Washington
Judge criticizes the Justice Department as he dismisses Jan. 6 seditious conspiracy case
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge decried efforts to rewrite the history of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol as he reluctantly dismissed the seditious conspiracy case against members of the far-right Oath Keepers extremist group at the Trump administration’s request.
The move Tuesday closes the book on the Jan. 6 cases that were wiped out with Republican President Donald Trump’s sweeping pardons and commutations last year, freeing from prison people convicted of violent of assaults on police and other crimes.
The Department of Justice in April acted to vacate the convictions of Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and others in the seditious conspiracy case who had their sentences commuted but did not receive pardons. It was a stunning reversal from the Democratic Biden administration, which hailed the guilty verdicts in one of the most serious cases stemming from the Capitol attack.
U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta, who oversaw the Oath Keepers’ trials, criticized the department’s move, writing in his ruling that the government “asks to absolve these Defendants of crimes against the United States itself.” But Mehta wrote that he had no choice but to grant the administration’s request.
“This is the last of the prosecutions seeking to hold accountable those responsible for the events of Jan. 6. That book is now closed,” wrote Mehta, who was nominated to the bench by Democratic President Barack Obama.
“Today’s epilogue diminishes the gravity of that day, denigrates the work of the prosecutors and law enforcement officers who secured these convictions, and excuses criminal acts that caused a centuries-long pillar of our democracy — the peaceful transfer of presidential power — to buckle. The court cannot write a different ending,” he wrote.
Juries in the nation’s capital convicted Oath Keepers leaders and members of another group, the Proud Boys, of orchestrating violent plots to stop the peaceful transfer of power after Trump’s 2020 election loss to Biden. Rhodes was released from prison in January 2025 after Trump commuted the 18-year sentence he received in the case.
Rhodes, who did not enter the Capitol on Jan. 6, has denied any wrongdoing and described himself at his 2023 sentencing as a “political prisoner.” James Lee Bright, an attorney who represented Rhodes at trial, wrote in a text message that he was “disappointed in the tenor” of Mehta’s opinion, adding that it was “not necessary to inject his personal opinions in such a fashion.”
Trump has argued that the Jan. 6 defendants were treated unfairly by the justice system, saying the pardons were intended to end “a grave national injustice that has been perpetrated upon the American people” and begin “a process of national reconciliation.”
More than 1,200 people across the United States were convicted of Jan. 6 crimes, including roughly 200 people who pleaded guilty to assaulting law enforcement.
Most of the Jan. 6 defendants were granted “full, complete and unconditional” pardons, while Rhodes and other defendants in the seditious conspiracy cases only had their sentences commuted. Trump also ordered the attorney general to seek the dismissal of roughly 450 cases that were pending before judges stemming from the largest investigation in Justice Department history.
Texas
Professors sue Texas A&M System over limits on teaching race, gender, sexuality
Four professors and a national faculty group asked a federal judge Monday to block the Texas A&M University System’s restrictions on teaching about race, gender and sexuality and to reinstate courses canceled under the policy.
The university system bars professors from “advocating” race or gender ideology or topics related to sexual orientation or gender identity. It requires presidential approval to address those subjects in certain courses and, according to the lawsuit, prohibits them in core courses.
The lawsuit asks the judge to rescind instructions requiring professors to remove particular readings or subjects and declare the policy unconstitutional. They allege the restrictions violate the professors’ First Amendment rights and are so vague that faculty cannot determine what they may teach without risking discipline.
The American Association of University Professors brought the lawsuit alongside four professors: Texas A&M professors Leonard Bright, Vanita Reddy and Landon Sadler and Tarleton State University professor Aaron George. They are represented by the ACLU of Texas, the national ACLU and the Houston law firm Yetter Coleman. They sued the system’s regents in a federal court in Houston.
It is the second Texas university system to face a lawsuit in recent weeks over academic restrictions. AAUP and one of its Texas chapters are suing Texas Tech as well.
