Archive for category: Weaponized DOJ

What Is DOJ Really After in Raiding Hannah Natanson?

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I shuddered when I read this article from Hannah Natanson in real time, in December, which was the first I really took notice of the name behind a flood of important reporting on Trump’s attack on the government. A chronicle of the hell Trump had subjected government workers to, it was a great article.

Signal message sent Feb. 23

I think about jumping off a bridge a couple times a day.

Signal message sent March 21

I want to die. It’s never been like this.

Signal message sent May 21

I have been looking at how much I am worth alive, as opposed to dead.

But in telling that story, Natanson told how she protected the anonymity of her sources.

Colleagues told me to join our internal tip-sharing Slack channel #federal-workers, then talk to Washington economics editor Mike Madden, who was coordinating our DOGE coverage. I started copying and pasting tips there as fast as I could, scraping out identifying details. Then, phone buzzing every few seconds, I speed-walked around the building until I found Mike. Skipping with grace over the fact we’d never met (and I didn’t work for him), he ferried me to every corner of the seventh floor: Meet the team covering technology. The team covering national security. The White House editors. Eventually, The Washington Post created a beat for me covering Trump’s transformation of government, and fielding Signal tips became nearly my whole working life.

[snip]

After consulting Post lawyers, I developed what we felt was the safest possible sourcing system. If I planned to use someone in a story, I asked them to send me a picture of their government ID, then tried to forget it. I kept notes from reporting conversations in an encrypted drive, never writing down anyone’s name. To Google-check facts and identities, I used a private browser with no search history. I retitled every Signal chat by agency — “Transportation Employee,” “FDA Reviewer,” “EPA Scientist” — until the app, unable to keep up, stopped accepting new nicknames. (Then I started moving contacts into two-person group chats, which I could still rename.)

Three weeks later, FBI seized the phone on which all those contacts were labeled with aliases. When they searched her home, she was logged into the Slack on which she had shared all those leads with colleagues. They seized the encrypted drive on which she had her notes.

In short, she publicly revealed where to look for everything else, and three weeks later, Trump agents came and took it all.

(For the record, this is not the only time I’ve shuddered about publicly disclosed operational security lately; far too many profiles on anti-ICE activism describe how their Signal trees are structured and what tools the central dispatcher uses to keep everything flowing.)

And that’s one of many reasons the unusual openness of the indictment against Aurelio Perez-Lugones — the pretext FBI used for raiding Natanson — terrifies me.

As I laid out here, I find it exceedingly unusual that DOJ laid out precisely what information got leaked and its classification level, described to be the following stories to which Natanson contributed.

Even as a legal issue, identifying the specific information that got leaked and how sensitive it is only serves to further compromise the information. It undermines prosecutors’ ability to prove that DOD (which is obscured in the indictment but which Pam Bondi freely identified) was trying to protect this information, a necessary element of the offense.

Seizing two MacBook Pros, an iPhone, a portable hard drive, her Garmin running watch, and a voice recorder from a journalist (while also sending WaPo a subpoena) when you already had proof that Perez-Lugones sent her classified information is more than overkill.

It’s the Garmin that really gets me. According to the declaration Natanson submitted in a bid to get her stuff back, she only communicated with Perez-Lugones via Signal or phone. The FBI is trying to obtain evidence about other people she met with, face-to-face.

So I want to consider what else DOJ might be looking for.

Did Perez-Lugones obtain proof of what Trump is really pursuing in Venezuela?

First, Garmin watch aside, it’s possible that Perez-Lugones took things that did not show up in Natanson’s reporting, yet, that DOJ is attempting to remove from her custody. The only thing classified at TS/SCI that Perez-Lugones is accused of leaking is a report based on an intercept of a letter Nicolás Maduro sent to Putin.

In mid-October, [Ramón Celestino] Velásquez, the transportation minister, traveled to Moscow for a meeting with his Russian counterpart, according to Russia’s Transport Ministry. According to documents obtained by The Post, he was also meant to deliver the letter from Maduro to Putin.

In the letter, Maduro requested that the Russians help boost his country’s air defenses, including restoring several Russian Sukhoi Su-30MK2 aircraft previously purchased by Venezuela. Maduro also asked for assistance overhauling eight engines and five radars in Russia, acquiring 14 sets of what were believed to be Russian missiles, as well as unspecified “logistical support,” according to the documents.

Maduro emphasized that Russian-made Sukhoi fighters “represented the most important deterrent the Venezuelan National Government had when facing the threat of war,” according to the U.S. records.

Maduro asked Russia for a “medium-term financing plan of three years” through Rostec, the Russian state-owned defense conglomerate. The documents did not specify an amount.

The documents also indicate that Velásquez was slated to meet with and deliver a second letter to Russian First Deputy Prime Minister Denis Manturov. They do not state whether or how the Russian government responded to Maduro’s outreach or whether the trip took place.

Nevertheless, DOJ successfully defeated an initial release order by citing all the TS/SCI information in Perez-Lugones’ brain.

Perez-Lugones is similarly positioned as the defendants in these cases: he has had decades of access to TS/SCI systems and, like these other defendants, what he knows is not erased simply because his access to the information ended. Further, like these defendants, because Perez-Lugones has “transcribed” and “photographed” highly classified information, it is likely he can recall it. Therefore, as the Government argued at the detention hearing, Perez-Lugones will be able to disseminate this information if released.

There is one document, classified Secret/Rel to NATO and identified as Document E, which Perez-Lugones allegedly photographed and sent to Natanson, that the indictment does not describe to be incorporated in this story including an account of an effort by the Pope to arrange an off-ramp for Maduro, the last of Natanson’s stories before his arrest.

On Christmas Eve, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, second-in-command to the pope and a longtime diplomatic mediator, urgently summoned Brian Burch, the U.S. ambassador to the Holy See, to press for details on America’s plans in Venezuela, according to government documents obtained by The Washington Post.

[snip]

For days, the influential Italian cardinal had been seeking access to Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the documents show, desperate to head off bloodshed and destabilization in Venezuela. In his conversation with Burch, a Trump ally, Parolin said Russia was ready to grant asylum to Maduro and pleaded with the Americans for patience in nudging the strongman toward that offer.

[snip]

In his Dec. 24 meeting with Burch, according to the documents obtained by The Post, Parolin said Russia was prepared to receive Maduro. He also shared what is described in the documents as a “rumor”: that Venezuela had become a “set piece” in Russia-Ukraine negotiations, and that “Moscow would give up Venezuela if it were satisfied on Ukraine.”

The materials Perez-Lugones shared are consistent with Trump having a quid pro quo with Russia, a swap of Venezuela for Ukraine. If he had obtained proof that he may or may not have shared, it might explain the need to seize any shred that he shared; but if so, the raid has nothing to do with national security, but instead with covering up Trump’s secret alliance with Russia.

A potentially related story describes that State was going to blow $50 million protecting Greenland’s polar bears, basically slush in support of Trump’s bid to conquer the entire hemisphere.

Is DOJ targeting specific whistleblowers, including Chuck Borges?

Remember how I noted that the new disclosures about DOGE’s unlawful access to Social Security data referenced an ongoing investigation?

“SSA first learned about this agreement during a review unrelated to this case in November 2025.”

WaPo was not the first outlet to report on Borges’ allegations of grave compromise of Social Security data, allegations that were partly confirmed by these recent disclosures; NYT was.

But WaPo, including Natanson, was the first outlet to interview Borges after he quit in October.

“Prove me wrong,” Borges told The Washington Post last week in his first media interview since his disclosure. “The only way I feel like we’re going to get to that point is with continued public interest, continued public pressure, and I’m willing to lend my name.”

Although he had until now avoided talking to the media, Borges told Post reporters that he had decided to go public to draw attention to his concerns about the safety of Americans’ data and his hope that the agency will share documentation to prove that the data wasn’t put at risk. At his Maryland home — decorated with photos of his family, his prolific board game collection and Navy paraphernalia — the self-described “data geek” said his fears while working at Social Security had kept him up at night.

And that interview linked several earlier WaPo articles, including an earlier Natanson one.

At the same time, the agency was exploring plans to lay off workers, and others were getting reassigned to jobs they were unfamiliar with or choosing to voluntarily leave. In those especially taxing days, Borges said, he saw co-workers breaking down in meetings or while sitting at their desks.

“I cannot count how many employees I saw cry, and that is at all levels of the agency, from executives downward,” Borges said.

In the summer, Borges first heard from colleagues that DOGE had transferred sensitive data to a cloud environment. He began to ask questions but got little information in response.

In Natanson’s Christmas Eve piece, she cited both a Social Security employee (the interview with Borges cites multiple others who back Borges’ claims, one of whom is Leland Dudek) and an IRS official who sent data to DOGE.

A Social Security employee: “Every piece of our data may be at the mercy of unscrupulous people.”

An IRS staffer: There is “a team figuring out how to get … data sent to Doge,” referring to the U.S. DOGE Service, Elon Musk’s cost-cutting team.

In short, DOJ may have raided Natanson in attempt to target a different whistleblower, one who went through formal channels to reveal an unprecedented assault on US person privacy.

Natanson’s sustained reporting of Trump’s dragnet

But it’s not just the Social Security data.

An earlier Natanson story described DOGE’s effort to effectively merge a bunch of massive government databases.

The U.S. DOGE Service is racing to build a single centralized database with vast troves of personal information about millions of U.S. citizens and residents, a campaign that often violates or disregards core privacy and security protections meant to keep such information safe, government workers say.

The team overseen by Elon Musk is collecting data from across the government, sometimes at the urging of low-level aides, according to multiple federal employees and a former DOGE staffer, who all spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals. The intensifying effort to unify systems into one central hub aims to advance multiple Trump administration priorities, including finding and deporting undocumented immigrants and rooting out fraud in government payments. And it follows a March executive order to eliminate “information silos” as DOGE tries to streamline operations and cut spending.

At several agencies, DOGE officials have sought to merge databases that had long been kept separate, federal workers said. For example, longtime Musk lieutenant Steve Davis told staffers at the Social Security Administration that they would soon start linking various sources of Social Security data for access and analysis, according to a person briefed on the conversations, with a goal of “joining all data across government.” Davis did not respond to a request for comment.

Natanson was part of a story revealing the Postal Service is involved in the migrant dragnet.

The law enforcement arm of the U.S. Postal Service has quietly begun cooperating with federal immigration officials to locate people suspected of being in the country illegally, according to two people familiar with the matter and documents obtained by The Washington Post — dramatically broadening the scope of the Trump administration’s government-wide mass deportation campaign.

The U.S. Postal Inspection Service, a little-known police and investigative force for the mail agency, recently joined a Department of Homeland Security task force geared toward finding, detaining and deporting undocumented immigrants, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of professional reprisals.

She revealed the effort to use Medicare data to target immigrants.

Trump immigration officials and the U.S. DOGE Service are seeking to use a sensitive Medicare database as part of their crackdown on undocumented immigrants, according to a person familiar with the matter and records obtained by The Washington Post.

And another describing how DOGE was using HUD data for a similar purpose.

At the Department of Housing and Urban Development, for example, officials are working on a rule that would ban mixed-status households — in which some family members have legal status and others don’t — from public housing, according to multiple staffers who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retribution.

These are some of Trump’s most egregious privacy violations, potentially the cornerstone of vast new data mining on Americans, including both immigrants (the ostensible focus) and citizens (clearly implicated in Borges’ allegations). If the Trump Administration believes Natanson has details about the real purpose of these data grabs, it might explain their raid of her devices: to prevent her from building on this reporting.

Relatedly, a Natanson story that should have generated more attention described how Trump is effectively trying to usurp DC’s policing sovereignty by boosting the numbers of Park Police.

The U.S. Park Police is seeking to double its ranks in D.C. over the next six months, according to documents obtained by The Washington Post detailing plans of an expansion that would bolster the federal agency’s role in the Trump administration’s crime crackdown in the nation’s capital.

[snip]

The Park Police website now boasts of a $70,000 hiring bonus, promotion potential and a “streamlined, virtual hiring process with quick turnaround.”

This was a one-off story. But it felt to me when I read it like a parallel to Stephen Miller’s creation of a national paramilitary force at ICE (the expansion of which has also been featured in Natanson reporting).

Like Natanson’s reporting on Trump’s data violations, this could reveal underlying plans for authoritarian power grabs.

Elon Musk’s corruption

Or maybe DOJ is after Natanson’s more general reporting on DOGE.

A number of her stories last year described how DOGE served to benefit Elon Musk and implant Musk’s businesses even more centrally in the Federal government.

One story last year (also relying on court filings and interviews) described all the agencies that Musk gained access while overseeing DOGE.

