Storming of the US Capitol (Jan, 2021)

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      John Eastman Blamed Pence for Violence at Jan. 6 Riot

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      John Eastman, the author of a memo that some in both parties liken to a blueprint for a coup, sent a hostile email to the vice president’s chief counsel as the mob attacked.WASHINGTON — As a mob was attacking the Capitol chanting “Hang Mike Pence,” a lawyer who plotted with President Donald J. Trump and his allies to try to overturn the 2020 election sent a hostile message to the vice president’s top lawyer, blaming Mr. Pence for the violence.The email, reported by The Washington Post and confirmed by a person briefed on its contents, shows the extent to which Mr. Trump and his advisers sought to pressure the vice president, who was presiding over the certification of the election, to defy the will of the voters and keep Mr. Trump in office.“The ‘siege’ is because YOU and your boss did not do what was necessary to allow this to be aired in a public way so that the American people can see for themselves what happened,” the lawyer, John Eastman, wrote to Greg Jacob, Mr. Pence’s chief counsel.Mr. Pence and Mr. Jacob were in a secure room at the Capitol when Mr. Eastman sent the message, The Post said. Outside, rioters were storming the building where Congress was meeting to certify Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s election, erecting a gallows, hunting for Speaker Nancy Pelosi and forcing lawmakers to evacuate in a scene of violence and mayhem. Police officers recovered guns, knives, Tasers, Molotov cocktails, explosive devices and zip ties in the area.Mr. Eastman rose within Mr. Trump’s legal circle in 2020 from a little-known conservative academic to one of the most influential voices in the president’s ear, writing a memo laying out steps he argued Mr. Pence could take to keep Mr. Trump in power — measures Democrats and anti-Trump Republicans have likened to a blueprint for a coup.The two-page memo written by Mr. Eastman and circulated to the White House in the days before the certification was revealed in the book “Peril” by the Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Robert Costa. In the memo, Mr. Eastman argued that as vice president, Mr. Pence was “the ultimate arbiter” of the election, essentially saying he had the power to determine who won, and that “we should take all of our actions with that in mind.”That view was rejected by Mr. Pence and his lawyers as illegal and unethical.Since his memo was made public, Mr. Eastman has sought to distance himself from its contents, arguing that the document was taken out of context. He told National Review that the strategy was not “viable” and would have been “crazy” to pursue.But the email to Mr. Jacob undercuts those comments. Mr. Jacob wrote in a draft opinion article that Mr. Eastman showed “a shocking lack of awareness” as “a band of thugs who had been sold the lie that the vice president had the power to reverse the outcome of the election” stormed the Capitol.“Vice President Pence rejected the spurious legal theories that were pitched to him, and he did his duty,” Mr. Jacob wrote. “An inquiry should be made into whether the president’s outside lawyers did theirs.”Through a spokesman, Mr. Eastman declined to comment.The liberal activist Lauren Windsor recently recorded Mr. Eastman calling Mr. Pence an “establishment guy” and standing by the contents of his memo. “These guys are spineless,” he said of lawmakers who refused to join his plan to overturn the election based on false claims of widespread voter fraud.Trump’s Bid to Subvert the ElectionCard 1 of 6A monthslong campaign. More

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      Court Filing Lists Documents Trump Seeks to Withhold From Jan. 6 Inquiry

