Tag: Jan

75 Jan Aushadhi Kendras To Be Established In JK To Commemorate Amrit Kaal: LG Sinha

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SRINAGAR: In a virtual address on Tuesday, Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha addressed the 5th Jan Aushadhi Diwas celebrations at GMC Jammu, under the Pradhan Mantri Bhartiya Janaushadhi Pariyojana.
During his speech, he praised the stakeholders and urged for collective efforts to promote the use of generic medicines and expand the reach of the program to every part of Jammu and Kashmir UT.
During his address, the Lt Governor emphasized that the scheme not only offers affordable and quality generic medicines to the public, but also provides an opportunity for self-employment to women and youth. He also highlighted the healthcare reforms implemented to ensure accessible and affordable healthcare for the people of Jammu Kashmir. The Lt Governor credited PM Narendra Modi for guiding the strengthening of the health sector to prioritize citizen’s well-being. Additionally, he mentioned that around 350 modern health infrastructure projects are underway in the UT to promote a resilient health system and strong socio-economic growth.
“Along with conventional economic metrics like GDP, we should also focus on the Gross Health & Happiness of people. A healthy and happy society can enable economic benefits and all-around development.” Lt Governor said.
He said affordable medicines from Jan Aushadhi Kendras have resulted in saving of huge sums for families across the country. Approximately 32,000 patients are visiting 227 Kendras every day in J&K UT, the Lt Governor said.
“We endeavor to start 75 Jan Aushadhi Kendras in every district to mark Amrit Kaal”, the Lt Governor noted.
Week-long events have been organized across J&K to commemorate the Jan Aushadhi Diwas.
Jan Aushadhi Kendra and other stakeholders were felicitated for their contribution to promoting generic medicines and menstrual health & hygiene.

Sh. Bhupinder Kumar, Administrative Secretary, Health and Medical Education Department; Dr. Shashi Sudan Sharma, Principal, GMC Jammu; Nodal Officer of PMBJP and other senior officials were present on the occasion.

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( With inputs from : kashmirlife.net )

March 7, 2023
Feds say Proud Boys associates fanned out to facilitate Jan. 6 breach

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In case after case, prosecutors said, the alleged offenders had links to the Proud Boys — some explicit, some tenuous — and either joined them on their march from the Washington Monument to the Capitol or participated in encrypted text message channels with the group’s leaders ahead of their actions on Jan. 6. But it’s the most specific effort by the Justice Department to capture the breadth of what it sees as the most significant case to arise from the Jan. 6 attack.
None of the 23 associates identified by prosecutors are charged as co-conspirators alongside Tarrio and the other leaders: Ethan Nordean, Joe Biggs, Zachary Rehl and Pezzola. Rather, the Justice Department contends that those in the broader group were handpicked by the leaders and acted as “tools” of the alleged seditious conspiracy.
“The people who marched with them, all the way from before Trump started speaking and who marched onto Capitol grounds, trampled police barricades before he finished speaking, were acting jointly with these defendants,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Eric Kenerson said on Monday.
Whether the jury ever sees this evidence is a question in the hands of U.S. District Court Judge Timothy Kelly, who must decide whether prosecutors have made a clear enough case that these individuals acted — knowingly or not — to further the goals of the alleged seditious conspiracy.
The prosecution’s assertion that the some defendants acted as “tools” of those charged in a separate case and that their acts should be imputed to those on trial on conspiracy charges drew outrage from defense attorneys.
Lawyers for the Proud Boys leaders contended that prosecutors were seeking to prove “guilt by association,” tagging Tarrio and others with the violent actions of a loosely connected group of rioters.
“We’ve cut the baloney now so thin that I can see through it and read the other side of the paper,” said Norm Pattis, an attorney for Biggs.
Pattis suggested that the government’s theory that individuals were “activated” by the Proud Boys to help advance their conspiracy could equally apply to other Jan. 6 influencers, including former President Donald Trump himself. Pattis has indicated that he hopes to subpoena Trump to testify in the trial, though it’s unclear whether he has served the subpoena as of this week. He described the government’s theory as “tenuous.”

