Two weeks after Election Day 2024, Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama assured the public that Donald Trump wouldn’t choose “a criminal” for a governmental position. Soon after, the president started adding politically aligned ex-cons to his administrative team.
But the latest example of the phenomenon is the most breathtaking. The New York Times reported:
A former F.B.I. agent who was charged with encouraging the mob that stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, to kill police officers has been named as an adviser to the Justice Department task force that President Trump established to seek retribution against his political enemies. The former agent, Jared L. Wise, is serving as a counselor to Ed Martin, the director of the so-called Weaponization Working Group, according to people familiar with the group’s activities.
The DOJ did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Wise’s new role.
For now, let’s not dwell on the fact that there is no need for a Weaponization Working Group — the existence of which is rooted in baseless conspiracy theories — and Martin’s role in the administration is itself indefensible.
Rather, let’s talk about Wise.
The Times’ report, which has not been independently verified by MSNBC or NBC News, added, “Even in a Justice Department that has often been pressed into serving Mr. Trump’s political agenda, the appointment of Mr. Wise to the weaponization task force was a remarkable development. His selection meant that a man who had urged violence against police officers was now responsible for the department’s official effort to exact revenge against those who had tried to hold the rioters accountable.”
It’s worth appreciating what “urged violence against police officers” means in this context. According to a June 2023 DOJ statement after Wise’s criminal indictment, body-cam footage from the assault on the Capitol showed Wise upbraiding police officers.
But that’s not all he did. From the statement: “When violence against law enforcement began in front of Wise, including officers being knocked to the ground directly in front of him, Wise turned in the direction of the violence and shouted, ‘Yeah, f— them! Yeah, kill ‘em!’ A few seconds later, as assaults continued, he shouted in the direction of the rioters attacking the police line, ‘Kill ‘em! Kill ‘em! Kill ‘em!’”
He was later seen celebrating after breaching the Capitol. Wise might very well have been convicted, but prosecutors didn’t have time to proceed with his case before the president handed out pardons to rioters. Two years after this information came to light, Wise — the man who was caught on video encouraging rioters to kill police officers — was hired to work in Trump’s Justice Department. I realize that Trump has already found a variety of ways to reward Jan. 6 rioters — with pardons and praise — but this is ridiculous. The next time a Republican tries to pretend that the president is an ally of law enforcement, keep this development in mind.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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