The Texas A&M system implemented the policy after months of upheaval in College Station that began after a student secretly recorded her confrontation with a professor over a lesson on gender identity last summer. A Republican state lawmaker then posted the video on social media that fall, fueling conservative outrage over what the university was teaching.
Then-President Mark A. Welsh III, who initially defended the professor, fired her after the video went viral. He resigned days later amid Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s criticism of his handling of the controversy. Chancellor Glenn Hegar subsequently ordered a systemwide review of courses.
Texas A&M regents first adopted the policy in November and revised it in December. The regents defined “race ideology” as concepts that shame a race or ethnicity, assign people guilt based on their ancestry or promote racial activism instead of academic instruction.
They defined “gender ideology” as the idea that a person’s gender identity could replace biological sex and that biological sex has less value or legitimacy.
They did not define what advocacy was.
Regent Sam Torn said at the time that the board left it to university presidents to determine the difference between teaching and advocacy.
Bright, president of Texas A&M’s AAUP chapter, had his graduate seminar, ethics in public policy, canceled in January, three days after the spring semester started, because he could not identify every class meeting in which sexual orientation might arise during discussions. Bright told administrators that he did not advocate for a particular position.
The policy allows professors to teach the restricted subjects in non-core and graduate courses only if they establish a “necessary educational purpose” and receive the university president’s written approval. The lawsuit argues that the policy does not define that standard and gives administrators sweeping discretion to determine which courses qualify.
After the policy took effect, professors submitted syllabi for review. Some were told to change their courses or teach something else. In one example, administrators told a professor to remove readings from Plato’s “Symposium” from a philosophy course to continue teaching it as a core course, or instead teach a different philosophy course that would not fulfill a core requirement.
Texas A&M officials have said the university still teaches Plato and have emphasized that only six of more than 5,400 courses reviewed were canceled in the spring, but the lawsuit argues that the cancellations alone understate the policy’s effects.
The lawsuit alleges that Texas A&M canceled an LGBTQ literature course that Reddy and Sadler were scheduled to teach this fall and required Sadler to remove the Academy Award-winning film “Moonlight” and a poem titled “Trans-Generation” from another course. Administrators allowed him to show “Barbie,” the complaint says.
At Tarleton State, administrators ordered George to remove “The Gay Manifesto” and Kevin Kruse’s book “White Flight” from a history course, while not flagging a reading by conservative activist Phyllis Schlafly opposing equal rights for women, according to the lawsuit. The professors and AAUP argue that the contrast shows the policy allows certain viewpoints while censoring others.
Vermont
Judge allows clergy abuse claimants to sue for parish assets in Catholic bankruptcy case
A U.S. Bankruptcy Court will allow clergy abuse claimants to sue for an estimated half-billion dollars in parish assets to fund settlements under the Vermont Roman Catholic Diocese’s current financial reorganization case.
In a written order, Burlington-based Judge Heather Cooper said creditors can pursue not only the highest-level bank and building holdings of the state’s largest religious denomination, but also the trust-sheltered local property and possessions of nearly 70 parishes — from St. Edward the Confessor in northernmost Derby Line, population 687, to St. Joachim in southernmost Readsboro, population 702.
The order doesn’t promise any parish assets, but simply permits abuse claimants to file a lawsuit — what the bankruptcy court labels an “adversary proceeding” — to determine whether they’re entitled to local holdings.
“Unless settled,” Cooper wrote of the question in her July 28 ruling, “there may be years of litigation ahead and millions of dollars spent in attorneys’ fees and costs that could have been paid valid abuse claims.”
The diocese’s leaders and lawyers declined VTDigger’s request for comment, although they filed an 18-page objection to the pursuit of parish assets as recently as July 21. They now have two choices available in court: try to negotiate an agreement with abuse claimants in closed-door mediation talks set for this week, or continue to fight the creditors, having already spent $2 million in legal bills over the last two years.
