or why. NYT quotes a Jones lawyer — probably the same lawyer that Jones, Shroyer, Biggs, and Rehl share, Norm Pattis — disclaiming any knowledge of why Chesebro was shadowing Jones that day (though, given Jones’ paranoia and Shroyer’s pending sentencing, I’d find the denial more credible if Jones were squawking about being spied on by the Deep State).

It remains unclear why Mr. Chesebro was with Mr. Jones’s group outside the Capitol or how he came to be with them. A lawyer for Mr. Jones said that Mr. Jones was unaware that Mr. Chesebro had been following his entourage that day.

Plus, at one point, Chesebro seems to share something on his phone with a member of Jones’ security.

It is clear that Chesebro is not participating in the riot. Chesebro never indulges in the kind of fan worship of Jones as everyone else following him around does. Nor does he ever get distracted by the far more significant spectacle happening just yards away. He appears to be, at a minimum, monitoring Jones (though CapitolHunters pointed to some mannerisms that could be the kind of signaling as other things seen in the crime scene footage). And when Jones leaves, Chesebro follows. Chesebro continues to monitor — and film — as Jones seeds a conspiracy theory about the attack being launched by provocateurs on his way out (Michael Coudrey is a key Alexander associate, another member of the entourage).

We have seen that members of both the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers monitored the proceedings of the attack remotely, with Proud Boy leaders — including Tarrio and Bertino — chiming into the command and control from afar. It may be that’s what we’re seeing here.

After thirty months of hypervisibility, it’s easy to forget that there were actually pockets of the attack (inside offices without surveillance cameras and under the scaffolding are two of them) that could only be rendered visible by the cameras of others onsite, making their own recording. There are parts of Jones’ movement — which his own entourage recorded with a GoPro and at least one phone — that he subsequently edited.

The actions of Ken Chesebro suggest that someone wanted to make sure Jones’ movements at the Capitol would be visible, possibly to people monitoring the attack remotely, perhaps even in real time. Indeed, given that we’ve never seen this footage published on Parler, it suggests someone wanted a record of Jones’ real-time movement for private consumption.

The two indictments implicating Ken Chesebro have brought new visibility to him, and his actions. The discovery of Chesebro monitoring Jones’ activities during the attack have made aspects of the coordination behind this attack visible to TV lawyers for the first time. But amid all that newfound visibility, it’s worth remembering that some people knew to — and did — monitor all this in real time.

Update: I may have overstated when I claimed that Chesebro hadn’t cheered Jones. At the very beginning of this clip, Chesebro (in the far left of the frame) yells out, “Alex Jones” with the rest inaudible to me.

“They Spoke Often:” It Took the Fash-Friendly FBI Over Two Months to Document the Lies Their Informant, Joe Biggs, Told them

The most telling detail released in DOJ’s sentencing package for Joe Biggs is this — the first 302 from after he led an attack on the nation’s Capitol, memorializing an interview done on January 8, one day after the first Proud Boy, Nicholas Ochs, was arrested.

DOJ included it — and excerpts from a second recorded interview from January 18 — to substantiate a 2-point obstruction enhancement to his sentence.

Biggs denied being with anyone he knew while he was inside the Capitol. Id. at 19:50 et. seq. (Q: “were you with anybody?” A: “No. I was lost. Like I didn’t know where to fucking go. I was by myself and I was scared shitless.”).

Biggs was asked again later in the interview whether there was anyone else with him. Biggs again claimed that he was separated and didn’t see anyone else he knew until after he left the Capitol. Id. at 25:45 et. seq. (Q: “Was there anyone else in your group that was in the Capitol?” A: [Pause] “Um, I mean, there had to have been.” Q: “You said you got separated, right?” A: “Yeah. I got separated. I didn’t see people until afterwards. I finally found people scraggling [sic] around running, you know, looking for people like me.”)

After initially denying breaking anything, Biggs was asked again whether there was anything else that was “worth sharing.” Twenty-four minutes into the interview, Biggs acknowledged “shaking” a black metal fence, but he claimed that he was only doing it because people were getting “pinned [] against it.” Id. at 24:25 et. seq. (Biggs: “I was shaking [the fence] at one point to get it loose so people could move and wouldn’t get pinned up against it” Biggs: “There was one guy who was pinned up against the fence like literally screaming; the pole was dug into his belly, and there was so much force from all the people around him, he couldn’t even breath . . . I thought that dude was gonna get hurt bad.”)

The sentencing memo suggests that Biggs victimized the FBI with these lies.

But there’s a backstory, one Biggs himself told over two years ago, in a filing submitted on March 29, 2021, in a bid to stay out of pre-trial detention.

As Biggs told the story then — two days before this 302 was finalized — Biggs would routinely reach out to cops before the Proud Boys would stage an operation, much as Enrique Tarrio did with Shane LaMond, a DC cop now being prosecuted for giving Tarrio inside tips about the investigation into him.

The same year, 2018, after the move to Florida, Biggs became active as an organizer, event planner and thought leader in the Proud Boys. He used his platform as a radio and social media personality to promote Proud Boy events and ideas. In particular, he personally planned two major events: rallies in Portland, Oregon in both 2019 and 2020 designed as counterdemonstrations against Antifa, which had been active in and around Portland for over two decades. See generally, MARK BRAY, ANTIFA: THE ANTI-FACIST HANDBOOK (August 2017) (history of Antifa networks in the Americas and Europe by social historian and Dartmouth College lecturer); L. Magelson, “Letter from Portland: In the Streets with Anitfa,” The New Yorker (Nov. 2, 2020 issue). As part of the planning, Biggs would regularly speak with by phone and in person to both local and federal law enforcement personnel stationed in Portland, including the FBI’s Portland Field Office. These talks were intended both to inform law enforcement about Proud Boy activities in Portland on a courtesy basis but also to ask for advice on planned marches or demonstrations, i.e., what march routes to take on Portland streets, where to go, where not to go. Similar conversations were held regularly with local police and FBI personnel for less major events in other cities.

As Biggs described it, rather than cracking down on the right wing group that would go on to lead an attack on the Capitol, the cops could give him “cautionary” phone calls.

By late 2018, Biggs also started to get “cautionary” phone calls from FBI agents located in Jacksonville and Daytona Beach inquiring about what Biggs meant by something politically or culturally provocative he had said on the air or on social media concerning a national issue, political parties, the Proud Boys, Antifa or other groups. Biggs regularly satisfied FBI personnel with his answers. He also stayed in touch with a number of FBI agents in and out of Florida.

As Biggs described it, he “regularly satisfied FBI personnel” with his explanations for stoking violence.

He did so even though — as his sentencing memo describes — he was openly calling for violence and attacks on the government.

Perhaps more than any other defendant, Biggs promoted the use of force against the government. Beginning in the days after the election, Biggs declared that the country could face “civil war” because the “left” was “radicalizing people by stealing th[e] election.” Ex. 603-1 and 2. Biggs told his followers that it was “time for fucking War if they steal this shit.” Ex. 603-4. Biggs steadily escalated his calls for political violence. During an episode of the “Warboys” podcast with Tarrio and Nordean in late November, Biggs demonized the “party” that was telling the public to accept the result of the election. Biggs closed his diatribe by saying that “they are evil scum and they all deserve to die a traitor’s death.” Biggs Ex. 1. Biggs’s comment prompted Nordean to calmly lean toward his microphone and say, “the day of the rope.” Id.

Biggs’s calls for political violence escalated throughout the fall, and he consistently called for war while characterizing his enemies (which included government actors such as the police) as traitors. The critical issue to Biggs was the stolen election, and he tied his calls to violence to the election. For example, in late November, in a post on his social media, Biggs warned officers in Michigan (a state won by Biden) that if they stopped electors from casting a vote for Trump, the people would “treat your thin[] blue line like we do antifa . . . get in our way and get walked over.” Ex. 603-33. Biggs declared that the officers would be “tried for treason” and that “[w]e aren[‘]t here to play games. This is war.” Id.

In fact, as Biggs further described it back in March 2021, long after he had become a key figure staging violent confrontations, five months before leading an attack on the peaceful transfer of power, an FBI Agent in Daytona Beach recruited Biggs to be an informant targeting Antifa.

In late July 2020, an FBI Special Agent out of the Daytona Beach area telephoned Biggs and asked Biggs to meet with him and another FBI agent at a local restaurant. Biggs agreed. Biggs learned after he travelled to the restaurant that the purpose of the meeting was to determine if Biggs could share information about Antifa networks operating in Florida and elsewhere. They wanted to know what Biggs was “seeing on the ground.” Biggs did have information about Antifa in Florida and Antifa networks in other parts of the United States. He agreed to share the information. The three met for approximately two hours. After the meeting, Biggs stayed in touch with the agent who had called him originally to set up the meeting. He answered follow-up questions in a series of several phone calls over the next few weeks. They spoke often.

