The US Capitol has been Breached [News]

[MaybeACoordinator 8349]

12 hours ago, atomheartbevo said:

They look like idiots because If you're going to carry in Texas around public areas, and you are going to rock a cowboy hat and cowboy boots, get with the fucking program, leave the M4 and body armor at home (Norks aren't invading, nor are the Cubans), and carry this:

Or even better, one of these

I give no fucks about M4s.  They are boring. 

Carry one of those rifles above, I'm going to stop you and talk to you about it.  Especially if it's a Sharps, that's been on my bucket list to shoot.

vs

 

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

Attack on Capitol was the beginning of an American insurgency, counterterrorism experts warn

Quote

After ransacking the U.S. Capitol and threatening the lives of members of Congress on Jan. 6, they walked down the building’s broad steps unmolested and into the mythology of right-wing extremism. Many wore shirts identifying them as accolades of QAnon, riders in “the Storm” who believe the fever-dream conspiracy that they are foot soldiers in a war against Satan-worshipping pedophiles in the government’s “deep state” bureaucracy. There were also neo-Nazis and anti-Semites in the overwhelmingly white crowd, including a man wearing a “Camp Auschwitz” sweatshirt. Racists rallied to the Confederate flag of rebellion that some of the insurrectionists waved in the halls of Congress.

With President Trump only days away from an unceremonious departure from the White House, the vision of a mob desecrating the citadel of democracy felt for many observers like the end of a shameful period of norm breaking and tradition smashing. But for counterterrorism experts who have spent the two decades since the 9/11 terrorist attacks closely studying and fighting violent extremist groups overseas, the spectacle looked like something altogether different: the likely birthing of a violent American insurgency.

Retired Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal was formerly the head of Joint Special Operations Command in Iraq and the commander of all U.S. and allied troops fighting the Taliban and al-Qaida in Afghanistan. “I did see a similar dynamic in the evolution of al-Qaida in Iraq, where a whole generation of angry Arab youth with very poor prospects followed a powerful leader who promised to take them back in time to a better place, and he led them to embrace an ideology that justified their violence. This is now happening in America,” McChrystal told Yahoo News.

A radical group of citizens have adopted a very hard-line view of the country, he noted, that echoes the Lost Cause narrative that took root in the old South after the Civil War. “Only President Trump has updated Lost Cause with his ‘Stop the Steal’ narrative that they lost because of a stolen election, and that is the only thing holding these people down and stopping them from assuming their rightful place in society,” McChrystal said. “That gives them legitimacy to become even more radical. I think we’re much further along in this radicalization process, and facing a much deeper problem as a country, than most Americans realize.”

Police try to hold back rioters who laid siege to the Capitol on Jan. 6. (Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)

Counterterrorism officials and experts who have closely examined how violent extremist movements arise out of unstable societies abroad have detected recurring patterns. The movements typically begin with small groups operating independently. Over time, they form connections with other like-minded groups through secret communications. This is a hallmark in the genesis of most terrorist organizations.

As they develop a coherent narrative and unifying ideology, extremist movements and leaders increasingly come out of the shadows and communicate over open forums in an effort to recruit and radicalize a wider following. A prime example is Anwar al-Awlaki, the American-born cleric and leader of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, who indoctrinated a whole generation of English-speaking jihadis, and whose sermons still attract tens of thousands of hits on YouTube a decade after his death in a U.S. drone strike in 2011.

Extremist movements also aggressively recruit from law enforcement and military communities to develop their hard power, a common tactic perfected by the Islamic State, whose close alliance with disaffected Baathist military officers enabled it to launch a military-style juggernaut in 2014 that captured a third of Iraq and Syria for its Islamist “caliphate.”

