{"id":2221094,"date":"2024-04-15T06:32:02","date_gmt":"2024-04-15T10:32:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/riot-revisited-biden-doj-tested-in-supreme-court-fight-implicating-trump-and-hundreds-of-jan-6-cases\/"},"modified":"2024-04-15T06:36:34","modified_gmt":"2024-04-15T10:36:34","slug":"riot-revisited-biden-doj-tested-in-supreme-court-fight-implicating-trump-and-hundreds-of-jan-6-cases","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/riot-revisited-biden-doj-tested-in-supreme-court-fight-implicating-trump-and-hundreds-of-jan-6-cases\/","title":{"rendered":"Exploring the aftermath: Biden&#8217;s DOJ faces Supreme Court challenge involving Trump and many Jan. 6 cases"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">32<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Friot-revisited-biden-doj-tested-in-supreme-court-fight-implicating-trump-and-hundreds-of-jan-6-cases%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2221094&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>The Department of Justice continues its aggressive pursuit \u2062of Capitol \u200driot participants, including\u200d Trump, with implications for his political\u200d and legal future. Biden&#8217;s DOJ crackdown on Jan. 6 \u2064offenders faces\u200c scrutiny in Fischer v. United States, central\u2063 to Trump&#8217;s third campaign. Over 1,265 defendants charged, raising concerns about wrongful \u2064felony charges. Supreme Court&#8217;s upcoming decisions\u200d may reshape the fate \u2062of many\u2062 Jan. 6 defendants and Trump&#8217;s criminal cases.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p><em>More than three years after the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, the Department of Justice is continuing to pursue those who participated through hundreds of aggressive prosecutions. That includes Donald Trump, whose political future and personal freedom may depend on whether a jury believes he is to blame for the violence. But the intensity of the Biden DOJ\u2019s crackdown on Jan. 6 offenders has stirred controversy, drawn scrutiny from the Supreme Court in <\/em>Fischer v. United States<em>, and become a central focus of Trump\u2019s third presidential campaign. In this series, <strong>Riot revisited: Jan 6, Justice and Capitol Consequences<\/strong>, the <\/em>Washington Examiner<em> will look at the potential legal weaknesses in the DOJ\u2019s efforts to punish Jan. 6 rioters and the future of those cases should Trump reclaim the White House. <\/em><\/p>\n<p>More than <a href=\"https:\/\/www.justice.gov\/usao-dc\/36-months-jan-6-attack-capitol-0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"Jan. 6, 2021 riot\">1,265 defendants<\/a> have been charged by the Department of Justice under President <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/joe-biden\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>Joe Biden<\/a> in relation to the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/january-6\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"Jan. 6, 2021 riot\">Jan. 6, 2021, riot<\/a> at the Capitol. Hundreds of them may have been wrongly charged with a felony.<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/supreme-court\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Supreme Court<\/a> is preparing to weigh oral arguments on Tuesday in <em>Fischer v. United States<\/em>, a dispute that could drastically alter the indictments against potentially hundreds of defendants, including former President <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/donald-trump\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Donald Trump<\/a>. The namesake of the case is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.justice.gov\/usao-dc\/defendants\/fischer-joseph-w\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>Joseph Fischer<\/a>, a former Pennsylvania police officer who was charged for his alleged participation in violence on the day of the riot.<\/p>\n<figure><figcaption>On Jan. 7, 2021, Fischer posted the following photos of himself to Facebook, which appear to have been taken at the \u201cStop the Steal\u201d rally. In the photos, Fischer can be seen wearing black framed glasses with a navy blue sweater underneath a red coat. (Source: FBI affidavit)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Fischer was arrested on Feb. 19, 2021, and charged with assaulting a police officer, disorderly conduct within the Capitol, and obstruction of a congressional proceeding, a violation of 18 U.S.C. \u00a7 1512(c)(2), which carries a maximum of 20 years in prison and makes it a crime to \u201cotherwise obstruct[], influence[], or impede[] any official proceeding.\u201d The Justice Department used the obstruction of an official proceeding charge in hundreds of other cases, but Fischer\u2019s lawyers will argue to the Supreme Court this week that the statute has no relevance to the riot.<\/p>\n<p>Prosecutors say Fischer sent text messages before the Jan. 6 riot, including a text that said his former police chief may need \u201cto post my bail\u201d because the protest \u201cmight get violent.