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Jan. 6 committee asks former speaker Newt Gingrich to sit for interview

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The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection issued a request to interview former House speaker Newt Gingrich on Thursday.

The request from Committee Chairman Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.) cited evidence obtained by the committee showing Gingrich was in communication with senior advisers to President Donald Trump, including Jared Kushner and Jason Miller, regarding television advertisements that amplified false claims about fraud in the 2020 election.

“These advertising efforts were not designed to encourage voting for a particular candidate. Instead, these efforts attempted to cast doubt on the outcome of the election after voting had already taken place,” Thompson said in a letter to Gingrich giving notice of the request for an interview. “They encouraged members of the public to contact their state officials and pressure them to challenge and overturn the results of the election. To that end, these advertisements were intentionally aired in the days leading up to December 14, 2020, the day electors from each state met to cast their votes for president and vice president.”

Thompson also wrote that the committee has obtained evidence that suggests Gingrich was involved in the fake elector plot designed to encourage Vice President Mike Pence and members of Congress to affect the outcome of the joint session of Congress on Jan. 6, 2021.

In an email sent on Nov. 12, 2020, Gingrich asked White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and White House counsel Pat Cipollone: “Is someone in charge of coordinating all the electors? Evans makes the point that all the contested electors must meet on [D]ecember 14 and send in ballots to force contests which the house would have to settle.”

Gingrich, according to the letter, also continued to press Meadows on the evening of Jan. 6, 2021, after the attack, asking, “[a]re there letters from state legislators about decertifying electors[?]”

A look at the Jan. 6 hearings so far — and what comes next

Committee investigators spent much of Congress’s August recess interviewing witnesses, chasing new threads that have cropped up throughout the course of the investigation, and tracking down information that has yet to be turned over to the committee and people who have so far refused to cooperate.

Investigators have continued to receive a steady stream of new documents — including a tranche of records from the Secret Service and two years worth of text messages from Alex Jones that were accidentally turned over to the lawyer for plaintiffs suing the conspiracy theorist.

Investigators also have been working to recover missing texts messages from the Secret Service and Defense Department after the committee learned earlier this summer that the two agencies wiped communications from phones of former and current officials who are viewed by the committee as key witnesses for understanding the response to the insurrection. They expect to recover some of the missing information from carriers — like time stamps, recipients and senders of texts and calls, and voice mails, but they are unsure they will be able to obtain the actual content of the communications, according to people familiar with the committee’s work who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal committee conversations.

The committee has been particularly interested in digging deeper into the role the Secret Service played around Jan. 6, amid suspicions about the agency’s transparency with congressional investigators.

“We are going back to all of the relevant people — both motorcades — to dig in on a lot of more detail,” said a person involved with the investigation, referring to testimony from Cassidy Hutchinson about what happened as Trump was leaving the Ellipse after his speech that day. Hutchinson testified under oath that those details were conveyed to her by Anthony Ornato, a Secret Service agent who also served as Trump’s deputy chief of staff.

People involved with the committee’s work say it wasn’t until investigators heard from a “national security” professional working at the White House on the day of the attack, who testified anonymously, that the committee was able to obtain Secret Service radio chatter around Pence’s evacuation from the Capitol on Jan. 6.

Investigators went back to the Secret Service to demand that radio traffic recording even though they had requested it a year ago. The committee is still unsure it has obtained all of the recordings of relevant channels, as there are over two dozen radio channels that the Secret Service communicates on in the Washington area.

Six hours of paralysis: Inside Trump’s failure to act after a mob stormed the Capitol

This is not the first time investigators have come up against the Trump administration’s poor and improper record-keeping practices, and lawmakers on the panel are still interested in identifying which documents Meadows allegedly burned in his office fireplace, according to testimony from Hutchinson.

Several people familiar with the committee’s work said the panel continues to explore the handling of documents by Meadows. According to these people, there is still information from Hutchinson’s closed-door depositions that has yet to be made public and needs further corroboration.

Earlier this month, Meadows made arrangements to return records to the Archives last week in the wake of the FBI’s search of Trump’s Florida residence, according to people familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to share sensitive information.

Meadows has been working with the Archives to recover records related to various requests since last year. He was initially engaged with officials from the independent federal agency that preserves government and historical records after they discovered that Trump had inappropriately taken presidential records that belonged to the Archives to Mar-a-Lago, according to the people.

Lawmakers on the committee are pressing for more information related to the testimony from the anonymous national security staffer featured during the eighth hearing — and are interested in tracking the flow of developments at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, recorded by staff on Trump’s National Security Council in a chat log.

While the committee hopes to again interview Ornato and Robert Engel, Trump’s former detail leader, there is concern that the two agents are trying to run out the clock. Testimony from Hutchinson and others placed Ornato and Engel, who have both retained private counsel, at the center of various claims regarding Trump’s actions on Jan. 6.

The committee has also interviewed some of Trump’s Cabinet secretaries — including Mike Pompeo, Steven Mnuchin, Robert O’Brien and Elaine Chao — regarding internal conversations following the insurrection about invoking the 25th Amendment, which provides for the removal of a president on grounds of incapacitation, mental health or physical fitness.

The Attack: Before, During and After

While there was never a vote on the 25th Amendment, the committee wants to show how seriously many Cabinet secretaries took invoking the amendment — and how the threat may have affected Trump’s thinking in the days after Jan. 6.

“The possible invocation of the 25th Amendment is important because it bolsters the case about just how wrong Trump’s behavior was and is an important part of lawmakers’ continued campaign to educate the American people about his wrongdoing,” said former House impeachment co-counsel Norman Eisen.

While the committee’s work so far was largely linear and followed a chronological timeline, it is now likely to take on disparate topics.

With Republicans positioned to possibly take back the House in November, lawmakers on the panel had at one point been figuring out when the last possible moment is to get the report to the government printing office to make sure it is entered into the Congressional Record by Jan. 3, 2023.

“We are not going to close down the committee until the final day,” one aide said.

The report will likely be written in chapters, and lawmakers are expected to be charged with overseeing various sections. The committee was ultimately unable to agree on a third-party writer to draft the report, in part due to concerns about partisan perceptions.

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Ex-NYPD officer sentenced to record 10 years for Jan. 6 riot

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WASHINGTON (AP) — A retired New York Police Department officer was sentenced on Thursday to a record-setting 10 years in prison for attacking the U.S. Capitol and using a metal flagpole to assault one of the police officers trying to hold off a mob of Donald Trump supporters.

