The former Trump official charged with storming the Capitol appeared in court today via teleconference. He asked the judge if he could be detained somewhere else. "It would be nice if I could sleep in a place where there were not cockroaches everywhere" https://t.co/llbrN4L6ri
— John Hudson (@John_Hudson) March 5, 2021
There are people for whom it is really, really hard to feel sympathy. And then there are people for whom feeling sympathy would probably constitute a personality disorder…
… Federico Guillermo Klein, a former State Department official, made an initial appearance by teleconference on Friday before U.S. Magistrate Zia M. Faruqui in Washington, where prosecutors said they would seek to jail him pending trial at a hearing next Wednesday.
The court papers obtained by The Washington Post detail Klein’s alleged conduct throughout the siege of the Capitol, tracing his apparent movements and actions from using a police shield to try to pry a door open, to calling for reinforcements from the crowd, to losing his red “Make America Great Again” baseball cap, looking for it amid the chaos, and then grabbing another red hat on the ground that turned out to be the wrong one.
Klein’s arrest is the most direct link yet between the Trump administration and the rioters, despite attempts by some conservatives to dissociate the insurrection from the former president. Many of the 300-plus people who have been charged in connection with the insurrection have described themselves as Trump supporters, while some have ties to extremist groups like the Proud Boys, which Canada has designated a terrorist group, and the Oath Keepers…
Klein had a top-secret security clearance that was renewed in 2019, the FBI said. A LinkedIn profile the FBI identified as Klein’s also lists a top-secret security clearance and shows that Klein has been politically active in the Republican Party since at least 2008, when he began volunteering for political campaigns. Before joining the State Department in 2017, Klein worked for the Trump campaign, which paid him a $15,000 salary…
Prosecutors said they were seeking to jail him pending trial on grounds that he is charged with assaulting an officer. Assistant Federal Defender Shelli Peterson said Klein was retaining private counsel who would oppose that request, arguing that Klein’s charges do not amount to a crime of violence barring his release under appropriate conditions to ensure public safety.
Klein did not enter a plea. However, he asked the judge at the end of the brief hearing, “I wonder if there’s a place where I can stay in detention where I don’t have cockroaches crawling over me while I attempt to sleep….I mean, I really haven’t slept all that much, your honor. It would be nice if I could sleep in a place where there were not cockroaches everywhere.”
Faruqui and Peterson told Klein that he would be transferred to D.C. jail shortly and that they would make sure to address his concerns if there were unsafe or dirty conditions. Klein said, “very well I appreciate that.”…
The Trump appointee faces several felony charges for his alleged role in the riot, including knowingly engaging in any act of physical violence against any person or property in any restricted building or grounds.
Klein’s mother, Cecilia Klein, told Politico that her son had admitted to being in D.C. on Jan. 6 but said he did not specify whether he had entered the Capitol building.
“Fred’s politics burn a little hot,” she told Politico, which first reported the arrest, “but I’ve never known him to violate the law.”
He was always a good boy, such a a nice young man, till he started hanging around with a bad crowd.
Original ‘scoop’:
BREAKING/SCOOP: FBI has arrested 1st Trump appointee in connection with #Capitol Riot. Freddie Klein worked on Trump 2016 campaign then landed a 'special assistant' job at State. 'Fred's politics run a little hot,' his mother said https://t.co/nCSBQR6VHA
— Josh Gerstein (@joshgerstein) March 5, 2021
Whoa! I missed some of this news. Now @chrislhayes is covering Freddie Klein, the Trump appointee who was part of the January 6 Capitol siege. I did not realize until tonight that he was still working for the state department when he participated in the insurrection.. pic.twitter.com/l3O5cqZRbh
— Jennifer Taub (@jentaub) March 6, 2021
Is it Trump? https://t.co/L77CIOMFQK
— Mig Greengard (@chessninja) March 5, 2021
NotMax
“Only the best people.”
chopper
cry more, snowflake
dmsilev
Parenting tip:if you find yourself being interviewed about why your child got arrested for insurrecting, you may have failed in the whole role model thing.
See also mother-of-Qshaman.
Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.)
You’ll all forgive me if I don’t weep for the poor fellow.
Jay
@NotMax:
you are supposed to yell “Frist”,
aaaaaaaaaaaah, the warm joy of the coveted second
Misterpuff
What’s with all these rioters being defended by their mothers? Do they not have spouses or friends or even fathers?
Using your Mom as your mouthpiece is skeevy.
All of them are little Cartmans aged 20 something years.
Jay
@Jay:
Followed by the dispair of fifth,….