Prosecutors described varying degrees of relationships between the so-called tools and the Proud Boys leaders. Some, like Paul Rae, crashed at an Airbnb with Nordean and others the night before Jan. 6, or like Gabriel Garcia, who was invited into pre-Jan. 6 encrypted chat groups by Tarrio. Others, like Barton Shively and Trevor McDonald, joined the Proud Boys somewhere along their march to the Capitol, which came even before Trump finished addressing a rally crowd assembled near the White House. Prosecutors said one defendant appeared to fist-bump with a man who later joined a violent push against police.
Kelly said he intends to consider the evidence prosecutors described on Monday and determine whether to permit the government to show it to jurors.
Nevertheless, prosecutors described about a dozen discrete examples of actions by associates of the Proud Boys that they say underscored the group’s influence during the riot.
The most compelling example was the case of Ronald Loehrke and James Haffner, two associates of Nordean. Prosecutors displayed text messages in which Nordean tells Loehrke, “I want you with me,” on Jan. 6. “I’ll have you on the front lines with me,” he says. Haffner came to Washington with Loehrke and is seen on video spraying police officers during a melee outside Capitol doors.
Other examples include Robert Gieswein, who was one of the first rioters to enter the Capitol and joined the confrontation with Capitol Police outside the Senate chamber; Paul Rae and Gilbert Fonticoba, who entered the Capitol with Biggs; and Nicholas Ochs, who scrawled “Murder the Media” on a Capitol door.
Prosecutors said they don’t intend to introduce the Gieswein evidence in front of the jury, which prompted Carmen Hernandez, the defense attorney for Rehl, to assert that Gieswein was invited to join the Proud Boys march by a “confidential human source” working with the government.
Prosecutors also said a group of five associates — A.J. Fischer, Dion Rajewski, Zach Johnson, Brian Boele and James Brett — who they consider “tools” of the Proud Boys’ conspiracy were part of the mob that besieged the Capitol’s Lower West Terrace tunnel, the scene of the day’s worst violence.
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( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

March 7, 2023
Once an albatross around Trump’s neck, Jan. 6 is now taboo in the GOP primary

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If any subject is verboten in the early stages of the Republican presidential primary, it’s the insurrection that once served as a defining point in 2024 frontrunner Donald Trump’s career. Whereas Republicans once talked openly about it being disqualifying for the former president, today it is little more than a litmus test in GOP circles of a candidate’s MAGA bona fides. None of them want any part of it.
For a primary candidate, said Scott Walker, the former Republican governor of Wisconsin, going after Trump for Jan. 6 is “a huge risk.”
The Jan. 6 avoidance is not just in DeSantis’ book. Mike Pence, the former vice president and likely presidential candidate, is preparing to resist a grand jury subpoena for testimony about Trump’s efforts to overturn the election, seeing only political landmines in testifying. Nikki Haley, asked on a podcast recently if she would describe the riot at the Capitol as an “insurrection, a riot, or a coup,” went instead with a more banal — and safer — description: “a sad day in America.”
In the primary, said Dave Carney, a national Republican strategist based in New Hampshire, “I don’t think January 6th will come up, period.”
The insurrection wasn’t always destined to be taboo in GOP primary politics. In the immediate aftermath, the riot appeared to provide an opening not only for Trump’s loudest critics in the party, but also for more mainstream, otherwise-Trumpian Republicans seeking to distinguish themselves from him ahead of 2024.
It was Haley, the former U.N. ambassador, who once said she was angry and “disgusted” with Trump and told Republican National Committee members that his “actions since Election Day will be judged harshly by history.” Pence made his first post-presidential break with Trump by declaring that he and Trump might never “see eye to eye” on the insurrection. DeSantis once openly criticized “the rioting and disorder” at the Capitol.
“The calculation was that this is clearly indefensible, he’s not going to have a place in the party going forward,” said one Republican strategist and former congressional aide. “That clearly hasn’t happened … January 6th is advantageous for Trump in a Republican primary now. Nobody’s going to hit him on January 6th.”
The advantages for Trump, if they do exist, were in plain view at the gathering of conservatives at the Conservative Political Action Conference. At the yearly confab — held this year outside of Washington — some attendees wore their connection to Jan. 6 as a badge of honor and found sympathetic ears.

