Tag: January 6

Commentary: The FBI-Tainted Whitmer ‘Kidnap Plot’ People Have Heard Next to Nothing About

RealClearWire
Gretchen Whitmer

In a fiery exchange last month, CNN anchorwoman Abby Phillip told GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy that there was “no evidence” to support his claim that federal agents abetted protesters at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

Ramaswamy shot back that the FBI conspicuously has never denied that law enforcement agents were on duty in the crowd. He argued that federal officials have repeatedly “lied” to the American people about not only that investigation but one that has gotten much less attention: the alleged failed plot to kidnap and kill Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan in 2020.

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Prosecutors Ask for January 6 Conspiracy Figure Ray Epps to Receive 6-Month Prison Sentence

Just the News
January Six Riot

Federal prosecutors are asking the court to sentence Ray Epps, the defendant at the center of Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot conspiracies, to six months in prison. 

In a 29-page court filing Tuesday, prosecutors asked the court to sentence Epps to six months in prison, which they said is the “high end” of the applicable sentencing guidelines. Epps, a retired 62-year-old former Marine and former Arizona Oath Keeper leader, pleaded guilty in September to disorderly conduct in a restricted building, a misdemeanor, and agreed to pay $500 in restitution as part of a plea agreement.

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Minnesota Mom Slams ‘Two-Tiered Justice System’ Ahead of Family’s January 6 Trial

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Rosemarie Westbury

A Minnesota family is facing an uncertain future as their trial dates move closer in connection to the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol breach.

On the latest episode of Liz Collin Reports, Rosemarie Westbury of Lindstrom, Minn., spoke out about the pre-dawn raids that rattled her family’s quiet community as her husband and three sons prepare for their Feb. 12 trial dates.

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Julie Kelly Commentary: Lower Courts Dare SCOTUS to Act with Lawless Rulings, But Will They?

Julie Kelly

Throughout 2020, both Republicans and Democrats warned that the U.S. Supreme Court would ultimately determine the winner of the presidential election — albeit for different reasons.

Democrats feared a conservative majority would uphold what they called “voter suppression” laws to tighten voting requirements that might benefit President Trump. Republicans worried how the court would handle cases related to lax absentee voting measures enacted as a result of the coronavirus pandemic that gave Joe Biden a big advantage.

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From Patriot to Prison: Tennessee Couple’s Battle Against Injustice Post-January 6

Tennessee Star Staff
Ronald McAbee

In an emotional interview on Thursday’s episode of The John Fredericks Show, Tennessean Sarah McAbee joined guest-host Michael Patrick Leahy to share the disturbing journey of her husband, J6er and former Williamson County Deputy Sheriff Ronald McAbee.

In this in-studio interview, Sarah McAbee reveals new details about her husband Ronald McAbee’s arrest and subsequent imprisonment and discusses the daunting legal battle, the possibility of a 17-year prison term, and the devastating toll the prosecution has had on the couple.

Her experience inspired Sarah McAbee to found a nonprofit foundation aiding January 6 defendants and their families called Stand in the Gap.

Despite facing political reluctance, she remains steadfast in her pursuit of justice for her husband and others and urges all Americans to consider the ongoing human cost and broader implications for civil liberties in the United States caught in the aftermath of January 6.

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Wife of Tennessee January 6 Prisoner Shares Holiday Struggles, ‘Survivor’s Guilt’ as Many Face Third Christmas Behind Bars

Tom Pappert
Ronald McAbee

The wife of a former Tennessee sheriff’s deputy who was convicted for on charges related to January 6 told The Tennessee Star that families and friends of those defendants often experience survivor’s guilt, especially as many of those accused of crimes spend their third Christmas in jails or prisons.

Sarah McAbee, the executive director of Stand in the Gap and wife of January 6 prisoner Ronald McAbee, explained, “Wives are waking up without their husbands, children are waking up without their fathers. Even in the federal prison system, they only get a 15 minute phone call per day.” She told The Star that January 6 have “have to decide, am I going to call my spouse? Am I going to call my parents? Am I going to call my child?”

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Commentary: Is SCOTUS Poised to Overturn Key J6 Felony Count?

Julie Kelly

An order published by the Supreme Court on December 13 represented a moment hundreds of January 6 defendants and their loved ones had been waiting for: the highest court granted a writ of certiorari petition in the case of Fischer v. USA.

In a nutshell, after more than two years of litigation before federal judges in Washington, SCOTUS will review the Department of Justice’s use of 1512(c)(2), obstruction of an official proceeding, in January 6 cases. A “splintered” 2-1 appellate court ruling issued in April just barely endorsed the DOJ’s unprecedented interpretation of the statute, passed in 2002 as part of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in the aftermath of the Enron/Arthur Anderson accounting scandal.

