Members of the House committee that investigated the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol have warned America for three years to take former President Donald Trump at his word.
Now, as Trump is poised to win the Republican presidential nomination, his criminal trials face delays that could stall them past Election Day, and his rhetoric grows increasingly authoritarian, some of those lawmakers find themselves following their own advice.
In mid-March, Trump said on social media that the committee members should be jailed. In December he vowed to be a dictator on “day one.” In August, he said he would “have no choice” but to lock up his political opponents.
“If he intends to eliminate our constitutional system and start arresting his political enemies, I guess I would be on that list,” said Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-San Jose). “One thing I did learn on the committee is to pay attention and listen to what Trump says, because he means it.”
Lofgren added that she doesn’t yet have a plan in place to thwart potential retribution by Trump. But Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Burbank), who has long been a burr in Trump’s side, said he’s having “real-time conversations” with his staff about how to make sure he stays safe if Trump follows through on his threats.
“We’re taking this seriously, because we have to,” Schiff said. “We’ve seen this movie before … and how perilous it is to ignore what someone is saying when they say they want to be a dictator.”
If you want to compare quantities, go ahead, but that's not on me to do. I did that already with your other stated comparison, and I'm not going to keep doing that with your whataboutism.
And I do believe it was an insurrection. They were literally demanding the election be overturned, and the charges and confessions were consistent with that.
If it wasn't an insurrection, what exactly was it? The burden of proof lies with you.
It was obviously a riot, and I am sad that you can see through some of the narrative but then get caught up on this one. How is it possible that you do not recognize this as a targeted prosecution for political reasons?
An insurrection can be a riot also, it was a riot formed with the intention of disturbing the electoral process (aka insurrection), how is that not obvious to you? They were extremely open about it, in the lead up to and during it. They live streamed the entire thing. Looking up the definition of 'insurrection', at a basic level it means an armed rebellion. Many people were armed.
They were not armed... I am doing the insurrection debate, the only reason you guys believe this was because the media kept telling you it was. Literally, its just propaganda, and it has been extremely effective on you guys.
I'm not going to bother doing your research for you, you can look up how many people were convicted with gun charges. THE MEDIA DIDN'T TELL ME dude the people doing it said it themselves while they were doing it! IF you support them, why aren't you proud that they tried to fix the corrupt government?
What was the number of people that brought guns INTO the capitol building? And yes, you are just repeating a narrative, I bet you are fully in support of the cops that shot the unarmed woman too.
All the gun charges I've seen are from bringing it into the capital building, I don't know the number.
If a cop is pointing a gun at you telling you "Stop or I will shoot", while you and a mob alongside you are destroying the last barricade to your targets (after several other barricades penetrated, numerous severe injuries and a few deaths) chanting hang Mike Pence, would you be surprised if he shot you when you tried to get to him? Do you support the 2A? It was self defense, and if you don't think it was justified then you haven't seen the footage. I think it's unfortunate she was shot and don't want anyone killed, but it was completely expected. I'm shocked more people weren't shot.
What was the number of people that brought guns in?
Exactly, you love it when the enemy get shot. Police can just shoot people and not arrest them as long as they are doing it for your cause.
Lol alright buddy, I hate the government and police, I'm a communist, this wasn't my cause.
Oh yeah you totally hate the government when you praise them shooting an unarmed woman...
Stating the facts of what happened isn't praise, I'm just pointing out it was extremely expected.
Shooting unarmed women is expected now if they are tresspassing? Hmm, I dont think that is expected...
You're obviously trolling alright, but you suck at it, I showed you the video, it wasn't trespassing.
I have seen the video, it was an unarmed woman perched in a broken window, literally he murdered a women instead of arresting her.
How do you expect one secret service agent to arrest a women among a mob storming a barricade? Do you want him to climb through the hole and stop protecting the people he was hired to?
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mgnh5jvmuZw&pp=QACIAgA%3D&rco=1 In case you haven't seen it, yes the gentle tourists are so peaceful and innocent with their weapons and riot gear
So the 70 year old woman that just got convicted was vioelnt? How about steven baker, the journalist?
Because of how Trump responded in both scenarios. On Jan 6, he provided no additional support to capitol police, despite being urged to do so, but on May 29, the Secret Service pepper sprayed protesters, various policing units were brought in, and troops and National Guard were deployed.
The response was so different between the two events that it's clear Trump was okay with Jan 6 (they were trying to keep him in power) but not okay with May 29 (they were opposing inaction on police reform). On Jan 6, multiple people died, and many more were hospitalized. On May 29, the were a few hospitalizations among police, but nothing life threatening. If Trump responded similarly to both, I'd be more sympathetic, but his active lack of action doesn't instill trust.
I'd like to see the various lawsuits resolved quickly, because it's getting to be a very political issue. Ideally, he would've resolved everything years ago, but he continually delayed and now we're in a massive mess. That said, I don't see him as a victim here, this is exactly the expected result for his actions. Whether he's guilty should be determined by the courts though, not public opinion.