Micki Witthoeft, the mother of Ashli Babbitt — the protester shot and killed by Capital police at the riot as she tried to break down a door inside the building — appeared on set with Donald Trump Jr. outside the convention’s main stage. There were two booths in the CPAC exhibition hall focused on Jan. 6 defendants. And it was standing room only for a breakout session at the conference titled: “True Stories of January 6: The Prosecuted Speak.” Speakers included Jan. 6 defendants Brandon Straka, Simone Gold, West Virginia legislator Derrick Evans, John Strand and Geri Perna, the aunt of Matthew Perna, who died by suicide after pleading guilty to four charges related to the Capitol riot.
In the halls, it wasn’t unusual to bump into people who were protesting on Capitol Hill on Jan. 6. Deborah Gordon, a retiree from Maryland, said it was “disgusting” that politicians didn’t talk about Jan. 6 more. “I was there,” Gordon said. Bruce Cherry, the chair of Seminole County Republican executive committee in Florida, said it was important to reelect Trump “to pardon those people.” Melissa Cornwell, who attended CPAC from Beaumont, Texas, called Jan. 6 a “non-event,” adding that the “real insurrection” was the riots that followed the death of George Floyd in 2020.
If anything, the tone and tenor of the conference suggested that Republican presidential candidates may feel pressure from corners of the base to talk about Jan. 6 in positive terms — and rally to the defense of people arrested following the riot.
“I can tell you that just interacting with a lot of the activists here, there is concern that the violations of protocol and civil rights around the Jan. 6 issue haven’t gotten sufficient attention from the Congress, and that’s really a matter for us in the House majority more so than 2024 candidates,” Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) said on the sidelines of CPAC.
Already, the Trump world attacks on potential 2024 contenders for not being sufficiently supportive of the Jan. 6 protesters are coming. Alex Bruesewitz, a Republican strategist and influencer close to the Trumps, said others who could seek the nomination have shown they “don’t care” about Jan. 6 defendants “because they’re going to lose out on the Wall Street money, they hate Trump and his base.” Bruesewitz himself was summoned by the Jan. 6 committee but reportedly pleaded the Fifth when asked to testify about the events on that day. He once said he would help pay for the legal defense of accused Capitol rioters, while Trump has suggested pardoning some Jan. 6 defendants and even collaborated on a song with some of them.
CPAC has grown increasingly aligned with Trump, making it difficult to assess how representative its gathering is of broader Republican politics. Indeed, last August, the conference featured a fake jail cell where a convicted Capitol rioter sat, fake cried, and prayed with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.). Still, the crowd assembled there was full of precisely the kind of hardline activists critical to presidential contenders in a GOP primary.
In the broader GOP ecosystem, even more moderate Republicans see little upside in mentioning the riot.
“I’m not trying to downplay January 6th and how terrible it was, but really, a lot of us just want to move past this guy, right?” said Mark Graul, a Republican strategist who worked on George W. Bush’s 2004 campaign. “We want to move past him, and move past the awfulness, which culminated on January 6th. That was the peak of Trump awfulness.”
But Graul added that anyone running to be the GOP standard-bearer understood the calculations that come with it.
“We’re still in this stage where if you’re running for the Republican nomination, you’re going to need to get votes from people who voted for Donald Trump,” he said.
Indeed, polls show that there just isn’t much of a constituency in the GOP primary for anyone criticizing Trump on Jan. 6. More than two years after the riot, the share of Republicans who disapprove of Trump supporters taking over the Capitol building has fallen to 49 percent, from 74 percent in 2021, according to a recent Economist/YouGov poll. And even if Republicans didn’t like what they saw that day, a majority of them don’t blame Trump.
Two years ago, Walker said, Jan. 6 was worthy of condemnation. He said so at the time. But it makes no sense for presidential candidates to be talking about it now, he added, when most people have moved on.
Anymore, he said, “Nobody cares.”
Natalie Allison contributed to this report.

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( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

March 6, 2023
Judge denies Jan. 6 defendant’s bid for time to review McCarthy’s Capitol security footage

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Boasberg’s ruling is the latest ripple caused by McCarthy’s decision to widen access to 44,000 hours of Capitol security footage from Jan. 6. The Capitol Police had previously turned over about 14,000 hours of the day’s footage that leaders said encompassed crucial time periods of the riot, as well as the relevant camera angles.
It’s unclear whether the additional footage includes evidence that will influence any of the 950-plus Jan. 6 criminal cases. But several defendants have said they intend to access the materials, which House Republicans have agreed to facilitate. The Justice Department has yet to indicate whether it, too, will attempt to obtain and review the footage.
At Friday’s hearing, prosecutors opposed Carpenter’s request, saying they had pieced together the “overwhelming” amount of her movements using CCTV footage, leaving only “a matter of seconds” unaccounted for. Carpenter already has access to a “massive” trove of CCTV footage, they noted, and defendants have the ability to request specific camera angles they would like to focus on if they believe they need additional material.
Prosecutors also suggested that they remain largely in the dark about what the cache of footage newly unearthed by McCarthy might include.
“We don’t have what the speaker has,” said assistant U.S. Attorney Christopher Cook, adding, “In any case, there’s always the possibility some information may be out there.”
Prosecutors are required to disclose to defendants any potentially exculpatory evidence they possess — a particularly thorny challenge in Jan. 6 cases as a result of the massive amounts of video evidence captured by Capitol security cameras, policy bodycams, journalists and rioters themselves, who recorded hundreds of hours worth of footage.
But that requirement isn’t limitless, particularly when it comes to evidence that is in the possession of another agency — like the Capitol Police, an arm of Congress — and if courts determine the government has made good-faith efforts to provide as much material as possible to defendants.
Carpenter’s attorneys argued in court Friday that McCarthy’s batch might help fill “gaps” in the footage that would provide context to the actions Carpenter took inside the Capitol. They contended that it might help contextualize some of the actions she took that resulted in the felony charges DOJ lodged, including for obstructing Congress’ proceedings and for participating in a civil disorder. She sought a 60-day delay in her trial, which is set to begin Monday, in order to determine whether any of the new footage might be relevant.

