It has never been easy for me to write about January 6.
Even standing in the crowd that day to cover the chaos, I found that sending out the first reports was a struggle. First, thanks to the sheer mass of the raging mob or perhaps some heavy law enforcement tech, the internet was jammed. It was a challenge to send out videos and posts documenting what was happening in front of me. But, along with dealing with those concrete logistics, I had to overcome the sheer disbelief. Was I really seeing people climbing the walls? Were Nick Fuentes Groyper flags really hanging from the windows of the U.S. Capitol? What had happened to the police?
In the wake of the insurrection at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, President Donald Trump quickly took up the cause of a 35-year-old veteran named Ashli Babbitt.
“Who killed Ashli Babbitt?” he asked in a one-sentence statement on July 1, 2021.
“An innocent, wonderful, incredible woman, a military woman,” Trump said during a Fox News interview a few weeks later.
To Trump and his Make America Great Again movement, Babbitt was not an insurrectionist shot while trying to get close to the members of Congress who were certifying the election results, the sole rioter killed by police that day. She was a martyr, someone who died for her beliefs. She was a woman who had died for lack of protection.
Trump’s framing of Babbitt’s death in the months after he left office served as one of the guiding principles of his second term: the necessity of “protecting women” and an insistence on identifying and eradicating those he sees as posing a threat to them.
This article is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis.
This is an exclusive excerpt adapted from “Storm at the Capitol: An Oral History of January 6th” by Associated Press reporter Mary Clare Jalonick. The book draws on personal interviews by the author, testimony, court documents and other public sources to compile a definitive account of the hours leading up to, during, and just after rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021.
This excerpt begins in the 2 p.m. hour, just after the first rioters had broken into the Capitol one floor below the Senate chamber. Almost the entire Senate was huddled inside as the people were coming closer and security officials debated what to do. Secret Service agents had already evacuated Vice President Mike Pence, who had been presiding over the debate on Arizona’s electors.
As the senators waited, Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, received a call from the White House. It was President Donald Trump on the line — but he was looking for Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville, a loyal supporter who had just been elected. Trump had mistakenly dialed Lee’s number.
The quotes in this excerpt are taken from interviews with the author, court testimony, pool reports and other published and spoken accounts. The words of Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, are from a Feb. 20, 2021 article in The Salt Lake Tribune by Bryan Schott: “What Sen. Mike Lee told me about Trump’s call the day of the Capitol riot.”
Thank you for your patience over the last few weeks while I, and other TPMers who help me put this together each day, took a break for the holidays. We’re back, with an appropriately brutal series of events to wade through to mark our return … 🙃
In a long-winded social media post this morning, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth — who likes to call himself the Secretary of War — announced that the Defense Department had placed a formal censure letter on Sen. Mark Kelly’s (D-AZ) file and “initiated retirement grade determination proceedings” against the Navy veteran. This is all a long way of saying he has initiated the formal proceedings for reducing Kelly’s Navy rank in retirement (he is a retired Navy Captain) and may also threaten Kelly’s retirement pay.
On Saturday, a friend and I were comparing notes on the events following the U.S. raid on Venezuela. Setting apart all the questions about just what the White House is trying to accomplish in Venezuela, my most basic takeaway from the events of the last week is this: as President Trump’s popularity and power erode domestically he will respond with more aggressive assertions of power in those areas where his executive and prerogative authorities remain unbounded, where his domestic popularity matters the least. (This applies most obviously, though not only, to his military powers overseas.) Anything else wouldn’t be consistent with Trump’s character, which is inflexible and unchanging, though perhaps hardening with the progress of advanced age. The current situation between the U.S. and Venezuela shows how jagged, unstable and uneven this may become.
We’re kicking off the new year with our first Morning Memo Live event on Jan. 29 in Washington, D.C.
I’ll be moderating a panel discussion on the politicization of the Justice Department, featuring:
Stacey Young, a former 18-year DOJ veteran who is the founder and executive director of Justice Connection, a network of DOJ alumni providing support to current and recent DOJ employees;
Aaron Zelinsky, a former assistant U.S. attorney in Maryland who served on Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s team, where he prosecuted Roger Stone, and who is now a partner at Zuckerman Spaeder in Baltimore; and
Anna Bower, a senior editor at Lawfare who covers rule of law issues and fields wacky Signal messages from Lindsey Halligan.
