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Sleepy Joe Rests After Vowing He Won’t Until Every Hostage Is Home


BY: M.D. KITTLE | APRIL 29, 2024

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2024/04/29/sleepy-joe-rests-after-vowing-he-wont-until-every-hostage-is-home/

President Joe Biden speaks at the annual White House Correspondents Dinner.

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President Joe Biden has a message for the 133 hostages held by the monsters of Hamas: He will not rest until they are “back in the arms of their loved ones.” 

“They have my word. Their families have my word,” Biden pledged Saturday on the POTUS X account before heading to a posh, black-tie White House Correspondents’ Dinner to rub elbows with the corporate media sycophants who have been carrying water for him.

Such a vow from the vaguely alert octogenarian known for being full of crap must have been comforting to the families of the people who have spent the better part of the past seven months in an unimaginable hell while the Biden administration has been sweet-talking the same people who want to wipe out Israel and annihilate Jews. 

Biden tirelessly avoided any talk of the political headaches of hostages and Israel’s right to exist during the annual fete of self-important politicians, journalists, and celebrities at the Washington Hilton. Reportedly on the menu, Terrine of Jumbo Lump Crabmeat as an appetizer, an entree of Smoked Paprika Rubbed Filet with Foraged Wild Mushroom Ragout and Pancetta & Gala Apple Demi, washed down with some very fine Chateau Ste. Michelle, Chardonnay, and Cabernet Sauvignon. Safe to say the menu for Hamas’ captives was not nearly as epicurean. 

But pretending to think about hostages works up a man-sized, elitist appetite.

“And let there be laughter. I hope for lots of side-splitting, light the internet on fire laughter,” Kelly O’Donnell, NBC senior White House correspondent and president of the White House Correspondents’ Association, insipidly said in her opening remarks.

But not a word about the goings on in Gaza and Israel from Biden or the assemblage of narcissists, to the chagrin of the hundreds of Hamas sympathizers protesting outside the high-priced Hilton. 

“Shame on you!” shouted the protesters adorned in the traditional Palestinian keffiyeh, the Associated Press reported. Their renunciations, like those of the professional protesters at Columbia and other college campuses, were reserved for Israel, the United States, and anybody who dares do business with them.

It was tough all over. Some of the correspondents’ dinner guests had to “hurry through hundreds of protesters outraged over the mounting humanitarian disaster for Palestinian civilians in Gaza,” in the AP’s telling. The self-loathing reporters forced to cover the glitzy affair couldn’t help but make the story about the protesters and the poor Palestinians, most of whom have been cheerleaders for the genocidal “From the River to the Sea, Palestine Will Be Free” campaign. 

‘Take This Serious’

Biden could muster all of 10 minutes in his stand-up routine, and much of that was to knock the political opponent he’s trying to imprison. The dinner is designed to be a good-natured roast, but Biden’s speech took a grim turn as he warned of the kind of horror only Democrats and the reporters assembled at the Washington Hilton could invent: a J6 apocalyptic future under another Donald Trump presidency. The room of accomplice media members surely shuddered thinking about the hellscape that life under Trump would unleash — like a booming economy, low inflation, a safer world, and a closed U.S. border. 

“We have to take this serious — eight years ago we could have written it off as ‘Trump talk’ but not after Jan. 6,” Biden told the attendees with a straight face. Know this, White House correspondents and esteemed corporate media reporters: Biden will never rest until every one of those Jan. 6 grandmother rebels, Capitol sightseers, and the Republican presidential candidate leading the current White House occupant rot in prison. 

Trump did not attend the dinner. That might have something to do with the fact that he’s been forced to defend himself in a Democrat-led banana republic while trying to find time to campaign for president. But as AP pointed out, Trump never attended the smorgasbord of smugness during his presidency. 

“In 2011, he sat in the audience, and glowered through a roasting by then-President Barack Obama of Trump’s reality-television celebrity status. Obama’s sarcasm then was so scalding that many political watchers linked it to Trump’s subsequent decision to run for president in 2016,” the story asserts as if communicating facts. We all know the No. 1 reason presidential campaigns launch is out of spite. Franklin Pierce jumped in the 1852 race after Whig Millard Fillmore dogged the Democrat about his raging alcoholism. Hell hath no fury like a Jacksonian Democrat scorned by “scalding sarcasm.” 

Biden did spend time on Sunday telling Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu how to run Israel’s war on terror. You’ll recall how much the United States appreciated similar meddling by other nations after 9/11. According to The Times of Israel, Biden spoke to Netanyahu about his joint statement with the leaders of 17 other nations calling on Hamas to immediately release the remaining hostages it is holding in Gaza amid the human shield Palestinians. Israel would grant a ceasefire if the hostages are released. And that’s what an unpopular American president drowning in bad polls really wants: a ceasefire. The release of the hostages is a means to his political ends, which is to get two critical contingencies — Muslims and Jews — off his back. 

And the hostages and their families can rest assured, tough-talking Joe Biden won’t rest until he secures freedom for his political aims. *Not including his daily rests and swanky dinners.

Matt Kittle is a senior elections correspondent for The Federalist. An award-winning investigative reporter and 30-year veteran of print, broadcast, and online journalism, Kittle previously served as the executive director of Empower Wisconsin.

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Jordan Demands Answers About DOJ’s Persecution of Blaze Investigative Reporter Steve Baker


BY: JORDAN BOYD | MARCH 13, 2024

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2024/03/13/jordan-demands-answers-about-dojs-persecution-of-blaze-investigative-reporter-steve-baker/

Steve Baker

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House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan wants President Joe Biden’s Department of Justice to explain why it targeted Blaze investigative reporter Steve Baker for covering the Jan. 6, 2021 chaos at the U.S. Capitol. Baker, one of the leading conservative journalists covering the fallout from the events at the Capitol, faces four charges connected to his presence while reporting at the demonstrations.

In a letter penned on March 12, Jordan demanded U.S. Attorney for Washington D.C. Matthew Graves hand over documents, communications, and other information related to Baker’s arrest and charges as well as “the investigation, prosecution, or arrest of any journalists covering the events at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021.”

“There are serious concerns about selective prosecution in this case as well as the Department’s commitment to the First Amendment rights of journalists,” Jordan warned. The Republican noted that “other journalists were in the Capitol at the same time as Mr. Baker who have not been charged with crimes” but Baker, “who has been critical of the Department’s handling of the January 6 investigations and prosecutions” was.

