Category Archives: Proud Boys

The document is so dowdy and formal it resembles the annual minutes of a society of tax accountants. Its index lists sections on objectives and rules of engagement and carries an addendum that provides recommendations for hotels and parking.

On the cover, two words give a clue to the notoriety of the group that produced it: MAGA and WARNING. That and the date: 5 January 2021, the day before the US Capitol attack.

What goes unsaid on the cover and is barely mentioned throughout the 23 pages is that this is the work of one of the most violent political gangs in America, the far-right street fighters told by Donald Trump to stand back and stand by: the Proud Boys.

The document, published by the Guardian for the first time, gives a very rare insight into the meticulous planning that goes into events staged by the far-right club.

The document was obtained from a Proud Boys member by the extremism reporter Andy Campbell as he researched his new book, We Are Proud Boys: How a Right-Wing Street Gang Ushered in a New Era of American Extremism. The book will be published on Tuesday. Campbell shared the document with the Guardian.

The Proud Boys have been designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center and are alleged to have acted as key organizers of the violent assault on the Capitol.

In the wake of January 6, which has been linked to the deaths of nine people, the New York march featured in the document was called off and the strategy so fastidiously laid out was never implemented. But the document remains sharply revealing.

It shows the lengths to which the Proud Boys go to prepare for potentially violent encounters and then to cover their tracks something prosecutors have stressed but that has never been seen in the groups own words. It exposes the militaristic structure and language the Proud Boys have adopted, and their aspiration to become the frontline vigilante force in a Trump-led America.

It also provides clues as to how the group continues to spread its tentacles throughout the US despite the fact that many of its top leaders, including its national chairman, Enrique Tarrio, are behind bars awaiting trial on charges of seditious conspiracy.

The purpose of the document is to provide a strategic security plan and call to action, summoning Proud Boys members to a pro-Trump Maga march that was scheduled for New York City on 10 January 2021. That was four days after Congress was to certify Joe Bidens victory in the 2020 presidential election the occasion that would be targeted by the fatal insurrection.

The author of the document is Randy Ireland, who as president of the groups New York branch, the Hells Gate Bridge Chapter, is one of the most prominent Proud Boys in the US north-east. The paper was circulated through Telegram, the encrypted chat app widely used by the Proud Boys as an organizing tool, to at least nine other chapters in New York and beyond.

Campbell told the Guardian the decentralized structure of the group, into what it claims are 157 active chapters in all but three states, is one of the Proud Boys greatest strengths, as reflected in the autonomous nature of the New York planning.

Chapter leaders like Randy can create their own events, run independently of each other, Campbell said. Enrique Tarrio and other leaders are in prison, but these guys are going to continue what they are doing.

The language in the planning paper is overtly militaristic. Ireland designates himself General of Security Detail, while his underlings in the chain of command are VPs of Recruiting, Scout Security and Team Leads.

The plan is for 60 or so Proud Boys at the 10 January event in Manhattan to be corralled into seven tactical teams of five to eight men each (they are all men, as one of the overriding values of the group is misogyny). Members are told to bring protective gear, including knife/stab protection, helmets, gloves, boots etc and to make use of radio channels, walkie-talkies or Telegram to communicate with each other.

They are to stick together in groups and under no circumstances allow Normies ordinary Trump supporters who are not Proud Boys or Females into their ranks.

Their presence will jeopardise the health and safety of all those involved with Security, and simply cannot be allowed to happen! Ireland writes.

Maps reproduced at the back of the document show positions scouts and tactical teams should adopt at key points along the route of the march, which was planned to start at Columbus Circle and pass Trump Tower.

That spot is understood in a very public way to hold special meaning for us, the paper says, referring to Trumps home on Fifth Avenue. WE WILL NOT DISAPPOINT!

Campbell, who has been reporting on the Proud Boys since they started turning up at Trump rallies in early 2017, describes them as Americas most notorious political fight club. In the planning paper, he sees equal parts fantasy and danger.

These guys see themselves as super soldiers, like some sort of military outfit, he said. On one level its funny, as nothing is in fact going to pan out the way they say it will. But on another level, its alarming because it shows how much thought they put into this stuff.

In We Are Proud Boys, Campbell traces the group from its birth in 2015-16 through to its central role on January 6 when a member, Dominic Pezzola, became the first person to breach the US Capitol. At least 30 Proud Boys have been charged in relation to the insurrection, including Tarrio and four others accused of seditious conspiracy among the most serious indictments yet handed down.

The group was invented by the British-born founder of Vice magazine, Gavin McInnes, who branded himself a western chauvinist and peddled in bigotry. McInnes floated the Proud Boys name on his online chatshow in May 2016, introducing them as a gang and inventing a uniform, a black Fred Perry polo shirt with yellow trim.

