695 people have been charged for federal crimes related to the January 6, 2021, Capitol breach—crimes motivated by the lie that Joe Biden won because of nationwide election fraud. Of those 695 people, not one has been charged with sedition, defined in the US Code as two or more people conspiring to “overthrow, put down, or to destroy” the government, “prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law,” or “by force to seize, take, or possess any property of the United States.”
January 6 defendants came armed with bats and bear spray and stun devices and guns and zip ties, aiming to overthrow the election by any means necessary. They called for the execution of the vice president. They assaulted law enforcement, bludgeoning officers with American flagpoles and police barricades. They stormed the Senate floor, stole mementos, and seized government files. They told us what they were there to do—for weeks ahead of time, in some cases—and they very nearly did it.
But no one has been charged with sedition, because America does not talk about violent expressions of white supremacy as sedition. Even when it manifests as a coup against America itself.
Not every person who stormed the Capitol is enrolled in a white supremacist group, but one does not need to avow white supremacy to be its surrogate. What other ideology imbues a mob with the power to besiege the citadel of American democracy and attempt to usurp an election, all in the name of “patriotism”?
“I was listening to Infowars and I was, like, getting patriotic,” said Daniel Rodriguez, who tased DC police officer Michael Fanone during the breach. “We thought we were being used as a part of a plan to save the country, to save America, save the Constitution, and the election, the integrity.” Rodriguez, who helpfully described himself to federal prosecutors as a “piece of shit,” was indicted not on sedition but on more technical charges like obstruction of an official proceeding, along with theft and destruction of government property.
When the rioters arrived at the Capitol, they, like Trump, granted no legitimacy to ballots cast for Biden by Black Americans. “I voted for Joe Biden,” Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn recalled telling insurgents as he confronted them inside the building. “Does my vote not count? Am I nobody?” He was met with jeers. “You hear that, guys?” he remembers a woman wearing a pink maga shirt shouting from a mob of about 20 rioters. “This nigger voted for Joe Biden.”
If those who assaulted the Capitol are not charged with crimes that equate them as anti-American, what, in the name of America, might they do next? Republicans who tolerate claims of a rigged election may not espouse allegiance to the Capitol insurrection itself, but they display alignment with its ends. Their gambit is that Trump and his disciples are their political life force—something to pledge fidelity to even if it means the obliteration of democracy, the Constitution, and the star-spangled banner.