“As Mr. Baker’s attorney noted, the Department ‘is not allowed to decide what press coverage it likes and what press coverage offends it and take prosecutorial action based on those judgments’,” Jordan wrote.

The FBI told Baker last month to turn himself in without disclosing the exact charges he would face. When Baker self-surrendered in Dallas on March 1, the FBI “fingerprinted, photographed, handcuffed, and placed Mr. Baker in the back of an FBI vehicle, transported him to the courthouse, and brought him before the magistrate judge in ‘a belly chain, box cuffs, and leg shackles.’”

“Mr. Baker’s counsel, a former federal prosecutor, stated that, in his long career with the Department, he never once saw ‘in an initial appearance on misdemeanor charges where the defendant was told to report first to the FBI to be fingerprinted and photographed before going to the courthouse,’” Jordan noted.

Not only did Jordan say, “this conduct smacks of harassment and selective treatment for a disfavored criminal defendant,” but he also wrote that the DOJ’s actions inherently contradict its alleged principles.

“The disparate treatment of disfavored groups violates the Department’s mission of equal justice under the law,” Jordan

Jordan also noted that members of the Judiciary Committee filed an amicus brief to the Supreme Court, which is “considering whether the Department has improperly interpreted a financial crimes statute to sentence January 6 defendants to 20-year prison terms,” focused on “explaining how the Department’s conduct criminalizes politics and weaponizes the administration of justice.”

“All of these issues raise concerns about the Biden Administration’s commitment to equal application of the law,” Jordan concluded.

Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire, Fox News, and RealClearPolitics. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.

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Oregon Democrats Ban 10 GOP Lawmakers From the Ballot for Same Action Democrats Took In Multiple States


BY: TRISTAN JUSTICE | FEBRUARY 01, 2024

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2024/02/01/oregon-democrats-ban-10-gop-lawmakers-from-the-ballot-for-same-action-democrats-took-in-multiple-states/

Oregon Capitol

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On Thursday, the Oregon Supreme Court upheld a decision by the state’s chief election official to ban 10 Republican state senators from the ballot this fall for walking out of the legislature to protest bills on abortion, guns, and transgenderism.

“Last year’s boycott lasted six weeks — the longest in state history — and paralyzed the legislative session, stalling hundreds of bills,” the Associated Press reported. If enough lawmakers walk out, they can deny the quorum required to legally pass legislation. Through their walkout, Oregon Republicans extracted concessions from Democrats on bills related to firearm transfers and medical procedures for abortion and transgender-identified people.

Voters approved ballot Measure 113 in 2022, which amended the state constitution to boot lawmakers from the ballot for more than 10 unexcused floor absences. Oregon voters passed Ballot Measure 113 after Republican walkouts in 2019, 2020, and 2021.

“We obviously disagree with the Supreme Court’s ruling,” said GOP Senate Minority Leader Tim Knopp, according to the AP. “But more importantly, we are deeply disturbed by the chilling impact this decision will have to crush dissent.”

Democrat lawmakers have also deployed walkouts to block legislation in Texas, Wisconsin, and Indiana. In 2021, Texas House Democrats staged a weeks-long walkout to prevent the passage of a Republican-sponsored election bill. Lawmakers made national headlines for launching the walkout by fleeing the state to Washington D.C., where they met with Vice President Kamala Harris. Democrats in Wisconsin and Indiana also staged legislative walkouts to delay progress on union-busting right-to-work bills.

In the last few months, Democrat U.S. House Rep. Jamal Bowman also received a slap on the wrist for pulling a fire alarm amid Democrats’ attempts to delay a vote on unfunded federal spending.

Stripping Oregon Republicans from ballot access marks the latest episode in a decades-long saga to eradicate the state’s political minority. Conservatives in Oregon have become so disillusioned by the leftist state government that activists are petitioning to redraw the state’s rural eastern counties into Idaho.

Just last year, Oregon Democrats rubber-stamped aggressive laws restricting guns and water use while expanding abortion and transgender interventions. Last year, lawmakers in the Idaho House of Representatives formally approved talks to annex disenchanted neighboring counties from Oregon.

[READ: These Americans Are So Fed Up With Portland And Sacramento They Want To Redraw State Borders]

Ballot bans have quickly become Democrats’ central campaign strategy, with former President Donald Trump disqualified as a candidate in Colorado and Maine. Challenges to Trump appearing on ballots have been filed in at least 35 states and remain unresolved in 16. The U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in an appeal of Colorado’s court-ordered Trump removal next week.

Democrats are also working to keep Robert F. Kennedy Jr. off primary and state ballots, fearing his effect on Joe Biden’s re-election chances.

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist and the author of Social Justice Redux, a conservative newsletter on culture, health, and wellness. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com. Sign up for Tristan’s email newsletter here.

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GOP-Led House Expels George Santos But Not Terrorist Sympathizer Rashida Tlaib


BY: TRISTAN JUSTICE | DECEMBER 01, 2023

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2023/12/01/gop-led-house-expels-george-santos-but-not-terrorist-sympathizer-rashida-tlaib/

George Santos

Rep. George Santos, or, now-former Rep. George Santos, has denied allegations that he moonlighted as a drag queen named “Kitara Ravache.” But maybe he would have been smart to embrace it — no Democrat could have voted to expel a drag queen from the lower chamber!

On Friday, House Democrats voted nearly unanimously along with 105 Republicans to expel the freshman representative from New York. It’s worth noting that Michigan Democrat Rashida Tlaib, meanwhile, received a mere censure over her antisemitic activism and solidarity with Hamas terrorists.

Santos became the third member removed from the House since the Civil War. Rep. James Traficant of Ohio was removed by the lower chamber in 2002 after a conviction of 10 felonies and Rep. Michael Myers was kicked out in 1980 following a bribery conviction. The New York lawmaker was ostensibly removed over a potential scandal involving fraudulent campaign activity that was detailed in a report from the House Ethics Committee last month. Investigators found substantial evidence that Santos committed federal crimes, and the freshman lawmaker was handed a 23-count indictment in October. To date, however, Santos has yet to be convicted of a single crime after voters elected the Republican to replace his Democrat predecessor.

Tlaib, on the other hand, openly called for the destruction of Israel and spread lies about an explosion near a Palestinian hospital, blaming the Israeli military. The rocket that terrorist officials claimed killed hundreds of civilians at the hospital was actually a Palestinian device that misfired and landed in a nearby parking lot, killing dozens, not hundreds.

“Israel just bombed the Baptist Hospital killing 500 Palestinians (doctors, children, patients) just like that,” Tlaib wrote on X. “POTUS this is what happens when you refuse to facilitate a ceasefire & help de-escalate.”

