1/6 Insurrection Investigation

[Rick Plant]

The GOP Treason Team. Lock them all up!

[Rick Plant]

Two Jan. 6 Organizers Are Coming Forward and Naming Names: ‘We’re Turning It All Over’
After losing faith in Trump, the pair plan to hand over text messages, Instagram direct messages, and other documents related to the planning of the Jan. 6 rally on the Ellipse where Trump spoke

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/jan6-rally-trump-2020-election-capitol-congress-gosar-1253392/

[Rick Plant]

Louie Gohmert's involvement in Jan. 6 riot and his pressure campaign on Pence has gone largely overlooked so far



Rep. Louie Gohmert's role in the Jan. 6 insurrection has gone largely overlooked by the public and investigators.

The Texas Republican filed a lawsuit Dec. 27 against then-vice president Mike Pence, who he argued should exert unilateral control over the electoral certification, and then went onto right-wing media to seemingly encourage violence to contest Donald Trump's election loss after a district court rejected his challenge, reported Politico.

"In effect, the ruling would be that you’ve got to go to the streets and be as violent as antifa and BLM,“ Gohmert said on Newsmax on Jan. 1, five days before the violent U.S. Capitol riot.

Pence allies have long suspected the twice-impeached one-term president was involved in Gohmert's pressure campaign, which was backed by lawyers associated with conspiracy theorist Sidney Powell, but it's unclear whether the House select committee is examining the Texas lawmaker's role in the insurrection, but at least one panelist agrees it played an important role in the violence on Jan. 6.

“It’s a significant detail in that it was part of a plan to isolate and coerce Pence,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD).

Gohmert hoped to force Pence to ignore a 130-year-old law governing the certification of presidential elections, but the former vice president ultimately decided he did not have that authority to throw out election results -- and Pence allies say Trump was furious that the Justice Department intervened to defend him as the suit was swiftly rejected by federal district and appellate courts in Texas.

The GOP lawmaker did not respond to two emails sent by Politico asking about the lawsuit.

Gohmert has previous denied reports that he was among “multiple members of Congress [who] were intimately involved in planning both (former President Donald) Trump’s efforts to overturn his election loss and the Jan. 6 events that turned violent.”

https://www.rawstory.com/louie-gohmert-jan-6/

[Rick Plant]

'Don’t worry about money': New charges show extensive coordination between extremist groups before Jan. 6



The arrests of two members of the Patriot Boys militia in northern Texas earlier this week raises new questions about outside funding to pay for tactical gear and travel to Washington, DC on Jan. 6, 2021, and broader coordination among the various groups that led the assault on the US Capitol.

According to the charging document for the two men, Lucas Denney, a US Army veteran and president of the Patriot Boys, recruited Donald Hazard to go to DC on Jan. 6 in a text on Christmas Day in 2020, simultaneously appointing him to serve as “sergeant at arms” for the militia.

“Hey, if your trip is paid for, can you go to DC?” Denney asked Hazard. “Don’t worry about money. Just get the days off if you can.”

The following day, Denney allegedly texted Hazard again, reporting: “Have plenty of money now. I just got a 1 thousand dollar donation from just one person for the trip. I have more donations coming in to [sic].” Denney then asked Hazard if he knew “any other guys that can go that’s like us and will fight, we could use them. And it will be paid for.”

An FBI spokesperson declined to comment on who may have contributed funding to Denney to finance the Patriot Boys’ travel to DC.

READ: #PoleTosser rioter flagrantly taunts FBI, poses with GOPers and 'patrols' the border with his pals

The charging document also cites statements by Denney as early as Christmas day that indicate he was communicating with other right-wing paramilitary leaders, including chapter leaders of the Proud Boys, about plans for Jan. 6.

To date, 17 members of the Oath Keepers have been charged with conspiracy to stop, delay or hinder Congress’ certification of the electoral vote. Four different sets of Proud Boys have also been charged with conspiracy to stop, delay or hinder the electoral vote certification, and members of all but one of those sets also face charges of conspiracy to obstruct and interfere with law enforcement officers engaged in their official duties to protect the Capitol. Five men in the California Patriots-DC Brigade and three men in the Patriots 45 MAGA Gang have also been charged in separate conspiracy cases.

