WASHINGTON, DC - Much has been made of the two-tiered justice system in the United States. Aside from the political persecution of former President Donald Trump, nowhere is this more obvious than the way defendants in two separate election-year protests have been and are being treated by the Washington, D.C. “justice” system.
You may recall that in January 2017, during the inauguration of President Trump, far-left zealots became unhinged, wreaking havoc in our nation’s capital and cities throughout the country.
These riots were intended to cause damage and send a message…Trump would never be accepted as president by an unhinged segment of the population.
For example, CNN reported on January 19, 2017, that over 200 individuals were arrested and six police officers injured in Washington, D.C., in what the outlet described as initially “peaceful protests” that denigrated into chaos and violence.
Who led the violent protests? “Antifascist” protesters, aka Antifa, destroyed storefronts, hammered windows out of a limousine, and threw rocks at police officers.
“Pepper spray and other control devices were used to control the criminal actors and protect persons and property,” police said at the time. These protests were designed to impede the peaceful transfer of power, otherwise known as “an insurrection” in today’s popular parlance.
The anti-Trump protests also occurred in the usual suspect cities—New York, Seattle, Dallas, Chicago, Portland, and Seattle. One person in Seattle was shot. To show a truly international flavor, similar protests took place in Hong Kong, Berlin, and London.
So, those arrested faced harsh sentences, correct? Not so much. An NBC news story from July 2018 noted, "Federal prosecutors on Friday moved to drop charges against the last 39 people accused of participating in a violent protest on the day of President Donald Trump’s inauguration.”
So, weren’t there 200 individuals arrested on January 21, 2017? What of the rest?
Left-wing activists banded together in “an intensely coordinated grassroots political opposition network” that offered “free lodging for defendants, legal coordination, and other support.”
The U.S. Attorney’s office attempted to coordinate two group trials for defendants who committed violence, committed assaults, and destroyed property. The first trial ended in acquittals for the six defendants who stood trial. That caused the government to pack it in and drop charges against an additional 129 defendants.
Partisan Washington, D.C. juries and judges acquitted an additional four people, and a hung jury resulted in freedom for the rest.
Nicholas Stix reported that despite the severe charges initially lodged against the ant-Trump rioters, none were held without bail, unlike the J6 defendants, despite many being charged with felony riot and numerous other felonies and misdemeanors.
To add injury to insult, and in an unprecedented decision, the prosecution planned to use an undercover investigator who would serve as their “star witness.” She had been privy to planning sessions of the conspirators who descended on Washington to disrupt Trump’s inauguration.
However, “Chief Judge Robert E. Morin decreed that the undercover investigator would have to testify using her own name, in open court. That would have ended her career and put her life in danger.”
This was after another judge, Lunn Leibovitz—a George W. Bush appointee—prevented prosecutors and witnesses from mentioning the terms “Antifa” and “Black Bloc,” claiming the terms were “prejudicial.”
In a bit of a hilarious contradiction in terms, a spokesman for an antifascist network, It’s Going Down, told Newsweek that “None of the people were charged with doing anything but just being there.”
It's kind of like a majority of January 6 arrestees.
See how that works? Those who are on the “right side” (or is it the “left” side) of violent protests are given leeway. That, however, is not the case if you are a January 6, 2021, defendant in the “worst insurrection (kind of) in the history of the world." Or, that’s what leftists tell us.
Conservative author and political commentator Julie Kelly has been closely following the January 6 trials in Washington, D.C. Last week, Kelly posted on X (formerly Twitter) that she was “the only reporter in the courtroom today as DOJ and a federal judge created more ‘domestic terror’ laws.
What is “domestic terrorism?” We’ll take it right from 18 U.S. Code § 2331:
(5) the term “domestic terrorism” means activities that—(A) involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any State; (B) appear to be intended—(i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping; and (C) occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States.
Let us now examine the charges under which an overwhelming majority of January 6 protesters are accused. Did any of the actions taken by those who “trespassed” or “paraded” on Capitol grounds rise to the level of being “dangerous to human life?” Clearly not. Even those who stupidly assaulted US Capitol Police can be accused of conduct that was “dangerous to human life.”
If anyone was engaging in conduct that was “dangerous to human life,” it was US Capitol Police Lt. Michael Byrd, who shot unarmed Ashli Babbitt to death for being next to a window. Instead of facing years in prison, Byrd was recently rewarded with a promotion to Captain. They sure showed him!
Prosecutors and judges in the US Capitol trials have made sport out of making “terror enhancements” out of nothing. Last week, Kelly reported, a U.S. Attorney made the absurd observation that shaking a fence is akin to a mass casualty event to justify a terrorism enhancement against a defendant.
The United States Constitution’s Sixth Amendment ensures that a defendant has “the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed.” In other words, a “jury of one’s peers.”
Kelly observes that her “favorite part of covering sentencings for J6ers is hearing judges, prosecutors, and reporters insist Trump supporters were convicted by a ‘jury of their peers' in Washington, D.C.” That is laughable. In 2020, 92.15% of DC voters voted for Joe Biden. Moreover, 45% of the citizens in DC are African American. An overwhelming majority of January 6 defendants are white.