The Post reviewed court documents and interviewed dozens of current and former U.S. government officials to determine which records DOGE aides were able to examine while Musk led the unit. Reporters also spoke with experts and business competitors about how that information, if improperly shared with Musk’s companies, could give them a competitive advantage.

DOGE aides, for example, were given near-blanket access to records at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, court records show. The agency holds proprietary information about algorithms used by payment apps similar to ones that Musk has said he wants to incorporate into his social media platform, X.

NASA employees told The Post that DOGE aides were able to review internal assessments of thousands of contracts, including those awarded to rivals of Musk’s SpaceX rocket company, which has already won billions of dollars of government work and is competing for more. (Among SpaceX’s competitors is Blue Origin, a company owned by Jeff Bezos, who also owns The Washington Post. Blue Origin and its executives did not respond to requests for comment.)

And Labor Department employees said in court filings that DOGE aides were allowed to examine any record at the agency, which holds files detailing dozens of sensitive workplace investigations into Tesla and other Musk companies as well as their competitors.

Another broke the story of how State was pushing foreign countries to adopt Starlink (which would put Musk at the center of a global surveillance network).

Less than two weeks after President Donald Trump announced 50 percent tariffs on goods from the tiny African nation of Lesotho, the country’s communications regulator held a meeting with representatives of Starlink.

The satellite business, owned by billionaire and Trump adviser Elon Musk’s SpaceX company, had been seeking access to customers in Lesotho. But it was not until Trump unveiled the tariffs and called for negotiations over trade deals that leaders of the country of roughly 2 million people awarded Musk’s firm the nation’s first-ever satellite internet service license, slated to last for 10 years.

[snip]

A series of internal government messages obtained by The Post reveal how U.S. embassies and the State Department have pushed nations to clear hurdles for U.S. satellite companies, often mentioning Starlink by name. The documents do not show that the Trump team has explicitly demanded favors for Starlink in exchange for lower tariffs. But they do indicate that Secretary of State Marco Rubio has increasingly instructed officials to push for regulatory approvals for Musk’s satellite firm at a moment when the White House is calling for wide-ranging talks on trade.

She was part of a series of stories on Starlink’s bid to replace an existing FAA contract.

So some of her many sources on DOGE last year exposed the corruption at the core of DOGE.

Obviously, DOJ could have targeted Natanson for no other reason than they want to go after all 1200 Signal contacts she had.

But whatever the reason, or reasons, the Aurelio Perez-Lugones seems like a pretext, a convenient national security case DOJ can invoke to try to identify thousands of whistleblowers, including whistleblowers who have firsthand evidence about the increasing authoritarianism of the Trump power grab.

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“Epstein Is Dead:” Pam Bondi Is Neglecting Live Sex Trafficking Prosecutions to Criminalize Democrats

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A week ago, on January 8, Donald Trump bitched out his US Attorneys (as well as those play-acting as US Attorney) — some, apparently, by name — because they are not focusing enough on prosecuting his perceived adversaries.

Dozens of U.S. attorneys, who lead prosecutors’ offices around the country, went to the White House Thursday for what was supposed to be a ceremonial photo shoot. After Attorney General Pam Bondi introduced the group of prosecutors, Trump criticized them as ineffective, saying the group was making it difficult for Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche to do their jobs, the people said.

[snip]

Among his grievances with prosecutors, Trump complained that the Justice Department hadn’t yet brought a case against one of his most prominent Democratic adversaries, Sen. Adam Schiff of California, the people said.

The department has been investigating whether Schiff engaged in mortgage fraud. The senator has called the probe a bogus attempt at political retribution.

The president criticized some specific prosecutors by jurisdiction and said he felt betrayed, the people said.

[snip]

Trump’s blowup at Justice Department prosecutors comes as the president ramps up pressure on the agency to more aggressively pursue his priorities. He has complained repeatedly in recent weeks about Bondi, calling her an ineffective enforcer of his agenda.

As WSJ noted in its story on this, the day after Trump’s tantrum, Jeanine Pirro sent a subpoena to Jerome Powell, setting off a crisis for Trump.

Also in the wake of that attack, the Minnesota US Attorney’s Office decided to investigate Renee Good’s network rather than the guy who shot her, Jonathan Ross, leading to the resignation of six AUSAs in MN and possibly some in the Civil Rights Division in DC, though Pam Bondi — who looked stunning for a 59 year old a year ago but now looks like shit — now claims she fired those MN AUSAs and Harmeet Dhillon claims the Civil Rights attorneys left for other reasons.

Donald Trump has made it the top focus of his DOJ to prosecute his enemies, and as a result, DOJ has been hemorrhaging experience for a year now.

That’s on top of the singular focus on Stephen Miller’s jihad against immigrants, which has led DOJ to reassign lawyers from national security cases to immigration cases (indeed, that’s one of the stated reasons why Bondi fired Robert McBride, because the First AUSA for one of the key national security divisions in the country didn’t sufficiently chase immigration cases).

But there’s another staffing choice that became public in recent weeks.

As multiple outlets have covered and as Jay Clayton detailed in two letters (January 5; January 15) to Judges Richard Berman (who presided over the Epstein case) and Paul Engelmayer (who picked up the Ghislaine Maxwell case after Alison Nathan moved to the 2nd Circuit) — DOJ has dedicated up to 580 people (the 500 reported last week, plus another 80 added this week)  to replicating the review that over a thousand FBI personnel did a year ago, this time accounting for victim privacy and “independent privileges” not permitted under the act.

To date, the Department has employed over five hundred reviewers to review and redact millions of pages of materials from the investigations into Epstein and his convicted coconspirator, Maxwell.2 The SDNY alone, in conjunction with the Department, has dedicated significant resources (including AUSAs as well as other SDNY personnel), which this week has been supplemented by approximately 80 attorneys from the Department’s Criminal Division, who will coordinate and work with SDNY during the review of documents identified as likely to contain victim information. As part of that review, the Department is identifying not only those materials the publication of which are required under the Act, but also those that carry independent privileges as well as the need to redact victim-identifying information, among other things. Act, § 2(c).3

3 Any materials withheld on this basis of course will be disclosed in a report to Congress. Act § 3.

We still have no explanation for what the hell Bondi did in the last review, such that she has to dedicate 580 attorneys to replicate the review (though the explanation probably lies in the matters DOJ plans to claim privilege over).

But not only is the need to replicate the work that taxpayers already paid for drawing from national security cases, but it is drawing from other high profile sex trafficking cases.

On Tuesday, Judge Valerie Caproni, who is presiding over the prosecution of the Alexander brothers — who are accused of trafficking seven women and a girl (with more victims accusing the brothers) using means not that dissimilar from Epstein’s modus operandi — laid into prosecutors for delays in turning over discovery for a trial currently due to start this month.

On Tuesday, another federal judge in the Southern District of New York told prosecutors to hold off of the Epstein assignment to focus on another marquee sex crime prosecution: the case of Oren, Alon and Tal Alexander — a trio of wealthy brothers in real estate accused of using their status to rape and traffic dozens of women.

With that case set to head to trial later this month, U.S. District Judge Valerie Caproni told prosecutors that they need to focus on expeditiously sending over discovery materials.

“A few people can be strung from the Epstein case given that these people are on trial,” said the Obama appointee. “Epstein is dead.”

See InnerCity Press’ live tweeting here.

So here’s how Pam Bondi has used the resources at DOJ.

DOJ has been firing or chasing out personnel — about 5,500 people, according to Justice Connection, not all of them lawyers — since Trump started. A great many of those ousted were ousted, whether by choice or firing, because they refused to pursue Trump’s unethical weaponization.

That’s not good enough, Trump said last week. He needs the hollowed out DOJ to pursue his enemies faster.

Meanwhile, Pam Bondi is so incompetent or corrupt, she has to replicate work she already did, reviewing the Epstein files. 1,000 FBI personnel last March, 580 attorneys now. As a result, she’s neglecting current sex trafficking prosecutions.

And we have yet to tally what the impact of the reassignment of attorneys who focus on real national security issues. Many of them are chasing Stephen Miller’s fever dreams.

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DOJ Continues to Let DHS Pick and Choose Screen Shots Pertaining to Their Assaults

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There’s a general reason and specific reasons why people should care about Bill Essayli’s response to David Huerta’s motion to compel the government to turn over metadata associated with the evidence obtained against him.

Generally, DHS has permitted — encouraged, seemingly — DHS officers to use their own personal phones and to use Signal. And whether officers are using their own or government phones, DHS ditched its archiving software last year; it is relying on officers’ taking screen caps of relevant communications.

The Department of Homeland Security has stopped using software that automatically captured text messages and saved trails of communication between officials, according to sworn court statements filed this week.

Instead, the agency began in April to require officials to manually take screenshots of their messages to comply with federal records laws, citing cybersecurity concerns with the autosave software.

[snip]

The policy expects officials to first take screenshots of the text messages on their work phones, send it to their work email, download it on their work computers and then run a program that would recognize the text to store it in searchable formats, according to the department’s guidance submitted to the court.

Under the Federal Records Act, government agencies are required to preserve all documentation that officials and federal workers produce while executing their duties. They have to make federal records available to the public under the Freedom of Information Act unless they fall under certain exemptions.

And we’ve seen AUSAs rely on officers themselves to review their own devices for communications covered by discovery.

In the LaMonica McIver case, for example, officers didn’t turn over exculpatory texts until Judge Jamel Semper ordered supplemental discovery.

It wasn’t until November 26 — almost two weeks after Judge Jamel Semper ruled on McIver’s immunity bid —  that DOJ turned over texts copying this video, observing that it looked bad.

5 The Spotlight News video came to light during the course of supplemental briefing only because it was referenced in a May 9, 2025, text message that the government finally turned over on November 26, 2025. HSI special agents exchanged the video in that May 9 conversation, where the agents also acknowledged that the evidence in the video was “bad.” Ex. Y at 2-3. The prosecution team therefore clearly knew about the text messages (and thus the video) when disclosures were due in July.

McIver’s lawyer, Paul Fishman, says he will address this delayed discovery in a follow-up letter.

Inexplicable delays in the government’s discovery productions mean that the record continues to be developed.1

1 Congresswoman McIver will detail these shortcomings in a forthcoming letter to the Court.

But the implication of this is clear.

DOJ was never going to turn over these discussions — conducted on Signal — until Judge Semper ordered this supplemental briefing. They were sitting on evidence that shows that before DHS first started calling McIver’s actions an assault on May 10 (McIver had to ask to have these Tweets taken down, but the timeline is in her motion to do so), they had shared video noting that their own actions looked bad.

Consider how this policy would work in the case of Jonathan Ross’ killing of Renee Good. Given that Ross’ video of the killing was released unofficially, it seems likely he was using his own phone that day. Particularly given the impunity with which Pam Bondi has treated him so far, there’s no reason to believe he’d retain anything incriminating himself, much less people like Greg Bovino or Stephen Miller.

It would take someone actually seizing his phone to see if there are incriminating details about his own motives.

That’s what David Huerta is asking for: that DOJ provide the metadata associated with both the videos and texts messages surrounding the day.

The metadata Mr. Huerta requests here—for the agents’ text messages already produced in this case,10 and for the photos and videos taken of the scene on June 6 and already produced—is critical and material to his ability to adequately prepare for his defense in this case. It is also relevant to understanding the sequence of events that occurred on June 6, both the actions of protestors and Mr. Huerta at the scene (e.g., shown in photographs and video recordings) and the agents’ statements to one another and activities that day as reflected in the text messages. Lastly, the metadata information affiliated with iPhone photos and messages is routinely stored in the ordinary course for such ESI, and would be straightforward to extract from the agents’ cellphones or devices. Moreover, producing the photos and videos in a native, load-ready format along with a corresponding index is routinely done in criminal cases by the Department of Justice.

10 Because the agents’ text messages and the photos and videos have already been collected by the government in this case and produced to the defense, there can be no dispute about the government’s “possession, custody, or control” of that material and/or those devices, as the government already had, and likely continues to have, access to them in preparing their discovery productions.

Even if these witnesses — HSI Supervisory Agent Ryan Ribner and Undercover Officer Jeremy Crossen — were reliable, this would be a reasonable ask. While the bulk of the video in discovery is unavailable publicly, the texts are difficult to unpack, and because Ribner “wrote the arrest report … from memory,” there are time discrepancies between the narrative he tells in the arrest report and the texts, to say nothing of additional discrepancies in Crossen’s countersurveillance report.

But these witnesses are not reliable. Crossen, for example, told interviewers that he was using his personal phone because his government phone “was not working at the time of the incident.”

TFO Crossen stated he used his personal phone to document the events which was turned over to an HSI Computer Forensics Agent (CFA) to download and preserve evidence.

TFO Crossen stated his government issued phone was not working at the time of the incident.

