June 28, 2024
The Supreme Court just handed a victory to dozens and maybe hundreds of January 6th defendants and today’s ruling may also impact the federal election interference case against former President Donald Trump. I’ll explain how in a second but first.
This was another six to three ruling but what’s interesting was the makeup of justices in the majority and dissent. The majority opinion was written by the Chief Justice Roberts, joined by Justices Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Jackson. The dissent was written by Justice Amy Coney Barrett and was joined by Justices Sotomayor and Kagan.
This whole case centers around a former police officer who was indicted on charges of assaulting a federal officer and entering or remaining in a restricted area on January 6th. But he was also charged with obstruction of an official proceeding for his alleged actions on January 6th. That crime carries a punishment of 20 years in prison. That former officer said the justice department used an overly broad interpretation of the law when they charged him with that serious crime of obstruction. 18 USC 1512(c). That law has been on the books for decades and has two parts – part one talks about the crime of altering, destroying, mutilating or concealing a record, document or other object or attempting to do so with the intent to impair the objects integrity or availability for the use in an official proceeding. But it also says a defendant violates the law if he or she “obstructs, influences or impleads any official proceeding or attempts to do so.” The former officer said he didn’t alter any documents or evidence on January 6th so he shouldn’t be charged with that crime.
And today, the majority of the Supreme Court agreed with him. Saying he didn’t impair the integrity of records, documents or other objects used during an official proceeding so if they let the justice department’s broad interpretation of the law stand it will have a ripple effect. Justice Roberts writes… “that novel interpretation would criminalize a broad swath of prosaic conduct, exposing activists and lobbyists alike to decades in prison.”
In her dissent Justice Barrett says the majority is absolutely wrong. She writes “statutes often go further than the problem that inspired them, and under the rules of statutory interpretation, we stick to the text anyway. The court, abandoning that approach, does textual backflips to find some way— any way—to narrow the reach of (the law) subsection (c)(2). I respectfully dissent.
Now let’s talk about how this may impact the former police officer who sued, the other January 6th defendants who have been charged with this same crime and potentially even former president Donald Trump. I’ll take the former police officer first. This ruling says his case will go back to the lower court and that court with this ruling in hand will have to determine whether his obstruction charge can stand. It probably will not. In reality – this obstruction charge was issued to hundreds of other January 6th defendants. So it’s possible their obstruction charges will also be dropped, it’s also possible if they were sentenced on that charge, it will be reduced or eliminated. However! It’s important to understand, the majority of those defendants were not only charged with this obstruction charge. They were charged with other crimes and those will not be impacted at all by today’s ruling.
And that brings me to former president Donald Trump. His federal criminal election interference case does include this same obstruction charge. His circumstances are different when it comes to the records but because of this ruling but it is entirely possible those specific obstruction charges may be dropped. But it’s important to understand he – like these other January 6th defendants — were charged with other crimes besides this obstruction charge – so this ruling– does not impact those.
Attorney General Merrick Garland issued a statement after today’s ruling saying he’s disappointed by today’s decision, but says “for the cases affected by today’s decision, the department will take appropriate steps to comply with the court’s ruling.”
Read the ruling here.
Read the AG Garland’s statement here.
