No one would want to be Jacob Chansley, a.k.a., the “QAnon Shaman,” these days. Of course, no one also made the guy dress up (for the January 6 insurrection) in the “Chewbacca Bikini” outfit and storm the Senate in session. Now, he’s still languishing in jail while his attorney keeps trying to dream up defenses that might possibly work. First, Albert Watkins attempted to gain leniency for his client by claiming that Trump “groomed” his followers to be rabid conspiracy theorists, and that must not have worked out well (spoiler alert: it did not, nor did it help that Chansley claimed that he saved the muffins) because Watkins’ latest defense is… hoo boy.
Watkins is attempting to persuade U.S. District Judge Royce C. Lamberth to release the Shaman ahead of his trial, but the so-called “Trump defense” that Watkins aims to use is actually getting in the way. Still (and according to Talking Points Memo), Watkins is pushing forth while claiming that his client’s Asperger’s syndrome was exacerbated by Trump’s wielding of “propaganda,” and that allegedly spurred Chansley into Shaman mode. While speaking to TPM, Watkins threw out a pretty brutal description for both Chansley and the rest of the mob. It’s not good, Bob:
“A lot of these defendants — and I’m going to use this colloquial term, perhaps disrespectfully — but they’re all f*cking short-bus people,” Watkins told TPM. “These are people with brain damage, they’re fucking ret*rded, they’re on the goddamn spectrum.
“But they’re our brothers, our sisters, our neighbors, our coworkers — they’re part of our country. These aren’t bad people, they don’t have prior criminal history. F*ck, they were subjected to four-plus years of goddamn propaganda the likes of which the world has not seen since f*cking Hitler.”
Again, not great! This approach, thus far, hasn’t worked for Watkins’ defense of the Shaman, given that Judge Lamberth reasoned that “even taking defendant’s claim at face value, it does not persuade the Court that defendant would not pose a danger to others if released.” Lamberth followed up by describing how Watkins’ argument actually goes a long way to prove that the Shaman cannot (or refuses to) think independently use reasonable judgment so as to avoid breaking the law again.
Still, one cannot deny that it’s at least “unprecedented” to see “Trump defense” in open court, so there’s that. Further, TPM’s description of “a novel disease” called “Foxitis” is a nod toward another defendant’s approach to a leniency attempt. In the case of that defendant, Anthony Antonio, his lawyer, Joe Hurley, claimed that his lockdown-afflicted client did nothing but watch Fox News for hours on end. Hurley was also quick to point out that “Foxitis” isn’t technically a defense but did provide context on why Antonio fell under the Trump spell. Will it work? That seems unlikely, but in the meantime, maybe the QAnon Shaman “needs a new lawyer.”
I think the QAnon Shaman needs a new lawyer. https://t.co/MoJ9uyX9qU
— Amarnath Amarasingam (@AmarAmarasingam) May 18, 2021
(Via Talking Points Memo)