NEWS from @joshgerstein: A former State Department aide has become the first Trump administration appointee arrested in connection with the Jan. 6 Capitol riots.
WOW: @ktbenner gets the actual arrest affidavit for former State Dept aide Federico KLEIN. He was still employed there on Jan. 6, held a Top Secret clearance that was renewed in 2019 and is accused of multiple assaults on Capitol police. int.nyt.com/data/documentt…
AND: Most notably, Klein — who served in the military — is accused of egging on the crowd and calling for “fresh people” at the front to help push back on officers. That detail was previously cited by authorities as evidence of a coordinated assault.
KLEIN, appearing remotely in court, complains about the conditions of his cell, asks magistrate if he can be moved somehwere "where I don't have cockroaches crawling over me while I try to sleep."
He's audibly frustrated that he'll be detained through mid next week.
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NEW filing documents one of the most brutal Jan. 6 assaults on Capitol police. Prosecutors are asking to hold Clayton Ray Mullins, who allegedly joined an assault on officers as they attempted to retreive Rosanne Boyland's body, one of five who died.
An image documenting the assault was partially redacted because Boyland was visible in it.
"Boyland’s associate, Justin Winchell, was attempting tobring Boyland’s body forward to law enforcement when the assaults of Officers A.W., B.M., and C.M. began."
MULLINS was later identified by someone who has a "30-year-banking relationship" with him, and he was spotted on Feb, 4 surveillance footage at his bank.
NEW: Prosecutors are beginning to fill in the details of the Proud Boys assault on the Capitol, revealing details about their financing, planning and operations in a new court filing against leader Ethan Nordean.
@joshgerstein Among other tactics Nordean helped orchestrate, per the filing: Dressing 'incognito' to avoid detection, spreading out at multiple Capitol entrances and recruiting"normies" — non Proud Boys — to join in the assault. politico.com/news/2021/03/0…
TODAY: The House's acting sergeant-at-arms will testify that on Jan. 6, the only way authorities knew to find lawmakers trapped in their offices was if his staff was contacted directly. He's advocating for a better system to communicate where lawmakers are in an emergency.
Acting sergeant-at-arms Tim Blodgett will also testify that he plans to introduce "emergency training for members on the House floor" and urges lawmakers to participate.
Notably, two of the three Republicans on the appropriations subcommittee holding this Capitol security hearing supported Trump's impeachmnent.
NEW: There are some disastrous aspects of what went wrong with security on Jan. 6, but it all seemed to culminate in this 2:28 p.m. conference call, when the Pentagon heard pleas for help — and didn't respond for hours.
When you hear lawmakers like Sen. Johnson suggest that the armed insurrection wasn't an armed insurrection, recall former Capitol Police Chief Sund's description:
"These criminals came prepared for war."
In unannounced testimony at Senate hearing, Capitol Police Captain Mendoza describes experience of facing the Jan. 6 rioters.
She notes rioters deployed "Military grade CS gas" inside the Capitol and received chemical burns to her face.
NEW: It’s hard to believe but today is Congress’ first chance to demand answers from key officials who oversaw the botched security response that allowed an armed insurrection to overtake the Capitol.