Six Three Percenters Indicted For Conspiracy In Capitol Insurrection, So What's That 18% Of?

Haha, math does not work like that.

A grand jury has indicted six "Three Percenter" loons from California on conspiracy charges for their part in trying to overthrow the 2020 election results on January 6, the first time that particular anti-government militia crowd has been charged in the insurrection. (So far, it's mostly been Proud Keepers and Oath Boys, plus a variety of militia creeps who didn't belong to any formal group but sure wanted to overthrow democracy to preserve America.) And what a nice bunch of patriots they appear to be!

 According to the indictment, the six dudes conspired on the encrypted Telegram app to drive a rented SUV loaded with weapons to Washington DC so they could participate in Donald Trump's wild rumpus, and planned to storm the Capitol. One of the gents, Derek Kinnison, was very excited about saving America from its elected representatives, writing, "I personally want to be on the front steps and be one of the first ones to breach the doors!"

Two of the guys, Alan Hostetter and Russell Taylor, seem like quite the "characters," as the New York Times explains. The two had founded a group during the pandemic that they called "the American Phoenix Project," so we'll assume they couldn't wait to burn everything down and restore Liberty. The group sought to

fight the "fear-based tyranny" of coronavirus-related restrictions. The group later embraced former President Donald J. Trump's lies about a stolen election, and helped organize a well-attended rally outside the Supreme Court on Jan. 5, where the speakers included Roger J. Stone Jr., a former adviser to Mr. Trump.

Not that hanging around with Stone is so much a crime as just tacky as fuck.

Hostetter, a former La Habra police chief turned Orange County yoga instructor whose brain seems to have broken during the pandemic, or possibly before, used his group to "advocate violence against certain groups and individuals that supported the 2020 election results," according to the indictment. He posted a YouTube video in late November 2020 in which he offered some very patriotic sentiments, explaining that

...some people at the highest levels need to be made an example of with an execution or two or three. Because when you commit treason against this country and you disenfranchise the voters of this country and you take away their ability to make decisions for themselves, you strip them of their Constitution rights. That's not hyperbole when we call it tyranny, that's fucking tyranny. And tyrants and traitors need to be executed as an example.

Hostetter also gave a speech at a Huntington Beach "Stop the Steal" rally in December where he said there "must, absolutely must, be a reckoning" and that the

enemies and traitors of America both foreign and domestic must be held accountable. And they will. There must be long prison terms, while execution is the just punishment for the ringleaders of this coup.

We should probably point out here that the conspiracy charges Hostetter and the others face have a maximum 20 year sentence, which seems a lot fairer than what he was calling for those awful Deep State people to get.

In some of the messages the Gang of Six that Couldn't Shoot Straight exchanged, they explicitly discussed the kinds of weaponry they planned to take to Washington, along with the sort of hilarious "kidding on the square" that's so typical of these very clever fellows:

a. HOSTETTER texted "I'll be heading to DC on 12/31. Let's hook up on 12/30 so you can give me your backpack," followed by three hatchet emojis.

b . TAYLOR responded, "Oh shiz. I need to pack that up. Alan are you bringing firearms?

c. HOSTETTER texted back, "NO NEVER (Instagram now monitors all text messages this has been a public service announcement)," followed by three emojis of faces laughing with tears coming out of their eyes.

The other four doofuses also took part in the planning, with all the usual militia-clown fake military jargon you'd expect ("I think we should clear all text in this chat the morning of the 5th just in case for opsec purposes"), AND discussing what weapons they would bring along (possibly a "shotty" and "another long iron," plus discussions of making sure to bring a gun short enough to be "stashed under the seat" of the SUV). if you don't mind, we'll skip the movie adaptation of their road trip to DC.

Now, it's worth noting that of the six, the feds don't accuse Hostetter or Taylor of invading the Capitol, although they were allegedly in the mob outside, and helped push around some Capitol Police. Taylor posted to rightwing messaging app Telegram that night that he had been "pushing through traitors all day today" and exulted, "WE STORMED THE CAPITOL! Freedom was fully demonstrated today!"

The Times suggests that the indictment may be fairly significant since it may mean that

prosecutors have started to pay attention not only to those who directly took part in the Capitol attack, but also to those who helped foment the assault.

That seems like a pretty good idea! You know what we do with ringleaders in this country? We charge them appropriately and try them in a court of law, instead of trying to incite a mob to lynch them.

[ Reuters / NYT / Justice Department / Indictment (PDF) via NYT]

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