The US Justice Department said on Sunday (local time) that it had arrested an elected official from New Mexico who had vowed to travel to Washington with firearms to protest President-elect Joe Biden's inauguration.
A National Guard member patrols outside the US Capitol. Photo: AFP / 2021 Getty Images
Cuoy Griffin, a New Mexico county commissioner and founder of a group called "Cowboys for Trump," was arrested in Washington on charges related to the 6 January attack on the US Capitol, according to documents posted on the Justice Department's website.
Griffin was among the thousands who stormed the Capitol in an attempt to block Congress from certifying Democrat Biden's victory over Republican President Donald Trump, according to charging documents. He stood on the steps of the building but did not enter it.
Authorities said he returned to New Mexico after the riot, where he said at a 14 January meeting of the Otero County Council that he planned to drive back to Washington with a rifle and a revolver to protest Biden's inauguration this Wednesday.
It was not immediately clear whether Griffin was carrying firearms when he was arrested on Sunday. He has been charged with knowingly entering or remaining in any restricted building or grounds without lawful authority.
Twitter has also locked the account of Republican US Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, a political newcomer known for promoting the baseless QAnon conspiracy theory.
The social media platform suspended her account after the newly elected Georgia congresswoman sparred with a state election official over baseless voter fraud allegations.
Greene's account "has been temporarily locked out for multiple violations" of Twitter's 'civic integrity policy', a company representative said in an emailed statement.
Greene accused Twitter of suppressing conservative political voices. "The borderline monopolistic stranglehold a few Big Tech companies have on the American political discourse is out of control," she said in a statement.
Greene promoted online conspiracy theory QAnon in a 2017 video but later backtracked, saying it was not part of her campaign. She won a House seat in conservative rural northwest Georgia after her Democratic opponent dropped out.
QAnon backers have pushed conspiracies on social media that include the baseless claim that US President Donald Trump secretly is fighting a cabal of child-sex predators, among them prominent Democrats, figures in Hollywood and "deep state" allies.
Twitter suspended tens of thousands of accounts primarily dedicated to sharing QAnon content after the violence in Washington this month when supporters of Trump stormed the US Capitol.
Federal authorities have brought criminal charges against more than 100 people so far in connection with the 6 January riot, in which Trump's supporters ransacked offices at the Capitol and in some cases attacked police. Investigators are scouring more than 140,000 videos and photos from the siege.
US officials said on Sunday they had charged Chad Barrett Jones of Kentucky with assaulting a federal officer, destruction of government property and trespassing, among other charges. Video evidence shows Jones using a wooden flagpole to try to break glass door panels in the House of Representatives, officials said.
Law enforcement officials have been bracing for further violence across the country ahead of Biden's inauguration. More than a dozen states activated National Guard troops to help secure their capitol buildings following an FBI warning of armed demonstrations by right-wing extremists. But by late Sunday afternoon, only handfuls of demonstrators had taken to the streets.
- Reuters