Guilty as Hell
This week a jury found Enrique Tarrio, the current leader of the Proud Boys, and three other group members guilty of sedition. Put together with earlier sedition convictions and guilty pleas from the Oath Keerps trial last year, and federal prosecutors have now successfully prosecuted 14 defendants for seditious conspiracy.
I know that many are unhappy with Merrick Garland for not yet charging Trump with any crimes, but there’s no doubt that Garland’s strategy for prosecuting the insurrectionist foot soldiers is a success. The DOJ’s record of guilty pleas and convictions is impressive. Recall that nearly all these folks simply exited the building after the riot. Garland promised to bring them to justice, which felt highly unlikely then. But Garland was a man of his word.
Defendants aren’t often charged with seditious conspiracy, and prosecutors who do bring the charge rarely succeed. This piece from Vox does an excellent job of breaking down why. From a historical perspective, I highly recommend Rachel Maddow’s Ultra podcast, which recaps two different sedition trials throughout the series. The bar for convictions was high, and it’s impressive that the DOJ has stuck the landing 14 times.
I believe these convictions are the main reason we hadn’t seen any other organized coup attempts or attempts at creating civil unrest when Trump was indicted. Groups like the Proud…