In November, the Michigan congresswoman defended her use of the terrorist slogan “from the river to the sea” demanding the creation of a Palestinian state on Israeli land.

“From the river to the sea,” Tlaib claimed on X, “is an aspirational call for freedom, human rights, and peaceful coexistence.”

“‘From the river to the sea’ is the least ambiguous phrase imaginable,” explained Federalist Senior Editor David Harsanyi last month. “It quite literally and geographically lays out the genocidal aims of its chanters — from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, including all of the Jewish state, not just ‘occupied’ territory.”

That 105 Republicans joined Democrats to expel Santos, in an effort actually led by Republicans, is bad enough. But two of the Republicans who voted to expel Santos simultaneously voted against censuring Tlaib three weeks ago. Retiring Colorado Rep. Ken Buck, who is gunning for a gig at CNN, and freshman California Rep. John Duarte, apparently didn’t think their antisemitic colleague from Michigan deserved censure but voted to boot Santos from Congress despite his reliably red voting record.

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist and the author of Social Justice Redux, a conservative newsletter on culture, health, and wellness. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com. Sign up for Tristan’s email newsletter here.

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More Released J6 Tapes Show Police Escorting and Fist-Bumping Protesters at the Capitol


BY: TRISTAN JUSTICE | NOVEMBER 20, 2023

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2023/11/20/more-released-j6-tapes-show-police-escorting-and-fist-bumping-protesters-at-the-capitol/

Capitol riot

More footage from the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, further contradicts the left-wing narrative that the day’s events constituted a “violent insurrection” wherein democracy itself was placed in jeopardy at the hands of virulent demonstrators.

Last week, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana began releasing tapes containing more than 40,000 hours of footage from the Capitol, which were buried for three years while House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and lawmakers on the partisan Jan. 6 Committee worked to dramatize the riot with prime-time show trials.

“When I ran for Speaker, I promised to make accessible to the American people the 44,000 hours of video from Capitol Hill security taken on January 6, 2021. Truth and transparency are critical,” Johnson said in a statement. “This decision will provide millions of Americans, criminal defendants, public interest organizations and the media an ability to see for themselves what happened that day, rather than having to rely upon the interpretation of a small group of government officials.”

With a bulk of the footage made available by Friday, the rest of the tapes will be made public on a rolling basis. Cameras captured demonstrators peacefully marching through the halls of the Capitol while police officers stood by.

In another clip, a Capitol police officer is seen removing restraints on one demonstrator after walking him down a hallway out of sight from the crowd — before another officer bizarrely congratulates him with a fist bump.

The footage corroborates what was shared by former Fox News host Tucker Carlson in March before his abrupt exit from the network. Johnson’s Republican predecessor, Kevin McCarthy, gave Carlson’s producers access to the footage that had been kept under seal by the Democrat majority.

“That video,” Carlson said, “tells a very different story about what happened on Jan. 6.”

[READ: Everything You Need To Know About Tucker Carlson’s J6 Tapes]

The tapes aired by Carlson showed Jacob Chansley, the infamous “QAnon Shaman,” being escorted by police around the complex; revealed deceased Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick “healthy and vigorous” after allegedly being hit in the head with a fire extinguisher; and unearthed new contradictions in Ray Epps’ testimony. The tapes also exposed outright fabrications by the House Select Committee on Jan. 6, which was established by House Speaker Pelosi ostensibly to probe the Capitol turmoil while concealing her own failures.

Democrat Mississippi Rep. Bennie Thompson, who chaired the partisan Select Committee, bizarrely conceded that over the course of the panel’s two-year investigation, lawmakers never reviewed the blockbuster footage that was later published by Fox News.

“I’m not actually aware of any member of the committee who had access,” Thompson said. “We had a team of employees who kind of went through the video.”

Former Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, meanwhile, who was vice chair of the Select Committee before an overwhelming primary defeat by Rep. Harriet Hageman, tried to downplay Friday’s release by resharing some of the panel’s carefully selected footage of the mob.

“Here’s some January 6th video for you,” she wrote on X, previously known as Twitter.

Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee, whom Cheney’s Soviet-style committee sought to frame as a collaborator in an apparent insurrection, pushed back on Cheney’s narrative.

“Liz, we’ve seen footage like that a million times. You made sure we saw that — and nothing else,” Lee wrote on X. “It’s the other stuff — what you deliberately hid from us — that we find so upsetting.”

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist and the author of Social Justice Redux, a conservative newsletter on culture, health, and wellness. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com. Sign up for Tristan’s email newsletter here.

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SPLC Lead Attorney Apparently Participated In Unlawful Capitol Anti-Israel Protest


BY: TRISTAN JUSTICE | OCTOBER 20, 2023

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2023/10/20/splc-lead-attorney-apparently-participated-in-unlawful-capitol-anti-israel-protest/

Capitol Protest

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A lead attorney for the far-left Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) was apparently present at the pro-Palestine demonstrations on Capitol Hill on Wednesday. According to Townhall contributor John Hasson, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., allegedly took a photo of a protester’s phone, which displayed a group chat titled “Global Intifada.” “Intifada” is an Arabic term used for “uprising” or “rebellion.”

Among the protester names captured on the phone is Katrina Bleckley, who shares the same name as a pro-Palestine attorney at the SPLC. The SPLC denied Bleckley’s employment but would not respond to follow-up inquiries about whether Bleckley had ever worked for the group. On Thursday, Bleckley’s LinkedIn profile still listed SPLC as her current employer, but as of Friday morning, her profile appears to be deactivated.

A profile for a “Katrina Bleckley” on X, previously known as Twitter, is now private. The online bio identifies her as an “abolitionist” and “migrant liberator” next to the hashtag “#FreePalestine.” The person in that profile picture appears to be the same person as on the LinkedIn account.

On Wednesday, more than 300 people were arrested after pro-Palestinian protesters took over the Rotunda in the Cannon House office building to demand a ceasefire between Israel and the Gaza-based terrorist group Hamas. Demonstrators tore down pro-Israel signs and called on the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to stand down while Hamas keeps Israeli men, women, and children as hostages. Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., stood outside the Capitol with demonstrators, regurgitating terrorist propaganda that Israel launched an attack on a hospital in Gaza that killed more than 500 civilians. The false claim, contradicted by audio and visual evidence from Israeli intelligence, was similarly picked up by American outlets. On the contrary, evidence shows the blast occurred in a parking lot, came from a Hamas rocket that misfired, and killed “dozens,” not hundreds.