McInnes was careful to brand his creation as harmless fun, a satirical male-only patriotic drinking club that later attached itself to all things Trump. But Campbell argues that from the outset political violence was baked in.

A Proud Boy was an organizer of the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, during which an anti-fascist protester was murdered. The group has held violent gatherings in Portland, Oregon. Outside a Republican event in New York in 2018, several members were arrested and charged with felonious assault.

Proud Boys membership is structured into four ranks, known as degrees, the fourth granted once you get arrested or get in a serious violent fight for the cause, as McInnes himself explained. In an interview with Campbell for the book, McInnes denied promoting violence and insisted the Proud Boys were never proactively aggressive, only reacting to leftwing attacks.

That official line is reiterated in the document published by the Guardian. Ireland is careful to portray the Proud Boys as a defensive group.

He writes: If any violence does spout off, all Proud Boys are expected to respond immediately only so far as to eliminate and end that threat to them or others. VERY IMPORTANT: Once the threat has been neutralized, WE STOP!

But there is a glaring contradiction: Ireland presents his chapter as a non-violent organization yet it goes out seeking violence. He assigns the group, uninvited, the role of a vigilante police force.

We are there as the first line of defense for all event attendees, he writes, then contradicts himself by saying the only role of the Proud Boys is to play a back-up role to law enforcement and to force them to do their jobs.

That speaks volumes. It carries the implication that if the police will not assail anti-fascist protesters, Proud Boys will.

Ive reported at Proud Boys events where they stood back and relaxed as police lobbed teargas and other munitions into the crowd of counter-protesters, Campbell said. Then the Proud Boys didnt have to do what Randy Ireland is hinting at here step in and do the fighting themselves.

For Campbell, the most disturbing aspect of the document is that, with its soft-lensed double-talk and contradictory meanings, it falls into arguably the main ambition of the Proud Boys: the normalization of political violence. Despite having so many leaders behind bars, the group is prospering.

As new chapters pop up, Americans are increasingly inured to the idea of heavily armed gangs in public settings. Proud Boys have posed as security details at anti-abortion rallies, anti-vaccination demonstrations, pro-gun protests and of course Trump rallies.

The street-level violence the Proud Boys helped to create is now being carried out by regular people, Campbell said. You saw it on January 6, you see it at Planned Parenthood and LGBTQ+ events where people are harassed and attacked by everyday Americans.

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Proud Boys memo reveals meticulous planning for street-level violence ...

The F.B.I. had as many as eight informants inside the far-right Proud Boys in the months surrounding the storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, recent court papers indicate, raising questions about how much federal investigators were able to learn from them about the violent mob attack both before and after it took place.

The existence of the informants came to light over the past few days in a flurry of veiled court filings by defense lawyers for five members of the Proud Boys who are set to go on trial next month on seditious conspiracy charges connected to the Capitol attack.

In the papers, some of which were heavily redacted, the lawyers claimed that some of the information the confidential sources had provided to the government was favorable to their efforts to defend their clients against sedition charges and was improperly withheld by prosecutors until several days ago.

In a sealed filing quoted by the defense, prosecutors argued that hundreds of pages of documents related to the F.B.I. informants were neither suppressed by the government nor directly relevant to the case of the Proud Boys facing sedition charges: Enrique Tarrio, the groups former leader; Joseph Biggs; Ethan Nordean; Zachary Rehl; and Dominic Pezzola.

Because all of the material remains under a highly restrictive protective order, it is not possible to know what the informants told the government about the Proud Boys role in the Capitol attack or how that information might affect the outcome of the trial.

A closed court hearing was held on Monday to discuss the informants in Federal District Court in Washington. Lawyers for the Proud Boys have asked Judge Timothy J. Kelly, who is overseeing the case, to dismiss the indictment or at least delay the trial to give them more time to investigate the newly revealed informants.

Judge Kelly made no decision at the hearing, according to a notice placed on the docket after the proceeding ended. Because it was sealed, journalists were not allowed in the courtroom.

The dispute about the informants in the Proud Boys came on the heels of revelations that the F.B.I. also had a well-placed source in the inner circle of Stewart Rhodes, the leader of the Oath Keepers militia, another far-right group that took part in the Capitol attack.

Last week, lawyers for Mr. Rhodes and four other Oath Keepers who are being tried on sedition charges planned to call the informant Greg McWhirter, the groups former vice president as a defense witness, believing that his testimony would bolster their case. But on the eve of his planned appearance, Mr. McWhirter suffered a heart attack and the defense put other witnesses in his place.

Questions about informants reporting to the government from inside extremist groups have been raised repeatedly throughout the Justice Departments sprawling investigation of the Capitol attack. They have included concerns about why the informants were not able to give the government advanced warning about plans to storm the Capitol on Jan. 6 or seemingly to corroborate accusations after the fact that the groups conspired in plotting the attack.