Soprano2
Awwwww, poor baby……fuck him. He should have thought about not wanting to be with cockroaches before he decided to help Trump overthrow the government.
NotMax
@dmsilev
Yo shamama! Or is it set to music as “shamana mama ding dong?”
Jay
scav
Mommy’s certainly clinging to a triple monkey mode.
plus
as though that implied necessarily innocent.
NotMax
@scav
Leave It to Aggriever.
//
James E Powell
@scav:
Suburban is code there, right?
Jay
Jay
@James E Powell:
yup, dogwhistle.
mrmoshpotato
Fuck ’em! Cry harder, Trump trash!
As someone said earlier today, let him sleep somewhere infested with bedbugs.
danielx
And he seemed like such a nice boy….
Excitable Boy
Mary G
Give him a cell with more cockroaches, rats, and a large angry cellmate.
mrmoshpotato
@dmsilev:
I was thinking more along the lines of “You might be a fascist shitstain too!” but failing at being a role model fits the bill too.
randy khan
The Mig Greengard tweet is funny, but of course Trump never would have risked his own safety to do something like storming the Capitol, particularly with the likes of his followers.
Achrachno
@Mary G: We don’t want anything bad to happen to him because we need his testimony. I look forward to the small fish like him pointing out the big ones.
Winston
Seems the Right only has 49 members there.
ETA Going to be a lot of 50 to 49 votes.
Mike G
Trumpsters cheered for capricious government cruelty, smugly sure in their empathy deficit that the machine would never be turned on them.
Leopards, faces, etc.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@scav: I don’t know… I’m seeing a lot of “Of course the boy ain’t right, but it ain’t my fault” in those quotes
dmsilev
@Winston: I think one of the R Senators (from Alaska?) had to leave because of a family emergency or some such.
Jay
@Achrachno:
it’s stochastic terrorism.
the little fish arn’t members of a formal organization, didn’t get orders, there is no command structure.
It’s just a bunch of people getting het up on self selected social media feeds.
they have little to nothing to trade,
3% however,………
Winston
@dmsilev: That is what I heard; death in the family. Timing is everything. Did Dems all take long naps today?
Jay
dmsilev
Via the Post, I kind of feel sorry for the QShaman’s lawyer:
Can any lawyers comment on the legal significance of tattoo-encircled nippleage?
RaflW
@Jay: The US Chamber is one of the under-appreciated vectors of GOP sleaze. One of the many fronts we should be attacking corporate overlordism is the Chamber system.
At annual meetings, activist shareholders should be asking corporate managements about specific lobbying and or model legislation the US Chamber pushes, and how that squares with corporate dues paid to the Chamber system compared to various corporate greenwashing noises the Co. likes to promote, or ESG claims that they tout.
Jay
@dmsilev:
violation of SC 1.192.348
scav
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
She’s a bit of a general whiner
I mean, “All the other kids were doing it!” isn’t usually the card card played by the parent. Very Very odd. But there’s a thread of entitlement that chimes with the “Where’s my vegan diet!” and the Bigo Barnett rant at the judge we saw earlier today.
NotMax
@dmsilev
When do we move to “My client was involuntarily exposed for a prolonged period during his most impressionable years to the works of the so-called Doctor Seuss.”
//
HumboldtBlue
@randy khan:
That’s why he retreated to a tent to watch it live.
On another note, the soundtrack to Narcos: Mexico has some real musical gems.
Achrachno
@Jay: I’m not so sure that’s true, and in any event that guy was employed in the T administration so part of a formal hierarchy. I’d like to see the squeezing of all these guys to see what they’ll produce.
NotMax
@HumboldtBlue
Which raises the question of how and why there was a tent already in place and equipped.
Yutsano
Since the thread be open…
J-Rub goes there.
Major Major Major Major
Major Major Major Major
@Jay:
the minor fall, the major lift…
HumboldtBlue
@NotMax:
I remember a family text thread on Jan 6 when I mentioned this wasn’t happening without inside help from police.
Family was incredulous, but it was immediately apparent to even those who don’t regularly read Silverman there was complicity, and it was interesting how quickly the light bulbs lit up.
Ilefttxwhenannlost
@randy khan: yeah you’re right…that insurrection speech is the only time he put up plexiglass barrier
Sebastian
@Ilefttxwhenannlost:
For real? Are you sure?
David Evans
@Jay: Wimp. Any position I occupy is special by definition.
