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      Tucker Carlson, who ‘passionately hates’ Trump, shows more Capitol footage

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      Tucker Carlson, who ‘passionately hates’ Trump, shows more Capitol footageFox News continues to claim January 6 was peaceful while legal filings show him saying Trump is good at ‘destroying things’The Fox News host Tucker Carlson told an associate he “hated” Donald Trump “passionately”, new filings in a $1.6bn defamation suit against Fox News by Dominion Voter Systems revealed.Rupert Murdoch feared Fox hosts may have gone ‘too far’ on 2020 voter fraud claims, court files showRead moreEven as the filings were reported on Tuesday, Carlson continued to broadcast January 6 security footage in his attempt to cast the deadly attack on Congress as “peaceful chaos” arising from a protest of Trump’s defeat by Joe Biden.“We are very, very close to being able to ignore Trump most nights,” Carlson said in a text on 4 January 2021, two days before the riot. “I truly can’t wait.”He also wrote: “I hate him passionately … What he’s good at is destroying things. He’s the undisputed world champion of that. He could easily destroy us if we play it wrong.”Many observers think the Dominion suit, over the broadcast of lies about electoral fraud by Trump and his allies, could prove seriously costly to Fox News.Hosts and executives up to and including Rupert Murdoch have been shown to have said Trump was lying, and to have ridiculed surrogates including Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell but to have broadcast their claims regardless.In one message newly revealed on Tuesday, the host Laura Ingraham called Powell a “complete nut” and said “no one will work with her. Ditto with Rudy.”In a statement, Fox News said Dominion was “using further distortion and misinformation in its PR campaign to smear Fox News and trample on freedom of speech and freedom of the press”.Carlson is Fox News’ premier primetime host. Last month, over protests from Democrats and Fox News’ rivals, the House speaker, Kevin McCarthy, chose to give Carlson more than 40,000 hours of security footage from the Capitol on January 6.After Carlson’s first broadcast on Monday, Democrats, Senate Republicans, the chief of Capitol police and the family of an officer who died the day after the riot were among those to condemn him.The police chief, Tom Manger, said in an internal memo Carlson’s broadcast was “filled with offensive and misleading conclusions”, “conveniently cherry-picked from the calmer moments of our 41,000 hours of video” and “fail[ed] to provide context about the chaos and violence … before or during these less tense moments”.Manger also said Carlson’s staff did not reach out to “provide accurate context”.The family of Brian Sicknick, who was 42 when he suffered two strokes and died a day after battling rioters and being sprayed with chemicals, decried “the ongoing attack on our family by the unscrupulous and outright sleazy so-called news network”.Nine deaths have been linked to the Capitol attack, including law enforcement suicides. More than 1,000 people have been charged and hundreds convicted of offences including seditious conspiracy.Trump escaped conviction in an impeachment trial and has not been criminally charged. A House committee made four referrals to the Department of Justice.On air on Tuesday, Carlson claimed Democrats had shown “hysteria, overstatement, crazed hyperbole, red-in-the-face anger” over his use of the January 6 footage. It was “not outrage”, he said, but “fear. It’s panic.”He then focused on Nancy Pelosi, the former speaker of the House, saying footage would show the January 6 security failure was her fault.The media continued to pore over the filings in the Dominion suit.In another text, Carlson said of “the last four years” under Trump, “We’re all pretending we’ve got a lot to show for it, because admitting what a disaster it’s been is too tough to digest. But come on. There isn’t really an upside to Trump.”TopicsFox NewsDonald TrumpUS Capitol attackUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      'Bald-faced lie': Chuck Schumer attacks Fox News for ‘shameful' use of January 6 footage – video

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      Democratic majority leader Chuck Schumer launched a blistering attack on the chamber floor on Tuesday on Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson for his ‘shameful’ portrayal of January 6 footage, after Carlson made first use of security footage from the riot obtained from Kevin McCarthy, the Republican House speaker. The Fox News anchor suggested in his show that the rioters that attacked Capitol Hill on Jan 6 were ‘peaceful sightseers’.
      Schumer told senators: ‘With contempt for the facts, disregard of the risks, and knowing full well he was lying to his audience, Fox News host Tucker Carlson ran a lengthy segment arguing the January 6 Capitol attack was not a violent insurrection.’ 
      Schumer also called on Rupert Murdoch, Fox News’ owner, to stop Carlson airing a second segment of his show on the January 6 insurrection. ‘You know it’s a lie, you’ve admitted it’s a lie,’ said Schumer, referring to messages shared privately by Fox anchors in which many of them mocked claims that Biden’s election was fraudulent.

