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This is a moment in which political time seems compressed, with different events overlying one another. On Monday, Joe Biden, wearing a dark-gray polo shirt, spoke briefly to reporters after receiving his second dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine. The first question he was asked was whether he has confidence in his coronavirus team (I do, he said); the second was whether he is afraid of taking his oath of office outdoors (No, Im not). The third was whether he is worried that the impeachment of Donald Trump might create delays in getting a new stimulus bill through Congress. Biden said that he had been speaking with senators about whether, if House members move forward with impeachment (which they obviously are), it might be possible to bifurcate thisthat is, to have the Senate divide its days into two parts, using one half for an impeachment trial and the other to get Bidens Cabinet nominees confirmed and his agenda approved. And why not? Everything else seems to be playing on a split screen now.

Similarly, Mondays pro-forma session of the House lasted less than a quarter of an hour, and yet it involved two measures that reflect how serious, and still precarious, this moment is. One was the formal submission and acceptance of the resignation of the House sergeant at arms, Paul Irving. His counterpart on the Senate side, Michael Stenger, has also resigned, but the questions about the role that each man played in the failure to defend the Capitol have only begun. Timothy Blodgett, who had been Irvings deputy, was immediately sworn in as his successor. The second measure was the introduction by the House Majority Leader, Steny Hoyer, of a resolution calling on the Vice-President, Mike Pence, to invoke the Twenty-fifth Amendment and begin the process of stripping Trump of the power of the Presidency, on the ground that he is incapable of carrying out his duties. Hoyer asked for unanimous consent; the chamber was almost empty, but Alex Mooney, Republican of West Virginia, was on hand to object. The result is that the full House will consider the resolution on Tuesday.

The Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, has told her members to be back for the vote on the Twenty-fifth Amendment resolution and for what is expected to follow. The plan is to pass the resolution on Tuesday evening, give Pence twenty-four hours to act on it, and, if he does not, proceed with a vote on impeachment. Pence has signalled that he does not plan to try to remove Trump; he and Trump met on Monday night, but their exchange reportedly had the character of a conversation, not a showdown. Trump, unrepentant, said on Tuesday, as he was leaving the White House for Texas, that efforts to hold him accountable constitute a witch hunt. Republicans, with some exceptions, still seem to be clinging to the idea that obliviousness and impunity are the only way to address the violent, direct attack on our democracy. As long as they take that position, the House, as Biden put it, is obviously moving forward with impeachment.

There is, at the moment, a single Article of Impeachment, on the charge of incitement of insurrection. The first time that Trump was impeached, just a little more than a year ago, there were two articlesabuse of power and obstruction of Congressand he was eventually acquitted on both charges in the Senate. (Conviction in a Senate trial requires sixty-seven votes; last February, Mitt Romney, of Utah, voted to convict on the first articlehe was the only Republican to do sothough not on the second.) There could, undoubtedly, have been even more articles this time. Trumps phone call to Brad Raffensperger, Georgias secretary of state, pressuring him to find enough votes to deliver the state to the President, could be an article on its own, and there are reports of other calls from the White House to Georgia officials. For the moment, the Raffensperger incident is simply recounted in the incitement article, as an element in Trumps larger scheme to subvert and obstruct the certification of the results of the 2020 Presidential election. The article also mentions the loss of life in the attack, and the vandalism of the Capitol. It continues, In all this, President Trump gravely endangered the security of the United States and its institutions of Government. He threatened the integrity of the democratic system, interfered with the peaceful transition of power, and imperiled a coequal branch of Government.

That last phrase is a significant one. The message from Pelosi and others is that, even though Trump will soon be out of office, the occasion of a President orchestrating an attack on Congress is in a category of its own, and demands a response from Congress. (In an interview with Lesley Stahl, of 60 Minutes, Pelosi suggested that the decision to go ahead with impeachment and various lawsuits involving Trump is in part a separation of powers issuemeaning that Congress has its own institutional concerns, beyond what the proceedings would mean for Bidens agenda.)

