Ali Alexander, a prominent organizer of pro-Trump events after the 2020 election, has agreed to cooperate with the Justice Department’s investigation of the attack on the Capitol last year, the first high-profile political figure known to have offered assistance to the government’s newly expanded criminal inquiry.Speaking through a lawyer, Mr. Alexander said on Friday that he had recently received a subpoena from a federal grand jury that is seeking information on several broad categories of people connected to pro-Trump rallies that took place in Washington after the election.In a statement from the lawyer, Mr. Alexander said he was taking “a cooperative posture” with the Justice Department’s investigation but did not know what useful information he could give. He also disavowed anyone who took part in or planned violence on Jan. 6.While it remains unclear what Mr. Alexander might tell the grand jury, he was intimately involved in the sprawling effort to mount political protests challenging the results of the election, and had contacts with other organizers, extremist groups, members of Congress and, according to the House committee investigating Jan. 6, White House officials during the period after Election Day.The grand jury empaneled by federal prosecutors is looking into a wide range of issues surrounding former President Donald J. Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the election, after months in which the Justice Department focused on rioters directly involved in the storming of the Capitol.In early December, Mr. Alexander voluntarily sat for a deposition with the House committee and gave it a trove of documents that helped shed light on the activities that preceded the Capitol attack.The grand jury subpoena Mr. Alexander received suggests that prosecutors have greatly widened the scope of their inquiry to include not only people who were at the Capitol, but also those who organized and spoke at pro-Trump events in November and December 2020 and on Jan. 6, 2021.In an indication that the inquiry could reach into the Trump administration and its allies in Congress, the subpoena also seeks information about members of the executive and legislative branches who were involved in the events or who may have helped to obstruct the certification of the 2020 election.Mr. Alexander took part in two so-called Stop the Steal rallies in Washington that preceded the former president’s event at the Ellipse, near the White House, on Jan. 6 — one on Nov. 14, 2020, and the other a few weeks later on Dec. 12 — as well as events in the key swing state of Georgia in December.In the run-up to those gatherings, Mr. Alexander came into contact with a host of rally organizers and with right-wing groups like the Oath Keepers militia and the 1st Amendment Praetorian that provided both public and personal security at the events. In the statement from his lawyer, he said he did not “coordinate any movements” with far-right extremists groups at his events.Mr. Alexander also had a permit for an event on the east side of the Capitol on Jan. 6 that never took place because of the violence that erupted. In the days and weeks before that rally, he was in touch with people in the White House and members of Congress, according to the House committee’s letter seeking his deposition.Mr. Alexander has said that he, along with Representatives Mo Brooks of Alabama, Paul Gosar of Arizona and Andy Biggs of Arizona, all Republicans, helped set the events of Jan. 6 in motion.“We four schemed up of putting maximum pressure on Congress while they were voting,” Mr. Alexander said in a since-deleted video posted online, “so that who we couldn’t lobby, we could change the hearts and the minds of Republicans who were in that body, hearing our loud roar from outside.”Mr. Alexander declined to answer any questions about his ties to the White House or members of Congress. He also declined to discuss whether he came up with the idea of marching to the Capitol himself or the notion emerged from conversations with others.ImageMr. Alexander took part in a pro-Trump rally in Washington Dec. 12, 2020.Credit...Victor J. Blue for The New York TimesWhile Mr. Alexander is the first pro-Trump political organizer to acknowledge his cooperation with the government, several far-right militants, including members of the Oath Keepers, have also reached cooperation deals with prosecutors.Those Oath Keepers working with the government could help prosecutors with the sprawling seditious conspiracy case that was filed in January against the Oath Keepers founder, Stewart Rhodes, and 10 other members of the group.At a court hearing in Washington on Friday, a leader of a North Carolina chapter of the Proud Boys also announced that under a plea deal with theBy: Alan Feuer
Title: Pro-Trump Rally Planner Is Cooperating in Justice Dept.’s Jan. 6 Inquiry
Sourced From: www.nytimes.com/2022/04/08/us/politics/january-6-investigation-ali-alexander.html
Published Date: Fri, 08 Apr 2022 22:55:13 +0000
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