Two-tiered “justice system?” You decide.
You may recall that in January 2017, during the inauguration of President Trump, far-left zealots became unhinged, wreaking havoc in our nation’s capital and cities throughout the country.
These riots were intended to cause damage and send a message…Trump would never be accepted as president by an unhinged segment of the population.
For example, CNN reported on January 19, 2017, that over 200 individuals were arrested and six police officers injured in Washington, D.C., in what the outlet described as initially “peaceful protests” that denigrated into chaos and violence.
Who led the violent protests? “Antifascist” protesters, aka Antifa, destroyed storefronts, hammered windows out of a limousine, and threw rocks at police officers.
“Pepper spray and other control devices were used to control the criminal actors and protect persons and property,” police said at the time. These protests were designed to impede the peaceful transfer of power, otherwise known as “an insurrection” in today’s popular parlance.
The anti-Trump protests also occurred in the usual suspect cities—New York, Seattle, Dallas, Chicago, Portland, and Seattle. One person in Seattle was shot. To show a truly international flavor, similar protests took place in Hong Kong, Berlin, and London.
So, those arrested faced harsh sentences, correct? Not so much. An NBC news story from July 2018 noted, "Federal prosecutors on Friday moved to drop charges against the last 39 people accused of participating in a violent protest on the day of President Donald Trump’s inauguration.”
So, weren’t there 200 individuals arrested on January 21, 2017? What of the rest?
Left-wing activists banded together in “an intensely coordinated grassroots political opposition network” that offered “free lodging for defendants, legal coordination, and other support.”
The U.S. Attorney’s office attempted to coordinate two group trials for defendants who committed violence, committed assaults, and destroyed property. The first trial ended in acquittals for the six defendants who stood trial. That caused the government to pack it in and drop charges against an additional 129 defendants.
Partisan Washington, D.C. juries and judges acquitted an additional four people, and a hung jury resulted in freedom for the rest.
Nicholas Stix reported that despite the severe charges initially lodged against the ant-Trump rioters, none were held without bail, unlike the J6 defendants, despite many being charged with felony riot and numerous other felonies and misdemeanors.
To add injury to insult, and in an unprecedented decision, the prosecution planned to use an undercover investigator who would serve as their “star witness.” She had been privy to planning sessions of the conspirators who descended on Washington to disrupt Trump’s inauguration.
However, “Chief Judge Robert E. Morin decreed that the undercover investigator would have to testify using her own name, in open court. That would have ended her career and put her life in danger.”
This was after another judge, Lunn Leibovitz—a George W. Bush appointee—prevented prosecutors and witnesses from mentioning the terms “Antifa” and “Black Bloc,” claiming the terms were “prejudicial.”
In a bit of a hilarious contradiction in terms, a spokesman for an antifascist network, It’s Going Down, told Newsweek that “None of the people were charged with doing anything but just being there.”
It's kind of like a majority of January 6 arrestees.
See how that works? Those who are on the “right side” (or is it the “left” side) of violent protests are given leeway. That, however, is not the case if you are a January 6, 2021, defendant in the “worst insurrection (kind of) in the history of the world." Or, that’s what leftists tell us.
Conservative author and political commentator Julie Kelly has been closely following the January 6 trials in Washington, D.C. Last week, Kelly posted on X (formerly Twitter) that she was “the only reporter in the courtroom today as DOJ and a federal judge created more ‘domestic terror’ laws.
What is “domestic terrorism?” We’ll take it right from 18 U.S. Code § 2331:
(5) the term “domestic terrorism” means activities that—(A) involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any State; (B) appear to be intended—(i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping; and (C) occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States.
Let us now examine the charges under which an overwhelming majority of January 6 protesters are accused. Did any of the actions taken by those who “trespassed” or “paraded” on Capitol grounds rise to the level of being “dangerous to human life?” Clearly not. Even those who stupidly assaulted US Capitol Police can be accused of conduct that was “dangerous to human life.”
If anyone was engaging in conduct that was “dangerous to human life,” it was US Capitol Police Lt. Michael Byrd, who shot unarmed Ashli Babbitt to death for being next to a window. Instead of facing years in prison, Byrd was recently rewarded with a promotion to Captain. They sure showed him!
Prosecutors and judges in the US Capitol trials have made sport out of making “terror enhancements” out of nothing. Last week, Kelly reported, a U.S. Attorney made the absurd observation that shaking a fence is akin to a mass casualty event to justify a terrorism enhancement against a defendant.
The United States Constitution’s Sixth Amendment ensures that a defendant has “the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed.” In other words, a “jury of one’s peers.”
Kelly observes that her “favorite part of covering sentencings for J6ers is hearing judges, prosecutors, and reporters insist Trump supporters were convicted by a ‘jury of their peers' in Washington, D.C.” That is laughable. In 2020, 92.15% of DC voters voted for Joe Biden. Moreover, 45% of the citizens in DC are African American. An overwhelming majority of January 6 defendants are white.
Two-tiered “justice system?” You decide.
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