An extraordinary development could occur if Special Counsel Jack Smith decides to pursue pretrial detention for former President Donald Trump in relation to the January 6, 2021, Capitol riot, a journalist has explained.
OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author’s opinion.
This development come in the aftermath of a significant 2021 court ruling and recent legal precedent in the prosecution of the January 6 events. These factors could potentially provide Smith with the essential legal basis to seek pretrial detention for the former president.
Journalist Julie Kelly laid out a scenario where Smith might ask a D.C. judge to deny bail for Trump after his potential indictment and arrest concerning charges related to the January 6, 2021, Capitol riot.
During an interview with SiriusXM Patriot’s host Joel B. Pollak on Breitbart News Sunday, Kelly discussed the impending indictment of the former president after Trump recently revealed that he received a “target letter,” indicating the possibility of an impending indictment.
In a Substack post on Sunday evening, Julie Kelly highlighted that January 6 defendants had been kept in pretrial detention for extended periods, even if they were accused of nonviolent offenses.
Breitbart News reported:
On air, Kelly noted that despite the evident hypocrisy in the Department of Justice refusing to treat Black Lives Matter rioters in 2020 in the same way, or to apply the same law to left-wing protesters at the Supreme Court or at the homes of individual justices, it was likely that prosecutors would charge Trump and that he would be convicted, thanks to the bias of the Washington, D.C. jury pool.
Trump’s actions on January 6 — in which he told protesters to march “peacefully and patriotically” — to the Capitol — have been scrutinized by a congressional impeachment investigation, as well as the extensive and one-sided January 6 Committee, with no evidence of any crime being found. Smith appears to be testing new theories, such as a so-called “fake elector” theory, to try him.
The Trump campaign — like John F. Kennedy’s 1960 campaign — prepared alternate slates of electors to reserve the right to have their votes counted in the event that recounts or court cases overturned the results of close elections in battleground states. The Special Counsel’s office is thought to be construing that strategy as an unlawful conspiracy to overturn the 2020 election results.
Pollack asked Kelly if Smith could attempt to prevent Trump from participating in the 2024 presidential race by charging him with sedition. Some Democrats have contended that such charges could serve as a basis for disqualifying Trump from holding public office under the Fourteenth Amendment.
She wrote on Twitter, now called “X”: “Of the hundreds of video clips used as evidence in the marathon trial of five members of the Proud Boys, prosecutors began closing arguments not with a clip of the defendants engaged in criminal activity but with a clip of Donald Trump.”
Kelly added:
The government showed the jury a portion of the September 2020 presidential debate; goaded by Joe Biden and then-Fox News host Chris Wallace to condemn “white supremacists and militia groups” in an effort to downplay Black Lives Matter and Antifa violence, Trump asked them to “give me a name.” Biden quickly answered, “the Proud Boys.”
“Proud Boys, stand back and stand by,” Trump said in response.
“These defendants saw themselves as Donald Trump’s army, fighting to keep their preferred leader in power no matter what,” assistant U.S. Attorney Conor Mulroe told a grand jury on Monday morning, referring to Ethan Nordean, Joseph Biggs, Enrique Tarrio, Dominic Pezzola, and Zachary Rehl.
“Prosecutors have used the clip at other points during the nearly four-month trial—a not-so-subtle reminder to jurors from a city that voted 93 percent for Joe Biden that the men on trial supported Trump. But the Justice Department may have a more sinister reason to tie the Proud Boys to the former president. Any convictions in this trial would give Special Counsel Jack Smith, an independent prosecutor in name only, justification to pursue similar charges against Trump as a coconspirator of sorts,” Kelly continued, noting that the Proud Boys defendants face charges of sedition.
If Trump were to be charged with that he could be held pre-trial and if he’s convicted — which is likely in D.C. — he cannot constitutionally hold federal public office and certainly not the presidency.
“Guilty verdicts in the most consequential January 6 trial will be the green light the Justice Department has been waiting for to go after” Trump, Kelly concluded.
As we await Jack Smith's criminal indictment of Donald Trump for January 6 possibly this week, here is what I wrote in April about the likelihood Smith could charge Trump with seditious conspiracy based on the Proud Boys trial. Four out of five were convicted in May of seditious…
— Julie Kelly ?? (@julie_kelly2) July 30, 2023
Disclaimer: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author’s opinion.