The participation of former military members in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol was revealed in the past week with the arrest of retired Air Force Lt. Col. Larry Rendall Brock Jr., who was photographed wearing military-style tactical gear and brandishing zip-tie handcuffs inside the Capitol, and by the death of military veteran Ashli Babbitt, who was shot by police during the melee. The U.S. Army is reportedly investigating 25 people who participated in the attempted putsch, some of whom may be active-duty military. Meanwhile, two off-duty Virginia police officers, Jacob Fracker and Thomas Robertson of the Rocky Mount Police Department, were also arrested on charges of illegally storming the Capitol.

Extremist movements commonly reach out to like-minded terrorist groups in other countries, forming loose networks for the sharing of strategies and lessons-learned in a continuous feedback loop. That network building was the hallmark of al-Qaida and its many global affiliates and franchises.

Similarly, counterterrorism experts say a number of the white supremacist groups who took part in the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol have reached out and formed linkages with white nationalist counterparts in Germany, Canada, Norway and Russia. “I worked with the State Department to designate as terrorists an extreme white supremacist group in Russia that has many ties to U.S.-based groups,” said Ali Soufan, a former FBI supervisory special agent and counterterrorism expert who led some of the highest-profile investigations of al-Qaida attacks, speaking on Thursday to reporters. He noted that a National Security Council strategy document identified the Nordic Front, a neo-Nazi group spreading throughout Nordic countries, as a threat to the United States. “If the Nordic Front is a threat to the U.S., that means they have some connection to activities here. There are also [right-wing] extremist groups in Canada designated as terrorist organizations by our ‘Five Eyes’ allies, but they still operate with impunity here in the United States. That has to stop.”

Rioters storm the Capitol on Jan. 6. (Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)

History also shows that when extremist movements coalesce around a charismatic leader who focuses their anger and amplifies their narrative, a tipping point is reached where extreme rhetoric is often turned into violent action. Beyond that tipping point, the violence tends to escalate unless the extremist movement and its leadership are convincingly defeated and their narrative and ideology widely rejected.

Even in the aftermath of Trump’s incitement of a violent insurrection, however, a new Washington Post-ABC News poll showed that a majority of Republicans believe that he bears no responsibility for the ransacking of the Capitol (56 percent); that there is solid evidence of fraud in the November election (66 percent); and that he acted responsibly after the election (65 percent). To this day Trump has refused to concede the election to Joe Biden, and he continues to promote the poisonous falsehood that he won in a “landslide” and that the election was stolen.

What most worries counterterrorism experts is that the collective that mobilized the violent mob responsible for sacking the Capitol last week has checked all those boxes, and fits the pattern that created other enduring violent extremist movements.

“Osama bin Laden’s major contribution to the terrorist pantheon was to create a mythology around the narrative that a band of Arab fighters defeated the Soviet superpower in Afghanistan in the 1980s, and he used that mythology to bring together a lot of disparate terrorist groups from all over the world under the single banner of al-Qaida, giving them cohesion and an organizational structure,” said Brian Michael Jenkins, a senior adviser to the president of the RAND Corporation and author of numerous books, reports and articles on terrorism. “Similarly, the people behind Jan. 6, 2021, mobilized right-wing extremists of every stripe — white supremacists, neo-Nazis, QAnon, anti-Semites, antigovernment militias, xenophobes, anti-feminists — and brought them together as a movement in what amounted to a Woodstock festival for extremists. And now the ‘Battle of Capitol Hill’ has become symbolically important and central to right-wing mythology, and it will lead to more organizing and escalating threats from this movement, which we’re already seeing.”

Indeed, the FBI-led investigation into the sacking of the Capitol has already revealed just how far the extremist movement behind it has evolved. Earlier this week the FBI warned in a memo to law enforcement agencies and departments that armed, far-right extremist groups were planning to march on all 50 state capitols in the coming days. Credible threats to Biden’s inauguration ceremony on Jan. 20 have prompted the National Guard to deploy more soldiers to protect the U.S. Capitol building than are currently deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq combined. Even before the riot last week, the FBI reported having more than 1,000 active domestic terrorism investigations underway in all 50 states, the preponderance of them involving racially motivated, white supremacist terror.

