Bennie Thompson to Ivanka: Come In from the Conspiracy

Even though you read this site, you may not recognize the names Brad Smith or Marshall Neefe. Even though I’ve focused some attention to his case, you may not remember the significance of Ronnie Sandlin. You might not even remember that the Oath Keeper conspiracy was named after retired Navy officer Thomas Caldwell before he was spun off into the sedition conspiracy named after Stewart Rhodes.

But those are all references of import to understand this footnote in the letter Bennie Thompson sent to Ivanka Trump, inviting her to testify voluntarily.

The Select Committee is aware of the motivation of many of the violent rioters from their posts on social media, from their contemporaneous statements on video, and from the hundreds of filings in federal court.11

11 For example, many defendants in pending criminal cases identified President Trump’s allegations about the “stolen election” as a motivation for their activities at the Capitol; a number also specifically cited President Trump’s tweets asking that supporters come to Washington, D.C. on January 6th. See, e.g., United States of America v. Ronald L. Sandlin https://www.justice.gov/opa/page/file/1362396/download: “I’m going to be there to show support for our president and to do my part to stop the steal and stand behind Trump when he decides to cross the rubicon.” United States of America v. Marshall Neefe and Charles Bradford Smith https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/case-multi-defendant/file/1432686/download: “Trump is literally calling people to DC in a show of force. Militias will be there and if there’s enough people they may fucking storm the buildings and take out the trash right there.” United States of America v. Caldwell et al. https://www.justice.gov/usao-dc/case-multi-defendant/file/1369071/download: “Trump said It’s gonna be wild!!!!!!! It’s gonna be wild!!!!!!! He wants us to make it WILD that’s what he’s saying. He called us all to the Capitol and wants us to make it wild!! ! Sir Yes Sir!!! Gentlemen we are heading to DC pack your shit!!”

The Select Committee could have chosen any number of individual defendants to support the claim that Trump was the motivating force for the participants of the mob that stormed the Capitol on January 6.

It did not.

Instead, without saying that it had, it cited three conspiracy indictments: a conspiracy that involved totally random guys who met online coming armed to DC and assaulting officers to break open the East doors and break into the Senate chamber, a conspiracy where guys armed themselves to come to DC based on a motivation that, “Why shouldn’t we be the ones” to kick off war, and a conspiracy that has now officially been charged as sedition.

What the Select Committee just said to Ivanka, very subtly (and without the hotlinks to these court filings to make it easy) is that multiple organizers across multiple conspiracies — all involving arming themselves before traveling to DC — acted on Trump’s comments in December and January as instructions.

What the Select Committee has laid out in this footnote is that key members of conspiracies that led to violent assaults on January 6 entered into an agreement with Donald Trump to engage in violence.

Other coverage of this letter has focused on the many other scathing details included in it:

  • Proof that Trump knew he was making an illegal request of Mike Pence (and that Ivanka knew such pressure was wrong)
  • Proof that multiple people attempted to get Trump to call off the violence (and that staffers repeatedly asked Ivanka to intercede to get him to do so)
  • Proof that advisors including Kaleigh McEnany and Sean Hannity attempted to get Trump to disavow these efforts

In response to the letter, Ivanka issued a statement making it clear that on January 6 she disavowed the violence caused by her father.

Ivanka Trump just learned that the Jan. 6 Committee issued a public letter asking her to appear. As the Committee already knows, Ivanka did not speak at the January 6 rally. As she publicly stated that day at 3:15pm, “any security breach or disrespect to our law enforcement is unacceptable. The violence must stop immediately. Please be peaceful.”

But that doesn’t account for another detail of the letter that has gotten far less attention than the eye-popping new details about Trump’s actions: Chairman Thompson reminded Ivanka (in a paragraph that seemingly addresses another topic) not just of the requirements of the Presidential Records Act, but also that she got formal notice of those requirements in 2017.

The Select Committee would like to discuss this effort after January 6th to persuade President Trump not to associate himself with certain people, and to avoid further discussion regarding election fraud allegations. We also wish to share with you a memorandum from former White House Counsel Donald McGahn (attached), regarding the legal requirements on White House personnel to turn over to the National Archives any work-related messages from personal devices. We wish to be certain that former White House staff are fully aware of these obligations.

Ivanka, of course, is not just the former President’s daughter. She’s also someone legally obliged to share all the communications conducted while performing whatever role it is she played in the White House — up to and including begging her Daddy to call off a violent mob — with the National Archives.

Thompson would not have mentioned this if the committee had been able to obtain Ivanka’s side of many of these communications from the Archives (or at least seen them in documents Trump was attempting to claim privilege over). Thompson seems to know that Ivanka is not in compliance with the Presidential Records Act specifically as it pertains to her role on January 6.

Here’s the thing about conspiracies. Once you join them, you’re in them — you’re on the hook for what all other co-conspirators do, from acquiring weapons to bring to DC, to assaulting cops, to planning to overthrow the government — unless you make an affirmative effort to leave the conspiracy.

Ivanka might well point to that comment in her statement — The violence must stop immediately — as an effort to leave a conspiracy.

Except if she is covering up some of the things she knows by withholding records from the Archives, she’s going to have a hard time arguing that she didn’t remain in the conspiracy with all those people plotting violence by helping to cover it up.

