Tag: Texas

UPDATE Feb. 6, 2023: On Friday, Feb. 2, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia announced that a Fort Worth man had been found guilty for his role in the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol breach, and a Houston-area woman had been arrested for her role in the events that attempted to delay the certification of the 2020 presidential election.

Jason Benjamin Blythe, 24, was found guilty of assaulting an officer with a deadly or dangerous weapon, a metal crowd control barrier, in this instance, and on a misdemeanor charge for committing an act of physical violence on the Capitol grounds. According to a press release, Blythe stayed on the Capitol grounds “for hours,” while he resisted officers and climbed the media tower near the Capitol steps. A sentencing hearing for Blythe is scheduled for June 13.

Judy Fraize, 70, of Highlands, was arrested on Monday and charged with four crimes, including disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds and disorderly conduct in a Capitol building. Federal court records identify Fraize in more than a dozen images taken from the Capitol’s closed circuit security video. At one point during her time inside the building, Fraize, sporting a red Make America Great Again cap, can be heard yelling at an officer “we gotta take our country back!” Investigators zeroed in on Fraize by connecting her to a mobile device registered under her name and linked to her Gmail account that was used at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

These are the latest developments related to Texans arrested in connection to the Jan. 6 insurrection to add to the total since the Observer originally published this article on Nov. 8, 2023. The article and list below is updated to reflect the latest information as of Feb. 6, 2024.

Just over three years ago, thousands of pro-Donald Trump protesters stormed into the building in an attempt to prevent Congressional certification of the election of President-elect Joe Biden. The chaos quickly became deadly when Ashli Babbitt, a Trump supporter who illegally attempted to climb through a shattered Capitol window while at the front of a violent mob, was shot and killed by police.

The third anniversary of the insurrectionist attacks on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, is just over two weeks away. Nearly three years ago, thousands of pro-Donald Trump protesters stormed into the building in an attempt to prevent Congressional certification of the election of President-elect Joe Biden. The chaos quickly became deadly when Ashli Babbitt, a Trump supporter who illegally attempted to climb through a shattered Capitol window while at the front of a violent mob, was shot and killed by police.

Since then, law enforcement agencies have continued to announce the arrests of many of those who participated, no doubt aided by a host of videos and photos posted to social media by the eventual defendants of their Jan. 6 rampage exploits. The U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia released a report detailing the arrests, charges, pleas and other action that have followed in the wake of the attack.

“The government continues to investigate losses that resulted from the breach of the Capitol, including damage to the Capitol building and grounds, both inside and outside the building,” the report reads. “As of October 14, 2022, the approximate losses suffered as a result of the siege at the Capitol totaled $2,881,360.20. That amount reflects, among other things, damage to the Capitol building and grounds and certain costs borne by the U.S. Capitol Police.”

So far, more than 1,200 arrests have been made in connection with the Jan. 6 case, and more than half of them have already resulted in guilty pleas.

Filmmaker Alexandra Pelosi, daughter of former U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, recently released her latest documentary, The Insurrectionist Next Door, a harrowing look at several of the people who were arrested for their roles in the Jan. 6 attack.

“The government continues to investigate losses that resulted from the breach of the Capitol, including damage to the Capitol building and grounds, both inside and outside the building.” – U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia

tweet this

Some of the subjects featured in the film displayed no remorse for their actions, while others had undergone a change of heart since early 2021. One man admitted he didn’t really know what he was even doing that day since he had never been a Trump supporter. Perhaps as much as any other point, the film hammers home the fact that the hordes of rioters involved on Jan. 6 represent an unexpectedly wide cross-section of the American population, and that it’s not a stretch to think one of them might be living near you.

That’s especially true if you live in Texas. The Lone Star state is home to the second most people charged with a role in the Capitol breach, behind only Florida. An X account that tracks arrests related to the Jan. breach, @Jan6thData, reports that Texas is now home to more than 100 Jan. 6 arrests with North Texas being home to more than a third of that total.

102 Texans charged in the #January6th attack, or 2.8 per 2020 US House Congressional District.
The defendant arrested today lived in TX-36 https://t.co/yKroxJmldf pic.twitter.com/jIu0ACoSvG

— Jan6thData (@Jan6thData) February 5, 2024

People from nearly all 50 states have been arrested for their Jan. 6 misdeeds, but Texas sits near the top of the list. According to a July report from the Center for Policy and Research at Seton Hall University, Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, New York and California account for just over 43% of those charged with Capitol breach crimes.

Texans played pivotal roles in the violent attack on the peaceful transfer of power above and beyond the basic number of participants. On the second anniversary of the attack and following the release of a 2022 Congressional report on Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election, the Texas Tribune wrote “[t]he Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection would not have been possible without the help of a number of key Texans.” Later in the piece, Tribune reporter Robert Downen noted the massive report read “like a who’s who of Texas conspiracy theorists, conservative activists and extremists.”

The charges that the dozens of arrested Texans face include, but are not limited to, entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds; disorderly and disruptive conduct in a restricted building or grounds; engaging in physical violence in a restricted building or grounds; disorderly or disruptive conduct in the Capitol grounds or buildings; acts of physical violence in the Capitol grounds or buildings; parading, demonstrating, or picketing in a Capitol building; obstruction of law enforcement during civil disorder; assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers; and seditious conspiracy.

There will likely be more added to the list of people charged. The U.S. Attorney’s 34-month report noted that “the FBI currently has 13 videos of suspects wanted for violent assaults on federal officers and (ONE) video of (TWO) suspects wanted for assaults on members of the media on January 6th and is seeking the public’s help to identify them.”

But before those suspects are arrested, let’s take a look at all of the Texans who have been charged by the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia for their role in the attack (in alphabetical order, with location of arrest).