[READ: The Gaza Hospital Fiasco Offers A Vivid Example Of Journalism’s Rot]

The SPLC has a history of engaging in far-left extremist activism. Last week, the SPLC, which targets churches and organizations with conservative ties as “hate groups,” refused to say whether Hamas sympathizers would similarly be placed on the SPLC’s famous list of more than 1,200 “hate groups.”

While a lead attorney for the SPLC was seemingly present at Capitol Hill on Wednesday, the group previously provided research and testimony for the House Select Committee on Jan. 6 to prosecute pro-Trump demonstrators.

“Over the past few months, our SPLC analysts have met with Jan. 6 Select Committee staff and submitted nearly 40 pages of written testimony and research to document the involvement of extremists in the planning and preparation for the insurrection,” Michael Lieberman, senior policy counsel on hate and extremism at the SPLC, told Politico last summer. “Our work has helped to document coordination between Trump, his allies and two extremist groups we’ve tracked for years.”

Yet in March, another lawyer for the SPLC named Thomas Webb Jurgens was arrested and charged with domestic terrorism amid protests against police in Georgia.

“An employee at the SPLC was arrested while acting — and identifying — as a legal observer on behalf of the National Lawyers Guild (NLG),” the SPLC said in a statement at the time. “The employee is an experienced legal observer, and their arrest is no evidence of any crime, but of heavy-handed law enforcement intervention against protestors.”

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist and the author of Social Justice Redux, a conservative newsletter on culture, health, and wellness. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com. Sign up for Tristan’s email newsletter here.

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Adam Johnson Op-ed: J6 Prosecutor’s Alleged Stabbing Rampage Exposes Our Failed Justice System


BY: ADAM JOHNSON | OCTOBER 02, 2023

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2023/10/02/j6-prosecutors-stabbing-rampage-exposes-our-failed-justice-system/

mug shot of J6 prosecutor Patrick Scruggs

By way of introduction, my name is Adam Johnson — but most people know me as “the Lectern Guy.” On Jan. 6, 2021, I kind of broke the internet after I was photographed smiling and waving as I was carrying then-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s podium through the Capitol rotunda. Suffice it to say, the authorities did not look kindly on what I did, and I was later arrested.

Eventually, I was transferred to a courtroom after four days in isolation to be met by Assistant United States Attorney Patrick Scruggs for my arraignment in Tampa. I had the opportunity to brush my teeth and shower for the first time in days that morning and was hoping to make a good impression. His freshly pressed suit and American flag pin fixed to his lapel evoked a sense of due respect. I was the criminal here today.

The magistrate read the complaint, while I sat contrite. Scruggs was adamant in his insistence that “Everyone should be held accountable for their crimes.” It seemed reasonable enough to me. I had made the inexcusable decision to enter a building through open doors and carefully move furniture without permission. For these transgressions, Scruggs implored the magistrate to set conditions of my release to match my supposed crimes.

My firearms and passport were confiscated, I received a nightly curfew, and I was ordered to wear an ankle monitor, be drug tested at random, and not travel beyond a few select counties in my state.

At the time I was unsure if it was excessive. I was just happy to be back home with my family. I might have even been thankful. This man, Patrick Scruggs, had deemed me worthy to reside with my family and be among the public. 

He must be one of the good ones, I thought.

But on Sept. 26, 2023, Patrick Scruggs was arrested and charged for brutally attacking a motorist with a deadly weapon during a road rage incident. He allegedly stabbed another motorist with a pocket knife. Within 24 hours, Scruggs posted bail with no conditions set for his release. 

These days, I can’t help but think about Rome a lot. For instance, the personification of justice has historical roots reaching back to Emperor Augustus in 27 BC. It was manifested in sculpture. 

She is our Lady Justice, the Roman goddess Justitia, blindfolded to bias, scales in balance to establish a constancy to her obligation, and a double-edged sword to carry out swift justice. 

Her effigy is displayed internationally, but her real significance is the universal truth of what she represents; there is a moral contract with which we hold each other accountable. The details of the contract have long been debated, and multiple revisions have been reworked, replaced, and repealed. And while most provisions for change within the contract simply come from progress, there are moments in history that alter justice suddenly and irrevocably. 

These events seem to emerge spontaneously, but the succinct response by the captors of Justitia paints a different story.

Most of us are likely familiar with the phrase “never forget,” probably in the context of 9/11. But I’ve always interpreted it to mean that if we want to preserve the idea of America, lines may need to be redrawn. Specifically, the lines where our rights and our security meet.

It seemed like a fair trade; my civil liberties and assurances would be restored once we got the bad guys. We were all in this together, after all. 

The line between citizen and terrorist had been blurred and those lamenting from soapboxes not fortunate enough to have the talking stick were ridiculed for their lack of patriotism and adorned with foil crowns.

Lest you think me hyperbolic, consider that the Patriot Act passed with only a single nay vote. 

The canary in the coal mine fell on deaf ears, and justice became malleable in the name of national security. Some rebuked the invasion, most didn’t care, and the rest flagrantly celebrated it. The social credit score of knowing you are morally superior has its perks — for a time. 

We were the good guys. We had our time in the sun, resigning with men acting as gods, forever in their favor. Call it naiveite if you want, but we were never meant to dine on Mount Olympus.  “Never forget: The Sequel” would be released less than 20 years later. 

But on Jan. 6, 2021, a group of unarmed “terrorists” managed to shut down an entire nation by walking through hallways, praying in gathering spaces, and moving furniture.

These new bad guys didn’t hide in caves or plant explosives in public spaces, with the exception of one shadowy figure who would adopt a legacy akin to the Sasquatch. Terrorism had a new face, and this time he wore Cabela’s and questioned a school board’s decisions to include pornography in libraries meant for children. An inquisition would ensue, and the ivory tower that once stood as a beacon of light for all nations would turn its gaze upon the very citizens that reinforced the bricks of its foundation. 

More than 1,000 individuals have been charged as a result of the events on Jan. 6. Their homes were raided, their livelihoods destroyed, and their reputations dragged out like the entrails of field-dressed prey. Bail was denied, they endured months of isolation, and the Geneva Conventions was violated. 

The inquisitors were hailed as heroes of democracy, despite the fact that most of the crimes committed were nonviolent misdemeanors that had historically resulted in fines and probation, when they were prosecuted at all. 