You are just repeating the media lines. If you have any doubts then look into the stories better and see the obvious double standard. Just take one second to look at the steve baker prosecution.
Or you can provide evidence...
For Steve Baker, it looks pretty open and shut:
So, not only did he essentially admit to the charges, but he showed intent to break other federal laws.
Maybe he was paraded about a bit to "make an example" of him, idk, I would need to review video footage to decide if it seemed excessive. However, journalists don't get additional protections and can't just break federal laws whenever they want to get a scoop and expect no charges.
So I honestly don't see a double standard here, what I see is you potentially buying into conspiracy BS.
And here's another article in case you don't like the AP or whatever. As a libertarian myself, I don't want to be associated with this idiot. If he thinks Trump is in any way libertarian, then he's mistaken about what to label himself. A self-respecting libertarian wouldn't trespass on federal property in an attempt to overthrow a democratic election, that's a clear violation of the NAP and I reject that nonsense. I'm no fan of Biden, but that doesn't mean I want to overthrow an election to put another piece of crap in office. I very much dislike both Biden and Trump and plan to not vote for either this election.
So what you are saying is that people cant make jokes anymore and the freedom of speech is gone?
Please tell me what his crime was very specifically? Why should the other press that were there were not be prosecuted? You know nothing on this case are literally using propaganda and claim to be a libertarian, bullshit.
His crime was likely trespassing related. From my second link:
So Schaffer had business there, Baker was only there as part of the riot. So it makes complete sense for Baker to be charged and not Schaffer.
I didn't find the specific charges in a quick search (it's probably in the court fillings somewhere), but I don't see any evidence to suggest it was because of "scary words" like he claims, that's just how he chooses to represent it.
He was not supposed to be in Pelosi's office or anywhere in the Capitol building, so he got charged with the rest of those involved in the riot.
If you have more details (i.e. the actual charges), I'm interested in looking it over. Perhaps I'm mistaken, I'm just using the evidence before me and it seems open and shut to me.
Good, you gave an actual thing he did and actually fell right into my point. Why was the 5th person through the broken window not prosecuted when he was also a journalist? You dont need to be displaying credentials to be press. I love how you claim to be a libertarian but then want them to go after journalists for being journalists, totally libertarian!
Prove it. He is literally on video doing journalism.
It has nothing to do with "being press," it has to do with trespassing. One was invited to be there, the other wasn't, so there's an argument that they would be treated differently under the law. It's simple property rights, which any libertarian should understand...
My opinion is they should both be charged because both are obviously not there through the normal, accepted means. But prosecuting everyone is unreasonable, and largely a waste of the court's time.
He is on video illegally trespassing. You can do both journalism and trespassing at the same time. Likewise, speech can also be illegal in certain circumstances as well, so I'm guessing there was some of that as well. You can also hear him admit to intent to steal federal property (Pelosi's computer), which may or may not hold up in court.
So what I see is:
So I agree that he should be charged and have his day in court. The government obviously has the obligation to prove guilt, and the video evidence and his own words would certainly be evidence there.
Exactly, if it was about them being where they were not supposed to be then the other 30 or so journalist that were there should all be under arrest and being prosecuted. Why is it only three of them that are conservative leaning, not the CNN guy that was the 5th through the broken window? Or any of the others?
Who is the CNN guy you're talking about? I'm not seeing any decent sources for anyone beyond the first four who entered through the window, to who were all charged.
My understanding is that CNN didn't have any journalists there, other than those already inside the capitol. If you have solid sources to the contrary, please link them.
Most of the people there were obviously conservatives, else why would they be there? There were certainly some independent journalists and whatnot, but my understanding is that the ones causing the damage and riling up the crowds were largely far right activists.
Sorry it was the NYT not CNN, and it was actually 60 other journalists were there not 30.
Because they were journalists covering a story, literally just like the guy this story is about is not a conservative. He just didnt treat jan 6th like a sacred event like he was supposed to.
If all he did was trespass like all of the other 60 journalists, why are they all not getting the same treatement?
There's also motive and intent. A journalist trespassing to record is a very different thing from a protester trespassing to damage property and hurt people. I would need to see the court documents to know what precisely a given individual was charged with and the arguments for and against it to get a feel for why they were targeted. The goal in prosecuting events like this isn't to catch everyone, but to catch enough people to prevent something similar from happening again.
The facts are:
There absolutely needs to be a legal response to that, but it's impractical and probably undesirable to charge everyone involved, only the worst offenders. If you can show that some of those other individuals were worse offenders, that would make a compelling argument. However, just throwing out whataboutism isn't going to convince me and just sounds like conspiracy nonsense to me.
Their "intent" is based off the joke that you quoted earlier which is the government using a joke. And you keep moving the goalposts all over the field here. If tresspassing is a crime, then its a crime, intent doesnt matter and ALL the journalists should be charged, but now you care about intent.
Great points a lot of people were injured and killed, and property was damaged, so people need to be prosecuted. If this is true since probably 100x more happened during the George Floyd riots, why do there seem to be less prosecutions?