“What the nation witnessed last week was a surgical strike at the heart of our democracy, and it was meant to empower a movement that will lead to the melting of the foundation of our republic,” said Soufan. In congressional testimony nearly two years ago, Soufan warned that the right-wing movement in America was already roughly where jihadi terrorists were in the 1980s and 1990s in terms of its development and increasing sophistication. “The right-wing movement is also taking advantage and feeding off the partisan political divisions in this country. So the first thing we need is a united approach to recognize the threat, and summon the political will needed for law enforcement to dismantle these networks.”

An American flag along the razor wire that now surrounds the U.S. Capitol ahead of Joe Biden's inauguration. (Liz Lynch/Getty Images)

In trying to reduce the social media accelerant to the extremism on display last week, Twitter has taken down no fewer than 70,000 accounts associated with just the QAnon conspiracy mongers, one node in the extremist movement’s growing network. The social media company has also permanently suspended Trump’s account, depriving the president of his favored communication channel with more than 88 million followers.

“Whether you believe President Trump intended to or not, the message that he has consistently communicated to these extremist groups has been a ‘green light,’” said Bruce Hoffman, a senior fellow for counterterrorism and homeland security at the Council on Foreign Relations. That’s how torch-bearing neo-Nazis and white supremacists interpreted Trump’s comment that there were “very fine people on both sides” of their 2017 protest in Charlottesville, Va., he noted, and how the Proud Boys white nationalist militia heard his call to “stand back and stand by” during a presidential debate.

“The entire movement read Trump’s tweet — ‘Big protest in D.C. on January 6th. Be there, will be wild!’ — as another green light, which Trump flashed again on the Ellipse when he told the crowd of supporters that ‘if you don’t fight like hell you’re not going to have a country anymore,’” said Hoffman. “With these constant green lights, Trump has unleashed very powerful forces that he nor anyone else can control. In that sense, what happened in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6 was a beginning, not an end. In the minds of Trump’s hard-core supporters it was the beginning of a revolution.”

McChrystal has thought long and hard about what happens to this extremist movement when its leader exits center stage, and for the near and middle term he sees the potential for great peril to the country. “As this extremist movement comes under increasing pressure from law enforcement in the coming days and weeks, its members will likely retreat into tighter and tighter cells for security, and that will make them more professional, and those cells will become echo chambers that incubate even more radical thinking along the lines of armed insurrection,” he said. “So even if Trump exits the scene, the radical movement he helped create has its own momentum and cohesion now, and they may find they don’t need Trump anymore. They can just wait for another charismatic leader to appear. So the fabric of something very dangerous has been woven, and it’s further along than most Americans care to admit.”

 

[Guest Lobo]

Fake news.  Patriots upset about a stolen election.  

although the extended video evidence of experienced people plotting to make their way through certain corridors/offices to obtain intel/commit certain executions does rise to the level of legal curiosity, I have been assured by dozens of posters on this site---that was simply the rest of some parking ticket misunderstandings.  

It has to be supremely awesome for some of you to know that you have so many morons acting on your behalf.  

[52-80 19082]

4 hours ago, mdleast said:

Pieces of Shit: The Movie
 

which one of you fucker is at 0:17 with the burnt orange beanie

[SquishMitten 10400]

 

That’s a cute belt. That from Claire’s?

[DDD Dad 14251]

Those M4s look like fucking douchebag toys, especially when carried in front of an overstuffed tactical vest.

It’s not the vests that are overstuffed so much as what’s underneath them.

[Captainant 27446]

Man there's more footage coming out from the invasion of the capitol. I'll try and find a link to it, but the Q shaman who was in the center of the Senate chamber was there WITH A FUCKING COP!!! The cop was extremely civil with them, and even let them pose for a picture and the strongest words he used were "when you're done taking the picture can you please leave?"

What. the. actual. FUCK.