Former F.B.I. officials say there might have been gaps in what bureau intelligence analysts had told agents to ask their informants. Analysts at the bureau are supposed to help agents connect the intelligence dots to provide a clearer picture of threat activity. The F.B.I.s intelligence directorate was created after Sept. 11 to help thwart terrorism and other threats.

It remains unclear what sorts of questions the F.B.I. was asking its informants in the Proud Boys and how focused the bureau was on the groups activities to undermine the results of the elections as Jan. 6 drew near. Previous court papers have suggested that some Proud Boys including Mr. Biggs were recruited by the F.B.I. before the election to provide information about their adversaries in the leftist movement known as antifa.

Last year, The New York Times revealed the existence of an informant in the Kansas City chapter of the Proud Boys who took part in the storming of the Capitol with a group of his compatriots. After the attack, the informant told his handlers in interviews that he was not aware of a premeditated plan to break into the building on Jan. 6, although as a relatively low-level member of the group it is possible that he was simply not privy to the making of such plans.

Right-wing media figures and Republican politicians have often sought to use the issue of F.B.I. informants in extremist groups to suggest that the bureau had a hand in guiding or encouraging the attack on the Capitol in a way that entrapped other rioters. No evidence has surfaced suggesting that the F.B.I. played any role in the attack.

But the lawyers for the Proud Boys have made entirely different claims, arguing that the information the confidential sources provided to prosecutors appears to be exculpatory and could contradict the governments chief allegation in the case: that their clients went to Washington on Jan. 6 with a plan in place to storm the Capitol and disrupt the transfer of power from President Donald J. Trump to Joseph R. Biden Jr.

The newly disclosed material called into question whether a Proud Boy conspiracy plan to obstruct the Biden-Harris vote certification or to commit sedition ever existed or could have existed, J. Daniel Hull, Mr. Biggss lawyer, wrote in papers filed on Monday.

The notion of whether there was a predetermined plan to attack the Capitol or whether the violence that erupted there on Jan. 6 was more spontaneous will be one of the key disputes when the Proud Boys trial now scheduled to start on Dec. 12 goes in front of a jury. To prove seditious conspiracy, prosecutors will have to show that the defendants knowingly entered into an agreement to use force to stop the lawful transfer of power after the 2020 election.

If the information provided by the informants is indeed exculpatory, the lawyers for the Proud Boys could in theory call some of them to testify at the trial and rebut the governments charges.

A similar dynamic has been playing out in recent days in the Oath Keepers sedition trial, which could go to the jury as early as this week. A central part of the defenses strategy in the case has been to introduce evidence that the Oath Keepers had no explicit plan to attack the Capitol.

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F.B.I. Had Informants in Proud Boys, Court Papers Suggest

Washington A former leader of the far-right extremist group the Proud Boys pleaded guilty Thursday to seditious conspiracy for his role related to the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol, becoming the first member of the organization to do so since the leader of the group and several of its members were indicted.

Jeremy Bertino, of Belmont, North Carolina, admittedin federal court to "knowingly combine, conspire, confederate and agree" with five members of the Proud Boys and its leader, Enrique Tarrio, "to oppose by force the authority of the government of the United States and to delay by force the execution of the laws governing the transfer of power, including the 12th Amendment."

As part of his plea deal with federal prosecutors, Bertino has agreed to cooperate with the Justice Department's ongoing investigation into the group. He also spoke with the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 assault, and his testimony was featured in its June hearing. Bertino told committee investigators that membership in the Proud Boys "tripled" after former President Donald Trump told the group to "stand back and stand by" during a September 2020 presidential debate.

According to the filing, Bertino also "unlawfully and knowingly" received and had several firearms, including two pistols, two rifles, a shotgun and a Mossburg .22 AR-15-style firearm with a scope, "which had been possessed, shipped and transported in and affecting interstate and foreign commerce." The weapons were discovered in a court-authorized search of his residence in March, during which the FBI also found 3,000 rounds of ammunition, according to the Justice Department.

He pleaded guilty to one count of seditious conspiracy and one count of unlawfully possessing a firearm or ammunition due to a prior conviction, and admitted to conspiring to use force to prevent the peaceful transfer of power from Trump to President Biden.

Bertino, 43, is the first Proud Boys member to plead guilty to seditious conspiracy, though he was not among the group's members charged by the Justice Department in June. Tarrio, along with codefendants Ethan Nordean, Joseph Biggs, Zachary Rehl, and Dominic Pezzola, are accused of conspiring to obstruct and stop the counting of state electoral votes when Congress convened for a joint session Jan.

The trial for the members is set to begin in mid-December.

Another leader of the group with close ties to Tarrio, Charles Donohoe, pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges and assaulting officers earlier this year. He, too, is cooperating with investigators.

