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Trump engaged in insurrection, judge says

Colorado District Judge Sarah Wallace concluded – based on testimony of US Capitol Police officers, lawmakers, clips from Trump’s January 6, 2021, speech and expert testimony about right-wing extremism – that Trump engaged in the January 6 insurrection.

This was a major legal hurdle that the challengers were able to overcome. And it’s the first time that any court in the country has ruled that Trump engaged in the insurrection, a watershed moment in the quest for accountability for January 6.

Wallace determined that Trump “actively primed the anger of his extremist supporters” and “acted with the specific intent to incite political violence and direct it at the Capitol.”

She also found that Trump “acted with the specific intent to disrupt the Electoral College certification of President Biden’s electoral victory through unlawful means.”

While this lawsuit is not a criminal case, it is a highly notable finding. It aligns closely with the federal criminal charges filed by special counsel Jack Smith, who accused Trump of illegally obstructing the Electoral College proceedings.

It’s unclear how this could impact the criminal case. But very few judges in the country have examined Trump’s post-election conduct as closely as Wallace has in this litigation.


Judge rejects Trump’s free-speech defense

Notably, Wallace gave a thorough legal analysis of Trump’s incendiary speech at the Ellipse. She devoted 17 pages to examine Trump’s words and whether they fit the legal standard of inciting violence.

Trump has repeatedly argued that his rhetoric that day was protected speech under the Supreme Court’s precedents in First Amendment cases involving incitement. His lawyers also made that argument in Colorado.

But Wallace rejected those free-speech defenses, and instead concluded that his speech that day “was intended as, and was understood by a portion of the crowd as, a call to arms.”

“The Court finds that Trump’s Ellipse speech incited imminent lawless violence,” she wrote.

“Trump did so explicitly by telling the crowd repeatedly to ‘fight’ and to ‘fight like hell,’ to ‘walk down to the Capitol,’ and that they needed to ‘take back our country’ through ‘strength.’ He did so implicitly by encouraging the crowd that they could play by ‘very different rules’ because of the supposed fraudulent election.”


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https://edition.cnn.com/2023/11/18/politics/takeaways-from-the-blockbuster-trump-insurrectionist-ban-ruling/index.html