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      The National Archives says the former president is asserting executive privilege over phone logs, notes and other records concerning the attack on the Capitol.WASHINGTON — Former President Donald J. Trump is seeking to block from release a wide range of documents related to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, the National Archives said Saturday in an early-morning federal court filing detailing what Mr. Trump is fighting to keep secret.In the filing, in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, John Laster, the director of the National Archives’ presidential materials division, laid out for the first time exactly which documents Mr. Trump was asserting executive privilege over. The former president is hoping to prevent the documents from being reviewed by the House committee empowered to investigate the mob violence at the Capitol.According to the filing, Mr. Trump has asserted executive privilege specifically over 770 pages of documents, including 46 pages of records from the files of Mark Meadows, his former chief of staff; Stephen Miller, his former senior adviser; and Patrick Philbin, his former deputy counsel. Mr. Trump is also objecting to the release of the White House Daily Diary — a record of the president’s movements, phone calls, trips, briefings, meetings and activities — as well as logs showing phone calls to the president and to Vice President Mike Pence concerning Jan. 6, Mr. Laster wrote.Mr. Trump has also asserted executive privilege over 656 pages that include proposed talking points for Kayleigh McEnany, his former press secretary; a handwritten note concerning Jan. 6; a draft text of a presidential speech for the “Save America” rally that preceded the mob attack; and a draft executive order on the topic of election integrity, the filing states.Finally, Mr. Trump asserted executive privilege over 68 additional pages, including a draft proclamation honoring the Capitol Police and two officers who died after the riot, Brian D. Sicknick and Howard Liebengood, as well as related emails; a memo about a potential lawsuit against several states that Joseph R. Biden Jr. won in the November election; an email chain from a state official regarding election-related issues; and talking points on alleged election irregularities in one Michigan county.The filing comes in response to a lawsuit Mr. Trump filed this month against the National Archives seeking to block the disclosure of White House files related to his actions and communications surrounding the Jan. 6 riot.In that lawsuit, in a 26-page complaint, a lawyer for Mr. Trump argued that the materials must remain secret as a matter of executive privilege. The lawyer said the Constitution gave the former president the right to demand their confidentiality even though he was no longer in office — and even though President Biden has refused to assert executive privilege over them.The lawsuit touched off what is likely to be a major legal battle between Mr. Trump and the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack, in which a mob of his supporters stormed the Capitol seeking to disrupt Congress’s counting of electoral votes to formalize Mr. Biden’s victory. Its outcome will carry consequences for how much the panel can uncover about Mr. Trump’s role in the riot, pose thorny questions for the Biden administration and potentially forge new precedents about presidential prerogatives and the separation of powers.The leaders of the committee, Representative Bennie Thompson, Democrat of Mississippi, and Representative Liz Cheney, Republican of Wyoming, have condemned Mr. Trump’s lawsuit as “nothing more than an attempt to delay and obstruct our probe.”“It’s hard to imagine a more compelling public interest than trying to get answers about an attack on our democracy and an attempt to overturn the results of an election,” Mr. Thompson, the committee’s chairman, and Ms. Cheney, the vice chairwoman, wrote in a statement after the suit’s filing.Understand the Claim of Executive Privilege in the Jan. 6. InquiryCard 1 of 8A key issue yet untested. More

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      An Oath Keeper Was at the Capitol Riot. On Tuesday, He’s on the Ballot.