Boasberg agreed that the request was legitimate. Any attorney would want to see a new batch of potentially exculpatory evidence, he said.
“It’s certainly not a frivolous request by any means,” he said.
But Boasberg agreed that the gaps Carpenter’s attorneys described were “minimal” and that the defense lawyers didn’t explain specifically why any additional footage might help Carpenter’s case.
Prosecutors trying the seditious conspiracy case of several leaders of the Proud Boys also recently confronted the issue, when a defense attorney asked the Justice Department whether it would help organize access to the additional footage. Assistant U.S. Attorney Jason McCullough called it a “serious question” and a “serious issue,” but said it was too soon to say how DOJ would be handling the matter.
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( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

March 4, 2023
DOJ rejects Trump claim of ‘categorical’ immunity from Jan. 6 lawsuits

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Longstanding court precedents protect presidents from civil litigation related to actions they take in their “official” capacity. But determining when presidents toggle between their official duties and their political ones — which are often blended and unclear — is complicated, and courts have typically avoided drawing bright lines.
DOJ on Thursday similarly urged a three-judge appeals court panel to avoid drawing such distinctions, even as it asked the court to dismiss Trump’s sweeping interpretation of his own immunity.
“Those are sensitive questions of fundamental importance to the Executive Branch, and this unusual case would be a poor vehicle for resolving them,” Justice Department attorney Sean R. Janda wrote.
Notably, in a footnote, the department seemed to allude to an ongoing criminal special counsel investigation of Trump, emphasizing that the agency’s opinion about Trump’s potential civil liability had no bearing on pending criminal matters related to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.
“The United States does not express any view regarding the potential criminal liability of any person for the events of January 6, 2021, or acts connected with those events,” according to the department.
The department’s brief is a notable benchmark in the long-running lawsuits that arose from the Capitol attack. Several members of Congress and Capitol Police officers sued Trump and his allies for damages, contending that they helped incite Trump’s rally crowd to violence that day.
U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta ruled last year that they had made a plausible case, permitting the suit to move forward. He noted that while presidents typically enjoy sweeping immunity from lawsuits for their public remarks, Trump’s speech arguably crossed a line into incitement of violence that would not be protected.
Trump, during his rally on Jan. 6, 2021, urged backers to “fight like hell” to prevent President Joe Biden from taking office in a speech laden with heated rhetoric. Though he urged supporters to march “peacefully and patriotically” to the Capitol, Mehta noted that it was a swift aside in a speech otherwise loaded with apocalyptic language. Even as Trump spoke, members of the rally crowd marched on the Capitol — at Trump’s urging — to pressure Republican lawmakers to oppose certification of the election. Many members of that crowd eventually joined a mob that battered its way past police lines and into the Capitol, forcing lawmakers and then-Vice President Mike Pence to flee for safety.

The U.S. government is not a party to the civil suits, but the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals panel weighing Trump’s effort to reverse Mehta’s ruling solicited DOJ’s views on the matter in December. That request from Chief Judge Sri Srinivasan, and Judges Gregory Katsas and Judith Rogers, followed oral arguments in December between an attorney for Trump and a lawyer for lawmakers and police officers claiming damages from the riot and ransacking of the Capitol two years ago.
The appeals court’s request also put the department — which typically defends the broad scope of executive power — in a tricky spot, particularly as special counsel Jack Smith continues to probe whether Trump bears criminal responsibility for his efforts to subvert the 2020 election. Many defendants charged for their actions at the Capitol on Jan. 6 have pointed to Trump’s conduct and remarks as a key influence and suggested that they took their cues from him.
Department lawyers stressed that they were not endorsing the legal theories or factual claims made in the various suits, but the government’s brief says that if a president issued an urgent call for private citizens to commit an attack that would or should be beyond the broad immunity traditionally afforded to occupants of the Oval Office.
“In the United States’ view, such incitement of imminent private violence would not be within the outer perimeter of the Office of the President of the United States,” the DOJ brief says.
The Justice Department said a president’s remarks of a purely personal or political nature might in theory be a potential trigger for civil liability, but that the courts need to take extraordinary care when trying to distinguish the official from the political.
“That principle … must be understood and applied with the greatest sensitivity to the complex and unremitting nature of the President’s Office and role, which are not amenable to neat dichotomies. The Supreme Court has emphasized, for example, that ‘there is not always a clear line’ between the President’s ‘personal and official affairs.”
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( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

March 3, 2023
House GOP moving to let Jan. 6 defendants access Capitol security footage

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Loudermilk will be leading the effort given his senior Administration panel post, according to a senior Republican congressional aide who addressed the evolving decision on condition of anonymity. The GOP aide added that the new House majority is working on a system that eventually will allow members of the media and the public to access some Jan. 6 records as well.
The footage access plan, described by three people familiar with the discussions, follows McCarthy’s move to grant exclusive access to the 41,000 hours of internal Capitol film from the day of the riot to Fox News’ Tucker Carlson. McCarthy and his allies are also making clear that there will be limits on the extent of material permitted to leave the tightly controlled confines of the Capitol, where Carlson’s team has been reviewing the footage for days.
“What gets released is obviously going to be scrutinized to make sure you’re not exposing any sensitive information that hasn’t already been exposed,” said Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.).
McCarthy told reporters Tuesday that he ultimately envisions releasing nearly all of the Jan. 6 surveillance footage publicly, with exceptions for sensitive security information.
“I think putting it out all to the American public, you can see the truth, see exactly what transpired that day and everybody can have the exact same” access, McCarthy said. “My intention is to release it to everyone.”
McCarthy dismissed questions about his decision to share the footage with Carlson, who has downplayed the Jan. 6 attack, describing it as a typical media exclusive. He noted that he did not consult with Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell about his decision.
Similar measures would be taken with any footage opened up to Jan. 6 defendants and their lawyers, two of the people familiar said, though details of those steps remain unclear for now. Among the big logistical questions Republicans are still discussing: whether any footage they open up to defendants can be used in court proceedings, which would effectively make it public.
McCarthy’s decision to let Carlson view the footage from the violent riot by former President Donald Trump’s supporters has already been raised in two ongoing Jan. 6 criminal cases. In one instance, a lawyer for one of the Proud Boys charged with seditious conspiracy has asked prosecutors to determine whether they will access and share the footage; then on Tuesday morning, Joseph McBride, an attorney for Jan. 6 defendant Ryan Nichols, claimed he had already been given permission to review the footage.

