Representative Jamie Raskin (D-MD), a member of the House Oversight Committee, discussed what could happen for Trump with MSNBC’s Jen Psaki. As we recently reported here, the former Proud Boys leader just threw Trump under the bus and repeatedly backed off. PSAki rightly wondered what this might mean for Dear Leader.
PSAKI: Four members of the Proud Boys were just convicted of seditious conspiracy this week and in their defense they all pointed the finger at the former president. Is it conceivable that Special Counsel Jack Smith is considering seditious conspiracy charges against Trump?
RASKIN: Absolutely. I mean, it’s not a defense. If you’re charged with conspiracy to overthrow the government or overthrow the government of the United States, which is seditious conspiracy, it’s no defense to say someone else told me to do or that someone else was involved in the conspiracy. Trump could very well have been part of the Proud Boys or Oath Keepers conspiracy, he could have been involved in a concentric ring conspiracy that overlaps with those conspiracies.
We don’t have a court system, I hope, as I said in the hearings on January 6, where the foot soldiers and the ringleaders from below go to jail and the ringleaders from above get a free pass. pass free and can continue their insurgent assault on democratic institutions.
So, you know, we’ve seen a lot of justice happen here, the Justice Department has done a great job, over 1000 arrests, hundreds of convictions, over a dozen people have been convicted of seditious conspiracy, completely refuting those who said, well, how could this be an insurrection if no one was trying to overthrow the government? Well, now they have their answer, over a dozen people have been convicted for it.
And Donald Trump, of course, was impeached by a 232-vote margin in the House for inciting an insurrection against the union. And 57 of 100 senators agreed that he instigated an insurrection against the union. We didn’t hit the magic two-thirds number to convict the president, and yet we had strong competing majorities from both houses of Congress declaring that is precisely what he did as a constitutional fact.
I would say he should have been charged a long time ago, but maybe it’s better late than never. We’ll see how many of these guys flip.