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      Edward Durfee Jr. is a member of the far-right militia and was at the Capitol on Jan. 6. He is now running for office in New Jersey.Edward Durfee Jr. is many things: a former Marine, a libertarian who distrusts the Federal Reserve and an active member of the far-right Oath Keepers militia who leads the group’s northern New Jersey region and was outside the Capitol during the Jan. 6 attack.He is also running for the New Jersey State Assembly as a Republican.More than 20 Oath Keepers have been charged in connection with the Jan. 6 attack. Prosecutors have accused members of the militia of plotting to overturn the election by breaching the Capitol and making plans to ferry “heavy weapons” in a boat across the Potomac River into Washington.Mr. Durfee, a 67-year-old tech consultant, said he did not enter the Capitol during the assault, and he condemned the violence that led to several deaths.But he wholeheartedly embraces the ideology of the Oath Keepers, an antigovernment group that pledges to support and defend its interpretation of the Constitution against all enemies.The group, whose name comes from their original mission to disobey certain government orders, became a zealous supporter of former President Donald J. Trump, promoting conspiracy theories about “deep-state” cabals attempting to overthrow him and embracing his relentless lies that the 2020 election was illegitimate.Mr. Durfee said he went to Washington in January to “stop the steal” and to protest against disproved claims of election fraud.Mr. Durfee, in blue, outside of the Capitol on Jan. 6 with the Oath Keeper founder Stewart Rhodes.Eric WoodsBut he is more than just a fringe candidate mounting a long-shot race for the Legislature.He also leads the Republican committee in the town where he lives, Northvale, underscoring the extent to which right-wing activism has become increasingly mainstream within the G.O.P., even in a Democratic stronghold like Bergen County, less than 30 miles from Manhattan.The Oath Keepers, founded more than a decade ago, are known to draw members from the ranks of former military and law enforcement personnel. But records from the militia group, leaked after a database was hacked and shared with a group known as Distributed Denial of Secrets, have offered a new window into the organization’s links to active-duty police officers and government officials.In New York City, Mayor Bill de Blasio has said that any officer associated with the Oath Keepers should be investigated — and fired.Tuesday’s election in New Jersey features a matchup between Jack Ciattarelli, a Republican, and the Democratic incumbent, Philip D. Murphy, one of just two governor’s races in the country. All seats are also on the ballot in the state Legislature, where Democrats are expected to retain majority control.Mr. Durfee — who gathered 165 signatures to get on the ballot and then ran unopposed in the primary — has called for ending all governmental oversight of parental rights, permitting families to use taxpayer-funded vouchers to pay for private and parochial schools, and cutting state agency budgets by 5 percent.He has few illusions of outright victory.“I’m an oxymoron in government,” he said. “I’m on the ballot because nobody challenged me. There’s that lack of participation among our citizens.”He is running to represent a liberal area of northern New Jersey just across the Hudson River from New York. Registered Democrats in the district outnumber Republicans by more than three to one, making it difficult to find Republicans willing to invest the time and money to mount hard-to-win campaigns, party leaders said. (A frequent Republican candidate in the district, Dierdre Paul, called them “kamikaze races.”)“I’m not this ogre that’s hiding behind the fence — ‘Oh, here comes one of them Democrats. Let’s jump on them,’” Mr. Durfee said.Gregg Vigliotti for The New York TimesThe county’s Republican chairman, Jack Zisa, defended Mr. Durfee as a “mild-mannered conservative,” but said that his main attribute was far more transactional: He was the only person willing to run.“It’s a very tough district for Republicans and Mr. Durfee was, frankly, one of only a couple people who put his name in,” Mr. Zisa said.Mr. Durfee is one of dozens of Oath Keepers across the country who are already in office or running for election, nearly all of them Republicans, according to a ProPublica analysis of the hacked database.Roy Sokoloski, a Republican, was involved with recruiting candidates to run for office when he was a councilman in Northvale, a 5,000-person town on the northern border with New York State. He and Mr. Durfee worship at the same Roman Catholic church.“If you don’t know his political background, he’s a nice fellow,” said Mr. Sokoloski, an architect.But he believes Mr. Durfee’s candidacy is an ominous sign for a once-formidable party struggling to remain relevant in a state with nearly 1.1 million more registered Democrats than Republicans.“He’s the worst candidate that the Republicans could have endorsed,” said Mr. Sokoloski, who said he voted against Mr. Trump twice and spoke wistfully of a time when G.O.P. leaders focused on issues like high taxes, not overturning elections.“If the Republican Party can only find people like that,” he said, “what does that say about the party?”Mr. Durfee said he drove from New Jersey on Jan. 6 to help with an Oath Keeper security detail. “We weren’t enforcers,” Mr. Durfee said. “We were just there as eyes.”He said he was close enough to the chaos to get doused with pepper spray, but far enough away to avoid being swept into the crowd that rampaged through the Capitol.Brian D. Sicknick, a Capitol Police officer who grew up in New Jersey and faced off against the angry mob, died after suffering what a medical examiner ruled were multiple strokes.