[ President Trump should be impeached, removed from office, and
then arrested for inciting his supporters to besiege and invade the US
Capitol. Because the rioters were white, they were allowed to walk
away. But just imagine if they had been Black.]
[[link removed]]

THE CONFEDERACY FINALLY STORMED THE CAPITOL  
[[link removed]]

 

Elie Mystal
January 6, 2021
The Nation
[[link removed]]

*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
* [[link removed]]

_ President Trump should be impeached, removed from office, and then
arrested for inciting his supporters to besiege and invade the US
Capitol. Because the rioters were white, they were allowed to walk
away. But just imagine if they had been Black. _

Right-wing extremists climb the west wall of the the US Capitol on
Wednesday, January 6, 2021., Jose Luis Magana / AP Photo // The Nation


 

At a speech he gave to a rally of his supporters right before Congress
attempted to certify his Electoral College defeat, Trump told his
people
[[link removed]] to
go to the Capitol to “support” members of Congress objecting to
the certification. He recited his long list of lies about the
election, and then egged his people on by telling them that Vice
President Mike Pence “didn’t have the courage to do what should
have been done to protect our country and our Constitution.” He
spoke for nearly two hours.

Not long afterward, his people breached the Capitol, stopped the
certification process in the House and Senate, and forced Pence and
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi to be taken to a secure location.

 

This is what the insurrection looked like as it began to march down
Pennsylvania Avenue toward the Capitol
The Star (Toronto)
For me, that’s enough to charge him with a crime. Trump’s speech
failed the Supreme Court’s “Brandenburg Test
[[link removed]]” (so named for
the 1969 case _Brandenburg v. Ohio_), which determines when speech
becomes an exhortation to violent action and loses its First Amendment
protections. The test asks if the speech was “directed to inciting
or producing imminent lawless action,” and the speech has to be
“likely to incite or produce such action.” Speaking in “code”
is no defense. Trump’s statements were directed to produce immediate
lawlessness—and were likely to do so.

There’s also a statute: 18 U.S.C. Section 373
[[link removed]] makes
“solicitation to commit a crime of violence” a federal offense.
The language there is: “Whoever, with intent that another person
engage in conduct constituting a felony…solicits, commands, induces,
or otherwise endeavors to persuade such other person to engage in such
conduct,” shall be imprisoned or fined or both.

Authorities would remove and arrest Trump—if he were Black. That’s
not a guess; that is literally what has already happened to Black
Lives Matter activist DeRay McKesson. In 2016, at a protest in the
aftermath of the police murder of Alton Sterling, Baton Rouge police
arrested McKesson and charged him with incitement. He hadn’t said
anything violent, but apparently one protester—one—threw a brick
that injured a cop. McKesson was just the most visible organizer at
the event, and so he got locked up.

McKesson was eventually released, after which he sued the police for
the false arrest. The department settled
[[link removed]],
but then the injured officer sued McKesson
[[link removed]]—again,
under an incitement theory. The US Court of Appeals for the Fifth
Circuit allowed the officer’s lawsuit to proceed, and McKesson had
to go all the way to the Supreme Court before it was finally
dismissed. If a Black activist can be arrested and hounded all the way
to the Supreme Court because a protester at a rally threw a brick,
what should happen to a white president who encourages his people to
storm the Capitol?

Nothing? Will the answer of the white legal establishment be
“nothing”? Leaders of failed insurrections (or coups or acts of
sedition or whatever you want to call this) are not supposed to get
off with nothing.

We are here, living in a state that is teetering on collapse, because
for too long the authorities have done nothing to stop violent white
supremacists, now organized under Donald Trump’s banner, or their
enablers in government and the media. Right-wing media incites their
viewers against “the Squad” consistently—yet law enforcement
does nothing. The Republican Party inflames anti-mask lunatics who
then go out and plan to kidnap Gretchen Whitmer—yet Republican
voters do nothing to punish representatives. And Trump has been
directly cited in the manifestos of mass shooters—yet
counterterrorism forces do nothing. Nothing ever happens, but the
media continues to amplify Trump’s violent rhetoric with live news
coverage.

