THE JANUARY 6 INSURRECTION INVESTIGATION: WHERE WE STAND

Investigations into the January 6 insurrection plod

along with three unmistakable  characteristics. In some ways, these characteristics typify and symbolize the state of our politics. They show the strengths and weaknesses of American democracy in 2021.

·     Democrats and a few brave Republicans in Congress keep moving methodically toward uncovering the truth, using tried and true tools and processes that fit the circumstances.

·     The courts are handling January 6 prosecutions as we’d expect – on a case-by-case basis, balancing the societal interest in holding those responsible accountable with individual rights afforded every criminal defendant, despite claims those  defendants are political prisoners.

·     Republican politicians stand in the way. The fact that’s happening –as odd as it is – represents a good starting place for an evaluation of where the investigation stands, nearly nine months after the deadly attack on the capitol.

 

The GOP Strategy: You Didn’t Really See 

WhatYou Thought You Saw

One remarkable thing stands out about the January 6 insurrection – we saw it on television.Republicans, however, continue their effort at convincing Americans it wasn’t what it looked like. In addition to outlandish statements from Republican members ofCongress about capitol rioters resembling tourists, the overall GOP strategy rests on the notion that if Republicans keep saying there’s nothing worth seeing, Americans will agree and lose interest.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy probably had that in mind when he threatened telecomcompanies asked to preserve phone records. Those records might show that Republican members of Congress helped facilitate the attack. McCarthy said those companies shouldn’t comply with document requests made by the bipartisan House Select Committee that’s conducting a probe into January 6. He claimed complying would violate federal law andRepublicans would remember that, presumably with dire consequences, if and when the GOP retakes the House of Representatives. McCarthy no doubt wants to minimize the importance of the investigation and make complying not normal. After all, what people thought they saw wasn’t big a deal. Wasn’t much to see, right?

Then there’s the matter of prematurely exonerating former President Donald Trump. Select CommitteeChairman Bennie Thompson and Vice Chair Liz Cheney, early in September, dismissed as “baseless” McCarthy’s claim that various federal agencies, including the Justice Department, had concluded Trump didn’t incite or provoke the January 6 violence. Many reasons exist for believing he did. It appears McCarthy thought he could give the public another reason for seeing the investigation as overblown and unnecessary. There’s just not much there, right?

 

Democrats (and two Republicans) Keep Doing

the Right Thing

While the Republican side show and misinformation campaign continue, the Select

Committee keeps moving the investigation forward methodically.  Federal agencies and private companies have now responded to the committee’s first round of requests for documents. Thompson indicated the panel needs more information from social media companies. Documents the committee wants could show the involvement of Trump, White House aides, Trump family members, and GOP legislators in the planning and execution of the insurrection.

                                    

It’s known, for example, that Trump talkedon January 6 with several Republican members of Congress while the insurrection remained in progress.  If it takes a little longer to get the documents that may lead to confirmation of the substance of those communications, so be it. Tracking down such facts requires painstaking investigation and analysis. The committee is doing that, as it should, using tools common to this kind of work. If the president of the United States committed treason against the American government, we want to know the details of that, right?

 

The Courts and Their Balancing Act

Some Americans no doubt would prefer the criminal cases against the January 6 insurrectionists move faster. More than 600 defendants have been charged with various crimes in connection with the attack. Most of them are not being held in jail while they await trial.  Some, however, have had their release conditions revoked because judges have concluded, in individual cases, that those defendants pose a threat. One, a former police officer, bought 37 guns after his arrest. That individual disrupted a court hearing and accosted a probation officer. A magistrate judge decided he should remain in jail.

That situation demonstrates how courts have balanced individual rights and concerns about

January 6 defendants who continue creating havoc. That’s the nature of the criminal justice system and things are likely to continue moving along that way for a long time to come. Meantime, Trump supporters and far rights groups spent a weekend demonstrating in Washington and elsewhere claiming the insurrectionists were just protesters exercising their constitutional rights and are being held wrongfully. Oh, really?

                                      

As much as everyone might hope the process of investigating January 6 and holding those responsible accountable might proceed differently or move faster, the current state of affairs seems like what we’ll have for a while. Republican

politicians have shown no interest in unearthing what happened. McCarthy once said the GOP would conduct its own investigation and seek “real answers.” No evidence exists that’s happening now or that it will happen. McCarthy and other Republicans

will likely continue doing  what they’re doing now – getting in the way, making disingenuous or outright false statements, and claiming nothing important happened.