So during the entire period when Biggs and his buddies were planning an attack on the nation’s Capitol, during the entire fall period when (prosecutors describe) Biggs was openly talking about attacking the government, he and this FBI agent?

“They spoke often.”

The FBI claims it had no notice of the terrorist attack on the nation’s Capitol, not even with an FBI agent “speaking often” with one of its leaders and an DC intelligence cop speaking often with the other one.

So now, DOJ wants to hold Joe Biggs accountable for the lies he told to the FBI agent who thought a key leader of the Proud Boys would make an appropriate informant targeting Antifa. But thus far, his handler has not been held accountable for missing the planning of a terrorist attack in DC when while speaking “often” with one of its key leaders.

Notably, the Daytona FBI office is the same one where, after fake whistleblower Stephen Friend refused to participate in a SWAT arrest of a Three Percenter known to own an assault rifle, his supervisor said “he wished I just ‘called in sick’ for this warrant,” before taking disciplinary action against him (though Friend didn’t start in Daytona Beach until after Biggs had already been arrested).

The second of these interviews (but not the first) interview was mentioned in Biggs’ arrest affidavit. It’s possible that investigating agents didn’t even know about what occurred in the first one.

Indeed, it’s really hard to credit the reliability of a 302 written two days after Biggs described his chummy relationship but not this interview in an attempt to stay out of jail.

This is why the FBI didn’t warn against January 6. Because these terrorists were the FBI’s people.

The Challenge of Treating the Proud Boy Leaders as Terrorists

The omnibus sentencing memo for the Proud Boy Leaders — an 80-page document supplemented by another 15 pages for each — describes their crime this way:

The defendants organized and directed a force of nearly 200 to attack the heart of our democracy.

[snip]

None of this was mere happenstance or accident. In the months leading up to January 6, 2021, they had brought their army of violence to Portland, Kalamazoo, and Washington, D.C. And then they brought that army of violence to the Capitol to exert their political will. In doing so, these defendants attempted to silence millions of Americans who had placed their vote for a different candidate, to ignore the variety of legal and judicial mechanisms that lawfully scrutinized the electoral process leading up to and on January 6, and to shatter the democratic system of governance enshrined in our laws and in our Constitution.

For years, these defendants intentionally positioned themselves at the vanguard of political violence in this country. They brought that violence to the Capitol on January 6 in an effort to change the course of American history, and the sentences imposed by this Court should reflect the seriousness of their offenses.

[snip]

The justice system’s response to January 6 will impact whether January 6 becomes an outlier or a watershed moment. “By nearly every measure, political violence is seen as more acceptable today than it was five years ago.” Adrienne LaFrance, The New Anarchy: America faces a type of extremist violence it does not know how to stop, THE ATLANTIC, Mar. 6, 2023 (citing a 2022 UC Davis poll31 that found one in five Americans believes political violence would be “at least sometimes” justified, and one in 10 believes it would be justified if it meant the return of President Trump). Left unchecked, this impulse threatens our democracy.

The defendants in this case sought to capitalize on this undercurrent in our society to change the result of a presidential election. They called for using force, intimidation, and violence to get political leaders to stop the certification of the election. They recruited others to this mission. They organized and participated in encrypted messaging groups and meetings to further their plans. Such conduct in leading and instigating an attack like January 6 demands deterrence. It is critical that this Court impose significant sentences of incarceration on all the defendants in this case to convey to those who would mobilize such political violence in the future that their actions will have consequences.

That language is a succinct statement of the terrorism committed by the Proud Boys.

But the document as a whole is a testament to how the asymmetrical treatment of terrorism in the United States makes it much harder to hold men like Enrique Tarrio and Joe Biggs accountable for attacking the Capitol that it would be if they were Islamic terrorists, rather than right wing Trump supporters.

The reason why the government had to dedicate 80 pages to justify sentences of 30 years for the core leaders of the January 6 attack is because it requires massaging the sentencing guidelines to treat white (or Afro-Cuban, as Tarrio identifies as) person terrorism like the US has long treated Islamic terrorism.

Here’s what DOJ had to in order to justify calling for these sentences:

  • Ask for consecutive sentences, effectively stacking some sentences on others
  • Adopt the treason sentencing guideline for sedition (which doesn’t otherwise have one), even while the maximum sentence for sedition is just 20 years
  • Ask that Judge Tim Kelly use the conspiracy convictions to apply the conduct of each defendant against the other, to apply the assault and property damage done by Pezzola against the others and the sedition conviction against Pezzola
  • Use enhancements for property destruction, substantial interference in the vote certification, and extensive planning on the obstruction charges
  • Use leadership or management enhancements for everyone but Pezzola
  • Ask for additional departures from the guidelines for “conduct [that] resulted in a significant disruption of a governmental function” and an “intent to frighten, intimidate, and coerce” federal lawmakers
  • Dismiss challenges (led by Nordean attorney Nick Smith over two years) to the treatment of the vote certification as an official proceeding that can be obstructed
  • Ask for a terrorism enhancement for the destruction of property (tied to the window Pezzola broke and some bicycle racks)
  • Ask for terrorism enhancement based on the clear political intent of all these crimes, including sedition, which is explicitly political
  • Add enhancements for Biggs, Tarrio, and Rehl for obstructing the investigation or trial (which is why Nordean’s proposed sentence is lower than the other guys’)
  • Describe the Oath Keeper as late-comers to sedition, by comparison
  • Laugh at any claim these men accepted responsibility for their crimes

The sentences make sense — particularly when you compare the damage these terrorists did against the aspirational Islamic terrorists who have been sentenced to even longer sentences. But in the scope of the sentencing guidelines as they exist, it all comes off as funny math.

Update: I probably should have explained in the post why this happens. Because domestic terrorism is not a crime unto itself, but instead an enhancement (which is the way it is being used with the destruction of property here), it is not finally used as a label until sentencing. Prosecutors have, in fact, been calling the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys terrorists throughout their prosecution in detention memos (relying on the same destruction of property). I addressed this in this post and this one.

Update: Here’s a post I wrote in 2015 about this asymmetry.

Note: The image accompanying this post is a challenge coin for January 6 introduced as an exhibit in Christoper Worrel (who has skipped bail as he awaits sentencing). The Proud Boys literally made the attack on the Capitol into a coin of their terrorist group. Update: Added the image to the body of the post, too, bc I confused people by referencing it w/o including it. 

All GOP Horserace Analysis Is Useless without Consideration of Possible Indictments

The NYT did a 3-byline 1,700-word story describing how the number of minor Republican candidates joining the race serves Trump’s purpose.

Its analysis of the numbers and Ron DeSantis’ early failures isn’t bad. But because it is silent about how the expanding field might play in the likelihood of Trump indictments, it is entirely worthless.

For example, the content and timing of indictments may have an utterly central impact on the two dynamics described in the piece: Trump’s diehard base and the unwillingness of others in the party to criticize Trump directly.

The rapidly ballooning field, combined with Mr. Trump’s seemingly unbreakable core of support, represents a grave threat to Mr. DeSantis, imperiling his ability to consolidate the non-Trump vote, and could mirror the dynamics that powered Mr. Trump’s takeover of the party in 2016.

It’s a matter of math: Each new entrant threatens to steal a small piece of Mr. DeSantis’s potential coalition — whether it be Mr. Pence with Iowa evangelicals or Mr. Scott with college-educated suburbanites. And these new candidates are unlikely to eat into Mr. Trump’s votes. The former president’s base — more than 30 percent of Republicans — remains strongly devoted to him.

[snip]

The reluctance to go after Mr. Trump, for many Republicans, feels eerily like a repeat of 2016. Then, Mr. Trump’s rivals left him mostly alone for months, assuming that he would implode or that they were destined to beat him the moment they could narrow the field to a one-on-one matchup, a situation that never transpired.

Consider how each of three legal risks (and these are only the most obvious) might affect these issues. This post builds on this series I did last month:

August Georgia indictments

The NYT itself has, as have many other close observers, noted the many signs that Fani Willis has given that she will indict Trump and others in August — probably mid-August.

The Georgia prosecutor leading an investigation into former President Donald J. Trump and his allies has taken the unusual step of announcing remote work days for most of her staff during the first three weeks of August, asking judges in a downtown Atlanta courthouse not to schedule trials for part of that time as she prepares to bring charges in the inquiry.

