OPINION:
The left celebrated Tuesday as Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio was sentenced to 22 years in prison for his role in the U.S. Capitol fracas on Jan. 6, 2021.
That the Department of Justice had asked the court to impose a harsher 33-year sentence on Tarrio, who was not even at the Capitol that day, raises questions about DOJ motives.
Tarrio has a history of rabble-rousing, and to the extent that he facilitated the destruction of property that unfortunate day, recompense is appropriate. But taking away two or three decades of a man’s life is grossly disproportionate to the stated offense — especially compared with the soft treatment enjoyed by the left’s violent thugs.
Compare Tarrio’s 22-year sentence with the two years given to Dakotah Ray Horton, who struck a deputy U.S. marshal from behind with a baseball bat at 2020’s antifa-led riots in Portland, Oregon.
John Boampong got five years for firing 11 shots at a crowd of police officers during riots in Boston — using a gun he was legally prohibited from owning as an indicted felon, no less.
Antifa activist Jason Charter was sentenced to probation for ripping down and setting fire to a statue here in Washington.
To date, the Biden administration’s dragnet has rounded up and charged 1,106 people over Jan. 6, not counting the recent charges levied against former President Donald Trump and his lawyers. That means DOJ has already spent far more on prosecuting Jan. 6 participants than the $1.5 million in damage that was done to the building, according to the Architect of the Capitol.
DOJ certainly hasn’t shown such zeal in pursuing the perpetrators of antifa’s 2020 riots, which led to an estimated $2 billion in insurance claims.
DOJ’s political motive is apparent from its use of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act against pro-life activists. Since 2022, federal prosecutors have charged 49 abortion foes with “blocking” abortion clinics.
Yet the department has shown no interest in prosecuting abortion access activists over the 81 attacks on pro-life pregnancy centers since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision returned the question of abortion to the individual states.
Mark Houck, one of the pro-lifers arrested in a guns-drawn FBI raid on his home, faced 11 years behind bars until a federal jury in Philadelphia saw through the bogus charges and acquitted the father of seven. The evidence showed Mr. Houck had merely been protecting his son from pro-abortion demonstrators outside a Planned Parenthood clinic.
DOJ filed equally dubious charges against Bevelyn Beatty Williams and Edmee Chavannes for protesting at an abortion clinic. The pair had previously gained attention by facing down Black Lives Matter protesters in Washington during the antifa riots, with Ms. Chavannes airing the inconvenient truth that “the No. 1 killer of the Black community is Planned Parenthood.”
Now these Black women hope they can convince U.S. District Judge Jennifer L. Rochon that the federal charges are inappropriate since, following the Dobbs decision, abortion is no longer a federal issue.
The rule of law cannot survive if the legal system is seen as a tool wielded by one side against another. Recognizing this, the conservative House Freedom Caucus has threatened to withhold support for any budget deal that fails to do something about the “unprecedented weaponization of the Justice Department and FBI.” That could trigger a government shutdown when funding runs out on Sept. 30.
House Republicans hold the power of the purse. If that’s what it takes to force DOJ to behave, they ought to use it.
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