Protesting in D.C. was not a novel occurrence. In fact, it not only has a lengthy history, it has a contemporary one as well. Storm a building during a Supreme Court justice confirmation hearing?  Not a problem. Set fire to a church, injure Secret Service members, and cause the sitting president to be ushered to a bunker for safety? Why that’s just democracy in action. 

Move a lectern 20 yards for a photo opportunity, however — well, that’s now “terrorism.”

Multi-decade sentences were recommended and administered to some of the participants that day. Moving a fence became tantamount to insurrection, resulting in a 17-year sentence, while Rene Boucher, who broke several of Sen. Rand Paul’s ribs during a lawn dispute, received a mere nine months! Not even the powerful were immune from this new breed of power!

As complex and nuanced as the justice system promotes itself to be, it is rudimentary at its core: You are either a facilitator of it or a victim of it.

Three years ago, I didn’t want to believe this. My worldview was anything but nihilistic, and I believed that once I had a chance to be seen and heard, the misunderstanding would be laughed off. 

But the plot thins. The veil slips. The shroud is lifted. We have seen the man behind the curtain, and we are at an impasse.

If we have learned anything over the past two decades, it is this: Any power we are willing to give away so our enemies might be smitten will inevitably be used against us as well given a long enough timeline. 

To restore our Lady Justice, we must honor the principles she once stood for. Scruggs will have his day in court, but no single case will restore equilibrium.

As I said earlier, I think about Rome a lot. The fall of an empire can’t be attributed to a singular event, much less a singular person. Nero was blamed for starting the fire that reduced more than half of Rome to ashes, but the citizens were content with bread and circuses. 

The mob cheered as their neighbors were persecuted and slaughtered by Nero. Justice had become bloody retribution to entertain the masses. Sound familiar? 

Our rulers and persecutors may be acting like Nero, but it doesn’t mean we have to be their mob; we cannot meet injustice with more injustice. 

Justice is not demanding we prosecute vindictively. She is blindfolded to narratives, balanced without bias, and consistent in punishment. If the least of us agree to this moral contract and if we choose to believe in equal justice under the law, we can begin to restore our nation.

Adam Johnson is 38-year-old father of five. He spends his time training jiu-jitsu and is currently writing his first book while pursuing higher education. You can follow him @lecternleader on X.

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7 Revelations From Ex-Capitol Police Chief That Explode Democrats’ Jan. 6 Narrative


BY: TRISTAN JUSTICE | AUGUST 11, 2023

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2023/08/11/7-revelations-from-ex-capitol-police-chief-that-explode-democrats-jan-6-narrative/

Steven Sund

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Ex-Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund is determined to set the record straight on what happened at the Jan. 6 Capitol riot more than two years ago.

After writing a book that challenged the groupthink of corporate media and the partisan Jan. 6 Committee, Sund sat down for an interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. According to Carlson, the interview with Sund was scheduled to air on the network April 24, the same day Fox News announced the anchor’s termination. (Another already-taped interview, with a Federalist senior contributor, was also stifled). Fox News refused to release the footage of Sund’s conversation with Carlson, so the pair recorded another sit-down published on Twitter Thursday.

“[Sund] knew more about what happened than virtually anyone else in the United States,” Carlson said. “Yet congressional investigators weren’t interested in talking to him. The media, not interested in talking to him. But we were.”

[RELATED: Everything You Need To Know About Tucker Carlson’s J6 Tapes]

1. DHS, FBI Hid Intelligence From Capitol Police

Sund went on to make explosive allegations of federal misconduct related to the Capitol chaos that raised more questions than answers about how and why the complex was left vulnerable. The Capitol Police, Sund said, were left in the dark about a cascade of intelligence gathered by the FBI and Department of Homeland Security that warned about the rally turning violent.

The intelligence that Capitol Police gathered, Sund said, indicated a level of political activity similar to previous rallies that featured “limited skirmishes” with counter-protesters.

“Coming into it,” Sund said, Capitol Police received “absolutely zero” of the “intelligence that we know now existed talking about attacking the Capitol, killing my police officers, attacking members of Congress, and killing members of Congress.”

“None of that was included in the intelligence coming up,” Sund said. “We now know FBI, DHS was swimming in that intelligence. We also know now that the military seemed to have some very concerning intelligence as well. “

“None of the intelligence,” Sund said, was shared with the Capitol Police chief.

“I’ve done many national security events and this was handled differently,” Sund added. “No intelligence, no [Joint Intelligence Bulletin], no coordination, no discussion in advance.”

2. Milley Wanted to Shut Down D.C. Ahead Of Jan. 6

Military officials were so concerned about the intelligence that warned of an explosive riot that the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, Mark Milley, considered preemptively shutting down the city.

“Acting Secretary of Defense [Christopher] Miller and General Milley had both discussed locking down the city of Washington D.C. because they were so worried about violence at the Capitol on Jan. 6,” Sund said.

According to Sund, the two Pentagon leaders discussed even revoking permits on Capitol Hill out of concern for violence.

“You know who issues the permits on Capitol Hill for demonstrations?” Sund said. “I do. You know who wasn’t told? Me.”

On Jan. 4, however, Miller signed a memo “restricting the National Guard from carrying the various weapons, any weapons, any civil disobedience equipment that would be utilized for the very demonstrations or violence he sees coming.”

3. Congressional Leadership Denied National Guard Requests Before and During Riot

Despite federal intelligence warning of mass upheaval amid the joint session of Congress, Sund explained how he was denied preemptive deployment of the National Guard twice in the days leading up to the riot. On Jan. 3, 2021, Sund sought approval from congressional leadership for guard deployment as was still required by law.

“I was denied twice because of optics and because the intelligence didn’t support us,” Sund said. “I was denied by Paul Irving, House sergeant-at-arms, and also Mike Stenger, Senate sergeant-at-arms.”

Irving served under the direction of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Stenger reported to GOP Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

The former Capitol Police chief said he was forced to beg for National Guard assistance as the turmoil escalated. While the riot grew, Sund said he called House Sergeant-at-Arms Irving to demand reinforcements from the nearby Guard troops.

“I’m told by Paul Irving, ‘I’m gonna run it up the chain, I’ll get back to you,’” Sund said. “His chain would be up to Nancy Pelosi. He didn’t have to do that but he wouldn’t give me authorization.”

Irving was allowed to authorize the deployment without Pelosi’s approval in the event of an emergency, Sund said. The former speaker’s office confirmed to The New York Times that Pelosi herself was asked to dispatch the National Guard.

Sund said Stenger was called next, who in turn said, “Let’s wait to hear what we hear from Paul [Irving].”

“For the next 71 minutes I make 32 calls,” Sund said, with no help from congressional leadership.