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10 Revelations That Changed Americans’ Understanding of Events on January 6

Just the News

Videotape of a Capitol door being mistakenly unlocked. Photos of gallows being set up outside without any police interference. Officers exhorting protesters to storm the Capitol. Intelligence warnings of potential violence that went unheeded. Major changes to testimony.

A year after the Democrat-led House Select Committee on Jan. 6 ended it works, major new revelations have emerged from House Republicans led by Rep, Barry Loudermilk, R-Ga, about how the Capitol riot unfolded that fateful day and the security failures that occurred in the days and hours ahead of the violence.

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Commentary: The ‘Jan. 6 Jurisprudence’ About to Be Unleashed on Trump

RealClearWire

Defense attorneys have coined the term “January 6 Jurisprudence” to describe the treatment received by the more than 1,200 defendants arrested so far in connection with the events of Jan. 6, 2021. This carve-out legal system involves the unprecedented and possibly unlawful use of a corporate evidence-tampering statute; excessive prison sentences and indefinite periods of pretrial incarceration; and the designation of nonviolent offenses as federal crimes of terrorism.

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Commentary: Where Are the J6 Committee Videos?

Julie Kelly
January 6 Riot

Special Counsel Jack Smith’s criminal case against Donald Trump for the events of January 6 is inextricably tied to the work of the special House committee that conducted an 18-month investigation into what happened before, on, and after that day.

In fact, one could safely argue that Smith lifted much of the language directly from the committee’s findings to prepare his 45-page indictment. Three of the four criminal referrals made by the committee, formed by then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in June 2021, are reflected in Smith’s indictment. As Kyle Cheney, Politico’s legal affairs reporter recently noted, “the words in Smith’s filing are almost verbatim the case that the committee’s vice chair, Liz Cheney, made at the panel’s first public hearing.”

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Democrats’ Star January 6 Witness Cassidy Hutchinson Made Significant Changes to Her Story, Memo Shows

Just the News

Three months after she testified as the Democrats’ star witness at the Jan. 6 congressional hearings, former Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson submitted significant changes to statements and information she had provided in transcribed interviews with the U.S. House of Representatives dating to February 2022, according to an errata sheet reviewed by Just the News that was kept from the American public. 

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BLM Agitator John Sullivan Convicted of Multiple January 6 Crimes

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A federal jury in the District of Columbia decided Thursday that left-wing agitator John Earle Sullivan didn’t just document the January 6 Capitol Riot—he was a participant, Fox 13 reported.

The jury convicted Sullivan, 29, of five felonies and two misdemeanor charges related to his conduct during the Jan. 6, 2021, breach of the U.S. Capitol. He was found guilty of the following felonious offenses: “obstructing an official proceeding, obstructing officers during a civil disorder, entering or remaining in a restricted building or grounds with a dangerous weapon, disorderly or disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds with a dangerous weapon, and unlawful possession of a dangerous weapon on Capitol grounds or buildings.”

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Commentary: House Republicans Must Expose the Full Truth of January 6

Julie Kelly

On a near-daily basis, the Department of Justice announces new arrests related to the events of January 6. Authorities arrested a Minnesota man on Wednesday for allegedly obstructing law enforcement and other minor offenses; U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Matthew Graves, appointed by Joe Biden in 2021, trumpeted the news on his office’s X account.

Court proceedings for January 6 defendants fill the docket of the federal courthouse in Washington on any given day as the current caseload exceeds 1,200 Capitol protesters. Political prisoners wait out excessive sentences as appeals slowly make their way through the system.

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D.C. Judge Pauses Trump Gag Order in January 6 Case

Just the News

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan on Friday agreed to temporarily pause a gag order she imposed on former President Donald Trump while he appeals the decision.

Chutkan on Monday issued the order, prohibiting him from publicly attacking the court staff, the prosecution, and any potential witnesses. The judge is overseeing special counsel Jack Smith’s Jan. 6 case against the former president. Trump has vocally accused Smith of pursuing a political witch hunt against him to derail his 2024 White House bid.

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Liz Cheney Calls Trump’s Actions on January 6th as ‘Evil as You Can Imagine’

Zachery Schmidt

Liz Cheney said Thursday that what former President Donald Trump did on January 6th is as “evil as you can imagine” and as much of a “dereliction of duty of an American president we have ever seen.”

“[Trump was watching [the riot] on television, and he thought the mob was doing the right thing. And no matter how many times people pleaded with him to tell the mobs to go home, he wouldn’t do it,” the former Wyoming representative said in a talk at the University of Montana’s 2023 Mansfield Center Lecture series. “And did he not do it for over three hours, but in the middle of the violence, when the attack was happening, he sent out a tweet saying that Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what Trump wanted him to do.

