Attorney General Merrick Garland delivered a speech to his Department of Justice on Wednesday heavy on platitudes, but little new news made. Many are trying to read into his words that the DOJ is actively investigating the coup plotters behind the January 6 insurrection, but there has been no public facing evidence that this is in fact occurring.
I am familiar with DOJ policy from working in the SDNY for a decade. But there is no point in making this speech if it’s just repeating platitudes. If DOJ is investigating the coup to overturn the election, the AG can and should confirm that. This is bigger than Jan 6. https://t.co/4jJ4bKHVNz
— Daniel Goldman (@danielsgoldman) January 4, 2022
If the coup plotters, of whom there are many, were actually being called in for interviews by the FBI or DOJ attorneys, or subpoeaned to appear before a grand jury, you can bet that these Trump acolytes would be whining to Fox News and other far-right media outlets, and parroting Donald Trump’s “political witch hunt” talking point. (There actually be witches). There would be leaks from the DOJ to “access” Capitol Hill reporters. None of ths has been occurring. Not a good sign.
The Washington Post reports, Garland: DOJ will hold those responsible for Jan. 6 riot accountable, whether they were present or committed other crimes:
Attorney General Merrick Garland vowed to hold all those responsible for the Jan. 6 riot accountable — whether they were at the Capitol or committed other crimes surrounding the day’s events — saying investigators are methodically building more complicated and serious cases and would prosecute people “at any level.”
“The actions we have taken thus far will not be our last,” Garland said Wednesday, speaking in the Justice Department’s Great Hall in an address that was broadcast live online and by cable news channels. “The Justice Department remains committed to holding all January 6th perpetrators, at any level, accountable under law — whether they were present that day or were otherwise criminally responsible for the assault on our democracy. We will follow the facts wherever they lead.”
It has been a whole year, General. There is enough evidence in the publicly available reporting to indict several of the coup plotters, e.g., Steve Bannon and Peter Navarro for starters. What is taking so long? Bannon is on the air every day inciting the next insurrection. Arrest him on the air, damnit!
Former U.S. Attorney and U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse was not reassured by AG Merrick Garland’s speech. WHITEHOUSE Statement On Attorney General Garland’s Speech On January 6th Investigation:
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), a senior member of the Senate Judiciary Committee and a former U.S. Attorney, released the following statement on Attorney General Merrick Garland’s remarks today on the status of the Justice Department’s investigation of the January 6th attack:
“Sweeping up low-level players while ignoring the kingpins upstream isn’t a full investigation.
“The Attorney General committed today to a fearless investigation that ‘follows the money’ and those responsible upstream. That is good. Investigative steps may be underway behind the proper screen of law enforcement and grand jury secrecy. That would be good.
“We must have a thorough inquiry that extends beyond the individuals who stormed the Capitol to the planners and funders who stoked the violence. The House’s January 6th Committee is doing that work, including a hard look at members of Congress and those in the White House. The Committee is also moving swiftly, which is important. The Department must do the same.”
Senator Whitehouse was interviewed by MSNBC’s Ari Melber, and discussed his concerns.
Merrick Garland’s former law professor at Harvard, Laurence Tribe, was interviewed by MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell and expressed similar concerns about the lack of any public facing evidence of a DOJ investigation into the coup plotters. Tribe says the DOJ is focusing too much on January 6th and not enough on the larger plot to overturn the election by coercing state officials to manipulate the results. “The scary thing,” Tribe says, “is there is simply no indication that the department of justice is investigating that broader plot. I hope to heaven that it is, but there’s no indication of it.”
If, as Attorney General Merrick Garland said: “The Justice Department remains committed to holding all January 6th perpetrators, at any level, accountable under law — whether they were present that day or were otherwise criminally responsible for the assault on our democracy. We will follow the facts wherever they lead” – the DOJ cannot move at a glacial pace of investigation. It must work with dispatch to bring the coup plotters to justice, and quickly. Time is of the essence, and time is running out.