All of the defendants in those cases are accused only of conspiring with other members and affiliates of their particular groups. No cases have been brought so far that allege a wider conspiracy involving the multiple groups or unaffiliated individuals involved in the insurrection. But statements by Denney bolster the view that the insurrection involved coordination among the various groups.

“We will need linking up with Proud Boys though,” Denney allegedly told Hazard in a Dec. 25. “I’ve been in contact with a few different chapters and they’re helping us out with safe hotels to get.

“We’ll all be staying in the same hotels that they are,” Denney added.

In a Dec. 31 Facebook message to an unidentified individual, Denney reportedly said: “A lot of the presidents and commanders of militias like myself are meeting on the 5th to organize and plan.” In another message sent at 2:09 a.m. that day, Denney wrote: “I’m still up chatting with all my brothers that are going to DC. All the presidents have been so busy organizing, planning and talking lol.”

Court documents that are publicly available do not indicate whether the Jan. 5 meeting actually took place.

The FBI declined to comment on whether the government plans to bring additional conspiracy charges that outline broader coordination among the various groups and unaffiliated individuals that were involved in the insurrection.

The recent arrests of two other men charged with assaulting law enforcement also point to the Proud Boys as a hub of broader organization for the Jan. 6 attack. The government alleges that Ethan Nordean, a Proud Boys leader in Seattle, texted Ronald Loehrke, a Marine Corps veteran whose name was saved as “Ron (Lisa’s friend)” in Nordean’s phone, and asked if he was coming to DC. Loehrke reportedly confirmed to Nordean that he was planning to make the trip. The government alleges that phone records show Loehrke was in contact with co-defendant James Haffner during the same time period.

Both Denney and Nordean used the term “front line” to describe where they expected fighters to be positioned in DC on Jan. 6, according to charging documents.

“I’m so pumped, brother,” Denney reportedly said in a Jan. 1 Facebook comment. “I can’t wait to be in the middle of it on the front line on the 6th.”

And according to the charging document for Ronald Loehrke and James Haffner, Nordean texted Loehrke on Dec. 27 to tell him he wanted him “on the front line” with him. Loehrke reportedly responded by saying, “Sounds good,” adding that he planned to bring three “Bad mother f*ckers” with him.

True to his word, Denney fought law enforcement on the west plaza of the Capitol. According to the government, he “grabbed and shoved a police officer,” attempted to grab a canister of crowd-control spray from another officer before swinging a long metal pole at him, and then launched a large tube toward a line of officers.

Later, according to the government, Denney relocated to the Lower West Terrace and joined a crowd of rioters in the tunnel, where they pushed a riot shield into and on top of a line of Metropolitan police officers. When Officer Michael Fanone was pulled into the crowd and down the steps about three minutes later, the government alleges that Denney swung his arm and fist at Fanone, grabbed him and pulled him further down the stairs.

Like Denney, Hazard is also accused of assaulting law enforcement at the Capitol.

Denney and Hazard were arrested earlier this week, and are being held in detention. A detention hearing for Hazard is scheduled for Friday at 1 p.m. in federal court in Fort Worth.

Similarly, the government alleges that Loehrke and Haffner positioned themselves near the front of a line of US Capitol police officers assembled in riot gear on the west plaza.

Loehrke reportedly admonished the other rioters for allowing themselves to be stopped by 25 officers. “Don’t back down, patriots!” he said. “The whole f*cking world is watching. Stand the f*ck up today!”

Multiple statements in the 42-page charging documents outlining Denney and Hazard’s alleged offenses indicate that funds donated to Patriot Boys were used to pay for tactical equipment, along with travel and lodging.

“I want to pick you up and take you to get a helmet and pick up some other gear,” Denney reportedly said to Hazard in a text on Dec. 30. Later, Denney told Hazard that he had “picked us each up a bottle of police grade pepper spray from the Fort Worth Police store…. I’ll have you a vest, too.”

And Denney reportedly thanked another unidentified individual for donating and said, “If you know anyone else that can donate, let them know about us. I still need more protective gear for some more of my guys and other supplies before we leave Sunday.”