      ‘Sleaze-slinging’ Fox News denounced by family of January 6 officer who died More

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      ‘Sleaze-slinging’ Fox News denounced by family of January 6 officer who died

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      ‘Sleaze-slinging’ Fox News denounced by family of January 6 officer who diedCondemnation of ‘so-called new network’ comes after Tucker Carlson shares footage from attack courtesy of Kevin McCarthyThe family of Brian Sicknick, the US Capitol police officer who died the day after the January 6 attack on Congress, condemned Tucker Carlson and Fox News as “unscrupulous and outright sleazy”, after the primetime host made first use of security footage from the riot bestowed by Kevin McCarthy, the Republican House speaker.Fox News hit with election complaint after Biden ad given to Trump son-in-lawRead moreA statement on Tuesday said: “The Sicknick family is outraged at the ongoing attack on our family by the unscrupulous and outright sleazy so-called news network of Fox News.”Fox and Carlson, the family said, “will do the bidding of [Donald] Trump or any of his sycophant followers, no matter what damage is done to the families of the fallen, the officers who put their lives on the line and all who suffered on January 6, due to the lie started by Trump and spread by sleaze-slinging outlets like Fox”.Nine deaths have been linked to the attack on the Capitol by supporters Trump told to “fight like hell” in service of his lie that his defeat by Joe Biden was the result of electoral fraud.Trump aimed to stop certification of Biden’s win. The process was only delayed but lawmakers including the vice-president, Mike Pence, were sent running for their lives.More than 1,000 people have been charged and hundreds convicted on charges including seditious conspiracy. Hundreds remain wanted by authorities.Trump was impeached for inciting the attack but acquitted when enough Senate Republicans stayed loyal. The House January 6 committee made four criminal referrals regarding Trump to the Department of Justice.Last month, to protests from Democrats and media groups, McCarthy made 41,000 hours of security footage available to Carlson and Fox News.Carlson had already claimed January 6 was a “false flag” attack, staged by authorities to entrap Trump supporters. On Monday night, he tried to portray those who stormed the Capitol as peaceful protesters.Saying the tapes showed “mostly peaceful chaos”, Carlson said: “Taken as a whole the video record does not support the claim that January 6 was an insurrection. In fact, it demolishes that claim.”In return, the Sicknick family lambasted Carlson and Fox News.Fox News, they said, “has shown time and time again that [it is] little more than the propaganda arm of the Republican party, and like Pravda will do whatever [it is] told to keep the hatred and the lies flowing while suppressing anything resembling the truth.“Fox does this not for any sense of morality as they have none but for the quest for every penny of advertising money they can get from those who buy airtime from them.”Recent revelations from filings in a $1.6n defamation suit from Dominion Voter Systems include Rupert Murdoch, Fox News’ owner, indicating he knew Trump’s claims were false but saying his motivation for accommodating election deniers was to stop viewers deserting.The Sicknick family also called McCarthy a “disgusting excuse for a House speaker”. Later on Tuesday, the Republican leader in the Senate, Mitch McConnell, was asked if McCarthy had made a mistake in giving Carlson the tapes.He said: “My concern is how [the riot] was depicted, which was a different issue. Clearly the chief of the Capitol police, in my view, correctly describes what most of us witnessed first-hand on January 6.”McConnell’s Democratic counterpart, Chuck Schumer, lamented “one of the most shameful hours we have ever seen on cable television” and said Carlson had shown “contempt for the facts [and] disregard of the risks [while] knowing full well he was lying to his audience”.Carlson, Schumer said, “told the bald-faced lie that the Capitol attack, which we all saw with our own eyes, somehow was not an attack at all”.Decrying efforts to make a martyr out of Ashley Babbitt, a Trump supporter shot dead by a police officer on January 6, the Sicknick family said Carlson was “downplaying the horrid situation faced by US Capitol police and DC Metro police who were incredibly outnumbered and were literally fighting for their very lives”.Sicknick, 42, was sprayed with chemicals, for which his attacker was jailed for nearly seven years. Sicknick died the day after the riot, after suffering two strokes. A medical examiner said he died of natural causes but his name remains linked to January 6. His body lay in state at the Capitol.Sicknick’s family said “his sense of duty and incredible work ethic were the driving force which sent him back in spite of his injuries and no doubt contributed to his succumbing to his injuries the following day.Stunning Rupert Murdoch deposition leaves Fox News in a world of troubleRead more“What will it take to silence the lies from people like Carlson? What will it take to convince people that the January 6 insurrection was very real, it was very violent, and that the event was orchestrated by a man [Trump] who is every bit as corrupt and evil as Vladimir Putin.“The Sicknick family would love nothing more than to have Brian back with us and to resume our normal lives. Fictitious news outlets like Fox and its rabid followers will not allow that. Every time the pain of that day seems to have ebbed a bit organisations like Fox rip our wounds wide open again and we are frankly sick of it.“Leave us the hell alone and instead of spreading more lies from Supreme Leader Trump, why don’t you focus on real news?”Fox News did not comment.TopicsUS Capitol attackFox NewsUS television industryTelevision industryWashington DCRepublicansUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      FBI searches for two Capitol attack defendants who have gone missing