“It just morphed into something and got out of control,” Mr. Durfee said. “It’s just shameful.”A devotee of the libertarian Ron Paul, Mr. Durfee speaks openly about his involvement with the Oath Keepers, which he said he joined in 2009, the year it was founded following the election of Barack Obama.Mr. Durfee runs the Oath Keepers’ northern New Jersey operation and said he was responsible for maintaining the national group’s email and membership lists, which were included in the documents that were hacked.Mr. Durfee, a tech consultant, says he maintains the Oath Keepers’ membership database. The list was hacked, offering a clearer understanding of people linked to the far-right militia group.Gregg Vigliotti for The New York TimesHis campaign, he said, has consisted mainly of attending community events, handing out business cards and directing people to a candidate website he built.He has little money to spend in his race against the Democratic Assembly candidates, Shama A. Haider and Ellen J. Park. He and two other candidates running on the Republican line for the Legislature have reported that, as a group, they do not expect to spend more than $15,800.He has not gotten support from the state Republican Party, and Mr. Ciattarelli has tried to distance himself from Mr. Durfee. “Anyone who advocates terrorism, or had anything to do with the insurrection, has no place in our party,” said Chris Russell, a strategist for the Ciattarelli campaign..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-3btd0c{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-3btd0c{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-3btd0c strong{font-weight:600;}.css-3btd0c em{font-style:italic;}.css-1kpebx{margin:0 auto;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-1kpebx{font-family:nyt-cheltenham,georgia,’times new roman’,times,serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.375rem;line-height:1.625rem;}@media (min-width:740px){#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-1kpebx{font-size:1.6875rem;line-height:1.875rem;}}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1kpebx{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-1gtxqqv{margin-bottom:0;}.css-16ed7iq{width:100%;display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;-webkit-box-pack:center;-webkit-justify-content:center;-ms-flex-pack:center;justify-content:center;padding:10px 0;background-color:white;}.css-pmm6ed{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;}.css-pmm6ed > :not(:first-child){margin-left:5px;}.css-5gimkt{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:0.8125rem;font-weight:700;-webkit-letter-spacing:0.03em;-moz-letter-spacing:0.03em;-ms-letter-spacing:0.03em;letter-spacing:0.03em;text-transform:uppercase;color:#333;}.css-5gimkt:after{content:’Collapse’;}.css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transition:all 0.5s ease;transition:all 0.5s ease;-webkit-transform:rotate(180deg);-ms-transform:rotate(180deg);transform:rotate(180deg);}.css-eb027h{max-height:5000px;-webkit-transition:max-height 0.5s ease;transition:max-height 0.5s ease;}.css-6mllg9{-webkit-transition:all 0.5s ease;transition:all 0.5s ease;position:relative;opacity:0;}.css-6mllg9:before{content:”;background-image:linear-gradient(180deg,transparent,#ffffff);background-image:-webkit-linear-gradient(270deg,rgba(255,255,255,0),#ffffff);height:80px;width:100%;position:absolute;bottom:0px;pointer-events:none;}.css-1g3vlj0{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1g3vlj0{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-1g3vlj0 strong{font-weight:600;}.css-1g3vlj0 em{font-style:italic;}.css-1g3vlj0{margin-bottom:0;margin-top:0.25rem;}.css-19zsuqr{display:block;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}.css-12vbvwq{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-12vbvwq{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-12vbvwq:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-12vbvwq{border:none;padding:10px 0 0;border-top:2px solid #121212;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-qjk116{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-qjk116 strong{font-weight:700;}.css-qjk116 em{font-style:italic;}.css-qjk116 a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-underline-offset:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:visited{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}Mr. Durfee said he preferred to keep his savings in precious metals based on a worry that paper “fiat money” will eventually be devalued.“I have dollars for my wife — we all have to live,” he said. “But I save in silver and gold.”He spent two years in the Marines in noncombat roles. After earning his G.E.D., he took classes in computer programming at Chubb Institute. Last year, he lost a race for Northvale councilman.A grandfather of three who opposes abortion, he is an ardent Catholic and a fourth-degree member of the Knights of Columbus, a rank given for patriotism.“I’m not this ogre that’s hiding behind the fence — ‘Oh, here comes one of them Democrats. Let’s jump on them,’” he said.Mr. Durfee participated in a videoconference with the Oath Keepers founder, Stewart Rhodes, and dozens of other members 10 days after the 2020 election, according to a leaked recording of the call released by Unicorn Riot, an alternative media site. As speakers discussed upcoming protests in Washington, Mr. Durfee can be heard urging people to “show the respect that we have for our country and our Constitution.”“We’re not coming down there with fisticuffs, unless, you know,” he said, his voice trailing off.“We’re all eager to be overzealous,” he added, “but we still have to maintain that position of respect for our flag and for our country.”Instead, the violence that unfolded shook the nation, leading to the arrests of more than 600 people and a congressional investigation into what the F.B.I. has called domestic terrorism.Assemblywoman Valerie Vainieri Huttle, a Democrat who represents Mr. Durfee’s district, said she saw his candidacy mainly as an indicator of Mr. Trump’s grip on the Republican Party, even in liberal bastions like Bergen County.Republican strongholds still exist in New Jersey, especially in the rural northwest and along the Jersey Shore; Mr. Trump lost to Joseph R. Biden Jr. statewide by 16 percentage points, yet beat him in Ocean County by 29 points.Still, Ms. Huttle said she was surprised to see such a far-right candidate vying for a seat she has held for 15 years.“I would understand it in South Jersey,” said Ms. Huttle, who lost a primary race for State Senate and will be leaving the Legislature in January. “I don’t understand it here.”Mr. Zisa, the Republican chairman, said it would be inaccurate to read too much into Mr. Durfee’s candidacy.“We’re the Republican Party,” he said. “We’re not the Oath Keeper party.”Nonetheless, he is hoping to capitalize on the media interest in Mr. Durfee’s affiliation with the extremist group. If it boosts turnout, he said, it could result in spinoff value for Republican candidates in more competitive races.“This might drive the Republican voter out,” Mr. Zisa said. More