Meantime, the Select Committee, which includes

only two Republicans, and the courts will keep

doing what they’re doing -- their jobs.

MOVING AHEAD WITH A JANUARY 6 SELECT COMMITTEE PROBE

DEMOCRATS TAKE THE HIGH ROAD AND

DO WHAT NEEDS DOING

                                                

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Ca.) has moved ahead with plans for a select committee that will investigate the January 6 insurrection at the U.S.

Capitol. Pelosi named eight committee members and designated Mississippi Congressman Bennie Thompson the chair. She  took the action following a June 30 House vote, mainly along party lines, favoring establishment of such a panel. That, in

turn, followed Senate rejection of a bipartisan, 9/11-style commission that would have investigated the events of January 6. Five people died as a result of the riot, including a police officer.  The dangerousness and brutality of the insurrectionists become more evident with each Justice Department release of new January 6 video.

Despite our preference for a bipartisan commission, we say Democrats have taken the only reasonable course Republicans left to them. It was a step they had no choice but to take. Congress had to fulfil its obligation to investigate what happened and decide who’s ultimately responsible.

A fierce urgency demands that  Congress find out who bears responsibility for the January 6 insurrection. In a democracy, not moving forward with an investigation of a matter like this would have been a dereliction of duty.

After Senate Republicans nixed the bipartisan commission option, only the select committee approach remained.  Republicans can complain all they want about the “partisan” nature of a select committee inquiry, but they could have prevented this circumstance. They declined the bipartisan commission under pressure from former President 

Donald Trump, who wants  nothing that might pin the blame on the person likely most responsible -- him. Republican fidelity to Trump’s wishes eviscerates the party’s viability as a defender of democracy and the nation’s most cherished ideals.       

 

The Urgency

Anyone who looks at the video or reads the published accounts of January 6 can only conclude that what occurred was an insurrection in the classic sense of the term – an effort at overthrowing the democratically expressed will of the people. We contend those who won’t recognize the events of January 6 as such now stand as opponents of democracy and are at war with the United States. A functioning democracy seeks out and holds accountable people who did what the insurrectionists did.

Fidelity to core American values requires that both

the general public and elected officials pursue full accountability for those who orchestrated and participated in what happened.  The public should, through social media, blogging, letters to the editor, and every other legal means, promote the need for that full accountability.

Meanwhile, elected officials owe a duty because of an oath they must uphold. That oath obligates them to protect and defend the United States Constitution. Those who won’t do that should resign their offices.

No one should believe the forces unleashed that day will just disappear. Trials of some of the 500 people already charged may tell us something

about the continuing threat posed by the right wing, white supremacist groups believed at the center of the January 6 riot. Trials, however, with their focus on the guilt or innocence of individuals, can never reveal the whole story of something like January 6.  That limitation makes the work of the select committee essential. It must find out who bears responsibility and let the nation know. Then, the country and its government can take steps that would prevent a repeat.

 

Committee Membership

Pelosi’s selection of Republican Representative Liz Chaney of Wyoming generated the most attention

among the members named. Republicans kicked Cheney out of her leadership role in their caucus because she voted in favor of Trump’s impeachment. She was one of two Republicans who backed a select committee

investigation (Adam Kinzinger of Illinois was the other). Chaney’s been adamant that Congress should get to the bottom of the January 6 incident.

In addition to Chairman Thompson, Pelosi put three Californians, Zoe Lofgren, Adam Schiff, and Pete Aguilar on the panel. Florida’s Stephanie Murphy, Jamie Raskin of Maryland, and Elaine Luria of Virginia round out the group.

That left the question of who, if anyone, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy would name.

McCarthy led the Republican complaints about “partisanship” in the process. His whining sounded hollow, given the fact he rejected the bipartisan commission, despite having gotten everything Republicans asked for in talks that led up to the vote on the measure that would have created a commission.

Thompson indicated the select committee won’t waste time getting to work. Its first hearings could come before the end of July. We’d welcome that. We believe those unwilling to find out what really happened now stand in opposition to democracy. The sooner Congress and the public can call out

exactly who falls into that category, the better. Are we or are we not a democracy? Congress bears the responsibility, starting with the work of this select committee, of providing us with an answer to that central question.

REPUBLICAN REJECTION OF THE JANUARY 6 COMMISSION: IS THIS WORSE THAN MEETS THE EYE?

Why would President Joe Biden say on Memorial Day that “Democracy itself is in peril?” No modern president has issued a comparable warning.