Republicans actively encourage the violent behavior of their fringe
extremists. Yet it’s not just Trump. It’s not just Josh Hawley
boosting Trump’s baseless claims about the election. It’s also law
enforcement—the ones whose unions endorsed him—who give aid and
comfort to lawless white people. It’s the cops in Kenosha who gave
street terrorist Kyle Rittenhouse a drink of water, and it’s the
cops in D.C. who took selfies with the people storming the Capitol
[[link removed]].

As with McKesson, we know what would be happening to these Capitol
rioters if they were Black. We just experienced a summer of protest
against police brutality, and time and again, the police met those
protesters with still more brutality. Black Lives Matter protesters,
as well as reporters, were tear-gassed and shot at with rubber bullets
for… being between Trump and a photo opportunity with a Bible. Black
Lives Matter protesters were pushed, body-slammed, choke-held,
pepper-sprayed, and beaten by police… for being in sneezing distance
of big-box stores. And Black people were arrested all summer—scores
of us—in the name of restoring order.

How many white people were arrested during the Capitol takeover? Did
they get the guy who took the dais off the Senate floor? How about the
one who sat down at Pelosi’s assistant’s desk? Or the people who
broke windows and rummaged through desks? Did they get the guy walking
around restricted areas with a Confederate freaking flag? What about
the people who planted explosive devices inside the Capitol?

As of this writing, D.C. Police are reporting that they’ve arrested
12 people
[[link removed]];
one woman was shot and killed. (The number of arrests has since
climbed to 52, the number of dead to 4, and the number of injured
police stands at 14.) The media turns every Black Lives Matter protest
into an episode of _C.O.P.S._, thereby sending the message that the
authorities have control, but, near as I can tell, the few arrests
happened off-camera. There was no dramatic paddy wagon scene despite
the endless displays of lawlessness and the first looting of the US
Capitol since the War of 1812.

The double standard is not surprising, but it is instructive. Our
society is permissive of white rage. That rage is constantly coddled,
explained, massaged, and justified. We are forever told that white
anger must be understood, white grievance must be explained, and white
racism must be studied because if we just dig down deep enough,
we’ll find that it’s actually motivated by some other, more benign
factor.

In contrast, Black anger is arrested. Black rage is executed. Black
grievance is dismissed. It’s not that Black people don’t have
cause to storm the Capitol and demand redress for injustices committed
against us—it’s that a Black person, with or without a weapon,
wouldn’t get two steps inside Statuary Hall without being gunned
down by police.

Joe Biden spoke about the attempted coup and he said, “This is not a
reflection of the true America.” He was wrong. White people have
always been allowed to violently express dissent. The Black people
pulled out of their homes and literally roasted in the New York draft
riots of 1863 could tell you what a “true” reflection of America
looks like, just as the Black people beaten on the Edmund Pettus
Bridge could tell you. This attempt was a perfect reflection of what
has always been true in America: We have one set of laws for Black
people and another, more lenient set of laws for violent white people.

Trump must be impeached and removed. All of his supporters who
breached the Capitol must be rounded up and arrested.

The likelihood that they won’t be is the reason this country is a
failed state.

_[Elie Mystal is The Nation’s justice correspondent—covering the
courts, the criminal justice system, and politics—and the force
behind the magazine’s monthly column “Objection!” He is also an
Alfred Knobler Fellow at the Type Media Center. He can be followed
@ElieNYC.]_

_Copyright c 2020The Nation. Reprinted with permission. May not be
reprinted without permission
[[link removed]].
Distributed by PARS International Corp
[[link removed]]. _

_Please support  progressive journalism. Get a digital subscription
[[link removed]]
to The Nation for just $12.00!_

 

*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
* [[link removed]]

 

 

 

INTERPRET THE WORLD AND CHANGE IT

 

 

Submit via web [[link removed]]
Submit via email
Frequently asked questions [[link removed]]
Manage subscription [[link removed]]
Visit xxxxxx.org [[link removed]]

Twitter [[link removed]]

Facebook [[link removed]]

 




[link removed]

To unsubscribe, click the following link:
[link removed]