Ruckus
@RaflW:
Just a little aside, the chamber asked me to come and speak at a meeting, because I’d just opened a new retail business in town. I went and found out they wanted me to pay them to speak. I seem to recall it was $300. It may have included a chamber membership for a year. My speech was supposed to be about how I planned to draw new customers to other chamber members companies. I declined to pay as it was obviously an attempt to shake me down.
bjacques
@NotMax: shamana my house, my house-a shaman…
sorry not sorry. Also…
Only A Lad
The Pale Scott
HaHa,
I assume he was in a Fed facility that had roaches, (which must be a special cell, Fed facilities are top tier) and he thanked the judge for being transferred to a DC jail.
Woywho is he in for a surprise! He’s gonna get dropped into a pod for non-violent offenders, which is for homeless trespassers, druggies (mostly methheads (kray kray) now and days), and various varieties of con artists all explaining to him why they’re innocent, and having to take a dump with them 2 feet away.
Until May? That my friends, is a reality show dying to happen
Splitting Image
@dmsilev:
I’m not a lawyer, but my understanding is that if the tattoo is on the left nipple, he’s a leader. If it’s on the right, he’s a follower.
The Pale Scott
Hey AL, I got jailed, there aren’t any links WTH?
The Pale Scot
Ok, there’s an extra T on my nym, sorry
Major Major Major Major
@The Pale Scot: freed the first one!
Tehanu
What disgusts me is that this guy is a classic representative of all the Repulsican Dump-lovers out there. These are people who think that jails should be infested with cockroaches and who screech furiously against having to pay a penny to improve conditions for prisoners or even protect them against, say, a deadly disease. Until, of course, the prisoner is them.
John Revolta
Is it just me, or might there be a wee scent of snark in the Judge’s statement that “they would make sure to address his concerns if there were unsafe or dirty conditions” in a D.C. jail?
Gvg
@scav: The earlier story I read on that mother claimed her politics were the opposite of her sons so they didn’t talk politics anymore. That’s a choice a lot of families make. So she might not know how extreme he had gotten.
These quotes sound different. Time will tell.
Poe Larity
Why wasn’t momma questioned about his antifa leanings?
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
Meanwhile, the cockroaches say they don’t want to share a cell with a traitor.
prostratedragon
For Brazil, by Heitor Villa-Lobos whose birthday was yesterday:
Mo Salad
HEINZ-KERRY!
prostratedragon
@prostratedragon:
And to finish the set: Prelude 5, Raphaël Feuillâtre
Cameron
He was a fine young man…..he just got pushed over the edge. Think about it, you’re sitting there, minding your own business, watching Fox News – and they announce that a plastic potato has rejected the gender that God assigned it at birth! The outrage! The trauma!
Baud
I like how the Today show put it this morning: “the first Trump official to be arrested.”
Jay
@Major Major Major Major: nice Cohen mention
EmbraceYourInnerCrone
@Misterpuff: they aren’t but the press seems to be harping on that. There was an article a few weeks ago about an Arizona father whose two kids were both arrested because of participating in the insurrection. He may have driven them to DC I don’t remember. Then there the Dad and daughter from I think Maine who went to overthrow the government together. Her mother was horrified and did not defend their actions, I believe that woman was divorced from the asshole dad. And in the end if you are a grown adult especially one who has been to college and out in the world you are responsible for your actions. Freddie’s Parents sound like they didn’t believe in consequences for his actions when he did wrong. But he made his own choices.
debbie
@Misterpuff:
Sounds like the life of an incel.
trnc
She was obviously kidding because that news will be hard to miss if and when it happens, but technically, he could be charged with inciting the riot. My question is whether he is in any legal jeopardy for delaying help. I know about the civil suits filed so far, which I assume are a gateway for getting information from the people around DT that day who have more direct knowledge of his actions.
trnc
@Jay:
I would not rule out the possibility of a discussion about “doing whatever we can to stop the steal” being found on a State Dept email server.
Yes, a State Dept email server.
Snarki, child of Loki
@David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch: “Meanwhile, the cockroaches say they don’t want to share a cell with a traitor.”
Those cockroaches have standards y’know.
JML
friend of mine knew ol’ Freddie back in the college days. Apparently he was always a political loon. I’m watching this one with great interest.
burnspbesq
If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime.
Barbara
They didn’t think they would be arrested much less prosecuted. They couldn’t care less about prison conditions for other people. I am guessing as well that it had started to dawn on him that his post-Trump employment prospects weren’t very rosy, and idiot that he was he thought he had nothing to lose. And yo mom, nearly every mass school shooter had a very suburban upbringing. It means squat.
WaterGirl
@burnspbesq: If you’re a whiner, don’t be a crime-er.