Whether it’s Paul Hodgkins or Mitch McConnell, Democrats like Joe Biden consider all detractors an enemy of the country.
Paul Hodgkins, according to Joe Biden’s Justice Department, is a domestic terrorist.
A working-class man from Tampa, Hodgkins committed what Democrats and the media consider a murderous crime comparable to flying a packed jetliner into a skyscraper or detonating a truck filled with explosives under a crowded federal building.
Paul Hodgkins entered the Capitol building on January 6, 2021.
What exactly did Hodgkins do on that day of infamy? He followed a group of like-minded Donald Trump supporters into the hallowed halls and chambers of the U.S. Senate. In that sacred space, where people far more important and educated than poor Hodgkins, according to those very important and very educated senators, make speeches and whatnot. Hodgkins, a crane operator, traveled alone by bus from central Florida to Washington—he was not chauffeured into the nation’s capital in a black SUV and detail team in the way that very important senators roll into town.
When he entered the sacred Senate chambers, Hodgkins carried with him a weapon so offensive that the mere sight of the device prompted the judge in his case to question Hodgkin’s loyalty to his own country. That weapon was a flag bearing the words “Trump 2020.”
Although Hodgkins did not commit a single violent act on January 6, federal prosecutors nonetheless consider him a domestic terrorist and want him punished accordingly.
“The need to deter others is especially strong in cases involving domestic terrorism, which the breach of the Capitol certainly was,” a prosecutor wrote in a July sentencing motion, asking a judge to send Hodgkins to prison for 18 months after he pleaded guilty to one count of obstruction. “Moreover, with respect to specific deterrence, courts have recognized that ‘terrorists[,] [even those] with no prior criminal behavior, are unique among criminals in the likelihood of recidivism, the difficulty of rehabilitation, and the need for incapacitation.’”
Judge Randolph Moss agreed with the Justice Department’s assessment. The Obama appointee claimed the four-hour disturbance at the Capitol on January 6 caused political and personal damage that “will persist in this country for decades.” Moss was outraged at the sight of Hodgkins hoisting a Trump flag. “The symbolism of that act is unmistakable. He was staking a claim on the Senate floor, declaring his loyalty to a single individual over a nation,” Moss ranted before sentencing Hodgkins to serve 15 months in jail.
Biden’s Justice Department just announced a new effort to keep the country safe from Hodgkins-type copy-cat criminals. During a Senate hearing on Tuesday, Matthew Olsen, head of the Justice Department’s National Security Division, confirmed the formation of a domestic terrorism unit within the very agency established in 2006 to coordinate government efforts to fight...