Except his texts show he switched phones during the incident (his testimony is so inconsistent I actually misunderstood whose phone this was on first read).

Plus, he told Ribner had had a couple hundred videos. The discovery includes far short of that.

And that’s just one reason to question Crossen’s candor when he told investigators, “he did not alter or delete any videos.” There are other holes in what appears in exhibits (this may be available in videos): he told investigators that somebody — I think he means protestors — called out “he’s a union member,” about Huerta, which is … not how I’d expect people in left-leaning politics to describe a senior SEIU official. The specific description of Huerta would go to the denials of everyone involved that they assaulted Huerta because he is a senior union official.

And Crossen described not filming the most important footage for this case, purportedly showing Huerta standing right in front of the van, rather than to its side, where the DHS goons assaulted him.

TFO Crossen recalled that immediately before 0:10 seconds before starting  video 2790, he observed HUERTA standing in front of the van, closer to the center of the van. He stated that he did not film that particular moment because there were a lot of distractions “from persistent instigators” including HUERTA.

And that’s why Essayli’s argument — that DOJ can provide Electronically Stored Information in whatever format they want so long as it maintains the data integrity — falls short.

In relevant part, the ESI protocol recommends that (1) after conferral, any format selected for producing discovery should maintain the ESI’s integrity, allow for reasonable usability, and reasonably limit costs, and, if possible, conform to industry standards for the format;

Crossen’s testimony, along with problems in the testimony of others, raises more than enough reason to question the integrity of the data as provided. A Cellebrite extraction, which is what Huerta is asking for, would show whether there were gaps in production.

Essayli is also citing in poor faith to misrepresent Huerta’s argument (and in his motion to dismiss, switched between PDF and document page numbers, further obscuring his references). He repeatedly claims Huerta just wants DOJ to create a searchable index.

To the extent defendant is requesting the government create an index of the metadata in a searchable format, see Dkt. 58 at 3:1-5, that request is beyond the government’s discovery obligations.

[snip]

Instead, defendant’s true complaint is that the government has not created a searchable index of the photos’ and videos’ metadata. (Dkt. 58 at 3.)

But the cited passage (this is on document page 2) reveals they’re asking for far more than that.

The screenshot PDF images of the messages do not contain any metadata affiliated with the messages or the source iPhones, and no corresponding index was provided to defense counsel with this information. Notably, the phone numbers belonging to the sender(s) and recipient(s) of the messages, or even the iPhone contact cards, were not included in the production or visible in the screenshots. Nor do the iMessage screenshots contain a timestamp for each message; while some messages do have a timestamp at the top (sometimes owing to a gap in time), many of the messages contain no timestamp whatsoever.6 Additionally, because of the nature of the initial production (individual PDFs named only by “IMG” file number), there is no way in which to tell who the owner and custodian (e.g., which agent) is of each set of messages and each phone. Additionally, due to the screenshot nature of the messages, certain messages are cut off and the messages were not all provided in chronological order to Mr. Huerta. Finally, the iMessage screenshots do not contain any geolocation or coordinate information, if any is available, as is often part of cellphone metadata or any “native” file.

There are a whole bunch of reasons this is necessary to reconstruct what happened.

But in DHS’ new parallel evidentiary role, it’s not clear whether Huerta — or any of the other people accused of assault using evidence from officers’ personal cell phones — will have access to that.

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Chekhov’s Back Door Gate Appears in the David Huerta Assault Saga

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F[ucking] A[sshole] Bill Essayli submitted his response to David Huerta’s motion to dismiss his information (see this post for an explanation of why I’m calling Essayli, “F[ucking] A[sshole]”).

Here’s a summary of the argument: Huerta intentionally blocked the only available entrance of the search (but not arrest) location, he did this via means other than standing in front of a van, and encouraged others to do so, which led (after Ryan Ribner assaulted Huerta) LAPD to declare a riot.

During the execution of a search warrant, defendant intentionally blocked the only available entrance of the Warrant Location. He did this by sitting down and walking in circles directly in front of the entrance of the Warrant Location, making it impossible for any law enforcement vehicles to enter or exit, without defendant moving. In addition, he also successfully encouraged other individuals to join him in blocking the entrance of the Warrant Location in the same manner eventually contributing to LAPD declaring a riot at the Warrant Location. As defendant concedes in the Motion, defendant was told explicitly he “shouldn’t block or impede the [law enforcement vehicle] that would be arriving.” (Dkt. 55 at 14.)

Even this passage conflates two things Huerta did — sit, and picket, before the van showed up — with blocking it.

But the most interesting part of the passage is that word “available,” which is doing a lot of work. Along with the filing, DOJ submitted seven exhibits: three compilations of video (filed manually, so we don’t get them), and the interview reports from HSI Special Agent J Smith (who seems to have overseen the search), a second interview with the van driver, Brian Gonzalez, an interview with HSI Special Agent Andre Lemon, who helped Gonzalez change a tire, and a picture of the tire that got slashed while or shortly after Huerta was being assaulted. These late interviews appear to be an attempt to salvage the case with witnesses besides Ryan Ribner and Carey Crook, the guys who assaulted Huerta. DOJ is spinning a new story that because of what happened with Huerta — that is, because Ribner, especially, assaulted the SEIU CA President — HSI had to flee the site of the search hours earlier than they otherwise would have, which limited the number of undocumented workers they could detain, which wasn’t supposed to be the point of the search.

As Lemon described, they fled out a back gate.

SA Lamon stated they loaded the vehicle with “Some of the detainees and snuck out of the back gate”.

You see, from the moment I read this line in Ribner’s affidavit supporting the arrest warrant, I was pretty sure there was another gate ready to open, just like Chekov’s gun, a plot point that must be resolved.

Our trusty cyber expert also suggests that the van entering the gate of the facility — the predicate for making Huerta move and therefore the predicate to tackling him, injuring him, and then arresting him — may not, after all, be the only entrance. He describes that “as far as I was aware,” it was.

As far as I was aware, this gate was the only location through which vehicles could enter or exit the premises.

I wonder whether his awareness has changed over the weekend.

Ribner said a bit more about Chekov’s gate in the arrest report (and also revealed that he left in a caravan via “the secondary gate,” which he did not otherwise explain).

ERO SDDO C C approached SSA Ribner to discuss a plan to safely escort an ERO USG vehicle into the facility. SSA Ribner provided the same information to SDDO C as he did to the DEA agents regarding subjects potentially impeding/blocking agents and USG vehicles. SDDO Cr asked if there was another entrance/exit to the facility; SSA Ribner related that he did not have knowledge of a secondary entrance/exit. SSA Ribner related that agents would need to go outside of the gate and encircle the sides of the van to make sure it isn’t blocked and/or damaged. SDDO C asked how agents would move the pickup truck [playing loud music] from the driveway. SSA Ribner advised that he would verbally request the driver to move the truck. [my emphasis]

DOJ didn’t bother to ask Crook whether he knew of a second gate last August, as it became clear neither his nor Ribner’s testimony was credible. But his interview report describes that Crook, “recalled himself and GS Ribner coming up with a plan for the main gate to slightly open to allow the van to enter the property and then close it after the van entered,” just before he made a claim — that Huerta had “straddle[d] the hood of the van” and “ma[de] his body an X,” a claim no other witnesses nor the video corroborated.

The “main gate.”

You only call something a main gate if you know there’s another.

Brian Gonzalez — the guy who drove the van and all of a sudden remembered David Huerta being close to it after he got a permanent job at CBP and had a follow-up call, probably the guy DOJ hopes will be their star witness given problems with calling Ribner or Crook to the stand –was not asked about any gates in his first interview (or the follow-up, where his memory about Huerta evolved).

But in his interview last week, he was asked about the gate.

Before I explain what he said, note that the F[ucking] A[sshole] Bill Essayli confessed in his response that earlier — right up until the moment David Huerta arrived, Essayli seems to suggest — DHS had no problem getting cars and vans through the entrance where protestors were.

Shortly thereafter, between 10:30 a.m. and 11:45 a.m. demonstrators began to show up at the Warrant Location and congregated near the entrance to the front gate. During this initial period, before defendant arrived, the demonstrators did not block the driveway and repeatedly allowed vehicles to enter and exit the Warrant Location through the front gate. (Ex. 1 at 7:30-7:35; 8:16-8:27; Ex. 2 at 4:25-5:25, 7:49-7:53, 8:22-8:26, 9:45-9:48, 11:47-11:58.)

There was a white van captured in one of Jeremy Crossen’s photos, showing a time stamp of 11:10 (it’s possible the van in one or both of these pictures is the one driven by Gonazalez; per Google his drop-off at the Federal Building was a 9-minute drive away).

Crossen’s countersurveillance report describes what may be this van — at around that time, a van and a beige car were able to pass through the gate because someone asked nicely for the protestors to move and they complied.

At approximately 11:25 a.m., The southwest gate of the business opened, and a beige Toyota sedan and a white ICE ERO transport van approached the south apron of the driveway. As the gate opened, UHM-1 ran from where he was standing, just east of the apron. UHM-1 initially stood center driveway of the apron, blocking the egress of the car and van while filming. An unidentified agent standing just north of the gate ordered UHM-1 to move and he subsequently complied.

Half an hour later, per Crossen’s report, a mini-convoy came up at a time when Huerta was legitimately in front of the gate, if we can believe any of these reports (we can’t).

At approximately 11:54 a.m., A black Government Jeep Grand Cherokee, along with several other government vehicles, approached the apron of the driveway from E. 15 Street. The vehicle th remained stopped as both the gate was closed and standing protesters were blocking the apron of the driveway, preventing the vehicle from pulling closer to the south gate for entry into the business. At this time, TFO Crossen observed HUERTA, LENEHAN, UHF-8 and UHM-7 sit down on the ground, approximately two to four feet from the closed gate. TFO Crossen both audibly heard and video recording HUERTA motioning with his left hand with an “enviting motion” to the crowd around him, yelling “Sit down! Sit Down!” repeatedly. HSI Supervisory Special Agent (SSA) Ryan Ribner approached the closed gate from the other side and informed the seated protesters they were impeding the vehicles and needed to move. Upon hearing this, HUERTA, while still seated, “scooted” forward, where he was now seated on his knees, right against the gate. HUERTA ignored SSA Ribner’s orders to move because they were impeding law enforcement vehicles attempting to enter the business. HUERTA yelled to SSA Ribner, “What are you doing! What are you doing! I can’t hear you through your fucking mask! How are you keeping me safe by doing this!” SSA Ribner, calmly again admonished HUERTA that he was impeding law enforcement vehicles from entering.

Those vehicles do not appear in Ribner’s report, as far as I can tell, at all.

There’s no resolution to what happened to those vehicles, though. They disappear from the narrative by the time the van driven by Gonzalez shows up, which is when seven people move to block the van, and oh by the way, so does David Huerta, added as an afterthought in Crossen’s report.

At approximately 12:15 p.m., a white Law enforcement van pulls up to the apron of the driveway, just south of the main south gate with its siren and emergency lights activated. As the vehicle pulled up, agents opened the south gate, and several agents walked from inside the property compound to the apron of the driveway to assist with moving protestors so the emergency vehicle could gain entrance. As most of the crowd moved for the loud audible siren and emergency police lights, LENEHAN, GARDUNO, CUERVO, ALTAMIRANO, UHM-7, and an unidentified Hispanic female, later identified as Edith DIAZ (DOB: /1977; COC UNK) and UHM-8, who was now out of his unoccupied vehicle, which was playing loud music and blocking the apron, ran closer to and in front of the law enforcement vehicle to block it.. HUERTA also moved toward the emergency van with activated lights and siren and stood approximately two feet from the front bumper, directly in front of it, ignoring the emergency lights, activated siren and ignoring agents orders to move.

With all that in mind — with the way that Ribner stages confrontation over the expected appearance of Gonzalez’ van — here’s what Gonzalez said in his interview last week:

Gonzalez stated that he called Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO), Supervisory Detention and Deportation Officer (SDDO) Carey Crook when he was about a block away from the location.

Gonzalez stated that he drove past the crowd at the front gate and asked SDDO Crook if he could come through the back.

Gonzalez stated that SDDO Crook informed him that the back gate was locked and they didn’t have the keys to the lock.

At noon, when Ribner was staging a confrontation with the people he believed were “vicious, horrible people,” he didn’t know there was a second gate.

But somehow Gonzalez, who found out just that morning he’d be doing this drive and had already done one pick-up that day, knew there was one. Not only Gonzalez knew of it. But Crook — whom Ribner claims asked him, Ribner, if there were a second gate — not only knew of one, but knew it was locked.

When they needed to get by protestors before Ribner had assaulted David Huerta, they asked nicely and everyone complied.