The moves suggest that Fani T. Willis, the Fulton County district attorney, is expecting a grand jury to unseal indictments during that time period. Ms. Willis outlined the remote work plan and made the request to judges in a letter sent on Thursday to 21 Fulton County officials, including the chief county judge, Ural Glanville, and the sheriff, Pat Labat.

“Thank you for your consideration and assistance in keeping the Fulton County Judicial Complex safe during this time,” wrote Ms. Willis, who has already asked the F.B.I. to help with security in and around the courthouse.

Ms. Willis had said in a previous letter that any charges related to the Trump investigation would come in the grand jury term that runs from July 11 to Sept. 1. Her letter on Thursday appears to offer more specificity on timing.

That means these indictments will come around the same time as the GOP primary debate scheduled for Milwaukee, hosted by Fox.

Trump has already signaled he may not attend this debate and the party has talked about floating minimum requirements to avoid another cattle call like we saw in 2016. If Willis indicts before this debate, the debate will focus closely on those indictments, meaning the middling candidates will be on a stage without Trump talking about alleged crimes he committed to try to win the 2020 election — alleged crimes he committed instead of doing what he could to win the two Georgia Senate seats that tipped control to Democrats.

While I agree with NYT that a cattle call primary and DeSantis’ weaknesses help Trump, had DeSantis had a stronger start, Trump might have been able to finish off any perceived opposition before substantive indictments drop. Now a bunch of other people will be prepped to capitalize on opportunities created by any Trump charges.

A far more important dynamic than the timing of this, though, is the likelihood Willis will indict others. If those others are just top Trump aides and a handful of fake electors (with other fake electors cooperating against them), it could set up a Trump versus the party dynamic, especially given Brian Kemp’s singular success at finding a way to ignore Trump’s demands while not antagonizing him. But if more Republicans are indicted — and commentary on the fake electors plot always seems to forget that the plot involved some of the most prominent Republicans in all the swing states necessary to win the presidential — then it may tend to solidify the Republican party with Trump, in spite of the legal damage his efforts to steal the last election will start to do.

It matters that Fox will host this debate, too, though it’s still too early to tell how. In the wake of the Dominion settlement and with Smartmatic still to come, Fox News has swung wildly from supporting to criticizing Trump. But Rupert Murdoch does seem intent on finding an alternative to him. And that means this debate may provide an opportunity for someone else to break out of the pack.

Stolen documents

Recent reporting suggests that possible August Georgia indictments may not even be the next indictments against Trump.

Last week, both the WSJ and Bloomberg reported that the stolen documents investigation is substantially finished, with Bloomberg suggesting it could be a matter of days or weeks after today’s federal holiday before Jack Smith announces charges.

Special Counsel Jack Smith is wrapping up his investigation into former president Donald Trump’s refusal to return classified documents after his election defeat and is poised to announce possible criminal charges in the days or weeks after Memorial Day, according to people familiar with the matter.

For months, key Republicans like Bill Barr and Andy McCarthy have been treating the stolen documents case as a legitimate investigation, effectively giving firebreathing Republicans permission to criticize Trump for these suspected crimes. And they’re doing so even if this is charged only as obstruction, 18 USC 1519.

Jack Smith might tell any of four stories with a hypothetical stolen documents indictment:

  • A straight-up obstruction charge for blowing off the August subpoena, the likes of which Barr envisions
  • An 18 USC 793 indictment charging fairly innocuous documents — the two classified documents used along with post-presidential records and the schedules Chamberlain Harris copied — both of which show Trump made use of stolen classified documents for his own personal benefit; such an indictment might focus on the fact that Trump made classified documents available to others, including non-staffers, too
  • An 18 USC 793 indictment making it clear that Trump sought out some of the nation’s most sensitive secrets in advance to take with him when he left; such an indictment might plausibly include a 18 USC 2071 charge, which with conviction, disqualifies someone from holding federal office (though that punishment is constitutionally suspect)
  • An Espionage Act indictment making it clear that documents Trump is believed to have stolen have not yet been retrieved and tying gaps in surveillance footage to business meetings at Mar-a-Lago with foreigners reflecting Smith’s recent focus on Trump’s business deals

We don’t know how Jack Smith will charge it if he does (or where, which for reasons I laid out here, is critically important). But the very last thing Smith is known to have done — the one thing he has done since what WaPo described as the last known grand jury meeting on May 5 — is obtain 16 documents from the Archives advising Trump about whether or how he should declassify specific records.

In a May 16 letter obtained by CNN, acting Archivist Debra Steidel Wall writes to Trump, “The 16 records in question all reflect communications involving close presidential advisers, some of them directed to you personally, concerning whether, why, and how you should declassify certain classified records.”

[snip]

According to the letter, Trump tried to block the special counsel from accessing the 16 records by asserting a claim of “constitutionally based privilege.” But in her letter, Wall rejects that claim, stating that the special counsel’s office has represented that it “is prepared to demonstrate with specificity to a court, why it is likely that the 16 records contain evidence that would be important to the grand jury’s investigation.”

The special counsel also told the Archives that the evidence is “not practically available from another source.”

The letter goes on to state that the records will be handed over on May 24, 2023 “unless prohibited by an intervening court order.”

Smith would have obtained these records last Wednesday, three weeks after the last activity of the grand jury.

You don’t hold off on indicting someone to obtain such records — the content of which Smith surely already knew from interviews with those who wrote the documents — solely to indict on obstruction.

There’s literally no predicting how Republicans would respond to a stolen documents indictment. But Barr and McCarthy have been laying the foundation to use it to finally split with Trump for months. And if such an indictment included a 18 USC 2071 count, it would present the additional dilemma for Republicans that if an inevitable constitutional challenge of the statute failed, their leading candidate could not legally be President.

It matters, too, that Jack Smith is a white male who has said literally nothing since he was appointed, not an elected Black prosecutor. It matters that Merrick Garland didn’t take the bait last week (though virtually every journalist did), when Trump responded to news of an imminent indictment by trying to turn this into a legal fight between him and Joe Biden’s appointed Attorney General, rather than him and laws his own advisors told him not to break.

I don’t know what to expect from a hypothetical stolen documents indictment; nor does anyone else. But I do know that if it drops in the next month or so, if it is perceived as legitimate and serious, it provides an opportunity for Republicans who have long been seeking an opportunity to split with Trump.

January 6 conspiracy

Finally, there are potential charges tied to January 6, which may have to wait on appellate certainty around the presumed lead charge, 18 USC 1512(c)(2) or may require an interim set of charges against others.

Aside from expecting some conspiracy charge under that obstruction statute, though, we have no idea what such an indictment might look like. Here are some possibilities that would affect how the GOP responds:

Trump could be charged with inciting the attempted assassination of his Vice President. Smith — and DOJ prosecutors before him — spent a lot of time obtaining details about the communications between Mike Pence and Trump in advance of insurrection, as well as on Trump’s inaction that day. While it would be the most aggressive potential charge, there is evidence to support it. How would mainstream Republicans respond if Trump were charged with siccing a mob he knew to be armed on a lifelong GOPer, someone who will be an announced primary challenger to Trump by then?

Trump could be charged with aiding and abetting the near-murder of Michael Fanone. I’ve laid out how distinctly DOJ treated the prosecution of Danny Rodriguez’ co-conspirator. Prosecutors aired footage from Ellipse speeches rather than excluding it from trial, as DOJ has successfully done with dozens of other defendants. DOJ developed evidence to show Rodriguez responding viscerally and violently to Rudy Giuliani and Trump’s Ellipse speeches just hours before he walked to the Capitol and tased a cop defending it. Rodriguez confessed to the FBI he knew in advance such casualties might be necessary. If DOJ were to implicate Trump in such an assault — something Judge Amit Mehta said was at least plausible over a year ago — it would implicate Trump in the worst assault of an officer that day.

Trump could be charged with conspiring with convicted seditionists. As I laid out here, Trump asked Alex Jones to bring his mob to the Capitol, and after Jones brought the mob there, the Proud Boys exploited those bodies to attack the Capitol. Trump is — as an exhibit introduced in the Christopher Worrell case (whose guilty verdict was closely reliant on evidence implicating Roger Stone) showed — literally the coin of the Proud Boys gang.

DOJ emphasized the import of Trump’s Stand Back and Stand By comment from the opening arguments of that sedition trial. Those are just some of the reasons why it is possible DOJ could charge Trump for conspiring not just with Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman, but also with men already convicted of sedition. Such a charge would take more time to develop — but charging Trump with conspiring with the Proud Boys is completely within the realm of conspiracy law.