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169 replies
  1. TrevofOz says:

    Delicious in its entirity as always Dr. EW. And we arrive full-circle to: “But her emails…”. The magnitiude of comparative collective corruption can’t be comprehended. Huge thanks for your ongoing suprahuman and dire distillations of these sagas, and carrying me through.

    • Alan Charbonneau says:

      “The magnitiude of comparative collective corruption can’t be comprehended”

      Indeed
      I’ll be 68 a month from today and I’ve seen govt corruption over time. But this scale is beyond my ability to understand

      I recall in Douglas Hofstadter’s book “Metamagocal Themas” a photo of a log jam on a River. It had about 10,000 logs in it. He said that 10,000 is about the limit of what we can envision. This conspiracy is similarly so vast that comprehending it is nearly impossible, I don’t mean that in the sense of Marcy”s article on understanding the scope in a numerical sense per se, but on the how could so many people be involved in such a blatantly illegal plan. My mind boggles

      • Krisy Gosney says:

        This past week it clicked in my mind too about just how many individual groups and people were involved in this illegal plan/action. My mind kind of wobbled a bit trying to grasp it but I visualized the space the players of this illegal plan/action occupy in my brain and then I stretched out the edges of the space so all the known players could fit comfortably. The size of it was disconcerting for a couple of days but my mind has adjusted. Then I thought- how do all these people stay on point together throughout the plan? And I think there’s kind of an electrical current that runs through all of them which consists of these three things- white nationalism/misogyny, Christianism and egomania with inferiority complex. All the players are at least one of these three things and all the players adopt the trapping of the three things to meet their own goal and the plan’s/action’s goal. I know this is heady and focused on personalities but this whole thing is just made up of people who are acting out their personalities (12 step would say ‘character defects’).

        • xy xy says:

          “Then I thought- how do all these people stay on point together throughout the plan?”
          Any different than any government, business?
          I can’t fathom how they can keep going when something little can mess up the works.
          Airlines have so many pieces to put together to get a plane somewhere.
          Or a manufacturer.
          I have never gotten my head wrapped around it.

        • timbo says:

          It takes more ingenuity and deep knowledge to build an airplane than to build a human political structure typically. Much more. Human beings are innately able to create political structures, born with certain aspects of our political penchant hardwired. Powered flying machines? Not so much.

        • Rayne says:

          That’s a crock. You assume that innate knowledge is a freebie, and that social ability hasn’t been something we’ve acquired throughout our lifetimes beginning in utero. Just because most humans don’t pay to learn that innate knowledge of society doesn’t mean that knowledge isn’t deep or incapable of ingenious expression.

          This is exactly why emotional labor gets such short shrift — it’s discounted as a function of automatic wetware. No, it’s not. Look around at the death wreaked by its absence, quite a bit more than casualties from plane crashes.

        • timbo says:

          What exactly is a crock? I said that human beings are born with more innate ability to build political structures than they have to build powered flight machines…

        • Rayne says:

          How do organized crime syndicates work? There are rules of which one of the most important is omertà, which isn’t unique to the Italian mafia.

          The most important rule guiding the Trumpist insurrectionists is keep Trump in office. Everything is derived from that and from the unexpressed code of omertà. These two simple rules are the glue between disparate subordinate conspiracies – fractal, in nature, someone in the community here suggested — and the filler between them.

          Once you understand how organized crime works the rest falls into place. The many associates, soldats, capos de regime, were all working in concert to maintain the mob boss’s regime.

      • Ewan says:

        “ 10,000 is about the limit of what we can envision “

        This was recognized in Ancient Greek, where the word myriad means 10,000 and also a multitude.

  2. Badger Robert says:

    Ivanka Trump has a long life ahead of her, and Donald Trump’s standing in the Republican Party is already declining. What is her calculation about regaining some part of public respectability that she will have and can use after her father is gone, and getting some type of immunity agreement from the DofJ?
    Her celebrity would be permanent if she were to go live with her attempt to abandon the conspiracy.
    As to the records issue, I doubt the records would confirm that she took a position against the attempted coup before the House members successfully evacuated and the FBI deployed a tactical team. That’s probably why she cannot comply the National Archives requirement. Up until 2:52-53PM she was silent.
    I doubt the committee will allow her to tell a story without full record disclosure, with no erasures.
    Brilliant work by Ms. Wheeler, as always.

    • Rugger9 says:

      I’m not so sure Ivanka could survive in the wild without the DJT brand influence, witness how she was snubbed by the world leaders when she trying to horn in on a discussion. In short, no one really likes her, they just tolerate her as long as she has some pull. She’s also wasted her opportunity to show she was an improvement upon her father (remember how she was portrayed as a moderating influence early in DJT’s reign) by her statements and actions while an “unpaid” Senior WH Advisor.

      So, if she cooperates with the J6 Select Committee she’ll be a pariah to the MAGA tribe and if she does not the J6SC might just hammer her anyway. Would Individual-1 protect her, and by what means? I think he would do a pro-forma defense (more than he’d do for Eric or Junior) but I do not see it lasting more than a couple of rounds. No way he “dies on the hill” for her if he can save his own flabby arse by letting the J6SC or DoJ have Ivanka in exchange.

      • madwand says:

        Exactly that was Michael Cohen’s conclusion when asked if DJT would protect Ivanka, his answer essentially you have to be kidding. He throws her under the bus with everyone else if she is in the way of his survival. It would be nice if we could see that happen here.