Members of another far-right group, the Oath Keepers, are currently on trial, facing numerous felonies including seditious conspiracy. A jury is currently hearing testimony in the case of Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and four codefendants, all of whom have pleaded not guilty to the charge.

Bertino joined the Proud Boys around 2018 and served as the vice president of a local chapter in South Carolina. According to court filings, he traveled to Washington, D.C., numerous times for rallies in 2020, and during one trip on Dec. 12, 2020, he was stabbed after an altercation involving other Proud Boys members.

Bertino was hospitalized and released. On Jan. 6, 2021, the day of the assault on the U.S. Capitol, he was still recovering from his injuries, according to the Justice Department, so he did not participate in the events of that day.

Federal prosecutors said that in December 2020, Bertino accepted an invitation from Tarrio to join a new chapter called the "Ministry of Self Defense," and participated in encrypted chats with members of the group's leadership in the weeks before the Jan. 6 attack. Members believed the 2020 presidential election was stolen, and they agreed that the goal of traveling to Washington on Jan. 6 was to stop the certification of electoral votes, the Justice Department said.

The so-called "Ministry of Self Defense" organization, with Tarrio at the top of the power structure, "was to form the nucleus of leadership in a new chapter of the Proud Boys organization," according to court documents filed earlier this year.

The Justice Department said that as early as Jan. 4, two days before the Capitol insurrection, Bertino received encrypted messages indicating leaders of the "Ministry of Self Defense" were discussing the possibility of storming the Capitol. On Jan. 6, he posted messages to the organization's leaders to offer assistance and encouragement, including urging those at the Capitol grounds to "form a spear."

Bertino also publicly posted to a social media account "DO NOT GO HOME. WE ARE ON THE CUSP OF SAVING THE CONSTITUTION" and, the evening of Jan. 6, Bertino messaged Tarrio, writing "You know we made this happen," and "1776 m*****f*****."

He faces a maximum of 20 years in prison for seditious conspiracy and up to 10 years in prison for the firearms charge.

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Jeremy Bertino, Proud Boys member from North Carolina, pleads guilty to ...

Former Wisconsin Proud Boy member saw bigotry and bullying

Daniel Berry joined the Wisconsin Proud Boys in search of camaraderie, but instead found racism, antisemitism and sadistic bullying.

Jasper Colt, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON A former leader of the Proud Boys extremist group pleaded guilty Thursday to seditious conspiracy in connection with the group's efforts to halt the certification of the 2020 election.

Jeremy Bertino, 43, acknowledged his role in helping to plan the Proud Boys'participation in the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol and also agreed to cooperate in the government's continuing investigation.

Five other members of the Proud Boys, including former national chairman Enrique Tarrio, also have been charged with sedition and are awaiting trial.A sixth member of the group, Charles Donohoe, 34, pleaded guilty earlier this year to a conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding and assaulting andresisting officers.

In addition to the sedition charge, Bertino also pleaded guilty to unlawful possession of firearms related to a March search of his home where authorities recovered six guns, including an AR-15 rifle and more than 3,000 rounds of ammunition. Bertino had been barred from possessing firearms andammunition due to a previous conviction.

In the weeks prior to the Jan. 6 assault, according to court documents,Bertino participated in encrypted chats and other communications with members of the group's so-called "Ministry of Self-Defense," in which leaders asserted that the "presidential election had been stolen."

At the time, the members discussed traveling to Washington on a mission to "stop the certification of the Electoral College Vote, and that the MOSD leaders were willing to do whatever it would take, including using force against police and others, to achieve that objective."

Monitoring activities outside of Washington, while recovering from a stabbing, Bertino allegedly encouraged his Proud Boy colleagues on Jan. 6 to "form a spear" and continue the fight.

DO NOT GO HOME. WE ARE ON THE CUSP OF SAVING THE CONSTITUTION," Bertino wrote to his colleagues, later celebrating the group's effort with Tarrio.

You know we made this happen," he wrote.

According to court documents, Bertino joined the Proud Boys in 2018 and for a time served as the vice president of the Proud Boys chapter in South Carolina.

In a videotaped deposition before the House committee investigating the Capitol assault, Bertino told lawmakers that membership in the Proud Boys group had "tripled," after then-President Donald Trump urged members to"stand back and stand by" during a 2020 presidential debate.

Bertino faces a maximum of 20 years in prison for seditious conspiracy and up to 10 years in prison for the firearms charge.

The guilty pleacomes as five members of the para-military group Oath Keepers, including leader Stewart Rhodes, stand trial on sedition charges in a Washington, D.C., federal court.