\u201d At one point amid the riot, the former officer called on those around him to \u201chold the line\u201d as he was part of a crowd that pushed against U.S. Capitol Police officers, according to his criminal affidavit.<\/p>\n<p>The former police officer, who contends he was only inside the Capitol for a few minutes after he was pushed into the police line by the crowd, is asking the justices to throw out the obstruction charge but not the two other charges he faces. The core of his argument is that the law was only intended to apply to evidence tampering and that applying it to protesters who went into the Capitol was an unfair interpretation of the statute.<\/p>\n<p>More than 300 other defendants from that day of protest and rioting have been charged with violating the obstruction law, which was enacted in 2002 as part of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in the wake of the Enron scandal. The provision was intended to punish the destruction of documents in the scandal surrounding Enron after auditor Arthur Andersen LLP was accused of destroying potentially incriminating records. The federal law is also at the center of two chargea brought in special counsel Jack Smith\u2019s 2020 election subversion indictment against Trump, for which the justices will <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/news\/2958739\/jack-smith-tells-supreme-court-keep-trump-charges-framers-never-endorsed-criminal-immunity\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title>hear argument on April 25 regarding<\/a> Trump\u2019s claims of presidential immunity.<\/p>\n<p>The eventual rulings in both Supreme Court cases, expected by the end of June, will shape the future for hundreds of Jan. 6 defendants as well as Trump\u2019s federal criminal cases.<\/p>\n<p>Back in February, the conservative group America First Legal filed a brief at the Supreme Court on behalf of Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR), Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), and 21 other members of Congress in support of\u00a0Fischer, saying the defendant was <a href=\"https:\/\/aflegal.org\/america-first-legal-and-boyden-gray-pllc-file-brief-on-behalf-of-senator-tom-cotton-representative-jim-jordan-and-21-other-members-of-congress-in-support-of-joseph-w-fischer\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">subjected<\/a> to a \u201cweaponized criminal prosecution\u201d while accusing the Biden administration of a double standard when the DOJ handed down no indictment against Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), who was caught on video pulling a fire alarm on Sept. 30 during a vote on the House floor.<\/p>\n<p>Frederick Ulrich, a federal public defender who represented Fischer after the government appealed the lower court decision to toss the obstruction charge, told the <em>Washington Examiner <\/em>he was convinced the Supreme Court would seek to reexamine the breadth of the obstruction statute after a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/breaking-federal-court-freezes-biden-vaccine-mandate-over-possible-grave-statutory-and-constitutional-issues\/\" title=\"BREAKING: Federal Court Freezes Biden Vaccine Mandate Over Possible \u2018Grave Statutory And Constitutional\u2019 Issues\">federal appeals court issued<\/a> a \u201cfractured\u201d decision on his client\u2019s case.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBecause it affected so many of these prosecutions and because the application of the statute in that context was unusual and unprecedented, we thought it had a shot of being [granted for review] regardless of the fact that later on, the Justice Department charged a former president with similar offenses,\u201d Ulrich said.<\/p>\n<p>Here is what you need to know as the justices prepare to hear the case.<\/p>\n<h2>How did this case arrive before the Supreme Court?<\/h2>\n<p>U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols, an appointee of Trump, dismissed the obstruction charge against Fischer on March 15, 2022. Nichols found that the previous subsection, \u00a7 1512(c)(1), which prohibits tampering with evidence \u201cwith the intent to impair the object\u2019s integrity or availability for use in an official proceeding,\u201d limits \u00a7 1512(c)(2) to cases involving evidence tampering that obstructs an official proceeding.<\/p>\n<p>The government appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. The appeals court reversed the decision in an opinion by a three-judge panel written by Judge Florence Pan, an appointee of President Joe Biden who succeeded Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson after she was elevated to the Supreme Court by Biden.<\/p>\n<p>Pan agreed with the defendant\u2019s viewpoint that \u201coutside of the January 6 cases brought in this jurisdiction, there is no precedent for using\u201d \u00a7 1512(c)(2) \u201cto prosecute the type of conduct at issue in this case.