When they needed to get by protestors after Ribner had assaulted David Huerta, they knew exactly how to do that: go out the back door gate, which it turns out they had keys to.

Update: On Thursday, Huerta asked to delay the trial until May. I suspect this reflects a bid by DOJ to implicate Huerta — possibly even to supersede him with a felony — for the punctured tire.

b. Defendant contends that the omnibus opposition and the recent discovery productions of the government raise issues that warrant additional investigation and the need for additional pretrial filings. Moreover, defendant anticipates making additional discovery requests based on and in response to the recent productions of by the government that raise new trial issues.

c. In light of the foregoing, counsel for defendant also represents that additional time is necessary to confer with defendant, conduct and complete an independent investigation of the case, conduct and complete additional legal research including for potential pre-trial motions, review the discovery and potential evidence in the case, and prepare for trial in the event that a pretrial resolution does not occur. Defense counsel represents that failure to grant the continuance would deny them reasonable time necessary for effective preparation, taking into account the exercise of due diligence.

Timeline

June 6: Arrest

9:00 AM: HSI task force officer (and Inglewood cop) Jeremy Crossen arrives under cover

9:20: Agents start executing search

9:57: Crossen interacts with Asian woman

10:26: Crossen interacts w/Hispanic protestor, claims he is monitoring the police

10:33: Crossen texts Ribner

11:07: Crossen sees pick-up without plates whose Hispanic driver films

11:19: Crossen describes a Hispanic woman with a neck gaiter; his report provides background on a Kids of Immigrants sweatshirt she wears; start time of alleged criminal conduct

11:25: A sedan enters the gate; after an agent instructs those filming it to step away, they do; Crossen texts Ribner,

 

11:31: A Hispanic woman whom Crossen IDs by name shows up, makes phone calls

11:36: Crossen describes a white woman by name, describes that she masked as the crowd grew

11:37: Crossen describes the Hispanic leader of ACCE Action, Council Member Jose Delgado, show up, make calls

11:49: Crossen claims he sees Huerta walk up

11:51: A white woman from Tenants Union starts yelling obscenities

11:53: Ribner instructs Crossen to focus on Huerta

11:54: Huerta and others sit in front of the gate

12:01 PM: Ribner leaves the property and assaults Huerta [note his report timeline goes haywire in here]

12:00-12:09: Crossen texts Ribner

12:15: Crossen claims van arrives (his description describe others who were in front of the van, then says Huerta also was)

12:15: Ribner calls 911 (claiming this is about pepper spray)

12:18: Crossen describes a scrimmage line

12:20-12:40: Discussions about Huerta’s attempt to call his attorney

12:30: LAFD responds; Huerta asks to be brought to the hospital; Crossen describes LAFD arrival this way:

At approximately 12:28 p.m., TFO Crossen observed a Los Angeles City Fire truck with activated emergency lights and loud audible siren, attempting to gain entry to the business, still being blocked by protestors, to render aid for HUERTA, inside the business, who had been exposed to OC Spray, during his arrest.

12:40: Ribner reports arrest to CACD US Attorney office

12:42: Ribner tells Crossen his personal phone is out of battery, asks him to use his government one

12:47: Ribner admits he used pepper spray

1:05: Ribner speaks to USAO again

1:30: Huerta taken to hospital w/agent in car

2:45: Ribner asks Crossen for pictures of Huerta

Unmarked time: Mayor Bass shows up to hospital room; they ask her to leave (and she does)

9:12: Crossen sends last clip from videos to Ribner (the discovery turned over provides nowhere near the “4 hours” or “100 videos” that Crossen told Ribner, five hours earlier, that he had taken (though the defense did not include all the texts in their exhibit)

9:36: Ribner obtains warrant for Huerta’s phone

10:30: Huerta attorney turns over the phone

June 8: Huerta charged with felony conspiracy

June 9: Case opened

June 17: Date created for one photo provided in discovery

June 19: Initial incident report; Ribner would later (in his September 10 interview) admit he wrote the report from memory and simply did not “recall that he told HUERTA, ‘You are not impeding’. He does not know why he did not include that statement in his report and agrees that his statement could sound exculpatory.”

June 23: Countersurveillance report from Crossen

July 2: Second set of discovery

July 17: Third set of discovery

July 28: Fourth set of discovery (including agent texts)

August 20: USAO interviews Brian Gonzalez, who drove the van allegedly blocked

August 27: USAO interviews Carey Crook; he told AUSAs that, contrary to Ribner’s claim, Huerta did not assault him

August 27: USAO interviews Crossen

September 9: USAO reinterviews Gonzalez; he says he does not remember Huerta straddling the van, as Crooks claimed

September 10: USAO interviews Ribner

September 11: Gonzalez starts at a new job at CBP

September 17: Later case opening date, possibly focusing on the lying agents

October 17: Huerta charged with misdemeanor

November 5: Huerta’s attorneys ask AUSA to identify the obstructive conduct

December 19: AUSA finally provides vague description of conduct

January 2: Interview of HSI Special Agent J Smith

January 9: Second interview with Brian Gonzalez

January 9: Interview with HSI Agent Andre Lemon

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Bill Essayli Has an Identity Crisis

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First Assistant AUSA Bill Essayli, who continues to serve most functions of US Attorney in Los Angeles even after Judge Michael Seabright ruled he’s not lawfully the US Attorney, has an identity crisis.

And it’s not his continued attempts to use textual gimmicks to obscure that he’s not the US Attorney, as the way he adds the initials “F.A.” in his Xitter profile as if his given name is “Fucking Asshole.”

Though the defendant who first forced a ruling that Essayli was playacting, Jaime Hector Rodriguez, continues to insist that Essayli can’t just change his title in a bid to keep powers he does not lawfully possess.

The simple answer is that Mr. Essayli is exercising power he does not possess. He has transcended the land of statutes. He is wielding significant authority, but the whole point is that he lacks that authority: it was not validly conferred on him by Congress. No powers are conferred on “a FAUSA” by statute, id., because the FAUSA position is absent from the statutes, R.M. 9–10. But this FAUSA has inferior-officer powers, because he is exercising powers he has never been conferred. E.g., R.M. 9 & n.2. This is just another way for the government to cast the trick it has played in benign language: appoint an ineligible individual to a vacant office, give him a different title not set out in the statutes, and thereby avoid all statutory limits on the appointment.

Lindsey Halligan’s similar identity problem in EDVA is heating up too.

Rather, I’m talking about the identity issues that threaten to destroy his efforts to criminalize doxing in the immigration context.

In US v. Raygoza, Essayli charged three women who followed an ICE officer — believing he was headed to conduct another snatching — only to arrive at his home. They continued to livestream, and from a neighbor’s property, they both invited others to come to the neighborhood but also announced to his neighbors that he’s la migra.

Yesterday, Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli responded to Sandra Samane’s and Ashleigh Brown’s motions to dismiss (Brown is represented by the same FPDs who made a frivolous assault charge against her go away last year). It’s not so much that their arguments were rock solid; motions to dismiss are really difficult to win. Rather, it’s that in the course of two footnotes, Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli revealed grave problems with his case. The second explained why a separate motion moved to dismiss the second count of the indictment, doxing, the crime which the defendants allegedly conspired to commit.

4 Defendants failed to state the actual home address of R.H. on social media, and instead said the number of a neighbor’s home approximately 100 feet from that of R.H. Because 18 U.S.C. § 119 criminalizes making publicly available “the home address” of covered individuals, the government has moved to dismiss the substantive count (Count Two).

The definition of restricted personal information as used in the law pertains only to the alleged victims own address; the defendants here livestreamed his neighbor’s address (in detention filings in her now-dismissed assault case, Brown explained that they stayed some distance from the victim’s house so as to comply with her release conditions).

A still graver problem for Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli is that — in a filing that elsewhere focuses closely on the terms specifically defined in the doxing statute (“restricted information” and “covered persons”) and on the import of the definitions generally (which is normal in responding to a void for vagueness challenge), Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli uses his first footnote to offer a definition of doxing.

1 Doxxing is short for “dropping documents.” Vangheluwe v. Got News, LLC, 365 F. Supp. 3d 850, 858 (E.D. Mich. 2019). The practice involves “using the Internet to source out and collect someone’s personal and private information and then publicly releasing that information online.” Id. The “goal of doxxing is typically retribution, harassment or humiliation.” Id.

He’s got two problems with that footnote.

First, what the defendants did — follow a guy home unwittingly and livestream where they ended up — is entirely different from “using the Internet to source out and collect someone’s personal and private information,” which only underscores that no one alleges that the defendants specifically sought out the ICE guy’s address. They didn’t dox him, according to the definition in this footnote.

Worse still, the defined goal of doxing in that footnote — “retribution, harrassment[,] or humiliation” — differs from the intent requirement in the statute:

(a) In General.—Whoever knowingly makes restricted personal information about a covered person, or a member of the immediate family of that covered person, publicly available—

(1) with the intent to threaten, intimidate, or incite the commission of a crime of violence against that covered person, or a member of the immediate family of that covered person; or

(2) with the intent and knowledge that the restricted personal information will be used to threaten, intimidate, or facilitate the commission of a crime of violence against that covered person, or a member of the immediate family of that covered person,

The defendants may have doxed the ICE goon. They may well have decided to humiliate him in front of his neighbors by revealing that he is an ICE goon.

But there’s a chasm between hoping to humiliate someone who does a disfavored job and intending for someone to use that information to commit a crime of violence against them. Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli attempts to dodge that by saying the conspiracy should not incorporate the elements of the count he’s seeking to admit and also stating that they won’t argue the defendants intended a crime of violence to happen to the ICE guy.

Separately, Brown argues the indictment must be dismissed because it does not specify the “crime of violence” Brown allegedly intended to incite. (Brown Mot. 19-21.) Even assuming this argument is applicable to the conspiracy alleged in Count One and not just the substantive count the government has moved to dismiss, at trial the government does not intend to proceed on the theory that defendants conspired to release R.H.’s home address with the intent to incite the commission of a crime of violence against him, or did so with the intent and knowledge that the restricted information would be used to facilitate the commission of a crime of violence against him. Defendant’s argument with respect to this portion of the statute is thus moot.

But he never gets around to addressing the larger point. Humiliation is not a crime of violence. But it is also not a threat or even intimidation.

The problem with this is made more apparent when Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli engages in a hypothetical dismissing Brown’s attempt to say she couldn’t have doxed the victim, because his address was already public. Brown’s tack would lead to absurd results, Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli says, because if it held, then how would they criminalize someone threatening the daughter of a judge (like Trump’s doxing of Barack Obama, something Trump has done), and how would they criminalize a defendant posting a witness’ address with the intent they they be intimidated by the criminal’s mob (again, something Trump has done more than once or twice or a hundred times).

And to interpret the statute as Brown would have it would lead to absurd results. Take, for example, the hypothetical of a judge’s daughter posting a photograph on Instagram that reveals her home address: a photograph of her family standing outside her home where the mailbox is visible. A defendant who later appears before the judge would not be subject to prosecution for posting the judge’s home address on an online forum with the intent to threaten the judge due to the daughter’s prior Instagram post. Similarly, a juror, informant, or witness would be cut off from statutory protection if a defendant’s family member or gang associate followed her home and posted the address on Facebook to intimidate her, but her address was already listed in the Whitepages.

In both those cases, of course, a prosecutor could — and should have, in the case of serial criminal Donald Trump — charged that as obstruction, witness tampering.

But these hypotheticals only underscore the point: in a filing asserting that doxing is done for humiliation, Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli is dodging language that requires further intent, not just to humiliate a goon in front of his neighbors, but to threaten him.

Threatening someone with social opprobrium is not the same as threatening someone with physical violence.

Yet the former is what Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli attempts to criminalize here.

Fucking Asshole Bill Essayli wants to criminalize any effort to shame someone for doing a shameful job. And while the argument may well get beyond this effort to dismiss the indictment, he has confessed in this filing that these women didn’t commit the charged crime.

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The Jerome Powell Clusterfuck Is a Clusterfuck of Pam Bondi’s Own Making

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On Sunday, the politically astute Fed Chair Jerome Powell posted a video describing subpoenas he received on Friday, which he claimed (credibly) were part of an effort to attack the independence of the Fed.

This new threat is not about my testimony last June or about the renovation of the Federal Reserve buildings. It is not about Congress’s oversight role; the Fed through testimony and other public disclosures made every effort to keep Congress informed about the renovation project. Those are pretexts. The threat of criminal charges is a consequence of the Federal Reserve setting interest rates based on our best assessment of what will serve the public, rather than following the preferences of the President.

This is about whether the Fed will be able to continue to set interest rates based on evidence and economic conditions—or whether instead monetary policy will be directed by political pressure or intimidation.