It is unclear whether anyone else traveled to DC with Denney and Hazard, but in a Dec. 30 text message to Hazard, Denney is said to have reported that “we have 3 guys so far.” In a Facebook message to an unidentified individual on the same day, Denney reportedly said, “I have 5 of my guys going but I’m linking up with over 300 in DC.” In another message, Denney mentioned that “two of the guys” still needed helmets, vests and medical equipment.

Beyond outside funding, coordination with the Proud Boys and other “militia” groups, the Denney-Hazard charging document indicates that Denney had foreknowledge that something significant was going to happen at the Capitol on Jan. 6. In a Facebook message to an unidentified individual on Dec. 29, Denney reported; “Got the room booked and plans to meet with about 1 thousand other guys that we are all in a Intel chatroom together.”

On Dec. 30, Denney reportedly shared two similar digital posters on Facebook, each with the hashtage #OccupyCongress, along with the date of Jan. 6, 2021. One read, “Stand up! Get Loud!” It specified the time to be at the Capitol as “noon.” Rioters initially breached the entrance of the Pennsylvania Avenue Walkway leading onto the Capitol grounds at 12:50 p.m., while President Trump was still speaking at the Ellipse.

The other #OccupyCongress poster shared by Denney included the text, “If they won’t hear us, they will fear us. Election fraud is the reason.”

According to the charging document, Denney told an unidentified individual on Facebook: “Trump is calling this rally himself. It’s the day that Congress is going to try and certify the electoral college. But Pence can deny the ones coming from the states where the fraud took place. So, we are thinking Trump wants us there to keep the area from being burned down by antifa thugs when they get mad…. Biden ain’t getting into office.”

Denney’s statement about the purpose of going to DC echoed a comment made by Oath Keepers leader Stewart Rhodes on Christmas day in a Signal thread for Florida members of the militia group.

“I think Congress will screw [Trump over],” Rhodes reportedly said in the “OKFL Hangout” thread. “The only change [sic] we/he has is if we scare the shit out of them and convince them it will be torches and pitchforks time is [sic] they don’t do the right thing. But I don’t think they will listen.”

In his text exchange with Hazard on Christmas day, Denney promised, “So, the 6th is going to be bigger than the last rally. I can’t tell you everything I know over media here but it’s gonna be big. Millions and millions will be there, I can tell you that.”

To an unidentified individual on Facebook, Denney messaged on Jan. 5: “Things are going to be happening here. Trump is going to be speaking to everyone Wed before everyone marches to the capital. Rumour has it that he may march with us. I’ll tell you more when you get here on where to be and what time so you have the best seats.”

Steve Bannon, the former White House strategist and the CEO of Trump’s 2016 campaign, reportedly made a similar statement to his podcast listeners on Jan. 5.

“All hell will break loose tomorrow,” Bannon said. “It will be quite extraordinarily different. All I can say is, strap in. Tomorrow is game day. So many people said, ‘Man, if I was in a revolution I would be in Washington.’ Well, this is your time in history.”

In the early morning hours of Jan. 6, Denney relayed the message to a friend on Facebook.

“Trump speaking to us around 11am; then we march to the capital and after that we have special plan that I can’t say right now over Facebook,” Denney wrote. “But keep an eye out for live feed tomorrow from me. Tomorrow will be historic.”

https://www.rawstory.com/capitol-riot-coordination/

[Rick Plant]

Author of Trump coup PowerPoint presentation hit with Jan. 6th Committee subpoena



The man who wrote the infamous PowerPoint presentation outlining how former President Donald Trump could stay in power despite losing the 2020 election by declaring a "national emergency" has just been subpoenaed by the House Select Committee investigating the Capitol riots.

The committee announced on Thursday that it had subpoenaed Phil Waldron, whose now-infamous PowerPoint presentation was given to the committee by former Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows.

"The document he reportedly provided to Administration officials and Members of Congress is an alarming blueprint for overturning a nationwide election," said Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS). "The Select Committee needs to hear from him about all these activities. We expect him to comply with the law and provide records and testimony as the Select Committee continues its work to get answers for the American people about January 6th."

