Judge Andrew Napolitano issued a press release this morning.  The Gateway Pundit posted his statement below in its entirety.

Napolitano condemned the lawless DOJ on their pursuit of the ‘Proud Boys’ defendants.

Last week the trial was postponed after the Defense discovered the DOJ was hiding and deleting evidence and spying on the defendants and their attorneys!

UPDATED… Proud Boys Attorneys to Release DAMNING EVIDENCE on DOJ Deceit, Hiding Evidence, Spying on Client-Attorney Privilege — 9 AM ET Thursday Morning

Judge Napolitano:

What Happens When the Government Breaks Its Own Laws?

Five members of the Proud Boys are currently on trial for sedition in federal court in Washington, D.C. Sedition is a conspiracy to overthrow the federal government by the use of force. This case stems from the events of Jan. 6, 2021 at the U.S. Capitol. During the trial, an FBI agent inadvertently admitted that she was asked to doctor and to destroy evidence, and that her colleagues have spied on defense lawyers in the case.

The Department of Justice has pursued the defendants in Jan. 6-related matters with much zeal. The current Proud Boys trial, however, exceeds anything that has recently been revealed.

Here is the backstory.

A conspiracy is an agreement by two or more persons to commit a crime that they are able to commit in which at least one of those who embraced the agreement took at least one step in furtherance of it.

Prosecutors love conspiracy cases because they are easy to prove. Yet, every modern definition of crime includes an element of harm. Since conspiracy is essentially a thought crime, the courts have dispensed with the element of harm. Stated differently, the government needs only prove the existence of the agreement and the single step in furtherance of its consummation. The government need not prove harm.

There is never harm caused in conspiracy cases, as the so-called conspiracy does not succeed. If it did succeed, the government would charge the actual committed crime. Conspiracy is not the crime of attempt. Attempt requires that the defendants come just one material step short of completion. Attempt often does cause harm, as in an attempted murder in which the victim is shot by the defendant but survives.

Can a conspiracy exist that is impossible to succeed?

I have argued, and in my years as a judge in New Jersey I have ruled, that the answer to this is: No. If the conspirators concoct a plan that cannot succeed, then by definition there is not only no harm, but the prosecution is exclusively for the employment of forbidden mental processes.

Yet, the right to think as you wish is a natural right and thus is immune from governmental reach. The natural rights of persons, which the Ninth Amendment states government shall not deny or disparage, means that there is no moral or legal basis for government condemnation of ideas or thoughts. This includes, of course, all thoughts, even — especially — those that are negative about the government.

The attorneys for the Proud Boys lost this argument, as most courts simply defer to the government — even when it prosecutes thoughts, even when it violates the natural law, even when the defendants have not harmed a hair on anyone’s head. And there are no crimes prosecuted more aggressively than those in which the government portrays itself as the victim.

Yet in the current case, the government should be prosecuting its own.

Late last week, an FBI agent admitted under cross-examination that she was asked to alter evidence so as to remove the name of another FBI agent as having been present during a critical government meeting between agents and a confidential source. Obviously, materially altering government records, particularly those likely to be evidence in a criminal case, is a crime.

The same agent also revealed that she was asked to destroy 338 items of evidence — we don’t know if she did so — by her FBI superiors. As if this were not enough, the same agent revealed that the FBI has been surveilling the communications between one of the Proud Boy defendants and his legal team. Since the latter was done without a search warrant, it, too, is a federal crime.

What’s going on here?

What we see here is not only the government breaking its own laws, but the manifestation of a culture in federal law enforcement that it needn’t abide by the Constitution or federal laws or even societal norms when it engages in prosecutions or surveillance for national security purposes.

This attitude — law enforcement is free to break the laws it enforces in order to preserve national security — goes back to the weeks after 9/11 when then-President George W. Bush began his systematic shredding of the Constitution by unleashing federal agencies to spy on all Americans without warrants and the CIA to torture foreign persons in order to gain information about so-called threats to the nation.

Since no one in the federal government after 9/11 has been prosecuted for spying on any of the 330 million Americans — that’s all of us — whose phone calls and digital communications are systematically recorded, nor prosecuted for torture, is it any wonder that a generation of federal agents has come of age lying, cheating, stealing and getting away with it?

On the torture front, I know of only one prosecution: that of a former CIA agent who revealed torture and named those who participated in it. And from time to time, a rogue FBI agent has been prosecuted for crimes in which the agent unlawfully sought to enrich himself.