It’s unclear if the Justice Department has requested similar access. A DOJ spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The footage release marks the latest twist in McCarthy’s complicated history with Jan. 6. He led more than 130 House Republicans in objecting to the 2020 election results, even after rioters tore through the Capitol, then condemned the riot in the immediate aftermath and said Trump bore responsibility for it.
Colleagues said McCarthy pleaded with Trump amid the chaos to call off his supporters as they ransacked the building and pummeled police. But after meeting with Trump weeks after the siege, McCarthy strongly opposed Democratic efforts to investigate the breach, particularly after then Speaker Nancy Pelosi blocked two of his members from serving on the panel. He ended up spurning a subpoena from the Jan. 6 select committee.
Though many House Republicans have indicated they hope to move on from regularly discussing the attack, McCarthy’s decision to allow access to the footage — following pressure from a faction of conservative detractors who worked initially to deny him the speakership — has forced Jan. 6 back onto the agenda.
Speaking to his conference for the first time since permitting Carlson to review the copious amounts of internal Capitol security footage, McCarthy sought to quell any internal concerns among members, according to three House Republicans in the room who spoke on condition of anonymity.
During Tuesday’s closed-door conference meeting, McCarthy pointed to footage that Democrats played during select committee hearings last year which showed various locations during the assault, according to one of those Republicans — and described the criticism he’s received for granting Carlson access as “hypocrisy.”
Scalise also argued during a press conference Tuesday morning that the Democrat-led Jan. 6 committee had already released similar types of information, as had former Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s daughter in a documentary film.
People familiar with the Jan. 6 select committee investigation have emphasized that the footage the panel aired followed intensive negotiations with the Capitol Police, which often pushed back to restrict the length of clips or number of angles the committee could show. Some footage aired by the panel had also been previously made public in ongoing criminal cases stemming from the riot.
It’s unclear what similar steps McCarthy is taking, and as a result his access for Carlson has sparked staunch pushback from Democrats, who say any wide release of unvetted footage could jeopardize Capitol security. The Capitol Police have warned repeatedly in court that any widespread access to security footage could provide a roadmap for potential perpetrators of any future assault on the Capitol.
But dozens of hours of security footage have also been publicly released in the hundreds of criminal cases that have been brought forward since Jan. 6.
Loudermilk is intimately familiar with the Jan. 6 select committee’s handling of security footage. The panel released film of a group of tourists he led through Capitol office buildings on Jan. 5, 2021 — one of whom approached the Capitol grounds the following day while recording menacing statements about Democratic leaders.
Some Republicans across the ideological spectrum praised McCarthy for his move to release the footage.
“Best if all Americans have access,” said Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.), who hails from a competitive battleground district. “I don’t hear much about this at home.”
Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.), a member of the pro-Trump House Freedom Caucus, praised McCarthy for the move and shrugged off those voicing security concerns: “This place is so convoluted. That’s why they don’t have a map on it … I just got lost trying to get to the tunnel.”
The Jan. 6 footage decision is getting a lot of attention during what Republicans say is an otherwise calm week — so far. In Tuesday morning’s conference meeting, Republicans discussed upcoming bills they will vote on this week, while Scalise also previewed plans for elements of their upcoming agenda, such as a parents’ bill of rights and an energy package set to hit the floor the spring, according to two GOP sources.

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( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

February 28, 2023
Judge rejects ‘terrorism’ sentencing enhancement for leader of Jan. 6 tunnel confrontation