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Ex Proud Boys leader pleads guilty to seditious conspiracy in Jan. 6

Jeremy Bertino, a Proud Boys leader from North Carolina, pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy and gun charges on Thursday, becoming the first member of the far-right group to admit to seditious conspiracy the toughest charge prosecutors have filed in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot investigation and the first Proud Boys leader to plead guilty to any charges. He agreed to cooperate with the government in its seditious conspiracy case against five other Proud Boys leaders, set for trial in December.

Bertino, 43, formally entered his guilty plea at a court hearing in Washington, D.C., down the hall from where Stewart Rhodes and other leaders of the Oath Keepers militia are being tried for seditious conspiracy for their roles in the Jan. 6 insurgency. U.S. District Judge Tim Kelly accepted Bertino's guilty plea.

The charges he admitted to carry maximum jail terms of 30 years, but "in a sign of the sensitivity and potential importance of Bertino's testimony, prosecutors agreed that in exchange for 'substantial cooperation,' they could seek leniency at sentencing and enter Bertino into a Justice Department witness protection program," The Washington Post reports. They said they would recommend a sentence in the four- to five-year range.

The five Proud Boys members facing trial for seditious conspiracy conspiring to forcibly overthrow the government, impede its laws, or seize its property are former national chairman Henry "Enrique" Tarrio, Joe Biggs, Zachary Rehl, Ethan Nordean, and Dominic Pezzola.

Neither Tarrio nor Bertino were at the Capitol on Jan. 6 Tarrio had been arrested on other charges two days earlier and barred from the capital, and Bertino was recovering from a stab wound he got at a bar fight in D.C. in December. Encrypted text messages showed both men were involved in planning an attack, as Bertino's plea deal says, to "stop the certification of the Electoral College vote" on Jan. 6, even if it involved "using force against police and others."

Four people affiliated with the Oath Keepers have also pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy, and two Proud Boys have pleaded guilty to lesser Jan. 6 conspiracy charges. In all, the Justice Department says, more than 870 people have been arrested for Jan. 6related crimes, and "the investigation remains ongoing."

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Tarrio is set to go on trial in December, along with Proud Boys Ethan Nordean, Joe Biggs, Zachary Rehl and Dominic Pezzola, who was the first member of the Jan. 6 mob to breach the Capitol when he shattered a Senate-wing window with a police riot shield.

Prosecutors say Tarrio and his allies developed a plan to besiege the Capitol, relying on and in fact organizing and spurring on members of the mob to help break through police lines and get inside the Capitol. It was part of an effort that prosecutors say was intended to disrupt the peaceful transfer of presidential power.

Kelly accepted Bertinos plea after asking Bertino a series of standard questions to ensure, under oath, that Bertino entered it voluntarily and without being threatened or coerced.

The seditious conspiracy charges against the Proud Boys leaders are the gravest leveled by the Justice Department against any of the more than 850 defendants charged in connection with the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

Bertino was briefly featured during video testimony aired by the Jan. 6 select committee during its first public hearing in June. He described a surge in Proud Boys membership after then-President Donald Trump urged the group to stand back and stand by during a debate against Joe Biden.

Would you say that Proud Boys numbers increased after the stand back, stand by comment? an investigator asked.

Exponentially. Id say tripled probably, Bertino replied.

Several leaders of the far-right Oath Keepers, including founder Stewart Rhodes, are currently on trial for seditious conspiracy as well, just down the hall from where Bertino entered his plea. Prosecutors say they spent the weeks after Election Day fomenting an armed rebellion against the government and seizing on the opportunity created by the Jan. 6 mob to disrupt the transfer of power.

In documents accompanying his plea, Bertino joined the Proud Boys in 2018 and admitted to attending Washington, D.C., rallies with the group after the 2020 election. He was one of a handful who was stabbed during civil unrest at a Dec. 12, 2020, event which he describes as the reason he wasnt present on Jan. 6.

Bertino was on an encrypted chat with other Proud Boys leaders, including Tarrio, in the weeks before Jan. 6, and he says in his plea documents that he believes the groups plan was to stop the certification of the Electoral College Vote on Jan. 6, even if it involved using force against police and others.

Hours after the attack on the Capitol, Bertino messaged Tarrio saying You know we made this happen and 1776 motherfucker.

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Proud Boys leader pleads guilty to seditious conspiracy over Jan. 6 ...

A high-ranking leader of the right-wing Proud Boys pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy, court documents revealed Thursday, making him the first member of the group to do so as its leader awaits trial.

Jeremy Bertino was a lieutenant to Proud Boys Chairman Enrique Tarrio, who along with four other members of the group is awaiting trial in December for seditious conspiracy related to the events of Jan. 6, 2021.

The plea dealwould give the Justice Department a key witness against Tarrio and the others.

The agreement says Bertino did knowingly combine, conspire, confederate, and agree with the plans of the other Proud Boys to to oppose by force the authority of the Government of the United States and to delay by force the execution of the laws governing the transfer of power.