Waldron's PowerPoint contained multiple false claims about the Chinese government completely infiltrating America's voting machines, and also recommended declaring all voting done through voting machines to be invalid.

"The electronic voting machines are shifting votes from Trump to Biden," the presentation wrote in justifying tossing out all votes cast electronically. "The election fraud perpetrated used the major brands of machines Dominion and ES&S."

https://www.rawstory.com/capitol-riot-committee-subpoenas-2656056201/

[Rick Plant]

How the January 6 committee finally exposed Trump's empire of lies

If politics still turned on truth and facts, this would be the week when the lie-filled foundations of Donald Trump's movement imploded, destroying his apparent dream of a return to power after the 2024 election.

But it is the ex-President's greatest, most subversive victory that his empire of falsehoods will surely survive new disclosures that lay bare his own abuses of power and the voter-mocking deceit of his political and media enablers.
While there has already been a steady accumulation of shocking evidence of Trump's coup attempt on January 6 and the emptiness of his election fraud claims, recent days put the saga into a horrifying new light. They brought the clearest indicators yet that the entire Make America Great Again infrastructure and Trump's potential next White House campaign rest on hogwash and the whitewashing of history.

The House select committee probing the January 6 insurrection has released fresh details of the elaborate behind-the-scenes plot to subvert the certification of President Joe Biden's election. There's embarrassing new evidence of how conservative media stars were privately alarmed by the attack by Trump's mob but quickly reverted to amplifying his lies to millions of Americans they willfully deceived. And a major new Associated Press survey of 2020 swing states contested by Trump found cases of voter fraud were sparse and far from the nationwide conspiracy he claims. There are separate reports that three Florida residents were recently arrested and charged with election fraud -- two of whom were registered Republicans.

This week will be remembered for Republican Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming, the vice chair of the House committee, bringing receipts that exposed the hypocrisy of Trump's extended orbit.

Texts from Republican lawmakers, Trump's son Donald Trump Jr. and Fox News prime-time anchors to then-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows show that they knew the attack on the Capitol was a disaster and wanted it to stop.
Yet those same conservative heroes are part of a political media operation that spent the last 11 months obscuring what really happened, in many cases denying the truth of Biden's election win and fueling lies about voter fraud that are feeding anti-democratic extremism. All to preserve a meal ticket named Trump.

In another development fraught with chilling implications, the committee revealed that Meadows wrote in an email that the National Guard would be present to "protect pro Trump people" on January 6. It was the latest example of a habit of weaponizing sacred American institutions for Trump's political gain.

The former President, meanwhile, encapsulated perverted political values that now rule much of the Republican Party and will likely produce its next presidential nominee. He recently declared that former Vice President Mike Pence had been "mortally wounded" because he had refused to steal the election during his ceremonial role in certifying Biden's victory. The ex-President was giving voice to a GOP incentive system that now rewards coup attempts and despotic behavior over honoring the Constitution.

The scale of the evidence coming to light this week is remarkable. But daily bombshells about what happened on January 6 often have the effect of diminishing the shock value of Trump-related outrages. And voters have pressing concerns like the rising cost of living and a pandemic that will shortly drag into a third year. Yet this week's developments are important not just because they chart the staggering breadth of Trump's election conspiracy. They are also exposing the lies on which his future political prospects are built -- and on which multiple Republican-run states have passed laws that make it harder to vote and easier to steal future elections.

Trump's biggest confidence trick

There has always been an aura of a con man about Trump, from his days as a bankruptcy-plagued real estate chancer who adopted a persona as the master of the art of the deal. His presidency opened with false claims about the size of his inauguration crowd that in retrospect augured an administration constructed on untruths -- or what his former senior aide Kellyanne Conway once dubbed "alternative facts."

It is now clear that his big lie that "frankly, we did win this election" is the most audacious and damaging confidence trick of his career.

A few Trump supporters are seeing the light, including Dustin Stockton, one of the organizers of the January 6 rally that preceded the insurrection, who found himself subpoenaed by the House committee -- and lacks the means to wage a legal battle like Trump's wealthy political guru Steve Bannon.

