Capitol Insurrection Report

On October 7, the Senate Judiciary Committee issued its staff report: "Subverting Justice: How the Former President and his Allies Pressured DOJ to Overturn the 2020 Election." This episode summarizes and analyzes the findings of this report, along with the transcript of the testimony of former Acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen before the Senate Judiciary Committee. You can find the staff report here. https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/subverting-justice-how-the-former-president-and-his-allies-pressured-doj-to-overturn-the-2020-election

Reviewing the 15 persons issued subpoenas by the House Select Committee to investigate the January 6th attack on the Capitol, and the release of the Eastman memo detailing plans to circumvent the peaceful transfer of power following the 2020 election. I also examine the data on the educational attainment and employment histories of 100 of 623 January sixth defendants, and how the classical Marxist category of the "lumpenproletariat" can help to understand the character of the Insurrectionist mob that continues to pose a threat to electoral democracy in the US.

Following a recap of the events in the ongoing investigations and criminal cases in the Capitol Insurrection, the episode proceeds to the main subject, the activities and ideology of one of the largest extremist gangs that took part in the Capitol Insurrection, the Three Percenters, with special attention to the indictment of the "DC Brigade" of paramilitary terrorists from California, and a summary of the ideas of the folk ideology of Mike Vanderboegh, a self-described former leftist who founded the Three Percenter gang in 2008.

Topics include the strange story of John Pierce, the Capitol Insurrection attorney representing 17 defendants who appears to be missing court dates because he is an anti-vaxer who is on a ventilator, the arrest of several violent offenders in the Capitol Insurrection, including #flaggaitercophater, a California Proud Boy identified by volunteer internet sleuths working to protect electoral democracy in the US from the threat of political violence, an analysis of a controversial Reuters article that relied on anonymous sources to suggest that the FBI has rejected the possibility that more high profile defendants involved in planning "stop the steal" protests would be charged in the Insurrection, a description of the latest developments in the investigation by the House Select Committee to investigate January sixth, and my critique of the failure of political science to adequately address the danger of authoritarian populism in the United States. https://www.lawfareblog.com/justice-department-shouldnt-open-pandoras-box-seditious-conspiracy https://www.emptywheel.net/2021/08/20/reuters-doesnt-mention-terrorism-when-discussing-the-january-6-investigation/

The seditious conspiracy charges against Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and 10 other members of his paramilitary gang prompt an examination of Rhodes’s redefinition of politics in founding the group, particularly how he defines politics as a potentially armed struggle against a domestic political enemy, an ideologically defined "other" that would have been recognizable to Frankfurt School political scientist and critic of Nazism Franz Neumann. Other topics include the latest news from the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack, a "Presidential Findings" memo that appears to outline a plot to unconstitutionally use the military to install Trump as a dictator, an information request issued to Ivanka Trump, and much more. https://january6th.house.gov/sites/democrats.january6th.house.gov/files/2022-1-20.BGT%20Letter%20to%20Ivanka%20Trump%20-%20Cover%20Letter%20and%20Enclosures_Redacted%202.pdf https://www.politico.com/f/?id=0000017e-920d-d65f-a77e-fbad182f0000 https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/21190289-rhodesdetrlgmjedtx012622?s=01 https://youtu.be/SqGRqqY7NdY