Kevin McCarthy, the House Minority Leader, who voted to reject the Electoral College votes of Arizona and Pennsylvania, is among those Republicans now complaining that impeachment is divisive. (In a private, closed-door meeting of the House Republican caucus, McCarthy reportedly acknowledged that Trump has some responsibility for what happened on January 6tha pathetic half-gesture that only raises the question of why McCarthy seems afraid to hold the President to account in public, and whether he is ready to renounce his own votes to overturn the Electoral College.) As Jamelle Bouie observed, in the Times, this sentiment is better understood as a threat to the country than as a desire for unity. The process will be as divisive or as unifying as the Republicans allow it to be. Seen from another angle, Pelosi is offering her Republican colleagues a chance to come together in a bipartisan way to make the point that the President should not instruct a crowd to march down Pennsylvania Avenue and fight like hella phrase quoted in the article of impeachmentagainst the certification of the legitimate winner of the election. Only a handful of House Republicans, notably Adam Kinzinger, of Illinois; Peter Meijer, of Michigan; and Liz Cheney, of Wyoming, seem likely to seize the opportunitylast week, after all, a majority of Republican House members voted to effectively disenfranchise the voters of Arizona and Pennsylvania. (Over the weekend, Meijer wrote of speaking to a colleague who said that he was objecting to the Electoral College tally only because he feared for the safety of his family.) But these are unpredictable days.

One way or another, it seems improbable that any trial in the Senate would begin before Trump leaves office. Even so, it would hardly be moot. In addition to removal from office, an available penalty after conviction is disqualification from holding federal office in the future; Trump could be barred from running in 2024. Again, a conviction would require a two-thirds majority of the Senate, which the Democrats dont have. But the contours of the trial, and what might be revealed in the course of it, are not yet clear. There is much that we dont know about what happened last week in Washington, and that we still need to know.

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A Second Trump Impeachment Could Answer More Questions About the Attack on the Capitol - The New Yorker

In his inaugural address, President-elect Joe Biden could announce that he is pardoning Donald Trump. It would raise a furor on the Left. But it would also allow Biden to declare that he is following through on his pledge to unite America.

Former FBI Director James Comey, who was fired by Trump, is supporting the idea. In an interview on BBC Newsnight, Comey stated, he should at least consider it. Donald Trump, hes not a genius, but he might figure out that if he accepts a pardon, thats anadmission of guilt, the United States Supreme Court has said, so I dont know that he would accept a pardon. Comey added that it would serve as part of healing the country and getting us to a place where we can focus on things that are going to matter over the next four years.

Biden would be able to handle the blowback that he would get from an enraged Democratic base. Given the gravity of the crises that he facesa slowing economy, a spreading pandemic, and a mounting loss of American international credibilityBiden enters office in a commanding position within his own party. A pardon, as Gerald Ford stressed, does not imply innocence. It implies acceptance of guilt.

Its also the case that Trump would continue to face a welter of potential criminal charges at the state level that a federal pardon would not cover (though a federal pardon would cover Washington, DC). The Southern District of New York appears to be avidly pursuing him for perpetrating financial crimes, including tax fraud and money-laundering. Now that William P. Barr has resigned, federal prosecutors are moving quickly to arraign Trump. Small wonder that Trump himself is apparently consumed with worries about what looms ahead once he exits office.

Still, Trump himself might seek to act preemptively by pardoning himself and his children. A self-pardon, however, would be a dicey move indeed as it could simply ratify his guilt and be overturned by the Supreme Court. The notion that a president can pardon himselfand essentially declare himself above the lawhas never been tested. Its not a test that Trump would want to flunk. Yale legal scholar William N. Eskridge notes, The original meaning of granting a pardon assumes someone granting the pardon who is distinct from the person receiving it. So does the original purpose of a pardon, namely, forgiveness bestowed by an authority on a rule-breaker. Though a priest may pardon sinners, he may not absolve himself. A former Justice Department official says, It almost certainly wouldnt work. It would make matters worse. It would be a red flag for the Justice Department.

A further wrinkle is that the Constitution impedes the ability of a president to issue pardons if he has been impeached. Article II, Section, Clause 1 says that the president can issue pardons except in Cases of Impeachment. But in his capacity as president, Trump, who has never been overly concerned about constitutional niceties, might seek to ignore this provision. It would not impinge upon his ability to pardon his children or advisers such as Rudy Giuliani. But pardoning his children would mean that they would forfeit their Fifth Amendment protections before a Grand Jury. They could be compelled to testify. By contrast, Giuliani would presumably have protections under the attorney-client privilege.