Thomas Webster’s prison sentence is the longest so far among roughly 250 people who have been punished for their conduct during the riot on Jan. 6, 2021. The previous longest was shared by two other rioters, who were sentenced separately to seven years and three months in prison.

Webster, a 20-year NYPD veteran, was the first Capitol riot defendant to be tried on an assault charge and the first to present a self-defense argument. A jury rejected Webster’s claim that he was defending himself when he tackled Metropolitan Police Department officer Noah Rathbun and grabbed his gas mask outside the Capitol on Jan. 6.

U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta sentenced Webster, 56, to 10 years in prison plus three years of supervised release. He allowed Webster to report to prison at a date to be determined instead of immediately ordering him into custody.

“Mr. Webster, I don’t think you’re a bad person,” the judge said. “I think you were caught up in a moment. But as you know, even getting caught up in a moment has consequences.”

Webster turned to apologize to Rathbun, who was in the courtroom but didn’t address the judge. Webster said he wishes he had never come to Washington, D.C.

“I wish the horrible events of that day had never happened,” he told the judge.

The judge said Rathbun wasn’t Webster’s only victim on Jan. 6.

“The other victim was democracy, and that is not something that can be taken lightly,” Mehta added.

Federal prosecutors had recommended a prison sentence of 17 years and six months. The court’s probation department had recommended a 10-year prison sentence. Mehta wasn’t bound by the recommendations.

In a court filing, prosecutors accused Webster of “disgracing a democracy that he once fought honorably to protect and serve.” Webster led the charge against police barricades at the Capitol’s Lower West Plaza, prosecutors said. They compared the attack to a medieval battle, with rioters pelting officers with makeshift projectiles and engaging in hand-to-hand combat.

“Nothing can explain or justify Mr. Webster’s rage. Nothing can explain or justify his violence,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Hava Mirell said Thursday.

Defense attorney James Monroe said in a court filing that the mob was “guided by unscrupulous politicians” and others promoting the lie that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from the Republican incumbent. He questioned why prosecutors argued that Webster didn’t deserve leniency for his 25 years of service to his country and New York City.

“That is not how we measure justice. That is revenge,” Monroe said.

In May, jurors deliberated for less than three hours before they convicted Webster of all six counts in his indictment, including a charge that he assaulted Rathbun with a dangerous weapon, the flagpole.

Also Thursday, a New Jersey man pleaded guilty to using pepper spray on police officers, including one who later died. Officer Brian Sicknick suffered a stroke the day after the riot and died of natural causes. He and other officers were standing guard behind metal bicycle racks as the mob of pro-Trump supporters stormed the Capitol.

Julian Khater, 33, pleaded guilty to two counts of assaulting or impeding officers with a dangerous weapon. He could face up to 20 years in prison, though will likely face a sentence ranging from about 6 1/2 to 8 years at a hearing set for December.

The case against Khater and a second man have been among the more notable brought by the Justice Department. George Pierre Tanios brought the pepper spray in a backpack. Tanios previously pleaded guilty and is also set to be sentenced in December.

Webster had testified at trial that he was trying to protect himself from a “rogue cop” who punched him in the face. He also accused Rathbun of instigating the confrontation.

Rathbun testified that he didn’t punch or pick a fight with Webster. Rathbun said he was trying to move Webster back from a security perimeter that he and other officers were struggling to maintain.

Rathbun’s body camera captured Webster shouting profanities and insults before they made any physical contact. The video shows that Webster slammed one of the bike racks at Rathbun before the officer reached out with an open left hand and struck the right side of Webster’s face.

After Rathbun struck his face, Webster swung a metal flag pole at the officer in a downward chopping motion, striking a bike rack. Rathbun grabbed the broken pole from Webster, who charged at the officer, tackled him to the ground and grabbed his gas mask, choking him by the chin strap.

Webster drove alone to Washington, D.C., from his home near Goshen, New York, on the eve of the Jan. 6 “Stop the Steal” rally, where Trump addressed thousands of supporters. Webster was wearing a bulletproof vest and carrying a Marine Corps flag on a metal pole when he joined the mob that stormed the Capitol.

Webster said he went to the Capitol to “petition” lawmakers to “relook” at the results of the 2020 presidential election. But he testified that he didn’t intend to interfere with Congress’ joint session to certify President Joe Biden ’s victory.

Webster retired from the NYPD in 2011 after 20 years of service, which included a stint on then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s private security detail. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps from 1985 to 1989 before joining the NYPD in 1991.

___

Associated Press writer Lindsay Whitehurst contributed to this report.

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Ex-NYPD officer Thomas Webster sentenced to 10 years in Jan. 6 assault on police

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A former New York City police officer and Marine Corps veteran, who swung a flagpole at police before tackling one officer and yanking his gas mask off during the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021, was sentenced to 10 years in prison Thursday, the longest sentence handed down among the nearly 250 people sentenced so far for their roles in the insurrection.

Thomas Webster, 56, of Goshen, N.Y., was the first riot defendant facing the felony charge of assaulting an officer to try his luck with a jury. Twelve others have pleaded guilty to a similar charge. Webster took the witness stand at his trial and testified that he was acting in self-defense, saying D.C. police officer Noah Rathbun had instigated the fight.

Video showed Webster yelling at police on the Lower West Plaza of the Capitol, as officers struggled to maintain a perimeter outside the building. Rathbun then pushed Webster in the face — Rathbun testified his hand slipped off Webster’s shoulder — before Webster swung and smashed a Marine Corps flagpole on a bike rack and then tackled Rathbun. Webster pulled the officer’s gas mask off, causing Rathbun to begin choking on tear gas, the officer testified.

The jury took three hours before finding Webster guilty in May of the assault and four other felony charges.

In the government’s sentencing memorandum, Assistant U.S. Attorney Hava Mirell said Webster’s argument that “a 20-year NYPD veteran believed he was entitled to retaliate with deadly and dangerous force against the vulnerable and non-violent Officer Rathbun is not only absurd, but dangerous. It may cause others to follow suit and use violence against an officer because of a political grievance.”

Two officers fought in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. Who did wrong?

Webster, a married father of three, acknowledged driving to Washington alone on Jan. 5, carrying his NYPD-issued pistol, which he did not take to the Capitol. He did wear a tactical vest and carry a Marine Corps flag to the Capitol. Records show he served in the Marines from 1985 to 1989, and in the NYPD from 1990 to 2011.