A seditious conspiracy convictioncarriesup to 20 years in prison. While a judge will determine Bertinos sentence, the government recommended a roughly five-year prison term for Bertino, as well as a fine totaling anywhere from $20,000 to $200,000.

Bertino, who is barred from owning firearms due to a prior conviction, separately pleaded guilty to unlawful possession of a firearm after authorities found six such weapons when they searched his home, including an AR-15 style gun. That charge carries up to 10 years in prison.

Tarrio was initially indicted in March with four other members of the group: Ethan Nordean, Joseph Biggs, Zachary Rehl and Dominic Pezzola.

The government has accused them of having directed, mobilized, and led members of the crowd onto the Capitol grounds and into the Capitol.

The Proud Boys describes itself as a pro-Western fraternal organization for men who refuse to apologize for creating the modern world, aka Western Chauvinists.

The plea deal for Bertino comes as the Justice Department had opening arguments this week in its first seditious conspiracy case to go to trial. Far-right militia group leader Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the Oath Keepers, is on trial along with four other members of the group.

Bertino and Tarrio, like Rhodes, never entered the Capitol that day. While Rhodes remained on the Capitol grounds, Tarrio had been ordered to remain outside of D.C. after having been arrested just a few days prior, and Bertino was also not in the city, as he had recently been stabbed during a brawl.

Bertino continued to participate in planning sessions as he recovered from his injures. At least as early as Jan. 4, 2021, he received encrypted chat messages indicating that members of MOSD leadership were discussing the possibility of storming the Capitol, the Justice Department wrote in a press release announcing the deal.

On Jan. 6, Bertino monitored activities through mainstream and social media, as well as posting in the (Ministry of Self Defense) MOSD chats. He posted messages himself to MOSD leaders and members to encourage and assist in the operation, such as advising those on the grounds of the Capitol to form a spear. Similarly, Bertino posted to his public social media account, DO NOT GO HOME. WE ARE ON THE CUSP OF SAVING THE CONSTITUTION.

Bertino previously spoke with the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack, telling the panels investigators in a video clip played in one of their hearings that the Proud Boys membership tripled after former President Trump told the groups members to stand back and stand by during a 2020 presidential debate.

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Proud Boys leader pleads guilty to seditious conspiracy

Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes is slated to speak at Penn State University later this month an event that has sparked protest plans and a petition. He's seen here in 2019. Stephanie Keith/Getty Images hide caption

Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes is slated to speak at Penn State University later this month an event that has sparked protest plans and a petition. He's seen here in 2019.

Penn State University says Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes spouts "hateful and discriminatory" rhetoric but the school also says a student group has the right to bring McInnes to speak on campus this month, at an event paid for with thousands of dollars in student fees.

Students have launched a petition and plan to protest the Oct. 24 event, seeking to block McInnes and another controversial far-right figure, Alex Stein, from speaking in State College, Pa.

Free-speech guarantees, warns the Student Committee for Defense and Solidarity, should not entail "platforming fascists and promoting hateful, meritless disinformation with thousands of student-fee dollars."

But the university's leaders on Tuesday rejected calls to cancel the engagement or ban McInnes and Stein from campus. As they did so, Penn State officials stressed that the school doesn't agree with what it deemed the speakers' "repugnant and denigrating rhetoric."

The event's organizer, the conservative student group Uncensored America, says McInnes and Stein will use comedy to provide "a unique perspective" on issues such as immigration (McInnes is Canadian), political correctness and gender roles.

As it made its case to bring McInnes to campus, Uncensored America compared him to "many great comedians that have come before," according to the minutes of the group's meeting with the University Park Allocation Committee, thestudent-led group that considers requests to use student-derived funds for events.

The organizers cited McInnes' willingness to "push the boundaries of comedy in a thought-provoking manner" to change how people think.

But his many detractors say there's nothing funny about McInnes or the Proud Boys, whose members call themselves "Western chauvinists" and who have repeatedly been involved in violence. More than two dozen Proud Boy members, including several leaders, have been named in federal charges over the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, including accusations of seditious conspiracy.

"McInnes plays a duplicitous rhetorical game: claiming to reject white nationalism while espousing a laundered version of popular white nationalist tropes," says the Southern Poverty Law Center, which labels the Proud Boys a hate group.

Uncensored America has sought to de-emphasize McInnes' ties to the Proud Boys, saying he "stepped down and veered away" from the movement. But it also gave the upcoming event the provocative title, "Stand Back and Stand By" emphasizing the Proud Boys by quoting former President Trump's famous 2020 message to the group.

General admission to the event is free on a first-come basis, with students getting priority. But attendees can also buy tickets including a $99 "Royalty" package that guarantees a spot up front and includes a chance to have dinner with McInnes and Stein.