The most likely course is that Biden will depute any investigation of Trumps conduct on January 6 to his Attorney General Merrick Garland. Garland would probably conduct a lengthy investigation of Trump before deciding that a federal prosecution of Trump would curtail the freedom of speech of future presidents. But the safest path for Trump would be if Biden pardoned him. Trump would receive direct benefits from a pardon, while Biden could adopt a Churchillian stance. In victory, magnanimity; and in peace, good will.

Jacob Heilbrunn is editor of The National Interest.

Image: Reuters.

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Will Joe Biden Issue a Pardon to Donald Trump? - The National Interest

For the past several years, Sean Kennedy, a Loyola law professor and his students noticed a troubling pattern forming within the Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department and its well-documented deputy gang problem.

A sheriff downplays or denies the problem of the deputy cliques.

A scandal erupts, usually from a lawsuit or reporting by the Los Angeles Times, exposing one of the deputy gangs and alleged misconduct like lying in court or during investigations.

The sheriff pledges to investigate the issue.

The findings of those investigations such as those promised by former sheriffs like John Scott and Jim McDonnell are never released to the public.

And the gangs, some of whom have a history of violence and harassment toward fellow department employees and members of the public, live on in relative secrecy.

Despite a growing list of allegations of misconduct by deputy gangs revealed in various commission reports and external investigations, Kennedy, who is also a member of the Sheriffs Civilian Oversight Commission, said the Sheriffs Department has struggled to address the issue within its ranks.

To move the needle toward more answers, Kennedy and his students wanted to create a single document that lays out all that is known including from findings from federal commissions, county inspector general reports, civilian commission hearings, court documents, news articles, interviews with former deputies about the departments deputy gangs.

After 24 months, the report was published Wednesday, and documents at least 18 deputy gangs or cliques that are suspected to have been operating within the Sheriffs Department for the past 50 years.

There have been so many pledges to get to the bottom of this issue that go nowhere, Kennedy said. Theyve been actively hidden too long.

Sheriff Alex Villanueva introduced a new policy in August, banning deputies from forming and participating in cliques and sub-groups. He also committed to investigating allegations of a deputy gang controlling the Sheriffs Compton Station. The department said Wednesday a study looking at deputy gangs, conducted by the Rand Corporation, is set to wrap up in the next few months. The FBI also has ongoing probes into the departments gangs.

The Sheriffs Department called the Loyola Law School report non-peer-reviewed, leaning on non-academically acceptable citations and unproven allegations as a primary basis for content.

The Department will examine the report and extrapolate everything which may be helpful towards positive organizational change, the Sheriffs Department said Wednesday through a spokesman.

The totality of the evidence, when viewed as a whole is very strong, that there is a longstanding, internal gang problem that goes unaddressed in the department, Kennedy said, responding to the departments comments. For accuracy, Kennedy said he ran the finalized report by five former high-ranking Sheriffs Department officials who recently retired.

Some of the gangs profiled in the report have been inactive for decades. Others are characterized more as subgroups with no evidence of gang-like activity.

However, several other deputy gangs, such as the Banditos, Vikings and Executioners, are suspected to be active and carry with them a slew of allegations of violence, harassment, and intimidation toward other department employees and members of the public, the report said.

Kennedy said he worries most about how these deputy gangs harm the communities they police. Most of the known deputy gangs operate within Sheriff stations located in communities that are inhabited predominantly by people of color, the report said.

Operating out of the Sheriffs Compton Station, the Executioners are alleged to have hosted celebrations after a deputy shot someone, later inking the deputy involved in the shooting with the gangs symbol, a skull wearing a Nazi helmet with CPT on front and a rifle encircled by flames, the report said, referencing Austreberto Gonzalez, a deputy at the station who shared the account during a 2020 deposition. Black and female deputies are reportedly barred from joining the gang.

Gonzalez also testified that the two Compton Station deputies involved in the fatal shooting of 18-year-old Andres Guardado in June Miguel Vega and Christian Hernandez were prospects looking to join the Executioners at the time of the shooting, the report said. Vega, who fired the shots that killed Guardado in Gardena, has remained silent, repeatedly invoking the Fifth Amendment throughout the Sheriffs investigation and during a November coroners inquest.