Federal sentencing guidelines set a range of punishment of 210 to 262 months, or 17.5 to 21.8 years. Prosecutors recommended the 17.5 years for Webster, the stiffest punishment they have proposed against a Jan. 6 defendant. The government’s recommendation was still the low end of the range, even as they argued that Webster was convicted of “spearheading the breach of the police line at the Lower West Plaza, and for disgracing a democracy that he once fought honorably to protect and serve.”

In his closing argument, Webster’s lawyer, James E. Monroe, criticized Rathbun for using improper force and called him “a dishonest, unprofessional police officer.” But in his sentencing memo filed last week, Monroe took a different approach. He said that Webster, who once served on protective duty for then-New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg, “was one of the few people among the thousands of Americans present at the U.S. Capitol on January 6 who should have fully appreciated the enormity of the task assigned to Officer Rathbun and his fellow officers.”

“Casted in this light,” Monroe wrote, “Mr. Webster does not have a justifiable excuse for verbally abusing the officers present along the police line; pushing on the bicycle rack; using his flagpole to threaten Officer Rathbun; or in engaging in the unspeakable act of charging and tackling of Officer Rathbun to the ground.”

Ex-NYPD officer found guilty in first Jan. 6 police assault trial

Monroe noted that the federal probation office recommended a sentence of 120 months, or 10 years. He asked U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta to impose a term below the 210-262 month range of the sentencing guidelines, which are advisory.

Of the 12 defendants who have pleaded guilty to assaulting the police on Jan. 6, the average sentence has been 41.6 months. Of the four defendants in that group who admitted a more severe assault, of which Webster was convicted, the average sentence has been 54 months. All 12 of those defendants received credit at sentencing for “acceptance of responsibility,” which lowers the sentencing guidelines.

Webster was only the 33rd defendant convicted and sentenced for any felony in connection with the Jan. 6 riot, a Washington Post database shows. The average felony sentence so far has been slightly less than 31 months. Only one felony defendant has not been sentenced to prison, Jacob Fracker. Also a police officer, Fracker was placed on two months home detention after he testified against his co-defendant, fellow officer Thomas Robertson. Robertson was sentenced to more than seven years in prison after a jury found him guilty of obstructing Congress and other charges.

There have now been eight jury trials, resulting in eight convictions. There have been 10 bench trials, with nine convictions. The acquittal occurred when a judge found that police allowed the defendant to enter the Capitol.

Robertson and Guy Reffitt, who both were convicted at trial but were not accused of assaulting police, were both sentenced to 87 months in prison. That had been the longest sentence until today.

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Julian Khater pleads guilty in Jan. 6 assault of officer Brian Sicknick

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A Pennsylvania man pleaded guilty Thursday to a chemical-spray assault on three police officers in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack, including Brian D. Sicknick, who later collapsed and died the following day.

In a plea deal with federal prosecutors, Julian Khater, a smoothie-shop owner of State College, Pa., admitted to assaulting and injuring law enforcement officers with a dangerous weapon. Along with co-defendant George Tanios, Khater had faced a 10-count indictment that included felony charges of rioting and obstructing Congress’s confirmation of Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory. Tanios pleaded guilty on July 27 to reduced misdemeanor charges.

Co-defendant in Jan. 6 Sicknick assault case pleads guilty

Khater pleaded guilty to counts punishable by up to 20 years in prison but faces a likely sentence of 78 to 97 months under federal guidelines negotiated with prosecutors. He has spent 17 months behind bars since his arrest and will be sentenced Dec. 13.

Video released to The Washington Post on April 28 showed the moment Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick was sprayed by rioter Julian Elie Khater on Jan. 6. (Video: Obtained by The Washington Post)

Khater’s plea resolves one of the most high-profile attacks on police in the Jan. 6 riot, in which nearly 140 defendants have been charged with felony assault against an officer. Childhood friends Khater, 33, and Tanios, 40, deployed chemical spray against officers holding back a violent crowd on the West Terrace of the Capitol, injuring Sicknick and others at a thin point in police lines.

Sicknick, 42, collapsed hours later and died the next day of natural causes, officials said. Neither Tanios or Khater is alleged to have caused Sicknick’s death.

In his plea, Tanios admitted bringing both bear and pepper spray to Washington and giving one canister to Khater before their arrival at the Capitol.

Tanios’s plea agreement did not require that he cooperate with prosecutors, although he admitted that he did not have information to dispute or disprove the allegations against Khater in the indictment.

More than 840 suspects have been charged in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot

Khater admitted deploying pepper spray at close range in the faces of Sicknick, Capitol Police Officer Caroline Edwards and a D.C. police officer identified as B. Chapman from the police line, forcing them to abandon their posts. In a bond hearing, prosecutors alleged that Khater moved to spray a second group before he was repelled by a police lieutenant who fired a chemical irritant at him using a “Super Soaker”-type device.

“Give me that bear sh–,” Khater told Tanios on video recorded nine minutes earlier, at 2:14 p.m. at the Lower West Terrace of the Capitol, where Sicknick and other officers were standing guard behind metal bicycle racks, according to the plea.

“Hold on, hold on, not yet, not yet … it’s still early,” Tanios allegedly replied.

Video released to The Washington Post on April 28 showed the moment Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick was sprayed by rioter Julian Elie Khater on Jan. 6. (Video: Obtained by The Washington Post)

In charging papers, an FBI agent said the exchange showed that the two were “working in concert and had a plan to use the toxic spray against law enforcement.” The agent asserted that Khater “appeared to time the deployment of chemical substances to coincide with other rioters’ efforts to forcibly remove the bike rack barriers that were preventing the rioters from moving closer to the Capitol building.”

Tanios’s attorney has argued that his client was 30 feet away from Khater when he sprayed the officers and did not aid or abet any crime.

Khater attorney Joseph Tacopina has said his client never coordinated or planned to attack police and never entered the Capitol building.

“It wasn’t a plan. It was a reaction” to being sprayed by police, Tacopina said. “He used a defensive spray.”

Sicknick had two strokes after his time at the Capitol that day, officials said. The medical examiner said an autopsy found no evidence that Sicknick suffered an allergic reaction to chemical irritants. There was also no evidence of internal or external injuries, the medical examiner said.

Battle for the West Terrace: Capitol riot charges reveal details of police attacks on Jan. 6

Khater and Tanios were arrested in March 2021. In a hearing last year ordering Khater’s detention pending trial, U.S. District Judge Thomas F. Hogan said videos of the assaults on the three officers showed a degree of premeditation and potential for future danger.