\u201d But she clarified that the meaning of the statute is \u201cunambiguous,\u201d stating that it clearly \u201capplies to all forms of corrupt obstruction of an official proceeding.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Pan contended that Supreme Court precedent states that even if a statute can be applied in situations not clearly anticipated by Congress, it does not demonstrate ambiguity but rather \u201cdemonstrates breadth.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Judge Gregory Katsas, a Trump appointee on the panel with Pan, argued in a dissent to Pan\u2019s majority decision that the DOJ\u2019s interpretation of the law was likely \u201cimprobably broad and unconstitutional in many of its applications.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After losing at the District of Columbia Circuit, Fischer appealed to the highest court, and the justices ultimately agreed to hear the case.<\/p>\n<figure><figcaption>Supreme Court Justices listen as President Joe Biden delivers his State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress at the Capitol in Washington, Thursday, March 7, 2024. (AP Photo\/J. Scott Applewhite)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<h2>How will justices rule in the case of <em>Fischer<\/em>?<\/h2>\n<p>Ulrich said the Supreme Court\u2019s options for deciding the <em>Fischer <\/em>case are based on the range of divergent viewpoints that have been expressed by judges so far in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/no-justice-clarence-thomas-doesnt-have-to-recuse-because-his-wife-has-political-opinions\/\" title=\"No, Justice Clarence Thomas Doesn\u2019t Have To Recuse Because His Wife Has Political Opinions\">lower court proceedings<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt could adopt Judge Nichols\u2019s very narrow view of the statute, which confined it pretty much to document destruction or something akin to it, or it could be closer to Judge Katsas\u2019s view that it reaches beyond documents \u2026 like involving testimony \u2026 or they could adopt Pan\u2019s view that it reaches anything from an official proceeding,\u201d Ulrich said.<\/p>\n<p>Bill Shipley, a defense attorney who has represented more than 50 clients involved in the Jan. 6 protest, told the <em>Washington Examiner <\/em>he believes the justices\u2019 agreement to consider the breadth of the obstruction statute may signal their belief that the DOJ has gone overboard by using it against defendants.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere was no reason for the court to take this case if it thought that the outcomes were appropriate. It generally only takes criminal cases for the purposes of reversal,\u201d Shipley said.<\/p>\n<p>The Supreme Court\u2019s prior case examining the Sarbanes-Oxley Act also supports the idea of a more limited application of the obstruction statute, according to\u00a0Fischer. He contends that the listing of specific acts of tampering in the language of \u00a7 1512(c)(1) \u2014 altering, destroying, mutilating, or concealing \u2014 limits the scope of \u00a7 1512(c)(2) on obstruction because the use of the word \u201cotherwise\u201d in \u00a7 1512(c)(2) suggests the acts that fall under the second subsection of the law must be related to those in the first.<\/p>\n<p>Shipley explained the dichotomy the justices will be analyzing: Does \u201cotherwise\u201d mean \u201cother actions of the same type of kind, or does [it] mean anything that corruptly\u201d impedes an official proceeding?<\/p>\n<p>Justice Department Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar contends that \u00a7 1512(c)(2) is not limited to conduct involving the availability of evidence but is instead a \u201ccatchall offense designed to ensure complete coverage of all forms of corrupt obstruction of an official proceeding,\u201d according to a brief filed at the high court.<\/p>\n<p>In Prelogar\u2019s understanding of the obstruction statute, words such as \u201cimpede\u201d or \u201cobstruct\u201d are intentionally broad terms that can cover a wide range of conduct that hinders official proceedings.<\/p>\n<p>And while the DOJ has acknowledged that \u00a7 1512(c) was enacted in direct response to the Enron scandal, it contends Congress created \u00a7 1512(c)(1) to preclude legal gaps exposed by the scandal and further argues that \u00a7 1512(c)(2) was written to address the risk that \u201ccorrupt obstruction could occur in unanticipated ways not prohibited by statutes targeted at specific forms of obstruction.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure><figcaption>FILE \u2013 President Donald Trump arrives to speak at a rally in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021. (AP Photo\/Jacquelyn Martin, File)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<h2>What are the implications for Trump and other defendants?<\/h2>\n<p>More than 327 defendants have been charged with violating the obstruction statute, and more than 50 have pleaded guilty to the count, according to a <em>Washington Examiner <\/em>review of court records.