The Vikings gang, previously operating out of the now-defunct Lynwood Station, has been accused by Black and Latino residents of taking part in shootings, killings, beatings, racial-profiling incidents and illegal searches in an effort to terrorize their community. One federal judge called the gang a neo-Nazi, white supremacist gang.

The Century Station in Lynwood, the report said, is occupied by two other gangs, the Regulators and Spartans.

Some deputy gangs found themselves at the center of wide-ranging investigations into deputy misconduct, including the countys jail abuse scandals that stained the departments legacy from the late 1990s and well into the 2010s, leading to the convictions of more than a dozen Sheriffs officials, including former Sheriff Lee Baca and former Undersheriff Paul Tanaka, a recorded member of the Vikings, according to the report.

In the Antelope Valley communities of Palmdale and Lancaster, deputies with Rattlesnakes symbols and skulls tattooed on them have become synonymous with discriminatory policing against Black residents, particularly among those living in public housing, the report said. Quoting a U.S. Department of Justice report from 2013, the report said deputies associated with the Rattlesnakes gang took part in unlawful searches and seizures and unreasonable use of force.

Gangs that operated in county jails included the 3000 Boys, 2000 Boys and the Posse.

In 1998, a Black man with a mental illness died after deputies in the Twin Towers jail beat him, the report said.

Days later, eight members of the Posse beat another mentally ill man, leaving flashlight marks on his back and boot prints on his side, the report said. A 1999 federal commission report highlighted the gang and its practice of violently targeting inmates with mental illness.

The 3000 boys were also known to take part in excessive force against inmates, according to the 2012 report by the Los Angeles County Citizens Commission on Jail Violence.

The Loyola report also found that among all 133 deputy shootings in the past five years, from November 2015 to November 2020, the stations that led the list in the most shootings, each has an active deputy gang, as well as a history of complaints, reporting, and lawsuits alleging deputy-gang misconduct. The East Los Angeles Station where the Banditos are said to be operating, topped the reports list with 20 shootings. About 80% of those shot by deputies were Black or Latino, the report said.

The report calls on the Sheriffs Department to address the gang issue by enforcing its new policy, prohibiting subgroups. Also, it asks the department to require existing employees to fill out a tattoo image form, something Villanueva and McDonnell have previously refused to subject their deputies to. Any findings the department has on its cliques or gangs should also be made public through the public records act, the report said.

Other suggested solutions include having prosecutors ask deputies who take part as witnesses in criminal cases to state whether or not they are affiliated in a deputy gang. The report also called on judges to allow defense attorneys to cross-examine deputies about their gang-affiliated tattoos.

Really they need to just release the info and let various people and groups investigate, Kennedy said of the Sheriffs Department. If its just as some say, a harmless social group, then nothing will come of it. But the more startling allegations that should concern us all.

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Theyve been hidden too long: Report details Los Angeles Sheriffs deputy gangs and violence toward communities of color - East Bay Times

Cleveland Grover Meredith, Jr., who goes by Cleve, grew up in a wealthy suburb of Atlanta in the nineteen-seventies and eighties. His father owns a hundred-year-old company that makes utility poles, and his mother was a homemaker who later became an interior decorator. He had two sisters, one of whom died young, of brain cancer. He attended the prestigious Lovett School, in north Atlanta, where nearly all his classmates were white, and where, a few of those classmates told me recently, the N-word was occasionally heard in the hallwaysmaking it depressingly similar, one said, to many schools in the area at the time. Meredith was an upbeat kid. One of his classmates, Dean Temple, who is now a stage actor, recalled a class trip to the U.S. Capitol. Most of the details were fuzzy, Temple said, but he could still recall the smile on Cleves face.

In high school, Meredith twice led Lovett to cross-country championships. He was so damn fast, he seemed to be on his own, a former teacher at Lovett told me, adding that Meredith set himself apart and above others. He was a popular and good-looking guy, Matt Arnett, whos now a music producer in Atlanta, said. A former family friend told me, He was about cars, running, and ego. He drove a Datsun 280ZX, and won the best car award in his senior year. He started a detailing business, Temple said, mainly so that he could drive fancy vehicles, and he painted flames down the side of the family station wagon. Patrick Brown, who became a lifelong friend, described a trip to the Grand Canyon during which Meredith, goofing off with other kids, slathered himself with ketchup and lay down in the middle of the road. The first people to pull up were the fucking game wardens, Brown said. I still have the citation. But that was Cleve. He loved to pull pranks. Brown went on, I dont see him as a violent person. Just a high-energy guy. Electric is the word Id use. Tries to suck the marrow out of life. He added, At the end of the day, I dont know if theres a joke element to it.