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McFadden’s swept away efforts by prosecutors to apply several enhancements to Judd’s sentence, most notably the so-called “terrorism” enhancement, for what Justice Department lawyers said was his intent to disrupt government functions with force. McFadden discarded their recommendations, noting that Judd didn’t appear to preplan his attack the way terrorists like those in a 2012 attack on a U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, did.
Rather, the judge said, Judd was “in some ways there at the behest of the president,” who had just minutes earlier urged his supporters to march on Congress and protest the certification of the election results.
It’s the second time prosecutors have attempted to apply the terrorism enhancement to a Jan. 6 defendant — both times unsuccessfully — during the sentencing process. Assistant U.S. Attorney Ashley Akers emphasized that the government viewed Judd’s crime as “domestic terrorism” worthy of the enhancement, which would add significant time on to Judd’s recommended sentence.
Invoking the terrorism enhancement can add about 15 years in prison to a defendant’s recommended sentence, set the minimum calculation at 17-and-a-half years, and also flip the person charged into the criminal-history category used for serial offenders.
However, prosecutors asked for only a modest adjustment in Judd’s case because the 2 offenses he pled guilty to — assault on a police officer and obstructing an official proceeding — are not on a list Congress has established of crimes of terrorism.
Still, McFadden declined to apply even that adjustment.
The judge noted that in the other case where prosecutors sought the more serious enhancement — against Texas’ Guy Reffitt — prosecutors assembled an extraordinary roster of evidence showing that Reffitt planned his actions on Jan. 6, carried a firearm, was a member of a right wing militia group and threatened a witness afterward. In that case, U.S. District Court Judge Dabney Freidrich rejected the enhancement, sentencing Reffitt to 7.25 years in prison.
McFadden used Monday’s sentencing hearing to strike another blow in a long-running critique of the Justice Department, which he has accused of treating Jan. 6 cases more harshly than rioters charged alongside the social justice protests in the summer of 2020. He said DOJ’s charging decisions in some of those cases cast doubt on Attorney General Merrick Garland’s vow for there “not to be one rule for Democrats and another for Republicans. One rule for friends, one rule for foes.”

Prosecutors have rejected the claim, arguing that Jan. 6 and the concerted assault on the transfer of power stands in stark contrast to the summertime 2020 violence — and is often accompanied by far more compelling video evidence of the crimes. They also noted that in some of the 2020 violence — particularly in Portland, Oregon — federal prosecutors opted against charging defendants who were facing even harsher charges at the state level.
McFadden, however, homed in on cases like the New York Police Department attorneys who threw Molotov cocktails in an empty NYPD police cruiser, whose sentence he said was relatively light compared to the steep penalties DOJ is seeking for some Jan. 6 offenders.
Even after McFadden rejected DOJ’s harshest sentencing enhancements, McFadden decided to apply a so-called “downward variance” to Judd’s sentencing, below the recommended sentencing guidelines, which called for a minimum of 37 months incarceration.
McFadden said he agreed with Judd’s contention that the object he threw at police was more akin to a sparkler than a firework that could have caused actual harm to police officers. Though McFadden said he believed Judd did intend to hurt people in the tunnel — noting that Judd himself fled after lobbing the object.
Under a 2005 Supreme Court case, federal judges are free to sentence defendants outside of guidelines, but courts are required to calculate the recommended range before imposing a sentence.
Judd briefly addressed the court, through tears, apologizing to police officers who defended the Capitol and to his family for causing them pain.
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( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

February 28, 2023
Judge rejected Perry’s bid to shield thousands of emails from Jan. 6 investigators

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But Howell said Perry had taken an “astonishing view” of his immunity that would effectively put members of Congress above the law and free of political consequences for their actions. She ordered him to disclose 2,055 of the documents he sought to withhold — including all 960 of his contacts with members of the executive branch, which she said are entitled to no constitutional protection at all. Some 161 items, she said, were proper to withhold.
“What is plain is the clause does not shield Rep. Perry’s random musings with private individuals touting an expertise in cybersecurity or political discussions with attorneys from a presidential campaign, or with state legislators concerning hearings before them about possible local election fraud or actions they could take to challenge election results in Pennsylvania,” Howell wrote in her 51-page December opinion.
Investigators have long scrutinized Perry’s contacts with Trump, as well as with Jeff Clark, a top Justice Department aide who Perry pushed Trump to install as attorney general in the waning weeks of his administration. Clark was seen by Trump and his allies as sympathetic to his bid to overturn the 2020 election results. The Jan. 6 select committee subpoenaed Perry to testify about his efforts but he refused to appear before the panel.
Prosecutors homed in on Perry last year, seeking his contacts with top figures connected to Trump, including Clark and attorney John Eastman, an architect of Trump’s last-ditch bid to remain in power despite losing reelection. And in August, Perry’s phone was seized by FBI agents while he was traveling with family.
Thus far, however, investigators have not had access to any of the records because, last month, a three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed to stay Howell’s ruling. On Thursday, those judges heard both public and private arguments about the dispute. The stay remains in place as the appeals court considers whether to leave Howell’s ruling in place, set it aside or modify it in some way.
The judges — Karen Henderson, Gregory Katsas and Neomi Rao — appeared skeptical of the Justice Department’s position and the breadth of Howell’s ruling, although they discussed her stance only in broad strokes and the details of her opinions remained under seal until Friday.
But the appeals panel’s ultimate leanings remained unclear at the conclusion of the public argument session Thursday. The appeals judges seemed most concerned by Howell’s determination that Perry’s outreach about Jan. 6 was not protected by the speech or debate clause because he was not acting with formal House approval.
That determination was a centerpiece of Howell’s ruling, which she said was rooted in longstanding precedent.

