As Democrats remain terrified of the prospect of a red wave in the 2022 miderm election—and even looking ahead to the 2024 general election—the partisan Justice Department may try to ensure that the most famous figure to emerge from the Jan. 6 uprising at the US Capitol stays safely behind bars.
Attorney General Merrick Garland and his biased DOJ prosecutors are seeking four years of prison time for Jacob Chansley, the infamous “QAnon Shaman,” CNN reported.
Chansley is famous for taking shirtless pictures on the Senate floor while wearing a horned headress, leather chaps and red-white-and-blue body paint.
Despite the relative innocuousness of his offense, the four-year sentence prosecutors are seeking is the longest term they have requested so far in the Jan. 6 proceedings.
Clearly, leftist elites are looking to make an example out of Chansley given his public profile. Yet, the four-year term also raises questions about whether there may be political motives—especially given the recent election success of other J6 rally attendees.
Apart from his unspecified—and likely self-appointed—shaman duties, Chansley has not publicly indicated any interest in seeking higher elected office.
But according to BuzzFeed News, out of 13 Republicans known to have attended the rally who were running for election, at least 10 were victorious.
In defending the steep sentence against Chansley, prosecutors claimed he functioned as a sort of ringleader to incite others to enter the Capitol and was “quite literally, their flagbearer.”
The terror of seeing a man so clad as the QAnon Shaman pose for selfies with figures including Nancy Pelosi’s own son-in-law in America’s nonsecular temple to democracy “has made us all question the safety and security of the country in which we live,” they further claimed.
Michiel Vos, Schoonzoon van Pelosi, onze man bij #Antifa. https://t.co/DCTEJRCoNW pic.twitter.com/qvgduKIwnb
— Darya (@D62Darya) January 6, 2021
“Those enormous harms, borne out of the acts of this defendant, must be deterred so that we never see a similar assault on our democracy again,” they eloquently expounded in the legal filings.
Chansley, an Arizona resident, has inexplicably awaited his sentencing for over 10 months now—eight of which he spent stuck in jail while awaiting his arraignment, a possible violation of the 6th Amendment’s right to a speedy public trial.
It is set to be concluded next week.
In recent attempts to undermine Chansley’s defense, prosecutors have called attention to his Facebook posts about election fraud, suggesting that he does not have sufficient respect for the laws.
“The government cannot overstate the seriousness of the defendant’s conduct as a one of the most prominent figures of the historic riot,” prosecutors wrote. “The severity of his actions, and respect for the laws of this country, must be impressed upon him.