As I have said before, if Merrick Garland is not up to the task, please resign, so that a more aggressive prosecutor can be appointed Attorney General. We cannot lose our democracy because Merrick Garland is overly cautious and took too long to bring the coup plotters to justice.
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Neal Katyal writes at The Atlantic, “Investigate Them”, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/01/justice-department-garland-january-six/621167/
(excerpt)
In the year since the Capitol, and American democracy, was savagely attacked, the beloved institution where I worked during earlier parts of my career, the Department of Justice, has been eerily silent on many events of that day. True, the department has done a terrific job at prosecuting some of the rank-and-file attackers, but thus far it has made no peep about investigations into former President Donald Trump, let alone his coterie of enablers, such as the former DOJ official Jeffrey Clark and former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, or his ostensible attorneys, John Eastman and Rudy Giuliani. This investigation into high-level wrongdoing is the greatest test an attorney general could face. And right now, despite what he said in yesterday’s generally good speech, it is worth worrying about whether Merrick Garland is failing that test.
[T]here is so far zero evidence of an actual investigation into Trump and his advisers. It’s been an entire year, and the governing U.S. Attorney’s Manual, which establishes the rules for federal prosecution, says, “When the community needs to be reassured that the appropriate law enforcement agency is investigating a matter … comments about or confirmation of an ongoing investigation may be necessary.” Moreover, if such an investigation were happening, it is likely that we would have learned of it by now, either through leaks or an interviewee saying something (or someone trying to block the inquiry through a public lawsuit, as the Trumps have done in New York). Law-enforcement officials know you can’t easily start such interviews a year or more after the fact—evidence disappears (a known issue with Trump folks) and memories fade. So it is very much worth worrying about whether the caution Garland cultivated as a judge—for you don’t sit on the nation’s second-highest court for two decades and avoid reversal without a heaping amount of caution—is driving his decision making today. If so, what would be the harm in “moving on” from what happened, as many top Republicans have argued?
Here’s the harm: The essence of the rule of law is to treat like parties equally. That’s why Lady Justice appears blindfolded, because she is to dole out justice impartially. I teach my criminal-law students that this is a “same yardstick” principle—what law is, at bottom, is a command to judge people according to the same yardstick, whether you like them or not. And that means that if there is serious evidence of crime, you don’t look the other way, no matter how hard prosecution may be.
[T]he yardstick principle asks us to pretend that those responsible were Democrats, and to use that thought experiment to decide whether an investigation is warranted.
When it comes to January 6, Attorney General Garland must realize that this yardstick points in a clear direction. As one senior government official put it, “There is no question—none—that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day. No question about it. The people who stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of their President … The leader of the free world cannot spend weeks thundering that shadowy forces are stealing our country and then feign surprise when people believe him and do reckless things.”
Moreover, given the public record already available—including evidence of “war rooms” at the Willard Hotel, bogus legal memos that circulated among senior government leaders, and even a member of Congress who is known to have worn body armor that day—it’s very hard to see how an investigation into all of this wouldn’t be required. To fail to investigate government officials, including the former president, who had to know that the attempt was to interfere with the counting of the vote, to say nothing of its potential for accompanying violence, is fantastically dangerous. The whole point of criminal law is to provide societal condemnation of evil acts and to deter them in the future. If government leaders and their private army of advisers can get away with encouraging a mob to, in 2021, stop one of our nation’s most solemn functions, the counting of electoral votes, what is to stop them from trying again in any other year?
[N]othing less is at stake than protecting the architecture of the U.S. government. Right now, members of Congress who look complicit in the January 6 attack are refusing to cooperate with the congressional investigation, emboldened by their belief that there is no serious risk of Justice Department prosecution. A DOJ investigation would change that. It speaks to Attorney General Garland’s character that he has handled the investigation with so much tact. But we are at a national crossroads. If Garland doesn’t speak out about the investigation’s scope, the other guys will.
[It’s] now up to Merrick Garland to run a criminal investigation to make sure that Trump and his advisers don’t get away with anything ever—ever.