By it, Brown meant Merediths espousal, in the past decade, of extreme and increasingly paranoid right-wing views, including the set of wild delusions that circulate among those who believe in the QAnon conspiracy, which holds that many Democrats in Washington and Hollywood are satanists and pedophiles. Meredith has shared those views on Facebook and elsewhere; at times, there appeared to be an element of trolling involved. But he could also seem deadly serious. Last week, Meredith was one of the first thirteen people charged in connection with the violence that followed a rally on January 6th for Donald Trump in Washington, D.C. The next day, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi held a press conference calling on Vice-President Mike Pence to invoke the Twenty-fifth Amendment. Meredith allegedly texted an acquaintance, Thinking about heading over to Pelosi CUNTs speech and putting a bullet in her noggin on Live TV. He appended the purple devil emoji. He allegedly had two firearms and thousands of rounds of ammo in his trailer.

Brown, who voted for Trump but said he didnt believe that thered been widespread election fraud and that theres no place for violence at any of these demonstrations, told me that hes still trying to make sense of it all. When we spoke, he was not yet aware that Meredith evidently never made it to the Capitol. Maybe he desecrated that place, Brown said, of his friend, and if he did Id beat the shit out of him. He went on, But if I was gonna go to battle and war for this country, I would want him on my side, next to me, in the trench. Hes a warrior, in a way.

Before graduating from Lovett, in 1986, Meredith served on the homecoming court, and he was active in vestry, a group connected with the schools chapel that did volunteer work and assisted in worship services. Always carrying that cross, the family friend told me. For his yearbook page, he chose a quote from Life in the Fast Lane, by the Eagles: Blowin and burnin, blinded by thirst, didnt see the stop sign, took a turn for the worst. After Lovett, he went to Sewanee, an Episcopal liberal-arts college in the hills of Tennessee. He had not been especially interested in politics in high school, and didnt seem to be at Sewanee, either, Arnett said. Its not exactly a bastion of militant conservatism, he added. I dont think he changed much there.

After college, he opened a car wash north of Atlanta. He got married and had two sons. He enjoyed driving Jet Skis and motorcycles and big trucks and trailers, Arnett said. I never got the impression that all that was funded by the car wash. I think he had family money. In recent years, Meredith raced Porsches and drove speedboats. He loved his toys, Brown said. On Facebook, Meredith posted pictures of those toys, and began sharing his opinions about the state of the country. After Barack Obama was elected President, those posts became exceptionally racist, a former classmate told me. She recalled one that referred to Obama as a porch monkeyshe added, of the slur, I thought that was of a vintage before my time. She unfollowed Meredith but still occasionally saw his posts. It seemed to her that he was disturbed by a world that had changed.

Temple thought so, too. I confronted him about his outspoken hatred of Muslims, he said. It struck him as a clichd, right-wing-media, knee-jerk take on the ills of the world. Meredith, to Temples surprise, responded with a seemingly open mind. I thought, Huh, that went well. But he really turned into a troll, and kind of a cult member, eventually.

Arnett, who tends to vote for Democrats, told me that his own Facebook page was a place where people from the right and left would debate. And Cleve was one of those people that would jump in with just the craziest, most outlandish things. One of Merediths recurring themes was that the Confederate flag represented heritage, not hate, he said. Meredith made a version of this argument after a white man named Dylann Roof killed nine members of a Black church in Charlestonat which point, Arnett said, he unfriended him. His posts just became so virulently racist and unmoored from fact, I drew the line, he said. Meredith was upset by the unfriending, and the two men had a long private exchange about it through Facebook. Honestly, Meredith wrote, I think the only way to solve these major issues and Im not talking about just racial/social issues, Im talking about the whole gamut (economic, military, debt, etc) is to flush everybody (both sides of course) out of Washington and start over... to hit the reset button.... Just not sure how we do that.