We’ll be taking your questions, with a reception to follow.
As ghastly as the lawless U.S. attacks on alleged drug-smuggling boats had been, it was clear all along that they were merely a prelude to an equally lawless but more robust military action against Nicolás Maduro’s regime in Venezuela. The weekend’s surprise decapitation strike — in violation of international law, U.S. law, and Venezuela’s national sovereignty — sets the United States on a familiar course of both historical Latin American interventionism and 21st century regime change with no plan or exit strategy.
What is unfamiliar about it and makes it more alarming than previous foreign escapades by the United States is that President Trump is claiming and exercising an unbridled form of executive power not heretofore seen in the United States, unconstrained by a pliable GOP-controlled Congress that has abdicated its constitutional powers.
Trump’s comments last night on Air Force One suggest that no country is safe from his impulsivity, especially as his domestic political fortunes darken amid his lame duck status:
In addition to a second strike against Venezuela, Trump threatened Cuba, Mexico, Colombia, Iran, and Greenland.
Maduroand his wife are scheduled to appear in federal court in Manhattan at noon for arraignment on a newly unsealed four-count superseding indictment alleging (1) a narco-terrorism conspiracy, (2) a cocaine importation conspiracy; (3-4) possession of and conspiracy to possess machine guns and destructive devices.
As of last evening, the Trump administration still had not briefed the Gang of Eight, according to Hill Democrats.
The Lawlessness
While U.S. presidents have increasingly bypassed Congress and engaged in hostilities abroad on a largely unilateral basis, no prior president has simultaneously asserted such wide-ranging executive authority while aggressively sidelining the legislative branch not just in foreign affairs but in matters of the purse. It sets up a uniquely dangerous threat to the constitutional order:
Just Security: “[S]triking Venezuela and abducting its president, is clearly a violation of the prohibition on the use of force in Article 2(4) of the UN Charter. That prohibition is the bedrock rule of the international system that separates the rule of law from anarchy, safeguards small States from their more powerful neighbors, and protects civilians from the devastation of war. The consequences of flouting this rule so brazenly are likely to extend well beyond the case of Maduro’s forcible ouster.”
Steve Vladeck: “[A] blatantly unlawful use of military force overseas will go un-remedied—because there’s no viable legal pathway to challenge it; and because the one branch of government historically in a position to hold the executive accountable in these cases (you might remember it—Congress) has become completely feckless not just in general, but in pushing back against unlawful unilateral uses of military force, specifically.”
NYT’s Charlie Savage: Can the U.S. Legally ‘Run’ Venezuela After Maduro’s Capture?
In another egregious move, the Trump White House posted video of a perp walk of Maduro.
How We Got Here
By nearly all accounts, the U.S. attack on Venezuela was not an inevitability at the start of Trump II, nor the result of a clear ideological through-line or grand strategic bargain. It was, like so many Trump II initiatives, the result of an easily manipulated, feckless president who has no clear sense of the U.S. national interest. Was it the oil? Sure. The rare earth elements? Perhaps. But are those reasons any more plausible than Trump’s fetish for violence and Stephen Miller’s thrill in taking punitive measures against brown people?
As TPM’s Josh Marshall put it: “[I]’s a mistake to think there’s a ‘real’ reason mixed in with other subterfuges and rationales, or that it’s important to find out which one the ‘real’ reason is. It’s not that linear or logical.”
The real answer is “all of the above” and whatever other rationales the Trump White House seizes on in the comings days, weeks, and months to bolster its position.
The Never-Ending Nobel Madness
The WaPo reports on why Trump isn’t elevating Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado:
Two people close to the White House said the president’s lack of interest in boosting Machado, despite her recent efforts to flatter Trump, stemmed from her decision to accept the Nobel Peace Prize, an award the president has openly coveted.
Although Machado ultimately said she was dedicating the award to Trump, her acceptance of the prize was an “ultimate sin,” said one of the people.
“If she had turned it down and said, ‘I can’t accept it because it’s Donald Trump’s,’ she’d be the president of Venezuela today,” this person said.
