On Jan. 6, 2021, Julian Khater used a can of bear spray to attack Capitol Police officers who were trying to hold the line against attackers. One of the officers Khater sprayed was Brian Sicknick, who died the next day after suffering a stroke.
Last year, Khater pleaded guilty to two counts of assaulting, resisting or impeding officers with a dangerous weapon, and earlier this year he was sentenced to more than six years in prison.
Presumably, he is one of the “Jan. 6 hostages” that Donald Trump says he will set free on his first day back in office, should he be elected in November, per a social media post that reads, “My first acts as your next President will be to Close the Border, DRILL, BABY, DRILL, and Free the January 6 Hostages being wrongfully imprisoned!”
The questions seem especially urgent because Trump’s promise to free the insurrectionists is not an afterthought or a throwaway line for him.
Curious minds (or at least the media) ought to ask whether Trump’s alleged get-out-of-jail card would also include Brian Christopher Mock, who bragged that he “beat the s— out of a police officer,” according to someone who spoke with the FBI. Mock, who was wielding a baton as a weapon, was sentenced to 33 months in prison and another two years of supervised release for a total of six felonies, including obstructing police officers during a civil disorder, and four counts of assaulting, resisting or impeding officers.
Or Peter Stager, who was sentenced to 52 months in prison for assaulting a Capitol police officer with a flagpole. In a video taken on Jan. 6, Stager declared that “every single one of those Capitol law enforcement officers, death is the remedy, that is the only remedy they get.” Is he on Trump’s list?
What about Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes, who was convicted of seditious conspiracy? Or Daniel “DJ” Rodriguez, who was sentenced to 12 years in prison for driving a stun gun into the neck of police officer Michael Fanone during…
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