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      FBI searches for two Capitol attack defendants who have gone missingJoseph Hutchinson and Olivia Pollock, whose brother is also a January 6 defendant, had ankle monitors that were removed or alteredThe FBI is searching for a Florida woman who was supposed to stand trial on Monday on charges stemming from the January 6 Capitol attack as well as another riot defendant who has also gone missing, officials said.A federal judge in Washington issued bench warrants for the arrest of Olivia Pollock and Joseph Hutchinson III last week after the court was notified that they had tampered with or removed the ankle monitors that track their location, said Joe Boland, a supervisory special agent with the FBI’s Lakeland, Florida, office.US Capitol rioter pleads guilty to stealing badge from beaten officerRead moreBoland said the FBI has recovered one of the defendants’ ankle monitors after they removed it, but declined to say whether it was Pollock’s or Hutchinson’s. As of Monday afternoon, the FBI had not located either of them, he said.Olivia Pollock, of Lakeland, is the sister of another January 6 defendant, Jonathan Pollock, who has been on the lam for months. The FBI has offered a reward of up to $30,000 in exchange for information leading to his arrest and conviction. He is accused of assaulting multiple police officers during the riot.Olivia Pollock and Hutchinson were initially arrested in 2021 and charged in a five-person indictment with assaulting law enforcement and other crimes. Hutchinson is representing himself at trial, and an attorney appointed to assist him as standby counsel declined to comment on Monday.Olivia Pollock’s lawyer, Elita Amato, said on Monday that her client “had been diligently assisting in her defense for her upcoming trial prior to her disappearance”.Authorities encouraged anyone with information about their whereabouts to contact the FBI.Olivia Pollock, who was wearing a ballistic plate-carrier vest during the riot, is accused of elbowing an officer in the chest and trying to strip the officer’s baton away during the melee. Jonathan Pollock is accused of thrusting a riot shield into an officer’s face and throat, pulling an officer down steps and punching others.Authorities say Hutchinson pulled back a fence that allowed other rioters to swarm police trying to defend the Capitol, punched an officer and grabbed the sleeve of another before throwing the officer out of his way.Hutchinson, who now lives in Georgia, was scheduled to face trial in August. The judge on Monday rescheduled Olivia Pollock’s trial for August as well.Also on Monday, a Colorado man pleaded guilty to using a chemical spray to attack police officers who were trying to hold off the mob.Robert Gieswein, of Woodland Park, Colorado, is scheduled to be sentenced on 9 June. Estimated sentencing guidelines for Gieswein recommend a prison sentence ranging from three years and five months to four years and three months, according to his plea agreement.Gieswein was wearing a helmet, flak jacket and goggles and carrying a baseball bat when he stormed the Capitol on 6 January 2021. He marched to the building from the Washington monument with members of the far-right Proud Boys extremist group.Gieswein repeatedly sprayed an “aerosol irritant” at police officers, pushed against a line of police and was one of the first rioters to enter the Capitol, according to a court filing accompanying his guilty plea to assault charges.Federal authorities have said Gieswein appeared to be an adherent of the Three Percenters militia movement and ran a private paramilitary training group called the Woodland Wild Dogs.Nearly 1,000 people have been charged so far in the riot. Sentences have ranged from probation for people who pleaded guilty to misdemeanor crimes to 10 years in prison for a retired New York police department officer who used a metal flagpole to assault an officer.TopicsUS Capitol attackThe far rightFloridaUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      US Capitol rioter pleads guilty to stealing badge from beaten officer

