Jan. 6 prosecutors urge Senate to stop confirming Trump’s election-denier nominees

The Senate has confirmed nearly 60 Trump-nominated election deniers to the judiciary. The attorneys who prosecuted the Jan. 6, 2021 rioters want them to stop.

A group of 12 former federal attorneys sent a letter Wednesday to the Senate addressing the dangers of appointing judicial nominees to lifetime seats who refuse to accept the legal facts of the insurrection.

“The institutional denial of truth — especially by potential federal judges — is dangerous, yet it’s become all too clear that President Trump expects his nominees to provide evasive answers about both the attack of January 6th, 2021, and the results of the 2021 presidential election,” the letter reads.

Calling the insurrection a “violent attack on American democracy,” the attorneys said that words matter and that refusing to use the language that most accurately describes the events that transpired does an injustice to the people who died or were injured, and to the law.

None of Trump’s judicial nominees have described Jan. 6 as an “insurrection” and have not been able to give a straightforward answer to the simple question: Who won the 2020 presidential election?

Instead, the boilerplate language that Joe Biden was “certified” as the winner is the chosen response by those like Benjamin Flowers and Matthew Schwartz, who were confirmed as appellate judges.

“The only legally, ethically correct answer is the one that prior nominees have given, which is that Joe Biden was certified as president in 2020,” Schwartz said in his confirmation hearing in May.

Schwartz is also one of Trump’s former personal attorneys. 

The Jan. 6 attorneys are asking judicial nominees to stand firm on three main criteria.

“Specifically, no judicial nominee should be confirmed if he or she cannot identify that (1) January 6 was an attack on our democracy, (2) the attack was led by supporters of Donald Trump, and (3) Joe Biden was legitimately elected in the 2020 election,” the attorneys wrote.

Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) magnified the letter’s message at a press conference at the Capitol.

“It is fundamentally required that a nominee demonstrate independence from the president of the United States,” Blumenthal said. “Otherwise, we are all in jeopardy of the kind of baseless lies and loyalty to an autocrat that is a danger to our democracy.”

Blumenthal has consistently pressed judicial nominees on the Capitol’s attack and said he will continue to do so for judges like Anna St. John, who he said previously called Jan. 6 a “political controversy” and has a confirmation hearing today.

Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), who joined Blumenthal at the press conference, also called out acting Attorney General Todd Blanche. Blanche is expected to be confirmed later today and has vowed to scrap Trump’s “anti-weaponization fund” but will not put this promise in writing.

Sean P. Murphy, a former federal prosecutor who spent four years at the Department of Justice and signed Wednesday’s letter, attempted to appeal to senators’ logic in pleading with them not to confirm any more election deniers.

“We would no more hire a school teacher who refuses to believe in fractions or a mechanic who won’t admit that gas goes in a gas tank than you should confirm someone to a lifetime seat on the bench who cannot admit that Donald Trump lost and who refuses to recognize that those who assaulted police officers at the U.S. Capitol were wrong to do so,” Murphy said.

Former federal prosecutors, like Brendan Ballou, said denial about Jan. 6 reflects a broader danger for the future of American democracy.

“Think about how dangerous it is,” Ballou said. “Think about how scary it is to have a court case about voting rights, about democracy, about the rule of law, prosecuted by Todd Blanche and overseen by one of these judges who denies the reality of what happened that day.”