'Donald Trump's army': DOJ, defense make closing arguments in Proud Boys sedition trial

Ella Lee, USA TODAY
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WASHINGTON–On Jan. 6, 2021, two months after then-President Donald Trump was defeated by Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election, members of the right-wing extremist Proud Boys were “thirsting for violence and organizing for action," the government said Monday in closing arguments for the historic trial of five members of the group.

"These defendants saw themselves as Donald Trump’s army, fighting to keep their preferred leader in power no matter what the law or the courts had to say about it," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Conor Mulroe.

But defense attorneys for the Proud Boys on trial — Ethan Nordean, Joe Biggs Zachary Rehl, Dominic Pezzola and former national chairman Enrique Tarrio — suggested the government's evidence is flimsy and that the defendants had "no plan."

"This group of people had no idea what they were doing right up to Jan. 6," Nordean attorney Nick Smith told the D.C. federal jury. "What you have are a lot of chats that are designed to inflame your anger for these people, to make you dislike them."

More than three months since its start, the Proud Boys seditious conspiracy trial is nearing its close as government prosecutors and defense attorneys make their final cases to the jury.

The Proud Boys are a far-right extremist group self-described as “Western chauvinists,” or “men who refuse to apologize for creating the modern world." Since its 2016 founding, members of the group have been a fixture at violent demonstrations across the country.

Tarrio and four lieutenants are charged with entering a seditious conspiracy against the U.S. government, a plot allegedly meant to stop the certification of the 2020 presidential election votes that ultimately culminated in the Jan. 6 Capitol attack. They face an array of other serious charges.

A guilty verdict could bolster the Justice Department's account that the Capitol attack, and those who participated in it, served as a dire threat to American democracy. Of the nine sedition cases the DOJ has tried, excluding the Proud Boys', it has won six convictions — all members of the right-wing militia group Oath Keepers.

'Foot soldiers of the right'

Prosecutors said the U.S. election certification process has been a "shining example" of democracy for the world for more than 200 years. But on Jan. 6, the Proud Boys turned it into a "horrifying spectacle."

"Ladies and gentlemen, this is a national disgrace," Mulroe said. "To (the defendants), it was mission accomplished. They had done it. They had stopped the certification of the election."

In its nearly 2.5 hour closing remarks, the government revisited the Proud Boys' "consistent drumbeat" of calls for violence after it became clear that Trump lost the 2020 election. For them, politics was a "battle between good and evil in the most literal sense," Mulroe said, "no longer something for the debating floor or the polling booth."

Rehl wrote in messages he hoped that "firing squads" would target "the traitors that are trying to steal the election from the American people." Biggs made repeated calls for war. Nordean suggested the Proud Boys should "fash the fuck out...live free, of die hard." Pezzola said he would "fight until my last breath" against communism. And Tarrio said that if the Proud Boys didn't fight back, they would become political prisoners, "hauled off in chains" in a Biden presidency.

The DOJ also presented videos showing the Proud Boys marching on the Capitol on Jan. 6 and engaging in violence against police. Capitol Police officers' frantic radio calls were the sound of a "200 year tradition of the peaceful transfer of power being shattered," Mulroe said.

"You wanna call this a drinking club? You wanna call this a men's fraternal organization? Let’s call this what it is: A violent gang that came together to use force against its enemies," Mulroe said.

Defense: There was 'no plan'

Defense attorneys for the Proud Boys began making their closing arguments Monday, asserting that the government could not refute their stance that the defendants had "no plan" to storm the Capitol on Jan. 6 or stop the certification of the 2020 election.

Smith, Nordean's attorney, criticized the government's case as half-baked, comparing it to a bad action movie with "thinly developed characters" that is nonetheless "loud and high octane."

"The government’s case is held together with paper clips and rubber bands," he said.

Smith also questioned whether the Proud Boys — whom he called "stupid" and "basically incompetent people" — could have executed a seditious conspiracy against the government successfully even if there was a plan.

Rehl attorney Carmen Hernandez asked the jury to look at the government's "theory versus reality," claiming the government's depiction of the Proud Boys as "'Mad Max,' violent fiends who came to D.C. to overthrow the government" is inaccurate.

She added that no matter the Proud Boys' characters, the jury should presume they are innocent until proven guilty.

"You see, people think these guys are racist, sexist – some of them may be, but that’s not what they’re charged with," she said. "If you don’t like what some of them say, that doesn’t make them guilty."

Attorneys for Biggs, Pezzola and Tarrio have not yet given their closing remarks.

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Proud Boys trial: Group saw itself as 'Donald Trump's army,' DOJ says