        • FL Resister says:

          Doubful Ivanka wants to be princess in the pokey.
          Ivanka takes Trump down to save herself feels like poetic justice.

        • Thomas2 says:

          No. She won’t give up anything useful — on purpose. Unintentionally, maybe some interesting factoids on the margin. But no way she truthfully indicts her dad.

        • FL Resister says:

          If she’s in a vise, I feel there’s no question Ivanka would give up what she could to cut herself a deal.
          But poetic justice is when the good guy wins, and the bad guy loses through some twist of fate.
          Both should lose no matter how she pleads.

        • Knox Bronson says:

          Any of them would flip on Dad, just as he would flip on them. No honor among thieves, esp. this bunch. Reality is just starting to crash in on all of them after lifetimes of privilege and protection. Soon, all bets will be off.
          Buy popcorn futures.

        • Kenster42 says:

          People have been saying that for the last 6 years. Every 6 months there’s another “we got ’em!” moment. No one in Trump’s core circle is flipping. They don’t need to flip, because the Trumps always outsource their dirty work to others to maintain plausible deniability and apparently there are plenty of idiots out there to do it and then take the fall. Remember Michael Cohen? He sure took down Trump, didn’t he? Remember Roger Stone? Stephanie Grisham? Anthony Scaramucci? Allen Weisselberg? Remember how they’re all gonna take down Trump? Remember how nothing’s happened? Nothing’s gonna happen. Trump’s superpower is his ability to evade criminal prosecution.

        • Alan Charbonneau says:

          If she is facing conspiracy charges, that could help her motivation to cooperate.

          Q: do the terrorism enhancements the oath keepers are facing apply to Ivanka?
          I’m thinking that like a corporation with 3 subsidiaries, the 3 conspiracies described puts anyone in the HQ, so to speak, as a roll-up of the conspiracies beneath it. Thus, Ivanka was covering up for a terrorist act by the oath keepers. That she was responsible for the violent acts of the seditious conspirators.
          Is this correct or am I off-base?

          p.s. I don’t like conspiracy thinking, but Fox is filling Putin’s goal of disrupting the west. I know Marcy mentioned Carlson’s claim about someone leaking his communications as an effort to get ahead of a story. Either in that or another piece she mentioned a possible Russian recruitment, but I don’t know how likely she thought that was. I’m starting to think the whole lot of them are compromised by Russia and it doesn’t seem crazy (how crazy is that?)

          Also, as 99.9% of social media believes, that Capitol pipe bomb person DOES walk like MTG, The person is about her size and knowing her psychotic nature, i not only believe her capable, I am starting to see her as the only one possible. She would blow up bombs and kill people with glee.

        • OldTulsaDude says:

          “…. I’m starting to think the whole lot of them are compromised by Russia…. ”

          No one has to be coerced if they are willing. Just saying.

        • Kenster42 says:

          Please point us to how Ivanka Trump could be charged with conspiracy, especially given that she went to great pains to disassociate herself from the rally and then issued a public plea to the insurrectionists to not commit crimes.

        • Alan Charbonneau says:

          As Marcy pointed out, she didn’t turn over her records under the presidential records act. That means she is covering for Donald/obstructing justice and advances the conspiracy. It puts her in deep.

        • timbo says:

          Uh… one doesn’t directly imply the other at all. There are any number of other reasons, completely separate from the insurrectionist conspiracy, that might motivate her not to turn over those emails.

        • Alan Charbonneau says:

          If you read the article, the Jan 6th committee has the other side of Ivanka’s text messages, you know, someone who turned over their texts showing they conversed with Ivanka. They know HER replies from those texts. So, if they have that info, they know the reasons she didn’t turn it over. They are telling her that they’ve seen her texts and know she is covering for Donald. If you still claim to not understand, you are trolling.

        • Knox says:

          Any of them would flip on Dad, just as he would flip on them. No honor among thieves, esp. this bunch. Reality is just starting to crash in on all of them after lifetimes of privilege and protection. Soon, all bets will be off.
          Buy popcorn futures.

        • bawiggans says:

          I think there is a fine distinction to be made here between those DJT throws under the bus and those, such as may be Ivanka, who become the metaphorical garbage cans he overturns as obstacles to his pursuers as he flees down the dead-end alleyway towards the chain-link fence.

        • earlofhuntingdon says:

          I don’t think that those under the bus or turned over like alleyway garbage cans would see the distinction, nor do I think Donald would make it.

        • Spencer Dawkins says:

          I’m not the Bawiggins whisperer, but I understand the distinction as

          When Donald throws someone under the bus, he does so out of a desire for revenge.

          When Donald overturns someone as a trash can, he does so out of fear for himself.

          And I recognize that these categories can overlap when specific people are involved.

        • earlofhuntingdon says:

          From the perspective of the cited participants, my comment stands.

          How quickly do you think love (and lust) would turn to hate and revenge if TFG thought Ivanka had turned state’s evidence on daddy, threatening his empire and his liberty? Raymond Reddington comes to mind. I think being cut out of the will – assuming there’s any estate left to administer – would be the least of her worries.

        • Doctor My Eyes says:

          It’s depressing how much time and energy the country has devoted to mulling over the psychological nuances of this psychopath. If he were a homeless guy, he would be just another boring crazy person.