“These two gentlemen are law-abiding, respected individuals in the community, and it makes it very difficult for the court to make this conclusion, but they still committed this attack on uniformed police officers. I don’t find a way around that,” Hogan said at the time.

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Top Secret Service official at center of Jan. 6 investigation retires

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Anthony Ornato, a senior Secret Service official at the center of the House investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, storming of the Capitol, has retired.

“We can confirm that Anthony Ornato retired from the U.S. Secret Service today in good standing after 25 years of devoted service,” Secret Service Special Agent Kevin Helgert said in a statement late Monday. Politico first reported on the retirement.

Ornato, as head of President Donald Trump’s personal security detail, grew close to the president, who hired him as White House deputy chief of staff for operations — a transition unprecedented in the agency’s history. In that role, Ornato helped coordinate a controversial June 2020 photo op in which Trump strode defiantly across Lafayette Square to pose with a Bible after the park had been forcibly cleared of peaceful protesters.

But the spotlight focused on Ornato after Cassidy Hutchinson, who was an aide to Trump White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, testified before the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack that Ornato told her Trump had lunged at a Secret Service agent who refused to take him to the Capitol after a rally at the Ellipse, before the riot.

Hutchinson said Ornato told her Trump was “irate” that he wasn’t allowed to go to the Capitol with his supporters after his speech at the rally. Ornato, she testified, said Trump had lunged toward the then-head of his Secret Service detail, Bobby Engel. Engel, Hutchinson said, never disputed what Ornato said.

But Ornato immediately disputed Hutchinson’s testimony and said he’d be willing to testify before the Jan. 6 panel to refute her statements. Although the committee interviewed Ornato before Hutchinson’s testimony, it is not clear whether he has spoken to the panel again since.

In another portion of her testimony, Hutchinson said that Ornato informed Meadows on the morning of Jan. 6 that Trump’s rallygoers had weapons, and that Ornato told her he’d also informed Trump. There have been no reports that Ornato disputes this portion of Hutchinson’s testimony.

Ornato is also connected to a separate investigation into the Jan. 6 attack, this one conducted by the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general, who is looking into the mass deletion of thousands of text messages sent by Secret Service officials. The Secret Service has said the deletion was done as part of a phone upgrade. The deleted text messages include some sent on and around Jan. 6.

Ornato returned to the Secret Service after Trump’s departure from the White House, serving as assistant director of the agency’s training department.

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Proud Boy accused of menacing Chuck Schumer on Jan. 6 sentenced to 55 months

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In an encrypted chat during the weeks before the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol, D.C. bartender Joshua Pruitt discussed how he wanted to become a full-fledged member of the Proud Boys, a far-right group with a history of violence that his text messages show was planning for full battle at the Capitol.

“I just want to do whatever needs to be done to be legit,” Pruitt said.

He discussed protective gear and lodging with other group members. Shortly after the riot, the texts show, his membership was approved.

Pruitt, 40, showed up at three key points at the Capitol on Jan. 6, wearing a “Punisher” tank top, including in the Crypt, where he was photographed hurling a sign across the room and later went face-to-face with police. He was also photographed in the Capitol Visitor Center, where he threw a chair and confronted another group of rioters trying to access the Capitol tunnel system.

Then, in the halls of the Capitol, he began approaching Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) as the senator was being hustled out of the building. Schumer’s team turned him around and had him run in the opposite direction from Pruitt.

Pruitt never actually assaulted any officers or made physical contact with staff. But on Monday, a federal judge sentenced him to 55 months in federal prison, followed by three years of supervised release. Pruitt pleaded guilty in June to obstructing an official proceeding, and federal sentencing guidelines suggested 51 to 63 months in prison, in part because he has a lengthy criminal history, including assaulting police, cocaine possession and drunken driving convictions.

D.C. Proud Boy and bartender pleads guilty to felony in Capitol riot

“You were acting somewhat in concert with others,” U.S. District Judge Timothy J. Kelly told Pruitt, “engaged in planning to some degrees with others. … You did get into the building early, you did penetrate deeply into the building, you did damage property, you played a role in amping up the crowd, you did get very close to one of our national leaders.”

Pruitt, a father of a 9-year-old and an 11-year-old, said he had been blacklisted from working in the D.C. restaurant business. “I’m not happy that January 6th happened at all,” he told the judge on Monday. “To be completely honest, I wish I’d have been watching it from a restaurant rather than participating in it. … Yes, I was wrong and I broke the laws, and I do apologize for that.”

But Pruitt also said: “I did believe the election was stolen. I still do.”

A member of Schumer’s security team said he is haunted by the near-confrontation between the senator and Pruitt.

“I saw Mr. Pruitt approaching us with the intent to inflict harm to the Majority Leader of the United States Senate,” the special agent, identified by the initials M.L., wrote in a victim impact statement. “It was only due to our teams’ preplanning of alternate evacuations procedures and quick actions that this impending meeting did not result in blood shed or serious bodily injury.”

“I was within 30 feet of these nasty insurrectionists,” Schumer said at a hearing in January.

Pruitt worked as a bartender in D.C. until November 2020, when he was filmed being inducted into the Proud Boys by Chairman Enrique Tarrio after a rally in support of President Donald Trump. Pruitt later said members of the group had protected him during one of several violent clashes between supporters and opponents of Trump. Pruitt was not a full-fledged member, though, and sought to become one after his first encounter with Tarrio, texts from his chats with other members show.

Defense attorney Robert L. Jenkins emphasized that Pruitt “did not physically attack any law enforcement officers … did not directly cause any bodily injury to any law enforcement officers” and “did not possess or employ any weapons.”

In a conversation with other local Proud Boys on Jan. 5, 2021, Pruitt suggested that he could distract the police while others fought, according to the court record. “Strike when they come first,” he said. “And at that point we put in work.”

Prosecutors say he fulfilled that role. “Well over a year later, many officers remembered him as an instigator,” prosecutors said in their sentencing memo. His appearance was distinctive: A bodybuilder, Pruitt wore a tactical glove with padded knuckles and a tank top emblazoned with the skull logo of a comic book vigilante. Inside the Capitol, he threw a sign and a chair.

One officer described Pruitt as “an agitator” who would get close to police and try to rattle them.