A few weeks before Meredith sent that message, Donald Trump announced that he was running for President. Meredith was thrilled. Somebody like Cleve was the perfect target for Trumps rhetoric, Arnett told me. Its much easier to understand why, perhaps, lower-income people would be susceptible to that talk, he added. But I think there are people of greater means, like Cleve, who see the way of life changing from white control of everything that has made them very comfortable. Meredith also enjoyed Trumps owning of the libs, Arnett said.

Though Meredith lost a few friends and followers on Facebook, he also gained new ones. Suleiman Fetrat, an Afghan-American former defense contractor, who has a degree in political science, is a few years older than Meredithold enough, he told me, to have been fooled by both sides. A mutual friend connected him with Meredith in late 2015, and Fetrat described to me a warm online relationship that transcended their divergent politics. (An ardent Bernie Sanders supporter, Fetrat sat out the 2016 election, then voted reluctantly for Joe Biden in 2020.) They never met in person, though, and Fetrat took notice of Merediths evolution with a degree of detachment, watching him parrot the Gateway Pundit, Trumps Twitter feed, Fox News, and, eventually, QAnon supportersand finding it all more fascinating than frightening. He took the red pill with the Q stuff, Fetrat said. I was grateful for that. My specialty is political ideology. I was an observer of this whole thing. Fetrat knew many Trump supporters, but Cleve was beyond that, he told me, adding, I hesitate to say this, but he and others like him are like the American Taliban. The difference, Fetrat believed, was that Merediths tough talk was, in his view, basically bluster. He enjoyed tweaking Meredith, and being his libtard pal. I dont think Cleve would ever hurt anybody, he said. Hes all nave braggadocio. Bark, no bite. He added, We always promised to meet each other. He would always say, When it all goes down, Ill protect your children. As much as we disagreed, he had my back.

In the spring of 2018, Meredith put up a billboard near his business, Car Nutz Car Wash, that read, simply, #QANON. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution ran a story about it; Meredith told the paper that he was a patriot among the millions who love this country. Then he put the hashtag on the car washs marquee. A real-estate appraiser named Chris got into an argument with him about it, and later wrote about the exchange in a private Facebook group. I told him that it is dumb to have the name of a batty insane organization flashing on their sign, that it drives away customers like me and makes them look like idiots, Chris wrote. Oh so you must be a Hillary supporter, Meredith said to him, according to Chriss account. I bet you are on welfare, and you are unemployed. Meredith continued to yell at me as other customers were in their cars in line, hearing all of it, Chris wrote. Soon afterward, Meredith began driving a blue two-door Saab decorated with a giant law-enforcement star bearing the name Donald Trump. He posted pictures of the vehicle on Facebook with the caption Theres a new Sheriff in town.

It was around this time that Meredith and his wife separated, and he moved from Cobb Countya once conservative area just north of Atlanta that has lately turned blueto Hiawassee, a small, deeply conservative town in the north Georgia mountains. (His ex-wife did not reply to an interview request.) Merediths parents had, at this point, become concerned enough about their son to call the Hiawassee Police Department to give them a heads-up. They wanted me to be aware of his involvement with Q, and the social-media posts hed been making, Paul Smith, Hiawassees chief of police, told me. (Merediths mother declined to comment for this story. His father could not be reached.) They described their son as a great person who had fallen from grace into far-right-extremist territory, Smith said, adding, They were letting me know that he seems like he could be dangerous and hes living in your city now. Merediths parents told Smith that they had communicated with the F.B.I., and the Hiawassee police passed along word to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. Smith said that there was an investigation but that he didnt know the details.

In March, 2019, Meredith showed up at Lovett in his unmistakable Saab to protest an appearance by the Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Jon Meacham, who was there to speak about current affairs. Fairly anodyne stuff, one of Merediths old classmates told me, of Meachams talk. But Meredith ended up skirmishing with campus security. It got kind of scuffly, the classmate said. Security escorted Meredith from the eventone classmate heard a rumor from friends that they took him to the OK Caf, which, until recently, prominently displayed a carving of the old Georgia flag. Whatd they do, this classmate speculated, laughing, go prop him under a Confederate flag for some fried chicken? Meredith was banned from Lovett after the incident. By March of last year, he was posting angry comments on his classs Facebook page. This was a page that has nothing to do with politics, the woman who unfollowed him told me. Meredith was posting things like, Democrats are idiots, theyre destroying America. Blah, blah, blah, she said. The page is devoted to who got married, who had a baby, who got a job! So it was weird.

