Tonight in Your Rights: Holding the line
Police who defended the Capitol on Jan. 6 sue to upend Trump's slush fund for insurrectionists. Also: The U.S. indicts 94-year-old Raúl Castro.
Tonight’s legal briefing details the first shot across the bow against Trump’s $1.776 billion fund to enrich his cronies, the indictment of Cuba’s aging Raúl Castro, and an important new development in the effort to bury Volume II of the Jack Smith report.
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The fund doling out nearly two billion dollars to Jan. 6 insurrectionists and other Donald Trump allies just found its fitting first challengers: Officers Harry Dunn and Daniel Hodges, who helped repel the mob and brought rioters to justice with courtroom and congressional testimony.
In their 29-page complaint, Dunn and Hodges call the fund “illegal” and an unconstitutional violation of the 14th Amendment’s prohibitions on the government paying insurrectionists.
“In the most brazen act of presidential corruption this century, President Donald J. Trump has created a $1.776 billion taxpayer-funded slush fund to finance the insurrectionists and paramilitary groups that commit violence in his name,” the complaint states in its fiery opening line.
They compare the filing of the lawsuit to showing up for duty at the Capitol.
“Dunn and Hodges did not back down on January 6,” the complaint states. “Instead, they held the line to defend democracy and the rule of law. They bring this case to do so once again.”
‘They should expect to be rewarded’
By design, Trump has tried to shield the fund from oversight and accountability, end-running Congress by suing the federal government under his control and avoiding judicial scrutiny by dismissing the case before a judge could intervene. The agreement establishing the fund states that nobody other than Trump or his federal government can challenge the settlement in court.
As a result, legal experts have questioned who has standing to challenge it, referring to the principle that a plaintiff must have a direct and personal stake in the outcome.
For Dunn and Hodges, the stakes are visceral. Rioters assaulted both of them at the Capitol and barraged them with threats after they went public in Senate testimony. Dunn, who is Black, testified that rioters shouted racist slurs and assaulted him. Rioters crushed Hodges between metal doors, as brutal video footage released by Congress captured his agony and his screams.
Their standing argument posits that Trump’s fund puts them in mortal danger.
“The Fund endangers the lives and safety of Plaintiffs Harry Dunn and Daniel Hodges—officers who defended the Capitol on January 6, 2021—in two ways,” the complaint states. “First, by its very existence, the Fund encourages those who enacted violence in the President’s name to continue to do so. Dunn and Hodges already face credible threats of death and violence on a regular basis; the Fund substantially increases the danger. Second, if allowed to begin making payments, the Fund will directly finance the violent operations of rioters, paramilitaries, and their supporters who threatened Plaintiffs’ lives that day, and continue to do so.”
“To prevent the public financing of paramilitary organizations in the United States, and to protect Plaintiffs from further violence, the fund must be dissolved,” it continues.
Dunn and Daniels say that they continue to receive a “series of credible death threats” presenting a risk of vigilante violence on a “near-daily basis.”
“The Anti-Weaponization Fund will both compensate and empower the very people making those threats. Militias like the Proud Boys will use money from the Fund to arm and equip themselves. The Fund will grant their past acts of violence legal imprimatur. And, most chillingly, the Fund will signal to past and potential future perpetrators of violence against Dunn and Hodges that they need not fear prosecution; to the contrary, they should expect to be rewarded.”
'In aid of insurrection’
Their attorney Brendan Ballou, a former Jan. 6 prosecutor, argues that the fund violates the 14th Amendment’s prohibition barring the government from paying “any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States.”
That clause can be found in the fourth section, which directly follows the disqualification clause barring insurrectionists from holding public office.
That’s the same clause behind the unsuccessful attempt to block Trump’s eligibility for a second term in office, but another case demonstrated proof-of-concept for the use of the statute after Jan. 6: In New Mexico, the state blocked Jan. 6 rioter Cuoy Griffin, a former county commissioner, from ever holding public office.
In the cases of Trump and Griffin, courts found that the attack on the Capitol amounted to an insurrection that both of the men “engaged in” or aided.
The Supreme Court, in Trump v. Henderson, didn’t touch the lower court’s determinations on those questions, finding that Congress, rather than the judiciary, should enforce the disqualification clause for federal candidates.