Military veteran and former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, a one-time Republican Senator from Nebraska, suggested a military coup could occur in America when he said, “The real threat is internal.” He added that America’s future is “in jeopardy.” What are Biden and Hagel worried about? What are they telling us?

Are they afraid one of our major political parties – the Republican Party – has become the anti-democracy party?

If not Treason, What?

On January 6, hundreds of mostly white people stormed the U.S. Capitol. They hoisted the Confederate flag, constructed a hangman’s noose, and overcame Capitol police with guns, knives, bear spray, clubs, and

poles. They took over both congressional chambers and chanted things like “Hang Mike Pence” and “Kill Nancy Pelosi.” Their invasion ultimately caused five deaths.

For more than four hours, the mob disrupted

congressional certification of Electoral College votes. Securing the Capitol took that amount of time. In all American history, the United States Capitol building had never been taken over by domestic invaders and only once –during the War of 1812 – by foreigners.

Though many in the crowd wore Trump

clothing and carried Trump signs, some in the right wing media claimed the insurgents were actually Black Lives Matter and Antifa members masquerading as Trump supporters. Some suspect

Republican members of Congress may have helped organize the invasion or at least enabled it.

 

Who’s Complicit?

House Homeland Security Chairman Bennie Thompson of Mississippi and the ranking

Republican on that committee, New York’s John Katko, drafted bipartisan legislation that would have created an independent commission to investigate the January 6 insurrection. House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy regularly consulted Katko during that process and Thompson gave Katko all he asked for in the negotiations. Still, McCarthy withdrew his support and urged that Republicans vote against the measure. Only 35 GOP members ended up voting with Democrats when the measure passed the House.

In the Senate, Republicans launched a filibuster, meaning the legislation needed 60 votes. Just seven Republicans joined 50 Democrats in voting yes, so the measure failed.

               

Why would 43 of the 50 Republican senators not

want answers to the questions surrounding the insurrection? Who organized it, for example? Why were the invaders determined to overthrow the democratic process by violent means? What were Republican senators afraid of? Why would they not support bipartisan legislation aimed at getting the facts about such an unprecedented domestic attack on the American Capitol?  Something is clearly afloat.

One obvious answer lies in the control Donald Trump still exerts over the base of the Republican

Party. In controlling that base, he controls members of Congress it elects. “He has a grip over politicians because he has a grip over voters,” says Carol Leonnig, author of Zero Fail: The Rise and

Fall of the Secret Service. These elected officials want to maintain their offices  and the benefits that go with serving the interests of movement conservatism. An interlocking set of institutions and alliances wins elections by stoking cultural and racial anxiety while using its power in pushing an elitist economic agenda, as  Paul Krugman writes in Arguing with Zombies. Since Republicans want to regain control of the House and Senate, they know they can’t do so without the white lemming that makes up the Republican base.

In the wake of the GOP’s rejection of the January 6

commission measure, former Trump national security adviser Michal Flynn, once a three-star general in the U.S. Army, told a QAnon conference a military coup “should happen” in the United States. Flynn referred to events in Myanmar, where the military overthrew a democratically elected government on the basis of unproven allegations of voter fraud. Other similarly disturbing statements from Trump supporters haven’t gotten the attention Flynn got, but it appears treasonous comments are becoming common place among Republicans and Trump supporters.

 

So What’s the Bargain?

Lyndon Johnson, the nation’s 36^th president, once said, “If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on and he’ll empty his pockets for you.”

Donald Trump ran for president in 2016 as the

champion of the little guy. His only significant legislative achievement, however, was a tax cut for the rich that ripped a hole in the social safety net his blue-collar supporters need. So, what do those supporters get out of the deal? Mostly, it seems, what President Johnson told us – a chance to look down on someone.      

Trump no longer pretends he’s going to make life better for working class whites in his base. They get xenophobic diatribes and racist venom directed at blacks, browns, and Asians but not much else. In the final analysis, Trump gives them someone they can look down on. Meantime, with the support of that base, the Republican Party has become the anti-democracy party. It seeks to deprive all but white people of the benefits of democracy. That’s the Faustian bargain. So they can look down on blacks, browns, Asians, and other out groups, Trump supporters discard democracy, with the complicity of their leaders.

So, we ask again – what do Biden and Hagel know? If we ignore the clear and present danger this “deal,” this “bargain” Trump’s supporters and GOP leaders have struck, we could all lose.  

                            

CONGRESSIONAL BAD ACTORS: CAN THE LEGISLATIVE BRANCH POLICE ITSELF?