“The defendant did this repeatedly throughout my interaction to include telling me that, ‘You better stop eyeballing me,’ ” the officer recalled in his statement. “When the defendant found his efforts to be unsuccessful he would then retreat into the larger crowd of protesters looking for another target in uniform to provoke.”

In media interviews after the riot, Pruitt said he had no idea that the crowd would converge on the Capitol despite having been in conversations about those plans in a local Proud Boys group chat. He was also part of discussions in which Proud Boys were told not to wear their traditional colors of black and yellow so as to blend in better with the crowd.

The chat “included explicitly anti-Semitic and racist memes,” according to court records, with some anti-Jewish comments made by Pruitt himself. Jenkins said Pruitt did not make or see many of the anti-Semitic or racist posts.

Pruitt did write that he was “going for blood” and excited about violent confrontation.

“My chick (now ex) left me yesterday,” he wrote the Proud Boys group on Jan. 4. “Built up frustration ready to come out. Makes me even more dangerous.”

Pruitt was arrested in December 2020, accused of violating a protection order by threatening an ex-girlfriend; he was on probation and pretrial release at the time of the Capital riot and wearing an ankle monitor.

correction

An earlier version of this article incorrectly reported Pruitt’s membership to the Proud Boys was approved shortly before the Jan. 6, 2021, riot. It was approved after. The article has been corrected.

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Colorado Republican becomes a Democrat, citing Jan. 6, climate change

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Colorado state Sen. Kevin Priola was a Republican for 32 years. On Monday, he announced that he couldn’t be one any longer.

So he defected to the Democrats.

There is “too much at stake right now for Republicans to be in charge,” Priola wrote in a two-page letter explaining his decision, adding: “Simply put, we need Democrats in charge.”

Priola cited two reasons for the switch: Many Republicans peddling false claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen and the party’s efforts to block legislation that would fight climate change.

Priola has served in the Colorado Capitol since 2009, first as a representative and then, starting in 2017, as a senator. He won a second term in the state Senate in 2020 and is up for reelection in 2024. He did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Washington Post late Monday.

The change in Priola’s party registration does not affect the balance of power in Colorado’s Senate; Democrats already controlled the chamber but now enjoy an even greater 21-14 majority as Republicans gear up to try to wrest control in November, the Colorado Sun reported.

On the whole, Republicans are in the midst of an internal battle between two factions vying to control the party: candidates loyal to former president Donald Trump who are willing to parrot his false election claims and rivals who want to move the party past all that, The Post has reported.

Final stretch of primaries will showcase a divided GOP

Priola decided to leave the GOP altogether. In the letter he posted Monday morning, Priola said he became a Republican in 1990, enamored with Ronald Reagan’s willingness to stand up to the Soviet Union and cooperate with Democrats on immigration.

“I haven’t changed much in 30 years; but my party has,” he wrote.

Priola said he watched in horror on Jan. 6, 2021, as rioters mobbed the U.S. Capitol. He thought the insurrection would lead his fellow Republicans to distance themselves from Trump, he wrote.

Instead, Republicans turned on a handful of their own — including Vice President Mike Pence, who affirmed Joe Biden’s 2020 electoral win, and Reps. Liz Cheney (Wyo.) and Adam Kinzinger (Ill.), who voted to impeach Trump after the riot.

“I cannot continue to be a part of a political party that is okay with a violent attempt to overturn a free and fair election and continues to peddle claims that the 2020 election was stolen,” Priola wrote.

He then moved on to the second way in which the GOP had disappointed him: its inaction on climate change. Republicans have repeatedly denied that humans are causing climate change and continue to block legislative efforts to fight it, even as Coloradans endure “near year-round” wildfires and “a seemingly never ending drought,” Priola wrote.

“I believe it’s immoral to saddle the next generation of Coloradans with even worse impacts,” he added.

The surprising political shifts that led to the climate bill’s passage

Colorado politicians on both sides of the aisle reacted to Priola switching parties.

Gov. Jared Polis (D) called the senator “a strong leader on climate issues,” and Senate President Steve Fenberg (D) hailed Priola as someone who “chose his constituents and Colorado’s future over partisan politics.”

Senate Minority Leader John Cooke (R) told the Colorado Sun that, given Priola’s recent voting record, he wasn’t shocked by his defection. He also dismissed its impact on Republicans’ attempt to seize control of the state Senate in November.

“This event will not change the trajectory of this election cycle, nor the outcome of this year’s fight for the state Senate,” Cooke told the paper, adding that Priola’s constituents “may explore their options for new representation.”

Kristi Burton Brown, chairwoman of the Colorado GOP, also mentioned Priola’s record of voting with Democrats on some issues, accusing him of “lying” to voters about being a Republican.

“It’s clear that Priola has selfishly chosen to make himself the story at the expense of Coloradans he was elected to fight for,” she wrote in a statement. “He will regret this decision when he is in the minority come January 2023.”

Priola doesn’t think so, saying that he remains committed to serving and fighting for his constituents rather than participating in tribal politics.

“Coloradans cannot afford for their leaders to give credence to election conspiracies and climate denialism,” he wrote, adding: “Our planet and our democracy depend on it.”



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Kyle Fitzsimons TKTKTK of assaulting policeon Jan. 6

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In the battle for the West Terrace tunnel at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, as a thundering mob tried to force its way through one small opening, three police officers testified in federal court this week that Kyle Fitzsimons pushed his way to the front line and assaulted them. All three also said they feared they were about to die during the hours-long attack.

Sgt. Phuson Nguyen, a 19-year veteran of the D.C. police, said he had already been hit once with some sort of chemical spray; he moved to the back of the tunnel and cleared his eyes, then returned to the front line with a gas mask on. Surveillance and police body-cam video played in court showed Fitzsimons reaching to pull Nguyen’s mask off while another man sprayed what Nguyen thought was bear spray directly into his face. Then Fitzsimons released the mask back onto Nguyen’s face, trapping the chemical irritant inside, the officer said.

“At that point I was choking under the mask,” Nguyen testified. “I also got knocked down at the same time. … In my head, I thought that was it for me. I thought that’s where I’m going to die. … In my head, I told myself, ‘If you want to see your family again, you need to gather yourself.’” He said he broke the seal on his mask and a colleague dragged him to safety.

After three days of testimony, and dozens of videos and photographs capturing Fitzsimons throughout the Capitol grounds on Jan. 6, the judge hearing the case decided Friday not to issue a verdict on six felony counts, including assaulting police officers and obstructing an official proceeding, and five misdemeanors. Instead, U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras said he would first consider a defense motion to dismiss some charges, and issue a ruling after Labor Day.