Attorneys for a federally appointed committee representing more than 100 clergy abuse claimants submitted its lawsuit Friday asking the judge to declare that all church assets are available to pay creditors.
“Absent a declaration,” the abuse claimants’ attorneys wrote in a filing, “the diocese will continue to evade its moral, financial and legal responsibility to the survivors.”
The court has yet to announce a next step or schedule on the issue.
The diocese filed for Chapter 11 protection in the fall of 2024, arguing that a past series of priest misconduct settlements had reduced its highest-level financial holdings by half, to about $35 million. But abuse claimants argue the collective wealth of 66 parishes — assessed at up to $500 million — also should be on the table, even after the diocese aimed to protect the local properties in 2006 by placing them in trusts.
“What the parties need at this stage in the case is guidance from the court regarding the actual legal status of the assets at question in order for us to reach a resolution,” Brittany Michael, lawyer for the claimants’ committee, told the judge July 28 of why she wanted to file a lawsuit.
In response, attorneys for the diocese voiced fear that continued hearings would cost everyone more money.
“The diocese is very concerned that if this proceeds, it will not have sufficient funds to pay for the litigation and, ultimately and most importantly, compensate the survivors,” said Steven Kinsella of the Minnesota firm of Fredrikson & Byron.
Under federal law, both the court and creditors must approve any Chapter 11 reorganization plan.
The diocese — one of 44 U.S. Catholic entities to seek Chapter 11 protection — is trying to reorganize its depleting finances after paying $34.5 million to settle 67 clergy misconduct lawsuits in the past two decades, according to records, only to still face 119 more claims dating as far back as 1950.
To raise money, the diocese has sold its South Burlington headquarters for $3.13 million and Rutland’s former Loretto Home senior living facility for $1 million. It’s now seeking court permission to transfer its parochial Rice Memorial High School campus in South Burlington for $4.3 million to a new nonprofit group of supporters.
Judge criticizes the Justice Department as he dismisses Jan. 6 seditious conspiracy case
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge decried efforts to rewrite the history of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol as he reluctantly dismissed the seditious conspiracy case against members of the far-right Oath Keepers extremist group at the Trump administration’s request.
The move Tuesday closes the book on the Jan. 6 cases that were wiped out with Republican President Donald Trump’s sweeping pardons and commutations last year, freeing from prison people convicted of violent of assaults on police and other crimes.
The Department of Justice in April acted to vacate the convictions of Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes and others in the seditious conspiracy case who had their sentences commuted but did not receive pardons. It was a stunning reversal from the Democratic Biden administration, which hailed the guilty verdicts in one of the most serious cases stemming from the Capitol attack.
U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta, who oversaw the Oath Keepers’ trials, criticized the department’s move, writing in his ruling that the government “asks to absolve these Defendants of crimes against the United States itself.” But Mehta wrote that he had no choice but to grant the administration’s request.
“This is the last of the prosecutions seeking to hold accountable those responsible for the events of Jan. 6. That book is now closed,” wrote Mehta, who was nominated to the bench by Democratic President Barack Obama.
“Today’s epilogue diminishes the gravity of that day, denigrates the work of the prosecutors and law enforcement officers who secured these convictions, and excuses criminal acts that caused a centuries-long pillar of our democracy — the peaceful transfer of presidential power — to buckle. The court cannot write a different ending,” he wrote.
Juries in the nation’s capital convicted Oath Keepers leaders and members of another group, the Proud Boys, of orchestrating violent plots to stop the peaceful transfer of power after Trump’s 2020 election loss to Biden. Rhodes was released from prison in January 2025 after Trump commuted the 18-year sentence he received in the case.
Rhodes, who did not enter the Capitol on Jan. 6, has denied any wrongdoing and described himself at his 2023 sentencing as a “political prisoner.” James Lee Bright, an attorney who represented Rhodes at trial, wrote in a text message that he was “disappointed in the tenor” of Mehta’s opinion, adding that it was “not necessary to inject his personal opinions in such a fashion.”