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      US Capitol rioter pleads guilty to stealing badge from beaten officerThomas Sibick pleads guilty to assault and theft charges for role in attack on the Washington DC police officer Michael FanoneA New York man has pleaded guilty to stealing a badge and radio from a police officer who was brutally beaten as rioters pulled him into the mob that attacked the US Capitol in Washington over two years ago, court record show.Thomas Sibick pleaded guilty on Friday to assault and theft charges for his role in the attack on the District of Columbia’s Metropolitan police department officer Michael Fanone during the January 6, 2021, insurrection when extremist supporters of then-president Donald Trump tried, unsuccessfully, to force Congress not to certify Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential victory over him.US district judge Amy Berman Jackson is scheduled to sentence Sibick on July 28. She allowed Sibick to remain free on bond until that hearing.Estimated sentencing guidelines call for Sibick to receive a prison sentence ranging from a low of two years and nine months to a high of nearly six years, according to his plea agreement.Rioters relentlessly kicked, punched, grabbed and shocked Fanone with a stun gun after pulling him away from other officers who were guarding a tunnel entrance on the Capitol’s lower west terrace. Another rioter threatened to take Fanone’s gun and kill him.Fanone’s body camera captured Sibick removing the officer’s badge and radio from his tactical vest during the mob’s attack, according to a court filing accompanying his guilty plea.Others in the crowd escorted Fanone back to the police line. Before FBI agents showed him the body camera video, Sibick initially denied assaulting Fanone and claimed that he tried in vain to pull the officer away from his attackers.Sibick said he buried Fanone’s badge in his backyard after returning home to Buffalo, New York. He returned the badge, but Fanone’s radio hasn’t been recovered.Other rioters have been charged with attacking Fanone, who was badly injured, lost consciousness and was taken to hospital.Albuquerque Cosper Head, a Tennessee man who dragged Fanone into the crowd, was sentenced in October 2022 to seven years and six month in prison. During Head’s sentencing, Fanone said the attack gave him a heart attack and a traumatic brain injury and ultimately cost him his career.Kyle Young, an Iowa man who grabbed Fanone by the wrist and handed a stun gun to another rioter who used it on the officer, was sentenced in September 2022 to seven years and two months in prison.A California man, Daniel Rodriguez, pleaded guilty in February to using a stun gun on Fanone during the attack. Rodriguez is scheduled to be sentenced on May 16.Approximately 1,000 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the riot on January 6. More than 500 of them have pleaded guilty, mostly to misdemeanors. Approximately 400 have been sentenced, with over half getting terms of imprisonment ranging from seven days to 10 years.TopicsUS Capitol attackUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      Singin’ the coups: Donald Trump releases single with January 6 prisoners