Fitzsimons, 38, from Lebanon, Maine, has been held in jail since February and is currently in the D.C. jail. He chose a bench trial rather than a jury trial, and Thursday he elected not to testify in the case.

Capitol Police Sgt. Aquilino Gonell, who has testified before Congress about his ordeal, said Fitzsimons grabbed his left arm and tried to yank him out of the tunnel while he was leaning in the opposite direction, and video showed the two men struggling. Pain shot through his left shoulder, “one of the worst pains I felt in my life,” Gonell said. He said he suffered a partially torn rotator cuff and labrum, underwent surgery, and now faces a forced medical retirement from the Capitol Police.

D.C. Officer Sarah Beaver was also in the tunnel, after retreating from an earlier lost skirmish on the Capitol’s perimeter. Video showed Fitzsimons hurling an unstrung archery bow, which he told a reporter he brought to the District as a sign of peace, into the tunnel and hitting Beaver in the head. She was wearing a helmet and was unhurt, though briefly staggered. But spending hours in the small tunnel, Beaver said, “I couldn’t breathe and I was afraid if I passed out, I was going to die.”

Fitzsimons’s attorney, Natasha Taylor-Smith, a federal public defender from Philadelphia, said video evidence did not clearly show Fitzsimons grabbing Nguyen’s gas mask or Gonell’s shield. She said that Nguyen was “simply mistaken” about which rioter grabbed the mask, and that Fitzsimons was severely stunned by chemical spray coming from both sides when he allegedly snagged Gonell’s arm or shield.

Because the photo of a bloodied Fitzsimons was widely published, Taylor-Smith said, he “has become the poster child for January 6.” She said he did not bring any weapons to the Capitol, though prosecutors counted his bow as a weapon, and she criticized Gonell, saying he wrote a book, conducted multiple interviews and tried to profit from his experience. Gonell denied that.

Though the assault and obstruction charges carry maximum sentences of 20 years, federal sentencing guidelines suggest a possible range of 63 to 78 months in prison for Fitzsimons if he is convicted. The range could rise to 87 to 108 months if Gonell’s shoulder injury is classified as “permanent.”

Fitzsimons did not attempt to conceal his distrust of the results of the 2020 election or his desire to be heard in Washington. In December 2020, he posted a request on the “Lebanon Maine Truth Seekers” Facebook page trying to organize a caravan to D.C. on Jan. 6, the page’s administrator said. He got no takers.

Fitzsimons also left three voice-mail messages for Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine) that month, Golden’s chief of staff testified, one of which started, “So what’s going on with the election fraud?” Fitzsimons continued, according to the voice mail played in court: “I will be down in D.C. on the 6th. I don’t think I’ll see you there. Maybe I will. Maybe I will.”

When Fitzsimons returned to Maine after Jan. 6, he called into the Lebanon Select Board meeting and regaled the board with his experience. “I couldn’t imagine a more peaceful revolution,” Fitzsimons said. He also gave an interview to the Rochester Voice, based in New Hampshire, and provided pictures of himself at the Capitol but neglected to mention his hand-to-hand combat with police, according to prosecutors.

Fitzsimons, a butcher by trade, told the Voice’s Harrison Thorp that after he attended President Donald Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally on Jan. 6, he went to his car and put on his white butcher’s coat, with his name embroidered on the chest, along with his rubber apron and a fur pelt. He also said he carried an unstrung archery bow “to signify his peaceful intent.”

He was soon captured on video climbing the stage set up for the pending inauguration of Joe Biden and holding the bow. Fitzsimons was seen on video shouting “Freedom” before winding up at the West Terrace tunnel. During his confrontation with Nguyen, the video shows an unidentified man reaching over Fitzsimons’s shoulder with a powerful spray and unleashing it near Fitzsimons’s face. At the same time, a police officer was also aiming spray at Fitzsimons, the officer’s body-cam video showed.

The encounter with Gonell occurred as he was holding his circular shield with his left arm and leaning down to help someone else who had fallen. Gonell said he had never been involved in an altercation with a protester, through hundreds of demonstrations, in his 16 years on the Capitol Police force.

Another protester who attacked Gonell, Mark Ponder, smashed a pole into the officer’s shield, shattering the pole and the shield. Gonell spoke at Ponder’s sentencing in July, when Ponder received a 63-month prison term.

Beaver said that all manner of police equipment had been ripped off officers and then hurled back into the tunnel at the police. “I was hit with police batons,” she said. “I saw a gun flying into the tunnel. Fire extinguishers. I got a whole can of bear spray.”

After Fitzsimons struggled with both Nguyen and Gonell, a surveillance video showed, he stood up, then ran headfirst into the line of officers with his fists flailing. He was quickly repulsed. During that foray, prosecutors said, another rioter swinging a metal crutch struck Fitzsimons in the top of the head, opening the bloody wound, which needed six staples to close.

Beaver and Gonell both said they thought their hours-long stand inside the tunnel was blocking the only way rioters could enter the Capitol, and only later did they learn that rioters had forced entry elsewhere.

“No one ever got through the West Terrace tunnel that day,” Beaver said. “We made sure that didn’t happen.”

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Ohio FBI shooting – latest: Ricky Shiffer eyed as ‘domestic extremist’ in Cincinnati attack as Jan 6 link found

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Eric Trump blames Biden administration after FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago

Cincinnati shooting suspect Ricky Shiffer was shot dead by police on the side of an interstate highway hours after he attempted to breach a visitor’s entrance at an FBI field office in the city.

The 42-year-old, of Columbus, Ohio, fled the scene of the attempted attack on Thursday morning before a standoff and shootout took place hours later. The FBI confirmed his death at 3.45pm following an exchange of gunfire.

Officials are now investigating Shiffer’s ties to the US Capitol riot and right wing extremism as he appears to have claimed that he was present in Washington on 6 January on Truth Social, a pro-Trump social media site.

Shiffer also appeared to support former US president Donald Trump’s unfounded claims of a stolen election in 2020 and responded to social media posts by pro-Trump figures such as congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene and Donald Trump Jr.

On Tuesday, the FBI carried out a search at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida as part of an investigation into the mishandling of White House documents, sparking anger among his supporters. The raid was referenced in Shiffer’s social media posts this week.