Trump has argued that the Jan. 6 defendants were treated unfairly by the justice system, saying the pardons were intended to end “a grave national injustice that has been perpetrated upon the American people” and begin “a process of national reconciliation.”
More than 1,200 people across the United States were convicted of Jan. 6 crimes, including roughly 200 people who pleaded guilty to assaulting law enforcement.
Most of the Jan. 6 defendants were granted “full, complete and unconditional” pardons, while Rhodes and other defendants in the seditious conspiracy cases only had their sentences commuted. Trump also ordered the attorney general to seek the dismissal of roughly 450 cases that were pending before judges stemming from the largest investigation in Justice Department history.
Texas
Professors sue Texas A&M System over limits on teaching race, gender, sexuality
Four professors and a national faculty group asked a federal judge Monday to block the Texas A&M University System’s restrictions on teaching about race, gender and sexuality and to reinstate courses canceled under the policy.
The university system bars professors from “advocating” race or gender ideology or topics related to sexual orientation or gender identity. It requires presidential approval to address those subjects in certain courses and, according to the lawsuit, prohibits them in core courses.
The lawsuit asks the judge to rescind instructions requiring professors to remove particular readings or subjects and declare the policy unconstitutional. They allege the restrictions violate the professors’ First Amendment rights and are so vague that faculty cannot determine what they may teach without risking discipline.
The American Association of University Professors brought the lawsuit alongside four professors: Texas A&M professors Leonard Bright, Vanita Reddy and Landon Sadler and Tarleton State University professor Aaron George. They are represented by the ACLU of Texas, the national ACLU and the Houston law firm Yetter Coleman. They sued the system’s regents in a federal court in Houston.
It is the second Texas university system to face a lawsuit in recent weeks over academic restrictions. AAUP and one of its Texas chapters are suing Texas Tech as well.
The Texas A&M system implemented the policy after months of upheaval in College Station that began after a student secretly recorded her confrontation with a professor over a lesson on gender identity last summer. A Republican state lawmaker then posted the video on social media that fall, fueling conservative outrage over what the university was teaching.
Then-President Mark A. Welsh III, who initially defended the professor, fired her after the video went viral. He resigned days later amid Gov. Greg Abbott and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s criticism of his handling of the controversy. Chancellor Glenn Hegar subsequently ordered a systemwide review of courses.
Texas A&M regents first adopted the policy in November and revised it in December. The regents defined “race ideology” as concepts that shame a race or ethnicity, assign people guilt based on their ancestry or promote racial activism instead of academic instruction.
They defined “gender ideology” as the idea that a person’s gender identity could replace biological sex and that biological sex has less value or legitimacy.
They did not define what advocacy was.
Regent Sam Torn said at the time that the board left it to university presidents to determine the difference between teaching and advocacy.
Bright, president of Texas A&M’s AAUP chapter, had his graduate seminar, ethics in public policy, canceled in January, three days after the spring semester started, because he could not identify every class meeting in which sexual orientation might arise during discussions. Bright told administrators that he did not advocate for a particular position.
The policy allows professors to teach the restricted subjects in non-core and graduate courses only if they establish a “necessary educational purpose” and receive the university president’s written approval. The lawsuit argues that the policy does not define that standard and gives administrators sweeping discretion to determine which courses qualify.
After the policy took effect, professors submitted syllabi for review. Some were told to change their courses or teach something else. In one example, administrators told a professor to remove readings from Plato’s “Symposium” from a philosophy course to continue teaching it as a core course, or instead teach a different philosophy course that would not fulfill a core requirement.
Texas A&M officials have said the university still teaches Plato and have emphasized that only six of more than 5,400 courses reviewed were canceled in the spring, but the lawsuit argues that the cancellations alone understate the policy’s effects.
