Barb McQuade, a former U.S. attorney who served during the Obama administration, believes there is enough evidence to charge former President Donald Trump with the federal crime of involuntary manslaughter due to his inaction during the January 6 Capitol attack.
McQuade, who is also a law professor at the University of Michigan Law School, suggested in an op-ed for MSNBC that the Department of Justice (DOJ) should charge Trump with a crime for instructing a mob of his loyalists to head to the U.S. Capitol building while Congress was certifying the results of the 2020 presidential election.
“This theory is probably a bridge too far for DOJ, but failing to call off the mob when he knew they were armed and angry makes the resulting deaths at the Capitol reasonably foreseeable,” McQuade wrote in a tweet sharing her op-ed.
Five people died as a result of the mob attacking Congress, McQuade noted. Given what Trump knew about the mob — testimony to the January 6 committee suggests he was aware that some of his loyalists were armed — “the loss of life was predictable in light of the size of the mob, their emotional state and their use of force,” she wrote.
According to federal law, McQuade went on, involuntary manslaughter requires prosecutors to prove that a person committed an act on federal property, without due care, that could result in someone’s death; this definition also applies to failures to act. Trump’s order for his loyalists to go to the Capitol, after riling them up with incendiary lies about the election being stolen from him, could fall under the definition of the law — as could his refusal to call off the mob hours after their attack began.
“Unlike most members of the public who have no duty to take action to prevent a crime, a president has a constitutional duty to ‘take care that the laws be faithfully executed.’ … On Jan. 6, when Trump was alerted that the situation at the Capitol was getting ‘out of control,’ he had a duty to call in the National Guard to quell the violence,” McQuade said. “According to Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley, Trump did not do so.”
Prosecutors would have to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump’s actions or inaction was culpable for the deaths that took place, an argument that the DOJ might be hesitant to pursue.
“Even if it cannot be established that Trump caused all five deaths, such as those resulting from medical emergencies, it seems clear that he caused at least some of them,” the former U.S. Attorney said.
McQuade concluded her op-ed by referencing a comment Trump made during his 2016 presidential election campaign:
Donald Trump once said he could ‘stand in the middle [of] Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody’ and not lose any voters. Can he also cause the deaths of five people and not lose his liberty?
According to an Economist/YouGov poll published last week, just over half of all Americans (51 percent) say Trump was responsible for “a lot” or at least “some” of what transpired, while only 28 percent believe he bears no responsibility at all.
We’re not backing down in the face of Trump’s threats.
As Donald Trump is inaugurated a second time, independent media organizations are faced with urgent mandates: Tell the truth more loudly than ever before. Do that work even as our standard modes of distribution (such as social media platforms) are being manipulated and curtailed by forces of fascist repression and ruthless capitalism. Do that work even as journalism and journalists face targeted attacks, including from the government itself. And do that work in community, never forgetting that we’re not shouting into a faceless void – we’re reaching out to real people amid a life-threatening political climate.
Our task is formidable, and it requires us to ground ourselves in our principles, remind ourselves of our utility, dig in and commit.
As a dizzying number of corporate news organizations – either through need or greed – rush to implement new ways to further monetize their content, and others acquiesce to Trump’s wishes, now is a time for movement media-makers to double down on community-first models.
At Truthout, we are reaffirming our commitments on this front: We won’t run ads or have a paywall because we believe that everyone should have access to information, and that access should exist without barriers and free of distractions from craven corporate interests. We recognize the implications for democracy when information-seekers click a link only to find the article trapped behind a paywall or buried on a page with dozens of invasive ads. The laws of capitalism dictate an unending increase in monetization, and much of the media simply follows those laws. Truthout and many of our peers are dedicating ourselves to following other paths – a commitment which feels vital in a moment when corporations are evermore overtly embedded in government.
Over 80 percent of Truthout‘s funding comes from small individual donations from our community of readers, and the remaining 20 percent comes from a handful of social justice-oriented foundations. Over a third of our total budget is supported by recurring monthly donors, many of whom give because they want to help us keep Truthout barrier-free for everyone.
You can help by giving today. Whether you can make a small monthly donation or a larger gift, Truthout only works with your support.