Trump’s efforts to cheat could damage swing-state Republican parties. Before Trump asked Republicans from seven swing states to help him create fraudulent certificates in an attempt to steal the election, Kenneth Cheesebro wrote down (!!!) that such an effort would be legally problematic in Nevada, Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Michigan. It’s bad enough asking key Republicans to break the law to help win an election; it is insane that Trump’s lawyers wrote down that it would be illegal before asking them. Of those four states, only Republicans in Pennsylvania took adequate efforts to protect themselves legally from Trump’s requests that they submit fraudulent certificates to the Archives. That means it is possible that DOJ will charge some of the most prominent Republicans in precisely the states that Trump proved unable to win in 2020. Such charges could align Trump and those Republican parties on the same side, or it could really piss off those whom Trump’s recklessness endangered. In Georgia, at least, some prominent Republicans have chosen to testify against others if it means avoiding jail time themselves and I could see Republicans in other states making the same choice.

Trump could be accused of cheating Republican small donors. Trump’s success in 2016 and since has always built off his success at fundraising from small donors. But even as he reaped millions from such efforts, he played fast and loose with campaign finance law, violations of the law for which Republican Federal Elections Commissioners have thus far refused to punish him. Now Jack Smith is reportedly considering criminal charges for the same kind of conduct — in fact, criminal charges tied to claiming he was going to pursue election integrity but then paying lawyers for unrelated legal exposure. Such charges for defrauding his supporters — parallel to the successful charges SDNY prosecuted in the Build the Wall case — would make it clear that Trump has been cheating loyal Republicans for years. They may not care in bulk, but some of the Build the Wall victims did. Such charges might also limit the ways Trump could fundraise going forward. Republicans might not care about the fraud itself, but they would care if a presidential candidate might be disadvantaged financially because of alleged crimes he had committed in the past.

Obviously, we don’t know whether these prosecutors will charge and if so with what (though in both the Georgia and stolen documents case, prosecutors look poised to ask a grand jury for an indictment). The Georgia case is the only one where we have a good idea of timing (though that timing is guaranteed to matter for the primary).

Trump actually used the Russian investigation brilliantly to win personal loyalty from Republicans who had previously been tepid to him (something I’ve been meaning to write up). The Alvin Bragg indictment, similarly, helped him at least in the short term. Trump’s bio on his failed media site literally equates the pursuit of him with an attack on his aggrieved supporters.

This is an utterly central part of his brand, the conceit that totally justified legal pursuits of him were really just an attack on the core identities of angry white nationalists.

And that brand has worked stupendously well. They love him because he is a suspected criminal according to the code of their imagined Deep State. There’s some reason to believe that Boris Epshteyn, a political advisor gatekeeping his legal advisors, has pursued a strategy in the stolen documents case that emphasizes this confrontation even while putting Trump at far greater legal risk.

Thus far, Trump has successfully used his own legal exposure as a way to grievance-monger with other Republicans, building loyalty every time his own legal jeopardy increases. If he were able to seal the GOP nomination before more serious indictments drop, he might do the same here.

But the possibility — the likelihood even — of criminal charges before he makes this equation into the GOP slogan for the entire 2024 election may disrupt that power.

The next three months, before the primary formally starts with a debate, are likely to be unprecedented in the history of presidential elections. Because they are unprecedented, literally no one can envision how those events will affect the primary, even if we know what the charges were and who else will get charged.

What we can be sure of, though, is that the old stale horse race analysis won’t apply to this race.

Update: I should have made something clearer. This analysis, about the impact of potential indictments alone, is meant to be separate from the possibility he’ll be convicted of these crimes. It is virtually impossible that Trump would be convicted before November 2024, and barring a successful application of 18 USC 2071, none of these charges would prevent him from being elected.

Rather, the argument here is that these indictments have the ability to alter the loyalty calculus for Republican voters. I’m not even arguing that will work against Trump! There are a number of ways it could actually help him, at least through the primary. All I’m saying is that each of these potential indictments carries with it the possibility of upending the loyalty that the NYT described, and doing so in ways that are so unprecedented (even setting aside the way Trump himself is almost unprecedented in the US), that no one will really know how it’ll all fall out.

And that’s probably why more Republicans keep hopping into the race.

How the Proud Boy Conspiracy Might Network Out in the Wake of the Seditious Conspiracy Verdict

Since at least August 2021, I have emphasized the import of the Proud Boys conspiracy because of the way Joe Biggs (and, I’d add, Enrique Tarrio) served as a nexus between the attack on the Capitol and the people who orchestrated the attack on the Capitol.

Because of Joe Biggs’ role at the nexus between the mob that attacked Congress and those that orchestrated the mob, his prosecution is the most important case in the entire January 6 investigation. If you prosecute him and his alleged co-conspirators successfully, you might also succeed in holding those who incited the attack on the Capitol accountable. If you botch the Biggs prosecution, then all the most important people will go free.

The point was echoed by Tarrio in a Gateway Pundit appearance after closing arguments, in which he called himself, “the next stepping stone.” And in a comment during closing arguments for which prosecutors got a curative instruction, Norm Pattis (the lawyer Biggs shares with Alex Jones) said, “this case will have impact on [the government’s] charging decisions in other cases.”

This post will explain how the Proud Boys seditious conspiracy verdict might network out, to other Proud Boys, in the weeks ahead. A follow-up will explain how it might network up.

The split verdict

Yesterday, a jury found Biggs and Tarrio guilty of all charges against them save two assaults charged under a co-conspirator liability theory: the one Dominic Pezzola committed in stealing the riot shield that he would then use to make the first breach of the building, and the one for throwing a water bottle for which Charles Donohoe, whose absence from the trial seems to have befuddled the jury, already pled guilty.

The sedition verdicts against Biggs, Tarrio, Ethan Nordean and Zach Rehl are the showy news result, but Pezzola’s fate may prove just as instructive for what this verdict means for others. In addition to charges for assaulting that cop, robbing his shield, and breaking the window, Pezzola was found guilty of obstructing the vote certification, but not conspiring with the others to do that (on which the jury hung) or to seditiously attack the government (on which the jury came back with a not guilty verdict).

Pezzola was found guilty of conspiring with the others to impede either cops or members of Congress from doing their duty, a conspiracy that carries a six year sentence rather than the twenty year max sentences the two other conspiracies carry. The government used that 18 USC 372 charge in this case and in the Oath Keepers’ case. As I’ve noted, it was only otherwise used to charge the men who attacked Brian Sicknick, though the conspiracy charge was ultimately dropped in guilty pleas. Using a slightly different description of the object of the conspiracy, all four members of the second Oath Keeper sedition group were found guilty of it (but then, they were found guilty of pretty much everything), three members of Rhodes sedition group were convicted of it (but not Rhodes or Thomas Caldwell), and four of six defendants in the lesser Oath Keeper conspiracy were convicted of it.

The Pezzola verdict may reflect his own testimony: He took the stand and claimed credit for his own assault, which he said had nothing to do with the other defendants, but tried to claim self-defense. (Here’s Brandi’s post on his testimony.) The jury seems to have believed that he had not agreed to enter into the two conspiracies — sedition and obstruction — that largely took form on Telegram threads he was not yet on, but their 372 verdict suggests they found he did agree on the day of the attack to work with the Proud Boys to chase Congress away from their job. I suspect that outcome may have relied on his willingness to take the stand.

In this split verdict, Pezzola’s outcome is pretty similar to that of Oath Keeper Kenneth Harrelson, who was convicted of the 372  conspiracy but not the sedition or obstruction conspiracies. Like Pezzola, he was convicted of obstruction individually.

In other words, most members of both militias were found guilty, not just of obstructing the vote certification, but of doing things to chase Congress out of their chambers, thereby preventing from doing their job. On that latter act — impeding Congress from doing their job — four separate juries have found more evidence to support a conspiracy than on obstruction.

The government may use these collective results to — as Tarrio and Pattis predicted — make further prosecutorial decisions.

The Proud Boy tools

As Brandi and I have both explained, prosecutors won a guilty verdict in this case by arguing that the Proud Boy leaders used others as “tools” of their conspiracy.

In response to a series of rulings, the theory evolved into a co-conspirator liability, with each “tool” presented at trial first premised — as Tim Kelly described in an order he released just before the initial  verdict — on the government’s proffer of their involvement based on some combination of a prior tie to the Proud Boys, participation on the chats in advance, and marching with the Proud Boys from the start on January 6. Judge Kelly did exclude some of the people the government had asked to include, marked by cross-outs below:

William Pepe; Christopher Worrell; Barry Ramey; Daniel Lyons Scott; Trevor McDonald; Marc Bru; Gilbert Fonticoba; Ronald Loehrke and James Haffner; Nicholas Ochs; Gabriel Garcia; Paul Rae; Barton Shively; a group that included A.J. Fischer, Dion Rajewski, Zach Johnson, Brian Boele, and James Brett; and another group that included Arthur Jackman, Nate and Kevin Tuck, and Eddie George.