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Liz Cheney Claims Making Jim Jordan the New Speaker of the House Is a ‘Risk’ to American Democracy

Zachery Schmidt

Former Representative of Wyoming Liz Cheney said on Thursday that making Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH-04) the new Speaker of the House is a risk to America’s democracy.

“The notion that the Republican Party is anywhere close to contemplating putting Jim Jordan into the position of Speaker of the House is something that tells you the level of risk we face in our democracy today,” Cheney said in a talk at the University of Montana’s 2023 Mansfield Center Lecture series.

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Commentary: Jack Smith’s Real-Life Bogeyman

Julie Kelly

One must wonder if Special Counsel Jack Smith checks under his bed every night to make sure a large man wearing an oversized blue suit, long red tie, and MAGA hat isn’t there.

Smith, the public has been assured, is a nerves-of-steel prosecutor who has taken on some of the world’s most dangerous criminals during his time at the U.S. Department of Justice and The Hague. Following Smith’s appointment in November 2022, one former colleague swooned to the New York Times how Smith “has a way about him of projecting calm” and that “people look to him for steady guidance.”

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Jack Smith Wants a Gag Order Against Donald Trump in January 6 Case

Just the News

Special counsel Jack Smith has asked a judge to issue a gag order to former President Donald Trump in his Jan. 6 case to prevent him from publicly attacking major figures in the case.

“The defendant’s past conduct, including conduct that has taken place after and as a direct result of the indictment in this case, amply demonstrates the need for this order,” reads a filing from prosecutors that Politico obtained.

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Gaetz Moves to Censure Trump’s January 6 Judge

Just the News

Florida Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz on Friday introduced a resolution to censure U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan over claims she has shown “blatant political bias from the bench.”

“Judge Tanya Chutkan’s extreme sentencing of January 6th defendants, while openly supporting the violent Black Lives Matter riots of 2020, showcases a complete disregard for her duty of impartiality and the rule of law,” Gaetz said, according to The Hill. “Justice may be blind, but the American people are not – we see Judge Chutkan for her actions, and we rebuke them in the greatest possible sense.”

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Commentary: Trump’s Claims of Election Misconduct Were Never Adjudicated in Georgia

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In a post to his locals.com page Georgia attorney Robert Barnes took subscribers on a little trip down memory lane about the 2020 Georgia election challenges.

As Mr. Barnes explained, detailed affidavits filed by the Trump campaign established the veracity of the claims. Short version: Constitutionally unqualified voters cast Constitutionally unqualified ballots that were Constitutionally unqualified canvassed and counted in far excess of the margin of victory — indeed, more than 10 times the margin of victory. Unlawfully, Fulton County courts blocked the case from ever being heard.

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Prosecutors Signal They Will Try to Make the Case Donald Trump Did Not Really Believe There Was 2020 Election Fraud in Arizona

Rachel Alexander
people voting

Politically motivated prosecutors convinced a grand jury to indict Donald Trump on August 1 for challenging the results of the 2020 presidential election, blaming him for the raucous protest at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. To prove their case, prosecutors intend to show Trump believed there was election fraud in several states, including Arizona. Trump genuinely believed there was election fraud in the state leading up to the protest. 

Trump’s campaign, along with the Republican National Committee and Arizona Republican Party, filed a lawsuit against then-Secretary of State Katie Hobbs on November 7, 2020, alleging that poll workers told voters who marked extra fields on their ballots, known as “overvotes,” to submit their ballots to the voting machine tabulators anyway. The lawsuit alleged that the overvotes were not counted by the tabulators. The judge dismissed the case, citing no reason other than mootness. 

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Yet More Indictments: Prosecution of 2020 Alternate Electors in Six of Seven States Likely

Just the News
Polling Place

In Special Counsel Jack Smith’s indictment of former President Donald Trump regarding the 2020 presidential election and Jan. 6, the issue of alternate electors from seven states has become another focal point, as officials – all Democrats – from six of those states determine whether to prosecute.

In the federal indictment of Trump last week, Smith charged the former president with four counts, including conspiracy to defraud, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of, and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding, and conspiracy against rights. The indictment also acknowledges six unnamed co-conspirators with whom Trump allegedly did “conspire, confederate, and agree” to defraud the country.

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Bernie Moreno Commentary: The Biden Administration’s Cynical Ploy to Stop Trump Will Not Work

Admin

This week, the Biden Department of (in)Justice has, once again, displayed that they will stop at nothing to try to ruin the life and reputation of Donald Trump. It’s a disgrace. It’s a spectacle that belies its purpose: the Left’s palpable fear of facing Trump in the 2024 general election.

Even the numbers bear this out. A poll from Harvard/Harris just last week had President Trump dominating the GOP primary, and beating both Biden and Harris in a head-to-head matchup. Is it any coincidence that this poll proceeded additional bogus legal action from the DOJ?