The allocation committee approved $7,522.43 in funds for the "Stand Back and Stand By" event, including airfare for McInnes and Stein and a combined $6,500 in honorarium payments for the pair.

Discussing the funding request, the committee chair noted that their task was to focus on the budget, not the speakers' content or ideology. While the event is "clearly catered toward a particular demographic," they added, "It is not our job to infer what the implications of funding this event are going to be. It is just our job to use the information we have been given to inform our funding decisions."

On Oct. 24, the Student Committee for Defense and Solidarity plans to hold a protest outside the building where McInnes and Stein will speak. The university is encouraging people on campus to attend alternate events celebrating unity and propaganda awareness, including a speech by Al Tompkins of the Poynter Institute titled, "Fighting Truth Decay: How and Why Fakers Fake."

Penn State has dealt with similar uproar over guest speakers before, including an appearance last November by Milo Yiannopoulos, who was also brought in by Uncensored America.

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Penn State refuses to cancel a speech by Proud Boys founder - NPR

Wearing skeleton-face masks and carrying signs, members of the extreme right-wing group Proud Boys showed up Saturday to protest at an outdoor session of Drag Queen Story Hour at Brookside Gardens in Wheaton.

The group of men, wearing baseball caps with the Proud Boys insignia, lined up outside the visitors center at the gardens in Wheaton Regional Park and carried signs that included the phrases Science is Real Boy or Girl and Groomer crossed out with a red X, according to a photo posted on Twitter by Washington Post columnist and deputy editorial page editor Karen Tumulty.

Peak 2022. On my walk this morning at a local park, I happened to come across Proud Boys awaiting the beginning of Drag Queen Story Hour, Tumulty tweeted Saturday.

In an interview with Bethesda Beat, Tumulty said she was going for a walk at the park with a friend when she saw the group of men wearing black T-shirts that read American Proud Boy. She said there was about 20 in total. Drag Queen Story Hour is part of an international program in which performers read stories to children in libraries, schools and bookstores. The event had been a regular occurrence at Brookside Gardens

DManda Martini, Saturdays performer, tweeted about the interruption to the story hour. Another @DQSHtweets interrupted by protestors. This time with giant signs & masks. They followed me to my car, got pics & videos of me & my car and shouted ugly things the whole time as I was being escorted out, Martini wrote.

Martini followed with another tweet that said, The families that came to listen to stories were absolutely lovely. I hope they truly enjoyed the books that I read today. The organizers did everything they could to keep me as safe as possible.

In a third tweet, Martini wrote, Unfortunately even with police & employee escort did not stop the mask wearing, giant sign holding, slur shouting cowards who came from taking my picture, pictures of my car, and verbally assaulting me.

When asked Monday about the protest, Montgomery Parks released the following statement:

While we respect the rights of people to peacefully protest, the safety of program attendees, park users, and staff is our number one priority. Each event is staffed with Montgomery Parks Park Police to help prevent any incidents. Montgomery Parks is pleased to host Drag Queen Story Hour, an inclusive program to help children understand the world around them in a fun way that uses storytelling and imagination.

In recent months, anti-LGBTQ protesters have disrupted a number of the story hours across the country. In Montgomery County, protesters have shown up at local story hours, including a session earlier this summer at Loyalty Bookstore in downtown Silver Spring.

In August, in anticipation of a possible protest, local LGBTQ activists gathered at Brookside Gardens for a session of Drag Queen Story Hour. Families were greeted by activists who held up rainbow flags and colorful sheets as they lined a sidewalk.

Kristin Mink, a community organizer and the Democratic candidate for County Council District 5 who helped organize LGBTQ activists for the August event, called on activists to again show their support.

What weve seen today is that the LGBTQ+ community is under attack even here in liberal MoCo. So we cannot let our guard down. And we wont. I know that whatever it takes to make clear that this is a place where we protect & celebrate the LGBTQ+ community, we will do it, she wrote Saturday on Twitter.

Tumulty said she spoke on Saturday to some parents at the event who have brought their children to other Drag Queen Story Hour sessions and told her there had never been an incident like Saturdays protest.

Martini declined to comment.

Contact information for a local representative of the Proud Boys could not be immediately determined.

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Proud Boys gather outside of Drag Queen Story Hour in Wheaton - BethesdaMagazine.com

The panel intends to focus on evidence that Trump has consistently and increasingly been using rhetoric that we knew caused violence on Jan. 6, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) told reporters recently. Cheney cited recent comments by U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson in which she upbraided elected Republicans for continuing to indulge one man, who knows full well that he lost, instead of the Constitution he was trying to subvert.

