Grand jury rejects DOJ bid to criminalize “don’t follow illegal orders” video
While prosecutors reportedly couldn’t identify an actual crime, under Trump-appointed crackpot US Attorney Jeannie Pirro, the DOJ still asked a Grand Jury to indict six lawmakers for reminding USAS personnel that illegal orders are illegal to follow. The Grand Jury unanimously declined.
Roughly two weeks ago, as first reported by NBC News, a federal grand jury in Washington, D.C., unanimously rejected an attempt by Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, to indict lawmakers over the video, illustrating that grand jurors didn’t think the government had passed even the low legal threshold of probable cause required to bring an indictment.
While a potential case against the six lawmakers is now considered dead in Washington, that decision wouldn’t necessarily bar a federal prosecutor from trying to bring a case in a different federal court district, though there have been no public indications that will happen.
Legal experts and Democrats have criticized the unprecedented attempt to use the immense powers of the Justice Department to punish six members of Congress as a purely political attack on protected free speech and a sign that the guardrails that existed during the first Trump administration have been eroding.
Even at the famously low probable-cause stage, “obey the law” has failed to qualify as a felony.