After the coronavirus pandemic hit Georgia, Meredith became a strident opponent of mask-wearing, and his Facebook posts started earning him temporary suspensions from the platform. After his first suspension, Fetrat told me, He became more and more vitriolic, less willing to share where he got his info. Posting fewer links. He was also posting pictures of increasingly aggressive activity on his toys, Fetrat said: The last picture I saw on his Facebook feed, hed flipped a Bobcat front-end loader. At a certain point, you stop doing that kind of stupid thing. But he didnt. Hes immature.

In June, after George Floyd was murdered by police in Minneapolis, a group of Hiawassee residents held a demonstration in the town about police brutality. Meredith showed up in loafers and khaki shorts holding a IWI Tavor X95 rifle. Witnesses say that he held it up in a menacing way. The North Georgia News spoke to Meredith for a story about the demonstration; he told the paper that he was a fifth-generation Atlantan who supported America, freedom and President Donald Trump. As for the protest, he said, Its basically a political stunt done by the higher ups, just paying people to screw everything up. He added, I sincerely believe the New World Order, Cabal, Deep Statewhatever you want to call itwants society to devolve into a race war so that its much easier to take over. In August, after an Illinois teen-ager named Kyle Rittenhouse killed two protesters for racial justice and injured another with an AR-15-style rifle in Wisconsin, Meredith posted a photoshopped Robocop poster bearing Rittenhouses face and the tagline PART KID, PART COP, ALL PATRIOT.

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The Georgia Dad Who Said That He Wanted to Kill Nancy Pelosi - The New Yorker

When Congress convened on Wednesday to certify the results from each respective states electoral college votes, from the previous month, it was clear there would be contention among representatives on the upcoming votes, however, few could have anticipated the actions that were about to be taken.

The siege on the U.S. Capitol would result in the death of a police officer, a woman being shot and killed, as well as damage to the historical building and its artifacts.

As with the following of each presidential election, Congress began Wednesday with the historical and ceremonial process of accepting each states certificate of votes from their respective Electoral College convenings.

In Ohio, for example, appointed members met on Monday, December 14 under the direction of Ohio Lieutenant Governor Jon Husted to affirm the states vote for president.

Ohio is a winner-take-all state, which means whichever candidate for president wins the popular vote within the state becomes the recipient of all of its states electoral votes.

Two states, Maine and Nebraska, divide their Electoral College votes by districts allowing for proportional allocation of electorates in selecting who will ultimately become the next president and vice president of the country.

Fifteen states and the District of Columbia pledge their electoral votes not on who wins the popular vote within their state, but who nationally wins the popular vote.

At the completion of the convenings on the first Monday after the second Wednesday of December, electors sign and record their votes on six certificates.

One certificate is sent to the President of the Senate, two are sent to the U.S. Federal Archivist, two are sent by registered mail to their own states Secretary of State and one is sent to the Chief Judge of the closest United States District Court.

Each certificate, which was sent to the Senate, is the official set of documents seen Wednesday in which is used to officially certify who will become the new leaders of the Executive Branch of the United States come January 20.

Numerous Senators and Members of the House of Representatives had publically stated before Wednesday their intent to challenge certain states allocation of electors.

Local Muskingum County U.S. Congressman Troy Balderson (R) said he would not contest the vote while the countys other U.S. Congressman Bill Johnson (R) said he would.

Due to the drawing of districts following the 2010 U.S. Census, Muskingum County is split and residents, depending on where they live, have either one of the two aforementioned representatives.

Both of Ohios U.S. Senators, Rob Portman (R) and Sherrod Brown (D), made clear before Wednesday that neither of them would contest the vote.

While rare, and often lacking the necessary momentum to move forward, votes have been contested before such as in 2000 following issues within counties in Flordia having complications with hanging chads on voting cards.

In many cases, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives will object but lack a sponsoring Senator, which is required to allow further discussion on the topic.

In 2004, Democrats were able to delay the final certification process by objecting to Ohios selection of electors alleging numerous, serious election irregularities that led to an alleged significant disenfranchisement of voters.