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Suspect was armed with AR-15 rifle, officials say

Suspect Ricky Shiffer was armed with a nail gun and an AR-15-style rifle when he tried to breach the visitor screening area at the FBI office Thursday, a law enforcement official told the Associated Press.

Earlier reports said Shiffer had fired a nail gun at the FBI office in Cincinnati, Ohio, before attempting to breach the visitor screening area of the building.

He then fled when agents confronted him, and was later shot dead during a standoff involving FBI agents and Ohio State Highway Patrol.

AR-15’s are a semi-automatic weapon that have been heavily criticised amid a series of mass shootings in the US this year, including at a 4 July parade and in schools.

Gino Spocchia12 August 2022 17:40

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Shiffer a ‘suspected domestic violent extremist’

Ricky Shiffer has been considered a “suspected domestic violent extremist” by investigators, law enforcement officials were reported as saying on Friday.

An official told ABC News that Shiffer was being investigated as a “suspected domestic violent extremist” and that his social media history was under investigation following the attack on an FBI office on Thursday.

The report cited his social media posts on Twitter and Truth Social, the platform set-up by Donald Trump after leaving office.

Ohio FBI suspect considered possible ‘violent extremist’, report says

Social media posts being looked at by law enforcement

Gino Spocchia12 August 2022 16:58

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Suspect seen in January 6 photos, law enforcement say

Although Ohio shooting suspect Ricky Shiffer was believed to have tweeted about attending the US Capitol on January 6, it remains unclear if he did enter the building.

As The New York Times reported on Thursday, a tweet by an account thought to being to Shiffer claimed in May: “ I was there. We watched as your goons did that.”

The tweet had been in response to a photo of rioters climbing the walls of the Capitol Building, and was among multiple posts with pro-Trump messaging.

Officials told reporters following the attack on an FBI office that the 42-year-old had not been charged in connection with the riot, although law enforcement had seen the Columbus, Ohio, resident in photos from the riot, NBC News reported.

Gino Spocchia12 August 2022 16:30

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Negotiations with shooter failed, officials said

ICYMI: Suspect shooter Ricky Shiffer fled the FBI field office in Cincinnati, Ohio, and was shot following failed negotiations with multiple law enforcement agencies.

Lt Nathan Dennis, of the Ohio State Highway Patrol, said negotiations with the suspect failed along the I-71 highway and that police had tried “less lethal tactics” before gunfire was exchanged.

There were no other injuries and it was unclear if the suspect had said anything to officers during the standoff, which came after Shiffer was accused of trying to break into the FBI’s field office in Cincinnati.

Gino Spocchia12 August 2022 15:50

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On the same day FBI shooting suspect Ricky Shiffer responded to a tweet by congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene in May, the Ohio man also responded to a post by the former US president’s eldest son with another apparently veiled threat.

“Do not comply,” Shiffer reportedly tweeted in response to a post by Donald Trump Jr telling his followers to “Get ready” because “the midterm variant (of COVID-19) is coming and it’s going to be really scary”.

A NBC News reported of the Twitter posts, the remarks by Mr Trump Jr were in an apparent reference to fringe conspiracy theories about the disease and were unfounded.

Gino Spocchia12 August 2022 15:00

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FBI issued warning on Wednesday to employees about threats

On Wednesday, the FBI had warned its officers to avoid potential protesters and to ensure their security key cards were “not visible outside FBI space” because of an increase in threats shared online, the Associated Press reported.

While the internal warning to FBI employees did not specifically mention the search of Mar-a-Lago, the bureau attributed the online threats to “recent media reporting on FBI investigative activity.” 

On Gab, a social media site popular with white supremacists, users have reportedly been warning that they were preparing for an armed revolution following the FBI’s execution of a search warrant on Donald Tump’s Florida home.

The search is believed to be part of an investigation into possible wrongdoing over classified White House documents taken to Mar-a-Lago.

Gino Spocchia12 August 2022 14:20

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Shoot-out under investigation, FBI says

In an updated statement on Thursday night, the FBI field office in Cincinnati said it “takes all shooting incidents involving our agents or their task-force members seriously” and that the the FBI’s Inspection Division was now probing the shoot-out between officers and suspect Ricky Shiffer.

The agency confirmed that Shiffer was shot dead by officers at about 3.45pm on Thursday, who also fired weapons.

Shiffer had earlier tried to breach the visitor entrance to the FBI office in Cincinnati before fleeing in his vehicle along the interstate 71 highway, where was spotted by Ohio State Highway Patrol and “contained”.

Gino Spocchia12 August 2022 13:20

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Suspect called for “1775” as “solution” in reply to Marjorie Taylor Greene

Social media accounts thought to belong to FBI shooting suspect Ricky Shiffer have come under scrutiny since his death on Thursday following a shoot-out with officers and an attempted attack on the bureau’s office in Cincinnati.

One tweet seen by NBC News suggested that in May, Shiffer responded to a tweet by pro-Trump congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene by referencing the need for a repeat of “1775” – in apparent reference to the beginning of the American Revolutionary War.

Shiffer reportedly wrote: “Congresswoman Greene, they got away with fixing elections in plain sight. It’s over. The next step is the one we used in 1775.”

Ms Greene had tweeted: “I know they are trying 1984, but I’m feeling 2016 vibes”. Those comments were in apparent reference to false claims made by Donald Trump that Democrats stole the 2020 US election.

Gino Spocchia12 August 2022 12:24

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Attack could lead to others, former agent warns

The attack on the FBI’s Cincinnati headquarters by a lone shooter could act as a rallying cry for other “unhinged” people to launch similar assaults, a former top agent has warned.

Speaking to CNN on Thursday, former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe said it was “coincidental” that the attack on an FBI field office came in the aftermath of an FBI search on Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property.

The suspect in the Cincinnati shoot-out, Ricky Shiffer, suggested on social media that he had attended the 6 January Capitol riot in support of the former president’s stolen election lies and was planning on carrying out the attack on the FBI office following the search on Mar-a-Lago, reports say.

Ex-FBI official fears Ohio attack could act as a rallying cry for ‘unhinged’ people

Republicans and rightwing commentators accused of stoking violence and endangering lives as armed man attacks FBI office in Ohio

Gino Spocchia12 August 2022 11:26

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Gunman may have left farewell message on Trump’s social platform

ICYMI: Social media accounts appearing to belong to the Ohio shooting suspect Ricky Shiffer indicate he was present in Washington, DC, on 5 and 6 January for pro-Trump demonstrations in 2021, and claimed to have been present at the storming of the Capitol itself.