But for the rest, Kelly issued a ruling finding the men participated in the attack launched on the Capitol as Proud Boys. It’s an important ruling not just because it helped prosecutors to prove the Proud Boy Leaders used force even without, themselves, having assaulted anyone, but because it used participation in the Proud Boys attack as an element of conspiracy in a way that does not depend on First Amendment protected membership in the militia. They were found to be tools of this conspiracy not because they were Proud Boys, but because of things they did as Proud Boys.

It is probably not a coincidence that the cases against many of these men have been languishing as prosecutors focused on the Leader conspiracy. The current status of the prosecution of those Kelly did include is as follows:

Nicholas Ochs (who did not march with the Proud Boys on January 6): Currently serving a four-year sentence for obstruction.

Dan Scott: Awaiting sentencing on obstruction and assault charges.

Christopher Worrell: Bench Trial for obstruction, civil disorder, and assault paused; due to resume May 11.

Gabriel Garcia: After Garcia got caught hob-nobbing with Matt Gaetz and Ivan Raiklin in violation of pretrial release, his then lawyer parted ways with him. He is scheduled to face trial on obstruction, civil disorder, and trespassing charges in August.

William Pepe: Currently the sole remaining defendant on a conspiracy, obstruction, and civil disorder indictment in which Pezzola and cooperating witness Matthew Greene were originally charged. His attorney, William Shipley, is trying to delay trial until the fall; he has a status conference before Judge Kelly today. Update: They extended this case to July 11 today.

Trevor McDonald: Trevor McDonald has not been publicly charged.

Marc Bru: Bru is scheduled for a Bench Trial on obstruction and civil disorder charges in July.

Gilbert Fonticoba: Fonticoba faces trial on obstruction and civil disorder charges in October.

Ronald Loehrke and James Haffner: Loehrke and Haffner remain charged by complaint, facing civil disorder and trespass charges, with an assault charge against Haffner. They have a status hearing scheduled May 9.

Paul Rae, Arthur Jackman, Nate and Kevin Tuck, and Eddie George: Joe Biggs’ co-travelers currently face charges including obstruction and — for some — civil disorder, assault, and theft. This case has been dawdling over conflict proceedings involving John Pierce. Two long-term loaner AUSAs, Christopher Veatch and Nadia Moore (the latter of whom delivered the rebuttal argument in the Proud Boy leader trial), dropped off the case after closing arguments in the Proud Boy Leaders trial, perhaps freeing them to return to their homes after two years of work. This case is bound to take on new form in the status hearing before Tim Kelly scheduled today. Update: In the status conference, they continued this case to July 11. This morning, Proud Boy Leader prosecutor Jason McCullough filed his appearance.

AJ Fischer and Zach Johnson: Fischer and Johnson are charged along with non-Proud Boys who were part of the Tunnel assault with civil disorder and, for the two Proud Boys, assault. The indictment was charged under the Major Conspiracy section and may reflect cooperation between militias. The defendants have a July status hearing. As she did in the Biggs co-traveler case, Moore dropped off this case after delivering closing arguments.

For all the named “tools,” a judge has found that they followed Biggs and Nordean on the day of the attack. Like Pezzola, it would not be a stretch to argue they entered into a conspiracy to impede the cops and members of Congress. For all but Ochs, Scott, and Worrell, the government could supersede the charges against the men to incorporate evidence presented in the Proud Boy Leaders trial.

Two other Proud Boy groups may be affected by this trial.

Rehl’s co-travelers: Three of the guys that Rehl recruited to join the Proud Boys on January 6 were charged in December 2021: Isaiah Giddings, Brian Healion, and Freedom Vy. Giddings pled guilty to the more serious trespassing charge in January, but his statement of offense was somewhat discredited by belatedly-discovered evidence presented at trial that Rehl had not just wanted to get a can of pepper spray to use on cops on January 6, but had done so. Healion and Vy are still awaiting indictment. Rehl’s testimony at trial — particularly the evidence that he may have assaulted a cop — may make it easier to charge them with felonies.

The KC cell: Like many other Proud Boy cases, the prosecution of the Kansas City cell — one of the few others charged as conspiracy from the start — has been languishing during the Proud Boy leaders trial, even in spite of the fact that there is a cooperating witness, Enrique Colon, and one who proffered but was unwilling to testify against his co-conspirators, Ryan Ashlock. There’s a likely additional reason this case has languished, to say nothing of the fact that prosecutors didn’t include this cell — not even cell leader Billy Chrestman — in their tools theory: the participation of an FBI informant, who testified under the name “Ehren,” in their cell, setting up the possibility that those defendants could claim their actions were incited by the government. More than any other set of Proud Boy defendants, however, the Leader trial likely harmed this group, because during “Ehren’s” testimony, he made it clear that he did what he did that day — including helping to prevent the police from closing the gates to the tunnels — of his own accord. Here’s how Brandi described it:

Following suboptimal testimony from Tarrio’s witnesses this week, defendant Ethan Nordean squeezed in witness testimony from an FBI confidential human source and Proud Boy who appeared in court using only his middle name, “Ehren.”

Unfortunately for the defense, “Ehren,” testified under cross-examination that he was not at the Capitol on Jan. 6 as an FBI informant in any meaningful sense. He was there, he affirmed, as a member of the Proud Boys. Though the spelling of his name was not reported into the record, “Ehren” would appear to be the individual that Jan. 6 internet sleuths have identified as “TrackSuitPB.”

In video footage, jurors could see how “Ehren” entered the Capitol carrying zip tie cuffs he said he acquired incidentally as a memento of sorts. At another point, he appears in capitol CCTV  footage flanked by Kansas City Proud Boys like William “Billy” Chrestman, Chris Kuehne, and others, as he helps place a podium under an interior electric gate to keep it from closing while others set chairs in the way. Police are seen working over and over to drop the barrier as rioters advanced.

Poking holes in the defense’s direct and indirect suggestions over these many weeks of trial that the FBI was responsible for guiding the violence of Jan. 6, “Ehren” admitted he wasn’t instructed by the bureau to obstruct the gate. Or enter the Capitol. Or impede police. In hindsight, he admitted, he shouldn’t have helped prop open gates police were trying to lower at all.

While he testified, evidence was also presented to strongly support the government’s claim that he was playing up the “informing” he offered to the FBI.

“Ehren” texted his handler on Jan. 6 at 1:02 p.m. ET just as barriers were overrun: “Pb did not do it, nor inspire. The crowd did as a herd mentality. Not organized. Barriers down at capital [sic] building crowd surged forward, almost to the building now.”

During his interviews with the FBI in the summer of 2021, he claimed he was standing 100 people back from the front of the first breach. In court, however, footage showed him more like 20 or 30 people back. He was also close to defendant Zachary Rehl at one point as Rehl filmed from the fore of the crowd.

Note that Ethan Nordean’s attorney, Nick Smith, called Ehren to give this fairly counterproductive testimony. Smith also represents two of the defendants in the KC Cell, siblings Corey and Felicia. They have a status hearing scheduled before Tim Kelly on May 16. As he did on the Biggs’ co-traveler case, Veatch dropped off this case after the Leaders closing arguments.

Altogether, there are 19 people already charged (the 17 tools less Ochs, Scott, Worrell, and McDonald, plus two Rehl co-travelers and the four remaining KC defendants), plus McDonald and a few others otherwise treated as co-conspirators, who might face superseding charges or — at the very least — a more damning set of evidence based on trial testimony presented at the Proud Boy Leader case. Prosecutors may take the Pezzola verdict as a gauge of what a jury will find convincing, including that the larger Proud Boys group conspired to impede the police and Congress on January 6. That may not only expose some of these defendants to one or more additional felonies, but lay out how a networked conspiracy worked to assault the Capitol on January 6.

Update: According to this Vice News interview with one of the jurors, one reason they didn’t convict Pezz on sedition is bc he “may not have been bright enough to really know about the plan.”

Dominic Pezzola, “Spazzo”, was acquitted on seditious conspiracy. What was the difference there? Why was he acquitted when the others were found guilty? 