        • Alan Charbonneau says:

          He can hate all he wants—that’s all he will have left. She’s young and wants no part of prison. She and Jared have plenty of grift to keep them in a high standard of living.

          Everybody is abandoning Donald. That he is so stupid to have thought this would work is one thing, but the number of people who have forfeited their lives for him is unreal.

        • bawiggans says:

          True, the distinction is in the eye of the beholder of the narrative. Under-busing tends to happen in the middle episodes, affording more leisurely contemplation. The frantic toppling of cans comes in a rush near the end. The sacrificed will find this a distinction without a difference and, yes, we have all been sacrificed to Trump’s pathology and his party’s venality. Still, I take a kind of aesthetic solace where I can find it.

      • Troutwaxer says:

        At this point, if you’re Ivanka (and you have a little common sense and can read the room) you’re not playing the game to “retain your celebrity.” You’re playing it to get away with 5-10 million dollars (mainly to live off the investment if Jared goes down,) not go to jail, and maybe keep enough dignity that you can attend a PTA meeting or somesuch and not get thrown out.

        Whether Ivanka has enough sense to know that’s the thing to play for is another matter, of course!

        • Leoghann says:

          Honestly, I think you hit on two attributes that she sorely lacks. For Daddy, she’s always been the obedient puppy, just happy to do whatever he pleases. I don’t think she’s ever had to evaluate the ramifications of what she does, and her performance shows that she doesn’t think much before she speaks.

        • rip says:

          I believe I’ve read that barbie played her father for the fool he is/was. She’d alter her voice to be the little-girl begging for treats. Otherwise she seemed to be a conniving hard-hearted “person” – just like almost anyone that could stand djt.

      • Katherine M Williams says:

        I am looking forward to when the committee subpoenas Mr. Ivanka. Jerrod had a lot of important portfolios from achieving peace in the Middle East to controlling COVID19 pandemic. I am very interested in his communications.

        • FL Resister says:

          I think the Jan 6 Committee only requested the Trump administration’s archives for events surrounding the attempted coup.

    • BobCon says:

      Meadows has already supplied evidence of his attempted intervention on 1/6, and I think there is going to be more evidence that people like Ivanka and Meadows went to Trump to call for him to gain control of the Capitol.

      I think the question is why and how this happened.

      For example, is evidence going to come out that these contacts were preplanned well in advance? Did they know about the plan and that it involved violence, and were they just performing a scripted role rather than spontaneously reacting to events?

      At a minimum, were they carrying out a pro forma role as a sinkhole for anticipated requests which Trump already knew could be ignored?

      Or more ominously, were they part of a plan to create a pretext for Trump to take command of law enforcement or military forces and send them to the Capitol?

      Like a lot of other public calls for testimony by 1/6 from very reluctant witnesses, I think this may need to be read as a warning more than a request, and in this case the warning may be that the cover story won’t hold.

      • Badger Robert says:

        Agreed. The so called response was clownishly inadequate. If that letter indicates the level of advice she is getting she will stonewall herself into exile.

        • YancyFaith says:

          How do Jared’s feelings about his father Charlie’s federal conviction and imprisonment factor into this, do you think? I’m sure he would have some role or say related to Ivanka’s cooperation (or refusal) with authorities.

        • AndTheSlithyToves says:

          As Marcy continues to point out, one of the first things achieved by the Biden Administration was the indictment against Tom Barrack for foreign lobbying. Barrack’s Middle East connections enabled Kushner and his criminal father to engage in lots of juicy transnational corruption, e.g. financing and bailout of 666 5th Avenue by shaking down the Qataris with support for a blockade and dalliances with MBS leading to the murder of Jamal Khashoggi. Jared and his father are dangerous sociopaths and should be treated as such.
          https://www.justsecurity.org/69094/timeline-on-jared-kushner-qatar-666-fifth-avenue-and-white-house-policy/

        • Kenster42 says:

          You do understand how criminal activity works, right? What exactly are they going to charge Ivanka with? Conspiracy? Great, where’s the evidence? Ivanka was a “senior advisor” to the Trump Administration, but her job on paper was “Director of the Office of Economic Initiatives and Entrepreneurship”. Anyone who thinks Ivanka is in serious legal jeopardy is wishcasting and wasting precious energy.

        • P J Evans says:

          In case you hadn’t noticed, they’re collecting all that evidence *now*. Including evidence from (and about) those people claim will never flip.

    • HW3 says:

      “I doubt the records would confirm that she took a position against the attempted coup before the House members successfully evacuated and the FBI deployed a tactical team.”

      In other words, once the coup was lost, because the government escaped, she turned up in opposition to it.

        • rip says:

          In fact, the opposite sequence would be a surprise.

          That she tried to stop her daddy from an autocoup. I’d love to see any sense of humanity from any of the spawns. If someone wants to study their genetics and find out the malevolent genes, it may help to save the world in the future.

    • Alan Charbonneau says:

      I wonder how Donald’s draft “National Healing” memo will be perceived by the Oath Keepers.

      “I would like to begin today by addressing the heinous attack that took place yesterday at the United States Capitol,” it opens. “Like all Americans, I was outraged and sickened by the violence, lawlessness and mayhem. I immediately deployed the National Guard and federal law enforcement to secure the building and expel the intruders. America is, and must always be, a nation of law and order.”