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      Singin’ the coups: Donald Trump releases single with January 6 prisonersFormer president drops charity song on streaming sites recorded with men imprisoned for their role in attack on US CapitolDonald Trump has released a charity single, recorded with a choir of men held in a Washington DC prison for their parts in the deadly January 6 insurrection he incited.Trump’s war with DeSantis heats up with details of 2024 battle planRead moreOn Friday, Justice for All by Donald J Trump and the J6 Prison Choir was available on streaming platforms including Spotify, Apple Music and YouTube.The move is the latest in a growing trend by Trump and others on the far right of US politics to embrace the January 6 attack on the Capitol as a political cause and portray many of those who carried it out as protesters being persecuted by the state.Forbes, which first reported the song’s production, said a video would debut on a podcast hosted by Steve Bannon, the far-right activist and alleged fraudster who was Trump’s campaign chair and White House strategist.Over an ambient backing, the song features Trump reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, interspersed with a male voice choir singing The Star-Spangled Banner. The song lasts for about two and a half minutes and ends with a chant of “U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!” Forbes said it was “produced by a major recording artist who was not identified”.Robert Maguire, research director for the watchdog Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said: “I have never been more repulsed by the mere existence of a song than one sung by a president who tried to do a coup and a literal ‘choir’ of insurrectionists who tried to help him.”Barb McQuade, a University of Michigan law professor and former US attorney, called the song “a disinformation tactic right out of the authoritarian playbook”.Trump, she said, was seeking to “wrap lies in patriotism”.On 6 January 2021, Trump told supporters to “fight like hell” to block certification of Joe Biden’s election win. A mob then attacked the US Capitol, sending lawmakers including Mike Pence, Trump’s vice-president, running for their lives.The riot only delayed the certification process but it is now linked to nine deaths, including law enforcement suicides.More than 1,000 people have been charged. Hundreds have been convicted, some with seditious conspiracy, and hundreds remain wanted by the FBI.Trump was impeached for inciting the insurrection but acquitted when enough Senate Republicans stayed loyal.The House January 6 committee made four criminal referrals regarding Trump to the Department of Justice, which continues to investigate.That is just one source of legal jeopardy for Trump, who also faces investigations of his financial affairs, a hush money payment to a porn star, his election subversion and his retention of classified records, as well as a defamation suit from a writer who accuses him of rape, an allegation he denies.Running for president again, Trump dominates polling regarding the Republican field.Forbes said Trump’s January 6-themed song was intended to raise money for the families of those imprisoned. It also said the project would not “benefit families of people who assaulted a police officer”.Citing “a person with knowledge of the project”, Forbes said the choir consisted of about 20 inmates at the Washington DC jail who were recorded over a jailhouse phone. Some such inmates reportedly sing the national anthem each night.Trump did not comment.TopicsDonald TrumpUS Capitol attacknewsReuse this content More

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      Trump not entitled to immunity from civil suits over Capitol attack, says DoJ

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      Trump not entitled to immunity from civil suits over Capitol attack, says DoJJustice department said ex-president could be held liable for physical and psychological harm suffered during January 6 Donald Trump does not have absolute immunity from civil suits seeking damages over his alleged incitement of the January 6 Capitol attack, the US justice department said in a court filing that could have profound implications for complaints against the former president.In an amicus brief in a case brought by two US Capitol police officers and joined by 11 House Democrats, the justice department said Trump could be held liable for physical and psychological harm suffered during the attack despite his attempts to seek blanket protections.Pence declines to support Trump if he’s 2024 nominee: ‘I’m confident we’ll have better choices’Read more“Speaking to the public on matters of public concern is a traditional function of the presidency,” read the 32-page brief to the US court of appeals for the DC circuit. “But that traditional function is one of public communication. It does not include incitement of imminent private violence.”The justice department stressed that it was not weighing in on whether the lawsuit had made a plausible argument that Trump’s speech immediately before the January 6 attack incited thousands of his supporters to storm the Capitol in an effort to stop certification of Joe Biden’s election win.But the department said that because actual incitement of imminent private violence – the key legal standard – would not be protected by presidential immunity, the appeals court should reject his contention that he had absolute immunity from civil litigation.“No part of a president’s official responsibilities includes the incitement of imminent private violence,” the brief said. “By definition, such conduct plainly falls outside the president’s constitutional and statutory duties.”The justice department opinion comes after the appeals court asked the government to offer its position while it considered whether Trump was acting within the confines of the office of the presidency when he urged his supporters to “fight like hell” and march on the Capitol.The sensitivity of the case – the potential impact on other civil suits against Trump that could have implications for presidential immunity – meant the department took several months and made two requests for a month’s extension before finalising its response.In siding against Trump’s position that he enjoyed “categorical immunity”, the justice department said it agreed with a lower-court ruling that the first amendment to the constitution did not allow Trump to evade liability in the January 6 suit.The lawsuit was filed under a statute, enacted after the civil war in response to Ku Klux Klan insurrections across the south to stop Black people voting, which allows for damages when force or intimidation are used to prevent government officials carrying out their duties.The amicus brief comes as the justice department controversially continues to defend Trump’s claim of absolute immunity in a defamation case brought by the writer E Jean Carroll, who accuses Trump of raping her in New York in the mid-1990s. Trump has said “it never happened” and said Carroll is not his “type”.Responding to that case, the department argued that while Trump’s comments were not appropriate, they came when he was president. Responding to a reporter’s question about the allegation, the department said part of a president’s responsibility was “to be responsive to the media and public”.TopicsUS newsDonald TrumpUS justice systemLaw (US)US Capitol attackUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      US court skeptical of bid to access congressman’s phone in January 6 inquiry