Well, he wasn’t in leadership for one. And he only joined the Proud Boys in November or December of 2020.  So he didn’t have a whole lot of time before Jan. 6. They have the different tiers you know, level 1 to level 4. Spazz was a 2 or 3 and on a fast track because he was so expressive of being a bad boy. We actually deadlocked on Spazz at first. But we got through that and said not guilty. Another factor was just that he wasn’t the brightest bulb on the porch. And may not have been bright enough to really know about the plan. So I said, well, poor guy.  He should’ve listened to his father-in-law, who told him “don’t go.”

The juror’s testimony about the demeanor of Pezzola and Rehl in their testimony closely matches what Brandi found.

Welcome to Brandi Buchman

As some of you likely know, last week, Brandi Buchman was one of a number of people laid off from DailyKos.

She was laid off perhaps halfway through her coverage of the Proud Boy Leaders trial (and in the midst of a really tough personal week for her). This trial is of historic import, both on its own terms, and for the prospect of holding related participants in January 6 accountable. She is just one of a few journalists who has covered the grueling trial from the start.

We at emptywheel are really privileged to welcome Brandi to emptywheel to finish her important work covering the trial. I know I’ve relied on Brandi’s coverage; if you haven’t yet followed her live-tweeting, she’s at https://twitter.com/brandi_buchman.

The trial is likely to last at least five more weeks — another week for the government case, plus at least two weeks for defense witnesses (the lawyer Joe Biggs shares with Alex Jones, Norm Pattis, claims he wants to call Donald Trump to testify), plus any rebuttal case, and finally, jury watch.

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From emptywheel, 4/2: Thanks to the generosity of emptywheel readers we have funded Brandi’s coverage for the rest of the trial. If you’d like to show your further appreciation for Brandi’s great work, here’s her PayPal tip jar.

Thanks!

And welcome to Brandi!

Judge Kelly’s Basis for His “Tools” Determinations

Since the beginning of the Proud Boys case, there has been an ongoing dispute about the government’s “tools” theory of the conspiracy, which argued that there were a bunch of people (which was trimmed after pre-trial hearings) whom Proud Boy leaders used to execute their conspiracy. This post explains that dispute.

These people are not accused or alleged to be part of one of the parallel conspiracies charged against the Leaders, and so normal hearsay rules will not apply as normal. But they are people who, the government alleges, the Leaders pulled together as recruits to make the attack happen.

Part of this dispute pertains to whose actions at the Capitol can be shown, as video evidence, to the jury in association with the Proud Boy Leaders. I think the case presents what I call a “view-say” exception, in which assaults committed by associates in places at the Capitol where no Leader was present, may or may not be shown to the jury. On the first day of trial, for example, Judge Kelly deferred on whether assaults that took place in the Tunnel should be shown, since no Leader was present.

But a big part of the debate pertains to how many of the communications on one or another of the Telegram threads the Leaders used to organize the Proud Boys can be introduced as evidence.

Last Friday, Judge Kelly issued his order on the issue verbally in what takes up about 80 pages of transcript. I wanted to lay out his logic here, so it is broadly accessible.

First, let me clarify an issue that came up on Monday, as we argued this, about who might count as a tool. On the one hand — it seems to me that the tools fall into two buckets for purposes of this case generally, as the Government has argued it. On the one hand, you have people whom the defendants or their cooperator — or their co-conspirators marched toward the Capitol on January 6th to whom they had some alleged nexus or relationship in the, sort of, physical effort of what happened that day on January 6th. And in — separately, you have the group we’re dealing with here, which is Proud Boys whom the defendants and their co-conspirators hand-selected to join the MOSD. Of course, there’s some overlap between these two groups of people. But I certainly don’t think, over the argument of some defendants, that someone ultimately had to be in one group for their statement to — or their conduct to be relevant for the — to this case. In other words, to be a tool, you didn’t have to necessarily believe — belong to both of those, sort of, groups.

I’ll next note that, again, by and large with regard to the tools evidence, I didn’t see any true hearsay issues there. It’s clear to me that the bulk of these statements, at least, were not offered as assertions but rather as circumstantial evidence of the tools’ motive and intent in the days leading up to January 6th. And to the extent they are assertions of the tools, they would fall under Rule 803(3) which allows statements expressing the declarant’s motive, intent, or plan to be admitted for the truth of the matter asserted.

But, of course, after clearing the hearsay bar, statements must still be relevant and satisfy Rule 403 balancing. So here’s the line I drew on that front. Where a purported MOSD tool’s statement expressed a more specific, concrete intent to use force or to act unlawfully on January 6th, I admitted them. But — or at least where the statement could — where you could infer that. But where, in my view, a statement was less specific, or tended to be more — a general reference to violence or perhaps even to a joke, I excluded them.

For — as for those I admitted, I think the statements are relevant/admissible because they do shed light on what the purpose of the MOSD was, which is a central issue in the trial. As I mentioned, the defendants have consistently argued — and even opened on the idea — that the MOSD was intended to create more of an organizational structure and a hierarchy at rallies for defensive purposes. And in short, the Government’s theory is that, at least with regard to January 6th, it was intended for an offensive purpose.

Thus, I think that the state of mind, in the days leading up to January 6th, of those that the co-conspirators and the defendants in this case vetted to be in the MOSD is relevant. And it’s an important factor supporting — and it is an important factor that, sort of, reinforces their relevance that the evidence shows that the defendants and their co-conspirators did select them. In fact, as Mr. Rehl says in Exhibit 503-10, everyone in the group was, quote, Represented by someone who trusted them to be there. That’s a little bit of a butchering of that quote, but I think that’s the essence of it.

The relevance of these exhibits is further buttressed by the fact that these statements were not rebuked by any of the defendants or their co-conspirators that were present in these chats as MOSD organizers. Now, we’ve talked about this a lot. I think, ordinarily, the idea that a single individual’s failure to respond to a comment in a chat — the idea that that can be relevant or some kind of adoptive admission in some way is a stretch in general, and it’s probably not a theory that would fly in a typical situation. Certainly, the bigger the chat that there is, the more public it is, and all the rest. But I think, here, that the failure to do so — not of one person, but collectively of all the people at issue, the four defendants here who were in those chats, plus their alleged co-conspirators — all those people’s non-responsiveness to some of these things is relevant, and it bolsters the overall relevance of the exhibits I decided to admit, especially because it’s clear that at least some of the defendants — again, there is evidence here — some of the defendants were monitoring the MOSD chats to ensure they stayed on topic.

Indeed, the stated rules of the MOSD chat made clear that the members had to stay on topic, and on a couple of occasions to which the Government has directed me, defendants or co-conspirators did, either in the group or amongst themselves, rebuke members’ suggestions that they viewed as outside the MOSD’s parameters. For example, in Exhibits 505-20 and 505-21, Mr. Stewart, Mr. Bertino, and Mr. Tarrio criticize an MOSD member in the MOSD Op group for suggesting that the group discuss what to do about, quote, Unaffiliated Proud Boys wearing colors, closed quote. Stewart admonished that there was nothing to talk about because the MOSD has a mission; either get with it or eff off, and that they were there for a reason. And Mr. Tarrio followed up by instructing everyone to focus. Mr. Bertino stepped in to emphasize that the member’s comment was not appropriate in the MOSD chat because the group had a mission and they didn’t want to be distracted from it. And in Exhibit-525-7, Defendant Biggs messaged Defendant Tarrio expressing in the — that the MOSD chat had already become annoying because members were talking about other events.

So importantly, in weighing whether to admit certain tools exhibits and drawing the line I did, I admitted only those exhibits where I thought there was a stronger inference that the comment would have drawn a rebuke from one of the defendants or one of their co-conspirators if the mission of the MOSD had truly only been defensive in nature.

So for all those reasons, I found the handful of the exhibits I admitted on this theory — the tools theory — were relevant, and also, satisfied Rule 403.

Before I move on to the categories of the documents, as one more offshoot of the tools issue — it doesn’t go to the admissibility of these documents, but it goes to the grounds for admissibility of statements made to — by other people, including the defendants, to the tools — I want to address one additional point that came up on Monday. Counsel for Mr. Nordean argued to me that several exhibits that the Government offered as co-conspirator statements could not have been in furtherance of the conspiracy simply because the statements at issue were made to non-co-conspirators, including tools. But in the United States v. Tarantino, the D.C. Circuit explained that if a statement, quote, Can reasonably be interpreted as encouraging a co-conspirator or another person to advance the conspiracy, or as enhancing a co-conspirator or another — or other person’s usefulness to the conspiracy, then the statement is in furtherance of the conspiracy and may be admitted. That case is 846 F.2d 1384 at 1412, a D.C. Circuit case from 1988. So to the extent that Mr. Nordean objected on that basis to several of the exhibits I’m about to discuss, particularly those involving the defendants’ or the co-conspirators’ statements to tools, that argument is foreclosed by Circuit precedent.