“No matter the vigor with which Rep. Perry pursued his wide-ranging interest in bolstering his belief that the results of the 2020 election were somehow incorrect — even in the face of his own reelection — his informal inquiries into the legitimacy of those election results are closer to the activities described as purely personal or political,” Howell said.
Perry’s communications with the White House and the Justice Department appear to be at the center of one of the investigations now being headed by special counsel Jack Smith, who has been probing the pressure put on DOJ officials to express public concern about unsubstantiated election fraud claims in the 2020 election.
That pressure culminated in an effort to have Trump dismiss acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen and install Clark, then the assistant attorney general for environment and natural resources, as acting attorney general. However, after almost every senior Justice Department official threatened to resign, Trump abandoned the plan.
Howell, an appointee of President Barack Obama, said Perry’s claim that his communications with the executive branch should be off limits to investigators to protect legislative branch confidentiality made little sense.
“The entire premise of Rep. Perry’s claim for privilege over these communications would turn the Clause’s foundational purpose on its head,” wrote Howell, who is set to turn over the chief judge’s position to a colleague next month. “Given the Clause’s purpose to protect Congressional members from untoward interference from the Executive Branch with legislative matters, Rep. Perry’s reliance on the Clause to shield his multi-pronged push for Executive Branch officials to take more aggressive action is not only ironic but also must fail as beyond the scope of the Clause.”
The dispute over access to Perry’s cell phone has drawn the House itself into the fray. Lawyers for Speaker Kevin McCarthy — authorized by a bipartisan vote of House leaders — weighed in earlier this month with a 6,000-word brief that remains sealed. Howell noted in her unsealed filings Friday that the chamber weighed in “at Perry’s request.”
Howell also dinged Perry for what she described in another unsealed filing — this one in November— for appearing to “slow-walk” his review of the items on some 10,000 documents contained on the phone FBI agents seized. She ordered him to pick up the pace of his review from about 250 documents per day to 800.
The three-judge appeals court panel decision on Perry’s bid for speech-or-debate protection for his communications may not be the final word. Either the Justice Department or Perry could ask the full bench of the D.C. Circuit to take up the issue or seek to get the Supreme Court to intervene.
What documents would be protected — and what wouldn’t be
Howell analyzed batches of documents that Perry sought to withhold and broke them down into categories:
— Contacts with members of Congress and aides about legislation and votes would be protected from review by investigators, since they’re integral to his legislative responsibilities.
— Communications with colleagues and staff about internal House Freedom Caucus business would also be protected, since it’s a group of lawmakers focused on the House agenda.
— Internal House GOP leadership newsletters would not be protected, Howell said, because they were almost entirely political in nature, offering talking points or describing upcoming events, not things central to the legislative process.
— Communications about Perry’s press coverage or media strategy are not protected, Howell determined, because they’re primarily political.
— Contacts with fellow members of Congress and aides about 2020 election fraud and legal challenges to the vote are not protected because they’re “purely political,” Howell ruled.
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( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

February 25, 2023
LIC’s investment value in Adani stocks down by Rs 50K crore since Jan

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The investments made in the Adani group companies by state-run insurance giant Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) have turned negative as of closing on February 23, according to data analysed from stakes held by the insurance company as per the December shareholding pattern made available on the exchanges.
If some Adani stocks do not find support soon, LIC’s investment in the beleaguered Group, whose listed companies’ share prices have fallen by up to 80 percent, will almost certainly turn negative, as combined profit has now fallen to around Rs 3,000 crore from Rs 53,000 crore profit since the beginning of this year.
Following a sell-off in Adani stocks following the Hindenburg Research report, the combined market value of LIC’s investments in Adani Group was Rs 33,000 crore on February 23, down from nearly Rs 83,000 crore on December 31, 2022. When Hindenburg published its damning report on January 24, the LIC’s investment in Adani Cos was valued at Rs 81,000 crore.
This is primarily due to the significant sell-off in Adani Group stocks.
After the publication of the Hindenburg report, LIC declared on January 30 that at the end of December, it owned Rs 35,917 crores under equity and debt in Adani Group equities.
Since the US-based short seller Hindenburg released their research a month ago alleging accounting fraud and stock manipulation, the market value of the group’s 10 listed firms has fallen by $146 billion, or approximately 60 percent. Adani has refuted the charges.
With the decline on Thursday, LIC’s investments now have a negative value or a loss. It is assumed that after January 30, LIC has not acquired or disposed of any stock in the Group entities.
LIC owns between 1.28 percent and 9.14 percent of the shares in seven publicly traded Adani companies.