      “The Demonstrators who infiltrated the Capitol have defiled the seat of American Democracy,” the remarks state. “I am directing the Department of Justice to ensure all lawbreakers are prosecuted to the fullest extent” of the law.”

      • skua says:

        Going by past responses, they’ll interpret and continue to live out of their “Deep State socialist Democrats are taking our liberties” fantasy and give low importance to Trump’s inconvenient statements.

  3. Yogarhythms says:

    Ew,
    “ Except if she is covering up some of the things she knows by withholding records from the Archives, she’s going to have a hard time arguing that she didn’t remain in the conspiracy with all those people plotting violence by helping to cover it up”
    Exceptional analysis of daughters NARA records exception. Ivanka’s golden handcuffs are exceptional too.
    Father’s instigation of 1000’s of plaintiffs legal actions may be influential? What are the odds a daughter defies tradition? Nachum the beggar wants to know.

  4. harpie says:

    I laughed out loud [but, not for the first time] when I got to the “Enclosure”:
    “Don MCGAHN’s 2/22/2017 memo to all personnel re: “Presidential Records Act Obligations”.

    • harpie says:

      The first LOL was on page 1:

      […] A lawyer, John Eastman, with whom the President was apparently consulting in planning for January 6th, has since invoked his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination because he fears criminal prosecution. Mr. Eastman has on that basis, refused to give testimony regarding his conversations with President Trump and others on these topics.2

      fn2 Of course, Mr. Eastman’s memoranda are public, and he has also made a number of public statements on these issues. Mr Trump was also being advised during this period by Rudy Giuliani. Mr. Giuliani’s license to practice law in New York has now been suspended, as has his license to practice law in the District of Columbia. [Giuliani had] “communicated demonstrably false and misleading statements to courts, lawmakers and the public at large in his capacity as lawyer” in connection with President Trump’s failed effort at reelection in 2020. […]

  5. Fran of the North says:

    Brilliantly connecting the dots as always, EW.

    However, I’ve got different take on the reason the letter was released publicly. This appears to be a very strategic decision by J6 to up the pressure on Daddy Insurrection-bucks.

    If a similar letter was released on Jr, TFG would just shrug it off, and mutter “See ya when you get out.’ But not for she who walks on water. I’d bet the old anger meter is pegged at 11 about now. And that will only make his normally bad decisions worse.

  6. Rugger9 says:

    The report that the J6SC already has the proof in hand about the knowledge (by both DJT and Ivanka, et al) of illegality from the WH Counsel’s office will make it much harder to claim ignorance or take the 5th down the road. Any ignorance claim will go as well as it did for Pooh-Bah in “The Mikado” trying to pretend he “wasn’t there” at the fully attested sham execution by Ko-Ko. The Mikado wasn’t having it (it was worked out later…) as an excuse, nor will the J6SC accept this CYA exercise from Ivanka.

    How about Jared, where was he? As the team known for being the SABI (Source of All Bad Ideas) Jarvanka worked as a tandem in just about everything else.

  7. klynn says:

    Great post. Great footnote catch. The sound of clocks ticking must be haunting to Ivanka after this letter was released. The McGahn memo reference is a chef’s kiss.

  8. madwand says:

    “How about Jared, where was he?” Don’t know but if he was smart he was in his office saving the Middle East. If not J6 will eventually get to him.

    • Rita says:

      If I recall correctly, on Jan. 6th Jared was returning from a trip to the Middle East where he was either wrapping up his stint as Trump’s extra special envoy or negotiating with his new friends for investments in his companies, or both.

  9. Rugger9 says:

    OT: I also see Michael Flynn is back in the news for allegedly doing oppo research and other dirty tricks. It might help explain DJT’s interest in trying to get Flynn out of his plea deal with as few fingerprints as he could, but for me it might also potentially push the Army to look at UCMJ Article 134 for bringing discredit upon the service. Let’s recall that Flynn talks up his general officer status as his principal qualification.

    While it does not yet seem to be tied in to RF duties while he was under orders in the Army, it could be leveraged that his brief WH tenure would also qualify for the same restriction.

  10. joel fisher says:

    As usual, I felt smarter after I read this. As you say, once you’re in, you’re in; you can get out, but those efforts seem to require some recognition that you were once in something to now be out of. Alternatively, it’s ever so tempting to pretend–“cover-up”, is a better description; “obstructing justice” is what mean spirited lawyers call it–that there was either nothing to be a part of in the first place–very difficult given the riot–or that you were not in on it. Also to be remembered: it’s possible to obstruct justice even if your participation was, in fact, entirely innocent.

  11. earlofhuntingdon says:

    Elegant post. I hope we’ll see whether this logic plays out with others, like, oh, Sean Hannity. In his case, his persistently hypocritical public vs. private messaging should doom his chances of proving that he attempted to leave any alleged conspiracy. Have you taken sufficient steps to leave a conspiracy if you continue to hide and protect its members and their purposes?

    • Leoghann says:

      I’m not really a seditionist; I just play one on TV. Although I did stay at the Ballston Comfort Inn Express.

        • Rayne says:

          It’s innocent — it’s an SNL skit parody of Ivanka.

          I let it through, bmaz, because it was about Ivanka and we do have other comments poking fun at these parasites. Not my cuppa, but might be somebody else’s.

        • joel fisher says:

          Glad you OK’ed this; I thought there was something wrong with me after I watched it and thought it was funny. Well, there is something wrong with me, but that’s another story.