Roger Stone’s Stop the Steal Effort Included as Proof of Milkshake’s Obstruction

Dan “Milkshake” Scott pled guilty to obstruction and assault yesterday. He faces 41 to 63 months of prison.

His plea does not include a cooperation agreement, so unless DOJ has kept that hidden in some way (everything about the Proud Boy cases is weird, so I don’t rule it out, and his plea also does not include the standard cooperation paragraph, which often means someone has already been interviewed), Scott will not be called as a witness in the Proud Boy leader trial to explain why he yelled, “Let’s take the fucking Capitol” two hours before the Proud Boys did just that.

Indeed, his statement of offense is interesting for the abundant evidence that Scott knew his objective for the day was to stop the vote certification, but did not know Joe Biggs and Ethan Nordean’s plans for doing so. In addition to his “take the fucking Capitol” comment, for example, Scott is quoted as gleefully saying, “Oh god, we’re going to the Capitol, guys.” And he admitted that,

Scott’s purpose in being in this restricted area was to influence or impede Congress’s certification of the results of the 2020 presidential election, which was occurring inside the U.S. Capitol Building.

But the statement of offense also repeatedly describes that he was not aware of the alleged conspiracy to obstruct the vote or engage in sedition that Biggs and Nordean are being tried for.

  • Scott did not attend any meetings with Ethan Nordean, Joseph Biggs, or Zachary Rehl on January 5, 2021
  • Scott also was not a member of the Proud Boys’ coordination chats on Telegram, “Ministry of Self-Defense” (or “MOSD”) or “Boots on the Ground,” and did not know the content of the messages in those chats
  • Prior to his entry onto Capitol grounds, Scott had not been told the details of any plans made by Proud Boy leaders, such as Nordean, Biggs, and Rehl, for January 6

This statement of offense, even without a cooperation component, is written just as prosecutors on the Leader prosecution team would need it to support their argument that the Leaders used people like Scott as “tools,” not co-conspirators, to achieve their alleged goal of stopping the vote certification. The statement describes how the Leaders moved behind him, and then after he assaulted two cops, they went up the stairs towards the Capitol.

Scott did not go up the stairs after the assault. Once he saw them going up the stairs, Scott believed that that [sic] the group of Proud Boys led by Nordean, Biggs, and Rehl would attempt to enter the building to obstruct Congress’s certification of the vote including through the use of force if necessary.

Milkshake’s complete dissociation from the even the Telegram chats used to plan the attack and his acute awareness that the goal was to storm the Capitol is interesting for the one other detail used to substantiate his obstruction: Roger Stone.

It turns out, Milkshake was helping Roger Stone intimidate Rick Scott on January 3.

On January 3, 2021, Daniel Scott, Worrell, and other members of their local Proud Boy chapter attended a “Stop the Steal” rally in Naples, Florida. The headline speaker at this event was Roger Stone. Daniel Scott helped Stone up a ladder that Stone used to talk to the crowd. During this speech, Stone asserted that the 2020 presidential election was rigged due to voting fraud, and urged Florida’s U.S. Senators to vote against the certification of the Electoral College vote. Stone stated: “Rick Scott has a fundamental choice. He will either stand up for the constitution…” At that point, Daniel Scott yelled “Or give him the rope!” At another point in the rally, Daniel Scott chanted “Stop the Steal!” into a megaphone, along with the crowd at the rally.

I can’t recall another statement of offense that mentions that earlier Stop the Steal efforts — not even Brandon Straka or Baked Alaska, who were key players in the movement (though both, inexplicably, got off without pleading to obstruction). Even Jacob Chansley, who played a key role in storming the AZ Capitol prior to January 6 and who did plead to obstruction, does not include that earlier action.

Again, unless I’m mistaken, this is also the first mention of Roger Stone in a statement of offense, even among the cooperating Oath Keepers who had interaction with Stone in the weeks before the attack on the Capitol.

Milkshake, in this statement of offense, is described as a tool used by Nordean and Biggs.

But, by description, Roger Stone is what made him one.

Trump Worked with People Who Allegedly Worked with the Proud Boys to Obstruct the Peaceful Transfer of Power

By my count, at least 14 people are known to have pled guilty to some kind of conspiracy on January 6, with four more cooperating against them. Another four were found guilty of one or more conspiracy in November’s Oath Keeper verdict. Eighteen people, in one way or another have been convicted of conspiring to prevent the peaceful transfer of power on January 6, most by obstructing the vote certification.

Trump played a key part in all those conspiracies.

Ronnie Sandlin, for example, first started planning to go, armed, to DC in response to Trump’s December 19 tweet, posting on December 23 that he planned to “stop the steal and stand behind Trump when he decides to cross the rubicon.” After he watched Trump’s speech on January 6, Sandlin did a live stream where he said, “I think it is time to take the Capitol.” Once he arrived at the Capitol, Sandlin and co-conspirator Nate DeGrave participated in tactically critical assaults on cops in two places, the East door and the door to the Senate gallery. After Sandlin helped him get into the gallery, Josiah Colt then rappelled from the gallery to the Senate floor.

Like Sandlin, Brad Smith started arming himself and planning to come to DC in response to Trump’s December 19 tweet.

The call to action was put out to be in DC on January 6th from the Don himself. The reason is that’s the day pence counts them up and if the entire city is full of trump supporters it will stop the for sure riots from burning down the city at least for awhile.

By December 31, Smith predicted, “Militias will be there and if there’s enough people they may fucking storm the buildings and take out the trash right there.” Smith and his co-conspirator, Marshall Neefe, participated in an assault on cops using an 8′ by 10′ Trump sign. And after the attack he boasted that the mission was successful because “we literally chased them out into hiding. No certification lol.”

Trump played a slightly different role in the Oath Keepers conspiracy. The Oath Keepers — Stewart Rhodes above all — viewed Trump as a means to prevent Biden’s election, because as President he could invoke the Insurrection Act and with it (the Oath Keepers believed) make the militias a legal arm of the state, defending Trump. Rhodes repeatedly called on Trump to invoke the Insurrection Act — on November 9, December 12, December 23, and January 6.

He dictated a note to Trump after January 6 asking him to call on the militias as his army to stop Biden from taking power.

For the most part, none of the channels via which Rhodes tried to speak directly to Trump (including Kellye SoRelle’s attempt to work through Rudy Giuliani’s son) are known to have reached Trump.

One of his attempted interlocutors, though, undoubtedly had access to Trump: Roger Stone, on whose Friends of Stone list Rhodes was sharing his plans for insurrection shortly after the election.

DOJ has exploited at least four phones owned by members of the Friends of Stone list: Rhodes and SoRelle, Owen Shroyer, and Enrique Tarrio. Probably DOJ asked for content from Ali Alexander as well (though he disclaimed having any Signal texts to the January 6 Committee).

While a jury found all the Oath Keepers guilty of obstructing the vote certification, with the key exception of Kelly Meggs (who was also in contact separately with the Proud Boys, Roger Stone, Ali Alexander, and alleged 3 Percenter Jeremy Liggett, who in turn had ties to the MAGA Bus Tour) as well as Jessica Watkins, it found the greater part of their conspiracy either overthrowing the government or interfering with with official duties: not obstructing the vote count. Their larger plan to keep Trump in power used different means than Trump used.

That’s not true of the Proud Boy Leaders, who are three days into their trial.

Not only did the Proud Boys allegedly pursue the same plan that Trump was pursuing — obstructing the vote certification on January 6 — but they were in communication with people who were in communication, and central to, Trump’s plan: most notably, Alex Jones, Ali Alexander, and Roger Stone. They were in communication with people who were in communication with people close to Trump during the attack.

Even their telephony records show that Enrique Tarrio, Joe Biggs, and Ethan Nordean were in contact with Alex Jones and Owen Shroyer during the period.

Records for Enrique Tarrio’s phone show that while the attack on the Capitol was ongoing, he texted with Jones three times and Shroyer five times.124 Ethan Nordean’s phone records reflect that he exchanged 23 text messages with Shroyer between January 4th and 5th, and that he had one call with him on each of those days.125 Records of Joseph Biggs’s communications show that he texted with Shroyer eight times on January 4th and called him at approximately 11:15 a.m. on January 6th, while Biggs and his fellow Proud Boys were marching at and around the Capitol.126

Given the known communication habits of the men, it’s possible there are Signal or Telegram communications that were unavailable to the J6C as well.