4. Secret Service Turned Over One Text to J6 Committee

While Sund made dozens of calls from the Capitol command center, the first agency to come to the police chief’s assistance was the Secret Service.

“One of the first people to offer assistance was United States Secret Service,” Sund said. “By law, I shouldn’t have requested their assistance … until I had approval. But I’m looking at my men and women having their asses handed to them and my first thought was ‘f-ck it, I will take whatever discipline there is. Send me whatever you got.’”

“That was the one text Secret Service turned over,” Sund added.

The agency had apparently deleted text messages from Jan. 5-6, 2021, that were subpoenaed by the House select committee probing the riot last summer. The only message turned over was Sund’s out-of-order request for support.

5. New Jersey State Police Arrived to Help Before National Guard

While Sund was begging congressional leaders to greenlight assistance from the National Guard, New Jersey State Police were on their way to reinforce Capitol Police.

The 150 to 180 National Guard troops who were “within eyesight” of the Capitol, Sund told Carlson, were put in vehicles and driven around the complex back to the D.C. Armory. Instead, Sund received the evening troops, who didn’t arrive on the scene until 6 p.m. By that point, according to Sund, the Capitol was under control.

“While I’m begging for assistance,” Sund said, “the Pentagon sent in resources to generals’ houses to protect their homes but not me.”

By the time the National Guard finally showed up, Sund noted, “New Jersey State Police [had] beat them to the Capitol.”

National Guardsmen were then positioned in front of the Capitol to take “pictures for military magazines” as “heroes” of Jan. 6.

6. Sund Wasn’t Told About Federal Informants Present at the Capitol

In the fall of 2021, The New York Times confirmed the presence of at least one federal informant at the Jan. 6 Capitol riot after the paper dismissed such claims as a conspiracy theory. The former Capitol police chief, however, was kept in the dark on undercover operations with “no idea” how many were in the crowd. The Justice Department had even deployed special commandos with “shoot to kill authority” at the Capitol, according to Newsweek.

“Not to share that in the intelligence,” Sund said, “that’s concerning.”

7. Lawmakers Didn’t Want Sund to Testify

In the aftermath of the Capitol riot, lawmakers began to schedule hearings on the security failures while the fever grew to launch a snap impeachment of the outgoing president.

“I fought to testify,” Sund said, but “they didn’t want me to testify in the Senate hearing.”

The hearing in the upper chamber was initially limited to current Capitol employees. Sund was excluded from the lineup because he was immediately dismissed from his job as chief of police after the riot. Irving and Stenger would have also initially been excluded. The trio of security officers eventually testified in the upper chamber after Trump’s acquittal in February 2021, with Sund the only one to appear in person.

Meanwhile Pelosi, who was in charge of the Capitol as speaker of the House, was “off limits” to investigation — leaving open questions such as whether the speaker was briefed on the potential for violence from other agencies. The House speaker even blocked Republican access to relevant documents ignored by the Democrats’ Jan. 6 Committee.

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist and the author of Social Justice Redux, a conservative newsletter on culture, health, and wellness. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com. Sign up for Tristan’s email newsletter here.

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Republicans Investigating J6 Committee Suggest Dems Destroyed Evidence In Apparent Cover Up


BY: TRISTAN JUSTICE | AUGUST 10, 2023

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2023/08/10/republicans-investigating-j6-committee-suggest-dems-destroyed-evidence-in-apparent-cover-up/

Capitol

In November, the leader of the incoming House Republican majority, Kevin McCarthy, sent a letter to the Select Committee on Jan. 6 reminding lawmakers they were required to “preserve all records” related to the panel’s work. Nine months later, however, Republicans in charge of investigating the committee’s work say the probe failed to comply with House rules.

GOP Georgia Rep. Barry Loudermilk, who became the target of the since-disbanded committee’s salacious attacks last summer, is leading the Republican probe into the Jan. 6 Committee as chairman of the Subcommittee on Oversight for the Committee on House Administration. Loudermilk told Fox News on Tuesday his team has struggled to locate the leftover material required to review the Select Committee’s work under Chairman Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss. The partisan probe spent 18 months prosecuting political opponents and was complete with Soviet-style show trials presented with fabricated evidence while lawmakers sought to portray the Capitol riot as a “deadly insurrection.”

“Nothing was indexed. There was no table of contents index. Usually when you conduct this level of investigation, you use a database system and everything is digitized, indexed. We got nothing like that,” Loudermilk said. “So it took us a long time going through it and one thing I started realizing is we don’t have anything much at all from the Blue Team.”

The “Blue Team” refers to the investigative staff on the committee in charge of probing the Capitol security failures, all of which point to former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. After then-Fox News prime-time host Tucker Carlson aired footage undermining central narratives of the Jan. 6 Committee in March, Chairman Thompson admitted the Select Committee didn’t actually review Capitol surveillance video.

[READ: Everything You Need To Know About Tucker Carlson’s J6 Tapes]

“We’ve got lots of depositions, we’ve got lots of subpoenas, we’ve got video and other documents provided through subpoenas by individuals,” Loudermilk told Fox. “But we’re not seeing anything from the Blue Team as far as reports on the investigation they did looking into the actual breach itself.”

“What we also realized we didn’t have was the videos of all the depositions,” said the congressman.

Fox News reported on a series of exchanges between Thompson and Loudermilk, the latter of whom was defamed by the committee as giving “reconnaissance” tours of the Capitol on the eve of the riot. The Jan. 6 tapes aired by Carlson, however, show the Georgia Republican was giving a routine tour of the complex to constituents.

Loudermilk told Fox News his committee was only given 2.5 terabytes of data, contrary to Thompson’s initial claim the Select Committee handed over 4. A letter from the former chairman of the Democrats’ probe this summer conceded the Select Committee failed to maintain records that the probe was required to preserve.

“Consistent with guidance from the Office of the Clerk and other authorities, the Select Committee did not archive temporary committee records that were not elevated by the Committee’s actions, such as use in hearings or official publications, or those that did not further its investigative activities,” Thompson wrote.

“He’s saying they decided they didn’t have to,” Loudermilk told Fox News. “The more we go in the more we’re realizing that there’s things that we don’t have. We don’t have anything about security failures at the Capitol, we don’t have the videos of the depositions.”

McCarthy sent the letter demanding records preservation after reporting from The Washington Post raised concerns that the Select Committee was prepared to omit key details of the investigation.