As President Biden pursues his agenda, Congress finds itself distracted by the behavior of

some of its Republican members. Democrats fear some Republicans may incite violence or even threaten their personal safety. Resolutions that would expel or censure Republican members have been introduced in both houses. A bipartisan vote stripped one GOP representative of her committee assignments because of her outrageous statements. The situation grows tenser by the day. 

Speaker Nancy Pelosi declared that threats “from within” exist in the House of Representative. 

Some Republicans want to take guns onto the floor and have refused to go through metal detectors installed outside the House chamber.     Danger from outside forces remains. Capitol police propose making permanent the fencing installed around the Capitol grounds for

the presidential inauguration. Meantime, the investigation into the January 6 insurrection seemingly turns up new and disturbing evidence every day.

The Greene Case

Freshman Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia got elected after suggesting the

execution of Pelosi, making threats against other Democrats, claiming that September 11 never happened, and denying the truth of school shootings, including the Parkland, Florida carnage in which 17 people died and 17 others were injured. Greene, an adherent of the QAnon

conspiracy movement, made other outlandish statements, including that lasers controlled by a Jewish-run company started wild fires in California.

Democrats urged that House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy strip Greene of her education and budget committee assignments, but he declined. Despite saying she regretted some of her statements, Greene lost her committee assignments on a vote of 230-199, with all Democrats and 11 Republicans voting in the affirmative.

“Disorderly Behaviour”

Article 1, section 5 of the United States 

Constitution gives each house of Congress power to regulate the conduct of its members. Both the House and the Senate can discipline members who engage in “disorderly Behaviour.” Punishment can include expulsion from Congress, though more often both houses have “censured” members for bad conduct. Expulsion requires a two-thirds vote, while a censure resolution needs only majority approval.

Fifteen senators have been expelled, the last in 

1862. Six were thrown out in 1797 for treason in connection with inciting participation of Native-American tribes in a British invasion of Florida. The other nine, kicked out in 1861 and 1862, supported the Confederacy in the Civil War.

Nine senators, most notably Joseph McCarthy in the 1950s, have been censured

for conduct that brought the Senate into dishonor and disrepute. Expulsion and censure cases have been prosecuted for abuse of office, fighting in the senate chamber, financial irregularities, sexual misconduct, and other bad acts. Very often, especially in recent times, senators brought up for expulsion or censure have resigned before senate action. Three members facing such sanctions since 1980 all resigned first.

In the House, 23 members have been censured, five since 1966. The House has expelled five members, two in the modern era. Michael Meyers was kicked out in 1980 on a 376-30 vote after a bribery conviction. James Traficant got his walking papers in 2002 by a vote of 420-1 following

convictions for conspiracy to commit bribery, defrauding the United States, obstruction of justice, and filing false tax returns. Three previous expulsions from the House, all in 1861, involved disloyalty by fighting for the Confederacy.

What’s Enough?

While it’s clear Congress can regulate its membership, the history of expulsion and censure raises the question of whether Congress needs criminal convictions before taking action against misbehaving members. In the House, that appears to have been the case, at least recently. Both expulsions in the 20^th and 21^st centuries came after convictions for real law breaking. The constitution doesn’t say criminal convictions must precede expulsion or censure, but Congress, especially the House, seems to have needed that in recent years before acting.

The Senate history presents a different picture, but one relevant to today. The 15 senators thrown out participated in inciting violence against the United States or its interests.  Given the events of January 6, Congress now may have to decide if threatening a member rises to the necessary level for action. 

How Did We Get Here?

Former President Donald Trump and compliant,

cowering Republican leaders justifiably get much of the blame. While we’d guess the impeachment trial won’t result in a conviction, we also believe the likely surge of civil and criminal cases against Trump will reveal the depth of his seditious behavior. Those cases, probably not tried until 2022 and 2023, should reveal just how far he stooped and how close the United States came to becoming a dictatorship, not a democracy.

But blaming Trump and his enablers isn’t enough. His rise to the presidency indicates a fundamental sickness in our society it may take years to eradicate. Because much of his appeal rests on anger and white supremacy, which have been with us since the beginning of the republic, it’s possible we won’t rid ourselves of this problem in the lifetime of anyone alive today. 

The congressional response to the threat of violence from both inside and outside the Capitol could say a good deal about the resolve of the nation to eliminate the abhorrent behavior that plagues so much of our politics. Things we could have never imagined now seem normal. Congress

can throw out members who make violence and the threat of violence part of their portfolios. History, however, shows senators and representatives have only reluctantly used that power. Now, it appears, we live in different times – times that call for a more aggressive use of that authority.