      • Kenster42 says:

        Thank you – I’m disappointed with the unusual amount of wishcasting on this thread about how “Ivanka’s going down, so she’s gonna flip on the Trumps”. Where do they come up with this stuff?

        • Rayne says:

          The one thing nearly everybody pooh-poohing the notion of flipping Ivanka forgets is that she’s got young kids and quite possibly no one to care for them if this all goes south badly. They’re unmentioned leverage. The question is whether she’s as detached a parent as her dad or not, and that factor most of us can’t qualify/quantify.

          ADDER: Five comments inside 15 minutes this evening. Perhaps you should slow your roll with your evidence-free defense for Ivanka; methinks you need to re-read Marcy’s post c a r e f u l l y rather than get snotty with community members.

  12. harpie says:

    IVANKA’s statement is interesting because she leaves out a few things:
    1] It was a retweet of TRUMP’s 3:13 PM tweet with an added message.
    2] She left out that she addressed that message in her statement to “American Patriots”
    3] According to WaPo, the tweet was criticized and she then deleted it.

    “THE ATTACK: Before, During and After”. A @washingtonpost investigative series about the causes, cost and aftermath of the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol.
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/interactive/2021/jan-6-insurrection-capitol/
    10/31/21

    • harpie says:

      […] Trump was being worked from multiple angles. This was around the same time that Kevin McCarthy, House minority leader, called the president practically begging him to denounce the riots.

      At 3:13 p.m., Trump tweeted a new message, one that again fell short of what those around him felt was necessary. [screenshot]

      Ivanka Trump retweeted her father’s message at 3:15 p.m. and addressed the rioters as “American Patriots.” She deleted her tweet a few minutes later after it was roundly criticized. [screenshot]

      3:13 PM TRUMP tweets: I am asking for everyone at the U.S. Capitol to remain peaceful. No violence! Remember, WE are the Party of Law & Order – respect the Law and our great men and women in Blue. Thank you!

      3:15 PM IVANKA retweets TRUMP’s 3:13 PM tweet, adding: American Patriots – any security breach or disrespect to our law enforcement is unacceptable.
      The violence must stop immediately. Please be peaceful.

  13. Rita says:

    I suspect that many in the Trump White House thought that the Presidential Records Act only applied to Democrats.

    The January 6th Committee’s public letters inviting people to testify are superbly crafted and designed to achieve the obvious purpose of encouraging voluntary cooperation. The letters serve as warning shots across the bow. The Committee is letting the recipient know enough of what evidence it already has in order to give the recipient fair warning and, perhaps, the incentive to cooperate.

    My recollection is that there were press reports from the period from Dec. 14th until January 6th to the effect that Ivanka and Jared were trying to distance themselves from the “crazies” surrounding Trump. On that basis I doubt that Ivanka was a participant but she would be a witness. And she has a chance to avoid the taint of sedition and cover up. The Committee is extending her a lifeline.

    But the public letters also serve another purpose. They let others know that the Committee has evidence pertaining to or of interest to them. In this regard, on Page 3 of the letter to Ivanka, is this gem: “Similarly, in the days before January 6th, a member of the House freedom Caucus with knowledge of the President’s planning for that day sent a message to the White House Chief of Staff with this explicit warning: “If POTUS allows this to occur …we’re driving a stake in the heart of the federal republic.”. Someone in the House Freedom Caucus might just possibly be looking for a good defense lawyer today.

      • Rita says:

        More than likely one of the texts turned over to the Committee by Mark Meadows before the Don took him out to the proverbial woodshed.

    • Parker Dooley says:

      “If POTUS allows this to occur …we’re driving a stake in the heart of the federal republic.”

      Did the member consider that to be a bad thing?

      • earthworm says:

        concur with parker dooley question.
        quote is ambiguous, can be read several different ways.
        disagreement — shock & horror at driving a stake through heart of federal republic
        approval — glee & approval at driving a stake through heart of the federal republic
        “If POTUS allows this to occur” — what is “this”? preventing coup? or enabling start of coup?

        • Rita says:

          Whatever the “this” was, the Member of Congress knew that it was bad for the ‘federal republic”.

  14. Chetnolian says:

    Another gem from the J6 letter is that it answers the question of what she was doing in the White House that made her subject to sending everything to the archives in paragraph 1

  15. obsessed says:

    Trump, Junior & Eric don’t seem anything like the Succession characters Logan, Kendall and Roman, but it’s very easy to imagine Shiv as Ivanka. I’m thinking of the episode where Logan has gone mad from his urinary tract infection and Shiv tries to step in to right the ship. Trump is like piss-mad Logan all the time.

  16. Savage Librarian says:

    Super-mal-a-barrel-toxic-intel-spells-
    Seditious!

    Supermalabarreltoxicintelspelseditious,
    Even though the sound of it
    is very surreptitious,
    If you say it loud enough
    It always sounds malicious,
    Supermalabarreltoxicintelspelseditious.

    Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I
    Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I

    Because I was afraid to speak
    when I was just a lass,
    My father gave my nose a tweak
    and told me it must pass,
    So then one day I learned a word
    that saved my aching nose,
    The biggest word you ever heard
    And this is how it goes.

    Supermalabarreltoxicintelspelseditious,
    Even though the sound of it
    is very surreptitious,
    If you say it loud enough
    it always sounds malicious,
    Supermalabarreltoxicintelspelseditious.

    Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I
    Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I

    I’ll travel all around the world
    and everywhere I go,
    I’ll use this word & all will say
    she’s someone in the know,
    When UAE or Saudi sheiks
    pass the time of day with me,
    I’ll say my special word and then
    they’ll ask me out to tea (woo).

    Supermalabarreltoxicintelspelseditious,
    Even though the sound of it
    is very surreptitious,
    If you say it loud enough
    it always sounds malicious,
    Supermalabarreltoxicintelspelseditious.

    Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I
    Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I

    So when the cat has got your tongue
    there’s no need for dismay (oui, oui),
    Just summon up this word
    then you’ve got lots to say.

    But better use it carefully
    because it can change your life,
    And if you don’t believe me,
    then just ask Kushner’s wife.

    Supermalabarreltoxicintelspelseditious,
    Even though the sound of it
    is very surreptitious,
    If you say it loud enough
    It always sounds malicious,
    Supermalabarreltoxicintelspelseditious.

    https://youtu.be/uZNRzc3hWvE

    Mary Poppins (1964) – “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious” – Video/Lyrics

  17. Jenny says:

    Thank you Dr. Marcy. Great post.

    “I’ve never had a sense of entitlement. I saw how hard my father worked for his money, and it was always made very clear to me that things wouldn’t just be given to me.”
    Ivanka Trump

    “If Ivanka weren’t my daughter, perhaps I’d be dating her.” Donald Trump

  18. WilliamOckham says:

    I think we need to help the Jan 6 Select Committee staff get some decent PDF redaction software. The first pages of their letters to witnesses seem to be images with non-searchable text simply so that they can redact the addresses. There must be some staffer who prints page one, redacts the address, scans that page, and then replaces page one with the scanned image.

    Yes, I have an unhealthy obsession with document construction, why do you ask?

    • Eureka says:

      Similar problem with lots of DOJ docs for J6 cases, except in those instances the whole page is rendered into an un-OCR-able image when DOJ inserts an image (with outside text) into a page, as I’m recalling the tendency — and so the image pages tend to occur mid-/dotted throughout a given filing.


      ETA: no clue why this landed in moderation (twice, now- though on this try I double-checked for email typos and thought I’d passed!)

  19. FL Resister says:

    Will Abbe Lowell be representing Ivanka in NY and DC?
    Should she be the linchpin pulled out to take the old man down, it’s Shakespearean.

  20. Overshire says:

    I have found terribly few places in the webs where references of HST and Callahan’s Saloon are appreciated by a participatory audience who are generally thoughtful, erudite, informed, and willing to accept responsibility. Thanks be to the god(ess)(es)(s) for all of you.
    But what I came to say before that distraction was hot damn, here come the leaks:
    https://www.politico.com/news/2022/01/21/read-the-never-issued-trump-order-that-would-have-seized-voting-machines-527572
    There’s an embedded pdf at the link. Let the fun begin!

  21. Badger Robert says:

    Ms Trumps request for non violent conduct is too late, and she doesn’t call for the rioters to leave the capital. So she was still following her father’s lead, even after it was likely the coup was going to fail.

  22. Leoghann says:

    I don’t see very much coming out of this request made to Ivanka. Her entire act seems to consist of platinum hair, a vacuous smile, questionable fashion choices, and weak attempts at virtue signaling. If she does show, I would expect her to be accompanied by her lawyer, who would tell her when to invoke the Fifth and when to answer, if ever. Any answers she gives will be akin to those given by St. Ronnie at the Iran-Contra hearings.

    Ivanka might give the impression of general innocence or non-involvement, but as several here have pointed out, she has been involved up to the jawbone in several family grifts, as well as a few involving her clothing line and several other grifts for which she was the putative head.

    There’s a particular family dynamic that I realized during my time counseling addicts in the criminal justice system. For most, their addiction didn’t show up in drug arrests. Instead, their arrests were usually for theft or fraud perpetrated in order to buy more drugs or to support themselves and their families so they could spend more money on their drug of choice. But even in recovery, many would catch themselves, or be caught, in morally iffy behavior, from scamming their bosses, to petty theft or just constant lying, even to their friends.

    When we discussed these things, it almost always came up that their parents or other close family members had the same types of behaviors, although sometimes manifesting differently. It wasn’t because of “bad blood.” It was because, in their upbringings, “normal” involved some very dishonest behavior. It never occurred to them that lying and cheating was wrong; they judged it by the standards they had learned, including convenience and necessity.

    So it is with Ivanka. She’s definitely Daddy’s girl. But look at Daddy. What she’s been presented as normal all her life is lack of affection, sexual preoccupation, and constant self-serving lies.

    • Eureka says:

      Did you see this case:

      Man who threatened lynchings in emails to Police Commissioner Outlaw gets four years in federal prison/
      https://www.inquirer.com/news/peter-fratus-sentence-danielle-outlaw-prison-maxine-waters-20220119.html

      Violent MA drunk who also threatened Rep. Maxine Waters (and Black MOC generally) among other (alleged) crimes. His favored targets are women, POC, and authority figures so Outlaw and Waters hit his BINGO.

      While he’s apparently abstaining in the confines, since it’s all about the family it seems fair to call him a dry* drunk given mom’s statement:

      “He’s not a racist,” his mother, Elizabeth Faiella, told the court. “But when he’s in a blackout he hates Jews … he hates Muslims. It’s a terrible disease.”

