A federal judge determined a California woman “followed then-President [Donald] Trump’s instructions” as she breached the Capitol as part of a mob on Jan. 6, 2021.
U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly’s ruling that Danean MacAndrew is guilty of several crimes related to her participation in the Jan. 6 riot highlighted the specific role Trump played in the day’s events.
Kollar-Kotelly’s ruling that MacAndrew followed Trump’s instructions could bolster the chances of Trump being indicted after the Jan. 6 committee referred him to the Justice Department for charges including inciting or assisting in an insurrection.
“At the ‘Stop the Steal’ rally, then-President Trump eponymously exhorted his supporters to, in fact, stop the steal by marching to the Capitol,” Kollar-Kotelly wrote.
“[MacAndrew] marched to the Capitol where, she testified, she understood that only Congress had the power to fix the election’s outcome and that Congress was likely in session while she was around and in the Capitol. Having followed then-President Trump’s instructions, which were in line with her stated desires, the Court therefore finds that Defendant intended her presence to be disruptive to Congressional business,” she continued.
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No charges have been filed against Trump related to several hundred rioters storming the halls of Congress with the intention of preventing lawmakers from certifying the 2020 election.
The Jan. 6 committee undertook an 18-month investigation to crystallize what the day looked like and attempt to document what Trump intended to achieve when he urged rallygoers to march on Congress.
While the panel did issue an 845-page report and accuse Trump of engaging in a “multi-part conspiracy” to overturn the 2020 election, members were not empowered to indict the former president.
The decision to move forward with criminal charges will be up to Attorney General Merrick Garland and the Justice Department.
Kollar-Kotelly’s Tuesday opinion might make Garland’s case easier. However, one judge tying a single rioter’s actions to Trump’s instructions isn’t decisive.
Bill Dunlap, a law professor at Quinnipiac University, told Newsweek he doesn’t think Kollar-Kotelly’s opinion will play a “significant role” in possible charges against Trump because she was using MacAndrew’s following of Trump’s instructions as a way to emphasize MacAndrew knew what she was doing when she entered a restricted area.
Kollar-Kotelly’s opinion drawing a direct link between Trump and a guilty rioter follows another judge ruling that prosecutors can use Trump’s directions to the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by” in a seditious conspiracy criminal trial.
District Judge Timothy Kelly wrote last week that Trump’s comments from a 2020 presidential debate could be used after prosecutors argued the statement was used as a recruiting tool for the riot.
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Liz Harrington, a spokeswoman for Trump, told the Washington Examiner Kollar-Kotelly and the Jan. 6 committee “deliberately omitted” the fact that the former president didn’t call for violence that day.
“President Trump urged the crowd to ‘peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard’ on Jan. 6,” Harrington said. “Even the judge could not bring herself to conclude that President Trump instructed anyone to engage in violence, only to march to the Capitol to make their voices be heard.”