 

What the fuck are the capitol police doing if they aren't securing the seat of our fucking democracy from lunatic seditionists??? The capitol police were either in on it, or had orders to use kid gloves with the president's mob

EDIT: turns out they put all 12 minutes on youtube. Scrub forward to 6mins for the section I mentioned, but it's fucking infuriating how easily these anti-democracy insurrectionists were just allowed to saunter into the seat of our government. Occasionally with a police escort, to boot!

 

Edited January 18, 2021 by Captainant

[Captainant 27446]

 

edit: turns out it was just a homeless person's shit catching on fire, keep up the good work America

 

 

Edited January 18, 2021 by Captainant

[TexasEd 8064]

Back in the 80s and 90s when I lived and worked there homeless campfire would have been my first guess.  in the 2020s right wing terrorist seems like the go to assumption.

 

[Guest Lobo]

Addressing the homeless camp that started on fire near a Capitol building, "Goddamn, I admire you."  said Steve Adler, Greg Casar, and Kathy Tovo 

[blacklab 11849]

If you want to discuss the political parties, causes or your hot takes on the reasons for this go to the fucking cloak room.

[Armybrat 40732]

2 minutes ago, blacklab said:

If you want to discuss the political parties, causes or your hot takes on the reasons for this go to the fucking cloak room.

{retreating to gun owners forum}

[atomheartbevo 89414]

5 hours ago, DDD Dad said:

It’s not the vests that are overstuffed so much as what’s underneath them.

At least when they look overstuffed on a cop, there's a decent chance he's wearing body armor underneath his shirt.

 

[DDD Dad 14251]

2 hours ago, blacklab said:

If you want to discuss the political parties, causes or your hot takes on the reasons for this go to the fucking cloak room.

CENSORSHIP!!!!

[DDD Dad 14251]

5 hours ago, Captainant said:

Man there's more footage coming out from the invasion of the capitol. I'll try and find a link to it, but the Q shaman who was in the center of the Senate chamber was there WITH A FUCKING COP!!! The cop was extremely civil with them, and even let them pose for a picture and the strongest words he used were "when you're done taking the picture can you please leave?"

What. the. actual. FUCK.

 

What the fuck are the capitol police doing if they aren't securing the seat of our fucking democracy from lunatic seditionists??? The capitol police were either in on it, or had orders to use kid gloves with the president's mob

EDIT: turns out they put all 12 minutes on youtube. Scrub forward to 6mins for the section I mentioned, but it's fucking infuriating how easily these anti-democracy insurrectionists were just allowed to saunter into the seat of our government. Occasionally with a police escort, to boot!

 

To be fair (insert Letterkenny clip) the officer was slightly outnumbered.  While I agree it looked bad, one could argue that he made the best of the situation by de-escalating and getting them to leave peacefully.

[atomheartbevo 89414]

At least some of the groups hanging out this weekend in Austin near the Capitol were apparently part of a libertarian/2A get-together that had been planned going back to October.  Not just the news saying that - I recognized somebody in a photo, and messaged them and they said as much.  He said there was actually a much bigger get-together planned, but a lot of people tapped the breaks after Jan 6th.

Probably not helped that DPS troopers continue to operate in a Fuck Around and Find Out mode.  The shotgun is a nice crowd pleaseer disperser.

 

[atomheartbevo 89414]

Fellows, if you're single, and have a kevlar belt you can use to protect your kidneys, and you enjoy watching YouTube videos on how to field-strip or accessorize your M4,  I found the gal for you.  She 's not in Vic Mackey territory yet.  She likes Nikon though, that's a deal breaker for me, I prefer Canon.

[blacklab 11849]

[Brisketexan 104577]

28 minutes ago, DDD Dad said:

To be fair (insert Letterkenny clip) the officer was slightly outnumbered.  While I agree it looked bad, one could argue that he made the best of the situation by de-escalating and getting them to leave peacefully.

Correct.  He even indicated as much on the video, stating at the time how he was vastly outnumbered in the room, so he was playing the only strategy he really could: ask them to leave, nicely.  Sucks that it got to that point, but once he was there, he couldn't exactly start a fight with a large group of people.  That's a good way for one or more of the people there to end up rather dead.

