Supporters’ words may haunt Trump in impeachment

The words of Donald Trump supporters who are accused of participating in the deadly riots in the United States Capitol may end up being used against him in his impeachment in the Senate as he faces the charge of inciting a violent insurrection. .

At least five supporters facing federal charges have suggested they were taking orders from the then president when they marched on Capitol Hill on January 6 to challenge Joe Biden’s certification of election victory.

But now those comments, captured in interviews with reporters and federal agents, are likely to take center stage as Democrats make their case. It is the first time that a former president has faced such charges after leaving office.

“I feel like I was basically following my president. He was following what we were called to do. He asked us to travel there. She asked us to be there, “Jenna Ryan, a Texas real estate agent, told a Dallas-Fort Worth television station who posted a photo on Twitter of her displaying a peace sign next to a broken Capitol window.

Jacob Chansley, the man from Arizona pictured on the Senate bench who was shirtless and wearing face paint and a furry hat with horns, also pointed a finger at Trump.

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Chansley called the FBI the day after the insurrection and told agents he traveled “at the request of the president that all ‘patriots’ come to DC on January 6, 2021,” authorities wrote in court documents.

Chanley’s attorney unsuccessfully lobbied for his client to be pardoned before Trump’s term expired, saying that Chansley “felt he was answering the call of our president.” Authorities say that while on the Senate floor, Chansley wrote a threatening note to then-Vice President Mike Pence that read: “It’s only a matter of time, justice is coming.”

Trump is the first president to be indicted twice and the first to face trial after leaving office. The charge this time is “inciting violence against the United States government.” His prosecuting attorney, Butch Bowers, did not return a call for comment.

Opening arguments in the trial will begin the week of February 8. House Democrats who voted to impeach Trump last week for inciting the assault on Capitol Hill say a full reckoning is necessary before the country, and Congress, can move forward.

For weeks, Trump rallied his supporters against the election result and urged them to go to the Capitol on January 6 to rage against Biden’s victory. Trump spoke to the crowd near the White House shortly before they marched down Pennsylvania Avenue to Capitol Hill.

“We will never give up. We will never concede. It doesn’t happen,” Trump said. “You don’t concede when there’s a robbery involved. Our country has had enough. We won’t take it anymore.”

Later he said, “If you don’t fight like hell, you won’t have a country anymore.” He told his followers to walk to the Capitol to “make his voice heard in a” peaceful and patriotic “way.

Trump has not taken responsibility for his role in fomenting the violence, saying days after the attack: “People thought what I said was totally appropriate.”

Unlike a criminal trial, where there are strict rules about what evidence is and is not, the Senate can consider anything it wants. And if they can show that Trump’s words had a real impact, so much the better, and academics await him at trial.

“Incorporating the statements of those people is part of showing that it would be, at the very least, reasonable for a rational person to expect that if you said and did the things that Trump said and did, then they would be understood precisely in the way that these people would understand them. they understood. ” them, “said Frank Bowman, a constitutional law expert and law professor at the University of Missouri.

A retired Pennsylvania firefighter told a friend he traveled to Washington with a group of people and the group listened to Trump’s speech and then “followed the president’s instructions” and headed to Capitol Hill, an agent wrote in court documents. That man, Robert Sanford, is charged with throwing a fire extinguisher that hit three Capitol Police officers.

Another man, Robert Bauer of Kentucky, told FBI agents that he “marched to the United States Capitol because President Trump said so,” authorities wrote. His cousin, Edward Hemenway, of Virginia, told the FBI that he and Bauer headed for the Capitol after Trump said “something about taking Pennsylvania Avenue.”

More than 130 people as of Friday faced federal charges; Prosecutors have promised more cases and more serious charges are ahead.

Most of those arrested so far are charged with crimes such as trespassing and disorderly conduct, but this week prosecutors filed conspiracy charges against three self-described members of a paramilitary group who authorities said planned the attack. A special group of prosecutors is examining the possibility of bringing charges of sedition, which carry up to 20 years in prison, against any of the rioters.

It takes two-thirds of the Senate to convict. And while many Republicans, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, have condemned Trump’s words, it is unclear how many would vote to condemn him.

“While these people’s statements reinforce the case for the House trustee, I think President Trump has benefited from a Republican Party that has been unwilling to examine evidence,” said Michael Gerhardt, a professor at the School of the University of North Carolina. of Law who testified before the House Judiciary Committee during Trump’s first impeachment hearings in 2019.

“They supported him throughout the first impeachment process, thinking that the phone call with the President of Ukraine was perfect and I am sure they will think that it was also a perfect speech. There’s still nothing to suggest they would think otherwise, “Gerhardt said.