“I was there,” a Twitter account with the name Ricky Shiffer wrote, replying to a picture of rioters climbing into the Capitol.

An account on Truth Social, Donald Trump’s conservative social network, also appears to belong to Shiffer.

Read the full story here:

Gunman killed in shootout may have left farewell message on Trump’s social platform

Man identified as Ricky Shiffer died at scene, police say, and may have been present at Jan 6 riot

Gino Spocchia12 August 2022 10:29



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Rocky Mount officer Thomas Robertson sentenced to over 7 years in Jan. 6 riot

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A Virginia police officer who prosecutors say lied about his actions before, during and after the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, including his military service and his marriage, was sentenced Thursday to 87 months in prison.

Thomas Robertson and Jacob Fracker were members of the police department in the small western Virginia town of Rocky Mount when they joined the mob that stormed the Capitol. Both have since been fired.

“You were not some bystander who just got swept up in the crowd,” Judge Christopher R. Cooper said at Robertson’s sentencing Thursday in U.S. District Court in Washington. “It really seems as though you think of partisan politics as war and that you continue to believe these conspiracy theories.”

Robertson, 49, was found guilty by a jury earlier this year of six crimes, including using a large wooden stick to block police outside the Capitol and destroying his phone when he got home. Fracker, who pleaded guilty to a conspiracy charge, testified at the trial.

Cooper said Robertson’s case was similar to that of Guy Reffitt, a member of the far-right anti-government militia group Three Percenters, who confronted an officer outside the Capitol with a gun. Reffitt was sentenced to 87 months in prison by a different judge.

At his sentencing, Robertson depicted his actions on Jan. 6 as an aberration in the life of a respected member of a law-abiding and respectable community. The government’s filings suggest he became radicalized under the influence of those around him, including the chief of a small neighboring police department and a retired FBI agent.

Prosecutors took the unusual step of publishing two detailed FBI investigations into the claims Robertson made in his appeal for mercy.

Retired police chief Dennis Deacon wrote the court saying that he had helped train Robertson as a police officer and that these crimes were “completely out of character.”

The agent produced a text conversation from March 2021, in which Robertson told Deacon, “I can kill every agent that they send for at least two weeks” and that he was “prepared to die in battle.” Deacon replied that Robertson should “be smart, pick battles, plan logistics, very carefully recruit and hope its not going to come down to it … we need a place to go … remote, defensible, water, very rugged terrain.”

Cooper said he found it particularly “disturbing” that Robertson made those comments after law enforcement officers were critically injured at the Capitol.

In an interview, Deacon said he was telling Robertson to recruit “friends” for “whatever inevitable things may happen … a flood or a hurricane,” or in the “extremely unlikely” event that “the government is overthrown by others from outside.”

Deacon retired last year as chief of police in Boones Mill, Va., near Rocky Mount. (When he was promoted in 2013, he said he was also the only officer on the force; there have been as many as seven.)

Another man described as a retired FBI agent went to the Capitol with Robertson and Fracker but did not go inside, according to the court records. That man, who could not be reached for comment, called the Capitol Police “cowards” who “will be on their knees before us” in text messages to Robertson, records said.

Fracker is set to be sentenced on Tuesday.

In his letter to the court, Fracker said he had been labeled a “rat,” a “snitch” and a “back stabber” by community members for testifying against Robertson. “It really is just heart breaking,” he said.

Robertson was a mentor to him and a “once valued father figure,” Fracker wrote.

A video from the Jan. 6 hearing on June 9 used multiple sources, including security and body camera footage, to walk viewers through the attack on the Capitol. (Video: The Washington Post)

At least two dozen people with past or current law enforcement affiliations are charged with criminal involvement in the Jan. 6 attack. Michael German, a former FBI agent who has studied far-right radicalization of police at NYU Law School’s Brennan Center for Justice, said the bureau is in “continuing denial” about the problem.

“Law enforcement has a lot of power to harm people,” he said. “Why don’t we see an aggressive project designed to protect the public?”

In a statement from the FBI, a spokeswoman said: “We cannot and do not investigate ideology. The FBI investigates when someone crosses the line from expressing beliefs to violating federal law.”

Robertson’s letter to the court explained his angry social media posts before the riot as a product of alcohol abuse and isolation while his wife was working in New York.

“I was … all alone at home,” he wrote. “I sat around at night drinking too much and reacting to articles and sites given to me by Facebook algorithms.”

However, an FBI agent wrote that Robertson’s wife went to New York after Jan. 6, not before, and that Robertson appeared to be having an extramarital affair while she was gone. Moreover, the agent said that if Robertson was drunk when he wrote the messages on Facebook that he would meet Joe Biden’s victory with violence, he was either drinking on a police shift or just before one.

At his sentencing, Robertson blamed Fracker for destroying their phones after the riot, something prosecutors noted is contradicted by both trial testimony and text evidence.

“Truth has no meaning to this defendant,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Elizabeth Aloi said in court. “He’ll say whatever he thinks he needs to say to get out of a situation.”

Robertson also misled the court, Rocky Mount police, journalists and friends about his military achievements, according to the FBI. He has indicated in various interviews and conversations that he trained as an Army sniper, Ranger and parachutist in the 1990s; served as an infantryman, sniper and sergeant when he reenlisted in the 2000s; and received a Bronze Star and was awarded a Purple Heart after an injury.

The FBI agent said that Robertson was discharged three weeks into basic training in 1991 for “lack of motivation”; he reenlisted in 2006 but served as a military police officer and had no apparent training for any other specialty. He spent about eight months in Iraq with the Virginia National Guard and then went to Afghanistan as a contractor in 2011. He was injured there, but contractors are not eligible for the Purple Heart. The agent also said that Robertson exaggerated his recovery time.

The agent suggested that Robertson may have committed a crime with those falsehoods, under a law that prohibits using “stolen valor” for material benefit.

Defense attorney Mark Rollins said that while Robertson “may have boasted about his background” and “made some clear mistakes,” he served his country and community in ways that cannot be faked. “He has always served his fellow man,” Rollins said. “He’s bled for this country.”

Robertson was released after his arrest in January 2021 but was jailed months later after going on what Cooper described as a “remarkable shopping spree for high-powered assault weapons” while becoming “further radicalized.” Robertson could be charged with illegal firearm possession, the judge noted.

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