“It is imperative that all information collected be preserved not just for institutional prerogatives but for transparency to the American people,” McCarthy wrote last fall. “The American people have a right to know that the allegations you have made are supported by the facts and to be able to view the transcripts with an eye towards encouraged enforcement of 18 USC 1001.”

California Republican Congressman Darrell Issa threatened members who served on the Jan. 6 Committee with censure over the destruction of records.

“The ones that are still in Congress might very well face a censure for what they participated in,” Issa said.

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist and the author of Social Justice Redux, a conservative newsletter on culture, health, and wellness. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com. Sign up for Tristan’s email newsletter here.

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Republicans Deserve a Senate Leader Willing to Defend Their Interests Over Democrats’


BY: TRISTAN JUSTICE | AUGUST 01, 2023

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2023/08/01/republicans-deserve-a-senate-leader-willing-to-defend-their-interests-over-democrats/

Mitch McConnell

While the Biden administration faces escalating calls for impeachment, either of the homeland security secretary, the attorney general, or even the president himself as evidence mounts over myriad scandals, Republicans’ top Senate lawmaker is distracted.

Instead of directing his ire at President Joe Biden for his influence-peddling schemes with corrupt overseas actors, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell piled onto the media onslaught against a freshman representative from Wisconsin who cussed out some teenagers at the Capitol. GOP Rep. Derrick Van Orden stirred up controversy last week when he went on a tirade against some interns with the Senate page program who were lying in the Capitol rotunda, which the congressman says he considered disrespectful.

“Wake the fuck up you little sh-ts. … What the f-ck are you all doing? Get the f-ck out of here,” Van Orden said, telling the group they were “defiling the space,” according to one page’s recollection of the incident. The Wisconsin lawmaker was defiant, explaining on a local radio show, “The people who have brought this up are not serious people.”

Nor are the Republicans who have remained silent on the administration’s series of scandals but have been quick to get behind the Democrats’ latest outrage circus.

The Van Orden outburst drew swift condemnation from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York. “I was shocked when I heard about it, and I am further shocked at his refusal to apologize to these young people,” Schumer said.

McConnell didn’t hesitate to make the outrage bipartisan. According to Politico, McConnell was clear to “associate myself with the remarks of the majority leader.”

“Everybody on this side of the aisle feels exactly the same way,” McConnell added.

If only Republicans had a leader in the upper chamber who dared stand up for Republicans. The problem is not that Van Orden’s eruption at a couple of teenagers is excusable. The problem is McConnell’s regular participation in Democrats’ smear campaigns against other Republicans while the GOP Senate leader remains silent on the administration’s corruption scandals. Last week, McConnell declined to comment at all on House Republicans’ impeachment push.

It’s far from the first time the Republican Senate leader has peddled the Democrats’ latest political narratives. In March, McConnell condemned Fox News for the network airing the Jan. 6 tapes presented by Tucker Carlson. The tapes undermined the Democrats’ narratives of a “deadly insurrection,” the basis for their snap impeachment of outgoing President Donald Trump.

“With regard to the presentation on Fox News last night, I want to associate myself entirely with the opinion of the chief of the Capitol Police about what happened on Jan. 6,” McConnell told reporters on Capitol Hill following Carlson’s first installment of the J6 tapes. Hours earlier, Capitol Police Chief Tom Manger had sent a memo to his department that called Carlson’s coverage “filled with offensive and misleading conclusions.”

The comments led even Elon Musk to begin to question whether McConnell was actually a Republican. “I keep forgetting which party he belongs to,” Musk wrote on Twitter.

After the FBI raid of former President Donald Trump’s Florida residence at Mar-a-Lago, McConnell didn’t condemn the weaponization of federal law enforcement. Instead, the Republican Senate leader endorsed more funding for the federal bureau. This followed the octogenarian lawmaker sabotaging Republicans’ midterm efforts to reclaim the Senate. McConnell was more interested in maintaining an establishment minority he could control than in achieving a GOP majority that aligned more with Trump’s vision for the party.

Republicans have a right to expect far better from their No. 1 leader in the Senate. Considering McConnell’s recent health problems, new leadership could come sooner rather than later. His successor would be wise to adopt a new approach that puts voters first.

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist and the author of Social Justice Redux, a conservative newsletter on culture, health, and wellness. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com. Sign up for Tristan’s email newsletter here.

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James Comer Announces Contempt Hearings For FBI Director Christopher Wray


BY: TRISTAN JUSTICE | JUNE 05, 2023

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2023/06/05/james-comer-announces-contempt-hearings-for-fbi-director-christopher-wray/

Christopher Wray

Republican Chairman of the House Oversight Committee James Comer announced Monday that lawmakers will convene contempt hearings for FBI Director Christopher Wray later this week.

Speaking to reporters in a Capitol Hill press conference, the Kentucky representative charged the FBI with violating a congressional subpoena over an unclassified document. The FBI record purportedly implicates President Joe Biden in a $5 million-dollar bribery scheme with a “foreign national” from Biden’s time in the Obama administration.

“Anything short of producing these documents to the House Oversight Committee is not in compliance with the subpoena,” Comer warned last week.

The House Oversight chairman viewed the document in a secure SCIF at the Capitol on Monday after agency officials initially refused and demanded lawmakers travel to the FBI headquarters on Pennsylvania Avenue.

“FBI officials confirmed that the unclassified FBI generated record has not been disproven and is currently being used in an ongoing investigation,” Comer said Monday. “At the briefing, the FBI again refused to hand over the unclassified record to the custody of the House Oversight Committee, and we will now initiate contempt of Congress hearings this Thursday.”

Comer noted the document “appears” to be used in an ongoing FBI probe “which I assume is in Delaware” and promised Congress’ own investigation is only in the “beginning” stages. Agency claims that the document can’t be released, however, are likely to be met with skepticism considering the FBI hired Igor Danchenko as an undercover informant to keep the lies around the Trump-Russia investigation quiet.

Republicans have threatened to hold Wray in contempt of Congress for weeks over the FBI chief’s refusal to hand over the requested record. Comer submitted a subpoena for the document with Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, a primary watchdog of the Justice Department in the upper chamber.

“We believe the FBI possesses an unclassified internal document that includes very serious and detailed allegations implicating the current President of the United States,” Grassley wrote in May. “What we don’t know is what, if anything, the FBI has done to verify these claims or investigate further. The FBI’s recent history of botching politically charged investigations demands close congressional oversight.”