The statement (and what has since been reported as a good deal of political maneuvering) set off a number of counterreactions that could prove really costly to Trump — and the United States as a whole.

While financial markets recovered from their initial shock by the end of the day (but not before gold hit a new record price), that may only continue as the political pushback continues.

Not all the markets were impervious to Powell’s harassment by DOJ goons. The dollar, which is down 8.3 percent over the past year—that is, more or less since Trump took office—dropped steeply Monday morning before rising a bit in the afternoon. The yield on 30-year Treasury bonds, which has been rising since October, spiked Monday morning. That’s a sign that fewer people wish to buy them. Why purchase dollars or Treasury bonds when the president is so determined to lower their value that he’s willing to throw the Fed chair, who’s been lowering interest rates lately but not fast enough to suit Trump, in jail? Over the course of the afternoon, however, bond yields fell, leaving them about where they closed Friday.

Gold, meanwhile, jumped nearly 3 percent. As I’ve explained previously, the rising price of gold is the surest sign that the United States economy is headed in a terrible direction. It’s a vote of no-confidence in the dollar. As I explained in October, investors call rising gold prices “debasement trade,” which means money is fleeing from assets in which the market is losing faith—in this case, the dollar and Treasury bonds. The higher the price of gold rises, the more debased our currency and our nation’s debt become.

More problematic for Trump, a number of Republican members of Congress — starting with some of the usual rebels, like Thom Tillis and Lisa Murkowski (who described in a Tweet that she had spoken with Powell)…

Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., said Sunday he will block any Trump appointees to the central bank, including for the new chair, in light of revelations over the weekend that the Justice Department is investigating Powell for potential perjury charges.

“If there were any remaining doubt whether advisers within the Trump Administration are actively pushing to end the independence of the Federal Reserve, there should now be none. It is now the independence and credibility of the Department of Justice that are in question,” Tillis said in a statement.

“I will oppose the confirmation of any nominee for the Fed — including the upcoming Fed Chair vacancy — until this legal matter is fully resolved,” he added.

… But extending t0 loyalists like French Hill, John Thune, and John Kennedy — complained about the disruption caused by the news, including to a crypto bill Congress has long been chasing.

inancial Services Chair French Hill, who called Powell a “man of integrity” and said the investigation threatened “sound monetary policy decisions.” Senate Majority Leader John Thune, meanwhile, called for the probe to be “resolved quickly.”

“I want to see [the Fed] operate in an independent way free of politics,” he added.

[snip]

While Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) called Powell a “bad” Fed chair, he added, “I do not believe, however, that he is a criminal.”

Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.), a Banking Committee member, said if administration officials thought Powell had committed perjury, then they needed to back up the accusations. He added, “I would be stunned if he had done anything wrong.”

“We need this like we need a hole to the head,” Kennedy said, warning of a possible spike in interest rates as markets lose faith in Fed independence.

Meanwhile, Scott Bessent — who has managed to stave off a great deal of stupidity worse than his own in the last year — worried not just about the effect this would have on the markets, but on his ability to stack the Fed with people who wouldn’t be independent.

A perturbed Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told President Trump late Sunday that the federal investigation into the Federal Reserve chair “made a mess” and could be bad for financial markets, two sources familiar with the call told Axios.

Why it matters: Bessent’s worries about the financial fallout were somewhat realized Monday, when the dollar dropped as bond yields and the price of gold rose amid worries about political interference in the Fed.

“The secretary isn’t happy, and he let the president know,” one source familiar with Bessent’s call to Trump told Axios.

That is, Pirro’s investigation of Powell may threaten precisely the purpose that she — or whoever’s brilliant idea all this was — thought she’d serve, giving Trump more power over the Fed.

Meanwhile, bankers the world over are backing Powell.

As I keep saying, Donald J. Trump has done a piss-poor job in choosing his political martyrs this term.

And all that’s before you consider how Powell’s statement will add to Lisa Cook’s credibility before the Supreme Court next week, when she claims her purported firing was an attempt to destroy the independence of the Fed. The entire exception for the Fed SCOTUS created served to protect Powell, and now he’s under the same threat Cook is.

So everyone is denying all responsibility.

Privately, some White House officials see the episode as radioactive, with aides and allies eager to distance themselves from a probe they believe could do more damage to the White House than to Powell. One of the five people familiar said some inside and close to the White House are “freaked out” that a further threat to the Fed chief’s job security could spook the bond market.

How this happened deserves closer attention.

WaPo describes that Bill Pulte — who has had it in for Powell for months (in part because Pulte is not very good at his own job running FHFA, and so imagines low interest rates will make his own failures less acute) — wanted to precipitate such an investigation, but did not.

Housing finance regulator Bill Pulte met recently with President Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago and shared a prop resembling a “wanted poster” he had made up featuring Federal Reserve Chair Jerome H. Powell, according to a person with knowledge of the meeting.

Pulte laid out scenarios that included investigating Powell and Trump liked the idea, the person said.

It’s not clear how the inquiry into Powell was approved, but an official with the Justice Department said it launched a criminal probe into Powell in November and Pulte was not a factor in the inquiry. The extraordinary investigation of a sitting Fed chairman was disclosed by Powell himself late Sunday.

[snip]

By the time Pulte met with Trump, the U.S. attorney’s office in D.C. had already launched an investigation, according to a person briefed on the situation.

Meanwhile, Anna Paulina Luna, who has been cozying up to one and another Russian handler of late, is claiming credit.

Jeanine Pirro posted a defensive tweet yesterday, attacking Powell because he didn’t respond to prosecutors’ bullshit questions without a subpoena, which is within his right.

Someone at DOJ threw Pirro under the bus to Marc Caputo.

U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro’s office in D.C. launched the probe without giving a heads-up to Treasury, top White House officials or the main Justice Department, sources told Axios.

[snip]

A DOJ spokesperson said the department doesn’t comment on investigations, but an administration source said Pirro “went rogue.”

The effort to blame Pirro for this tremendous own goal comes in the wake of a WSJ article describing that Trump is bitching about his Attorney General, though his complaints suggest he might well support the criminal investigation of Powell, especially given that he doubled down on his complaints against the Fed Chair yesteday.

President Trump has complained to aides repeatedly in recent weeks about Attorney General Pam Bondi, describing her as weak and an ineffective enforcer of his agenda, administration officials and other people familiar with his complaints said.

The criticisms appear to be part of an intense campaign by Trump to pressure the Justice Department to more aggressively pursue his priorities, some of the officials said. Trump has previously criticized Bondi at times but his vocal concerns about his attorney general have grown more frequent in recent months, officials said.

A clusterfuck, the White House needs someone to blame, and they’re pointing to DOJ.

And yet, this clusterfuck is a clusterfuck of Pam Bondi’s own making.

In a normal DOJ, there’s an established non-political body that would vet an investigation like this one, Public Integrity. At the very least they would ensure the integrity of the inquiry and flag the investigation for necessary approvals. If we can believe those accusing Pirro of free-lancing, that didn’t happen.

But Pam Bondi destroyed that function last May.

To protect against politically motivated abuses, the DOJ’s Justice Manual has long required prosecutors in local U.S. attorneys’ offices to consult with the Public Integrity Section on any “federal criminal matter that involves alleged or suspected violations of federal or state campaign financing laws, federal patronage crimes, or corruption of the election process.”

But Trump’s DOJ reversed that policy in June. “Department leadership is currently revising this section,” this part of the Justice Manual now says. “The consultation requirement is suspended while revisions are ongoing.”

Several former Justice Department employees expressed extreme concern that the change in the Justice Manual, coupled with the flattening of the Public Integrity Section, opens the door for the Trump administration to engage in partisan prosecutions of Democrats by assigning the job to prosecutors working for U.S. attorneys — political appointees nominated by the president.

[snip]

But with so few lawyers left to consult, former members of the team say those consultation requirements are essentially meaningless.

“In a stripped-down office, the consulting function becomes nominal, if it exists at all. It sort of exists on paper so the government can say it exists and claim to be complying with the law,” said Michael Romano, a former prosecutor on the team. “But if you want people to provide legitimate oversight, guidance and expertise, you can’t do that with a team of two. In reality, the advising function becomes a box-checking exercise.”

Sure, they destroyed PIN precisely so they could predicate investigations into Trump’s enemies more easily.

This was entirely the point.

And now the entire Trump Administration is panicking about the results.

Update: More Pirro underbussing from the NYT.

Ms. Pirro also did not share information with her bosses at the main headquarters of the Justice Department — including Attorney General Pam Bondi and her top deputy, Todd Blanche — citing the discretion granted local U.S. attorneys’ offices to investigate the head of the most powerful monetary policy body on earth, according to several officials with knowledge of her actions.

Senior officials at the department were stunned, and annoyed, that Ms. Pirro did not consult them on an investigation of such international importance, the officials with knowledge of her actions said.

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Where We Go from Here

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At the beginning of 2026, I did a post piggybacking on what had succeed against Trump last year, laying out ways to use Trump’s own conspiracism and grievance against him. That post linked an assessment of our success in five ways fighting fascism, and also explained why I think we need to fight Trump using his own tools against him.

This page repeats the same categories from that post, and fleshes out developments that accord with my original framework.

Treat Epstein as the base layer

Remember that Marc Caputo column — it was published on December 23 — stating that the Epstein releases could last a whole ‘nother week? On the day that would mark that week, December 30, Devlin Barrett published a story saying that, “The document review” of what is now believed to be 5.2 million documents “is expected to take until at least Jan. 20, according to a person familiar with the matter.” Even if they could finish it by January 20 (they won’t), that’ll just be the first go-around. DOJ has not done what they need to do to document the redactions, so there’ll be demands from Congress for them to do that (with obvious areas — including DOJ names and some deliberative documents specifically included in the law, where they’re in violation), they’ll need to repeat the entire process over again, Congress will begin to bring more legal pressure, and all the while survivors will be pointing out things they missed.

A week, Marc Caputo reported, as if that were credible!

This will go on for some time. This will go on for a very long time.

Still, while the Epstein scandal has been absolutely instrumental in loosing Trump’s grip on things, people are naive in thinking that will be enough. “My friends will get hurt,” Trump predicted, but what does it really mean for Trump’s power that Les Wexner has been implicated in the Epstein scandal as a co-conspirator? What is the use of creating right wing cognitive dissonance about Les Wexner, when Wexner is not the oligarch currently helping Trump destroy the country?

In my opinion, the Epstein scandal is a tool. It undercuts Trump’s ability to grab and redirect attention. It can create moments of cognitive dissonance, as it did for MTG. It is a way to turn Trump’s conspiracism and populism against him and may make other related narrative lines more salient. And if there’s a surprise disclosure — perhaps about Melania’s origin story — all the better. But as you keep the focus on Epstein, remember that there needs to be a direction beyond Epstein as well, a direction which incorporates the oligarchs who are still key players in Trump’s network of power.

Focus on the Broligarchs and AI

The Broligarchs who’ve been a key part of Trump’s power are one way to do that (and that’s before we’ve really gotten into Steve Bannon and Peter Thiel’s ties to Epstein).

Tesla Takedown was one of the most successful campaigns of 2025. At a time when Tesla faced cheaper competitors worldwide, the protests incurred a cost on Musk for his DOGE depredations.

Elon was installed in the White House in significant part by fellow South African “alien invader” David Sacks, who is even more conspiratorial and even more pro-Russian than Musk. Sacks was installed in the White House as a Special Government Employee (who, Elizabeth Warren suggests, has overstayed his welcome) to force a bunch of policy decisions that suck for America but ensure that Broligarchs won’t pay any consequences for their rash business deals. When one or both of crypto and AI crash (this is a really good story on how and why AI will burst), he’ll be there to ensure the government bails them out, as he did after playing a role in the failure of Silicon Valley Bank.

And even as Trump sheds support based on his mockery of affordability, even as MTG split with Trump over that and his support for crypto, Sacks is trying to brand Democrats as being more populist than even Zohran Mamdani is.

Fine. You want Democrats to be the party attending to the needs of working people? You’ve just made the GOP the party of “alien invader” billionaires who got tax cuts as millions lost their health care.

This happened even as AI has become a political liability. It has happened as local groups successfully stave off new data centers. It has happened as more instances of AI-inflamed suicide, murder, and porn — including porn exploiting children — appear. And it happens before the aforementioned crash.

Sacks and the other Broligarchs are going to do something for which they’ll try to dodge accountability. Now is the time to make sure his name comes up as people look for culprits.

