Former Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker (R-Ill.) said the Supreme Court was “absolutely right” to block the Justice Department from prosecuting the January 6 rioters on obstruction charges.
Whitaker, who served as Trump’s acting attorney general for three months after Attorney General Jeff Sessions left the role at the president’s request in 2018, said he believed the Jan. 6 obstruction of justice allegations exceeded the Justice Department’s authority.
“I think the Supreme Court got it absolutely right and I think the Department of Justice was overly aggressive in piling on every charge in these cases,” he said. Appearing on Fox News Saturday.
The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 on Friday that the Justice Department cannot exploit a gap in the law from the time of the Enron accounting scandal to bring obstruction charges against the Jan. 6 rioters. The law made it a crime to “wrongfully” obstruct, impede or interfere with an official congressional inquiry or investigation.
The justices did not rule on ideological grounds; Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson joined the conservative concurring opinion, and Justice Amy Coney Barrett dissented with the two remaining liberal justices.
In her dissent, Barrett criticized the fact that Congress likely did not anticipate a riot when it drafted the obstruction statute.
“Can anyone blame Congress for its lack of imagination?” she said.
The impact of this ruling varies, but it will prevent the Department of Justice from bringing cases against defendants who have not yet been convicted of obstruction of justice.
Attorney General Merrick Garland has publicly said he plans to comply but is disappointed.
About 350 defendants have been charged with disruption, and most of the indicted rioters are also charged with other felonies. High-profile defendants charged with disruption include Proud Boys and Oath Keepers leaders Enrique Tarrio and Stewart Rhodes. Trump is also one of those defendants.
Trump’s lawsuit is pending in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.
“Those are two of the four charges he faces,” Whitaker said, “and I think they’re definitely going to be forced to drop those two charges.”
“Jack Smith will need to reconsider how he prosecutes this case.”