The lawsuit alleges that Texas A&M canceled an LGBTQ literature course that Reddy and Sadler were scheduled to teach this fall and required Sadler to remove the Academy Award-winning film “Moonlight” and a poem titled “Trans-Generation” from another course. Administrators allowed him to show “Barbie,” the complaint says.
At Tarleton State, administrators ordered George to remove “The Gay Manifesto” and Kevin Kruse’s book “White Flight” from a history course, while not flagging a reading by conservative activist Phyllis Schlafly opposing equal rights for women, according to the lawsuit. The professors and AAUP argue that the contrast shows the policy allows certain viewpoints while censoring others.
Vermont
Judge allows clergy abuse claimants to sue for parish assets in Catholic bankruptcy case
A U.S. Bankruptcy Court will allow clergy abuse claimants to sue for an estimated half-billion dollars in parish assets to fund settlements under the Vermont Roman Catholic Diocese’s current financial reorganization case.
In a written order, Burlington-based Judge Heather Cooper said creditors can pursue not only the highest-level bank and building holdings of the state’s largest religious denomination, but also the trust-sheltered local property and possessions of nearly 70 parishes — from St. Edward the Confessor in northernmost Derby Line, population 687, to St. Joachim in southernmost Readsboro, population 702.
The order doesn’t promise any parish assets, but simply permits abuse claimants to file a lawsuit — what the bankruptcy court labels an “adversary proceeding” — to determine whether they’re entitled to local holdings.
“Unless settled,” Cooper wrote of the question in her July 28 ruling, “there may be years of litigation ahead and millions of dollars spent in attorneys’ fees and costs that could have been paid valid abuse claims.”
The diocese’s leaders and lawyers declined VTDigger’s request for comment, although they filed an 18-page objection to the pursuit of parish assets as recently as July 21. They now have two choices available in court: try to negotiate an agreement with abuse claimants in closed-door mediation talks set for this week, or continue to fight the creditors, having already spent $2 million in legal bills over the last two years.
Attorneys for a federally appointed committee representing more than 100 clergy abuse claimants submitted its lawsuit Friday asking the judge to declare that all church assets are available to pay creditors.
“Absent a declaration,” the abuse claimants’ attorneys wrote in a filing, “the diocese will continue to evade its moral, financial and legal responsibility to the survivors.”
The court has yet to announce a next step or schedule on the issue.
The diocese filed for Chapter 11 protection in the fall of 2024, arguing that a past series of priest misconduct settlements had reduced its highest-level financial holdings by half, to about $35 million. But abuse claimants argue the collective wealth of 66 parishes — assessed at up to $500 million — also should be on the table, even after the diocese aimed to protect the local properties in 2006 by placing them in trusts.
“What the parties need at this stage in the case is guidance from the court regarding the actual legal status of the assets at question in order for us to reach a resolution,” Brittany Michael, lawyer for the claimants’ committee, told the judge July 28 of why she wanted to file a lawsuit.
In response, attorneys for the diocese voiced fear that continued hearings would cost everyone more money.
“The diocese is very concerned that if this proceeds, it will not have sufficient funds to pay for the litigation and, ultimately and most importantly, compensate the survivors,” said Steven Kinsella of the Minnesota firm of Fredrikson & Byron.
Under federal law, both the court and creditors must approve any Chapter 11 reorganization plan.
The diocese — one of 44 U.S. Catholic entities to seek Chapter 11 protection — is trying to reorganize its depleting finances after paying $34.5 million to settle 67 clergy misconduct lawsuits in the past two decades, according to records, only to still face 119 more claims dating as far back as 1950.
To raise money, the diocese has sold its South Burlington headquarters for $3.13 million and Rutland’s former Loretto Home senior living facility for $1 million. It’s now seeking court permission to transfer its parochial Rice Memorial High School campus in South Burlington for $4.3 million to a new nonprofit group of supporters.