The Alien Enemies Act Was the First Salvo at Venezuela
As a reminder that the first attack on Venezuela under Trump II was the lawless invocation of the Alien Enemies Act in March, the Trump DOJ last night cited the ouster of Maduro in asking U.S. District Judge James Boasberg of D.C. for an extension of today’s deadline to submit a proposal for how to provide the original AEA detainees with due process:
Given substantial changes on the ground in Venezuela and the fluid nature of the unfolding situation, Defendants respectfully move for an extension to respond to this Court’s Order … directing them to propose a remedy by Monday, January 5. Over the weekend, the United States apprehended Nicolas Maduro. As a result, the situation on the ground in Venezuela has changed dramatically. Defendants thus need additional time to determine the feasibility of various proposals. Defendants therefore request a 7-day extension to evaluate and determine what remedies are possible.
Here’s the backstory on what Boasberg had demanded from the administration.
The Biggest News Over the Holiday
U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw of Nashville unsealed his Dec. 3 order that found high-level Trump DOJ officials were involved in pushing the prosecution of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, bolstering his case for vindictive prosecution.
The finding that acting U.S. Attorney Robert McGuire may not have been the sole decision-maker contradicts repeated assertions made in court by the Trump DOJ to try to avoid scrutiny into the roles of top officials, including Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche.
From Crenshaw’s much-anticipated order:
Specifically, some of the documents suggest not only that McGuire was not a solitary decision-maker, but he in fact reported to others in DOJ and the decision to prosecute Abrego may have been a joint decision, with others who may or may not have acted with an improper motivation. …
These documents show that McGuire did not act alone and to the extent McGuire had input on the decision to prosecute, he shared it with Singh and others. … Specifically, the government’s documents may contradict its prior representations that the decision to prosecute was made locally and that there were no outside influences.
An evidentiary hearing is scheduled for Jan. 28 on Abrego Garcia’s vindictive prosecution claims.
Hannah Dugan Resigns
Convicted of interfering with the arrest of an undocumented immigrant in her courthouse, Wisconsin state Judge Hannah Dugan has tendered her resignation from the bench, under threat of impeachment for statehouse Republicans.
ICYMI: Jack Smith Testimony
In a New Year’s Eve news dump, the Republican-controlled House Judiciary Committee released the transcript and video of former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s deposition testimony. Your regular reminder that Smith is being targeted by Republicans as political retribution for his investigations of Trump:
The Corruption: White Collar Crime Edition
“President Trump’s first year back in office turned the world of white-collar enforcement upside down,” the WSJ reports.
There Is Always More Epstein
WSJ: The Incident That Prompted Trump to Ban Epstein From Mar-a-Lago’s Spa
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This article first appeared at ProPublica, a nonprofit newsroom that investigates abuses of power. Sign up to receive their biggest stories as soon as they’re published.
Before Todd Blanche could be confirmed as the second-highest official at the Justice Department, he had to satisfy the concerns of ethics officials.
Let me reiterate a general point I’ve made in other posts. I don’t think there’s any actual reason we’re invading Venezuela or trying to decapitate its government or whatever we’re doing. I think there are two or three different factions in the government each pushing a very hostile policy toward Venezueala for differing reasons. Meanwhile, Trump thinks it’s cool and has a personal beef with Maduro. That combination of factors created a lot of forward momentum within the U.S. government with nothing pushing back in the opposite direction. That gets you to today. My point is that it’s a mistake to think there’s a “real” reason mixed in with other subterfuges and rationales, or that it’s important to find out which one the “real” reason is. It’s not that linear or logical.
Let me share a few thoughts about the U.S. action overnight in Venezuela. I say “action” because it’s not clear to me that the U.S. itself (as in the people calling the shots in Washington) know what this was, or have decided. I woke up in the middle of the night and saw the news of some major U.S. attack. That only registered a few WTFs in my mind. Then I woke up again at maybe 4 a.m. and saw at the least the claim that U.S. forces had captured and exfiltrated Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. Then my WTFs escalated to 11.
Let me take an initial crack at assessing what the United States has done in Venezuela with the proviso that time can easily prove such analyses mistaken. Donald Trump’s claimed takeover of Venezuela has been compared to what the American invasion aimed to do in Iraq in 2003, but I’d go back instead to the American intervention in the Spanish-American War in 1898 and its conquest and takeover of Cuba and the Philippines, about which I wrote in Folly of Empire.