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      Cori Bush and AOC Are Right About Jan. 6 and 1866

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      When, in the early morning hours of Jan. 7, Congress finally certified the 2020 Electoral College count, more than 140 Republican members of Congress had voted, in one way or another, to reject the outcome. They had embraced the spirit of the mob that stormed the Capitol the day before, even if they had not physically joined it.With that said, there was a smaller number of congressional Republicans who may have gone further than simply casting a vote the way President Donald Trump wanted them to, in the days leading up to Jan. 6. According to a new report by Hunter Walker in Rolling Stone, “Multiple people associated with the March for Trump and Stop the Steal events that took place during this period communicated with members of Congress throughout this process.”Walker’s sources, two unnamed organizers who say they helped plan the rallies, claim that Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene, Andy Biggs, Paul Gosar, Lauren Boebert, Mo Brooks, Madison Cawthorn and Louie Gohmert or members of their staffs spoke to or collaborated with pro-Trump activists in the days, weeks and months before the attack on the Capitol. Gosar, a staunch defender of the former president, reportedly told potential rally goers that Trump would give them a “blanket pardon” for their activities.Greene, Gohmert, Boebert, Brooks, Cawthorn and Biggs have all pushed back strongly on the Rolling Stone report, which appeared over the weekend. Gosar called it “categorically false and defamatory.”“There was a meeting at the White House about voter fraud and election theft activity,” Brooks said. “But I have no recollection of any kind of organizational activity regarding the speeches on Jan. 6.”For his part, Gohmert released a statement Monday: “No one in my office, including me, participated in the planning of the rally or in any criminal activity on Jan. 6. We did not attend or participate at all.”Boebert also issued a statement on Monday: “Let me be clear. I had no role in the planning or execution of any event that took place at the Capitol or anywhere in Washington, D.C. on Jan. 6th.”The organizers who spoke to Rolling Stone apparently plan to testify before the Jan. 6 select committee to provide more details about what they say was collaboration between Republican lawmakers and the pro-Trump activists who planned the events that ultimately led to the attack.In the meantime, some Democrats are already calling for their removal from office.“Any member of Congress who helped plot a terrorist attack on our nation’s Capitol must be expelled,” Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wrote on Twitter. “Those responsible remain a danger to our democracy, our country, and human life in the vicinity of our Capitol and beyond.”Likewise, Representative Cori Bush of Missouri said on Twitter that the House must “investigate and expel members of Congress who helped incite the deadly insurrection on our Capitol.”Bush had actually introduced a House resolution for this purpose just days after the attack. “There is no place in the people’s House for these heinous actions,” she said at the time, referring to “members who attempted to disenfranchise voters and incited this violence.”“I firmly believe,” she went on, “that these members are in breach of their sworn Oath of Office to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. They must be held accountable.”They weren’t. There was simply no appetite, among House leadership, for such drastic and decisive action. There still isn’t. But it was a serious demand, and we should take it seriously.Bush’s resolution rests on Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which cleared Congress in 1866 and was ratified in 1868:No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any state legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any state, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.In plain English, Congress has the power and authority to expel from office any constitutional officer who engages in sedition and takes up arms against the Constitution of the United States.The original context for this, obviously, was the Civil War and its immediate aftermath. By the summer of 1865, President Andrew Johnson, a conservative unionist from Tennessee, had taken charge of Reconstruction with a plan to restore the Southern states as equals, their political and constitutional status essentially unchanged from what it was before the war.Under Johnson’s arrangement, the former Confederate states could operate under their antebellum constitutions, the end of slavery notwithstanding. All-white electorates could elect all-white legislatures and send all-white delegations to Washington. Some of these men were, like Johnson, conservative unionists. Many more were former rebel leaders. Alexander Stephens — of the infamous Cornerstone Speech — was elected to represent Georgia in the Senate in 1866 after he was arrested and imprisoned as the former vice president of the Confederacy in 1865.Either way, neither group supported anything like fundamental change to the social and political fabric of the South. If seated, these delegations to Congress would stymie and block any Republican effort to reconstruct the South as an open society with free labor.Indeed, had every Southern representative been seated, Republicans would not have had the votes to get the 14th Amendment through Congress in the first place, on account of the two-thirds majority requirement for passage.Worse than potential obstruction was the real chance that the South would re-enter Congress with as much, or more, political power than it had before the war. The 13th Amendment had abolished chattel slavery, which effectively gutted the three-fifths compromise. And thanks to Johnson, recalcitrant Southern elites could form new governments without extending the vote to free and recently freed Blacks. When the 14th Amendment repealed the three-fifths compromise outright, the effect would be to give the South a considerable bonus in Congress.“Beginning with the reapportionment of 1870,” the legal scholar Garrett Epps writes in “The Antebellum Political Background of the Fourteenth Amendment,” “the Southern states would receive full representation for each freed slave rather than a mere sixty percent, a change that would give the region thirteen more House seats and electoral votes without the extension of minimal political rights, much less the franchise, to the freed slaves who formed the basis of the representation.”To head off this threat, Republicans took two steps. First, they refused to recognize, much less seat, members from the states readmitted under Johnson’s policies. And then, looking to the future, they wrote this prohibition on former Confederate leaders into the Constitution as Section 3 of the 14th Amendment. Republicans would prevent the re-ascendence of this “slave power” with a blockade of federal office deployed against Southern elites.If the ultimate goal of Section 3, in other words, was to preserve the integrity of Congress against those who would capture its power and plot against the constitutional order itself, then Representative Bush is right to cite the clause against any members of Congress who turn out to have collaborated with the plotters to overturn the election and whose allies are still fighting to “stop the steal.”There is a movement afoot to undermine electoral democracy for the sake of a would-be strongman. We have the tools to stop it. Congress, and by this I mean the Democratic majority, should use them.The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram. More

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      Las investigaciones internas de Facebook: los documentos muestran señales de alarma sobre la desinformación