January 12, 2026: Trump seeks to quell data center rebellion (WaPo)

January 12, 2026: America’s Biggest Power Grid Operator Has an AI Problem—Too Many Data Centers (WaPo)

Emphasize Trump’s loser stench

Another thing that will lead people to defect is to realize that Trump is a loser. He has done things — like the takeover of the Kennedy Center — that makes it easy to demonstrate he’s a loser in tangible fashion. Better still, every time Trump attaches his name to something, it provides an opportunity to hijack that brand, as comedian Toby Morton auspiciously managed to do by anticipating Trump’s most venal instincts and buying the domain.

The same is true of his businesses. Trump and his entire family is getting rich off the presidency 2.0. But his businesses are built as cons, sometimes Ponzi schemes. The idea is to leverage the loyalty of MAGAts to get them to invest in something, run up its value, only to collapse, leaving the most vulnerable screwed. In the past, at least, the cult effect was such that even MAGAts bilked by Trump associates, as with Steve Bannon’s Build the Wall graft, were reluctant to turn on the fraudsters; that may change. But at the very least, the volatile nature of Trump’s frauds makes it easy to show that as a businessman, he’s a loser.

Visualize Trump’s corruption

While there has been good reporting on Trump’s corruption — see, for example, NYT’s nifty visualization from New Year’s Eve — there has not been a systematic effort to take on his corruption.

Nevertheless, possibly because of the Epstein scandal, a majority of the country does think Trump is corrupt.

That may actually not be in a bad place to be as we move into 2026. That’s because Democrats can make Republican inaction in the face of Trump’s corruption a campaign issue (and then, if it leads to a Democratic sweep in midterms, the electoral buy-in will be in place to do a lot of oversight and defunding of Trump’s corruption).

Trump’s pardons are similar. There’s actually a solid stream of reporting on how corrupt they are, without yet any political direction to it. Democrats running against Republican incumbents — especially in the Senate — should state as presumed that it is the job of Senators to respond to the kind of naked corruption Trump is engaged in.

Where activists can magnify the good reporting on both Trump’s corruption and his pardons is to focus on the victims. This is actually showing up in the reporting on both topics. WaPo focused on the victims of Trevor Milton who might have gotten restitution had Trump not pardoned him. LAT similarly focused on the victims fucked over by Trump’s pardon of David Gentile.

Rosenberg, a retired wholesale produce distributor living in Nevada, has supported Trump since he entered politics, but the president’s decision in November to commute the sentence of former private equity executive David Gentile has left him angry and confused.

“I just feel I’ve been betrayed,” Rosenberg, 68, said. “I don’t know why he would do this, unless there was some sort of gain somewhere, or some favor being called in. I am very disappointed. I kind of put him above this kind of thing.”

Trump’s decision to release Gentile from prison less than two weeks into his seven-year sentence has drawn scrutiny from securities attorneys and a U.S. senator — all of whom say the White House’s explanation for the act of clemency is not adding up. It’s also drawn the ire of his victims.

“I think it is disgusting,” said CarolAnn Tutera, 70, who invested more than $400,000 with Gentile’s company, GPB Capital. Gentile, she added, “basically pulled a Bernie Madoff and swindled people out of their money, and then he gets to go home to his wife and kids.”

This superb Bloomberg story on the extent to which the Juan Orlando Hernández pardon unraveled years of work starts with a murder arranged by the network.

Five minutes later, González was circling a roundabout when a gray van braked in front of him. At the same time, a green SUV crowded his rear bumper. A motorcycle carrying two men emerged on his left. A man on the back of the bike fired six shots through the driver-side window. González’s head slumped toward his shoulder, and he tilted forward, held upright by the seatbelt. He died instantly.

More than a dozen men streamed out of the two vehicles that had sandwiched his Nissan. They scrambled to collect the spent shell casings on the ground, then scattered other casings across the pavement—decoys to complicate ballistics tracing. They jumped back into their vehicles, circled the roundabout and took the same road Julián had just driven down.

When they approached the Slaughterhouse, the gates opened to let them in, then closed behind them.

Every one of these pardons has a victim — and that’s before you get into the people newly victimized by people who’ve been pardoned by Trump, which NYT covered in November and others are tracking as well.

A New Jersey fraudster who was pardoned by President Trump in 2021 was sentenced to 37 years in prison this month for running a $44 million Ponzi scheme, one of a growing number of people granted clemency by Mr. Trump only to be charged with new crimes.

The man, Eliyahu Weinstein, was pardoned by Mr. Trump in 2021 and was re-indicted by the U.S. attorney’s office in New Jersey three years later. He was accused of swindling investors who thought their money was being used to buy surgical masks, baby formula and first-aid kits bound for Ukraine, and a jury convicted him in April of several crimes, including conspiracy to commit securities and wire fraud.

[snip]
Some of those pardoned for their role in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol have quickly drawn new attention from law enforcement. The group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington said in June that at least 10 of the more than 1,500 who were pardoned had been rearrested and charged, and the number has only grown since then.

Earlier this month, a man who was pardoned after having participated in the Jan. 6 attack was charged with sex crimes against two children. Another man whose original sentence Mr. Trump commuted in 2021 was recently sentenced to 27 months in prison after convictions on physical and sexual assault, among other crimes.

These stories provide an important way to explain the costs of Trump’s corruption.

Brand Trump as the criminal he is

And while we’re talking about telling these stories: We must never ever cede the ground of crime to Stephen Miller’s attempt to brand immigrants as criminals.

Trump — a felon who freed hundreds of cop assailants on his first day on the job — has an entire infrastructure devoted to trying to spin brown people as criminal. Every time that infrastructure goes into action, including with the effort to brand Somalis in Minnesota as inherently fraudulent when Trump himself is a serial fraudster, we need to repeat, relentlessly, that Trump is a serial criminal who coddles other criminals.

This is something Gavin Newsom just started doing, with an entire website devoted to cataloging Trump’s crime and that of his pardon recipients.

Do not let a conversation about crime go by without focusing on how much of it Trump does.

Crime, in Trump’s era, is a rich white man’s thing. And while it will take a lot of work to adjust a lot of racist priors, until people start seeing Trump as a criminal it will be far too easy for them to make excuses for him.

Hold Stephen Miller accountable for his failures

I focused on Stephen Miller — and the import of making his failures clear — last week.

The import of shifting how we speak of Miller’s considerable power is clear. That’s true because he frankly has done huge damage, even to Trump’s goals, and well more so to average Americans. He’s someone that people, including Republicans, can scapegoat for Trump’s failures (and they’ll be right). And if we don’t make sure that happens, then he’ll scapegoat brown people.

Again, are Somali day care workers or billionaires systematically defrauding average people the problem? One easy to way to drown out Miller’s case that it’s the former is to make it clear how much he personally has harmed average Americans.

Visualize how Stephen Miller took money for cancer research and veterans care to pay for a goon army snatching grandmothers

On January 12, AOC explained this shift better than anyone has.

Relatedly, particularly as the huge injection of funding Republicans approved last year starts landing at DHS, it will become increasingly necessary to tie the goon squads in the streets to the loss of benefits elsewhere.

We need to make it clear that this is a direct trade. 50,000 ICE goons in, 300,000 other government employees out, including people who cure cancer, help learning disabled kids get through school, protect our National Parks, ensure your Social Security comes on time, and care for veterans.

Christopher Ingraham did a handy graphic to show the trade-off.

Stephen Miller’s dragnet is unpopular in the abstract and wildly unpopular in the lived sense, even — if meekly — among local Republican leaders.

But it still retains support of a big chunk of the population, probably because Trump officials routinely blame their own failures to address American problems on migrants, when as often as not, Trump’s response to immigration is the source of the problem.

America can’t have nice things, like cures for cancer and welcoming public schools, because Republicans in Congress took the money used to pay for those things and gave it to Stephen Miller to use to invade America’s neighborhoods.

Discredit Key Spokespeople

Right wingers like Jonah Goldberg and David French have expressed alarm by an old promo for a 60 Minutes piece (the piece itself was from October) that an influencer reposted yesterday, describing dozens of times when the government lied in court filings.

Judges have caught Trump’s DOJ in several major lies since then. In Chicago, Judge Sara Ellis wrote a 233-page opinion documenting the many lies DHS has told about their Chicago invasion.

And in December, judges in both Kilmar Abrego’s case caught the government obfuscating. In the criminal case, on December 30, Judge Waverly Crenshaw unsealed a December 3 opinion describing how Nashville’s US Attorney lied about how centrally involved Todd Blanche’s office was in demanding Abrego face trial.

The central question after Abrego established a prima facie case of vindictiveness is what information in the government’s control sheds light on its new decision to prosecute Abrego, after removing him from the United States without criminal charges. These documents show that McGuire did not act alone and to the extent McGuire had input on the decision to prosecute, he shared it with Singh and others. (Doc. No. 178-1). Specifically, the government’s documents may contradict its prior representations that the decision to prosecute was made locally and that there were no outside influences. For example, Singh contacted McGuire on April 27, 2025, to discuss Abrego’s case. (See Doc. No. 229 at Abrego-Garcia000001). On April 30, 2025, Singh asked McGuire what the potential charges against Abrego would be, whether the charging document would reference Abrego’s alleged MS-13 affiliation, and asked for a phone call before any charges were filed. (Id. at Abrego-Garcia000007–000008). In a separate email on April 30, 2025, Singh made clear that Abrego’s criminal prosecution was a “top priority” for the Deputy Attorney General’s office (Blanche). (Id. at Abrego-Garcia000037). He then told McGuire to “sketch out a draft complaint for the 1324 charge [making it unlawful to bring in and harbor certain aliens].” (Id.). On May 15th, McGuire emailed his staff that “DAG (Blanche) and PDAG would like Garcia charged sooner rather than later.” (Id. at Abrego-Garcia000060).

And as I’ve already noted, Judge Paula Xinis cataloged the many deliberately ignorant declarations DOJ filed about whether DHS had deportation plans for Abrego when she ruled that he must be released.

Respondents showcased Cantú’s ignorance about the content of his Declaration pertaining to Costa Rica. As the pointed questions of Respondents’ counsel made clear, Cantú’s lack of knowledge was planned and purposeful.

Counsel: So paragraph 4, final sentence [of the Cantú Declaration], do you see where it says the word—the words “certain understandings”?

Cantú: I found it. Yes, I do. I see it.

Counsel: What are the certain understandings referenced in the last sentence?

Cantú: I don’t know . . .

Counsel: What are the “contingencies” referenced in the last sentence?

Cantú: I do not know . . .

Counsel: What are the “interim developments” referenced in paragraph 5?

Cantú: I don’t know.

ECF No. 107 at 26:8–27:12 (counsel for Respondents, Jonathan Guynn (“Guynn”), questioning Cantú). See also id. at 53:8–9 (Guynn, at sidebar with Court, stating “I’ll just say I told you this was exactly what was going to happen,” regarding the witness’ ignorance on Costa Rica as a viable country of removal).

Ultimately, Respondents’ calculated effort to take Costa Rica “off the table” backfired. Within 24 hours, Costa Rica, through Minister Zamora Cordero, communicated to multiple news sources that its offer to grant Abrego Garcia residence and refugee status is, and always has been, firm, unwavering, and unconditional.

It’s a problem that, after huge scoldings like these, right wing critics of Trump don’t understand how much Trump’s people lie — not least because the Supreme Court still credits the most outlandish claims Trump makes, even after they’ve been thoroughly debunked by lower court judges.

Many of these lies are coming from the same people: Stephen Miller, Todd Blanche’s office, DHS spox Tricia McLaughlin, and Greg Bovino.

It is remarkable that so many of these people have been caught lying to courts (or publicly, about people before courts). But it needs to become common knowledge for everyone, so every time Tricia says something, they start from the assumption she’s lying, because she almost always is.

There comes a time when the credibility of systematic liars not named Trump collapse entirely such that every utterance they make discredits the claims they try to sell. Tricia McLaughlin, at least, is close those levels of propaganda, and Stephen Miller is not far behind.

Use Trump’s claimed opposition to antisemitism against him

Within days of his inauguration last year, Trump signed an EO — adding to one he signed in 2019 — claiming to oppose antisemitism. There has been some discussion about the bad faith of this EO and a DOJ lawyer implementing it, Michael Velchik, once wrote a paper from Hitler’s perspective. While it is explicitly targeted at universities (and has been a key tool to attempt to takeover universities), it nevertheless claimed to oppose antisemitism everywhere.

It shall be the policy of the United States to combat anti-Semitism vigorously, using all available and appropriate legal tools, to prosecute, remove, or otherwise hold to account the perpetrators of unlawful anti-Semitic harassment and violence.

This is the kind of statement of principle that can form the basis of political pressure — particularly as the MAGAt movement splinters around the overt antisemitism of people like Nick Fuentes and Candace Owen, and as political opportunists like Ted Cruz attempt to exploit that splinter.