[RELATED: Chuck Grassley Demands DOJ Cough Up Document Over Criminal Scheme Involving Joe Biden]

While the FBI director faces contempt charges over the document implicating the president in a bribery scheme, the agency continues to stonewall congressional requests on a pair of pipe bombs found at the DNC and RNC headquarters in Washington, D.C. on Jan. 6, 2021.

House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan of Ohio has demanded an FBI briefing on the pipe bomb investigation multiple times. According to Kyle Seraphin, a former FBI agent who worked on the case, the agency previously tracked down the suspect’s car but has not identified the culprit. The FBI also found both bombs to be inoperable.

[READ: The FBI Knows What Car Was Used In J6 DNC Pipe Bomb, But Refuses To Identify Prime Suspect]

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist and the author of Social Justice Redux, a conservative newsletter on culture, health, and wellness. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com. Sign up for Tristan’s email newsletter here.

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Jan. 6 Committee Avoids Probing Security Failures as Hearing Finally Covers Capitol Riot


REPORTED BY: TRISTAN JUSTICE | JULY 13, 2022

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2022/07/13/jan-6-committee-avoids-probing-security-failures-as-hearing-finally-covers-capitol-riot/

Jan. 6 Hearing

Why is the Jan. 6 committee soliciting testimony from former D.C. government employees instead of the Capitol Police Intelligence Unit?

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The House Select Committee on Jan. 6 finally devoted a major portion of a hearing in its summer show trial series to the violence at the Capitol. After again re-establishing that members of the Trump White House were divided over the Republican president’s challenges to the 2020 election, lawmakers spent the second half of Tuesday’s hearing on the turmoil from more than 18 months ago.

“We settle our differences at the ballot box,” Committee Chair Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., said during his opening of proceedings in which a fellow panel member, Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-M.d., led the questioning of two repentant rioters who illegally entered the Capitol. Just five years ago, Raskin spearheaded efforts to overturn the 2016 election results as one of his first actions in Congress, objecting to the certification over made-up narratives of Trump-Russia collusion.

Over the course of Tuesday’s hearing, lawmakers sought to paint former President Donald Trump as guilty of coordinating an assault on the Capitol, which began well before he had finished his speech at the White House. At one point, the panel featured an unsent tweet from the president urging supporters to “March to the Capitol,” as incriminating evidence. The post loses its shock value, however, when one acknowledges that Trump said plainly to those gathered at the Ellipse to head toward the Capitol and protest “peacefully.” Quite the bombshell.

“I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard,” Trump said.

For all its redundancy in its desperate attempt to smear political dissidents as violent “insurrectionists” ahead of the fall midterms, the Jan. 6 Committee’s latest hearing offered the most information yet about the telegraphing and public planning in the run-up to the Capitol riot. The proceedings, on the other hand, came complete not with testimony from senior officials in charge of Capitol security, but instead from an anonymous Twitter employee and former D.C. Chief of Homeland Security and Intelligence Donell Harvin.

In a pre-recorded clip played during the hearing, Harvin told lawmakers his division received information “suggesting that some very, very violent individuals were organizing to come to D.C. and not only were they organizing to come to D.C., but these groups, these nonaligned groups, were aligning. All the red flags went up at that point.”

“When you have armed militia collaborating with white supremacy groups collaborating with conspiracy theory groups online all towards a common goal, you start seeing what we call in terrorism, ‘a blended ideology,’” Harvin added. “And that’s a very, very bad sign.”

Harvin said groups went beyond casual chatter and began coordinating specifics.

The committee’s anonymous Twitter employee, meanwhile, testified that the company was concerned about the potential for violence on Jan. 6.

“I don’t know that I slept that night [Jan. 5, 2021] to be honest with you,” the employee said. “I was on pins and needles, because again, for months, I had been begging and anticipating and attempting to raise the reality that, if we made no intervention into what I saw occurring, people were going to die.”

Twitter fostered the same type of user riot planning that Silicon Valley tech giants cited to justify their collective purge of rival app Parler from their online services shortly after the riot.

Tuesday’s testimony raised more questions than answers and reinforced existing questions about the Capitol security failures under the leadership of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who six times turned down requests for the deployment of the National Guard, according to former Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund.

Why didn’t Pelosi’s House Sergeant at Arms approve requests for National Guard assistance? According to The Washington Post, “Harvin’s team set up a call with analysts at the Capitol Police.” Why did the U.S. Capitol Police Intelligence Unit “not warn its officers or law enforcement partners of the gravity of the threat” as outlined by a Senate report last summer? Why didn’t the Jan. 6 Committee ask Harvin about the Capitol Police’s failure to heed his warnings? And why is the committee soliciting testimony from former D.C. government employees instead of the Capitol Police Intelligence Unit? We all know the answer to the last two.

Devoid of opposition, the committee is operating for the sole purpose of expunging its political enemies from public life, and that means doing everything in its power to present a curated narrative. Panel member Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., admitted that much on CNN on Sunday when she said on national television that the committee was uninterested in corroborating blockbuster claims left unverified at best.

“We never call in witnesses to corroborate other witnesses or to give their reaction to other witnesses,” Lofgren said.

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com.

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Editorial Board: Patriots Do Not Storm Their Nation’s Capitol


Commentary by EDITORIAL BOARD, CONTRIBUTOR | January 06, 2021

Read more at https://dailycaller.com/2021/01/06/editorial-board-patriots-do-not-storm-their-nations-capitol/

Rioters sing National Anthem / Richie McGinniss / Daily Caller

Patriots enlist and defend their country. They work hard, do their best, raise good families. They help their neighbors. They perform civic duties. They grit their teeth and pay their taxes. Then they show up and vote. They compete, they win or lose, but they do both with grace. These are some of the things patriots do.

Patriots do not storm their own Capitol over a lost election. They do not bum rush members of Congress. They do not assault strangers. They do not push and shove police officers and trash federal buildings. These are things criminals do, and criminals of any political stripe deserve one thing: the rule of law.

As this summer’s political protests escalated into rioting and lawlessness, many of us pointed out how unacceptable that was for any reason. This situation is no different. Every single one of the people who stormed that building and participated in that rank, un-American lawlessness should be in jail. There are prodigious photos and video evidence. Law enforcement officials should find them and prosecute them, all of them, no exceptions.

The left excused this summer’s rioting as “mostly peaceful.” The same could be said of the events in Washington. It’s irrelevant. “Mostly” is not the standard to which we should aspire. Political violence is wrong. Period. This was true in 2016 when the #NotMyPresident rioters disrupted the Trump Inaugural and it’s true today. Rule of law is an essential element of our peaceful transition of power. The people who stormed that building do not represent the vast majority of America.

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