Enrique Tarrio, the previous nationwide chairman of the Proud Boys, was arrested by U.S. Capitol Police on Friday following a press convention with different Proud Boys members and Oath Keepers’ founder Stewart Rhodes.
A spokesperson for USCP stated Tarrio was arrested for easy assault, after a counter protester put a mobile phone near his face and he struck her telephone and arm in response.
The counter protester stated she needed to file fees, so Tarrio was arrested. The incident came about between the U.S. Capitol and Washington’s Union Station.
“This is absolutely insane,” Proud Boy Joe Biggs instructed The Hill in a textual content, claiming native police let “agitators” into their path. “Tarrio did nothing wrong. This is a set-up.”
Shortly earlier than his arrest, Tarrio gathered with different Proud Boys member and Rhodes to announce their intent to file lawsuits over their prosecutions tied to the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol assault.
They introduced the authorized actions exterior the Capitol, which members of each teams stormed 4 years in the past as Congress licensed the election win of President Trump’s Democratic opponent within the 2020 presidential race, former President Biden.
“I’m not talking about violent retribution,” Tarrio stated, flanked by the Proud Boys and supporters of Jan. 6 defendants. “I’m talking about something much more powerful: accountability and the rule of law.”
Tarrio stated that he and 4 different Proud Boys tried alongside him for sedition would sue the Justice Division for “about $150 million” throughout the subsequent few weeks over “their murders, their lies and the infinite struggling they’ve put us by way of.” The Proud Boy declined to element particular claims.
Biggs instructed The Hill they deliberate to file swimsuit within the Southern District of Florida.
Rhodes, founding father of the right-wing militia group Oath Keepers, instructed The Hill he additionally deliberate to file swimsuit however couldn’t element any specifics.
Each Tarrio and Rhodes have been convicted of seditious conspiracy, a uncommon Civil Battle-era cost, for plotting to forcibly halt the peaceable switch of energy from Trump to Biden.
Tarrio was not in Washington on Jan. 6, after being barred from town following an unrelated arrest, however prosecutors stated he organized different Proud Boys to descend on the Capitol that day.
Prosecutors stated Rhodes, who was on the Capitol however didn’t enter the constructing nor assault legislation enforcement, acted “like a general overlooking a battlefield while his troops stormed inside.”
Rhodes was sentenced to 18 years in jail, and Tarrio obtained a jail time period of 22 years — the longest sentence handed down in reference to the riot.
However these sentences have been wiped away with the stroke of Trump’s pen on his first day again within the White Home. Tarrio was granted a full pardon and Rhodes’s sentence was commuted to time served.
The clemency marked a pointy rebuke of the Justice Division’s sweeping Jan. 6 probe. Its sedition convictions of the extremist group leaders have been the crown jewels of a prosecution hailed as one of many “largest, most complex, and most resource-intensive investigations” within the company’s historical past.
Trump vowed on the marketing campaign path to alleviate Jan. 6 defendants, whom he described as “political prisoners,” however the scope of the president’s clemency motion — which granted full pardons for almost all rioters, together with those that attacked legislation enforcement — got here as a shock to some.
Prosecutors stated the Oath Keepers plotted for weeks forward of the Capitol assault, establishing an armed “quick reaction force” — a cache of weapons saved throughout the Potomac River — in case their plan went south. That day, a number of members ascended the Capitol steps in what prosecutors described as a military-style “stack” formation earlier than breaching the constructing.
The Proud Boys noticed themselves because the political proper’s “foot soldiers,” prosecutors stated, ready to go to struggle to maintain Trump in energy.
The 4 Proud Boys tried alongside Tarrio — Biggs, Ethan Nordean, Zachary Rehl and Dominic Pezzola — additionally attended the press convention.
Nordean, Biggs and Rehl have been convicted of sedition. Pezzola, who used a stolen police riot defend to smash open a Capitol window, letting within the first members of the mob, was acquitted of sedition however convicted of different severe felonies. Trump commuted their sentences to time served.
Ivan Raiklin, a Trump supporter who has deemed himself “Secretary of Retribution,” was current for the announcement, as effectively.
Since his return to energy, Trump’s personal retribution in opposition to the justice system has been swift.
Roughly two dozen prosecutors who labored on the greater than 1,500 Jan. 6 instances have been fired, and Trump’s Justice Division requested FBI management to show over a listing of brokers who labored Jan. 6 instances, placing in danger some 2,400 brokers who participated in the large prosecutorial endeavor. That directive has been challenged in courtroom.
Prosecutors and brokers who beforehand labored on Trump’s two federal felony instances have been additionally terminated.
Up to date 5:15 p.m. ET
