Don't get so cynical about the DOJ that you miss important progress in investigations [View all]

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...I posted at the end of last month about the convictions of the Oath Keepers on charges of sedition and other crimes committed surrounding the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.

Jordan Fischer @JordanOnRecord
🚨 VERDICT: A jury has found Oath Keepers Roberto Minuta, Joseph Hackett, David Moerschel and Edward Vallejo GUILTY of seditious conspiracy, obstruction of an official proceeding and two other conspiracy counts. Hackett also convicted of tampering w/ evidence.

Jordan Fischer @JordanOnRecord 44m
After two Oath Keepers seditious conspiracy trials, here are the verdicts for all nine defendants on each charged count:

Four Oath Keepers found guilty of Jan. 6 seditious conspiracy

Four members of the far-right Oath Keepers group were convicted of seditious conspiracy Monday, joining founder Stewart Rhodes in being found guilty by a jury of plotting to keep President Donald Trump in power by force.

Seditious conspiracy charges are rarely used and even more rarely successful, making the verdict a significant victory for the Justice Department. Of the nearly 1,000 people charged with committing crimes at the Capitol on Jan. 6, only 14 were charged with seditious conspiracy, identified by the Justice Department as not just participants in a violent mob but leaders using brutality to further a political plot. In November, the same prosecution team failed to convict three associates of the Oath Keepers of the crime.

At Rhodes’s trial only he and Florida Oath Keepers leader Kelly Meggs were found guilty of conspiring to commit sedition, while three associates were convicted of less politically loaded felonies that did not require plans to use force. The Oath Keepers verdict — which came after the jury deliberated for about 13 hours — comes as five members of the Proud Boys face trial down the hall on seditious conspiracy charges.

(Oath keepers) Hackett and Moerschel traveled to D.C. from Florida with Meggs and followed him into the Capitol at 2:38 p.m. Minuta was in a separate Oath Keeper group providing security for Trump confidante Roger Stone that morning. Stone refused to leave his hotel because the Oath Keepers could not guarantee him access to the presidential stage, according to the testimony. When the riot started, Minuta and the others left Stone and rode hotel golf carts over to the Capitol.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/01/23/oathkeepers-verdict-seditious-conspiracy-jan6-guilty/
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...and this morning, at the D.C. Federal Courthouse:

Daniel Barnes @dnlbrns 8h
Tom Fitton, the president of Judicial Watch, is currently appearing before a grand jury inside the DC federal courthouse. At least one prosecutor from special counsel Jack Smith's office is present.

Fitton not only told Trump publicly to stonewall DOJ on the Maralago documents, he's a prominent member of 'Groundswell,' which is basically made up of Jan. 6 insurrection organizers including, conservative activist and Supreme Court spouse Virginia (Ginni) Thomas, John Bolton, Frank Gaffney, Kenneth Blackwell, Judicial Watch's Tom Fitton, former Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.), Max Pappas (an aide to Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas), The Washington Examiner's Mark Tapscott, and Breitbart News' Matthew Boyle, Mike Flynn, and Stephen Bannon.

Nicole Wallace brought this up today:

...not exactly the portrait of a retreating DOJ that critics seem so eager to convince.

DOJ has won 10 seditious conspiracy cases. In addition, five Proud Boys are on trial, in court right now. The judge in that Proud Boys trial ruled that he would allow prosecutors to use Trump’s ‘stand back and stand by’ comment in trial

read emptywheel:

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

As the Proud Boys trial gets underway, finally, prosecutors are beginning to show how the Proud Boys worked with people -- Alex Jones, Ali Alexander, and Roger Stone -- who in turn worked with Donald Trump in what ended up being a successful attempt to obstruct the certification of Donald Trump's loss.

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.

https://www.emptywheel.net/2023/01/17/trump-worked-with-people-who-worked-with-the-proud-boys-to-obstruct-the-peaceful-transfer-of-power/

...look to the grand juries, which aren't yet finished with wringing out every drop of evidence from an impressive number of Trump principals, and haven't reached any decision at all.

Don't listen to people who can't tell you about the actual state of the trial, what's publicly known. Don't rest your judgment of DOJ on cynics who can't be bothered to acknowledge the progress right in front of them.