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      US court skeptical of bid to access congressman’s phone in January 6 inquiryAt issue is whether a protection afforded by the constitution applies to ‘informal’ fact-finding by members of CongressA federal appeals court appeared skeptical on Thursday of the justice department’s interpretation of US Congress members’ immunity from criminal investigations and whether it allowed federal prosecutors to access House Republican Scott Perry’s phone contents in the January 6 investigation.The department seized Perry’s phone in the criminal investigation last year and was granted access to its contents by a lower court, until Perry appealed the decision on the grounds that the speech or debate clause protections barred prosecutors from seeing his messages.January 6 insurrection has proved an obsession for Fox News’s Tucker CarlsonRead moreTwo of the three DC circuit judges appeared unconvinced about the justice department’s reading of the clause – the constitutional provision that shields congressional officials from legal proceedings – though it was unclear whether that would lead to them ruling against prosecutors.The court did not issue a ruling from the bench during the partly unsealed hearing, but the judge’s decision could have far-reaching implications for witnesses like Perry and even Mike Pence in the January 6 investigation, as well as the constitutional power and scope of the protection itself.The two Trump-appointed judges, Gregory Katsas and Neomi Rao, indicated they could rule in two ways: that messages with people outside Congress are not confidential at all, or that Perry could not be prosecuted or questioned about the messages, but that prosecutors could gain access to them.The supreme court has ruled in several instances on the speech or debate clause. While the exact nature of the protection remains vague, it has generally found the protection to be “absolute” as long as the conduct came in furtherance of legislative activity.At issue is whether Perry’s communications with third parties as he sought to assist Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election results – and in particular, “informal” fact-finding – could be classified as legislative activity that would fall under the speech or debate clause.Perry’s main lawyer, John Rowley, argued that the congressman was protected from being forced to give up roughly 2,200 messages on his phone to prosecutors because they amounted to legislative work as he prepared for the 6 January certification and possible election reform legislation.But the justice department’s lawyer John Pellettieri disputed Rowley’s broad reading of the clause and argued that such “informal” fact-finding that had not been authorized by Congress as an institution meant Perry was acting unilaterally and therefore beyond the scope of the protection.Katsas and Rao sharply quizzed the justice department on its position that only committee-authorized investigations were protected under the speech or debate clause, and how any other fact-finding could not be a legislative activity.Katsas ran the department through various scenarios, including whether a recording of a call made by a member of Congress to a third party that they would use to inform how they voted on specific legislation would be protected – to which the department replied that it would not.“So a member who is not on a committee has no fact-finding ability?” Rao asked.Katsas added that he found it “odd” that “a member working to educate himself or herself” on how to vote would not be covered by the protection.The justice department argued in response that the conduct had to be “integral” to actual “legislative procedures” to be protected, and warned that the speech or debate clause would otherwise include anything members of Congress did so long as they claimed it was legislative work.The department also suggested that the conduct had to be “bona fide” legislative work – which prompted a response from Katsas that judges were not supposed to consider the motive and the behind-the-scenes decision-making of members of Congress.At the end of the hearing, Perry’s lawyer Rowley added that the department’s narrow interpretation of the speech or debate clause – that it had to be authorized and integral to actual legislative procedure – would mean the minority in Congress would have no protection in researching legislation.The hearing also revealed the previously sealed ruling by the chief US judge for the District of Columbia, Beryl Howell, in December that Perry was appealing: Howell had decided that Perry’s fact-finding messages were not protected because they were not part of a formal congressional investigation.TopicsUS Capitol attackUS constitution and civil libertiesUS politicsRepublicansnewsReuse this content More