Alex Jones and Ali Alexander knew in advance they would lead the mob to the Capitol (the January 6 Report offers an unpersuasive explanation that the request came exclusively from Caroline Wren). Roger Stone had planned to join them, probably until he got cranky about being denied a speaking role on the morning of January 6. Mike Flynn wanted to latch on, as well, until the General got too cold and had to go back to his posh hotel room. “Hell no,” he said, according to Caroline Wren. “It’s freezing.”

Meanwhile, even as Shroyer was in touch with Biggs, Alexander was in touch with Caroline Wren, who remained at the Ellipse, and asked for 5-minute updates on the Trump’s progress to the Capitol (the text in question appears to have come from Wren, but may not have been provided in Alexander’s production).

The communication between Proud Boys and Jones in real time is critical because once the riot police showed up and slowed the attack, the Proud Boy leaders pulled up, effectively waiting until Jones appeared. And after Jones did appear, he told the mob following him that Trump was coming to give another speech — something Alexander, and so almost certainly Jones — knew to be false because Wren had told Alexander. Nevertheless, Jones led his mob to the East steps, riled them up with a 1776 chant, and left them there, where they were soon joined by the Oath Keepers (led by Kelly Meggs, who also was in touch with Alexander) and Joe Biggs and some other Proud Boys (including one who had been directing traffic). That collective mob breached the East door of the Capitol, opening a second major front on the Capitol and adding to the invasion of the Senate chamber.

There are rioters who were sentenced to two months in jail because they followed Alex Jones credulously to the top of those steps and joined the mob storming the Capitol.

And it wasn’t just Jones and Alexander who were in touch with Trump’s handlers.

Mark Meadows was, per Cassidy Hutchinson, in communication with Stone about his plans for January 6, at a time when Stone still planned to march to the Capitol with Jones and Alexander.

LIZ CHENEY: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Before we turn to what Ms. Hutchinson saw and heard in the White House during the violent attack on the Capitol on January 6th, let’s discuss certain communications White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows had on January 5th. President Trump’s associate, Roger Stone, attended rallies during the afternoon and the evening of January 5th in Washington, DC On January 5th and 6th, Mr. Stone was photographed with multiple members of the Oath Keepers who were allegedly serving as his security detail.

As we now know, multiple members of that organization have been charged with or pled guilty to crimes associated with January 6th. Mr. Stone has invoked his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination before this committee. General Michael Flynn has also taken the Fifth before this committee. Mr. Stone previously had been convicted of other federal crimes unrelated to January 6th.

General Flynn had pleaded guilty to a felony charge, also predating and unrelated to January 6th. President Trump pardoned General Flynn just weeks after the Presidential election, and in July of 2020, he commuted the sentence Roger Stone was to serve.

The night before January 6th, President Trump instructed his Chief of Staff Mark Meadows to contact both Roger Stone and Michael Flynn regarding what would play out the next day. Ms. Hutchinson, Is it your understanding that President Trump asked Mark Meadows to speak with Roger Stone and General Flynn on January 5th?

CASSIDY HUTCHINSON: That’s correct. That is my understanding.

LIZ CHENEY: And Ms. Hutchinson, is it your understanding that Mr. Meadows called Mr. Stone on the 5th?

CASSIDY HUTCHINSON: I’m under the impression that Mr. Meadows did complete both a call to Mr. Stone and General Flynn the evening of the 5th.

In an earlier interview, when she was still represented by Stefan Passantino, she had attributed the idea for this call to Peter Navarro or a Navarro staffer; the Navarro staffer who had let Mike Flynn into the White House on December 18, Garrett Ziegler, was another White House contact of Ali Alexander’s, in addition to Wren.

All this matters because of the way conspiracy law works, as laid out in the bullet points from Elizabeth de la Vega that I always rely on.

CONSPIRACY LAW – EIGHT THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW.

One: Co-conspirators don’t have to explicitly agree to conspire & there doesn’t need to be a written agreement; in fact, they almost never explicitly agree to conspire & it would be nuts to have a written agreement!

Two: Conspiracies can have more than one object- i.e. conspiracy to defraud U.S. and to obstruct justice. The object is the goal. Members could have completely different reasons (motives) for wanting to achieve that goal.

Three: All co-conspirators have to agree on at least one object of the conspiracy.

Four: Co-conspirators can use multiple means to carry out the conspiracy, i.e., releasing stolen emails, collaborating on fraudulent social media ops, laundering campaign contributions.

Five: Co-conspirators don’t have to know precisely what the others are doing, and, in large conspiracies, they rarely do.

Six: Once someone is found to have knowingly joined a conspiracy, he/she is responsible for all acts of other co-conspirators.

Seven: Statements of any co-conspirator made to further the conspiracy may be introduced into evidence against any other co-conspirator.

Eight: Overt Acts taken in furtherance of a conspiracy need not be illegal. A POTUS’ public statement that “Russia is a hoax,” e.g., might not be illegal (or even make any sense), but it could be an overt act in furtherance of a conspiracy to obstruct justice.

Co-conspirators don’t all have to meet in a room together and agree to enter a conspiracy. That can happen (and did, in the Oath Keepers’ case) via a series of communications which networks everyone.

The demonstrative exhibit prosecutors used in the Oath Keeper trials showed how the various communications channels included everyone, even if some members of the conspiracy only interacted with a limited group of other co-conspirators.

I circled Rhodes and SoRelle in pink to show that even in the Oath Keeper trial, prosecutors treated the Friends of Stone list part of the communications infrastructure of the conspiracy.

Here’s what the larger conspiracy looks like, reflecting  the known communications between Rhodes, Meggs, Tarrio, Biggs, and Nordean and Jones and Stone, and the known communications between Jones and Stone and Alexander with Trump or his handlers, like Meadows, Wren, and Ziegler by way of Navarro.

The numbers and letters in parentheses come from one or another of the indictments charging conspiracy. As you can see, Trump’s known actions map onto the known, charged overt acts of various conspiracies to obstruct the vote count like a mirror.

Obviously, the pink part of this table has not been charged (yet). And it may not be unless prosecutors win guilty verdicts in the Proud Boys case. It also may not be if the obstruction charge gets narrowed on appeal.

For reasons I laid out here, the Proud Boys trial is far more complex than the Oath Keepers trial. And in the Proud Boys trial, like the Oath Keepers trial, prosecutors don’t have a clear map showing that the plan was to occupy the Capitol; instead they have testimony that Biggs and Nordean kept consulting, and everyone took orders from them, and those orders had the effect of sending cells of Proud Boys off to breach parts of the building. So it is not at all certain that prosecutors will win convictions of the men — Tarrio, Biggs, and Nordean — who were working with people who were working with Trump and his handlers.

But this is one of the means via which DOJ has been working to hold Trump accountable since just months after the attack (I first laid this out in July 2021, long before most commentators understood how DOJ was using obstruction).

Even with the disorganized conspiracy (Sandlin and friends), prosecutors have carefully shown how the men took Trump’s December 19 tweet as an explicit instruction, took instructions from a WildProtest flyer put out by Ali Alexander, believed Trump had ordered them to march to the Capitol. There are hundreds more rioters who took Trump’s December 19 tweet as an instruction, though in the case of Sandlin and his co-conspirators, they took steps that were critical to the occupation of the Capitol and the Senate chamber in response.

But with the Proud Boys, to an extent thus far only seen with Oath Keeper Kelly Meggs, the communication ties, via a two step network, to Trump’s own actions and directions. And with the Proud Boys, that coordination builds off years-long relationships, particularly between Biggs and Jones and Stone, and through them, to Trump.

Everyone was working towards the same goal: to prevent Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s victory. There were, in various places, explicit agreements made. There were, as with Trump’s Stand Back and Stand By comment that prosecutors used to kick off this trial, more implicit agreements as well.

And DOJ is now at the point where it is beginning to show how those agreements, explicit and implicit, all worked together to make the assault on the Capitol successful.

Conspiracy guilty verdicts

Oath Keepers Stewart Rhodes, Kelly Meggs, Jessica Watkins, Kenneth Harrelson, Kelly Meggs, Mark Grods, Caleb Berry, James Dolan, Joshua James, Brian Ulrich, Todd Wilson (11 conspiracy verdicts)

Proud Boys Matthew Greene, Charles Donohoe, Jeremy Bertino, with Isaiah Giddings, Louis Colon, and James Stewart cooperating (3 known conspiracy verdicts)

Disorganized Militia Ronnie Sandlin, Nate DeGrave, with Josiah Colt cooperating (2 conspiracy verdicts)

“Patriots” Marshall Neefe and Charles Smith (2 conspiracy verdicts)