That issue was overturned by a full vote of each chamber of Congress.

This year was different however in that while Democrats controlled the U.S. House of Representatives, the Senate likely would have been split on partisan lines leaving Vice President Mike Pence in a precarious position to overturn the election.

Had that occurred on Wednesday, the United States House of Representatives would have chosen the next President and Vice President of the United States, however, each state would each only receive one vote, likely securing the next term for the incumbents, President Donald Trump and Vice President Pence.

The last time Congress selected a president was in 1877 soon after the Civil War.

As history would have it however while the certification process was ongoing individuals began to storm the U.S. Capitol.

During that siege, Capitol Police and other law enforcement officers were overrun as large groups broke past barriers and onto the Capitol steps before breaking windows and doors to gain access to the physical building.

One concerning sign of trouble, individuals chanting their intention to hang the Vice President on Capitol Grounds as they advanced, coincided with a noose and structure that had recently been constructed nearby.

Secret Service quickly extracted the Vice President and within the following minutes other congressional leaders, such as Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D), was taken away to a secure bunker under the Capitol Building.

Some members, including local representative Johnson, were unable to escape, forced to shelter in place as attackers got closer.

In an interview shortly after the incident, Johnson spoke on Fox News about his experience.

According to Johnson, during debate security came in and took Pelosi as well as Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D) and Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R) out of the House Chambers.

Soon after, security informed the representatives that the capitol had been breached and asked them to remain quiet.

Tear gas was being deployed in the Capitol rotunda and members were instructed to reach under their seats and retrieve masks.

The special CBRN Escape Hoods, designed to protect wearers from chemical, biological and radiological events was one of many security enhancements installed after the attacks of September 11, 2001.

In a photo retrieved by Y-City News, Johnson can be seen sitting on steps in the House Chamber holding his escape hood.

You could actually hear the beating on the door, said Johnson, who spent a large portion of his career in the U.S. Military.

Johnson elaborated to the host on Fox News that the door that was being attacked was the very one the President of the United States would enter through when coming to present the yearly State of the Union address.

Soon after members were also extracted from the chamber, while Johnson didnt disclose where he was taken, other members he was near reported being taken to an underground bunker beneath the Capitol building, which until that day had yet to been publically proven to even exist.

Both Balderson and Johnson issued public comments, like many of their colleagues, condemning the act of violence and destruction.

Balderson, who did not respond to a request for comment from Y-City News on his experience during the siege, said he was deeply disheartened by the violence that occurred.

While I am a firm believer in the First Amendment and Americans right to protest, what our nation has witnessed on Capitol Hill today is not protected by the First Amendment, said Balderson in a written statement. These behaviors are deeply un-American and threaten the very foundation of our Republic.

Following his statement, Balderson issued another letter Friday where he called for a full investigation into how the events Wednesday were allowed to transpire and request for assurances that they would never occur again.

Johnson, like Balderson, thanked the heroic actions of Capitol Police and gave their sympathies to the family of Officer Brian Sicknick, who was killed Wednesday.

Following the events Wednesday afternoon, Congress reconvened and finalized the certification of the election.

The siege caused many representatives who had previously said they would contest the election to cease their objections citing the need for a peaceful transition of power.

Johnson however continued to object to the certification of both Arizonas and Pennsylvanias certifications citing what he said he saw as an unconstitutional act in those states.

Further explained during his interview with Fox News, Johnson said his constituents felt their voices were being silenced by officials and judges in other states.

It was not about an attempt to overthrow or overturn the electoral college election, said Johnson. It was about bringing light to the fact that some states had violated their own constitution and that is wrong.

Citing Trump as the reason for the siege on the Capitol, almost every digital account held by the president was suspended or removed.

Most notably his Twitter account, which had the largest following, was one such account taken down, often the presidents chosen medium of communication.

Multiple members of his cabinet and staff resigned in protest, with the possibility of the invoking of the twenty-fifth amendment being enacted by the Vice President being alleged to be considered by Pence.

Sunday evening, Pelosi said the U.S. House of Representatives would move forward on Monday with a resolution giving Pence 24-hours to take control of the presidency.

If action is not taken, Pelosi said the House would move to impeach Trump by mid-week.

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Local leaders respond to siege on capitol - Y-City News