[Brisketexan 104577]

9 minutes ago, blacklab said:

Can you imagine what a mood killer it is if y'all are getting all hot and frisky, and you have to take all that stuff off?  I mean, I remember being annoyed by a tricky bra strap back in the day.  Now you've gotta figure out how to unclip 37 different accessory vests and shit?  I do not envy folks in the Militia dating pool.  

Yeah, I mean, I just made the assumption that there's an actual Militia dating pool, so maybe the joke's on me.

[DDD Dad 14251]

31 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Can you imagine what a mood killer it is if y'all are getting all hot and frisky, and you have to take all that stuff off?  I mean, I remember being annoyed by a tricky bra strap back in the day.  Now you've gotta figure out how to unclip 37 different accessory vests and shit?  I do not envy folks in the Militia dating pool.  

Yeah, I mean, I just made the assumption that there's an actual Militia dating pool, so maybe the joke's on me.

Have you never heard of crotchless gun belts?

[Ichabod 184]

That girl in the above pic is my buddies neighbor. Didn't realize she was this devoted to the Libertarian party 

[NeverMarryAStripper 21781]

She seems to go against the Libertarian Party ideals.  I think the only thing she is devoted to is cheeseburgers, and possibly being fisted.

[Armybrat 40732]

Speaking of criminal Texas politicians needing protection, my son phoned a few minutes ago from Las Vegas where he just boarded the plane to come home to Austin. Four pre-boards dressed in suits got on without showing tickets. One of them was wearing a mask with “Ken Paxton” written on it.

 

Edited January 18, 2021 by Armybrat

[atomheartbevo 89414]

11 minutes ago, Armybrat said:

Speaking of criminal Texas politicians needing protection, my son phoned a few minutes ago from Las Vegas where he just boarded the plane to come home to Austin. Four pre-boards dressed in suits got on without showing tickets. One of them was wearing a mask with “Ken Paxton” written on it.

Nate Paul just wants to send some of his "friends" to have a friendly chat with Paxton?

[atomheartbevo 89414]

1 hour ago, Brisketexan said:

Yeah, I mean, I just made the assumption that there's an actual Militia dating pool, so maybe the joke's on me.

Well, there's https://farmersonly.dating so maybe Surly needs to start up militiaonly.dating or something

 

[MissingInAction 24811]

1 hour ago, atomheartbevo said:

At least some of the groups hanging out this weekend in Austin near the Capitol were apparently part of a libertarian/2A get-together that had been planned going back to October.  Not just the news saying that - I recognized somebody in a photo, and messaged them and they said as much.  He said there was actually a much bigger get-together planned, but a lot of people tapped the breaks after Jan 6th.

Probably not helped that DPS troopers continue to operate in a Fuck Around and Find Out mode.  The shotgun is a nice crowd pleaseer disperser.

 

Talked to a guy at 31 flavors who knows an aunt of a dps troopers mom, and word is they are prepared to go full fucking Alamo if necessary.

[atomheartbevo 89414]

1 minute ago, MissingInAction said:

Talked to a guy at 31 flavors who knows an aunt of a dps troopers mom, and word is they are prepared to go full fucking Alamo if necessary.

That's a few degrees of separation, but given how bored and pissed off most of them look, and how well equipped they are, yeah, I just assume that they aren't going to hold the doors for anybody.  And missing from the photos are the National Guard (and possibly the State Guard (Texas's own militia)), who show up in some of the videos and other photos.

Oh, and it's going to be raining off and on all week, and so not only will be they be bored, and pissed off that they have to be there, but they will have to deal with this shit in the rain, which will elevate the surly factor.

[Pato del Muerto 52342]

8 minutes ago, MissingInAction said:

Talked to a guy at 31 flavors who knows an aunt of a dps troopers mom, and word is they are prepared to go full fucking Alamo if necessary.