<\/p>\n<p>Trump has been charged with two counts under the same law, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding and obstruction of an official proceeding, in Smith\u2019s 2020 election subversion case. He has pleaded not guilty to both of these counts, along with two others that arose from his actions in the weeks following the 2020 election.<\/p>\n<p>Ulrich said he believes that if the justices find the obstruction law was overly broad as applied to Fischer, the court will likely remand the case back to the trial court with an accompanying opinion outlining the breadth of \u00a7 1512(c)(2).<\/p>\n<p>Notably, the federal public defender said he thinks the more than 50 defendants who have already pleaded guilty to the obstruction count could be \u201cout of luck.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNot unless they pled conditionally,\u201d Ulrich said of whether those defendants could benefit from the Supreme Court\u2019s decision.<\/p>\n<p>For defendants who have already been \u201ctried, convicted and sentenced or pled and did not raise this issue,\u201d Ulrich said they may find it difficult to have their sentences retroactively altered. But he noted for defendants who do have guilty pleas on the record, there is a so-called collateral challenge mechanism they could use if the high court ultimately narrows the breadth of \u00a7 1512(c)(2).<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, Smith has sought to pour cold water on the notion that Trump could shake off two charges against him in his Washington, D.C., federal criminal case, one of two indictments the special counsel has levied against him as he fights two other state-level indictments amid the 2024 presidential campaign.<\/p>\n<p>In his latest Supreme Court filing arguing against Trump\u2019s claim that he can avoid a trial entirely by invoking \u201cpresidential immunity,\u201d Smith argued that even if the justices narrowed the breadth of the obstruction statute in <em>Fischer<\/em>, the statute as applied to Trump would remain \u201cvalid.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhether the Court interprets [that provision] consistently with a natural reading of its text or adopts the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/jack-smith-tells-supreme-court-to-keep-trump-charges-framers-never-endorsed-criminal-immunity\/\" title=\"Jack Smith urges Supreme Court to proceed with Trump charges, emphasizing that the Founding Fathers never supported criminal immunity\">evidence-impairment gloss urged<\/a> by the petitioner in <em>Fischer,<\/em> the Section 1512 charges in this case are valid,\u201d Smith wrote.<\/p>\n<p>Even if Trump managed to shake off two charges he faces in the indictment, he would still be on the hook for the other two charges, including conspiracy to defraud the United States and conspiracy against rights to have votes properly counted.<\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Trump more broadly has sought to delay his <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/judge-andrew-p-napolitano-bush-guantanamo-and-the-rule-of-law\/\" title=\"Judge Andrew P. Napolitano: Bush, Guantanamo and the Rule of Law\">federal criminal trials<\/a> at every turn, as he could call on the DOJ to end its prosecution of him if he defeats Biden in the election. To all 88 felony counts he faces across four separate indictments, Trump has pleaded not guilty.<\/p>\n<p>Nearly one week after the arguments in the <em>Fischer <\/em>case, the nine justices will reconvene on April 25 to weigh whether Trump enjoys broad immunity that shields him from Smith\u2019s indictment, another case that will determine the potency of Smith\u2019s case against the former president.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Over three years post-Capitol riot, DOJ relentlessly pursues hundreds involved. Trump&#8217;s fate hinges on jury perception of his role in the violence, impacting both his political prospects and legal troubles<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2633,"featured_media":2221095,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/wex-s3.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/AP24067740096122-1024x683.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[538],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2221094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-washington-examiner"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/wex-s3.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/AP24067740096122-1024x683.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2221094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2633"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2221094"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2221094\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2221095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2221094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2221094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2221094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}