The select committees closing pitch to Americans will draw on all aspects of its more than yearlong probe. Its expected to feature evidence that Trumps allies were pushing him to declare victory on Election Day 2020 even before the votes were counted, and that Trump was warned of the unfolding violence at the Capitol before he tweeted an inflammatory attack on then Vice President Mike Pence.

By contending that even amid the wreckage of Jan. 6, Trump continued to plot ways to remain in power, the hearing will also function as a segue of sorts to the criminal case that federal prosecutors are piecing together bolstered by the recent issuance of dozens of grand jury subpoenas and court-authorized searches of some of Trumps top allies.

The committee has long emphasized its distinct mission from prosecutors to inform the public and develop legislative recommendations to prevent future attacks on the peaceful transfer of power but has used its platform to press the Justice Department to pursue potential crimes among Trumps inner circle.

The panel won a hard-fought court ruling in March in which a federal judge contended Trump likely entered a criminal conspiracy to obstruct the presidential transition, an effort the judge described as a coup in search of a legal theory. That ruling became a centerpiece of the committees public hearings and legal arguments in the subsequent months.

We think we very, very much proved the case in a compelling way by the end of that hearing series, select panel member Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) said in a recent interview. And now, frankly, on the criminal side, because were not the criminal committee, its up to the DOJ. They have the torch, and well see where they go with it.

Since leaving office, Trump has used his megaphone to promise pardons to many of those jailed for storming the Capitol on Jan. 6 and has leaned on state legislators and members of Congress to embrace impossible proposals to unravel the 2020 election including an explicit call to be reinstated as president.

Hes also suggested that if he runs and wins another term, he might pardon the rioters who sought to keep him in power, and hes put pressure on figures like Wisconsin House Speaker Robin Vos to support measures to decertify election results in that state. Vos told Trump it was impossible, and the select committee has subpoenaed him to obtain testimony about his interactions with Trump in recent months.

The hearing had been scheduled to take place originally on Sept. 28, but the select committee postponed it as Hurricane Ian bore down on Florida; the delay may turn out to be a boon for the panel. In the intervening two weeks, the committee obtained testimony from Virginia Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. And last week, Jeremy Bertino, a North Carolina leader of the Proud Boys who also interviewed with the select panel, pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy.

Thursdays hearing is likely to feature some of the select panels evidence obtained after its summer hearings, like interviews with Trump Cabinet members about internal discussions concerning the potential invocation of the 25th Amendment to remove him from power. Its also set to include documentary footage of longtime Trump ally Roger Stone, who was followed around by a camera crew in the weeks leading up to Jan. 6.

The Stone footage, provided by a Danish film crew and obtained by CNN, includes audio of Stone one day before Election Day telling an associate, Fuck the voting, lets get right to the violence, while laughing.

Select panel Chair Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) has also described a significant trove of documents and messages recently turned over by the Secret Service. Investigators have viewed the agency with skepticism after learning that thousands of messages sent among senior officials including on and around Jan. 6, 2021 were erased in what the agency described as a tech upgrade.

Two Secret Service officials have previously testified to the panel: Robert Engel, the head of Trumps detail, and Tony Ornato, who held an unusual post as a political appointee in Trumps White House. Ornato retired from the Secret Service at the end of August. But select committee members have suggested that both men said they couldnt recall key details about the events surrounding Jan. 6 and sought follow-up interviews with them.

The committee is likely to flick at some of the links between pro-Trump extremist groups like the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys and Stone. Investigators have eyed the voluminous connections between Trump and those who facilitated nearly every aspect of the former presidents push to subvert the election, even though theres been little evidence of Stones direct involvement in those efforts.

Yet several figures in Stones orbit were among the most significant players in the events of Jan. 6: Ali Alexander, founder of the post-election Stop the Steal activism; pro-Trump InfoWars broadcaster Alex Jones; Proud Boys national chairman Enrique Tarrio; and Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes.

Stone also hired several members of the Oath Keepers to perform security for him on Jan. 5 and 6, 2021 among them, Kelly Meggs, who is charged alongside Rhodes with seditious conspiracy for their involvement in the breach of the Capitol. Another Oath Keeper who guarded Stone, Joshua James, has already pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy.

The hearing will play out alongside the Justice Departments most significant criminal trial yet stemming from the Jan. 6 attack. Just across the street from the Capitol, five leaders of the Oath Keepers, including Rhodes, are beginning their trial on seditious conspiracy charges.

The select committee is also deeply immersed in the process of writing its final report and conclusions. Though interviews and aspects of the investigation remain ongoing, the panel is seeking to produce a final document in December that sums up its sprawling investigation before the current Congress ends. Investigators are also weighing the timing of the release of hundreds of witness transcripts and interview recordings that federal prosecutors have indicated interest in.

Zach Montellaro contributed to this report.

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'Clear and present danger': Jan. 6 committee to describe lingering Trump threat - POLITICO