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Vivek Ramaswamy Sues the DOJ, Files New FOIA Request Relating to Trump Indictment

Kaitlin Housler

GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) after the department failed to respond to his previously-filed Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to uncover the communication between the White House, DOJ, and Special Counsel Jack Smith about the indictment in the classified documents case of former President Donald Trump.

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January 6 Security Footage: Secret Service Brought Kamala Harris Within Yards of Undetected DNC Pipe Bomb

Just the News

U.S. Capitol complex security footage shows the Secret Service brought Vice President-elect Kamala Harris into a garage at the Democratic National Committee headquarters on Jan. 6, 2021, just a few yards from where a pipe bomb had been planted the night before by an unidentified suspect.

The video footage, obtained by Just the News and released on Friday, raised immediate concerns with experts on presidential security and top lawmakers in Congress on how the explosive device was overlooked during security sweeps.

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January 6 Security Failures Mount as Footage Shows Capitol Police Losing Control of Gear Used Against Them

Just the News

Intelligence forewarning of violence kept from decision makers. A plea for National Guard rejected. Security locks on a door deactivated, allowing rioters to flood into the Capitol. And now officers losing control of gear that then gets used against them.

The evidence of serious security failures inside the Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021 tragedy keeps mounting as House Republicans use their new found control to expose information that was suppressed by their Democratic counterparts’ original investigation.

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Commentary: January 6 Pipe Bomber Story Goes Boom

Admin

It remains the greatest unsolved mystery related to the events of January 6: Who placed pipe bombs near the headquarters of both the Democratic National Committee and Republican National Committee the night before?

Shortly before the joint session of Congress convened at 1 p.m. to debate the results of the 2020 Electoral College vote, a woman on her way to do some laundry looked down and spotted a device in an alley adjacent to the RNC building. Karlin Younger ran to notify security guards, who then called police. Law enforcement conducted a search of the area and located another device outside the DNC building.

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Plainclothes Police Officers at Capitol During January 6 Riot, One on Video Exhorting Crowd, Key Lawmaker Says

Just the News

The Metropolitan Police Department in Washington D.C. has confirmed to Congress that it had plainclothes officers at the Capitol during the Jan. 6 riot and that at least one was captured on video exhorting the crowd, a key House investigator told Just the News.

Rep. Barry Loudermilk, R-Ga., the chairman of the House Administration Subcommittee on Oversight, said in wide-ranging interview Wednesday night that MPD body cam video that leaked onto the video platform Rumble is authentic and confirms that officers in plainclothes were at the riot.

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J6 Unmasked: Security Footage Confirms Senate Door Opened, Allowing 300 to Enter Capitol Freely

Just the News

A door on the West side of the U.S. Capitol was left open and mostly unguarded for key moments during the Jan. 6 riot, allowing more than 300 people to enter the building unimpeded even as officers fought valiantly to keep protesters out of other sections of the official home of Congress, according to police security footage obtained by Just the News. The footage — which confirms concerns first raised by Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., two years ago — shows an episode in a narrow hallway in the middle of the Capitol that began around 2:30p.m. on Jan. 6, 2021 right after the first breaches were reported elsewhere in the landmark building.

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Commentary: Everyone Is Protecting Ray Epps

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Over the past month, speculation has swirled around why Fox News honchos ousted the nation’s most popular cable news host just hours before he was set to begin his nightly monologue. Tucker Carlson reportedly was stunned by the news, which was announced in a terse statement released by the network on April 24: “FOX News Media and Tucker Carlson have agreed to part ways. We thank him for his service to the network as a host and prior to that as a contributor.”

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FBI Repeatedly Abused Surveillance Tool to Spy on Americans in Wake of January 6, Newly Unsealed Court Doc Reveals

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The FBI abused a digital surveillance tool nearly 300,000 times between 2020 and early 2021, running 23,132 inquiries alone after Jan. 6., according to a newly unsealed court document.

The Section 702 database, which the FBI is authorized to use to gather foreign intelligence information or if they believe there is evidence of a crime, was used on Jan. 6 suspects, along with congressional campaign donors and protestors arrested in riots after George Floyd was killed in 2020, a newly unsealed court document reveals. An April 2022 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISA) opinion described these abuses, noting that the employee who ran the queries after Jan. 6 did so “to find evidence of possible foreign influence, although the analyst conducting the queries had no indications of foreign influence related to the query term used.”

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Commentary: The Hate Industry

Admin

In the aftermath of September 11, 2001, when establishment politicians started to make common use of the term “homeland,” they told us the most dangerous threat to Americans was foreign terrorists. But today, we are instructed to fear the enemy within. A new iconic date, January 6, 2021, is inscribed on our collective consciousness. From coast to coast, Americans are being herded into two camps. There are the “white supremacists,” those bad people who purportedly hate good people. And then there is everyone else, good people who are encouraged to hate the bad people.

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