Do they know who ended up winning that battle?

[NeverMarryAStripper 21781]

The people that no longer own Texas?

[MissingInAction 24811]

29 minutes ago, Pato del Muerto said:

Do they know who ended up winning that battle?

Soooo what happened after the battle?

[Judge Roybeanbag 11809]

1 hour ago, Ichabod said:

That girl in the above pic is my buddies neighbor. Didn't realize she was this devoted to the Libertarian party 

The guy next to her in the middle pic has a bigger camel toe.

[Pato del Muerto 52342]

10 minutes ago, MissingInAction said:

Soooo what happened after the battle?

I believe the survivors got marched over to goliad and were executed along with the survivors of that battle. 
 

so if you are defending the Capitol, maybe you choose a different reference. 

Edited January 18, 2021 by Pato del Muerto

[Armybrat 40732]

1 hour ago, Pato del Muerto said:

I believe the survivors got marched over to goliad and were executed along with the survivors of that battle. 
 

so if you are defending the Capitol, maybe you choose a different reference. 

I don’t think you stayed awake in 7th Grade Texas History. 

a better analogy would be the Santa Fe Expedition.... launched from Round Rock. 😄

Edited January 19, 2021 by Armybrat

[Armybrat 40732]

1 minute ago, Armybrat said:

 

Edited January 19, 2021 by Armybrat
Dp

[Captainant 27446]

ProPublica just put out a really incredible timeline of all the videos recorded on, around, and inside the Capitol. 

https://projects.propublica.org/parler-capitol-videos/

Thank god the parler admins were dumbfucks and broke just about every best-practice when building their insurrection platform.

 

Side note on parler - did yall hear it's back up? It's being hosted by a russian hosting company. Lmao.

[Guest Lobo]

It's amazing to me, having watched 'The Americans', the trouble Russia went through to try to topple our Republic.  When really all they needed to do was just wait 25 years and plant some seeds to watch us destroy ourselves.  I thought the show was great but fanciful, at best.  One thing remains though, Keri Russell's ass could still heal our nation if some of you would quit acting like this Capitol raid was just a misunderstanding with directions on Waze.  

[Captainant 27446]

Ho-lee-fuk if you want some straight, uncut crazy, check out this ad-hoc interview of the Q shaman right after he was escorted out of the senate chamber and let free by capitol PD

https://projects.propublica.org/parler-capitol-videos/?id=HpQ07PUDmWDk

There's some fucking WILD videos in there, it's fascinating to see how widespread the breach was and how many different melees were going on at once.

[tbone_ 14020]

Someone posted in one of the threads a good succinct summary of the various fringe groups and their backgrounds/ideology.

Anyone know where that was? Can’t seem to locate it.

[Captainant 27446]

12 Guard members removed from Biden inauguration

WASHINGTON (AP) — Twelve U.S. Army National Guard members have been removed from the presidential inauguration security mission after they were found to have ties with right-wing militia groups or posted extremist views online, according to two U.S. officials. There was no threat to President-elect Joe Biden, they said.

The officials, a senior intelligence official and an Army official briefed on the matter, did not say which fringe group the Guard members belonged to or what unit they served in. The officials were not authorized to speak publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

[Guest Lobo]

Yeah, this is a totally normal event unfolding at the seat of American government.  Having U.S. Army National Guardsmen escort out of the Capitol building, 12 other U.S. Army National Guardsmen because they can't be trusted to not murder (or aide insurrectionists in the same) the incoming government in a building they shouldn't even be inside of right now in the first place.  

It feels so good to be globally respected again.  

Don't matter either way anyway, 21 hours from now---I gotta turn in my weapon and net worth because the 2A is being repealed and we're turning Socialist. 

 

[NeverMarryAStripper 21781]

Socialist...Fascist, whatever it takes

[atomheartbevo 89414]

I wonder if Greg is offended that when you enter the military, a background check is done on you, and that before you are given a security clearance, or allowed to operate in an area that requires a security clearance, that you are vetted.