      Paging Dr. Freud (I’d add a snark tag, but wait — there’s more … ).


      *And so Ivanka et al. shall remain dry grifters evermore, at the least. There’s always Instagram.

    • Rita says:

      Donald learned how to do business from his father and Ivanka learned from her father. Ivanka could be a somewhat sympathetic figure except for the almost complete lack of awareness she shows about her limitations

  23. harpie says:

    Continued from: https://www.emptywheel.net/2022/01/21/bennie-thompson-to-ivanka-come-in-from-the-conspiracy/#comment-917856

    Mentions of “FBI” in TL:

    XX:XX AM REPORT of overheard threat to FBI: “we are going to storm the FBI at 2PM.” [2:00 PM]
    MAP: https://www.google.com/maps/@38.8944362,-77.0264467,17z
    12:40 PM BOMB reported at the RNC CAPITOL HILL CLUB [CP, FBI and ATF respond]
    2:00 PM Time of overheard threat to “storm the FBI”
    2:52 PM “Near the Capitol” [Parler VIDEO of FBI entering SOUTH DOOR of CAPITOL] https://d2hxwnssq7ss7g.cloudfront.net/QHORzN1dKMRY_cvt.mp4
    7:00 PM [WaPo] FBI and ATF agents complete their sweep of the Capitol, going room to room looking for rioters, weapons or other security threats. BOWDICH leads the FBI team on one end of the building while DONOGHUE, of the Justice Department, leads the ATF agents at the other. When they meet in the middle, they have a quick conference CALL with PENCE, MILLER and CONGRESSIONAL LEADERS

  24. harpie says:

    Mentions of “FBI” in TL:

    XX:XX AM REPORT of overheard threat to FBI: “we are going to storm the FBI at 2PM.” [2:00 PM]
    MAP: https://www.google.com/maps/@38.8944362,-77.0264467,17z
    12:40 PM BOMB reported at the RNC CAPITOL HILL CLUB [CP, FBI and ATF respond]
    2:00 PM Time of overheard threat to “storm the FBI”

    2:52 PM “Near the Capitol” [Parler VIDEO of FBI entering SOUTH DOOR of CAPITOL] https://d2hxwnssq7ss7g.cloudfront.net/QHORzN1dKMRY_cvt.mp4
    7:00 PM [WaPo] FBI and ATF agents complete their sweep of the Capitol, going room to room looking for rioters, weapons or other security threats. BOWDICH leads the FBI team on one end of the building while DONOGHUE, of the Justice Department, leads the ATF agents at the other. When they meet in the middle, they have a quick conference CALL with PENCE, MILLER and CONGRESSIONAL LEADERS

  25. Riktol says:

    What is the penalty for failing to comply with the Presidential records act? The notice from Consel Don McGahn at the bottom of Ivanka’s letter says that failure to comply could result in “administrative or even criminal penalties” (in bold italics no less). Who determines if someone is out of compliance and who issues charges? Does this change for former employees?

    • bmaz says:

      The only authority that could possibly charge is the DOJ. Is it really a crime? That is a different question.

      • Leoghann says:

        Seems to me that, if it violates a law, it is. But in the synopsis on archives.gov I don’t see any penalty established.

      • Riktol says:

        Thanks, when I skimmed the text of 44 USC chapter 22 I couldn’t see anything about penalties for non compliance, how does that work?
        With respect to determining compliance and charges, I was thinking of the angst about alleged Hatch Act violations under Trump, IIRC part of the problem was former employees can’t be charged for alleged Hatch Act violations, but I realised after commenting that the main problem was that Barr’s DOJ categorically refused to bring initial charges, which I doubt Garland’s DOJ would do.

        • bmaz says:

          Heh, that is the dirty little secret about Hatch Act violations, they are mostly civil in nature and pretty much never penalized. Same for the Logan Act. They are mostly rolling jokes to criminal lawyers.

        • timbo says:

          Hopefully there will be more teeth added to these laws so that there is more compelling reasons for government officials to not willfully break them.

    • Rayne says:

      …go after children,” who are ages 44, 40, and 38, an in-law who is 41, and a girlfriend who is 52. All old enough to have adult children of their own.

      It’s amazing how he just spits out this propaganda. I really should put up a quick hit post about this nonsense.

  26. pdaly says:

    Poor Ivanka is on the horns of a dilemma. Unless the chessboard changes and someone comes to her rescue, either protect Daddy and risk being injured herself or step away from the conspiracy and expose Daddy. How to calculate which course of action is least injurious to herself?

    In the meantime, I’m smiling to read in the Dear Ms. Trump letter that Bennie Thompson and Jan6th Committee are looking for the Donald Trump video outtakes:
    “President Trump ultimately filmed a video statement from the Rose Garden, which was not released until 4:17 p.m. That video finally instructed the rioters to leave the Capitol, but it did not condemn the violence. [snip] Public reports suggest you had been urging President Trump to ask people to leave the Capitol for two hours by that point in time. The Select Committee understands that multiple takes of the video were filmed but not utilized. Information in the Select Committee’s
    possession suggests that the President failed in the initial clips to ask rioters to leave the Capitol. The Select Committee has sought copies of those unused clips from the National Archives.”

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