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      Documentos de la empresa revelan que en varias ocasiones trabajadores de la red social advirtieron de la difusión de desinformación y teorías de la conspiración antes y después de las elecciones presidenciales de Estados Unidos.Dieciséis meses antes de las elecciones presidenciales celebradas en noviembre del año pasado, una investigadora de Facebook describió un acontecimiento alarmante. Una semana después de abrir una cuenta experimental, ya estaba recibiendo contenido sobre la teoría conspirativa de QAnon, según escribió en un informe interno.El 5 de noviembre, dos días después de las elecciones, otro empleado de Facebook escribió un mensaje para alertar a sus colegas sobre los comentarios con “desinformación electoral polémica” que se podían ver debajo de muchas publicaciones.Cuatro días después de eso, un científico de datos de la empresa escribió una nota para sus compañeros de trabajo en la que decía que el diez por ciento de todas las vistas de material político en Estados Unidos —una cifra sorprendentemente alta— eran publicaciones que alegaban un fraude electoral.En cada caso, los empleados de Facebook sonaron una alarma sobre desinformación y contenido inflamatorio en la plataforma e instaron a tomar medidas, pero la empresa no atendió los problemas o tuvo dificultades para hacerlo. La comunicación interna fue parte de un conjunto de documentos de Facebook que obtuvo The New York Times, que brindan nueva información sobre lo ocurrido dentro de la red social antes y después de las elecciones de noviembre, cuando a la empresa la tomaron desprevenida los usuarios que convirtieron la plataforma en un arma para difundir mentiras sobre la votación. More

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      What Happened When Facebook Employees Warned About Election Misinformation

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      Company documents show that the social network’s employees repeatedly raised red flags about the spread of misinformation and conspiracies before and after the contested November vote.Sixteen months before last November’s presidential election, a researcher at Facebook described an alarming development. She was getting content about the conspiracy theory QAnon within a week of opening an experimental account, she wrote in an internal report.On Nov. 5, two days after the election, another Facebook employee posted a message alerting colleagues that comments with “combustible election misinformation” were visible below many posts.Four days after that, a company data scientist wrote in a note to his co-workers that 10 percent of all U.S. views of political material — a startlingly high figure — were of posts that alleged the vote was fraudulent.In each case, Facebook’s employees sounded an alarm about misinformation and inflammatory content on the platform and urged action — but the company failed or struggled to address the issues. The internal dispatches were among a set of Facebook documents obtained by The New York Times that give new insight into what happened inside the social network before and after the November election, when the company was caught flat-footed as users weaponized its platform to spread lies about the vote. More

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      House Finds Bannon in Contempt for Defying Jan. 6 Inquiry Subpoena