We’re going to have to fight this battle in any case. As part of the revocation of everything Eric Adams did after he was indicted for bribery yesterday, Zohran Mamdani revoked an EO that gave Israel preferential treatment, which Israel is using to stoke division; yet Mamdani preserved the office Adams opened to combat antisemitism.

We need to call out the dripping antisemitism of Trump’s team, from top (at least JD Vance, who refuses to disavow Fuentes) to bottom.

There are two key Trump aides who should be targeted. Most notably, Paul Ingrassia, who had to withdraw his nomination to be Special Counsel after Politico exposed texts in which he confessed to a Nazi streak been installed at GSA instead. In addition, Kingsley Wilson became DOD spokesperson in spite of Neo-Nazi comments. NPR has done good work unpacking these ties.

Reclaim disinformation research

Republicans plan on exporting fascism via US tech platforms.

That’s not new. I’ve been talking about Elon’s plans to use Xitter as a machine for fascism for some time.

But since then, Trump’s minions worked it into the National Security Strategy.

And, in the wake of the EU’s sanctions against Elon Musk for — basically — lying about why I have a blue check, Marco Rubio stripped the visas of five people, including US Green Card holder Imran Ahmed, a long time adversary of Elon’s.

But there are several developments that suggest it is time to renew efforts to defend disinformation research, not least the White House’s absurd effort to attack real journalism, what is sure to be a snowballing failure on Bari Weiss’ part to make propaganda popular, and the meltdown the head of DOJ’s Civil Rights division, Harmeet Dhillon, had over the holidays about right wing “misinformation” targeting Pam Bondi.

The right wingers are doing what they themselves established is unlawful. And that presents both political and legal opportunities to demonize their propaganda.

Which in turn cycles back to the increasing problem of AI propaganda, including Grok’s flagrant willingness to nudify children in recent days.

Some people write short resolutions. I guess I write 4,000-word To Do lists. Join me in my efforts!

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On Same Day Robert McBride’s Firing Is Reported, Stan Woodward “Errs” His Grievances

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A slew of outlets — starting with MS and including NYT but not including ABC, which usually gets the details right — have reported the firing of Robert McBride because, the MS headline claims, he “declined to pursue James Comey case.” All suggested that, even with the appeal of Lindsey Halligan’s firing before the Fourth Circuit (the Fourth just granted DOJ’s request to stall two weeks and keep the two appeals consolidated), McBride’s sins involved recharging the case in EDVA, even though DOJ abandoned its attempts to reindict Letitia James (on the mortgage fraud; now they’re pursuing hairdresser fraud) before it appealed.

No one mentioned news of the firing happened on the day the SDFL grand jury convenes, or the Comey-related role McBride has been willingly playing, as the single non-defense lawyer litigating Dan Richman’s efforts to get his files returned.

Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward’s latest prank — an “erring” of grievances — may explain McBride’s firing.

When last we checked in on the Richman litigation before Christmas, after spending some time making sure that someone had ethical skin in her courtroom, Colleen Kollar-Kotelly attempted to juggle the genuinely complex issues before her, granting one after another notice of defiances masquerading as emergency motions for delay for the government, before — seemingly — issuing a final order on December 23, requiring the government to turn over all materials it had, but allowing it to delete the single no-longer classified file they used to obtain the materials back in 2017.

For the foregoing reasons, the Court shall GRANT IN PART the Government’s [22], [33] Emergency Motions to Clarify and Modify the Court’s Order and AMEND its [20] Order dated December 12, 2025, to make explicit that the Government may delete the purportedly classified document identified in 2017 from any material that it returns to Petitioner Richman. Because the Government has not shown that it has a lawful right to retain and use any of the materials at issue, the Court shall not otherwise alter its Order to relieve the Government from its obligation to return those materials to Petitioner Richman.

The next day, in a filing signed by Todd Blanche, Lindsey Halligan, and McBride, DOJ asked for an emergency extension. Again. Because of the holiday, they couldn’t technically remove that single classified file they supposedly removed back in 2017.

7. However, because of significant operational constraints caused by the imminent Christmas and New Year’s holidays (i.e., the lack of sufficient, technically qualified Government personnel in the Washington, DC area for the remainder of this week and the next), which make the current compliance deadline fall a mere one business day after the Court’s revised clarifying order, the Government anticipates that it will not be able to review all electronic storage devices containing classified information, delete that information, and return those devices to Richman’s counsel by December 29, 2025.

But on Christmas Eve, they were going to delete that file.

Days later Kollar-Kotelly granted that extension while reiterating that they only thing they were allowed to do was to delete that file.

Then Stan Woodward, the guy who defended all the people covering up Trump’s crimes across two criminal investigations, got involved. Without filing a notice of appearance — so Stan has no ethical skin in this game — On January 2, he effectively indicated that DOJ was going to defy Kollar-Kotelly’s order, because deleting that single classified file would destroy the forensic copy of this.

In the days since the Court last extended the foregoing deadline, the undersigned counsel has endeavored to negotiate in good faith with counsel for Petitioner-Movant the particulars of the parties’ understanding of what compliance with the Court’s Orders requires. For example, classified information cannot be deleted from the government’s forensic copy of electronic media without the destruction of the entire media. Thus, although the Court’s Orders, “permit the Government to permanently delete a single classified document from the material seized from Petitioner Richman’s personal computer hard drive . . . from any of these materials before returning them to Petitioner Richman,” ECF No. 41 at 2, such limited deletion of classified information from a forensic image is not technologically feasible.

Now, this may be bullshit. Richman’s lawyers, at least, understand that DOJ still retains the actual hard drive, not a forensic copy. The reasons why they believe that are mostly redacted, but it appears the serial number on the subsequent search warrants matches the serial number of Richman’s original hard drive, meaning they kept the original and gave him a different hard drive.

Nicholas Lewin at least believes DOJ gave Richman a different hard drive back in 2017, effectively stealing his actual hard drive in defiance of the consent he gave.

If so, it’s not a forensic image.

And, anyway, someone should have started asking — I know I did — why the Associate Attorney General and the President’s third defense attorney involved in just this matter got involved in a seemingly minor issue that seemed to be settled at all.

Nevertheless, for reasons (probably professional comity) that I cannot fathom, Richman’s lawyers agreed to discuss how DOJ could get out of complying with Kollar-Kotelly’s order, so long as DOJ promised it wouldn’t do anything with his stuff. Kollar-Kotelly granted that extension too.

At that point, it was clear to me at least, DOJ had succeeded in dicking Kollar-Kotelly around long enough to facilitate a different grand jury — the one in SDFL and possibly convened before Aileen Cannon — to issue a warrant and therefore create competing orders from two District Courts.

Then, last night at 7:50PM, and so well after McBride was fired, Stan Woodward asked for another extension. With a flourish, the guy who badly struggled with basic technical issues during the stolen documents case elaborated on his blather about forensic copies (again, if it’s true that DOJ kept Richman’s original hard drive, then this is all bullshit).

The Parties dispute what the Court has authorized the United States to delete. However, when a device contains classified information the only way to properly remove that information is to destroy the device and all the information on that device. Put differently, the United States cannot delete just the documents containing classified material from the device. Further complicating matters is the fact that regardless of the presence of classified information, a single file cannot be deleted from a forensic copy of a device. Either the entire forensic copy is deleted or none of it is. Nevertheless, Petitioner-Movant has requested the United States not destroy any devices containing classified material absent further Order of the Court. The United States will honor this request and hopes the Parties can propose language for the Court’s consideration promptly.

But the bulk of Woodward’s filing consisted of, as he described it, “erring” his grievance that — around the time McBride may have disappeared –Richman’s lawyers did not immediately respond to Woodward’s attempts to keep a full set of Richman’s data on January 10.

To that end, the United States provided counsel for Petitioner-Movant a draft joint consent motion proposing modification to the Courts Orders on December 31, 2025, following a call to outline the contours of the same with Petitioner-Movant’s counsel the previous day. On January 5, 2025, Petitioner-Movant’s counsel wrote to question whether an agreement between the Parties was conceivable. The United States requested a call with counsel for Petitioner-Movant the next day, January 6, 2026, but counsel for Petitioner-Movant advised they were unavailable before January 8 for such a call. Given the desire for the United States to promptly resolve this matter, the United States implored counsel for Petitioner-Movant to provide a redline to the proposed consent motion, which counsel for Petitioner-Movant did after business hours on January 8. The United States provided further edits to the joint motion the next morning, on January 9. Since that time – and at the time of this filing – the United States has not received feedback on that draft despite representations that such feedback would be forthcoming on January 10.

Despite the undersigned representing to Petitioner-Movant’s counsel multiple times a desire to resolve this matter promptly, no agreement has been reached. The undersigned does not err this grievance lightly, but does so only out of respect for the Court’s deadline and out of regret for not seeking an extension earlier. [my emphasis]

It’s Richman’s fault, Woodward suggests by claiming grievance, not his own.

I have no idea whether Kollar-Kotelly saw the news that the only line prosecutor who filed a notice of appearance before her got fired in the middle of all this, but she seemed unimpressed that Woodward was erring grievances about delay when he filed his motion for an extension well after hours the day of his deadline.

The Court is in receipt of the Government’s Unopposed 45 Motion for Extension of Time. Given the late hour of this filing, which the Court received at 7:50 p.m. this evening, and with the understanding that the Government has complied with the Court’s 20 Order (as clarified and amended) in all respects except for the narrow unresolved issues identified in the 45 Motion, it is ORDERED that the deadline for the Attorney General or her designee to certify compliance with the Court’s Order is STAYED through January 13, 2026. The Court otherwise DEFERS RULING on the Government’s 45 Motion for Extension of Time. The Court shall resolve the 45 Motion by further order in due course.

She’s going to deal with it today.

But by firing McBride (who would have had cause to talk with EDVA judges about the supposedly intact copy DOJ stored in their SCIF, another of the crimes for which he was fired), there’s no longer anyone with real ethical skin in the game before Kollar-Kotelly, just Donald Trump’s defense attorneys, all of whom have chummy ties with Aileen Cannon.

Effectively, the promises not to access Dan Richman’s stuff have become virtually unenforceable.

Update: I missed that Stan Woodward did file a notice of appearance on January 2. It remains true that Trump’s defense attorneys likely aren’t that worried about bar complaints.

Update: Kollar-Kotelly has given DOJ a week from today.

MINUTE ORDER: Upon further consideration of the Government’s 45 Motion for Extension of Time, it is ORDERED that the Government’s 45 Motion is GRANTED to the following extent: It is ORDERED that the deadline for the Attorney General or her designee to certify to this Court, with specificity, that the Government has complied with this Court’s 20 Order dated December 12, 2025, as clarified and modified by any subsequent Order of this Court, including the provisions regarding both the return of certain materials to Petitioner Richman and the deposit of certain materials in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, is EXTENDED to 5:00 p.m. ET on January 20, 2026.It is further ORDERED that the parties shall file a joint status report, no later than 9:00 a.m. ET on January 16, 2026, advising the Court of (1) the progress of the Government’s efforts to comply with the Court’s 20 Order, and (2) whether Petitioner Richman possesses a copy of any files or other materials that the Government proposes to delete or destroy on the basis that they are stored on a device or in an image that contains classified information.As previously ordered, the Government and its agents shall not access Petitioner Richman’s covered materials, except for the limited purpose of deleting the purportedly classified memorandum already identified in the record, or share, disseminate, disclose, or transfer those materials to any person, without first seeking and obtaining leave of this Court. Signed by Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly on 01/13/2026.

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DHS Assaulting Protesters Because Goons Believe They Are “Vicious, Horrible People”

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215 days before Jonathan Ross shot Renee Good dead after Good’s wife, Becca, engaged in First Amendment protected taunting of Ross, HSI Special Agent Ryan Ribner rushed through a gate at at a Los Angeles garment factory and — along with ICE Officer Carey Crook — assaulted SEIU CA President David Huerta, targeting Huerta rather than several other people who were more directly blocking a van, the purported crime in question.

Huerta argued in a motion to dismiss on First Amendment grounds submitted last week, days before Good’s killing,  that Ribner and Crook did not arrest Huerta for obstructing a Federal officer, which is what got charged after DOJ abandoned a claim that Huerta had conspired to impede officers, much less the assault that they contemplated charging initially, but because Huerta had engaged in that First Amendment protected taunting.

It may well be that Ribner lied when he claimed he didn’t learn Huerta was a powerful union leader until after he assaulted him. Months later, the undercover officer working the crowd, Jeremy Crossen, admitted people in the crowd referred to Huerta as a union “member,” though that didn’t appear in either the texts that got shared with Huerta in discovery — which described the institutional affiliation of others — or a countersurveillance report he wrote weeks after the assault, where he included the research he had done after the fact for everyone but the state president of one of the most powerful unions in the country, the guy who got assaulted.