We are not in the darkest timeline, we are in the stupid timeline.

[Homercles 10205]

1 hour ago, Captainant said:

12 Guard members removed from Biden inauguration

WASHINGTON (AP) — Twelve U.S. Army National Guard members have been removed from the presidential inauguration security mission after they were found to have ties with right-wing militia groups or posted extremist views online, according to two U.S. officials. There was no threat to President-elect Joe Biden, they said.

The officials, a senior intelligence official and an Army official briefed on the matter, did not say which fringe group the Guard members belonged to or what unit they served in. The officials were not authorized to speak publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

Maybe they just found aggy stickers on their trucks 

[staboner 4957]

On 1/19/2021 at 9:04 AM, Ichabod said:

That girl in the above pic is my buddies neighbor. Didn't realize she was this devoted to the Libertarian party 

well it appears she is

and she doesn't have neighbors

[Pato del Muerto 52342]

3 hours ago, Lobo said:

Yeah, this is a totally normal event unfolding at the seat of American government.  Having U.S. Army National Guardsmen escort out of the Capitol building, 12 other U.S. Army National Guardsmen because they can't be trusted to not murder (or aide insurrectionists in the same) the incoming government in a building they shouldn't even be inside of right now in the first place.  

It feels so good to be globally respected again.  

Don't matter either way anyway, 21 hours from now---I gotta turn in my weapon and net worth because the 2A is being repealed and we're turning Socialist. 

 

Earlier this year I sold all of the weapons that I hadn’t lost in boating accidents, so that’ll save me a trip to pd. 

[crash_davis 23084]

NSIAP

Great video spelling out possible charges facing rioters. Spoiler, Sedition seems slam dunk in most cases.

 

[Captainant 27446]

Houston police officer charged in Capitol riot after FBI agents find deleted selfies on phone

Quote

A veteran Houston police officer was federally charged Tuesday in connection with the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol after agents said they searched his phone and found deleted selfies taken inside the building.

Tam Pham initially told authorities during a Jan. 12 interview at his Richmond, Texas, home that he traveled to Washington, D.C., for a business trip, according to an affidavit obtained Wednesday by NBC News. While he said he briefly attended President Donald Trump's rally after learning about it on Facebook, Pham denied following the crowd to the Capitol, FBI Special Agent Amie Stemen wrote in the affidavit.

The search of his phone revealed otherwise. Agents found footage of him inside the Capitol in his folder of deleted photos. Among the images were portraits of the Capitol Rotunda, a selfie inside the historic building and a photo of him posing with a statue of former President Gerald R. Ford draped in a Trump 2020 flag.

The time stamp on the images and videos placed him inside the Capitol at the time of the siege, authorities said.

After investigators warned him it was illegal to lie, Pham admitted he joined rally attendees at the Capitol, according to the affidavit. He said he jumped barricades surrounding the building, but had no intention to enact violence or vandalism, Stemen wrote.

Pham told investigators he entered the Rotunda and remained there for about 10 to 15 minutes to “look at the historical art on the walls,” according to the affidavit.

He was charged with one count of knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority and one count of violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds, records show.

[Guest Lobo]

I broke into the Capitol illegally to "look at the historical art on the walls."  Bold strategy, Pham.  Let's see if it pays off. 

I picture Pham looking at the murals like Steve Martin in "L.A. Story."  

"I mean, the way Washington is holding the flag...it's almost...filthy.  It's really pretty torrid."  

[atomheartbevo 89414]

It blows my mind how many people were so stupid.

I mean, it'd be one thing if you had a bunch of Timothy McVeigh/Unabomber types with manifestos, Qanon incels living in their moms' basements, etc.

You know, people with very little to lose.  You expect them to go all in.

But holy shit, it's a bunch of cops, real estate agents, insurance company employees, small business owners, etc.

People with a lot to lose, with a lot of skin in the game, and who are fully cognizant of what they are doing.