One of the six men charged in a plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer pleaded guilty on Wednesday.
Ty Garbin, 25, admitted to a half-dozen pages of allegations, including discussing a “plan to storm the Capitol and kidnap the governor” and “waiting until after the national election, when the conspirators expected widespread civil unrest to make it easier for them to operate,” according to court documents obtained by the Associated Press. Garbin, who pleaded guilty to a conspiracy charge and agreed to cooperate with investigators, invited the other five alleged participants to his property, constructed a “shoot house” similar to Whitmer’s vacation home, and assaulted it with live firearms.
In October, an undercover FBI agent, who posed as a vigilante interested in participating, infiltrated the alleged plot that sought to nab Whitmer and destroy a bridge to slow down police officers. Prosecutors said Adam Fox and Barry Croft Jr. orchestrated the scheme and recruited other members to participate in “field training” exercises, including a simulated assault on a vehicle with guns.
Garbin allegedly sent a text to the undercover law enforcement officer in reference to destroying the bridge near the governor’s home: “If the bridge goes down it will stop the wave.” The 25-year-old also offered to paint his boat black to better survey the Democrat’s vacation home.
Garbin and five suspected accomplices were charged in federal court, while eight others were jailed in local facilities for purportedly aiding the plan. The six men were indicted by a federal court in mid-December.
The 25-year-old’s lawyer, Mark Satawa, insists Garbin never actually intended to carry out the plot.
“Saying things like, ‘I hate the governor, the governor is tyrannical’ … is not illegal, even if you’re holding a gun and running around the woods when you do it,” he said in October.