But if Huerta wasn’t targeted because he’s a powerful Democrat (in Ribner’s report there’s a weird claim that the agent guarding Huerta in the hospital only “feigned” interest when Mayor Karen Bass showed up to Huerta’s hospital room), then the record shows little else beyond speech.

According to videos turned over in discovery, Ribner started predicting Huerta would go to jail based solely off taunting, mostly about their masks.

Mr. Huerta asked them, “How are you keeping us safe?” Agent Ribner’s response was: “You are gonna go to jail. You are not impeding us. You are not impeding us. You’re going to jail, [unintelligible from 0:00:09–00:11] and you’re going to jail.” Id. at 0:00:01–00:12. Mr. Huerta then repeatedly asked him, “What are you doing?” and told him, “I can’t hear you through your fuckin’ mask,” and pointed at Agent Ribner. Id. at 0:00:14–00:17. Agent Ribner can be heard replying: “You’re gonna go to jail, you’re going to jail.” Id. at 0:00:17. For the next few minutes, Mr. Huerta continued to protest in front of the gate, including conversing with Agent Ribner, Officer Crook, and other officers, including, according to agents’ after-the-fact reports, “aggressively”4 asking the officers to identify themselves, stating “What are you going to do… Where’s your fucking badge number… What’s your fucking name?” Ex. B at 9. He also allegedly stated: “You’re not police! You’re not fucking police! You’re not keeping me safe!”

Indeed, Ribner’s own report describes himself predicting that Huerta and others would obstruct them, so he instructed his colleagues to be prepared to make arrests.

Later, HUERTA approached the gate and began yelling and about wanting to see agents’ faces. At times HUERTA was putting his arms through the fence as he yelled, and on at least one occasion he pointed as well. HUERTA stated, “Your boss” [believed to be referring to President Trump] wants things “made in America”. HUERTA went on and said that the things were manufactured inside of Ambiance. HUERTA appeared to be aggressive and angry by his voice, demeanor, and facial features. At some point HUERTA walked up to the gate and asked either about the purpose or legit impact of agents’ duties. SSA Ribner asked HUERTA the purpose of what he was doing [regarding being belligerent with law enforcement]. HUERTA made a comment that he lived in the community and /or cared about the community. SSA Ribner advised HUERTA that “we” [agents] also live in the community. SSA Ribner made the comment to HUERTA in the hopes of obtaining HUERTA’s compliance by advising HUERTA that law enforcement agents are just like him and care about the community and are also part of the demographic of the southern California area.

[snip]

STRONG, and LENEHAN would highly likely block or impede law enforcement vehicles, cause damage to USG property, or commit a battery against agents as they attempt to depart. SSA Ribner informed the DEA agents that if anyone in the crowd impedes, blocks, or physically batters an agent that arrests would be made. [my emphasis]

“He pointed as well”!!! And from that (and perhaps in his view that Huerta was Hispanic? — though several other people present looked more obviously Hispanic), Ribner concluded Huerta was aggressive.

Even though a vehicle had already entered the gate Ribner stood behind without major obstruction, Ribner predicted that a white detainee van that pulled up shortly after the conflict with Huerta occurred, while the gate was still closed, would incite some response. Huerta was on the public sidewalk in front of the gate, though several other people were more directly in front of the van’s path. But when the gate did open, at which point Huerta was to the side of the van, Crook and Ribner rushed Huerta and pushed him down.

That’s when Ribner conducted a brutal arrest, even applying pepper spray to his hand and smothering Huerta’s face with it, because — he claimed after Huerta sought hospital treatment for a head injury — Ribner did not want Huerta to hit his head on the curb he was driving it into.

SSA Ribner decided to deploy a chemical agent (pepper spray) on HUERTA due to HUERTA actively resisting arrest, the angered crowd, and HUERTA’s safety as his head was near a cement curb and SSA Ribner didn’t want him suffering an injury. Due to the concern of over spraying the chemical agent with others nearby (SDDO C and the crowd) or spraying HUERTA directly in the eyes, SSA Ribner decided to spray a small amount of the chemical agent in his hand and place his hand near the upper nose area of HUERTA’s face. HUERTA began to make noises and say that he couldn’t breathe.

Huerta’s head got slammed, and Huerta sought immediate hospital care. In his arrest report — again, written after he learned Huerta had a head injury — Ribner describes feeling no lump on Huerta’s head but said he did so to help Huerta to clean the pepper spray that Ribner’s post hoc reports claim he specifically avoided getting in his eyes out of Huerta’s eyes.

Agent’s Note: During the arrest encounter SSA Ribner never personally observed HUERTA strike his head on the ground. Additionally, when SSA Ribner was decontaminating HUERTA, he placed his hands on the back of HUERTA’s head to help move his head back to place water in his eyes and face area. SSA Ribner never felt any bumps or cuts on the back of HUERTA’s head. Additionally, SSA Ribner didn’t observe any physical bumps or cuts on HUERTA’s head.

As so often has happened after DHS assaults and hurts someone, that night make-believe US Attorney Bill Essayli accused Huerta of assault.

And sometime later, Ribner was in a meeting with Todd Blanche, and Essayli promised Blanche this would go to trial in September or October.

GS Ribner stated he spoke with United States Attorney Bill Essayli about this case and others, such as the Deputy Attorney General (DAG) and Special Agent in Charge Eddie Wang. During the briefing, USA Essayli told the DAG that “this case is going to trial in September or October

It did not go to trial in September or October. Instead, as AUSAs learned more about what happened, they gave up the felony charge.

As you can tell from Ribner’s attempt to build in deniability for the head injury, Ribner obviously tried to reverse-engineer his actions, to provide some excuse for the assault.

As I noted at the time, when Ribner wrote the arrest affidavit back in June, he absurdly claimed that Huerta intimidated him because he banged on the gate.

“Banged on a gate” and “pointed as well”!?!?! No wonder they asked to detain Huerta pretrial.

Ribner’s initial arrest report (the same report where he denied knowledge of a head injury, which he wrote almost two weeks after the arrest) is full of things — including some alleged assaults by protesters, but also including exchanges like the local San Diegans who, days before the Huerta assault, shouted “shame” until ICE abandoned their effort to raid a local restaurant — that Ribner cited to explain why he implanted an undercover agent at the scene to seek out a vast conspiracy Ribner was sure existed.

Mostly, though, I suspect it was the shame.

Huerta was lucky. Because he’s an American citizen, he couldn’t be shunted off to a GEO prison and refused access to his attorneys, which is what make-believe US Attorney Essayli did to prevent Carlitos Ricardo Parias from unpacking the problems with the claims of assault against him. Because — unlike Renee Good — Huerta survived, DOJ had to try to invent a criminal case out of Ribner’s own actions.

But, it appears that by August, after several delays in attempting to indict Huerta, the whole charade started falling apart. Ribner’s report (which, on top of the obvious retconning of his actions, did not match the documented timeline in a few other areas) and the absence of any crime was bad enough. But the witness stories didn’t match, even though there’s good reason to believe they were coordinated after the fact. In addition to claiming he noticed Huerta arrive in real time rather than after Ribner called him out, Crossen described Huerta push back, something not captured in video (and which Crossen may not have been able to see from where he stood). Carey Crook (the guy who first pushed Huerta), falsely claimed Huerta had splayed himself across the van in an X, and similarly invented a claim that Ribner had sprayed Huerta, rather than smother his face in pepper spray. The driver of the van, Brian Gonzales, didn’t remember seeing Huerta in a first interview, but in a follow-up the day before he would start a new permanent job at CBP, he did, though he disputed Crook’s claim that Huerta had splayed across the van grill.

Crossen explained that his video didn’t capture Huerta in front of the van because he started filming just after that. He said he did all this on his personal phone because his government phone wasn’t working that day (in addition to the motion to dismiss, Huerta is also demanding the Cellebrite metadata for the texts extracted from the personal phones both Ribner and Crossen used that day). He admitted that Ribner gave instructions on how to write up his countersurveillance report, but didn’t tell him what to say.

Ribner’s was the last interview from this period when DOJ was stalling the case, a week before a new case opening date possibly focused on Ribner. When asked to describe his actions, as problems with the arrest must have become evident, Ribner explained simply that the peaceful protesters were “vicious, horrible people.”

GS Ribner stated HUERTA and other protesters are “vicious, horrible people”.[In reference to a still photo of video 2774 at 0:03], GS Ribner identified HUERTA. He recalled telling HUERTA, “You better not block the cars”. He stated that HUERTA was not in the way of vehicles or personnel at this point.

Stephen Miller has told all Trump supporters, especially those who work at DHS, that people who support immigration are vicious, horrible people. And he gave them rules of engagement that invited assaults like this, assaults they simply bury in often-failed attempts to criminalize the victim.

It’s surprising it took seven months before someone Stephen Miller has defined as a vicious horrible person got killed.

Timeline

June 6: Arrest

9:00 AM: HSI task force officer (and Inglewood cop) Jeremy Crossen arrives under cover

9:20: Agents start executing search

9:57: Crossen interacts with Asian woman

10:26: Crossen interacts w/Hispanic protestor, claims he is monitoring the police

10:33: Crossen texts Ribner

11:07: Crossen sees pick-up without plates whose Hispanic driver films

11:19: Crossen describes a Hispanic woman with a neck gaiter; his report provides background on a Kids of Immigrants sweatshirt she wears; start time of alleged criminal conduct

11:25: A sedan enters the gate; after an agent instructs those filming it to step away, they do; Crossen texts Ribner,

 

11:31: A Hispanic woman whom Crossen IDs by name shows up, makes phone calls

11:36: Crossen describes a white woman by name, describes that she masked as the crowd grew

11:37: Crossen describes the Hispanic leader of ACCE Action, Council Member Jose Delgado, show up, make calls

11:49: Crossen claims he sees Huerta walk up

11:51: A white woman from Tenants Union starts yelling obscenities

11:53: Ribner instructs Crossen to focus on Huerta

11:54: Huerta and others sit in front of the gate

12:01 PM: Ribner leaves the property and assaults Huerta [note his report timeline goes haywire in here]

12:00-12:09: Crossen texts Ribner

12:15: Crossen claims van arrives (his description describe others who were in front of the van, then says Huerta also was)

12:15: Ribner calls 911 (claiming this is about pepper spray)

12:18: Crossen describes a scrimmage line

12:20-12:40: Discussions about Huerta’s attempt to call his attorney

12:30: LAFD responds; Huerta asks to be brought to the hospital; Crossen describes LAFD arrival this way:

At approximately 12:28 p.m., TFO Crossen observed a Los Angeles City Fire truck with activated emergency lights and loud audible siren, attempting to gain entry to the business, still being blocked by protestors, to render aid for HUERTA, inside the business, who had been exposed to OC Spray, during his arrest.

12:40: Ribner reports arrest to CACD US Attorney office

12:42: Ribner tells Crossen his personal phone is out of battery, asks him to use his government one

12:47: Ribner admits he used pepper spray

1:05: Ribner speaks to USAO again

1:30: Huerta taken to hospital w/agent in car

2:45: Ribner asks Crossen for pictures of Huerta

Unmarked time: Mayor Bass shows up to hospital room; they ask her to leave (and she does)

9:12: Crossen sends last clip from videos to Ribner (the discovery turned over provides nowhere near the “4 hours” or “100 videos” that Crossen told Ribner, five hours earlier, that he had taken (though the defense did not include all the texts in their exhibit)

9:36: Ribner obtains warrant for Huerta’s phone

10:30: Huerta attorney turns over the phone

June 8: Huerta charged with felony conspiracy

June 9: Case opened

June 17: Date created for one photo provided in discovery

June 19: Initial incident report; Ribner would later (in his September 10 interview) admit he wrote the report from memory and simply did not “recall that he told HUERTA, ‘You are not impeding’. He does not know why he did not include that statement in his report and agrees that his statement could sound exculpatory.”

June 23: Countersurveillance report from Crossen

July 2: Second set of discovery

July 17: Third set of discovery

July 28: Fourth set of discovery (including agent texts)

August 20: USAO interviews Brian Gonzalez, who drove the van allegedly blocked

August 27: USAO interviews Carey Crook; he told AUSAs that, contrary to Ribner’s claim, Huerta did not assault him

August 27: USAO interviews Crossen

September 9: USAO reinterviews Gonzalez; he says he does not remember Huerta straddling the van, as Crooks claimed

September 10: USAO interviews Ribner

September 11: Gonzalez starts at a new job at CBP

September 17: Later case opening date, possibly focusing on the lying agents

October 17: Huerta charged with misdemeanor

November 5: Huerta’s attorneys ask AUSA to identify the obstructive conduct

December 19: AUSA finally provides vague description of conduct

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