"Essentially, he abandons people when the going gets tough for people. And, you know, in some ways, it's embarrassing to think that in a lot of ways, we bought into what essentially turned out to be a bluff or a con," Stockton told CNN's Anderson Cooper on Tuesday.

Yet Stockton is an outlier. Trump's popularity among Republican voters makes him the preemptive favorite for the GOP's 2024 nomination. He has the power to shape the political careers of those willing to accept his extremism -- as his raft of endorsements of midterm election candidates, nationally and in the states, shows. The Trump story, meanwhile, makes millions for conservative media outlets and stars -- giving them an incentive to promote a false alternative reality that has won over legions of viewers.

The mendacity of the conservative media propaganda machine was exposed by Cheney's reading aloud of texts sent to Meadows by several Fox News powerhouses, including Laura Ingraham and Sean Hannity, pleading with Meadows to get Trump to intervene on January 6.

"Mark, the president needs to tell people in the Capitol to go home," Ingraham texted. "This is hurting all of us. He is destroying his legacy." Hannity asked the-then chief of staff whether Trump could make a statement that would tell the people at the Capitol to leave.

Both anchors later condemned the violence on January 6. But they have been among Fox News personalities who attack the investigation as a political vendetta against Trump rather than a probe into one of the worst assaults on democracy in American political history. And television disinformation is only a small part of the problem; social media networks teem with falsehoods about the election and boost Trump's lies in what is almost a fact-free zone.

Trump's Orwellian method

Trump's enablers have reacted to the disclosures of recent days by adopting the signature move of their leader -- spinning a false reality to excuse his behavior and mislead his supporters about what really happened.

Meadows, for instance, appeared on Hannity's show on Monday and concocted a story that contradicts reports that the former President had cooled his heels and watched on TV as his rioting supporters marauded through the Capitol.

"At the end of the day, they're going to find that not only did the President act, but he acted quickly," Meadows said. The former chief of staff has since been cited for criminal contempt by the House for refusing a subpoena to testify to the committee. His tactic was familiar from previous Trump scandals, as he pivoted away from the truth to create a more palatable tale for Trump supporters that absolved the ex-President of culpability.

The approach recalled Trump's own when his pressure on Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelensky to open an investigation into then-candidate Biden and his son Hunter came out. The ex-President simply insisted that their call was "perfect," even though a White House transcript showed repeated abuses of power as he used military aid as a carrot -- a transgression that led to his first impeachment.

This Trump gambit -- also used by conservative news outlets every day -- recalls the party's reality-defying "War is Peace" slogan in George Orwell's novel "Nineteen Eighty-Four." Trump explained his method in a less literal way in 2018 when instructing followers to distrust their own eyes and non-partisan media and to believe only him. "What you're seeing and what you're reading is not what's happening," he said.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/12/16/politics/donald-trump-january-6-committee-republicans-fox-news/index.html

[Rick Plant]

Cop-assaulting MAGA rioter gets longest January 6th prison sentence yet



Robert Scott Palmer, a Florida man who assaulted Capitol Police during the January 6 Capitol attack, got slapped with a five-year prison sentence on Friday, the longest sentence handed out yet in cases related to the deadly Trump-incited riots.

NBC News reports that the 54-year-old Palmer was sentenced to 63 months in prison for assaulting multiple officers during the January 6th riots.

"Prosecutors said he threw a wooden plank the police, then picked up a fire extinguisher and sprayed its contents at a line of officers, throwing the canister at them after it was empty," writes NBC News. "A few minutes later, prosecutors said, he picked up the fire extinguisher and threw it at them a second time and assaulted another group of officers with a metal pole, throwing it like a spear."

Palmer earlier this week made a bid for leniency when he expressed regret for his actions and blamed former President Donald Trump for lying to his supporters about a "stolen" election.

"[We] were lied to by... the sitting president, as well as those acting on his behalf," Palmer wrote.

Nonetheless, that didn't stop U.S. District Judge Tanya S. Chutkan from coming down hard on him in her ruling.

"It has to be made clear that trying to violently overthrow the government, trying to stop the peaceful transition of power, and assaulting law enforcement officers in that effort is going to be met with absolutely certain punishment," she said Friday.

https://www.rawstory.com/capitol-rioter-sentence-2656063330/