“Those rioters engaged in an act of ‘insurrection . . . against the United States’ by attacking the Capitol in an attempt to prevent the lawful certification of a presidential election,” the complaint states. “As a consequence of that conduct, many insurrectionists incurred sizeable debts and other financial obligations—in particular, legal fees incurred defending against criminal charges and, for the many convicted, restitution obligations.”
Dunn and Hodges seek a court order “holding unlawful and setting aside DOJ’s unconstitutional assumption of insurrectionist debts and obligations.”
The defendants include Trump, his ex-criminal defense attorney turned Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche, and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
Read the complaint here.
Raul Castro, indicted
Cuba’s 94-year-old former leader Raúl Castro has been indicted for allegedly ordering the shooting down of two U.S. civilian aircraft during the Brothers to the Rescue incident in 1996.
Four people were killed in the 30-year-old incident, resulting in four counts of murder, two counts of destruction of aircraft, and a single count of conspiracy to kill U.S. nationals.
Trump openly announced a goal of regime change in Cuba, following the abduction and arrest of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro earlier this year.
Since that time, the United States imposed a blockade that has plunged the country into darkness with severe blackouts.
Last week, CBS News broke the news that Castro’s indictment was imminent, and their sources accurately conveyed the nature of the charges, which can be read here.
Professor Jamie Rowen, who teaches legal studies at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, recently described that development as a “new phase of authoritarian law” using the Justice Department in service of geopolitical aims.
In an interview recorded before the indictment was unsealed, she recounted the history of the Brothers to the Rescue incident, laid out the relevant international law, and discussed the curious timing of a prosecution for allegedly shooting down aircraft in the Caribbean — at the same time that the United States keeps bombing boats around those same international waters.
Watch our conversation below.
Prosecutor who helped Jack Smith probe charged
A federal prosecutor who assisted Jack Smith’s investigation faces four charges accusing her of secretly sending electronic copies of the Special Counsel’s still-hidden Volume II to her personal email account.
The long awaited second volume details Trump’s retention of highly classified national defense information in his Mar-a-Lago home and resort.
On Jan. 21, 2025, U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon issued an order blocking its release at Trump’s urging, making Volume II the only special counsel report never to have been released publicly. She also forbade the report’s transmission outside the Justice Department.
According to an indictment, former managing assistant U.S. Attorney Carmen Lineberger sent herself a copy of the report months later, disguising the filename as " “Bundt Cake_Recipe.pdf.”
FBI director Kashyap Patel didn’t disguise the retributive aspect of the case, claiming that Lineberger supported Smith’s “politicized” investigation of Trump.
“This FBI will not hesitate to bring to account those who violated the trust of the American public in an investigation that should’ve never been brought to begin with,” Patel wrote on social media.
Smith’s second volume is widely expected to include new information about Patel’s role in the investigation, as he was granted immunity to testify before a grand jury after initially invoking his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.
Lineberger’s attorney didn’t immediately respond to an email requesting comment.
By filing the indictment in the Southern District of Florida’s Fort Pierce division, the Trump Justice Department was guaranteed a favorable assignment. Typically, Cannon is the only judge sitting in that division, but Lineberger’s case has been assigned to newly-minted U.S. District Judge Ed Artau, another Trump appointee whose ascension to the bench was mired in scandal.
While presiding over Trump’s defamation lawsuit against the Pulitzer Board, Artau had been secretly lobbying for a federal judicial nomination. Artau, who didn’t disclose that to the Board or the public, ultimately ruled in Trump’s favor. The Republican-led Congress confirmed him in a party-line vote.
Lineberger’s case has been assigned to Artau.
Read the indictment here.
All Rise News will continue to follow the effort to bury Volume II, the only special counsel report that hasn’t seen the light of day.
Bravo! It is so appropriate that these federal officers who were attacked brought the lawsuit. We owe all the Capitol security personnel so much for defending Congress and a peaceful succession that day. We can all agree on that without getting into the personalities of politics. Some of the attackers have incurred additional felonies since they were pardoned by The President.
How does this benefit Cubans? Rhetorical. Cuba is simply in the crosshairs for Trump to claim another "victory."
I apologize for making this totally useless observation. I now will go do something actually worthwhile and of benefit to my family. Time to cook dinner (while we still can).