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      The vote came after a bitterly partisan debate over the Capitol attack and as Republicans sought to deflect questions about Donald J. Trump’s role in the violence.The House recommended that Stephen K. Bannon, a former top adviser to President Donald J. Trump, face criminal contempt charges for refusing to cooperate with its select committee’s investigation into the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.Carlos Bernate for The New York TimesWASHINGTON — The House voted on Thursday to find Stephen K. Bannon in criminal contempt of Congress for stonewalling the investigation into the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, pressing for information from a close ally of Donald J. Trump even as Republicans moved to insulate the former president from accountability.The vote of 229 to 202, mostly along party lines, came after Mr. Bannon refused to comply with a subpoena from the House select committee investigating the assault, declining to provide the panel with documents and testimony. The action sent the matter to the Justice Department, which now must decide whether to prosecute Mr. Bannon and potentially set off a legal fight that could drag on for months or years.But what was clear on Thursday was that nine months after the deadliest attack on the Capitol in two centuries, many Republicans in Congress remain bent on whitewashing, ignoring or even validating what took place as their party continues to embrace the lie of a stolen election. Only nine Republicans joined Democrats in voting to enforce the panel’s subpoena.The rest followed the lead of Mr. Trump, who in a statement before the vote derided the election he lost as a crime and praised the mob attack — which injured 140 police officers and claimed several lives — as a legitimate response.“The insurrection took place on Nov. 3, Election Day,” Mr. Trump wrote. “Jan. 6 was the protest!”Before the vote, Republicans argued that the investigation — which Democrats undertook after Republicans blocked the formation of an independent, bipartisan inquiry — was a partisan exercise devised to smear Mr. Trump and persecute his supporters for their political beliefs.On the House floor, Representative Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio and an ardent Trump supporter, accused the committee of harassing Mr. Bannon and organizers of the “Stop the Steal” rally that preceded the riot.“You’re involved in political activity? They’re going to investigate you,” Mr. Jordan said. “You know what this is really about: getting at President Trump.”Representative Jim McGovern, Democrat of Massachusetts, condemned the former president’s comments and the way Republicans continued to follow his lead.“We live in an age where apparently, some put fidelity to Donald Trump over fidelity to the Constitution,” he said.“He is so feared,” Mr. McGovern added, “that my Republican colleagues are going to keep denying what happened that day.”Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming, who broke sharply with Mr. Trump, pleaded with her fellow Republicans to stop following him down a path that she warned would lead to ruin.“There’s a moment when politics must stop if we want to defend and protect our institutions,” said Ms. Cheney, the vice chairwoman of the select committee. “A violent assault on the Capitol to stop a constitutional process of counting electoral votes is that moment.”The question of what will happen to Mr. Bannon now goes to the Justice Department, where Attorney General Merrick B. Garland has declined to say whether he will move forward with charges.“We’ll apply the facts in the law and make a decision, consistent with the principles of prosecution,” he told the House Judiciary Committee during an oversight hearing on Thursday.The question of what will happen to Mr. Bannon now goes to the Justice Department. Attorney General Merrick B. Garland has declined to say whether he will move forward with charges.Stefani Reynolds for The New York TimesPresident Biden has endorsed prosecuting those who do not cooperate with the investigation. On Thursday, he made a point of condemning the riot and its origins.“The violent, deadly insurrection on the Capitol nine months ago — it was about white supremacy,” Mr. Biden said in a speech on Thursday to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the Martin Luther King Jr. monument in Washington.Robert J. Costello, Mr. Bannon’s lawyer, informed the House committee this month that his client would not comply with its subpoena, citing Mr. Trump’s directive for his former aides and advisers to invoke immunity and refrain from turning over documents that might be protected under executive privilege.Under federal law, any person summoned as a congressional witness who refuses to comply can face a misdemeanor charge that carries a fine of $100 to $100,000 and a jail sentence of one month to one year.Members of the investigative committee, which is controlled by Democrats, believe that Mr. Bannon has crucial information about plans to undermine Mr. Biden’s victory, including conversations Mr. Bannon had with Mr. Trump in which he urged the former president to focus his efforts on Jan. 6.In its report recommending that the House find Mr. Bannon in contempt, the committee repeatedly cited comments he made on his radio show on Jan. 5 — when Mr. Bannon promised “all hell is going to break loose tomorrow” — as evidence that “he had some foreknowledge about extreme events that would occur the next day.”“He was deeply involved in the so-called Stop the Steal campaign,” Representative Bennie Thompson, Democrat of Mississippi and the chairman of the committee, said of Mr. Bannon. “We know that the forces that tried to overturn the election persist in their assault on the rule of law.”Representative Liz Cheney, Republican of Wyoming, was stripped of her leadership post over her opposition to Mr. Trump’s election lies. She has pleaded with her colleagues to stop enabling him.Stefani Reynolds for The New York TimesMs. Cheney has suggested that Mr. Trump’s insistence on asserting executive privilege is evidence that he was “personally involved” in the plot to overturn the election on Jan. 6.“Today,” she noted, “the former president suggested that the violence was justified.”Ms. Cheney was one of nine Republicans to join House Democrats in voting to find Mr. Bannon in criminal contempt. The others were Representatives Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, the other Republican member of the panel; Anthony Gonzalez of Ohio; John Katko of New York; Nancy Mace of South Carolina; Jaime Herrera Beutler of Washington; Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania; and Fred Upton and Peter Meijer, both of Michigan.Understand the Claim of Executive Privilege in the Jan. 6. InquiryCard 1 of 8A key issue yet untested. More

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      ‘Ordinary Citizens’ Turned Rioters on Jan. 6

