This Week
It was a busy week. Putin’s War in Ukraine got uglier. The Russian losses on the battlefield were paid for with Ukrainian civilian losses. We watched cities like Mariupol leveled, blocks of apartments and office buildings literally nothing but rubble. The Ukrainians continued their demands for more aid and more action from the NATO countries. They earned the right to be heard with their successes on the ground, and their sacrifices in the cities. And President Biden weighed how far the United States could go without triggering World War III, or whether, as President Zelenskyy stated, it’s already begun.
Back in Washington, the first Black woman was nominated to a seat in the United States Supreme Court. The Senate Judiciary Committee held hearings with incredibly moving oratory about this moment in history. But those hearings also demonstrated the depths some are willing to go to further their political careers, and the inherent racism that still exists. Two steps forward – a Black woman on the Supreme Court. One step back – the fact that she might have empathy for those who stand before the Court is explained as a failing, and reason why her nomination should be denied.
And finally, the United States lost a great patriot, a woman who stood against the growing Authoritarianism in the world. Madeleine Albright broke the “glass ceiling” as the first woman to become US Secretary of State under President Clinton, and mentored an entire generation of American Foreign Service diplomats. Her efforts to maintain democracy will be sorely missed.
So it was easy to miss two important advances in the investigation of the January 6th Insurrection.
Ongoing Crime
The first was from a major figure in the actual rally that preceded the attack on the Capitol. Congressman Mo Brooks of Alabama spoke at the rally. “Are you willing to do what it takes to fight for America!” Brooks yelled before telling rally attendees to “carry the message to Capitol Hill” and that “the fight begins today.” He was so ready for a fight, he himself was wearing body armor. His Congressional staff was part of the organizers of the January 6th events – ostensibly before the Insurrection itself.
Brooks did everything he could to overturn the 2020 results in the months after the election, and keep Trump in office. Trump “returned the favor” by withdrawing his endorsement Brooks for the Senate seat from Alabama last week. Brooks’ entire campaign was based around his MAGA connections and the Trump endorsement, so the flip-flop was a body blow.
Brooks revealed why the endorsement was withdrawn. In September of 2021, nine months after the inauguration of Joe Biden, Trump asked Brooks to have Congress “…overturn the (2020) election results and re-install Trump as President”. Brooks told Trump there is no Constitutional method of doing that, once the Electoral votes were certified – but Trump demanded it anyway. It was the cost of his endorsement.
The “bottom line” of this story: Trump continues to try to overthrow the elected President of the United States. It didn’t end on January 6th, or 20th – that sedition continues today.
The Justice’s Wife
Ginni Thomas has been a conservative activist for a quarter-century. In the months after the 2020 election, she was active in the movement to overturn the election results. She sent dozens of text messages to Trump’s Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, suggesting ways to continue the “battle” to maintain Trump in office. Thomas completely “bought in” to the “Stop the Steal” theories put forth by Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell. She was constantly sending advice and support to Meadows, declaring that Meadows should “…do anything to overturn the election”.
Her husband is the Senior Justice of the United States Supreme Court, Clarence Thomas. In spite of his wife’s deep involvement in the events of January 6th (she was in attendance at the rally, though she says she did not go to the Capitol), Thomas was the sole dissenting vote on the January 6th Committee’s attempt to get documents for their investigation. There are no set rules requiring Justices of the Supreme Court to recuse themselves from cases where they have personal involvement, each Justice decides for themselves. But it would seem that Ginni Thomas’s intimate participation would require him to withdraw. He did not.
Not only does this raise questions about Justice Thomas’s ethic, but it also demonstrates how deeply the “Stop the Steal” movement was inculcated in the Republican and conservative leadership. The January 6th Committee is preparing for public hearings, to lay out the evidence they have found of the planning and execution of the Insurrection. It will be difficult to find a time when the events of the world won’t overwhelm their message.
But we still need to listen. For some, the Insurrection isn’t over.