But the feds simply see no wrong in their own obstruction of justice. They don’t prosecute their own for doing their jobs in contravention of the oaths they have sworn and in violation of the Constitution and federal criminal law they are morally and legally bound to uphold.

What happens when the government breaks its own laws and the law breakers go unpunished? It becomes a precedent and thus a basis for others in government to do the same. That precedent tramples human liberty and makes those in government who do this into tyrants. How do these law-breakers decide whose rights to trample and whose to protect?

Which is more harmful to personal liberty — thinking and wishing the government ill, or agreeing to uphold the Constitution and then assaulting it?

COPYRIGHT 2023 ANDREW P. NAPOLITANO

DISTRIBUTED BY CREATORS.COM

The post “The Government Should Be Prosecuting Its Own” – Judge Napolitano Issues Press Release Concerning the Highly Controversial Proud Boys Trial appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

Kamala Harris taped an appearance on the CBS show the Late Show with Stephen Colbert in New York City Wednesday night where she was jeered by protesters as she arrived and departed the Ed Sullivan Theater. In a promo clip posted by the Late Show, Harris wagged her finger as she haughtily lectured Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) over his recent position statement on Ukraine that is not in line with the groupthink in Washington.

DeSantis wrote in response to questions on Ukraine sent to Republican presidential hopefuls by Fox News Channel host Tucker Carlson that Ukraine is not a vital interest of the United States and called Russia’s war on Ukraine “a territorial dispute.”

Harris: “So, as vice president I have now met with over a hundred world leaders: Presidents, prime ministers, chancellors and kings. And when you have had the experience of meeting, and, and understanding the significance again of international rules and norms and the importance of the United States of America standing firm and clear about the significance of sovereignty and territorial integrity, the significance of standing firm against any nation that would try to take by force another nation. If you really understand the issues, you probably would not make statements like that.”

To her credit, Harris made it through her remarks without cackling. But on the other hand she looked like someone trying to impress guests at a cocktail party.

.@VP Kamala Harris shares her thoughts on Gov. Ron DeSantis calling the war in Ukraine a “territorial dispute.” #Colbert pic.twitter.com/ig1vPFEXRI

— The Late Show (@colbertlateshow) March 16, 2023

DeSantis’ answers to the Tucker Carlson questionnaire that triggered Harris:

“While the U.S. has many vital national interests – securing our borders, addressing the crisis of readiness within our military, achieving energy security and independence, and checking the economic, cultural, and military power of the Chinese Communist Party – becoming further entangled in a territorial dispute between Ukraine and Russia is not one of them. The Biden administration’s virtual “blank check” funding of this conflict for “as long as it takes,” without any defined objectives or accountability, distracts from our country’s most pressing challenges.

Without question, peace should be the objective. The U.S. should not provide assistance that could require the deployment of American troops or enable Ukraine to engage in offensive operations beyond its borders. F-16s and long-range missiles should therefore be off the table. These moves would risk explicitly drawing the United States into the conflict and drawing us closer to a hot war between the world’s two largest nuclear powers. That risk is unacceptable.

A policy of “regime change” in Russia (no doubt popular among the DC foreign policy interventionists) would greatly increase the stakes of the conflict, making the use of nuclear weapons more likely. Such a policy would neither stop the death and destruction of the war, nor produce a pro-American, Madisonian constitutionalist in the Kremlin. History indicates that Putin’s successor, in this hypothetical, would likely be even more ruthless. The costs to achieve such a dubious outcome could become astronomical.

The Biden administration’s policies have driven Russia into a de facto alliance with China. Because China has not and will not abide by the embargo, Russia has increased its foreign revenues while China benefits from cheaper fuel. Coupled with his intentional depletion of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and support for the Left’s Green New Deal, Biden has further empowered Russia’s energy-dominated economy and Putin’s war machine at Americans’ expense.

Our citizens are also entitled to know how the billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars are being utilized in Ukraine.

We cannot prioritize intervention in an escalating foreign war over the defense of our own homeland, especially as tens of thousands of Americans are dying every year from narcotics smuggled across our open border and our weapons arsenals critical for our own security are rapidly being depleted.”

The post Haughty Kamala Harris Wags Her Finger as She Lectures Ron DeSantis on Ukraine: “If You Really Understand the Issues, You Probably Would Not Make Statements Like That” appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.