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      More from our inbox:Republican Contempt for Voting RightsParler’s Free Speech PrinciplesI’ll Take the Jefferson StatueThe Transition From DrivingI Keep My Files on Paper, Not in the Cloud  Joseph RushmoreTo the Editor:Re “90 Seconds of Rage on the Capitol Steps” (front page, Oct. 17):This is one of the best pieces of reporting on the Jan. 6 riot to appear in some time. The role of Proud Boys, neo-Nazis and other committed insurrectionists and troublemakers is easy to understand in connection with the day’s events. The ability of seemingly ordinary, heretofore law-abiding citizens to be swept along in something like this, to the point of violently attacking police officers, is what needs our more considered attention.Donald Trump continues to hold rallies and deliver semi-coherent rants rooted in lies and fantasies. He remains a menace to American democracy, world peace and fundamental human decency.But perhaps we should worry less about the man at the microphone and more about the crowds that continue to cheer him even after all that has come before. Especially after all that has come before.W.T. KoltekLouisville, OhioTo the Editor:What are we to conclude about the insurrection participants you profiled? Their family members, friends and neighbors were quoted as saying that these were nice, giving and very helpful people. Some of the participants stated that they just wanted to be in the rally or to see President Donald Trump.Did they have a short circuit in their brains that made them participate in the riot? Is there some kind of contradiction between their lives back home and their violent behavior on Jan. 6?Not at all. We should not be distracted by the attempts to portray these participants as just ordinary folk. Some of them brought or used other items as weapons, as well as communication devices for coordinating their efforts. These participants engaged in a violent attempt to subvert our democracy and injure or kill our elected officials, as well as the police protectors of our nation’s democratic process and buildings.Actions have consequences. They are responsible for their behavior and must be brought to justice. No niceness can save them from judicial remedies.Robert RosofskyMilton, Mass.To the Editor:This article is chilling because it is likely that Donald Trump, if he becomes president again, would grant a blanket pardon to these and other so-called “patriots” for any federal crimes arising out of the Jan. 6 riots.The article notes that prosecutors and congressional investigators are looking into how “seemingly average citizens — duped by a political lie, goaded by their leaders and swept up in a frenzied throng — can unite in breathtaking acts of brutality.” This statement evokes Kristallnacht and the horror that followed.Donald Trump did goad this group. What these “ordinary citizens” are capable of in the thrall of a demagogue is frightening.Mr. Trump has learned this from Jan. 6. And from past Republican inaction, he’s also learned, and would certainly come into office believing, that the rule of law does not apply to him. That power and mind-set in the hands of this petulant little man are a true danger.Gary H. LevinFort Washington, Pa.Republican Contempt for Voting RightsProtesters demonstrate in support of voting rights on Tuesday in Washington.Shuran Huang for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Voting Rights Impasse Puts Pressure on Filibuster,” by Carl Hulse (news analysis, Oct. 21):The Senate’s failure to pass the Freedom to Vote Act is a cynical corrosion of democratic values. The act would limit partisan gerrymandering, require disclosure of very large campaign contributions and increase election security. These common-sense safeguards are foundational to a functional democracy.Fortunately, my senators, Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer, supported the act. But every Republican senator who blocked it — representing a minority of voters — demonstrates contempt for the system they’re elected to defend.Sarah RichardsonNew YorkParler’s Free Speech Principles Lynsey Weatherspoon for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Hey Parler, My Blue City Isn’t Turning Red,” by Margaret Renkl (Opinion guest essay, nytimes.com, Oct. 18):Parler, a social media platform committed to free speech and to the preservation of a digital “town square,” has recently moved its headquarters to Nashville. Ms. Renkl’s premise is that Parler mistook Nashville to be a right-wing haven, and she zeroes in on my assertion that “Tennessee shares Parler’s vision of individual liberty and free expression.” Ms. Renkl wrongly suggests that these principles are somehow exclusive to those on the political right.At Parler, we draw our inspiration from the Constitution — not the Republican Party’s platform — and we defend the American principle of free speech, which, as far as we are aware, is a principle that transcends party politics and is valued on both the left and the right. Or at least it used to be.It is telling that so many on the left believe that “free expression” and “individual liberty” are code words for “conservative.” Worthy of discussion, isn’t it?George FarmerNashvilleThe writer is the chief executive of Parler.I’ll Take the Jefferson Statue  Dave Sanders for The New York TimesTo the Editor:Re “Jefferson Knocked Off Pedestal in New York Council Chamber” (front page, Oct. 19):Thomas Jefferson was a man of his era who, like all men in all eras, did not always live his ideals. Those ideals — that “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness,” and that the only legitimate government is by consent of the people — are the cornerstones of every modern democracy, including our own.They have enabled our nation to evolve from a society in which slavery was tolerated into one in which, for most Americans, civil and human rights are paramount.The framers’ vision, and the nation that they founded based on an idea, eclipse the frailties that marked Jefferson and his contemporaries as human beings.As James Madison wrote, “If men were angels, no government would be necessary.”If the New-York Historical Society does not accept the City Council’s Thomas Jefferson statue, the city is welcome to relocate it on my front lawn.Rita C. TobinChappaqua, N.Y.The Transition From Driving Gracia LamTo the Editor:Thanks to Jane E. Brody for her thoughtful column “Keeping Older Drivers Protected on the Road” (Personal Health, Oct. 19).One additional point: To help ease the transition from driving, carefully choose where you live. If possible, pick a location where you can walk (or bike) to many of the places you want or need to go to: stores, doctors, cafes, the library, parks and so on. This will enable you to have a healthier and more pleasant life.And, for those now in your 40s and 50s, think ahead. Move to that more walkable neighborhood before you’re old.David W. SearsBethesda, Md.I Keep My Files on Paper, Not in the Cloud Sophia Foster-DiminoTo the Editor:Re “The Case for Filing Cabinets,” by Pamela Paul (Opinion guest essay, Sunday, Oct. 17):Two phrases from this article — “digitally functional people” and “special I.T. skills” — do not describe this senior citizen who finds file cabinets indispensable.I have an active two-drawer file cabinet that is used daily and culled yearly around tax time or when I need room for additions. My genealogy files contain original documents, pictures and even a braid of hair cut from an ancestor’s head circa 1863 — and my own personal and professional history to pass on to my progeny.My late son was a systems analyst with superior I.T. skills. Our difficulty in accessing his encrypted files in the cloud made his scraps of paper and his voluminous paper files crucial in settling his estate.So I will continue to file away without trying to remember passwords, or relying on internet service, which was out the other day.V.E. FranceWhite Plains, N.Y. More