The value of LIC’s investment in Adani Ports (APSEZ), in which it owns more than 9 percent, has fallen from Rs 15,000 crore on January 24 to slightly less than Rs 11,000 crore on February 23. Similarly, the value of its 4.23 percent stake in Adani Enterprises has decreased from Rs 16,500 crore to Rs 6,660 crore over the same time period. LIC also owns slightly less than 6 percent of Adani Total Gas.
Since this Adani stock has dropped nearly 80 percent in the last month, LIC’s investment value has dropped from Rs 25,500 crore on January 24 to around Rs 5,200 crore.
LIC holds 3.65 percent of Adani Transmission and 1.28 percent of Adani Green. In one month, the shares of both companies fell 73 percent. The LIC’s investment in Adani Transmission is now valued at Rs 3,000 crore, while the investment in Adani Green is valued at around Rs 1,000 crore. The loss suffered by LIC in Ambuja Cement and ACC is not severe.
According to LIC, its total exposure in Adani Group companies amounts to 0.975 percent of its total assets under management (AUM) at book value.
Meanwhile, most Adani stocks closed with significant losses on Thursday. In one month, the Group’s market capitalisation has dropped by approximately Rs 12 lakh crore.
The stock market’s fallout has resulted in a sharp decline in Gautam Adani’s wealth, which now stands at $42.7 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires index. He has dropped to 29th place on the world’s wealthiest list, down from second place last year.
Gautam Adani is the founder of the Ahmedabad-based conglomerate Adani Group. Infrastructure, commodities, power generation, transmission, real estate, and cement are all areas of interest for the group.
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( With inputs from www.siasat.com )

February 24, 2023
Judge won’t unseal details of Trump’s privilege fight over Jan. 6 grand jury

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POLITICO and The New York Times had both petitioned Howell to unseal portions of the grand jury proceedings in October, citing the historic nature of the secret rulings she had issued. The Justice Department opposed the unsealing, prompting Howell’s decision.
“The continued secrecy of certain details about that investigation is required for the sake of grand jury witnesses and the government’s investigation,” Howell wrote.
Both POLITICO and The Times indicated they were considering whether to appeal.
“POLITICO is committed to the principle that a government of, for and by the people is transparent with the people on such an important matter,” company spokesperson Brad Dayspring said. “We are reviewing the decision and evaluating next steps.”
A spokesperson for The Times, Danielle Rhoades Ha, said: “We are disappointed in the ruling. We will make a decision about whether to pursue further legal steps once we’ve had time to process the opinion that sets forth the rationale for the decision.”
In recent months, aides to former Vice President Mike Pence have appeared at the courthouse to testify behind closed doors after Howell rejected an effort by Trump to claim privilege over their testimony. Other top Trump allies have been seen heading into the federal courthouse’s sealed grand jury rooms — including former White House Counsel Pat Cipollone and his onetime deputy Pat Philbin.
Press reports, typically attributed to people familiar with the proceedings, have also detailed a series of fights over legal privilege issues and a bid by Trump to assert executive privilege to keep some aides from testifying.
One grand jury-related dispute, involving an objection by Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) to prosecutors’ seizure of his cellphone last year in an election-related probe, was argued before the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday in a session held partly in public and partly in secret. POLITICO revealed the details of that grand jury fight ahead of the appeals panel’s decision to partially unseal the arguments.

Howell seemed to evince discomfort about aspects of her latest ruling, particularly what she termed the “ironic” result that because cases of significant interest to the public often draw extensive news coverage and speculation about grand jury activities, the governing legal standards can require courts to withhold information in such cases even though court rulings on grand jury subpoenas in routine cases are often released with the names of those involved blacked out.
Redaction would be ineffective in the current dispute, the chief judge said, because it would simply be too easy for those reading the opinions or filings to infer the identities of those involved in the litigation.
“Redacting information in those materials would not sufficiently uphold that secrecy because matters occurring before the grand jury are so deeply intertwined with non-secret information would prove useless, or worse, misleading,” the chief judge wrote.
Howell, who will hand over the chief judge’s post and decision-making authority in grand jury matters to a colleague next month, also dinged the Justice Department for failing to address how Attorney General Merrick Garland’s public announcement in November of the appointment of special counsel Jack Smith might have undercut the justification for secrecy in the ongoing probe.
“When asked to address the impact of this DOJ announcement on grand jury secrecy in the instant applications … the government simply ignored this portion of the Order and chose not to respond to the fact of the Special Counsel’s appointment,” Howell wrote.
Howell used her 32-page opinion to throw considerable shade at a 2019 decision in which the D.C. Circuit overruled her and held that judges lack discretion to release grand jury materials for reasons not specifically enumerated in a federal court rule governing disclosures. In that ruling, the appeals court said historical interest was not a sufficient basis for a judge to make grand jury-related information public.
Howell pointed to what she portrayed as a series of oversights in the appeals court’s decision, even as she acknowledged that it binds her legally.
The Supreme Court declined to review the D.C. Circuit ruling, leaving it as the established law for federal grand juries in Washington.
However, then-Justice Stephen Breyer issued a statement noting that three other federal appeals courts had found more flexibility for judges to release grand jury-related records. Calling it an “important question,” Breyer urged a federal panel overseeing court rules to dive into the issue and determine whether changes to the policy are appropriate.
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( With inputs from : www.politico.com )

February 24, 2023